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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, St. Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson, Edited
+by Sidney Colvin
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: St. Ives
+       being The Adventures of a French Prison in England
+
+
+Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+Editor: Sidney Colvin
+
+Release Date: October 30, 2010  [eBook #322]
+First Posted: September 1995
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. IVES***
+
+
+Transcribed 1898 William Heinemann edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@pflaf.org
+
+
+
+
+
+                                 St. Ives
+
+
+                                  Being
+
+                   The Adventures of a French Prisoner
+                                in England
+
+                                    By
+
+                          Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                             _SECOND EDITION_
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                                  London
+                            William Heinemann
+                                   1898
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+         _First Edition_, _May_ 5, 1897; _Reprinted May_ 6, 1897
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                          _All rights reserved_
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+_The following tale was taken down from Mr. Stevenson’s dictation by his
+stepdaughter and amanuensis_, _Mrs. Strong_, _at intervals between
+January_ 1893 _and October_ 1894 (_see_ Vailima Letters, _pp._ 242–246,
+299, 324 _and_ 350).  _About six weeks before his death he laid the story
+aside to take up_ Weir of Hermiston.  _The thirty chapters of_ St. Ives
+_which he had written_ (_the last few of them apparently unrevised_)
+_brought the tale within sight of its conclusion_, _and the intended
+course of the remainder was known in outline to Mrs. Strong_.  _For the
+benefit of those readers who do not like a story to be left unfinished_,
+_the delicate task of supplying the missing chapters has been entrusted
+to Mr. Quiller-Couch_, _whose work begins at Chap. XXXI._ {0}
+
+                                                                 [_S. C._]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I—A TALE OF A LION RAMPANT
+
+
+It was in the month of May 1813 that I was so unlucky as to fall at last
+into the hands of the enemy.  My knowledge of the English language had
+marked me out for a certain employment.  Though I cannot conceive a
+soldier refusing to incur the risk, yet to be hanged for a spy is a
+disgusting business; and I was relieved to be held a prisoner of war.
+Into the Castle of Edinburgh, standing in the midst of that city on the
+summit of an extraordinary rock, I was cast with several hundred
+fellow-sufferers, all privates like myself, and the more part of them, by
+an accident, very ignorant, plain fellows.  My English, which had brought
+me into that scrape, now helped me very materially to bear it.  I had a
+thousand advantages.  I was often called to play the part of an
+interpreter, whether of orders or complaints, and thus brought in
+relations, sometimes of mirth, sometimes almost of friendship, with the
+officers in charge.  A young lieutenant singled me out to be his
+adversary at chess, a game in which I was extremely proficient, and would
+reward me for my gambits with excellent cigars.  The major of the
+battalion took lessons of French from me while at breakfast, and was
+sometimes so obliging as to have me join him at the meal.  Chevenix was
+his name.  He was stiff as a drum-major and selfish as an Englishman, but
+a fairly conscientious pupil and a fairly upright man.  Little did I
+suppose that his ramrod body and frozen face would, in the end, step in
+between me and all my dearest wishes; that upon this precise, regular,
+icy soldier-man my fortunes should so nearly shipwreck!  I never liked,
+but yet I trusted him; and though it may seem but a trifle, I found his
+snuff-box with the bean in it come very welcome.
+
+For it is strange how grown men and seasoned soldiers can go back in
+life; so that after but a little while in prison, which is after all the
+next thing to being in the nursery, they grow absorbed in the most
+pitiful, childish interests, and a sugar biscuit or a pinch of snuff
+become things to follow after and scheme for!
+
+We made but a poor show of prisoners.  The officers had been all offered
+their parole, and had taken it.  They lived mostly in suburbs of the
+city, lodging with modest families, and enjoyed their freedom and
+supported the almost continual evil tidings of the Emperor as best they
+might.  It chanced I was the only gentleman among the privates who
+remained.  A great part were ignorant Italians, of a regiment that had
+suffered heavily in Catalonia.  The rest were mere diggers of the soil,
+treaders of grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly and violently
+preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.  We had but the one interest
+in common: each of us who had any skill with his fingers passed the hours
+of his captivity in the making of little toys and _articles of Paris_;
+and the prison was daily visited at certain hours by a concourse of
+people of the country, come to exult over our distress, or—it is more
+tolerant to suppose—their own vicarious triumph.  Some moved among us
+with a decency of shame or sympathy.  Others were the most offensive
+personages in the world, gaped at us as if we had been baboons, sought to
+evangelise us to their rustic, northern religion, as though we had been
+savages, or tortured us with intelligence of disasters to the arms of
+France.  Good, bad, and indifferent, there was one alleviation to the
+annoyance of these visitors; for it was the practice of almost all to
+purchase some specimen of our rude handiwork.  This led, amongst the
+prisoners, to a strong spirit of competition.  Some were neat of hand,
+and (the genius of the French being always distinguished) could place
+upon sale little miracles of dexterity and taste.  Some had a more
+engaging appearance; fine features were found to do as well as fine
+merchandise, and an air of youth in particular (as it appealed to the
+sentiment of pity in our visitors) to be a source of profit.  Others
+again enjoyed some acquaintance with the language, and were able to
+recommend the more agreeably to purchasers such trifles as they had to
+sell.  To the first of these advantages I could lay no claim, for my
+fingers were all thumbs.  Some at least of the others I possessed; and
+finding much entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer my
+advantages to rust.  I have never despised the social arts, in which it
+is a national boast that every Frenchman should excel.  For the approach
+of particular sorts of visitors, I had a particular manner of address,
+and even of appearance, which I could readily assume and change on the
+occasion rising.  I never lost an opportunity to flatter either the
+person of my visitor, if it should be a lady, or, if it should be a man,
+the greatness of his country in war.  And in case my compliments should
+miss their aim, I was always ready to cover my retreat with some
+agreeable pleasantry, which would often earn me the name of an ‘oddity’
+or a ‘droll fellow.’  In this way, although I was so left-handed a
+toy-maker, I made out to be rather a successful merchant; and found means
+to procure many little delicacies and alleviations, such as children or
+prisoners desire.
+
+I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy man.  It is not
+indeed my character; and I had, in a comparison with my comrades, many
+reasons for content.  In the first place, I had no family: I was an
+orphan and a bachelor; neither wife nor child awaited me in France.  In
+the second, I had never wholly forgot the emotions with which I first
+found myself a prisoner; and although a military prison be not altogether
+a garden of delights, it is still preferable to a gallows.  In the third,
+I am almost ashamed to say it, but I found a certain pleasure in our
+place of residence: being an obsolete and really mediaeval fortress, high
+placed and commanding extraordinary prospects, not only over sea,
+mountain, and champaign but actually over the thoroughfares of a capital
+city, which we could see blackened by day with the moving crowd of the
+inhabitants, and at night shining with lamps.  And lastly, although I was
+not insensible to the restraints of prison or the scantiness of our
+rations, I remembered I had sometimes eaten quite as ill in Spain, and
+had to mount guard and march perhaps a dozen leagues into the bargain.
+The first of my troubles, indeed, was the costume we were obliged to
+wear.  There is a horrible practice in England to trick out in ridiculous
+uniforms, and as it were to brand in mass, not only convicts but military
+prisoners, and even the children in charity schools.  I think some
+malignant genius had found his masterpiece of irony in the dress which we
+were condemned to wear: jacket, waistcoat, and trousers of a sulphur or
+mustard yellow, and a shirt or blue-and-white striped cotton.  It was
+conspicuous, it was cheap, it pointed us out to laughter—we, who were old
+soldiers, used to arms, and some of us showing noble scars,—like a set of
+lugubrious zanies at a fair.  The old name of that rock on which our
+prison stood was (I have heard since then) the _Painted Hill_.  Well, now
+it was all painted a bright yellow with our costumes; and the dress of
+the soldiers who guarded us being of course the essential British red
+rag, we made up together the elements of a lively picture of hell.  I
+have again and again looked round upon my fellow-prisoners, and felt my
+anger rise, and choked upon tears, to behold them thus parodied.  The
+more part, as I have said, were peasants, somewhat bettered perhaps by
+the drill-sergeant, but for all that ungainly, loutish fellows, with no
+more than a mere barrack-room smartness of address: indeed, you could
+have seen our army nowhere more discreditably represented than in this
+Castle of Edinburgh.  And I used to see myself in fancy, and blush.  It
+seemed that my more elegant carriage would but point the insult of the
+travesty.  And I remembered the days when I wore the coarse but
+honourable coat of a soldier; and remembered further back how many of the
+noble, the fair, and the gracious had taken a delight to tend my
+childhood. . . .  But I must not recall these tender and sorrowful
+memories twice; their place is further on, and I am now upon another
+business.  The perfidy of the Britannic Government stood nowhere more
+openly confessed than in one particular of our discipline: that we were
+shaved twice in the week.  To a man who has loved all his life to be
+fresh shaven, can a more irritating indignity be devised?  Monday and
+Thursday were the days.  Take the Thursday, and conceive the picture I
+must present by Sunday evening!  And Saturday, which was almost as bad,
+was the great day for visitors.
+
+Those who came to our market were of all qualities, men and women, the
+lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly pretty.  Sure, if people at
+all understood the power of beauty, there would be no prayers addressed
+except to Venus; and the mere privilege of beholding a comely woman is
+worth paying for.  Our visitors, upon the whole, were not much to boast
+of; and yet, sitting in a corner and very much ashamed of myself and my
+absurd appearance, I have again and again tasted the finest, the rarest,
+and the most ethereal pleasures in a glance of an eye that I should never
+see again—and never wanted to.  The flower of the hedgerow and the star
+in heaven satisfy and delight us: how much more the look of that
+exquisite being who was created to bear and rear, to madden and rejoice,
+mankind!
+
+There was one young lady in particular, about eighteen or nineteen, tall,
+of a gallant carriage, and with a profusion of hair in which the sun
+found threads of gold.  As soon as she came in the courtyard (and she was
+a rather frequent visitor) it seemed I was aware of it.  She had an air
+of angelic candour, yet of a high spirit; she stepped like a Diana, every
+movement was noble and free.  One day there was a strong east wind; the
+banner was straining at the flagstaff; below us the smoke of the city
+chimneys blew hither and thither in a thousand crazy variations; and away
+out on the Forth we could see the ships lying down to it and scudding.  I
+was thinking what a vile day it was, when she appeared.  Her hair blew in
+the wind with changes of colour; her garments moulded her with the
+accuracy of sculpture; the ends of her shawl fluttered about her ear and
+were caught in again with an inimitable deftness.  You have seen a pool
+on a gusty day, how it suddenly sparkles and flashes like a thing alive?
+So this lady’s face had become animated and coloured; and as I saw her
+standing, somewhat inclined, her lips parted, a divine trouble in her
+eyes, I could have clapped my hands in applause, and was ready to acclaim
+her a genuine daughter of the winds.  What put it in my head, I know not:
+perhaps because it was a Thursday and I was new from the razor; but I
+determined to engage her attention no later than that day.  She was
+approaching that part of the court in which I sat with my merchandise,
+when I observed her handkerchief to escape from her hands and fall to the
+ground; the next moment the wind had taken it up and carried it within my
+reach.  I was on foot at once: I had forgot my mustard-coloured clothes,
+I had forgot the private soldier and his salute.  Bowing deeply, I
+offered her the slip of cambric.
+
+‘Madam,’ said I, ‘your handkerchief.  The wind brought it me.’
+
+I met her eyes fully.
+
+‘I thank you, sir,’ said she.
+
+‘The wind brought it me,’ I repeated.  ‘May I not take it for an omen?
+You have an English proverb, “It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good.”’
+
+‘Well,’ she said, with a smile, ‘“One good turn deserves another.”  I
+will see what you have.’
+
+She followed me to where my wares were spread out under lee of a piece of
+cannon.
+
+‘Alas, mademoiselle!’ said I, ‘I am no very perfect craftsman.  This is
+supposed to be a house, and you see the chimneys are awry.  You may call
+this a box if you are very indulgent; but see where my tool slipped!
+Yes, I am afraid you may go from one to another, and find a flaw in
+everything.  _Failures for Sale_ should be on my signboard.  I do not
+keep a shop; I keep a Humorous Museum.’  I cast a smiling glance about my
+display, and then at her, and instantly became grave.  ‘Strange, is it
+not,’ I added, ‘that a grown man and a soldier should be engaged upon
+such trash, and a sad heart produce anything so funny to look at?’
+
+An unpleasant voice summoned her at this moment by the name of Flora, and
+she made a hasty purchase and rejoined her party.
+
+A few days after she came again.  But I must first tell you how she came
+to be so frequent.  Her aunt was one of those terrible British old maids,
+of which the world has heard much; and having nothing whatever to do, and
+a word or two of French, she had taken what she called an _interest in
+the French prisoners_.  A big, bustling, bold old lady, she flounced
+about our market-place with insufferable airs of patronage and
+condescension.  She bought, indeed, with liberality, but her manner of
+studying us through a quizzing-glass, and playing cicerone to her
+followers, acquitted us of any gratitude.  She had a tail behind her of
+heavy, obsequious old gentlemen, or dull, giggling misses, to whom she
+appeared to be an oracle.  ‘This one can really carve prettily: is he not
+a quiz with his big whiskers?’ she would say.  ‘And this one,’ indicating
+myself with her gold eye-glass, ‘is, I assure you, quite an oddity.’  The
+oddity, you may be certain, ground his teeth.  She had a way of standing
+in our midst, nodding around, and addressing us in what she imagined to
+be French: ‘_Bienne_, _hommes_! _ça va bienne_?’  I took the freedom to
+reply in the same lingo: _Bienne_, _femme_! _ça va couci-couci tout
+d’même_, _la bourgeoise_!’  And at that, when we had all laughed with a
+little more heartiness than was entirely civil, ‘I told you he was quite
+an oddity!’ says she in triumph.  Needless to say, these passages were
+before I had remarked the niece.
+
+The aunt came on the day in question with a following rather more than
+usually large, which she manoeuvred to and fro about the market and
+lectured to at rather more than usual length, and with rather less than
+her accustomed tact.  I kept my eyes down, but they were ever fixed in
+the same direction, quite in vain.  The aunt came and went, and pulled us
+out, and showed us off, like caged monkeys; but the niece kept herself on
+the outskirts of the crowd and on the opposite side of the courtyard, and
+departed at last as she had come, without a sign.  Closely as I had
+watched her, I could not say her eyes had ever rested on me for an
+instant; and my heart was overwhelmed with bitterness and blackness.  I
+tore out her detested image; I felt I was done with her for ever; I
+laughed at myself savagely, because I had thought to please; when I lay
+down at night sleep forsook me, and I lay, and rolled, and gloated on her
+charms, and cursed her insensibility, for half the night.  How trivial I
+thought her! and how trivial her sex!  A man might be an angel or an
+Apollo, and a mustard-coloured coat would wholly blind them to his
+merits.  I was a prisoner, a slave, a contemned and despicable being, the
+butt of her sniggering countrymen.  I would take the lesson: no proud
+daughter of my foes should have the chance to mock at me again; none in
+the future should have the chance to think I had looked at her with
+admiration.  You cannot imagine any one of a more resolute and
+independent spirit, or whose bosom was more wholly mailed with patriotic
+arrogance, than I.  Before I dropped asleep, I had remembered all the
+infamies of Britain, and debited them in an overwhelming column to Flora.
+
+The next day, as I sat in my place, I became conscious there was some one
+standing near; and behold, it was herself!  I kept my seat, at first in
+the confusion of my mind, later on from policy; and she stood, and leaned
+a little over me, as in pity.  She was very still and timid; her voice
+was low.  Did I suffer in my captivity? she asked me.  Had I to complain
+of any hardship?
+
+‘Mademoiselle, I have not learned to complain,’ said I.  ‘I am a soldier
+of Napoleon.’
+
+She sighed.  ‘At least you must regret _La France_,’ said she, and
+coloured a little as she pronounced the words, which she did with a
+pretty strangeness of accent.
+
+‘What am I to say?’ I replied.  ‘If you were carried from this country,
+for which you seem so wholly suited, where the very rains and winds seem
+to become you like ornaments, would you regret, do you think?  We must
+surely all regret! the son to his mother, the man to his country; these
+are native feelings.’
+
+‘You have a mother?’ she asked.
+
+‘In heaven, mademoiselle,’ I answered.  ‘She, and my father also, went by
+the same road to heaven as so many others of the fair and brave: they
+followed their queen upon the scaffold.  So, you see, I am not so much to
+be pitied in my prison,’ I continued: ‘there are none to wait for me; I
+am alone in the world.  ’Tis a different case, for instance, with yon
+poor fellow in the cloth cap.  His bed is next to mine, and in the night
+I hear him sobbing to himself.  He has a tender character, full of tender
+and pretty sentiments; and in the dark at night, and sometimes by day
+when he can get me apart with him, he laments a mother and a sweetheart.
+Do you know what made him take me for a confidant?’
+
+She parted her lips with a look, but did not speak.  The look burned all
+through me with a sudden vital heat.
+
+‘Because I had once seen, in marching by, the belfry of his village!’ I
+continued.  ‘The circumstance is quaint enough.  It seems to bind up into
+one the whole bundle of those human instincts that make life beautiful,
+and people and places dear—and from which it would seem I am cut off!’
+
+I rested my chin on my knee and looked before me on the ground.  I had
+been talking until then to hold her; but I was now not sorry she should
+go: an impression is a thing so delicate to produce and so easy to
+overthrow!  Presently she seemed to make an effort.
+
+‘I will take this toy,’ she said, laid a five-and-sixpenny piece in my
+hand, and was gone ere I could thank her.
+
+I retired to a place apart near the ramparts and behind a gun.  The
+beauty, the expression of her eyes, the tear that had trembled there, the
+compassion in her voice, and a kind of wild elegance that consecrated the
+freedom of her movements, all combined to enslave my imagination and
+inflame my heart.  What had she said?  Nothing to signify; but her eyes
+had met mine, and the fire they had kindled burned inextinguishably in my
+veins.  I loved her; and I did not fear to hope.  Twice I had spoken with
+her; and in both interviews I had been well inspired, I had engaged her
+sympathies, I had found words that she must remember, that would ring in
+her ears at night upon her bed.  What mattered if I were half shaved and
+my clothes a caricature?  I was still a man, and I had drawn my image on
+her memory.  I was still a man, and, as I trembled to realise, she was
+still a woman.  Many waters cannot quench love; and love, which is the
+law of the world, was on my side.  I closed my eyes, and she sprang up on
+the background of the darkness, more beautiful than in life.  ‘Ah!’
+thought I, ‘and you too, my dear, you too must carry away with you a
+picture, that you are still to behold again and still to embellish.  In
+the darkness of night, in the streets by day, still you are to have my
+voice and face, whispering, making love for me, encroaching on your shy
+heart.  Shy as your heart is, _it_ is lodged there—_I_ am lodged there;
+let the hours do their office—let time continue to draw me ever in more
+lively, ever in more insidious colours.’  And then I had a vision of
+myself, and burst out laughing.
+
+A likely thing, indeed, that a beggar-man, a private soldier, a prisoner
+in a yellow travesty, was to awake the interest of this fair girl!  I
+would not despair; but I saw the game must be played fine and close.  It
+must be my policy to hold myself before her, always in a pathetic or
+pleasing attitude; never to alarm or startle her; to keep my own secret
+locked in my bosom like a story of disgrace, and let hers (if she could
+be induced to have one) grow at its own rate; to move just so fast, and
+not by a hair’s-breadth any faster, than the inclination of her heart.  I
+was the man, and yet I was passive, tied by the foot in prison.  I could
+not go to her; I must cast a spell upon her at each visit, so that she
+should return to me; and this was a matter of nice management.  I had
+done it the last time—it seemed impossible she should not come again
+after our interview; and for the next I had speedily ripened a fresh
+plan.  A prisoner, if he has one great disability for a lover, has yet
+one considerable advantage: there is nothing to distract him, and he can
+spend all his hours ripening his love and preparing its manifestations.
+I had been then some days upon a piece of carving,—no less than the
+emblem of Scotland, the Lion Rampant.  This I proceeded to finish with
+what skill I was possessed of; and when at last I could do no more to it
+(and, you may be sure, was already regretting I had done so much), added
+on the base the following dedication.—
+
+                               À LA BELLE FLORA
+                         LE PRISONNIER RECONNAISSANT
+                             A. D. ST.  Y. D. K.
+
+I put my heart into the carving of these letters.  What was done with so
+much ardour, it seemed scarce possible that any should behold with
+indifference; and the initials would at least suggest to her my noble
+birth.  I thought it better to suggest: I felt that mystery was my
+stock-in-trade; the contrast between my rank and manners, between my
+speech and my clothing, and the fact that she could only think of me by a
+combination of letters, must all tend to increase her interest and engage
+her heart.
+
+This done, there was nothing left for me but to wait and to hope.  And
+there is nothing further from my character: in love and in war, I am all
+for the forward movement; and these days of waiting made my purgatory.
+It is a fact that I loved her a great deal better at the end of them, for
+love comes, like bread, from a perpetual rehandling.  And besides, I was
+fallen into a panic of fear.  How, if she came no more, how was I to
+continue to endure my empty days? how was I to fall back and find my
+interest in the major’s lessons, the lieutenant’s chess, in a twopenny
+sale in the market, or a halfpenny addition to the prison fare?
+
+Days went by, and weeks; I had not the courage to calculate, and to-day I
+have not the courage to remember; but at last she was there.  At last I
+saw her approach me in the company of a boy about her own age, and whom I
+divined at once to be her brother.
+
+I rose and bowed in silence.
+
+‘This is my brother, Mr. Ronald Gilchrist,’ said she.  ‘I have told him
+of your sufferings.  He is so sorry for you!’
+
+‘It is more than I have the right to ask,’ I replied; ‘but among
+gentlefolk these generous sentiments are natural.  If your brother and I
+were to meet in the field, we should meet like tigers; but when he sees
+me here disarmed and helpless, he forgets his animosity.’  (At which, as
+I had ventured to expect, this beardless champion coloured to the ears
+for pleasure.)  ‘Ah, my dear young lady,’ I continued, ‘there are many of
+your countrymen languishing in my country, even as I do here.  I can but
+hope there is found some French lady to convey to each of them the
+priceless consolation of her sympathy.  You have given me alms; and more
+than alms—hope; and while you were absent I was not forgetful.  Suffer me
+to be able to tell myself that I have at least tried to make a return;
+and for the prisoner’s sake deign to accept this trifle.’
+
+So saying, I offered her my lion, which she took, looked at in some
+embarrassment, and then, catching sight of the dedication, broke out with
+a cry.
+
+‘Why, how did you know my name?’ she exclaimed.
+
+‘When names are so appropriate, they should be easily guessed,’ said I,
+bowing.  ‘But indeed, there was no magic in the matter.  A lady called
+you by name on the day I found your handkerchief, and I was quick to
+remark and cherish it.’
+
+‘It is very, very beautiful,’ said she, ‘and I shall be always proud of
+the inscription.—Come, Ronald, we must be going.’  She bowed to me as a
+lady bows to her equal, and passed on (I could have sworn) with a
+heightened colour.
+
+I was overjoyed: my innocent ruse had succeeded; she had taken my gift
+without a hint of payment, and she would scarce sleep in peace till she
+had made it up to me.  No greenhorn in matters of the heart, I was
+besides aware that I had now a resident ambassador at the court of my
+lady.  The lion might be ill chiselled; it was mine.  My hands had made
+and held it; my knife—or, to speak more by the mark, my rusty nail—had
+traced those letters; and simple as the words were, they would keep
+repeating to her that I was grateful and that I found her fair.  The boy
+had looked like a gawky, and blushed at a compliment; I could see besides
+that he regarded me with considerable suspicion; yet he made so manly a
+figure of a lad, that I could not withhold from him my sympathy.  And as
+for the impulse that had made her bring and introduce him, I could not
+sufficiently admire it.  It seemed to me finer than wit, and more tender
+than a caress.  It said (plain as language), ‘I do not and I cannot know
+you.  Here is my brother—you can know him; this is the way to me—follow
+it.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II—A TALE OF A PAIR OF SCISSORS
+
+
+I was still plunged in these thoughts when the bell was rung that
+discharged our visitors into the street.  Our little market was no sooner
+closed than we were summoned to the distribution, and received our
+rations, which we were then allowed to eat according to fancy in any part
+of our quarters.
+
+I have said the conduct of some of our visitors was unbearably offensive;
+it was possibly more so than they dreamed—as the sight-seers at a
+menagerie may offend in a thousand ways, and quite without meaning it,
+the noble and unfortunate animals behind the bars; and there is no doubt
+but some of my compatriots were susceptible beyond reason.  Some of these
+old whiskerandos, originally peasants, trained since boyhood in
+victorious armies, and accustomed to move among subject and trembling
+populations, could ill brook their change of circumstance.  There was one
+man of the name of Goguelat, a brute of the first water, who had enjoyed
+no touch of civilisation beyond the military discipline, and had risen by
+an extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which he was otherwise
+unfitted—that of _maréchal des logis_ in the 22nd of the line.  In so far
+as a brute can be a good soldier, he was a good soldier; the Cross was on
+his breast, and gallantly earned; but in all things outside his line of
+duty the man was no other than a brawling, bruising ignorant pillar of
+low pothouses.  As a gentleman by birth, and a scholar by taste and
+education, I was the type of all that he least understood and most
+detested; and the mere view of our visitors would leave him daily in a
+transport of annoyance, which he would make haste to wreak on the nearest
+victim, and too often on myself.
+
+It was so now.  Our rations were scarce served out, and I had just
+withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived him drawing near.
+He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of young fools, among whom he
+passed for a wit, followed him with looks of expectation; and I saw I was
+about to be the object of some of his insufferable pleasantries.  He took
+a place beside me, spread out his rations, drank to me derisively from
+his measure of prison beer, and began.  What he said it would be
+impossible to print; but his admirers, who believed their wit to have
+surpassed himself, actually rolled among the gravel.  For my part, I
+thought at first I should have died.  I had not dreamed the wretch was so
+observant; but hate sharpens the ears, and he had counted our interviews
+and actually knew Flora by her name.  Gradually my coolness returned to
+me, accompanied by a volume of living anger that surprised myself.
+
+‘Are you nearly done?’ I asked.  ‘Because if you are, I am about to say a
+word or two myself.’
+
+‘Oh, fair play!’ said he.  ‘Turn about!  The Marquis of Carabas to the
+tribune.’
+
+‘Very well,’ said I.  ‘I have to inform you that I am a gentleman.  You
+do not know what that means, hey?  Well, I will tell you.  It is a
+comical sort of animal; springs from another strange set of creatures
+they call ancestors; and, in common with toads and other vermin, has a
+thing that he calls feelings.  The lion is a gentleman; he will not touch
+carrion.  I am a gentleman, and I cannot bear to soil my fingers with
+such a lump of dirt.  Sit still, Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not
+say a word, or I shall know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are
+upon us.  Here is your health!’ said I, and pledged him in the prison
+beer.  ‘You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a young child,’ I
+continued, ‘who might be your daughter, and who was giving alms to me and
+some others of us mendicants.  If the Emperor’—saluting—‘if my Emperor
+could hear you, he would pluck off the Cross from your gross body.  I
+cannot do that; I cannot take away what His Majesty has given; but one
+thing I promise you—I promise you, Goguelat, you shall be dead to-night.’
+
+I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought there was
+no end to my forbearance, and he was at first amazed.  But I have the
+pleasure to think that some of my expressions had pierced through his
+thick hide; and besides, the brute was truly a hero of valour, and loved
+fighting for itself.  Whatever the cause, at least, he had soon pulled
+himself together, and took the thing (to do him justice) handsomely.
+
+‘And I promise you, by the devil’s horns, that you shall have the
+chance!’ said he, and pledged me again; and again I did him scrupulous
+honour.
+
+The news of this defiance spread from prisoner to prisoner with the speed
+of wings; every face was seen to be illuminated like those of the
+spectators at a horse-race; and indeed you must first have tasted the
+active life of a soldier, and then mouldered for a while in the tedium of
+a jail, in order to understand, perhaps even to excuse, the delight of
+our companions.  Goguelat and I slept in the same squad, which greatly
+simplified the business; and a committee of honour was accordingly formed
+of our shed-mates.  They chose for president a sergeant-major in the 4th
+Dragoons, a greybeard of the army, an excellent military subject, and a
+good man.  He took the most serious view of his functions, visited us
+both, and reported our replies to the committee.  Mine was of a decent
+firmness.  I told him the young lady of whom Goguelat had spoken had on
+several occasions given me alms.  I reminded him that, if we were now
+reduced to hold out our hands and sell pill-boxes for charity, it was
+something very new for soldiers of the Empire.  We had all seen bandits
+standing at a corner of a wood truckling for copper halfpence, and after
+their benefactors were gone spitting out injuries and curses.  ‘But,’
+said I, ‘I trust that none of us will fall so low.  As a Frenchman and a
+soldier, I owe that young child gratitude, and am bound to protect her
+character, and to support that of the army.  You are my elder and my
+superior: tell me if I am not right.’
+
+He was a quiet-mannered old fellow, and patted me with three fingers on
+the back.  ‘_C’est bien_, _mon enfant_,’ says he, and returned to his
+committee.
+
+Goguelat was no more accommodating than myself.  ‘I do not like apologies
+nor those that make them,’ was his only answer.  And there remained
+nothing but to arrange the details of the meeting.  So far as regards
+place and time we had no choice; we must settle the dispute at night, in
+the dark, after a round had passed by, and in the open middle of the shed
+under which we slept.  The question of arms was more obscure.  We had a
+good many tools, indeed, which we employed in the manufacture of our
+toys; but they were none of them suited for a single combat between
+civilised men, and, being nondescript, it was found extremely hard to
+equalise the chances of the combatants.  At length a pair of scissors was
+unscrewed; and a couple of tough wands being found in a corner of the
+courtyard, one blade of the scissors was lashed solidly to each with
+resined twine—the twine coming I know not whence, but the resin from the
+green pillars of the shed, which still sweated from the axe.  It was a
+strange thing to feel in one’s hand this weapon, which was no heavier
+than a riding-rod, and which it was difficult to suppose would prove more
+dangerous.  A general oath was administered and taken, that no one should
+interfere in the duel nor (suppose it to result seriously) betray the
+name of the survivor.  And with that, all being then ready, we composed
+ourselves to await the moment.
+
+The evening fell cloudy; not a star was to be seen when the first round
+of the night passed through our shed and wound off along the ramparts;
+and as we took our places, we could still hear, over the murmurs of the
+surrounding city, the sentries challenging its further passage.  Leclos,
+the sergeant-major, set us in our stations, engaged our wands, and left
+us.  To avoid blood-stained clothing, my adversary and I had stripped to
+the shoes; and the chill of the night enveloped our bodies like a wet
+sheet.  The man was better at fencing than myself; he was vastly taller
+than I, being of a stature almost gigantic, and proportionately strong.
+In the inky blackness of the shed, it was impossible to see his eyes; and
+from the suppleness of the wands, I did not like to trust to a parade.  I
+made up my mind accordingly to profit, if I might, by my defect; and as
+soon as the signal should be given, to throw myself down and lunge at the
+same moment.  It was to play my life upon one card: should I not mortally
+wound him, no defence would be left me; what was yet more appalling, I
+thus ran the risk of bringing my own face against his scissor with the
+double force of our assaults, and my face and eyes are not that part of
+me that I would the most readily expose.
+
+‘_Allez_!’ said the sergeant-major.
+
+Both lunged in the same moment with an equal fury, and but for my
+manoeuvre both had certainly been spitted.  As it was, he did no more
+than strike my shoulder, while my scissor plunged below the girdle into a
+mortal part; and that great bulk of a man, falling from his whole height,
+knocked me immediately senseless.
+
+When I came to myself I was laid in my own sleeping-place, and could make
+out in the darkness the outline of perhaps a dozen heads crowded around
+me.  I sat up.  ‘What is it?’ I exclaimed.
+
+‘Hush!’ said the sergeant-major.  ‘Blessed be God, all is well.’  I felt
+him clasp my hand, and there were tears in his voice.  ‘’Tis but a
+scratch, my child; here is papa, who is taking good care of you.  Your
+shoulder is bound up; we have dressed you in your clothes again, and it
+will all be well.’
+
+At this I began to remember.  ‘And Goguelat?’ I gasped.
+
+‘He cannot bear to be moved; he has his bellyful; ’tis a bad business,’
+said the sergeant-major.
+
+The idea of having killed a man with such an instrument as half a pair of
+scissors seemed to turn my stomach.  I am sure I might have killed a
+dozen with a firelock, a sabre, a bayonet, or any accepted weapon, and
+been visited by no such sickness of remorse.  And to this feeling every
+unusual circumstance of our rencounter, the darkness in which we had
+fought, our nakedness, even the resin on the twine, appeared to
+contribute.  I ran to my fallen adversary, kneeled by him, and could only
+sob his name.
+
+He bade me compose myself.  ‘You have given me the key of the fields,
+comrade,’ said he.  ‘_Sans rancune_!’
+
+At this my horror redoubled.  Here had we two expatriated Frenchmen
+engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of beasts.  Here was
+he, who had been all his life so great a ruffian, dying in a foreign land
+of this ignoble injury, and meeting death with something of the spirit of
+a Bayard.  I insisted that the guards should be summoned and a doctor
+brought.  ‘It may still be possible to save him,’ I cried.
+
+The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement.  ‘If you had been
+wounded,’ said he, ‘you must have lain there till the patrol came by and
+found you.  It happens to be Goguelat—and so must he!  Come, child, time
+to go to by-by.’  And as I still resisted, ‘Champdivers!’ he said, ‘this
+is weakness.  You pain me.’
+
+‘Ay, off to your beds with you!’ said Goguelat, and named us in a company
+with one of his jovial gross epithets.
+
+Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what they
+certainly were far from experiencing, sleep.  It was not yet late.  The
+city, from far below, and all around us, sent up a sound of wheels and
+feet and lively voices.  Yet awhile, and the curtain of the cloud was
+rent across, and in the space of sky between the eaves of the shed and
+the irregular outline of the ramparts a multitude of stars appeared.
+Meantime, in the midst of us lay Goguelat, and could not always withhold
+himself from groaning.
+
+We heard the round far off; heard it draw slowly nearer.  Last of all, it
+turned the corner and moved into our field of vision: two file of men and
+a corporal with a lantern, which he swung to and fro, so as to cast its
+light in the recesses of the yards and sheds.
+
+‘Hullo!’ cried the corporal, pausing as he came by Goguelat.
+
+He stooped with his lantern.  All our hearts were flying.
+
+‘What devil’s work is this?’ he cried, and with a startling voice
+summoned the guard.
+
+We were all afoot upon the instant; more lanterns and soldiers crowded in
+front of the shed; an officer elbowed his way in.  In the midst was the
+big naked body, soiled with blood.  Some one had covered him with his
+blanket; but as he lay there in agony, he had partly thrown it off.
+
+‘This is murder!’ cried the officer.  ‘You wild beasts, you will hear of
+this to-morrow.’
+
+As Goguelat was raised and laid upon a stretcher, he cried to us a
+cheerful and blasphemous farewell.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III—MAJOR CHEVENIX COMES INTO THE STORY, AND GOGUELAT GOES OUT
+
+
+There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost in getting
+the man’s deposition.  He gave but the one account of it: that he had
+committed suicide because he was sick of seeing so many Englishmen.  The
+doctor vowed it was impossible, the nature and direction of the wound
+forbidding it.  Goguelat replied that he was more ingenious than the
+other thought for, and had propped up the weapon in the ground and fallen
+on the point—‘just like Nebuchadnezzar,’ he added, winking to the
+assistants.  The doctor, who was a little, spruce, ruddy man of an
+impatient temper, pished and pshawed and swore over his patient.
+‘Nothing to be made of him!’ he cried.  ‘A perfect heathen.  If we could
+only find the weapon!’  But the weapon had ceased to exist.  A little
+resined twine was perhaps blowing about in the castle gutters; some bits
+of broken stick may have trailed in corners; and behold, in the pleasant
+air of the morning, a dandy prisoner trimming his nails with a pair of
+scissors!
+
+Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the authorities did not
+leave the rest of us in peace.  No stone was left unturned.  We were had
+in again and again to be examined, now singly, now in twos and threes.
+We were threatened with all sorts of impossible severities and tempted
+with all manner of improbable rewards.  I suppose I was five times
+interrogated, and came off from each with flying colours.  I am like old
+Souvaroff, I cannot understand a soldier being taken aback by any
+question; he should answer, as he marches on the fire, with an instant
+briskness and gaiety.  I may have been short of bread, gold or grace; I
+was never yet found wanting in an answer.  My comrades, if they were not
+all so ready, were none of them less staunch; and I may say here at once
+that the inquiry came to nothing at the time, and the death of Goguelat
+remained a mystery of the prison.  Such were the veterans of France!  And
+yet I should be disingenuous if I did not own this was a case apart; in
+ordinary circumstances, some one might have stumbled or been intimidated
+into an admission; and what bound us together with a closeness beyond
+that of mere comrades was a secret to which we were all committed and a
+design in which all were equally engaged.  No need to inquire as to its
+nature: there is only one desire, and only one kind of design, that
+blooms in prisons.  And the fact that our tunnel was near done supported
+and inspired us.
+
+I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the sittings
+of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no one listens to; and
+yet I was unmasked—I, whom my very adversary defended, as good as
+confessed, as good as told the nature of the quarrel, and by so doing
+prepared for myself in the future a most anxious, disagreeable adventure.
+It was the third morning after the duel, and Goguelat was still in life,
+when the time came round for me to give Major Chevenix a lesson.  I was
+fond of this occupation; not that he paid me much—no more, indeed, than
+eighteenpence a month, the customary figure, being a miser in the grain;
+but because I liked his breakfasts and (to some extent) himself.  At
+least, he was a man of education; and of the others with whom I had any
+opportunity of speech, those that would not have held a book upsidedown
+would have torn the pages out for pipe-lights.  For I must repeat again
+that our body of prisoners was exceptional: there was in Edinburgh Castle
+none of that educational busyness that distinguished some of the other
+prisons, so that men entered them unable to read, and left them fit for
+high employments.  Chevenix was handsome, and surprisingly young to be a
+major: six feet in his stockings, well set up, with regular features and
+very clear grey eyes.  It was impossible to pick a fault in him, and yet
+the sum-total was displeasing.  Perhaps he was too clean; he seemed to
+bear about with him the smell of soap.  Cleanliness is good, but I cannot
+bear a man’s nails to seem japanned.  And certainly he was too
+self-possessed and cold.  There was none of the fire of youth, none of
+the swiftness of the soldier, in this young officer.  His kindness was
+cold, and cruel cold; his deliberation exasperating.  And perhaps it was
+from this character, which is very much the opposite of my own, that even
+in these days, when he was of service to me, I approached him with
+suspicion and reserve.
+
+I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six faults.
+
+‘H’m.  Six,’ says he, looking at the paper.  ‘Very annoying!  I can never
+get it right.’
+
+‘Oh, but you make excellent progress!’ I said.  I would not discourage
+him, you understand, but he was congenitally unable to learn French.
+Some fire, I think, is needful, and he had quenched his fire in soapsuds.
+
+He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and looked at me
+with clear, severe eyes.
+
+‘I think we must have a little talk,’ said he.
+
+‘I am entirely at your disposition,’ I replied; but I quaked, for I knew
+what subject to expect.
+
+‘You have been some time giving me these lessons,’ he went on, ‘and I am
+tempted to think rather well of you.  I believe you are a gentleman.’
+
+‘I have that honour, sir,’ said I.
+
+‘You have seen me for the same period.  I do not know how I strike you;
+but perhaps you will be prepared to believe that I also am a man of
+honour,’ said he.
+
+‘I require no assurances; the thing is manifest,’ and I bowed.
+
+‘Very well, then,’ said he.  ‘What about this Goguelat?’
+
+‘You heard me yesterday before the court,’ I began.  ‘I was awakened
+only—’
+
+‘Oh yes; I “heard you yesterday before the court,” no doubt,’ he
+interrupted, ‘and I remember perfectly that you were “awakened only.”  I
+could repeat the most of it by rote, indeed.  But do you suppose that I
+believed you for a moment?’
+
+‘Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it here,’ said I.
+
+‘I may be wrong—we shall soon see,’ says he; ‘but my impression is that
+you will not “repeat it here.”  My impression is that you have come into
+this room, and that you will tell me something before you go out.’
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+‘Let me explain,’ he continued.  ‘Your evidence, of course, is nonsense.
+I put it by, and the court put it by.’
+
+‘My compliments and thanks!’ said I.
+
+‘You _must_ know—that’s the short and the long,’ he proceeded.  ‘All of
+you in shed B are bound to know.  And I want to ask you where is the
+common-sense of keeping up this farce, and maintaining this cock-and-bull
+story between friends.  Come, come, my good fellow, own yourself beaten,
+and laugh at it yourself.’
+
+‘Well, I hear you, go ahead,’ said I.  ‘You put your heart in it.’
+
+He crossed his legs slowly.  ‘I can very well understand,’ he began,
+‘that precautions have had to be taken.  I dare say an oath was
+administered.  I can comprehend that perfectly.’  (He was watching me all
+the time with his cold, bright eyes.)  ‘And I can comprehend that, about
+an affair of honour, you would be very particular to keep it.’
+
+‘About an affair of honour?’ I repeated, like a man quite puzzled.
+
+‘It was not an affair of honour, then?’ he asked.
+
+‘What was not?  I do not follow,’ said I.
+
+He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat awhile silent, and began again
+in the same placid and good-natured voice: ‘The court and I were at one
+in setting aside your evidence.  It could not deceive a child.  But there
+was a difference between myself and the other officers, because _I knew
+my man_ and they did not.  They saw in you a common soldier, and I knew
+you for a gentleman.  To them your evidence was a leash of lies, which
+they yawned to hear you telling.  Now, I was asking myself, how far will
+a gentleman go?  Not surely so far as to help hush a murder up?  So
+that—when I heard you tell how you knew nothing of the matter, and were
+only awakened by the corporal, and all the rest of it—I translated your
+statements into something else.  Now, Champdivers,’ he cried, springing
+up lively and coming towards me with animation, ‘I am going to tell you
+what that was, and you are going to help me to see justice done: how, I
+don’t know, for of course you are under oath—but somehow.  Mark what I’m
+going to say.’
+
+At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder; and whether
+he said anything more or came to a full stop at once, I am sure I could
+not tell you to this day.  For, as the devil would have it, the shoulder
+he laid hold of was the one Goguelat had pinked.  The wound was but a
+scratch; it was healing with the first intention; but in the clutch of
+Major Chevenix it gave me agony.  My head swam; the sweat poured off my
+face; I must have grown deadly pale.
+
+He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.  ‘What is wrong
+with you?’ said he.
+
+‘It is nothing,’ said I.  ‘A qualm.  It has gone by.’
+
+‘Are you sure?’ said he.  ‘You are as white as a sheet.’
+
+‘Oh no, I assure you!  Nothing whatever.  I am my own man again,’ I said,
+though I could scarce command my tongue.
+
+‘Well, shall I go on again?’ says he.  ‘Can you follow me?’
+
+‘Oh, by all means!’ said I, and mopped my streaming face upon my sleeve,
+for you may be sure in those days I had no handkerchief.
+
+‘If you are sure you can follow me.  That was a very sudden and sharp
+seizure,’ he said doubtfully.  ‘But if you are sure, all right, and here
+goes.  An affair of honour among you fellows would, naturally, be a
+little difficult to carry out, perhaps it would be impossible to have it
+wholly regular.  And yet a duel might be very irregular in form, and,
+under the peculiar circumstances of the case, loyal enough in effect.  Do
+you take me?  Now, as a gentleman and a soldier.’
+
+His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me.  I could bear no
+more, and winced away from him.  ‘No,’ I cried,  ‘not that.  Do not put
+your hand upon my shoulder.  I cannot bear it.  It is rheumatism,’ I made
+haste to add.  ‘My shoulder is inflamed and very painful.’
+
+He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.
+
+‘I am sorry about your shoulder,’ he said at last.  ‘Let me send for the
+doctor.’
+
+‘Not in the least,’ said I.  ‘It is a trifle.  I am quite used to it.  It
+does not trouble me in the smallest.  At any rate, I don’t believe in
+doctors.’
+
+‘All right,’ said he, and sat and smoked a good while in a silence which
+I would have given anything to break.  ‘Well,’ he began presently, ‘I
+believe there is nothing left for me to learn.  I presume I may say that
+I know all.’
+
+‘About what?’ said I boldly.
+
+‘About Goguelat,’ said he.
+
+‘I beg your pardon.  I cannot conceive,’ said I.
+
+‘Oh,’ says the major, ‘the man fell in a duel, and by your hand!  I am
+not an infant.’
+
+‘By no means,’ said I.  ‘But you seem to me to be a good deal of a
+theorist.’
+
+‘Shall we test it?’ he asked.  ‘The doctor is close by.  If there is not
+an open wound on your shoulder, I am wrong.  If there is—’  He waved his
+hand.  ‘But I advise you to think twice.  There is a deuce of a nasty
+drawback to the experiment—that what might have remained private between
+us two becomes public property.’
+
+‘Oh, well!’ said I, with a laugh, ‘anything rather than a doctor!  I
+cannot bear the breed.’
+
+His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still far from
+comfortable.
+
+Major Chevenix smoked awhile, looking now at his cigar ash, now at me.
+‘I’m a soldier myself,’ he says presently, ‘and I’ve been out in my time
+and hit my man.  I don’t want to run any one into a corner for an affair
+that was at all necessary or correct.  At the same time, I want to know
+that much, and I’ll take your word of honour for it.  Otherwise, I shall
+be very sorry, but the doctor must be called in.’
+
+‘I neither admit anything nor deny anything,’ I returned.  ‘But if this
+form of words will suffice you, here is what I say: I give you my parole,
+as a gentleman and a soldier, there has nothing taken place amongst us
+prisoners that was not honourable as the day.’
+
+‘All right,’ says he.  ‘That was all I wanted.  You can go now,
+Champdivers.’
+
+And as I was going out he added, with a laugh: ‘By the bye, I ought to
+apologise: I had no idea I was applying the torture!’
+
+The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a piece of
+paper in his hand.  He seemed hot and angry, and had certainly no mind to
+be polite.
+
+‘Here!’ he cried.  ‘Which of you fellows knows any English?  Oh!’—spying
+me—‘there you are, what’s your name!  _You’ll_ do.  Tell these fellows
+that the other fellow’s dying.  He’s booked; no use talking; I expect
+he’ll go by evening.  And tell them I don’t envy the feelings of the
+fellow who spiked him.  Tell them that first.’
+
+I did so.
+
+‘Then you can tell ’em,’ he resumed, ‘that the fellow, Goggle—what’s his
+name?—wants to see some of them before he gets his marching orders.  If I
+got it right, he wants to kiss or embrace you, or some sickening stuff.
+Got that?  Then here’s a list he’s had written, and you’d better read it
+out to them—I can’t make head or tail of your beastly names—and they can
+answer _present_, and fall in against that wall.’
+
+It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I read the
+first name on the list.  I had no wish to look again on my own handiwork;
+my flesh recoiled from the idea; and how could I be sure what reception
+he designed to give me?  The cure was in my own hand; I could pass that
+first name over—the doctor would not know—and I might stay away.  But to
+the subsequent great gladness of my heart, I did not dwell for an instant
+on the thought, walked over to the designated wall, faced about, read out
+the name ‘Champdivers,’ and answered myself with the word ‘Present.’
+
+There were some half dozen on the list, all told; and as soon as we were
+mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and we followed after,
+like a fatigue party, in single file.  At the door he paused, told us
+‘the fellow’ would see each of us alone, and, as soon as I had explained
+that, sent me by myself into the ward.  It was a small room, whitewashed;
+a south window stood open on a vast depth of air and a spacious and
+distant prospect; and from deep below, in the Grassmarket the voices of
+hawkers came up clear and far away.  Hard by, on a little bed, lay
+Goguelat.  The sunburn had not yet faded from his face, and the stamp of
+death was already there.  There was something wild and unmannish in his
+smile, that took me by the throat; only death and love know or have ever
+seen it.  And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.
+
+He held out his arms as if to embrace me.  I drew near with incredible
+shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with overwhelming disgust.
+But he only drew my ear down to his lips.
+
+‘Trust me,’ he whispered.  ‘_Je suis bon bougre_, _moi_.  I’ll take it to
+hell with me, and tell the devil.’
+
+Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities?  All that
+he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could not clothe it
+otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce.  Presently he bade me
+call the doctor; and when that officer had come in, raised a little up in
+his bed, pointed first to himself and then to me, who stood weeping by
+his side, and several times repeated the expression, ‘Frinds—frinds—dam
+frinds.’
+
+To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much affected.  He nodded
+his little bob-wigged head at us, and said repeatedly, ‘All right,
+Johnny—me comprong.’
+
+Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I went out of
+the room sobbing like an infant.
+
+How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable fellows make the
+happiest exits!  It is a fate we may well envy them.  Goguelat was
+detested in life; in the last three days, by his admirable staunchness
+and consideration, he won every heart; and when word went about the
+prison the same evening that he was no more, the voice of conversation
+became hushed as in a house of mourning.
+
+For myself I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what ailed me:
+when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it; but that night I
+was filled with a gloomy fury of the nerves.  I had killed him; he had
+done his utmost to protect me; I had seen him with that awful smile.  And
+so illogical and useless is this sentiment of remorse, that I was ready,
+at a word or a look, to quarrel with somebody else.  I presume the
+disposition of my mind was imprinted on my face; and when, a little
+after, I overtook, saluted and addressed the doctor, he looked on me with
+commiseration and surprise.
+
+I had asked him if it was true.
+
+‘Yes,’ he said, ‘the fellow’s gone.’
+
+‘Did he suffer much?’ I asked.
+
+‘Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb,’ said he.  He looked on me a
+little, and I saw his hand go to his fob.  ‘Here, take that! no sense in
+fretting,’ he said, and, putting a silver two-penny-bit in my hand, he
+left me.
+
+I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall, for it was
+the man’s one act of charity in all my knowledge of him.  Instead of
+that, I stood looking at it in my hand and laughed out bitterly, as I
+realised his mistake; then went to the ramparts, and flung it far into
+the air like blood money.  The night was falling; through an embrasure
+and across the gardened valley I saw the lamplighters hasting along
+Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and looked on moodily.  As I was so
+standing a hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I turned about.  It was
+Major Chevenix, dressed for the evening, and his neckcloth really
+admirably folded.  I never denied the man could dress.
+
+‘Ah!’ said he, ‘I thought it was you, Champdivers.  So he’s gone?’
+
+I nodded.
+
+‘Come, come,’ said he, ‘you must cheer up.  Of course it’s very
+distressing, very painful and all that.  But do you know, it ain’t such a
+bad thing either for you or me?  What with his death and your visit to
+him I am entirely reassured.’
+
+So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.
+
+‘I had rather not discuss it,’ said I.
+
+‘Well,’ said he, ‘one word more, and I’ll agree to bury the subject.
+What did you fight about?’
+
+‘Oh, what do men ever fight about?’ I cried.
+
+‘A lady?’ said he.
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+‘Deuce you did!’ said he.  ‘I should scarce have thought it of him.’
+
+And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words.  ‘He!’ I cried.  ‘He
+never dared to address her—only to look at her and vomit his vile
+insults!  She may have given him sixpence: if she did, it may take him to
+heaven yet!’
+
+At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a considering look,
+and brought up sharply.
+
+‘Well, well,’ said he.  ‘Good night to you, Champdivers.  Come to me at
+breakfast-time to-morrow, and we’ll talk of other subjects.’
+
+I fully admit the man’s conduct was not bad: in writing it down so long
+after the events I can even see that it was good.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV—ST. IVES GETS A BUNDLE OF BANK NOTES
+
+
+I was surprised one morning, shortly after, to find myself the object of
+marked consideration by a civilian and a stranger.  This was a man of the
+middle age; he had a face of a mulberry colour, round black eyes, comical
+tufted eyebrows, and a protuberant forehead; and was dressed in clothes
+of a Quakerish cut.  In spite of his plainness, he had that inscrutable
+air of a man well-to-do in his affairs.  I conceived he had been some
+while observing me from a distance, for a sparrow sat betwixt us quite
+unalarmed on the breech of a piece of cannon.  So soon as our eyes met,
+he drew near and addressed me in the French language, which he spoke with
+a good fluency but an abominable accent.
+
+‘I have the pleasure of addressing Monsieur le Vicomte Anne de Kéroual de
+Saint-Yves?’ said he.
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘I do not call myself all that; but I have a right to, if
+I chose.  In the meanwhile I call myself plain Champdivers, at your
+disposal.  It was my mother’s name, and good to go soldiering with.’
+
+‘I think not quite,’ said he; ‘for if I remember rightly, your mother
+also had the particle.  Her name was Florimonde de Champdivers.’
+
+‘Right again!’ said I, ‘and I am extremely pleased to meet a gentleman so
+well informed in my quarterings.  Is monsieur Born himself?’  This I said
+with a great air of assumption, partly to conceal the degree of curiosity
+with which my visitor had inspired me, and in part because it struck me
+as highly incongruous and comical in my prison garb and on the lips of a
+private soldier.
+
+He seemed to think so too, for he laughed.
+
+‘No, sir,’ he returned, speaking this time in English; ‘I am not
+“_born_,” as you call it, and must content myself with _dying_, of which
+I am equally susceptible with the best of you.  My name is Mr.
+Romaine—Daniel Romaine—a solicitor of London City, at your service; and,
+what will perhaps interest you more, I am here at the request of your
+great-uncle, the Count.’
+
+‘What!’ I cried, ‘does M. de Kéroual de St.-Yves remember the existence
+of such a person as myself, and will he deign to count kinship with a
+soldier of Napoleon?’
+
+‘You speak English well,’ observed my visitor.
+
+‘It has been a second language to me from a child,’ said I.  ‘I had an
+English nurse; my father spoke English with me; and I was finished by a
+countryman of yours and a dear friend of mine, a Mr. Vicary.’
+
+A strong expression of interest came into the lawyer’s face.
+
+‘What!’ he cried, ‘you knew poor Vicary?’
+
+‘For more than a year,’ said I; ‘and shared his hiding-place for many
+months.’
+
+‘And I was his clerk, and have succeeded him in business,’ said he.
+‘Excellent man!  It was on the affairs of M. de Kéroual that he went to
+that accursed country, from which he was never destined to return.  Do
+you chance to know his end, sir?’
+
+‘I am sorry,’ said I, ‘I do.  He perished miserably at the hands of a
+gang of banditti, such as we call _chauffeurs_.  In a word, he was
+tortured, and died of it.  See,’ I added, kicking off one shoe, for I had
+no stockings; ‘I was no more than a child, and see how they had begun to
+treat myself.’
+
+He looked at the mark of my old burn with a certain shrinking.  ‘Beastly
+people!’ I heard him mutter to himself.
+
+‘The English may say so with a good grace,’ I observed politely.
+
+Such speeches were the coin in which I paid my way among this credulous
+race.  Ninety per cent. of our visitors would have accepted the remark as
+natural in itself and creditable to my powers of judgment, but it
+appeared my lawyer was more acute.
+
+‘You are not entirely a fool, I perceive,’ said he.
+
+‘No,’ said I; ‘not wholly.’
+
+‘And yet it is well to beware of the ironical mood,’ he continued.  ‘It
+is a dangerous instrument.  Your great-uncle has, I believe, practised it
+very much, until it is now become a problem what he means.’
+
+‘And that brings me back to what you will admit is a most natural
+inquiry,’ said I.  ‘To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit? how did
+you recognise me? and how did you know I was here?’
+
+Carefull separating his coat skirts, the lawyer took a seat beside me on
+the edge of the flags.
+
+‘It is rather an odd story,’ says he, ‘and, with your leave, I’ll answer
+the second question first.  It was from a certain resemblance you bear to
+your cousin, M. le Vicomte.’
+
+‘I trust, sir, that I resemble him advantageously?’ said I.
+
+‘I hasten to reassure you,’ was the reply: ‘you do.  To my eyes, M. Alain
+de St.-Yves has scarce a pleasing exterior.  And yet, when I knew you
+were here, and was actually looking for you—why, the likeness helped.  As
+for how I came to know your whereabouts, by an odd enough chance, it is
+again M. Alain we have to thank.  I should tell you, he has for some time
+made it his business to keep M. de Kéroual informed of your career; with
+what purpose I leave you to judge.  When he first brought the news of
+your—that you were serving Buonaparte, it seemed it might be the death of
+the old gentleman, so hot was his resentment.  But from one thing to
+another, matters have a little changed.  Or I should rather say, not a
+little.  We learned you were under orders for the Peninsula, to fight the
+English; then that you had been commissioned for a piece of bravery, and
+were again reduced to the ranks.  And from one thing to another (as I
+say), M. de Kéroual became used to the idea that you were his kinsman and
+yet served with Buonaparte, and filled instead with wonder that he should
+have another kinsman who was so remarkably well informed of events in
+France.  And it now became a very disagreeable question, whether the
+young gentleman was not a spy?  In short, sir, in seeking to disserve
+you, he had accumulated against himself a load of suspicions.’
+
+My visitor now paused, took snuff, and looked at me with an air of
+benevolence.
+
+‘Good God, sir!’ says I, ‘this is a curious story.’
+
+‘You will say so before I have done,’ said he.  ‘For there have two
+events followed.  The first of these was an encounter of M. de Kéroual
+and M. de Mauseant.’
+
+‘I know the man to my cost,’ said I: ‘it was through him I lost my
+commission.’
+
+‘Do you tell me so?’ he cried.  ‘Why, here is news!’
+
+‘Oh, I cannot complain!’ said I.  ‘I was in the wrong.  I did it with my
+eyes open.  If a man gets a prisoner to guard and lets him go, the least
+he can expect is to be degraded.’
+
+‘You will be paid for it,’ said he.  ‘You did well for yourself and
+better for your king.’
+
+‘If I had thought I was injuring my emperor,’ said I, ‘I would have let
+M. de Mauseant burn in hell ere I had helped him, and be sure of that!  I
+saw in him only a private person in a difficulty: I let him go in private
+charity; not even to profit myself will I suffer it to be misunderstood.’
+
+‘Well, well,’ said the lawyer, ‘no matter now.  This is a foolish
+warmth—a very misplaced enthusiasm, believe me!  The point of the story
+is that M. de Mauseant spoke of you with gratitude, and drew your
+character in such a manner as greatly to affect your uncle’s views.  Hard
+upon the back of which, in came your humble servant, and laid before him
+the direct proof of what we had been so long suspecting.  There was no
+dubiety permitted.  M. Alain’s expensive way of life, his clothes and
+mistresses, his dicing and racehorses, were all explained: he was in the
+pay of Buonaparte, a hired spy, and a man that held the strings of what I
+can only call a convolution of extremely fishy enterprises.  To do M. de
+Kéroual justice, he took it in the best way imaginable, destroyed the
+evidences of the one great-nephew’s disgrace—and transferred his interest
+wholly to the other.’
+
+‘What am I to understand by that?’ said I.
+
+‘I will tell you,’ says he.  ‘There is a remarkable inconsistency in
+human nature which gentlemen of my cloth have a great deal of occasion to
+observe.  Selfish persons can live without chick or child, they can live
+without all mankind except perhaps the barber and the apothecary; but
+when it comes to dying, they seem physically unable to die without an
+heir.  You can apply this principle for yourself.  Viscount Alain, though
+he scarce guesses it, is no longer in the field.  Remains, Viscount
+Anne.’
+
+‘I see,’ said I, ‘you give a very unfavourable impression of my uncle,
+the Count.’
+
+‘I had not meant it,’ said he.  ‘He has led a loose life—sadly loose—but
+he is a man it is impossible to know and not to admire; his courtesy is
+exquisite.’
+
+‘And so you think there is actually a chance for me?’ I asked.
+
+‘Understand,’ said he: ‘in saying as much as I have done, I travel quite
+beyond my brief.  I have been clothed with no capacity to talk of wills,
+or heritages, or your cousin.  I was sent here to make but the one
+communication: that M. de Kéroual desires to meet his great-nephew.’
+
+‘Well,’ said I, looking about me on the battlements by which we sat
+surrounded, ‘this is a case in which Mahomet must certainly come to the
+mountain.’
+
+‘Pardon me,’ said Mr. Romaine; ‘you know already your uncle is an aged
+man; but I have not yet told you that he is quite broken up, and his
+death shortly looked for.  No, no, there is no doubt about it—it is the
+mountain that must come to Mahomet.’
+
+‘From an Englishman, the remark is certainly significant,’ said I; ‘but
+you are of course, and by trade, a keeper of men’s secrets, and I see you
+keep that of Cousin Alain, which is not the mark of a truculent
+patriotism, to say the least.’
+
+‘I am first of all the lawyer of your family!’ says he.
+
+‘That being so,’ said I, ‘I can perhaps stretch a point myself.  This
+rock is very high, and it is very steep; a man might come by a devil of a
+fall from almost any part of it, and yet I believe I have a pair of wings
+that might carry me just so far as to the bottom.  Once at the bottom I
+am helpless.’
+
+‘And perhaps it is just then that I could step in,’ returned the lawyer.
+‘Suppose by some contingency, at which I make no guess, and on which I
+offer no opinion—’
+
+But here I interrupted him.  ‘One word ere you go further.  I am under no
+parole,’ said I.
+
+‘I understood so much,’ he replied, ‘although some of you French gentry
+find their word sit lightly on them.’
+
+‘Sir, I am not one of those,’ said I.
+
+‘To do you plain justice, I do not think you one,’ said he.  ‘Suppose
+yourself, then, set free and at the bottom of the rock,’ he continued,
+‘although I may not be able to do much, I believe I can do something to
+help you on your road.  In the first place I would carry this, whether in
+an inside pocket or my shoe.’  And he passed me a bundle of bank notes.
+
+‘No harm in that,’ said I, at once concealing them.
+
+‘In the second place,’ he resumed, ‘it is a great way from here to where
+your uncle lives—Amersham Place, not far from Dunstable; you have a great
+part of Britain to get through; and for the first stages, I must leave
+you to your own luck and ingenuity.  I have no acquaintance here in
+Scotland, or at least’ (with a grimace) ‘no dishonest ones.  But further
+to the south, about Wakefield, I am told there is a gentleman called
+Burchell Fenn, who is not so particular as some others, and might be
+willing to give you a cast forward.  In fact, sir, I believe it’s the
+man’s trade: a piece of knowledge that burns my mouth.  But that is what
+you get by meddling with rogues; and perhaps the biggest rogue now
+extant, M. de Saint-Yves, is your cousin, M. Alain.’
+
+‘If this be a man of my cousin’s,’ I observed, ‘I am perhaps better to
+keep clear of him?’
+
+‘It was through some paper of your cousin’s that we came across his
+trail,’ replied the lawyer.  ‘But I am inclined to think, so far as
+anything is safe in such a nasty business, you might apply to the man
+Fenn.  You might even, I think, use the Viscount’s name; and the little
+trick of family resemblance might come in.  How, for instance, if you
+were to call yourself his brother?’
+
+‘It might be done,’ said I.  ‘But look here a moment?  You propose to me
+a very difficult game: I have apparently a devil of an opponent in my
+cousin; and, being a prisoner of war, I can scarcely be said to hold good
+cards.  For what stakes, then, am I playing?’
+
+‘They are very large,’ said he.  ‘Your great-uncle is immensely
+rich—immensely rich.  He was wise in time; he smelt the revolution long
+before; sold all that he could, and had all that was movable transported
+to England through my firm.  There are considerable estates in England;
+Amersham Place itself is very fine; and he has much money, wisely
+invested.  He lives, indeed, like a prince.  And of what use is it to
+him?  He has lost all that was worth living for—his family, his country;
+he has seen his king and queen murdered; he has seen all these miseries
+and infamies,’ pursued the lawyer, with a rising inflection and a
+heightening colour; and then broke suddenly off,—‘In short, sir, he has
+seen all the advantages of that government for which his nephew carries
+arms, and he has the misfortune not to like them.’
+
+‘You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must excuse,’ said I; ‘yet
+which of us has the more reason to be bitter?  This man, my uncle, M. de
+Kéroual, fled.  My parents, who were less wise perhaps, remained.  In the
+beginning, they were even republicans; to the end they could not be
+persuaded to despair of the people.  It was a glorious folly, for which,
+as a son, I reverence them.  First one and then the other perished.  If I
+have any mark of a gentleman, all who taught me died upon the scaffold,
+and my last school of manners was the prison of the Abbaye.  Do you think
+you can teach bitterness to a man with a history like mine?’
+
+‘I have no wish to try,’ said he.  ‘And yet there is one point I cannot
+understand: I cannot understand that one of your blood and experience
+should serve the Corsican.  I cannot understand it: it seems as though
+everything generous in you must rise against that—domination.’
+
+‘And perhaps,’ I retorted, ‘had your childhood passed among wolves, you
+would have been overjoyed yourself to see the Corsican Shepherd.’
+
+‘Well, well,’ replied Mr. Romaine, ‘it may be.  There are things that do
+not bear discussion.’
+
+And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a flight of
+steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V—ST. IVES IS SHOWN A HOUSE
+
+
+The lawyer was scarce gone before I remembered many omissions; and chief
+among these, that I had neglected to get Mr. Burchell Fenn’s address.
+Here was an essential point neglected; and I ran to the head of the
+stairs to find myself already too late.  The lawyer was beyond my view;
+in the archway that led downward to the castle gate, only the red coat
+and the bright arms of a sentry glittered in the shadow; and I could but
+return to my place upon the ramparts.
+
+I am not very sure that I was properly entitled to this corner.  But I
+was a high favourite; not an officer, and scarce a private, in the castle
+would have turned me back, except upon a thing of moment; and whenever I
+desired to be solitary, I was suffered to sit here behind my piece of
+cannon unmolested.  The cliff went down before me almost sheer, but
+mantled with a thicket of climbing trees; from farther down, an outwork
+raised its turret; and across the valley I had a view of that long
+terrace of Princes Street which serves as a promenade to the fashionable
+inhabitants of Edinburgh.  A singularity in a military prison, that it
+should command a view on the chief thoroughfare!
+
+It is not necessary that I should trouble you with the train of my
+reflections, which turned upon the interview I had just concluded and the
+hopes that were now opening before me.  What is more essential, my eye
+(even while I thought) kept following the movement of the passengers on
+Princes Street, as they passed briskly to and fro—met, greeted, and bowed
+to each other—or entered and left the shops, which are in that quarter,
+and, for a town of the Britannic provinces, particularly fine.  My mind
+being busy upon other things, the course of my eye was the more random;
+and it chanced that I followed, for some time, the advance of a young
+gentleman with a red head and a white great-coat, for whom I cared
+nothing at the moment, and of whom it is probable I shall be gathered to
+my fathers without learning more.  He seemed to have a large
+acquaintance: his hat was for ever in his hand; and I daresay I had
+already observed him exchanging compliments with half a dozen, when he
+drew up at last before a young man and a young lady whose tall persons
+and gallant carriage I thought I recognised.
+
+It was impossible at such a distance that I could be sure, but the
+thought was sufficient, and I craned out of the embrasure to follow them
+as long as possible.  To think that such emotions, that such a concussion
+of the blood, may have been inspired by a chance resemblance, and that I
+may have stood and thrilled there for a total stranger!  This distant
+view, at least, whether of Flora or of some one else, changed in a moment
+the course of my reflections.  It was all very well, and it was highly
+needful, I should see my uncle; but an uncle, a great-uncle at that, and
+one whom I had never seen, leaves the imagination cold; and if I were to
+leave the castle, I might never again have the opportunity of finding
+Flora.  The little impression I had made, even supposing I had made any,
+how soon it would die out! how soon I should sink to be a phantom memory,
+with which (in after days) she might amuse a husband and children!  No,
+the impression must be clenched, the wax impressed with the seal, ere I
+left Edinburgh.  And at this the two interests that were now contending
+in my bosom came together and became one.  I wished to see Flora again;
+and I wanted some one to further me in my flight and to get me new
+clothes.  The conclusion was apparent.  Except for persons in the
+garrison itself, with whom it was a point of honour and military duty to
+retain me captive, I knew, in the whole country of Scotland, these two
+alone.  If it were to be done at all, they must be my helpers.  To tell
+them of my designed escape while I was still in bonds, would be to lay
+before them a most difficult choice.  What they might do in such a case,
+I could not in the least be sure of, for (the same case arising) I was
+far from sure what I should do myself.  It was plain I must escape first.
+When the harm was done, when I was no more than a poor wayside fugitive,
+I might apply to them with less offence and more security.  To this end
+it became necessary that I should find out where they lived and how to
+reach it; and feeling a strong confidence that they would soon return to
+visit me, I prepared a series of baits with which to angle for my
+information.  It will be seen the first was good enough.
+
+Perhaps two days after, Master Ronald put in an appearance by himself.  I
+had no hold upon the boy, and pretermitted my design till I should have
+laid court to him and engaged his interest.  He was prodigiously
+embarrassed, not having previously addressed me otherwise than by a bow
+and blushes; and he advanced to me with an air of one stubbornly
+performing a duty, like a raw soldier under fire.  I laid down my
+carving; greeted him with a good deal of formality, such as I thought he
+would enjoy; and finding him to remain silent, branched off into
+narratives of my campaigns such as Goguelat himself might have scrupled
+to endorse.  He visibly thawed and brightened; drew more near to where I
+sat; forgot his timidity so far as to put many questions; and at last,
+with another blush, informed me he was himself expecting a commission.
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘they are fine troops, your British troops in the
+Peninsula.  A young gentleman of spirit may well be proud to be engaged
+at the head of such soldiers.’
+
+‘I know that,’ he said; ‘I think of nothing else.  I think shame to be
+dangling here at home and going through with this foolery of education,
+while others, no older than myself, are in the field.’
+
+‘I cannot blame you,’ said I.  ‘I have felt the same myself.’
+
+‘There are—there are no troops, are there, quite so good as ours?’ he
+asked.
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘there is a point about them: they have a defect,—they
+are not to be trusted in a retreat.  I have seen them behave very ill in
+a retreat.’
+
+‘I believe that is our national character,’ he said—God forgive him!—with
+an air of pride.
+
+‘I have seen your national character running away at least, and had the
+honour to run after it!’ rose to my lips, but I was not so ill advised as
+to give it utterance.  Every one should be flattered, but boys and women
+without stint; and I put in the rest of the afternoon narrating to him
+tales of British heroism, for which I should not like to engage that they
+were all true.
+
+‘I am quite surprised,’ he said at last.  ‘People tell you the French are
+insincere.  Now, I think your sincerity is beautiful.  I think you have a
+noble character.  I admire you very much.  I am very grateful for your
+kindness to—to one so young,’ and he offered me his hand.
+
+‘I shall see you again soon?’ said I.
+
+‘Oh, now!  Yes, very soon,’ said he.  ‘I—I wish to tell you.  I would not
+let Flora—Miss Gilchrist, I mean—come to-day.  I wished to see more of
+you myself.  I trust you are not offended: you know, one should be
+careful about strangers.’
+
+I approved his caution, and he took himself away: leaving me in a mixture
+of contrarious feelings, part ashamed to have played on one so gullible,
+part raging that I should have burned so much incense before the vanity
+of England; yet, in the bottom of my soul, delighted to think I had made
+a friend—or, at least, begun to make a friend—of Flora’s brother.
+
+As I had half expected, both made their appearance the next day.  I
+struck so fine a shade betwixt the pride that is allowed to soldiers and
+the sorrowful humility that befits a captive, that I declare, as I went
+to meet them, I might have afforded a subject for a painter.  So much was
+high comedy, I must confess; but so soon as my eyes lighted full on her
+dark face and eloquent eyes, the blood leaped into my cheeks—and that was
+nature!  I thanked them, but not the least with exultation; it was my cue
+to be mournful, and to take the pair of them as one.
+
+‘I have been thinking,’ I said, ‘you have been so good to me, both of
+you, stranger and prisoner as I am, that I have been thinking how I could
+testify to my gratitude.  It may seem a strange subject for a confidence,
+but there is actually no one here, even of my comrades, that knows me by
+my name and title.  By these I am called plain Champdivers, a name to
+which I have a right, but not the name which I should bear, and which
+(but a little while ago) I must hide like a crime.  Miss Flora, suffer me
+to present to you the Vicomte Anne de Kéroual de Saint-Yves, a private
+soldier.’
+
+‘I knew it!’ cried the boy; ‘I knew he was a noble!’
+
+And I thought the eyes of Miss Flora said the same, but more
+persuasively.  All through this interview she kept them on the ground, or
+only gave them to me for a moment at a time, and with a serious
+sweetness.
+
+‘You may conceive, my friends, that this is rather a painful confession,’
+I continued.  ‘To stand here before you, vanquished, a prisoner in a
+fortress, and take my own name upon my lips, is painful to the proud.
+And yet I wished that you should know me.  Long after this, we may yet
+hear of one another—perhaps Mr. Gilchrist and myself in the field and
+from opposing camps—and it would be a pity if we heard and did not
+recognise.’
+
+They were both moved; and began at once to press upon me offers of
+service, such as to lend me books, get me tobacco if I used it, and the
+like.  This would have been all mighty welcome, before the tunnel was
+ready.  Now it signified no more to me than to offer the transition I
+required.
+
+‘My dear friends,’ I said—‘for you must allow me to call you that, who
+have no others within so many hundred leagues—perhaps you will think me
+fanciful and sentimental; and perhaps indeed I am; but there is one
+service that I would beg of you before all others.  You see me set here
+on the top of this rock in the midst of your city.  Even with what
+liberty I have, I have the opportunity to see a myriad roofs, and I dare
+to say, thirty leagues of sea and land.  All this hostile!  Under all
+these roofs my enemies dwell; wherever I see the smoke of a house rising,
+I must tell myself that some one sits before the chimney and reads with
+joy of our reverses.  Pardon me, dear friends, I know that you must do
+the same, and I do not grudge at it!  With you, it is all different.
+Show me your house then, were it only the chimney, or, if that be not
+visible, the quarter of the town in which it lies!  So, when I look all
+about me, I shall be able to say: “_There is one house in which I am not
+quite unkindly thought of_.”’
+
+Flora stood a moment.
+
+‘It is a pretty thought,’ said she, ‘and, as far as regards Ronald and
+myself, a true one.  Come, I believe I can show you the very smoke out of
+our chimney.’
+
+So saying, she carried me round the battlements towards the opposite or
+southern side of the fortress, and indeed to a bastion almost immediately
+overlooking the place of our projected flight.  Thence we had a view of
+some foreshortened suburbs at our feet, and beyond of a green, open, and
+irregular country rising towards the Pentland Hills.  The face of one of
+these summits (say two leagues from where we stood) is marked with a
+procession of white scars.  And to this she directed my attention.
+
+‘You see these marks?’ she said.  ‘We call them the Seven Sisters.
+Follow a little lower with your eye, and you will see a fold of the hill,
+the tops of some trees, and a tail of smoke out of the midst of them.
+That is Swanston Cottage, where my brother and I are living with my aunt.
+If it gives you pleasure to see it, I am glad.  We, too, can see the
+castle from a corner in the garden, and we go there in the morning
+often—do we not, Ronald?—and we think of you, M. de Saint-Yves; but I am
+afraid it does not altogether make us glad.’
+
+‘Mademoiselle!’ said I, and indeed my voice was scarce under command, ‘if
+you knew how your generous words—how even the sight of you—relieved the
+horrors of this place, I believe, I hope, I know, you would be glad.  I
+will come here daily and look at that dear chimney and these green hills,
+and bless you from the heart, and dedicate to you the prayers of this
+poor sinner.  Ah!  I do not say they can avail!’
+
+‘Who can say that, M. de Saint-Yves?’ she said softly.  ‘But I think it
+is time we should be going.’
+
+‘High time,’ said Ronald, whom (to say the truth) I had a little
+forgotten.
+
+On the way back, as I was laying myself out to recover lost ground with
+the youth, and to obliterate, if possible, the memory of my last and
+somewhat too fervent speech, who should come past us but the major?  I
+had to stand aside and salute as he went by, but his eyes appeared
+entirely occupied with Flora.
+
+‘Who is that man?’ she asked.
+
+‘He is a friend of mine,’ said I.  ‘I give him lessons in French, and he
+has been very kind to me.’
+
+‘He stared,’ she said,—‘I do not say, rudely; but why should he stare?’
+
+‘If you do not wish to be stared at, mademoiselle, suffer me to recommend
+a veil,’ said I.
+
+She looked at me with what seemed anger.  ‘I tell you the man stared,’
+she said.
+
+And Ronald added.  ‘Oh, I don’t think he meant any harm.  I suppose he
+was just surprised to see us walking about with a pr--- with M.
+Saint-Yves.’
+
+But the next morning, when I went to Chevenix’s rooms, and after I had
+dutifully corrected his exercise—‘I compliment you on your taste,’ said
+he to me.
+
+‘I beg your pardon?’ said I.
+
+‘Oh no, I beg yours,’ said he.  ‘You understand me perfectly, just as I
+do you.’
+
+I murmured something about enigmas.
+
+‘Well, shall I give you the key to the enigma?’ said he, leaning back.
+‘That was the young lady whom Goguelat insulted and whom you avenged.  I
+do not blame you.  She is a heavenly creature.’
+
+‘With all my heart, to the last of it!’ said I.  ‘And to the first also,
+if it amuses you!  You are become so very acute of late that I suppose
+you must have your own way.’
+
+‘What is her name?’ he asked.
+
+‘Now, really!’ said I.  ‘Do you think it likely she has told me?’
+
+‘I think it certain,’ said he.
+
+I could not restrain my laughter.  ‘Well, then, do you think it likely I
+would tell you?’ I cried.
+
+‘Not a bit.’ said he.  ‘But come, to our lesson!’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI—THE ESCAPE
+
+
+The time for our escape drew near, and the nearer it came the less we
+seemed to enjoy the prospect.  There is but one side on which this castle
+can be left either with dignity or safety; but as there is the main gate
+and guard, and the chief street of the upper city, it is not to be
+thought of by escaping prisoners.  In all other directions an abominable
+precipice surrounds it, down the face of which (if anywhere at all) we
+must regain our liberty.  By our concurrent labours in many a dark night,
+working with the most anxious precautions against noise, we had made out
+to pierce below the curtain about the south-west corner, in a place they
+call the _Devil’s Elbow_.  I have never met that celebrity; nor (if the
+rest of him at all comes up to what they called his elbow) have I the
+least desire of his acquaintance.  From the heel of the masonry, the
+rascally, breakneck precipice descended sheer among waste lands,
+scattered suburbs of the city, and houses in the building.  I had never
+the heart to look for any length of time—the thought that I must make the
+descent in person some dark night robbing me of breath; and, indeed, on
+anybody not a seaman or a steeple-jack, the mere sight of the _Devil’s
+Elbow_ wrought like an emetic.
+
+I don’t know where the rope was got, and doubt if I much cared.  It was
+not that which gravelled me, but whether, now that we had it, it would
+serve our turn.  Its length, indeed, we made a shift to fathom out; but
+who was to tell us how that length compared with the way we had to go?
+Day after day, there would be always some of us stolen out to the
+_Devil’s Elbow_ and making estimates of the descent, whether by a bare
+guess or the dropping of stones.  A private of pioneers remembered the
+formula for that—or else remembered part of it and obligingly invented
+the remainder.  I had never any real confidence in that formula; and even
+had we got it from a book, there were difficulties in the way of the
+application that might have daunted Archimedes.  We durst not drop any
+considerable pebble lest the sentinels should hear, and those that we
+dropped we could not hear ourselves.  We had never a watch—or none that
+had a second-hand; and though every one of us could guess a second to a
+nicety, all somehow guessed it differently.  In short, if any two set
+forth upon this enterprise, they invariably returned with two opinions,
+and often with a black eye in the bargain.  I looked on upon these
+proceedings, although not without laughter, yet with impatience and
+disgust.  I am one that cannot bear to see things botched or gone upon
+with ignorance; and the thought that some poor devil was to hazard his
+bones upon such premises, revolted me.  Had I guessed the name of that
+unhappy first adventurer, my sentiments might have been livelier still.
+
+The designation of this personage was indeed all that remained for us to
+do; and even in that we had advanced so far that the lot had fallen on
+Shed B.  It had been determined to mingle the bitter and the sweet; and
+whoever went down first, the whole of his shed-mates were to follow next
+in order.  This caused a good deal of joy in Shed B, and would have
+caused more if it had not still remained to choose our pioneer.  In view
+of the ambiguity in which we lay as to the length of the rope and the
+height of the precipice—and that this gentleman was to climb down from
+fifty to seventy fathoms on a pitchy night, on a rope entirely free, and
+with not so much as an infant child to steady it at the bottom, a little
+backwardness was perhaps excusable.  But it was, in our case, more than a
+little.  The truth is, we were all womanish fellows about a height; and I
+have myself been put, more than once, _hors de combat_ by a less affair
+than the rock of Edinburgh Castle.
+
+We discussed it in the dark and between the passage of the rounds; and it
+was impossible for any body of men to show a less adventurous spirit.  I
+am sure some of us, and myself first among the number, regretted
+Goguelat.  Some were persuaded it was safe, and could prove the same by
+argument; but if they had good reasons why some one else should make the
+trial, they had better still why it should not be themselves.  Others,
+again, condemned the whole idea as insane; among these, as ill-luck would
+have it, a seaman of the fleet; who was the most dispiriting of all.  The
+height, he reminded us, was greater than the tallest ship’s mast, the
+rope entirely free; and he as good as defied the boldest and strongest to
+succeed.  We were relieved from this dead-lock by our sergeant-major of
+dragoons.
+
+‘Comrades,’ said he, ‘I believe I rank you all; and for that reason, if
+you really wish it, I will be the first myself.  At the same time, you
+are to consider what the chances are that I may prove to be the last, as
+well.  I am no longer young—I was sixty near a month ago.  Since I have
+been a prisoner, I have made for myself a little _bedaine_.  My arms are
+all gone to fat.  And you must promise not to blame me, if I fall and
+play the devil with the whole thing.’
+
+‘We cannot hear of such a thing!’ said I.  ‘M. Laclas is the oldest man
+here; and, as such, he should be the very last to offer.  It is plain, we
+must draw lots.’
+
+‘No,’ said M. Laclas; ‘you put something else in my head!  There is one
+here who owes a pretty candle to the others, for they have kept his
+secret.  Besides, the rest of us are only rabble; and he is another
+affair altogether.  Let Champdivers—let the noble go the first.’
+
+I confess there was a notable pause before the noble in question got his
+voice.  But there was no room for choice.  I had been so ill-advised,
+when I first joined the regiment, as to take ground on my nobility.  I
+had been often rallied on the matter in the ranks, and had passed under
+the by-names of _Monseigneur_ and _the Marquis_.  It was now needful I
+should justify myself and take a fair revenge.
+
+Any little hesitation I may have felt passed entirely unnoticed, from the
+lucky incident of a round happening at that moment to go by.  And during
+the interval of silence there occurred something that sent my blood to
+the boil.  There was a private in our shed called Clausel, a man of a
+very ugly disposition.  He had made one of the followers of Goguelat;
+but, whereas Goguelat had always a kind of monstrous gaiety about him,
+Clausel was no less morose than he was evil-minded.  He was sometimes
+called _the General_, and sometimes by a name too ill-mannered for
+repetition.  As we all sat listening, this man’s hand was laid on my
+shoulder, and his voice whispered in my ear: ‘If you don’t go, I’ll have
+you hanged, Marquis!’
+
+As soon as the round was past—‘Certainly, gentlemen!’ said I.  ‘I will
+give you a lead, with all the pleasure in the world.  But, first of all,
+there is a hound here to be punished.  M. Clausel has just insulted me,
+and dishonoured the French army; and I demand that he run the gauntlet of
+this shed.’
+
+There was but one voice asking what he had done, and, as soon as I had
+told them, but one voice agreeing to the punishment.  The General was, in
+consequence, extremely roughly handled, and the next day was
+congratulated by all who saw him on his _new decorations_.  It was lucky
+for us that he was one of the prime movers and believers in our project
+of escape, or he had certainly revenged himself by a denunciation.  As
+for his feelings towards myself, they appeared, by his looks, to surpass
+humanity; and I made up my mind to give him a wide berth in the future.
+
+Had I been to go down that instant, I believe I could have carried it
+well.  But it was already too late—the day was at hand.  The rest had
+still to be summoned.  Nor was this the extent of my misfortune; for the
+next night, and the night after, were adorned with a perfect galaxy of
+stars, and showed every cat that stirred in a quarter of a mile.  During
+this interval, I have to direct your sympathies on the Vicomte de
+Saint-Yves!  All addressed me softly, like folk round a sickbed.  Our
+Italian corporal, who had got a dozen of oysters from a fishwife, laid
+them at my feet, as though I were a Pagan idol; and I have never since
+been wholly at my ease in the society of shellfish.  He who was the best
+of our carvers brought me a snuff-box, which he had just completed, and
+which, while it was yet in hand, he had often declared he would not part
+with under fifteen dollars.  I believe the piece was worth the money too!
+And yet the voice stuck in my throat with which I must thank him.  I
+found myself, in a word, to be fed up like a prisoner in a camp of
+anthropophagi, and honoured like the sacrificial bull.  And what with
+these annoyances, and the risky venture immediately ahead, I found my
+part a trying one to play.
+
+It was a good deal of a relief when the third evening closed about the
+castle with volumes of sea-fog.  The lights of Princes Street sometimes
+disappeared, sometimes blinked across at us no brighter than the eyes of
+cats; and five steps from one of the lanterns on the ramparts it was
+already groping dark.  We made haste to lie down.  Had our jailers been
+upon the watch, they must have observed our conversation to die out
+unusually soon.  Yet I doubt if any of us slept.  Each lay in his place,
+tortured at once with the hope of liberty and the fear of a hateful
+death.  The guard call sounded; the hum of the town declined by little
+and little.  On all sides of us, in their different quarters, we could
+hear the watchman cry the hours along the street.  Often enough, during
+my stay in England, have I listened to these gruff or broken voices; or
+perhaps gone to my window when I lay sleepless, and watched the old
+gentleman hobble by upon the causeway with his cape and his cap, his
+hanger and his rattle.  It was ever a thought with me how differently
+that cry would re-echo in the chamber of lovers, beside the bed of death,
+or in the condemned cell.  I might be said to hear it that night myself
+in the condemned cell!  At length a fellow with a voice like a bull’s
+began to roar out in the opposite thoroughfare:
+
+‘Past yin o’cloak, and a dark, haary moarnin’.’
+
+At which we were all silently afoot.
+
+As I stole about the battlements towards the—gallows, I was about to
+write—the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of my resolution, kept close
+by me, and occasionally proffered the most indigestible reassurances in
+my ear.  At last I could bear them no longer.
+
+‘Be so obliging as to let me be!’ said I.  ‘I am neither a coward nor a
+fool.  What do _you_ know of whether the rope be long enough?  But I
+shall know it in ten minutes!’
+
+The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted me.
+
+It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper before a friend
+alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had to go handsomely.  It
+was then my time to come on the stage; and I hope I took it handsomely.
+
+‘Now, gentlemen,’ said I, ‘if the rope is ready, here is the criminal!’
+
+The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope extended.  As I moved
+forward to the place, many of my comrades caught me by the hand and wrung
+it, an attention I could well have done without.
+
+‘Keep an eye on Clausel!’ I whispered to Laclas; and with that, got down
+on my elbows and knees took the rope in both hands, and worked myself,
+feet foremost, through the tunnel.  When the earth failed under my feet,
+I thought my heart would have stopped; and a moment after I was demeaning
+myself in mid-air like a drunken jumping-jack.  I have never been a model
+of piety, but at this juncture prayers and a cold sweat burst from me
+simultaneously.
+
+The line was knotted at intervals of eighteen inches; and to the inexpert
+it may seem as if it should have been even easy to descend.  The trouble
+was, this devil of a piece of rope appeared to be inspired, not with life
+alone, but with a personal malignity against myself.  It turned to the
+one side, paused for a moment, and then spun me like a toasting-jack to
+the other; slipped like an eel from the clasp of my feet; kept me all the
+time in the most outrageous fury of exertion; and dashed me at intervals
+against the face of the rock.  I had no eyes to see with; and I doubt if
+there was anything to see but darkness.  I must occasionally have caught
+a gasp of breath, but it was quite unconscious.  And the whole forces of
+my mind were so consumed with losing hold and getting it again, that I
+could scarce have told whether I was going up or coming down.
+
+Of a sudden I knocked against the cliff with such a thump as almost
+bereft me of my sense; and, as reason twinkled back, I was amazed to find
+that I was in a state of rest, that the face of the precipice here
+inclined outwards at an angle which relieved me almost wholly of the
+burthen of my own weight, and that one of my feet was safely planted on a
+ledge.  I drew one of the sweetest breaths in my experience, hugged
+myself against the rope, and closed my eyes in a kind of ecstasy of
+relief.  It occurred to me next to see how far I was advanced on my
+unlucky journey, a point on which I had not a shadow of a guess.  I
+looked up: there was nothing above me but the blackness of the night and
+the fog.  I craned timidly forward and looked down.  There, upon a floor
+of darkness, I beheld a certain pattern of hazy lights, some of them
+aligned as in thoroughfares, others standing apart as in solitary houses;
+and before I could well realise it, or had in the least estimated my
+distance, a wave of nausea and vertigo warned me to lie back and close my
+eyes.  In this situation I had really but the one wish, and that was:
+something else to think of!  Strange to say, I got it: a veil was torn
+from my mind, and I saw what a fool I was—what fools we had all been—and
+that I had no business to be thus dangling between earth and heaven by my
+arms.  The only thing to have done was to have attached me to a rope and
+lowered me, and I had never the wit to see it till that moment!
+
+I filled my lungs, got a good hold on my rope, and once more launched
+myself on the descent.  As it chanced, the worst of the danger was at an
+end, and I was so fortunate as to be never again exposed to any violent
+concussion.  Soon after I must have passed within a little distance of a
+bush of wallflower, for the scent of it came over me with that impression
+of reality which characterises scents in darkness.  This made me a second
+landmark, the ledge being my first.  I began accordingly to compute
+intervals of time: so much to the ledge, so much again to the wallflower,
+so much more below.  If I were not at the bottom of the rock, I
+calculated I must be near indeed to the end of the rope, and there was no
+doubt that I was not far from the end of my own resources.  I began to be
+light-headed and to be tempted to let go,—now arguing that I was
+certainly arrived within a few feet of the level and could safely risk a
+fall, anon persuaded I was still close at the top and it was idle to
+continue longer on the rock.  In the midst of which I came to a bearing
+on plain ground, and had nearly wept aloud.  My hands were as good as
+flayed, my courage entirely exhausted, and, what with the long strain and
+the sudden relief, my limbs shook under me with more than the violence of
+ague, and I was glad to cling to the rope.
+
+But this was no time to give way.  I had (by God’s single mercy) got
+myself alive out of that fortress; and now I had to try to get the
+others, my comrades.  There was about a fathom of rope to spare; I got it
+by the end, and searched the whole ground thoroughly for anything to make
+it fast to.  In vain: the ground was broken and stony, but there grew not
+there so much as a bush of furze.
+
+‘Now then,’ thought I to myself, ‘here begins a new lesson, and I believe
+it will prove richer than the first.  I am not strong enough to keep this
+rope extended.  If I do not keep it extended the next man will be dashed
+against the precipice.  There is no reason why he should have my
+extravagant good luck.  I see no reason why he should not fall—nor any
+place for him to fall on but my head.’
+
+From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible, as the fog
+lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which gave me a measure
+of the height he had to fall and the horrid force that he must strike me
+with.  What was yet worse, we had agreed to do without signals: every so
+many minutes by Laclas’ watch another man was to be started from the
+battlements.  Now, I had seemed to myself to be about half an hour in my
+descent, and it seemed near as long again that I waited, straining on the
+rope for my next comrade to begin.  I began to be afraid that our
+conspiracy was out, that my friends were all secured, and that I should
+pass the remainder of the night, and be discovered in the morning, vainly
+clinging to the rope’s end like a hooked fish upon an angle.  I could not
+refrain, at this ridiculous image, from a chuckle of laughter.  And the
+next moment I knew, by the jerking of the rope, that my friend had
+crawled out of the tunnel and was fairly launched on his descent.  It
+appears it was the sailor who had insisted on succeeding me: as soon as
+my continued silence had assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier,
+for that was his name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself
+so extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.  It was like the fellow,
+who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive selfishness.  But he was
+like to have paid pretty dearly for the privilege.  Do as I would, I
+could not keep the rope as I could have wished it; and he ended at last
+by falling on me from a height of several yards, so that we both rolled
+together on the ground.  As soon as he could breathe he cursed me beyond
+belief, wept over his finger, which he had broken, and cursed me again.
+I bade him be still and think shame of himself to be so great a cry-baby.
+Did he not hear the round going by above? I asked; and who could tell but
+what the noise of his fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the
+very moment leaning upon the battlements to listen?
+
+The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the third man
+came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of course, child’s play;
+and before there were ten of us collected, it seemed to me that, without
+the least injustice to my comrades, I might proceed to take care of
+myself.
+
+I knew their plan: they had a map and an almanack, and designed for
+Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.  Suppose them to do so, I
+had no idea they were qualified to manage it after it was stolen.  Their
+whole escape, indeed, was the most haphazard thing imaginable; only the
+impatience of captives and the ignorance of private soldiers would have
+entertained so misbegotten a device; and though I played the good comrade
+and worked with them upon the tunnel, but for the lawyer’s message I
+should have let them go without me.  Well, now they were beyond my help,
+as they had always been beyond my counselling; and, without word said or
+leave taken, I stole out of the little crowd.  It is true I would rather
+have waited to shake hands with Laclas, but in the last man who had
+descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and since the scene in the shed
+my distrust of Clausel was perfect.  I believed the man to be capable of
+any infamy, and events have since shown that I was right.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII—SWANSTON COTTAGE
+
+
+I had two views.  The first was, naturally, to get clear of Edinburgh
+Castle and the town, to say nothing of my fellow-prisoners; the second to
+work to the southward so long as it was night, and be near Swanston
+Cottage by morning.  What I should do there and then, I had no guess, and
+did not greatly care, being a devotee of a couple of divinities called
+Chance and Circumstance.  Prepare, if possible; where it is impossible,
+work straight forward, and keep your eyes open and your tongue oiled.
+Wit and a good exterior—there is all life in a nutshell.
+
+I had at first a rather chequered journey: got involved in gardens,
+butted into houses, and had even once the misfortune to awake a sleeping
+family, the father of which, as I suppose, menaced me from the window
+with a blunderbuss.  Altogether, though I had been some time gone from my
+companions, I was still at no great distance, when a miserable accident
+put a period to the escape.  Of a sudden the night was divided by a
+scream.  This was followed by the sound of something falling, and that
+again by the report of a musket from the Castle battlements.  It was
+strange to hear the alarm spread through the city.  In the fortress drums
+were beat and a bell rung backward.  On all hands the watchmen sprang
+their rattles.  Even in that limbo or no-man’s-land where I was
+wandering, lights were made in the houses; sashes were flung up; I could
+hear neighbouring families converse from window to window, and at length
+I was challenged myself.
+
+‘Wha’s that?’ cried a big voice.
+
+I could see it proceeded from a big man in a big nightcap, leaning from a
+one-pair window; and as I was not yet abreast of his house, I judged it
+was more wise to answer.  This was not the first time I had had to stake
+my fortunes on the goodness of my accent in a foreign tongue; and I have
+always found the moment inspiriting, as a gambler should.  Pulling around
+me a sort of great-coat I had made of my blanket, to cover my
+sulphur-coloured livery,—‘A friend!’ said I.
+
+‘What like’s all this collieshangie?’ said he.
+
+I had never heard of a collieshangie in my days, but with the racket all
+about us in the city, I could have no doubt as to the man’s meaning.
+
+‘I do not know, sir, really,’ said I; ‘but I suppose some of the
+prisoners will have escaped.’
+
+‘Bedamned!’ says he.
+
+‘Oh, sir, they will be soon taken,’ I replied: ‘it has been found in
+time.  Good morning, sir!’
+
+‘Ye walk late, sir?’ he added.
+
+‘Oh, surely not,’ said I, with a laugh.  ‘Earlyish, if you like!’ which
+brought me finally beyond him, highly pleased with my success.
+
+I was now come forth on a good thoroughfare, which led (as well as I
+could judge) in my direction.  It brought me almost immediately through a
+piece of street, whence I could hear close by the springing of a
+watchman’s rattle, and where I suppose a sixth part of the windows would
+be open, and the people, in all sorts of night gear, talking with a kind
+of tragic gusto from one to another.  Here, again, I must run the
+gauntlet of a half-dozen questions, the rattle all the while sounding
+nearer; but as I was not walking inordinately quick, as I spoke like a
+gentleman, and the lamps were too dim to show my dress, I carried it off
+once more.  One person, indeed, inquired where I was off to at that hour.
+
+I replied vaguely and cheerfully, and as I escaped at one end of this
+dangerous pass I could see the watchman’s lantern entering by the other.
+I was now safe on a dark country highway, out of sight of lights and out
+of the fear of watchmen.  And yet I had not gone above a hundred yards
+before a fellow made an ugly rush at me from the roadside.  I avoided him
+with a leap, and stood on guard, cursing my empty hands, wondering
+whether I had to do with an officer or a mere footpad, and scarce knowing
+which to wish.  My assailant stood a little; in the thick darkness I
+could see him bob and sidle as though he were feinting at me for an
+advantageous onfall.  Then he spoke.
+
+‘My goo’ frien’,’ says he, and at the first word I pricked my ears, ‘my
+goo’ frien’, will you oblishe me with lil neshary infamation?  Whish roa’
+t’ Cramond?’
+
+I laughed out clear and loud, stepped up to the convivialist, took him by
+the shoulders and faced him about.  ‘My good friend,’ said I, ‘I believe
+I know what is best for you much better than yourself, and may God
+forgive you the fright you have given me!  There, get you gone to
+Edinburgh!’  And I gave a shove, which he obeyed with the passive agility
+of a ball, and disappeared incontinently in the darkness down the road by
+which I had myself come.
+
+Once clear of this foolish fellow, I went on again up a gradual hill,
+descended on the other side through the houses of a country village, and
+came at last to the bottom of the main ascent leading to the Pentlands
+and my destination.  I was some way up when the fog began to lighten; a
+little farther, and I stepped by degrees into a clear starry night, and
+saw in front of me, and quite distinct, the summits of the Pentlands, and
+behind, the valley of the Forth and the city of my late captivity buried
+under a lake of vapour.  I had but one encounter—that of a farm-cart,
+which I heard, from a great way ahead of me, creaking nearer in the
+night, and which passed me about the point of dawn like a thing seen in a
+dream, with two silent figures in the inside nodding to the horse’s
+steps.  I presume they were asleep; by the shawl about her head and
+shoulders, one of them should be a woman.  Soon, by concurrent steps, the
+day began to break and the fog to subside and roll away.  The east grew
+luminous and was barred with chilly colours, and the Castle on its rock,
+and the spires and chimneys of the upper town, took gradual shape, and
+arose, like islands, out of the receding cloud.  All about me was still
+and sylvan; the road mounting and winding, with nowhere a sign of any
+passenger, the birds chirping, I suppose for warmth, the boughs of the
+trees knocking together, and the red leaves falling in the wind.
+
+It was broad day, but still bitter cold and the sun not up, when I came
+in view of my destination.  A single gable and chimney of the cottage
+peeped over the shoulder of the hill; not far off, and a trifle higher on
+the mountain, a tall old white-washed farmhouse stood among the trees,
+beside a falling brook; beyond were rough hills of pasture.  I bethought
+me that shepherd folk were early risers, and if I were once seen skulking
+in that neighbourhood it might prove the ruin of my prospects; took
+advantage of a line of hedge, and worked myself up in its shadow till I
+was come under the garden wall of my friends’ house.  The cottage was a
+little quaint place of many rough-cast gables and grey roofs.  It had
+something the air of a rambling infinitesimal cathedral, the body of it
+rising in the midst two storeys high, with a steep-pitched roof, and
+sending out upon all hands (as it were chapter-houses, chapels, and
+transepts) one-storeyed and dwarfish projections.  To add to this
+appearance, it was grotesquely decorated with crockets and gargoyles,
+ravished from some medieval church.  The place seemed hidden away, being
+not only concealed in the trees of the garden, but, on the side on which
+I approached it, buried as high as the eaves by the rising of the ground.
+About the walls of the garden there went a line of well-grown elms and
+beeches, the first entirely bare, the last still pretty well covered with
+red leaves, and the centre was occupied with a thicket of laurel and
+holly, in which I could see arches cut and paths winding.
+
+I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the better.  The house
+appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to wake any one, I had no guarantee
+it might not prove either the aunt with the gold eyeglasses (whom I could
+only remember with trembling), or some ass of a servant-maid who should
+burst out screaming at sight of me.  Higher up I could hear and see a
+shepherd shouting to his dogs and striding on the rough sides of the
+mountain, and it was clear I must get to cover without loss of time.  No
+doubt the holly thickets would have proved a very suitable retreat, but
+there was mounted on the wall a sort of signboard not uncommon in the
+country of Great Britain, and very damping to the adventurous: SPRING
+GUNS AND MAN-TRAPS was the legend that it bore.  I have learned since
+that these advertisements, three times out of four, were in the nature of
+Quaker guns on a disarmed battery, but I had not learned it then, and
+even so, the odds would not have been good enough.  For a choice, I would
+a hundred times sooner be returned to Edinburgh Castle and my corner in
+the bastion, than to leave my foot in a steel trap or have to digest the
+contents of an automatic blunderbuss.  There was but one chance left—that
+Ronald or Flora might be the first to come abroad; and in order to profit
+by this chance if it occurred, I got me on the cope of the wall in a
+place where it was screened by the thick branches of a beech, and sat
+there waiting.
+
+As the day wore on, the sun came very pleasantly out.  I had been awake
+all night, I had undergone the most violent agitations of mind and body,
+and it is not so much to be wondered at, as it was exceedingly unwise and
+foolhardy, that I should have dropped into a doze.  From this I awakened
+to the characteristic sound of digging, looked down, and saw immediately
+below me the back view of a gardener in a stable waistcoat.  Now he would
+appear steadily immersed in his business; anon, to my more immediate
+terror, he would straighten his back, stretch his arms, gaze about the
+otherwise deserted garden, and relish a deep pinch of snuff.  It was my
+first thought to drop from the wall upon the other side.  A glance
+sufficed to show me that even the way by which I had come was now cut
+off, and the field behind me already occupied by a couple of shepherds’
+assistants and a score or two of sheep.  I have named the talismans on
+which I habitually depend, but here was a conjuncture in which both were
+wholly useless.  The copestone of a wall arrayed with broken bottles is
+no favourable rostrum; and I might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as
+fascinating as Richelieu, and neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads
+would care a halfpenny.  In short, there was no escape possible from my
+absurd position: there I must continue to sit until one or other of my
+neighbours should raise his eyes and give the signal for my capture.
+
+The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could be scarce
+less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of the beech which
+made a fashion of sheltering me were already partly fallen; and I was
+thus not only perilously exposed myself, but enabled to command some part
+of the garden walks and (under an evergreen arch) the front lawn and
+windows of the cottage.  For long nothing stirred except my friend with
+the spade; then I heard the opening of a sash; and presently after saw
+Miss Flora appear in a morning wrapper and come strolling hitherward
+between the borders, pausing and visiting her flowers—herself as fair.
+_There_ was a friend; _here_, immediately beneath me, an unknown
+quantity—the gardener: how to communicate with the one and not attract
+the notice of the other?  To make a noise was out of the question; I
+dared scarce to breathe.  I held myself ready to make a gesture as soon
+as she should look, and she looked in every possible direction but the
+one.  She was interested in the vilest tuft of chickweed, she gazed at
+the summit of the mountain, she came even immediately below me and
+conversed on the most fastidious topics with the gardener; but to the top
+of that wall she would not dedicate a glance!  At last she began to
+retrace her steps in the direction of the cottage; whereupon, becoming
+quite desperate, I broke off a piece of plaster, took a happy aim, and
+hit her with it in the nape of the neck.  She clapped her hand to the
+place, turned about, looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying
+me (as indeed I was parting the branches to make it the more easy), half
+uttered and half swallowed down again a cry of surprise.
+
+The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.  ‘What’s your wull,
+miss?’ said he.
+
+Her readiness amazed me.  She had already turned and was gazing in the
+opposite direction.  ‘There’s a child among the artichokes,’ she said.
+
+‘The Plagues of Egyp’!  _I’ll_ see to them!’ cried the gardener
+truculently, and with a hurried waddle disappeared among the evergreens.
+
+That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms stretched
+out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with heavenly blushes, the
+next pale as death.  ‘Monsieur de. Saint-Yves!’ she said.
+
+‘My dear young lady,’ I said, ‘this is the damnedest liberty—I know it!
+But what else was I to do?’
+
+‘You have escaped?’ said she.
+
+‘If you call this escape,’ I replied.
+
+‘But you cannot possibly stop there!’ she cried.
+
+‘I know it,’ said I.  ‘And where am I to go?’
+
+She struck her hands together.  ‘I have it!’ she exclaimed.  ‘Come down
+by the beech trunk—you must leave no footprint in the border—quickly,
+before Robie can get back!  I am the hen-wife here: I keep the key; you
+must go into the hen-house—for the moment.’
+
+I was by her side at once.  Both cast a hasty glance at the blank windows
+of the cottage and so much as was visible of the garden alleys; it seemed
+there was none to observe us.  She caught me by the sleeve and ran.  It
+was no time for compliments; hurry breathed upon our necks; and I ran
+along with her to the next corner of the garden, where a wired court and
+a board hovel standing in a grove of trees advertised my place of refuge.
+She thrust me in without a word; the bulk of the fowls were at the same
+time emitted; and I found myself the next moment locked in alone with
+half a dozen sitting hens.  In the twilight of the place all fixed their
+eyes on me severely, and seemed to upbraid me with some crying
+impropriety.  Doubtless the hen has always a puritanic appearance,
+although (in its own behaviour) I could never observe it to be more
+particular than its neighbours.  But conceive a British hen!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII—THE HEN-HOUSE
+
+
+I was half an hour at least in the society of these distressing bipeds,
+and alone with my own reflections and necessities.  I was in great pain
+of my flayed hands, and had nothing to treat them with; I was hungry and
+thirsty, and had nothing to eat or to drink; I was thoroughly tired, and
+there was no place for me to sit.  To be sure there was the floor, but
+nothing could be imagined less inviting.
+
+At the sound of approaching footsteps, my good-humour was restored.  The
+key rattled in the lock, and Master Ronald entered, closed the door
+behind him, and leaned his back to it.
+
+‘I say, you know!’ he said, and shook a sullen young head.
+
+‘I know it’s a liberty,’ said I.
+
+‘It’s infernally awkward: my position is infernally embarrassing,’ said
+he.
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘and what do you think of mine?’
+
+This seemed to pose him entirely, and he remained gazing upon me with a
+convincing air of youth and innocence.  I could have laughed, but I was
+not so inhumane.
+
+‘I am in your hands,’ said I, with a little gesture.  ‘You must do with
+me what you think right.’
+
+‘Ah, yes!’ he cried: ‘if I knew!’
+
+‘You see,’ said I, ‘it would be different if you had received your
+commission.  Properly speaking, you are not yet a combatant; I have
+ceased to be one; and I think it arguable that we are just in the
+position of one ordinary gentleman to another, where friendship usually
+comes before the law.  Observe, I only say _arguable_.  For God’s sake,
+don’t think I wish to dictate an opinion.  These are the sort of nasty
+little businesses, inseparable from war, which every gentleman must
+decide for himself.  If I were in your place—’
+
+‘Ay, what would you do, then?’ says he.
+
+‘Upon my word, I do not know,’ said I.  ‘Hesitate, as you are doing, I
+believe.’
+
+‘I will tell you,’ he said.  ‘I have a kinsman, and it is what _he_ would
+think, that I am thinking.  It is General Graham of Lynedoch—Sir Thomas
+Graham.  I scarcely know him, but I believe I admire him more than I do
+God.’
+
+‘I admire him a good deal myself,’ said I, ‘and have good reason to.  I
+have fought with him, been beaten, and run away.  _Veni_, _victus sum_,
+_evasi_.’
+
+‘What!’ he cried.  ‘You were at Barossa?’
+
+‘There and back, which many could not say,’ said I.  ‘It was a pretty
+affair and a hot one, and the Spaniards behaved abominably, as they
+usually did in a pitched field; the Marshal Duke of Belluno made a fool
+of himself, and not for the first time; and your friend Sir Thomas had
+the best of it, so far as there was any best.  He is a brave and ready
+officer.’
+
+‘Now, then, you will understand!’ said the boy.  ‘I wish to please Sir
+Thomas: what would he do?’
+
+‘Well, I can tell you a story,’ said I, ‘a true one too, and about this
+very combat of Chiclana, or Barossa as you call it.  I was in the Eighth
+of the Line; we lost the eagle of the First Battalion, more betoken, but
+it cost you dear.  Well, we had repulsed more charges than I care to
+count, when your 87th Regiment came on at a foot’s pace, very slow but
+very steady; in front of them a mounted officer, his hat in his hand,
+white-haired, and talking very quietly to the battalions.  Our Major,
+Vigo-Roussillon, set spurs to his horse and galloped out to sabre him,
+but seeing him an old man, very handsome, and as composed as if he were
+in a coffee-house, lost heart and galloped back again.  Only, you see,
+they had been very close together for the moment, and looked each other
+in the eyes.  Soon after the Major was wounded, taken prisoner, and
+carried into Cadiz.  One fine day they announced to him the visit of the
+General, Sir Thomas Graham.  “Well, sir,” said the General, taking him by
+the hand, “I think we were face to face upon the field.”  It was the
+white-haired officer!’
+
+‘Ah!’ cried the boy,—his eyes were burning.
+
+‘Well, and here is the point,’ I continued.  ‘Sir Thomas fed the Major
+from his own table from that day, and served him with six covers.’
+
+‘Yes, it is a beautiful—a beautiful story,’ said Ronald.  ‘And yet
+somehow it is not the same—is it?’
+
+‘I admit it freely,’ said I.
+
+The boy stood awhile brooding.  ‘Well, I take my risk of it,’ he cried.
+‘I believe it’s treason to my sovereign—I believe there is an infamous
+punishment for such a crime—and yet I’m hanged if I can give you up.’
+
+I was as much moved as he.  ‘I could almost beg you to do otherwise,’ I
+said.  ‘I was a brute to come to you, a brute and a coward.  You are a
+noble enemy; you will make a noble soldier.’  And with rather a happy
+idea of a compliment for this warlike youth, I stood up straight and gave
+him the salute.
+
+He was for a moment confused; his face flushed.  ‘Well, well, I must be
+getting you something to eat, but it will not be for six,’ he added, with
+a smile: ‘only what we can get smuggled out.  There is my aunt in the
+road, you see,’ and he locked me in again with the indignant hens.
+
+I always smile when I recall that young fellow; and yet, if the reader
+were to smile also, I should feel ashamed.  If my son shall be only like
+him when he comes to that age, it will be a brave day for me and not a
+bad one for his country.
+
+At the same time I cannot pretend that I was sorry when his sister
+succeeded in his place.  She brought me a few crusts of bread and a jug
+of milk, which she had handsomely laced with whisky after the Scottish
+manner.
+
+‘I am so sorry,’ she said: ‘I dared not bring on anything more.  We are
+so small a family, and my aunt keeps such an eye upon the servants.  I
+have put some whisky in the milk—it is more wholesome so—and with eggs
+you will be able to make something of a meal.  How many eggs will you be
+wanting to that milk? for I must be taking the others to my aunt—that is
+my excuse for being here.  I should think three or four.  Do you know how
+to beat them? or shall I do it?’
+
+Willing to detain her a while longer in the hen-house, I displayed my
+bleeding palms; at which she cried aloud.
+
+‘My dear Miss Flora, you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs,’
+said I; ‘and it is no bagatelle to escape from Edinburgh Castle.  One of
+us, I think, was even killed.’
+
+‘And you are as white as a rag, too,’ she exclaimed, ‘and can hardly
+stand!  Here is my shawl, sit down upon it here in the corner, and I will
+beat your eggs.  See, I have brought a fork too; I should have been a
+good person to take care of Jacobites or Covenanters in old days!  You
+shall have more to eat this evening; Ronald is to bring it you from town.
+We have money enough, although no food that we can call our own.  Ah, if
+Ronald and I kept house, you should not be lying in this shed!  He
+admires you so much.’
+
+‘My dear friend,’ said I, ‘for God’s sake do not embarrass me with more
+alms.  I loved to receive them from that hand, so long as they were
+needed; but they are so no more, and whatever else I may lack—and I lack
+everything—it is not money.’  I pulled out my sheaf of notes and detached
+the top one: it was written for ten pounds, and signed by that very
+famous individual, Abraham Newlands.  ‘Oblige me, as you would like me to
+oblige your brother if the parts were reversed, and take this note for
+the expenses.  I shall need not only food, but clothes.’
+
+‘Lay it on the ground,’ said she.  ‘I must not stop my beating.’
+
+‘You are not offended?’ I exclaimed.
+
+She answered me by a look that was a reward in itself, and seemed to
+imply the most heavenly offers for the future.  There was in it a shadow
+of reproach, and such warmth of communicative cordiality as left me
+speechless.  I watched her instead till her hens’ milk was ready.
+
+‘Now,’ said she, ‘taste that.’
+
+I did so, and swore it was nectar.  She collected her eggs and crouched
+in front of me to watch me eat.  There was about this tall young lady at
+the moment an air of motherliness delicious to behold.  I am like the
+English general, and to this day I still wonder at my moderation.
+
+‘What sort of clothes will you be wanting?’ said she.
+
+‘The clothes of a gentleman,’ said I.  ‘Right or wrong, I think it is the
+part I am best qualified to play.  Mr. St. Ives (for that’s to be my name
+upon the journey) I conceive as rather a theatrical figure, and his
+make-up should be to match.’
+
+‘And yet there is a difficulty,’ said she.  ‘If you got coarse clothes
+the fit would hardly matter.  But the clothes of a fine gentleman—O, it
+is absolutely necessary that these should fit!  And above all, with
+your’—she paused a moment—‘to our ideas somewhat noticeable manners.’
+
+‘Alas for my poor manners!’ said I.  ‘But my dear friend Flora, these
+little noticeabilities are just what mankind has to suffer under.
+Yourself, you see, you’re very noticeable even when you come in a crowd
+to visit poor prisoners in the Castle.’
+
+I was afraid I should frighten my good angel visitant away, and without
+the smallest breath of pause went on to add a few directions as to stuffs
+and colours.
+
+She opened big eyes upon me.  ‘O, Mr. St. Ives!’ she cried—‘if that is to
+be your name—I do not say they would not be becoming; but for a journey,
+do you think they would be wise?  I am afraid’—she gave a pretty break of
+laughter—‘I am afraid they would be daft-like!’
+
+‘Well, and am I not daft?’ I asked her.
+
+‘I do begin to think you are,’ said she.
+
+‘There it is, then!’ said I.  ‘I have been long enough a figure of fun.
+Can you not feel with me that perhaps the bitterest thing in this
+captivity has been the clothes?  Make me a captive—bind me with chains if
+you like—but let me be still myself.  You do not know what it is to be a
+walking travesty—among foes,’ I added bitterly.
+
+‘O, but you are too unjust!’ she cried.  ‘You speak as though any one
+ever dreamed of laughing at you.  But no one did.  We were all pained to
+the heart.  Even my aunt—though sometimes I do think she was not quite in
+good taste—you should have seen her and heard her at home!  She took so
+much interest.  Every patch in your clothes made us sorry; it should have
+been a sister’s work.’
+
+‘That is what I never had—a sister,’ said I.  ‘But since you say that I
+did not make you laugh—’
+
+‘O, Mr. St. Ives! never!’ she exclaimed.  ‘Not for one moment.  It was
+all too sad.  To see a gentleman—’
+
+‘In the clothes of a harlequin, and begging?’ I suggested.
+
+‘To see a gentleman in distress, and nobly supporting it,’ she said.
+
+‘And do you not understand, my fair foe,’ said I, ‘that even if all were
+as you say—even if you had thought my travesty were becoming—I should be
+only the more anxious, for my sake, for my country’s sake, and for the
+sake of your kindness, that you should see him whom you have helped as
+God meant him to be seen? that you should have something to remember him
+by at least more characteristic than a misfitting sulphur-yellow suit,
+and half a week’s beard?’
+
+‘You think a great deal too much of clothes,’ she said.  ‘I am not that
+kind of girl.’
+
+‘And I am afraid I am that kind of man,’ said I.  ‘But do not think of me
+too harshly for that.  I talked just now of something to remember by.  I
+have many of them myself, of these beautiful reminders, of these
+keepsakes, that I cannot be parted from until I lose memory and life.
+Many of them are great things, many of them are high virtues—charity,
+mercy, faith.  But some of them are trivial enough.  Miss Flora, do you
+remember the day that I first saw you, the day of the strong east wind?
+Miss Flora, shall I tell you what you wore?’
+
+We had both risen to our feet, and she had her hand already on the door
+to go.  Perhaps this attitude emboldened me to profit by the last seconds
+of our interview; and it certainly rendered her escape the more easy.
+
+‘O, you are too romantic!’ she said, laughing; and with that my sun was
+blown out, my enchantress had fled away, and I was again left alone in
+the twilight with the lady hens.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX—THREE IS COMPANY, AND FOUR NONE
+
+
+The rest of the day I slept in the corner of the hen-house upon Flora’s
+shawl.  Nor did I awake until a light shone suddenly in my eyes, and
+starting up with a gasp (for, indeed, at the moment I dreamed I was still
+swinging from the Castle battlements) I found Ronald bending over me with
+a lantern.  It appeared it was past midnight, that I had slept about
+sixteen hours, and that Flora had returned her poultry to the shed and I
+had heard her not.  I could not but wonder if she had stooped to look at
+me as I slept.  The puritan hens now slept irremediably; and being
+cheered with the promise of supper I wished them an ironical good-night,
+and was lighted across the garden and noiselessly admitted to a bedroom
+on the ground floor of the cottage.  There I found soap, water,
+razors—offered me diffidently by my beardless host—and an outfit of new
+clothes.  To be shaved again without depending on the barber of the gaol
+was a source of a delicious, if a childish joy.  My hair was sadly too
+long, but I was none so unwise as to make an attempt on it myself.  And,
+indeed, I thought it did not wholly misbecome me as it was, being by
+nature curly.  The clothes were about as good as I expected.  The
+waistcoat was of toilenet, a pretty piece, the trousers of fine
+kerseymere, and the coat sat extraordinarily well.  Altogether, when I
+beheld this changeling in the glass, I kissed my hand to him.
+
+‘My dear fellow,’ said I, ‘have you no scent?’
+
+‘Good God, no!’ cried Ronald.  ‘What do you want with scent?’
+
+‘Capital thing on a campaign,’ said I.  ‘But I can do without.’
+
+I was now led, with the same precautions against noise, into the little
+bow-windowed dining-room of the cottage.  The shutters were up, the lamp
+guiltily turned low; the beautiful Flora greeted me in a whisper; and
+when I was set down to table, the pair proceeded to help me with
+precautions that might have seemed excessive in the Ear of Dionysius.
+
+‘She sleeps up there,’ observed the boy, pointing to the ceiling; and the
+knowledge that I was so imminently near to the resting-place of that gold
+eyeglass touched even myself with some uneasiness.
+
+Our excellent youth had imported from the city a meat pie, and I was glad
+to find it flanked with a decanter of really admirable wine of Oporto.
+While I ate, Ronald entertained me with the news of the city, which had
+naturally rung all day with our escape: troops and mounted messengers had
+followed each other forth at all hours and in all directions; but
+according to the last intelligence no recapture had been made.  Opinion
+in town was very favourable to us: our courage was applauded, and many
+professed regret that our ultimate chance of escape should be so small.
+The man who had fallen was one Sombref, a peasant; he was one who slept
+in a different part of the Castle; and I was thus assured that the whole
+of my former companions had attained their liberty, and Shed A was
+untenanted.
+
+From this we wandered insensibly into other topics.  It is impossible to
+exaggerate the pleasure I took to be thus sitting at the same table with
+Flora, in the clothes of a gentleman, at liberty and in the full
+possession of my spirits and resources; of all of which I had need,
+because it was necessary that I should support at the same time two
+opposite characters, and at once play the cavalier and lively soldier for
+the eyes of Ronald, and to the ears of Flora maintain the same profound
+and sentimental note that I had already sounded.  Certainly there are
+days when all goes well with a man; when his wit, his digestion, his
+mistress are in a conspiracy to spoil him, and even the weather smiles
+upon his wishes.  I will only say of myself upon that evening that I
+surpassed my expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.
+Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution; until at
+last we were brought back to earth by a catastrophe that might very
+easily have been foreseen, but was not the less astonishing to us when it
+occurred.
+
+I had filled all the glasses.  ‘I have a toast to propose,’ I whispered,
+‘or rather three, but all so inextricably interwoven that they will not
+bear dividing.  I wish first to drink to the health of a brave and
+therefore a generous enemy.  He found me disarmed, a fugitive and
+helpless.  Like the lion, he disdained so poor a triumph; and when he
+might have vindicated an easy valour, he preferred to make a friend.  I
+wish that we should next drink to a fairer and a more tender foe.  She
+found me in prison; she cheered me with a priceless sympathy; what she
+has done since, I know she has done in mercy, and I only pray—I dare
+scarce hope—her mercy may prove to have been merciful.  And I wish to
+conjoin with these, for the first, and perhaps the last time, the
+health—and I fear I may already say the memory—of one who has fought, not
+always without success, against the soldiers of your nation; but who came
+here, vanquished already, only to be vanquished again by the loyal hand
+of the one, by the unforgettable eyes of the other.’
+
+It is to be feared I may have lent at times a certain resonancy to my
+voice; it is to be feared that Ronald, who was none the better for his
+own hospitality, may have set down his glass with something of a clang.
+Whatever may have been the cause, at least, I had scarce finished my
+compliment before we were aware of a thump upon the ceiling overhead.  It
+was to be thought some very solid body had descended to the floor from
+the level (possibly) of a bed.  I have never seen consternation painted
+in more lively colours than on the faces of my hosts.  It was proposed to
+smuggle me forth into the garden, or to conceal my form under a horsehair
+sofa which stood against the wall.  For the first expedient, as was now
+plain by the approaching footsteps, there was no longer time; from the
+second I recoiled with indignation.
+
+‘My dear creatures,’ said I, ‘let us die, but do not let us be
+ridiculous.’
+
+The words were still upon my lips when the door opened and my friend of
+the gold eyeglass appeared, a memorable figure, on the threshold.  In one
+hand she bore a bedroom candlestick; in the other, with the steadiness of
+a dragoon, a horse-pistol.  She was wound about in shawls which did not
+wholly conceal the candid fabric of her nightdress, and surmounted by a
+nightcap of portentous architecture.  Thus accoutred, she made her
+entrance; laid down the candle and pistol, as no longer called for;
+looked about the room with a silence more eloquent than oaths; and then,
+in a thrilling voice—‘To whom have I the pleasure?’ she said, addressing
+me with a ghost of a bow.
+
+‘Madam, I am charmed, I am sure,’ said I.  ‘The story is a little long;
+and our meeting, however welcome, was for the moment entirely unexpected
+by myself.  I am sure—’ but here I found I was quite sure of nothing, and
+tried again.  ‘I have the honour,’ I began, and found I had the honour to
+be only exceedingly confused.  With that, I threw myself outright upon
+her mercy.  ‘Madam, I must be more frank with you,’ I resumed.  ‘You have
+already proved your charity and compassion for the French prisoners, I am
+one of these; and if my appearance be not too much changed, you may even
+yet recognise in me that _Oddity_ who had the good fortune more than once
+to make you smile.’
+
+Still gazing upon me through her glass, she uttered an uncompromising
+grunt; and then, turning to her niece—‘Flora,’ said she, ‘how comes he
+here?’
+
+The culprits poured out for a while an antiphony of explanations, which
+died out at last in a miserable silence.
+
+‘I think at least you might have told your aunt,’ she snorted.
+
+‘Madam,’ I interposed, ‘they were about to do so.  It is my fault if it
+be not done already.  But I made it my prayer that your slumbers might be
+respected, and this necessary formula of my presentation should be
+delayed until to-morrow in the morning.’
+
+The old lady regarded me with undissembled incredulity, to which I was
+able to find no better repartee than a profound and I trust graceful
+reverence.
+
+‘French prisoners are very well in their place,’ she said, ‘but I cannot
+see that their place is in my private dining-room.’
+
+‘Madam,’ said I, ‘I hope it may be said without offence, but (except the
+Castle of Edinburgh) I cannot think upon the spot from which I would so
+readily be absent.’
+
+At this, to my relief, I thought I could perceive a vestige of a smile to
+steal upon that iron countenance and to be bitten immediately in.
+
+‘And if it is a fair question, what do they call ye?’ she asked.
+
+‘At your service, the Vicomte Anne de St.-Yves,’ said I.
+
+‘Mosha the Viscount,’ said she, ‘I am afraid you do us plain people a
+great deal too much honour.’
+
+‘My dear lady,’ said I, ‘let us be serious for a moment.  What was I to
+do?  Where was I to go?  And how can you be angry with these benevolent
+children who took pity on one so unfortunate as myself?  Your humble
+servant is no such terrific adventurer that you should come out against
+him with horse-pistol and’—smiling—‘bedroom candlesticks.  It is but a
+young gentleman in extreme distress, hunted upon every side, and asking
+no more than to escape from his pursuers.  I know your character, I read
+it in your face’—the heart trembled in my body as I said these daring
+words.  ‘There are unhappy English prisoners in France at this day,
+perhaps at this hour.  Perhaps at this hour they kneel as I do; they take
+the hand of her who might conceal and assist them; they press it to their
+lips as I do—’
+
+‘Here, here!’ cried the old lady, breaking from my solicitations.
+‘Behave yourself before folk!  Saw ever anyone the match of that?  And on
+earth, my dears, what are we to do with him?’
+
+‘Pack him off, my dear lady,’ said I: ‘pack off the impudent fellow
+double-quick!  And if it may be, and if your good heart allows it, help
+him a little on the way he has to go.’
+
+‘What’s this pie?’ she cried stridently.  ‘Where is this pie from,
+Flora?’
+
+No answer was vouchsafed by my unfortunate and (I may say) extinct
+accomplices.
+
+‘Is that my port?’ she pursued.  ‘Hough!  Will somebody give me a glass
+of my port wine?’
+
+I made haste to serve her.
+
+She looked at me over the rim with an extraordinary expression.  ‘I hope
+ye liked it?’ said she.
+
+‘It is even a magnificent wine,’ said I.
+
+‘Aweel, it was my father laid it down,’ said she.  ‘There were few knew
+more about port wine than my father, God rest him!’  She settled herself
+in a chair with an alarming air of resolution.  ‘And so there is some
+particular direction that you wish to go in?’ said she.
+
+‘O,’ said I, following her example, ‘I am by no means such a vagrant as
+you suppose.  I have good friends, if I could get to them, for which all
+I want is to be once clear of Scotland; and I have money for the road.’
+And I produced my bundle.
+
+‘English bank-notes?’ she said.  ‘That’s not very handy for Scotland.
+It’s been some fool of an Englishman that’s given you these, I’m
+thinking.  How much is it?’
+
+‘I declare to heaven I never thought to count!’ I exclaimed.  ‘But that
+is soon remedied.’
+
+And I counted out ten notes of ten pound each, all in the name of Abraham
+Newlands, and five bills of country bankers for as many guineas.
+
+‘One hundred and twenty six pound five,’ cried the old lady.  ‘And you
+carry such a sum about you, and have not so much as counted it!  If you
+are not a thief, you must allow you are very thief-like.’
+
+‘And yet, madam, the money is legitimately mine,’ said I.
+
+She took one of the bills and held it up.  ‘Is there any probability,
+now, that this could be traced?’ she asked.
+
+‘None, I should suppose; and if it were, it would be no matter,’ said I.
+‘With your usual penetration, you guessed right.  An Englishman brought
+it me.  It reached me, through the hands of his English solicitor, from
+my great-uncle, the Comte de Kéroual de Saint-Yves, I believe the richest
+_émigré_ in London.’
+
+‘I can do no more than take your word for it,’ said she.
+
+‘And I trust, madam, not less,’ said I.
+
+‘Well,’ said she, ‘at this rate the matter may be feasible.  I will cash
+one of these five-guinea bills, less the exchange, and give you silver
+and Scots notes to bear you as far as the border.  Beyond that, Mosha the
+Viscount, you will have to depend upon yourself.’
+
+I could not but express a civil hesitation as to whether the amount would
+suffice, in my case, for so long a journey.
+
+‘Ay,’ said she, ‘but you havenae heard me out.  For if you are not too
+fine a gentleman to travel with a pair of drovers, I believe I have found
+the very thing, and the Lord forgive me for a treasonable old wife!
+There are a couple stopping up by with the shepherd-man at the farm;
+to-morrow they will take the road for England, probably by skriegh of
+day—and in my opinion you had best be travelling with the stots,’ said
+she.
+
+‘For Heaven’s sake do not suppose me to be so effeminate a character!’ I
+cried.  ‘An old soldier of Napoleon is certainly beyond suspicion.  But,
+dear lady, to what end? and how is the society of these excellent
+gentlemen supposed to help me?’
+
+‘My dear sir,’ said she, ‘you do not at all understand your own
+predicament, and must just leave your matters in the hands of those who
+do.  I dare say you have never even heard tell of the drove-roads or the
+drovers; and I am certainly not going to sit up all night to explain it
+to you.  Suffice it, that it is me who is arranging this affair—the more
+shame to me!—and that is the way ye have to go.  Ronald,’ she continued,
+‘away up-by to the shepherds; rowst them out of their beds, and make it
+perfectly distinct that Sim is not to leave till he has seen me.’
+
+Ronald was nothing loath to escape from his aunt’s neighbourhood, and
+left the room and the cottage with a silent expedition that was more like
+flight than mere obedience.  Meanwhile the old lady turned to her niece.
+
+‘And I would like to know what we are to do with him the night!’ she
+cried.
+
+‘Ronald and I meant to put him in the hen-house,’ said the encrimsoned
+Flora.
+
+‘And I can tell you he is to go to no such a place,’ replied the aunt.
+‘Hen-house, indeed!  If a guest he is to be, he shall sleep in no mortal
+hen-house.  Your room is the most fit, I think, if he will consent to
+occupy it on so great a suddenty.  And as for you, Flora, you shall sleep
+with me.’
+
+I could not help admiring the prudence and tact of this old dowager, and
+of course it was not for me to make objections.  Ere I well knew how, I
+was alone with a flat candlestick, which is not the most sympathetic of
+companions, and stood studying the snuff in a frame of mind between
+triumph and chagrin.  All had gone well with my flight: the masterful
+lady who had arrogated to herself the arrangement of the details gave me
+every confidence; and I saw myself already arriving at my uncle’s door.
+But, alas! it was another story with my love affair.  I had seen and
+spoken with her alone; I had ventured boldly; I had been not ill
+received; I had seen her change colour, had enjoyed the undissembled
+kindness of her eyes; and now, in a moment, down comes upon the scene
+that apocalyptic figure with the nightcap and the horse-pistol, and with
+the very wind of her coming behold me separated from my love!  Gratitude
+and admiration contended in my breast with the extreme of natural
+rancour.  My appearance in her house at past midnight had an air (I could
+not disguise it from myself) that was insolent and underhand, and could
+not but minister to the worst suspicions.  And the old lady had taken it
+well.  Her generosity was no more to be called in question than her
+courage, and I was afraid that her intelligence would be found to match.
+Certainly, Miss Flora had to support some shrewd looks, and certainly she
+had been troubled.  I could see but the one way before me: to profit by
+an excellent bed, to try to sleep soon, to be stirring early, and to hope
+for some renewed occasion in the morning.  To have said so much and yet
+to say no more, to go out into the world upon so half-hearted a parting,
+was more than I could accept.
+
+It is my belief that the benevolent fiend sat up all night to baulk me.
+She was at my bedside with a candle long ere day, roused me, laid out for
+me a damnable misfit of clothes, and bade me pack my own (which were
+wholly unsuited to the journey) in a bundle.  Sore grudging, I arrayed
+myself in a suit of some country fabric, as delicate as sackcloth and
+about as becoming as a shroud; and, on coming forth, found the dragon had
+prepared for me a hearty breakfast.  She took the head of the table,
+poured out the tea, and entertained me as I ate with a great deal of good
+sense and a conspicuous lack of charm.  How often did I not regret the
+change!—how often compare her, and condemn her in the comparison, with
+her charming niece!  But if my entertainer was not beautiful, she had
+certainly been busy in my interest.  Already she was in communication
+with my destined fellow-travellers; and the device on which she had
+struck appeared entirely suitable.  I was a young Englishman who had
+outrun the constable; warrants were out against me in Scotland, and it
+had become needful I should pass the border without loss of time, and
+privately.
+
+‘I have given a very good account of you,’ said she, ‘which I hope you
+may justify.  I told them there was nothing against you beyond the fact
+that you were put to the haw (if that is the right word) for debt.’
+
+‘I pray God you have the expression incorrectly, ma’am,’ said I.  ‘I do
+not give myself out for a person easily alarmed; but you must admit there
+is something barbarous and mediaeval in the sound well qualified to
+startle a poor foreigner.’
+
+‘It is the name of a process in Scots Law, and need alarm no honest man,’
+said she.  ‘But you are a very idle-minded young gentleman; you must
+still have your joke, I see: I only hope you will have no cause to regret
+it.’
+
+‘I pray you not to suppose, because I speak lightly, that I do not feel
+deeply,’ said I.  ‘Your kindness has quite conquered me; I lay myself at
+your disposition, I beg you to believe, with real tenderness; I pray you
+to consider me from henceforth as the most devoted of your friends.’
+
+‘Well, well,’ she said, ‘here comes your devoted friend the drover.  I’m
+thinking he will be eager for the road; and I will not be easy myself
+till I see you well off the premises, and the dishes washed, before my
+servant-woman wakes.  Praise God, we have gotten one that is a treasure
+at the sleeping!’
+
+The morning was already beginning to be blue in the trees of the garden,
+and to put to shame the candle by which I had breakfasted.  The lady rose
+from table, and I had no choice but to follow her example.  All the time
+I was beating my brains for any means by which I should be able to get a
+word apart with Flora, or find the time to write her a billet.  The
+windows had been open while I breakfasted, I suppose to ventilate the
+room from any traces of my passage there; and, Master Ronald appearing on
+the front lawn, my ogre leaned forth to address him.
+
+‘Ronald,’ she said, ‘wasn’t that Sim that went by the wall?’
+
+I snatched my advantage.  Right at her back there was pen, ink, and paper
+laid out.  I wrote: ‘I love you’; and before I had time to write more, or
+so much as to blot what I had written, I was again under the guns of the
+gold eyeglasses.
+
+‘It’s time,’ she began; and then, as she observed my occupation, ‘Umph!’
+she broke off.  ‘Ye have something to write?’ she demanded.
+
+‘Some notes, madam,’ said I, bowing with alacrity.
+
+‘Notes,’ she said; ‘or a note?’
+
+‘There is doubtless some _finesse_ of the English language that I do not
+comprehend,’ said I.
+
+‘I’ll contrive, however, to make my meaning very plain to ye, Mosha le
+Viscount,’ she continued.  ‘I suppose you desire to be considered a
+gentleman?’
+
+‘Can you doubt it, madam?’ said I.
+
+‘I doubt very much, at least, whether you go to the right way about it,’
+she said.  ‘You have come here to me, I cannot very well say how; I think
+you will admit you owe me some thanks, if it was only for the breakfast I
+made ye.  But what are you to me?  A waif young man, not so far to seek
+for looks and manners, with some English notes in your pocket and a price
+upon your head.  I am a lady; I have been your hostess, with however
+little will; and I desire that this random acquaintance of yours with my
+family will cease and determine.’
+
+I believe I must have coloured.  ‘Madam,’ said I, ‘the notes are of no
+importance; and your least pleasure ought certainly to be my law.  You
+have felt, and you have been pleased to express, a doubt of me.  I tear
+them up.’  Which you may be sure I did thoroughly.
+
+‘There’s a good lad!’ said the dragon, and immediately led the way to the
+front lawn.
+
+The brother and sister were both waiting us here, and, as well as I could
+make out in the imperfect light, bore every appearance of having passed
+through a rather cruel experience.  Ronald seemed ashamed to so much as
+catch my eye in the presence of his aunt, and was the picture of
+embarrassment.  As for Flora, she had scarce the time to cast me one look
+before the dragon took her by the arm, and began to march across the
+garden in the extreme first glimmer of the dawn without exchanging
+speech.  Ronald and I followed in equal silence.
+
+There was a door in that same high wall on the top of which I had sat
+perched no longer gone than yesterday morning.  This the old lady set
+open with a key; and on the other side we were aware of a rough-looking,
+thick-set man, leaning with his arms (through which was passed a
+formidable staff) on a dry-stone dyke.  Him the old lady immediately
+addressed.
+
+‘Sim,’ said she, ‘this is the young gentleman.’
+
+Sim replied with an inarticulate grumble of sound, and a movement of one
+arm and his head, which did duty for a salutation.
+
+‘Now, Mr. St. Ives,’ said the old lady, ‘it’s high time for you to be
+taking the road.  But first of all let me give the change of your
+five-guinea bill.  Here are four pounds of it in British Linen notes, and
+the balance in small silver, less sixpence.  Some charge a shilling, I
+believe, but I have given you the benefit of the doubt.  See and guide it
+with all the sense that you possess.’
+
+‘And here, Mr. St. Ives,’ said Flora, speaking for the first time, ‘is a
+plaid which you will find quite necessary on so rough a journey.  I hope
+you will take it from the hands of a Scotch friend,’ she added, and her
+voice trembled.
+
+‘Genuine holly: I cut it myself,’ said Ronald, and gave me as good a
+cudgel as a man could wish for in a row.
+
+The formality of these gifts, and the waiting figure of the driver, told
+me loudly that I must be gone.  I dropped on one knee and bade farewell
+to the aunt, kissing her hand.  I did the like—but with how different a
+passion!—to her niece; as for the boy, I took him to my arms and embraced
+him with a cordiality that seemed to strike him speechless.  ‘Farewell!’
+and ‘Farewell!’ I said.  ‘I shall never forget my friends.  Keep me
+sometimes in memory.  Farewell!’ With that I turned my back and began to
+walk away; and had scarce done so, when I heard the door in the high wall
+close behind me.  Of course this was the aunt’s doing; and of course, if
+I know anything of human character, she would not let me go without some
+tart expressions.  I declare, even if I had heard them, I should not have
+minded in the least, for I was quite persuaded that, whatever admirers I
+might be leaving behind me in Swanston Cottage, the aunt was not the
+least sincere.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X—THE DROVERS
+
+
+It took me a little effort to come abreast of my new companion; for
+though he walked with an ugly roll and no great appearance of speed, he
+could cover the around at a good rate when he wanted to.  Each looked at
+the other: I with natural curiosity, he with a great appearance of
+distaste.  I have heard since that his heart was entirely set against me;
+he had seen me kneel to the ladies, and diagnosed me for a ‘gesterin’
+eediot.’
+
+‘So, ye’re for England, are ye?’ said he.
+
+I told him yes.
+
+‘Weel, there’s waur places, I believe,’ was his reply; and he relapsed
+into a silence which was not broken during a quarter of an hour of steady
+walking.
+
+This interval brought us to the foot of a bare green valley, which wound
+upwards and backwards among the hills.  A little stream came down the
+midst and made a succession of clear pools; near by the lowest of which I
+was aware of a drove of shaggy cattle, and a man who seemed the very
+counterpart of Mr. Sim making a breakfast upon bread and cheese.  This
+second drover (whose name proved to be Candlish) rose on our approach.
+
+‘Here’s a mannie that’s to gang through with us,’ said Sim.  ‘It was the
+auld wife, Gilchrist, wanted it.’
+
+‘Aweel, aweel,’ said the other; and presently, remembering his manners,
+and looking on me with a solemn grin, ‘A fine day!’ says he.
+
+I agreed with him, and asked him how he did.
+
+‘Brawly,’ was the reply; and without further civilities, the pair
+proceeded to get the cattle under way.  This, as well as almost all the
+herding, was the work of a pair of comely and intelligent dogs, directed
+by Sim or Candlish in little more than monosyllables.  Presently we were
+ascending the side of the mountain by a rude green track, whose presence
+I had not hitherto observed.  A continual sound of munching and the
+crying of a great quantity of moor birds accompanied our progress, which
+the deliberate pace and perennial appetite of the cattle rendered
+wearisomely slow.  In the midst my two conductors marched in a contented
+silence that I could not but admire.  The more I looked at them, the more
+I was impressed by their absurd resemblance to each other.  They were
+dressed in the same coarse homespun, carried similar sticks, were equally
+begrimed about the nose with snuff, and each wound in an identical plaid
+of what is called the shepherd’s tartan.  In a back view they might be
+described as indistinguishable; and even from the front they were much
+alike.  An incredible coincidence of humours augmented the impression.
+Thrice and four times I attempted to pave the way for some exchange of
+thought, sentiment, or—at the least of it—human words.  An _Ay_ or an
+_Nhm_ was the sole return, and the topic died on the hill-side without
+echo.  I can never deny that I was chagrined; and when, after a little
+more walking, Sim turned towards me and offered me a ram’s horn of snuff,
+with the question ‘Do ye use it?’ I answered, with some animation,
+‘Faith, sir, I would use pepper to introduce a little cordiality.’  But
+even this sally failed to reach, or at least failed to soften, my
+companions.
+
+At this rate we came to the summit of a ridge, and saw the track descend
+in front of us abruptly into a desert vale, about a league in length, and
+closed at the farther end by no less barren hilltops.  Upon this point of
+vantage Sim came to a halt, took off his hat, and mopped his brow.
+
+‘Weel,’ he said, ‘here we’re at the top o’ Howden.’
+
+‘The top o’ Howden, sure eneuch,’ said Candlish.
+
+‘Mr. St. Ivey, are ye dry?’ said the first.
+
+‘Now, really,’ said I, ‘is not this Satan reproving sin?’
+
+‘What ails ye, man?’ said he.  ‘I’m offerin’ ye a dram.’
+
+‘Oh, if it be anything to drink,’ said I, ‘I am as dry as my neighbours.’
+
+Whereupon Sim produced from the corner of his plaid a black bottle, and
+we all drank and pledged each other.  I found these gentlemen followed
+upon such occasions an invariable etiquette, which you may be certain I
+made haste to imitate.  Each wiped his mouth with the back of his left
+hand, held up the bottle in his right, remarked with emphasis, ‘Here’s to
+ye!’ and swallowed as much of the spirit as his fancy prompted.  This
+little ceremony, which was the nearest thing to manners I could perceive
+in either of my companions, was repeated at becoming intervals, generally
+after an ascent.  Occasionally we shared a mouthful of ewe-milk cheese
+and an inglorious form of bread, which I understood (but am far from
+engaging my honour on the point) to be called ‘shearer’s bannock.’  And
+that may be said to have concluded our whole active intercourse for the
+first day.
+
+I had the more occasion to remark the extraordinarily desolate nature of
+that country, through which the drove road continued, hour after hour and
+even day after day, to wind.  A continual succession of insignificant
+shaggy hills, divided by the course of ten thousand brooks, through which
+we had to wade, or by the side of which we encamped at night; infinite
+perspectives of heather, infinite quantities of moorfowl; here and there,
+by a stream side, small and pretty clumps of willows or the silver birch;
+here and there, the ruins of ancient and inconsiderable fortresses—made
+the unchanging characters of the scene.  Occasionally, but only in the
+distance, we could perceive the smoke of a small town or of an isolated
+farmhouse or cottage on the moors; more often, a flock of sheep and its
+attendant shepherd, or a rude field of agriculture perhaps not yet
+harvested.  With these alleviations, we might almost be said to pass
+through an unbroken desert—sure, one of the most impoverished in Europe;
+and when I recalled to mind that we were yet but a few leagues from the
+chief city (where the law courts sat every day with a press of business,
+soldiers garrisoned the castle, and men of admitted parts were carrying
+on the practice of letters and the investigations of science), it gave me
+a singular view of that poor, barren, and yet illustrious country through
+which I travelled.  Still more, perhaps, did it commend the wisdom of
+Miss Gilchrist in sending me with these uncouth companions and by this
+unfrequented path.
+
+My itinerary is by no means clear to me; the names and distances I never
+clearly knew, and have now wholly forgotten; and this is the more to be
+regretted as there is no doubt that, in the course of those days, I must
+have passed and camped among sites which have been rendered illustrious
+by the pen of Walter Scott.  Nay, more, I am of opinion that I was still
+more favoured by fortune, and have actually met and spoken with that
+inimitable author.  Our encounter was of a tall, stoutish, elderly
+gentleman, a little grizzled, and of a rugged but cheerful and engaging
+countenance.  He sat on a hill pony, wrapped in a plaid over his green
+coat, and was accompanied by a horse-woman, his daughter, a young lady of
+the most charming appearance.  They overtook us on a stretch of heath,
+reined up as they came alongside, and accompanied us for perhaps a
+quarter of an hour before they galloped off again across the hillsides to
+our left.  Great was my amazement to find the unconquerable Mr. Sim thaw
+immediately on the accost of this strange gentleman, who hailed him with
+a ready familiarity, proceeded at once to discuss with him the trade of
+droving and the prices of cattle, and did not disdain to take a pinch
+from the inevitable ram’s horn.  Presently I was aware that the
+stranger’s eye was directed on myself; and there ensued a conversation,
+some of which I could not help overhearing at the time, and the rest have
+pieced together more or less plausibly from the report of Sim.
+
+‘Surely that must be an _amateur drover_ ye have gotten there?’ the
+gentleman seems to have asked.
+
+Sim replied, I was a young gentleman that had a reason of his own to
+travel privately.
+
+‘Well, well, ye must tell me nothing of that.  I am in the law, you know,
+and _tace_ is the Latin for a candle,’ answered the gentleman.  ‘But I
+hope it’s nothing bad.’
+
+Sim told him it was no more than debt.
+
+‘Oh, Lord, if that be all!’ cried the gentleman; and turning to myself,
+‘Well, sir,’ he added, ‘I understand you are taking a tramp through our
+forest here for the pleasure of the thing?’
+
+‘Why, yes, sir,’ said I; ‘and I must say I am very well entertained.’
+
+‘I envy you,’ said he.  ‘I have jogged many miles of it myself when I was
+younger.  My youth lies buried about here under every heather-bush, like
+the soul of the licentiate Lucius.  But you should have a guide.  The
+pleasure of this country is much in the legends, which grow as plentiful
+as blackberries.’  And directing my attention to a little fragment of a
+broken wall no greater than a tombstone, he told me for an example a
+story of its earlier inhabitants.  Years after it chanced that I was one
+day diverting myself with a Waverley Novel, when what should I come upon
+but the identical narrative of my green-coated gentleman upon the moors!
+In a moment the scene, the tones of his voice, his northern accent, and
+the very aspect of the earth and sky and temperature of the weather,
+flashed back into my mind with the reality of dreams.  The unknown in the
+green-coat had been the Great Unknown!  I had met Scott; I had heard a
+story from his lips; I should have been able to write, to claim
+acquaintance, to tell him that his legend still tingled in my ears.  But
+the discovery came too late, and the great man had already succumbed
+under the load of his honours and misfortunes.
+
+Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us farewell and
+disappeared with his daughter over the hills.  And when I applied to Sim
+for information, his answer of ‘The Shirra, man!  A’body kens the
+Shirra!’ told me, unfortunately, nothing.
+
+A more considerable adventure falls to be related.  We were now near the
+border.  We had travelled for long upon the track beaten and browsed by a
+million herds, our predecessors, and had seen no vestige of that traffic
+which had created it.  It was early in the morning when we at last
+perceived, drawing near to the drove road, but still at a distance of
+about half a league, a second caravan, similar to but larger than our
+own.  The liveliest excitement was at once exhibited by both my comrades.
+They climbed hillocks, they studied the approaching drove from under
+their hand, they consulted each other with an appearance of alarm that
+seemed to me extraordinary.  I had learned by this time that their
+stand-off manners implied, at least, no active enmity; and I made bold to
+ask them what was wrong.
+
+‘Bad yins,’ was Sim’s emphatic answer.
+
+All day the dogs were kept unsparingly on the alert, and the drove pushed
+forward at a very unusual and seemingly unwelcome speed.  All day Sim and
+Candlish, with a more than ordinary expenditure both of snuff and of
+words, continued to debate the position.  It seems that they had
+recognised two of our neighbours on the road—one Faa, and another by the
+name of Gillies.  Whether there was an old feud between them still
+unsettled I could never learn; but Sim and Candlish were prepared for
+every degree of fraud or violence at their hands.  Candlish repeatedly
+congratulated himself on having left ‘the watch at home with the
+mistress’; and Sim perpetually brandished his cudgel, and cursed his
+ill-fortune that it should be sprung.
+
+‘I willna care a damn to gie the daashed scoon’rel a fair clout wi’ it,’
+he said.  ‘The daashed thing micht come sindry in ma hand.’
+
+‘Well, gentlemen,’ said I, ‘suppose they do come on, I think we can give
+a very good account of them.’  And I made my piece of holly, Ronald’s
+gift, the value of which I now appreciated, sing about my head.
+
+‘Ay, man?  Are ye stench?’ inquired Sim, with a gleam of approval in his
+wooden countenance.
+
+The same evening, somewhat wearied with our day-long expedition, we
+encamped on a little verdant mound, from the midst of which there welled
+a spring of clear water scarce great enough to wash the hands in.  We had
+made our meal and lain down, but were not yet asleep, when a growl from
+one of the collies set us on the alert.  All three sat up, and on a
+second impulse all lay down again, but now with our cudgels ready.  A man
+must be an alien and an outlaw, an old soldier and a young man in the
+bargain, to take adventure easily.  With no idea as to the rights of the
+quarrel or the probable consequences of the encounter, I was as ready to
+take part with my two drovers, as ever to fall in line on the morning of
+a battle.  Presently there leaped three men out of the heather; we had
+scarce time to get to our feet before we were assailed; and in a moment
+each one of us was engaged with an adversary whom the deepening twilight
+scarce permitted him to see.  How the battle sped in other quarters I am
+in no position to describe.  The rogue that fell to my share was
+exceedingly agile and expert with his weapon; had and held me at a
+disadvantage from the first assault; forced me to give ground
+continually, and at last, in mere self-defence, to let him have the
+point.  It struck him in the throat, and he went down like a ninepin and
+moved no more.
+
+It seemed this was the signal for the engagement to be discontinued.  The
+other combatants separated at once; our foes were suffered, without
+molestation, to lift up and bear away their fallen comrade; so that I
+perceived this sort of war to be not wholly without laws of chivalry, and
+perhaps rather to partake of the character of a tournament than of a
+battle _à outrance_.  There was no doubt, at least, that I was supposed
+to have pushed the affair too seriously.  Our friends the enemy removed
+their wounded companion with undisguised consternation; and they were no
+sooner over the top of the brae, than Sim and Candlish roused up their
+wearied drove and set forth on a night march.
+
+‘I’m thinking Faa’s unco bad,’ said the one.
+
+‘Ay,’ said the other, ‘he lookit dooms gash.’
+
+‘He did that,’ said the first.
+
+And their weary silence fell upon them again.
+
+Presently Sim turned to me.  ‘Ye’re unco ready with the stick,’ said he.
+
+‘Too ready, I’m afraid,’ said I.  ‘I am afraid Mr. Faa (if that be his
+name) has got his gruel.’
+
+‘Weel, I wouldnae wonder,’ replied Sim.
+
+‘And what is likely to happen?’ I inquired.
+
+‘Aweel,’ said Sim, snuffing profoundly, ‘if I were to offer an opeenion,
+it would not be conscientious.  For the plain fac’ is, Mr. St. Ivy, that
+I div not ken.  We have had crackit heids—and rowth of them—ere now; and
+we have had a broken leg or maybe twa; and the like of that we drover
+bodies make a kind of a practice like to keep among oursel’s.  But a corp
+we have none of us ever had to deal with, and I could set nae leemit to
+what Gillies micht consider proper in the affair.  Forbye that, he would
+be in raither a hobble himsel’, if he was to gang hame wantin’ Faa.  Folk
+are awfu’ throng with their questions, and parteecularly when they’re no
+wantit.’
+
+‘That’s a fac’,’ said Candlish.
+
+I considered this prospect ruefully; and then making the best of it,
+‘Upon all which accounts,’ said I, ‘the best will be to get across the
+border and there separate.  If you are troubled, you can very truly put
+the blame upon your late companion; and if I am pursued, I must just try
+to keep out of the way.’
+
+‘Mr. St. Ivy,’ said Sim, with something resembling enthusiasm, ‘no’ a
+word mair!  I have met in wi’ mony kinds o’ gentry ere now; I hae seen o’
+them that was the tae thing, and I hae seen o’ them that was the tither;
+but the wale of a gentleman like you I have no sae very frequently seen
+the bate of.’
+
+Our night march was accordingly pursued with unremitting diligence.  The
+stars paled, the east whitened, and we were still, both dogs and men,
+toiling after the wearied cattle.  Again and again Sim and Candlish
+lamented the necessity: it was ‘fair ruin on the bestial,’ they declared;
+but the thought of a judge and a scaffold hunted them ever forward.  I
+myself was not so much to be pitied.  All that night, and during the
+whole of the little that remained before us of our conjunct journey, I
+enjoyed a new pleasure, the reward of my prowess, in the now loosened
+tongue of Mr. Sim.  Candlish was still obdurately taciturn: it was the
+man’s nature; but Sim, having finally appraised and approved me,
+displayed without reticence a rather garrulous habit of mind and a pretty
+talent for narration.  The pair were old and close companions,
+co-existing in these endless moors in a brotherhood of silence such as I
+have heard attributed to the trappers of the west.  It seems absurd to
+mention love in connection with so ugly and snuffy a couple; at least,
+their trust was absolute; and they entertained a surprising admiration
+for each other’s qualities; Candlish exclaiming that Sim was ‘grand
+company!’ and Sim frequently assuring me in an aside that for ‘a rale,
+auld, stench bitch, there was nae the bate of Candlish in braid
+Scotland.’  The two dogs appeared to be entirely included in this family
+compact, and I remarked that their exploits and traits of character were
+constantly and minutely observed by the two masters.  Dog stories
+particularly abounded with them; and not only the dogs of the present but
+those of the past contributed their quota.  ‘But that was naething,’ Sim
+would begin: ‘there was a herd in Manar, they ca’d him Tweedie—ye’ll mind
+Tweedie, Can’lish?’  ‘Fine, that!’ said Candlish.  ‘Aweel, Tweedie had a
+dog—’  The story I have forgotten; I dare say it was dull, and I suspect
+it was not true; but indeed, my travels with the drove rendered me
+indulgent, and perhaps even credulous, in the matter of dog stories.
+Beautiful, indefatigable beings! as I saw them at the end of a long day’s
+journey frisking, barking, bounding, striking attitudes, slanting a bushy
+tail, manifestly playing to the spectator’s eye, manifestly rejoicing in
+their grace and beauty—and turned to observe Sim and Candlish
+unornamentally plodding in the rear with the plaids about their bowed
+shoulders and the drop at their snuffy nose—I thought I would rather
+claim kinship with the dogs than with the men!  My sympathy was
+unreturned; in their eyes I was a creature light as air; and they would
+scarce spare me the time for a perfunctory caress or perhaps a hasty lap
+of the wet tongue, ere they were back again in sedulous attendance on
+those dingy deities, their masters—and their masters, as like as not,
+damning their stupidity.
+
+Altogether the last hours of our tramp were infinitely the most agreeable
+to me, and I believe to all of us; and by the time we came to separate,
+there had grown up a certain familiarity and mutual esteem that made the
+parting harder.  It took place about four of the afternoon on a bare
+hillside from which I could see the ribbon of the great north road,
+henceforth to be my conductor.  I asked what was to pay.
+
+‘Naething,’ replied Sim.
+
+‘What in the name of folly is this?’ I exclaimed.  ‘You have led me, you
+have fed me, you have filled me full of whisky, and now you will take
+nothing!’
+
+‘Ye see we indentit for that,’ replied Sim.
+
+ ‘Indented?’ I repeated; ‘what does the man mean?’
+
+‘Mr. St. Ivy,’ said Sim, ‘this is a maitter entirely between Candlish and
+me and the auld wife, Gilchrist.  You had naething to say to it; weel, ye
+can have naething to do with it, then.’
+
+‘My good man,’ said I, ‘I can allow myself to be placed in no such
+ridiculous position.  Mrs. Gilchrist is nothing to me, and I refuse to be
+her debtor.’
+
+‘I dinna exac’ly see what way ye’re gaun to help it,’ observed my drover.
+
+‘By paying you here and now,’ said I.
+
+‘There’s aye twa to a bargain, Mr. St. Ives,’ said he.
+
+‘You mean that you will not take it?’ said I.
+
+‘There or thereabout,’ said he.  ‘Forbye, that it would set ye a heap
+better to keep your siller for them you awe it to.  Ye’re young, Mr. St.
+Ivy, and thoughtless; but it’s my belief that, wi’ care and
+circumspection, ye may yet do credit to yoursel’.  But just you bear this
+in mind: that him that _awes_ siller should never _gie_ siller.’
+
+Well, what was there to say?  I accepted his rebuke, and bidding the pair
+farewell, set off alone upon my southward way.
+
+‘Mr. St. Ivy,’ was the last word of Sim, ‘I was never muckle ta’en up in
+Englishry; but I think that I really ought to say that ye seem to me to
+have the makings of quite a decent lad.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI—THE GREAT NORTH ROAD
+
+
+It chanced that as I went down the hill these last words of my friend the
+drover echoed not unfruitfully in my head.  I had never told these men
+the least particulars as to my race or fortune, as it was a part, and the
+best part, of their civility to ask no questions: yet they had dubbed me
+without hesitation English.  Some strangeness in the accent they had
+doubtless thus explained.  And it occurred to me, that if I could pass in
+Scotland for an Englishman, I might be able to reverse the process and
+pass in England for a Scot.  I thought, if I was pushed to it, I could
+make a struggle to imitate the brogue; after my experience with Candlish
+and Sim, I had a rich provision of outlandish words at my command; and I
+felt I could tell the tale of Tweedie’s dog so as to deceive a native.
+At the same time, I was afraid my name of St. Ives was scarcely suitable;
+till I remembered there was a town so called in the province of Cornwall,
+thought I might yet be glad to claim it for my place of origin, and
+decided for a Cornish family and a Scots education.  For a trade, as I
+was equally ignorant of all, and as the most innocent might at any moment
+be the means of my exposure, it was best to pretend to none.  And I
+dubbed myself a young gentleman of a sufficient fortune and an idle,
+curious habit of mind, rambling the country at my own charges, in quest
+of health, information, and merry adventures.
+
+At Newcastle, which was the first town I reached, I completed my
+preparations for the part, before going to the inn, by the purchase of a
+knapsack and a pair of leathern gaiters.  My plaid I continued to wear
+from sentiment.  It was warm, useful to sleep in if I were again
+benighted, and I had discovered it to be not unbecoming for a man of
+gallant carriage.  Thus equipped, I supported my character of the
+light-hearted pedestrian not amiss.  Surprise was indeed expressed that I
+should have selected such a season of the year; but I pleaded some delays
+of business, and smilingly claimed to be an eccentric.  The devil was in
+it, I would say, if any season of the year was not good enough for me; I
+was not made of sugar, I was no mollycoddle to be afraid of an ill-aired
+bed or a sprinkle of snow; and I would knock upon the table with my fist
+and call for t’other bottle, like the noisy and free-hearted young
+gentleman I was.  It was my policy (if I may so express myself) to talk
+much and say little.  At the inn tables, the country, the state of the
+roads, the business interest of those who sat down with me, and the
+course of public events, afforded me a considerable field in which I
+might discourse at large and still communicate no information about
+myself.  There was no one with less air of reticence; I plunged into my
+company up to the neck; and I had a long cock-and-bull story of an aunt
+of mine which must have convinced the most suspicious of my innocence.
+‘What!’ they would have said, ‘that young ass to be concealing anything!
+Why, he has deafened me with an aunt of his until my head aches.  He only
+wants you should give him a line, and he would tell you his whole descent
+from Adam downward, and his whole private fortune to the last shilling.’
+A responsible solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my
+inexperience as to give me a word or two of good advice: that I was but a
+young man after all—I had at this time a deceptive air of youth that made
+me easily pass for one-and-twenty, and was, in the circumstances, worth a
+fortune—that the company at inns was very mingled, that I should do well
+to be more careful, and the like; to all which I made answer that I meant
+no harm myself and expected none from others, or the devil was in it.
+‘You are one of those d---d prudent fellows that I could never abide
+with,’ said I.  ‘You are the kind of man that has a long head.  That’s
+all the world, my dear sir: the long-heads and the short-horns!  Now, I
+am a short-horn.’  ‘I doubt,’ says he, ‘that you will not go very far
+without getting sheared.’  I offered to bet with him on that, and he made
+off, shaking his head.
+
+But my particular delight was to enlarge on politics and the war.  None
+damned the French like me; none was more bitter against the Americans.
+And when the north-bound mail arrived, crowned with holly, and the
+coachman and guard hoarse with shouting victory, I went even so far as to
+entertain the company to a bowl of punch, which I compounded myself with
+no illiberal hand, and doled out to such sentiments as the following:—
+
+‘Our glorious victory on the Nivelle’!  ‘Lord Wellington, God bless him!
+and may victory ever attend upon his arms!’ and, ‘Soult, poor devil! and
+may he catch it again to the same tune!’
+
+Never was oratory more applauded to the echo—never any one was more of
+the popular man than I.  I promise you, we made a night of it.  Some of
+the company supported each other, with the assistance of boots, to their
+respective bedchambers, while the rest slept on the field of glory where
+we had left them; and at the breakfast table the next morning there was
+an extraordinary assemblage of red eyes and shaking fists.  I observed
+patriotism to burn much lower by daylight.  Let no one blame me for
+insensibility to the reverses of France!  God knows how my heart raged.
+How I longed to fall on that herd of swine and knock their heads together
+in the moment of their revelry!  But you are to consider my own situation
+and its necessities; also a certain lightheartedness, eminently Gallic,
+which forms a leading trait in my character, and leads me to throw myself
+into new circumstances with the spirit of a schoolboy.  It is possible
+that I sometimes allowed this impish humour to carry me further than good
+taste approves: and I was certainly punished for it once.
+
+This was in the episcopal city of Durham.  We sat down, a considerable
+company, to dinner, most of us fine old vatted English tories of that
+class which is often so enthusiastic as to be inarticulate.  I took and
+held the lead from the beginning; and, the talk having turned on the
+French in the Peninsula, I gave them authentic details (on the authority
+of a cousin of mine, an ensign) of certain cannibal orgies in Galicia, in
+which no less a person than General Caffarelli had taken a part.  I
+always disliked that commander, who once ordered me under arrest for
+insubordination; and it is possible that a spice of vengeance added to
+the rigour of my picture.  I have forgotten the details; no doubt they
+were high-coloured.  No doubt I rejoiced to fool these jolter-heads; and
+no doubt the sense of security that I drank from their dull, gasping
+faces encouraged me to proceed extremely far.  And for my sins, there was
+one silent little man at table who took my story at the true value.  It
+was from no sense of humour, to which he was quite dead.  It was from no
+particular intelligence, for he had not any.  The bond of sympathy, of
+all things in the world, had rendered him clairvoyant.
+
+Dinner was no sooner done than I strolled forth into the streets with
+some design of viewing the cathedral; and the little man was silently at
+my heels.  A few doors from the inn, in a dark place of the street, I was
+aware of a touch on my arm, turned suddenly, and found him looking up at
+me with eyes pathetically bright.
+
+‘I beg your pardon, sir; but that story of yours was particularly rich.
+He—he!  Particularly racy,’ said he.  ‘I tell you, sir, I took you
+wholly!  I _smoked_ you!  I believe you and I, sir, if we had a chance to
+talk, would find we had a good many opinions in common.  Here is the
+“Blue Bell,” a very comfortable place.  They draw good ale, sir.  Would
+you be so condescending as to share a pot with me?’
+
+There was something so ambiguous and secret in the little man’s perpetual
+signalling, that I confess my curiosity was much aroused.  Blaming
+myself, even as I did so, for the indiscretion, I embraced his proposal,
+and we were soon face to face over a tankard of mulled ale.  He lowered
+his voice to the least attenuation of a whisper.
+
+‘Here, sir,’ said he, ‘is to the Great Man.  I think you take me?  No?’
+He leaned forward till our noses touched.  ‘Here is to the Emperor!’ said
+he.
+
+I was extremely embarrassed, and, in spite of the creature’s innocent
+appearance, more than half alarmed.  I thought him too ingenious, and,
+indeed, too daring for a spy.  Yet if he were honest he must be a man of
+extraordinary indiscretion, and therefore very unfit to be encouraged by
+an escaped prisoner.  I took a half course, accordingly—accepted his
+toast in silence, and drank it without enthusiasm.
+
+He proceeded to abound in the praises of Napoleon, such as I had never
+heard in France, or at least only on the lips of officials paid to offer
+them.
+
+‘And this Caffarelli, now,’ he pursued: ‘he is a splendid fellow, too, is
+he not?  I have not heard vastly much of him myself.  No details, sir—no
+details!  We labour under huge difficulties here as to unbiassed
+information.’
+
+‘I believe I have heard the same complaint in other countries,’ I could
+not help remarking.  ‘But as to Caffarelli, he is neither lame nor blind,
+he has two legs and a nose in the middle of his face.  And I care as much
+about him as you care for the dead body of Mr. Perceval!’
+
+He studied me with glowing eyes.
+
+‘You cannot deceive me!’ he cried.  ‘You have served under him.  You are
+a Frenchman!  I hold by the hand, at last, one of that noble race, the
+pioneers of the glorious principles of liberty and brotherhood.  Hush!
+No, it is all right.  I thought there had been somebody at the door.  In
+this wretched, enslaved country we dare not even call our souls our own.
+The spy and the hangman, sir—the spy and the hangman!  And yet there is a
+candle burning, too.  The good leaven is working, sir—working underneath.
+Even in this town there are a few brave spirits, who meet every
+Wednesday.  You must stay over a day or so, and join us.  We do not use
+this house.  Another, and a quieter.  They draw fine ale, however—fair,
+mild ale.  You will find yourself among friends, among brothers.  You
+will hear some very daring sentiments expressed!’ he cried, expanding his
+small chest.  ‘Monarchy, Christianity—all the trappings of a bloated
+past—the Free Confraternity of Durham and Tyneside deride.’
+
+Here was a devil of a prospect for a gentleman whose whole design was to
+avoid observation!  The Free Confraternity had no charms for me; daring
+sentiments were no part of my baggage; and I tried, instead, a little
+cold water.
+
+‘You seem to forget, sir, that my Emperor has re-established
+Christianity,’ I observed.
+
+‘Ah, sir, but that was policy!’ he exclaimed.  ‘You do not understand
+Napoleon.  I have followed his whole career.  I can explain his policy
+from first to last.  Now for instance in the Peninsula, on which you were
+so very amusing, if you will come to a friend’s house who has a map of
+Spain, I can make the whole course of the war quite clear to you, I
+venture to say, in half an hour.’
+
+This was intolerable.  Of the two extremes, I found I preferred the
+British tory; and, making an appointment for the morrow, I pleaded sudden
+headache, escaped to the inn, packed my knapsack, and fled, about nine at
+night, from this accursed neighbourhood.  It was cold, starry, and clear,
+and the road dry, with a touch of frost.  For all that, I had not the
+smallest intention to make a long stage of it; and about ten o’clock,
+spying on the right-hand side of the way the lighted windows of an
+alehouse, I determined to bait there for the night.
+
+It was against my principle, which was to frequent only the dearest inns;
+and the misadventure that befell me was sufficient to make me more
+particular in the future.  A large company was assembled in the parlour,
+which was heavy with clouds of tobacco smoke, and brightly lighted up by
+a roaring fire of coal.  Hard by the chimney stood a vacant chair in what
+I thought an enviable situation, whether for warmth or the pleasure of
+society; and I was about to take it, when the nearest of the company
+stopped me with his hand.
+
+‘Beg thy pardon, sir,’ said he; ‘but that there chair belongs to a
+British soldier.’
+
+A chorus of voices enforced and explained.  It was one of Lord
+Wellington’s heroes.  He had been wounded under Rowland Hill.  He was
+Colbourne’s right-hand man.  In short, this favoured individual appeared
+to have served with every separate corps, and under every individual
+general in the Peninsula.  Of course I apologised.  I had not known.  The
+devil was in it if a soldier had not a right to the best in England.  And
+with that sentiment, which was loudly applauded, I found a corner of a
+bench, and awaited, with some hopes of entertainment, the return of the
+hero.  He proved, of course, to be a private soldier.  I say of course,
+because no officer could possibly enjoy such heights of popularity.  He
+had been wounded before San Sebastian, and still wore his arm in a sling.
+What was a great deal worse for him, every member of the company had been
+plying him with drink.  His honest yokel’s countenance blazed as if with
+fever, his eyes were glazed and looked the two ways, and his feet
+stumbled as, amidst a murmur of applause, he returned to the midst of his
+admirers.
+
+Two minutes afterwards I was again posting in the dark along the highway;
+to explain which sudden movement of retreat I must trouble the reader
+with a reminiscence of my services.
+
+I lay one night with the out-pickets in Castile.  We were in close touch
+with the enemy; the usual orders had been issued against smoking, fires,
+and talk, and both armies lay as quiet as mice, when I saw the English
+sentinel opposite making a signal by holding up his musket.  I repeated
+it, and we both crept together in the dry bed of a stream, which made the
+demarcation of the armies.  It was wine he wanted, of which we had a good
+provision, and the English had quite run out.  He gave me the money, and
+I, as was the custom, left him my firelock in pledge, and set off for the
+canteen.  When I returned with a skin of wine, behold, it had pleased
+some uneasy devil of an English officer to withdraw the outposts!  Here
+was a situation with a vengeance, and I looked for nothing but ridicule
+in the present and punishment in the future.  Doubtless our officers
+winked pretty hard at this interchange of courtesies, but doubtless it
+would be impossible to wink at so gross a fault, or rather so pitiable a
+misadventure as mine; and you are to conceive me wandering in the plains
+of Castile, benighted, charged with a wine-skin for which I had no use,
+and with no knowledge whatever of the whereabouts of my musket, beyond
+that it was somewhere in my Lord Wellington’s army.  But my Englishman
+was either a very honest fellow, or else extremely thirsty, and at last
+contrived to advertise me of his new position.  Now, the English sentry
+in Castile, and the wounded hero in the Durham public-house, were one and
+the same person; and if he had been a little less drunk, or myself less
+lively in getting away, the travels of M. St. Ives might have come to an
+untimely end.
+
+I suppose this woke me up; it stirred in me besides a spirit of
+opposition, and in spite of cold, darkness, the highwaymen and the
+footpads, I determined to walk right on till breakfast-time: a happy
+resolution, which enabled me to observe one of those traits of manners
+which at once depict a country and condemn it.  It was near midnight when
+I saw, a great way ahead of me, the light of many torches; presently
+after, the sound of wheels reached me, and the slow tread of feet, and
+soon I had joined myself to the rear of a sordid, silent, and lugubrious
+procession, such as we see in dreams.  Close on a hundred persons marched
+by torchlight in unbroken silence; in their midst a cart, and in the
+cart, on an inclined platform, the dead body of a man—the centre-piece of
+this solemnity, the hero whose obsequies we were come forth at this
+unusual hour to celebrate.  It was but a plain, dingy old fellow of fifty
+or sixty, his throat cut, his shirt turned over as though to show the
+wound.  Blue trousers and brown socks completed his attire, if we can
+talk so of the dead.  He had a horrid look of a waxwork.  In the tossing
+of the lights he seemed to make faces and mouths at us, to frown, and to
+be at times upon the point of speech.  The cart, with this shabby and
+tragic freight, and surrounded by its silent escort and bright torches,
+continued for some distance to creak along the high-road, and I to follow
+it in amazement, which was soon exchanged for horror.  At the corner of a
+lane the procession stopped, and, as the torches ranged themselves along
+the hedgerow-side, I became aware of a grave dug in the midst of the
+thoroughfare, and a provision of quicklime piled in the ditch.  The cart
+was backed to the margin, the body slung off the platform and dumped into
+the grave with an irreverent roughness.  A sharpened stake had hitherto
+served it for a pillow.  It was now withdrawn, held in its place by
+several volunteers, and a fellow with a heavy mallet (the sound of which
+still haunts me at night) drove it home through the bosom of the corpse.
+The hole was filled with quicklime, and the bystanders, as if relieved of
+some oppression, broke at once into a sound of whispered speech.
+
+My shirt stuck to me, my heart had almost ceased beating, and I found my
+tongue with difficulty.
+
+‘I beg your pardon,’ I gasped to a neighbour, ‘what is this? what has he
+done? is it allowed?’
+
+‘Why, where do you come from?’ replied the man.
+
+‘I am a traveller, sir,’ said I, ‘and a total stranger in this part of
+the country.  I had lost my way when I saw your torches, and came by
+chance on this—this incredible scene.  Who was the man?’
+
+‘A suicide,’ said he.  ‘Ay, he was a bad one, was Johnnie Green.’
+
+It appeared this was a wretch who had committed many barbarous murders,
+and being at last upon the point of discovery fell of his own hand.  And
+the nightmare at the crossroads was the regular punishment, according to
+the laws of England, for an act which the Romans honoured as a virtue!
+Whenever an Englishman begins to prate of civilisation (as, indeed, it’s
+a defect they are rather prone to), I hear the measured blows of a
+mallet, see the bystanders crowd with torches about the grave, smile a
+little to myself in conscious superiority—and take a thimbleful of brandy
+for the stomach’s sake.
+
+I believe it must have been at my next stage, for I remember going to bed
+extremely early, that I came to the model of a good old-fashioned English
+inn, and was attended on by the picture of a pretty chambermaid.  We had
+a good many pleasant passages as she waited table or warmed my bed for me
+with a devil of a brass warming pan, fully larger than herself; and as
+she was no less pert than she was pretty, she may be said to have given
+rather better than she took.  I cannot tell why (unless it were for the
+sake of her saucy eyes), but I made her my confidante, told her I was
+attached to a young lady in Scotland, and received the encouragement of
+her sympathy, mingled and connected with a fair amount of rustic wit.
+While I slept the down-mail stopped for supper; it chanced that one of
+the passengers left behind a copy of the _Edinburgh Courant_, and the
+next morning my pretty chambermaid set the paper before me at breakfast,
+with the remark that there was some news from my lady-love.  I took it
+eagerly, hoping to find some further word of our escape, in which I was
+disappointed; and I was about to lay it down, when my eye fell on a
+paragraph immediately concerning me.  Faa was in hospital, grievously
+sick, and warrants were out for the arrest of Sim and Candlish.  These
+two men had shown themselves very loyal to me.  This trouble emerging,
+the least I could do was to be guided by a similar loyalty to them.
+Suppose my visit to my uncle crowned with some success, and my finances
+re-established, I determined I should immediately return to Edinburgh,
+put their case in the hands of a good lawyer, and await events.  So my
+mind was very lightly made up to what proved a mighty serious matter.
+Candlish and Sim were all very well in their way, and I do sincerely
+trust I should have been at some pains to help them, had there been
+nothing else.  But in truth my heart and my eyes were set on quite
+another matter, and I received the news of their tribulation almost with
+joy.  That is never a bad wind that blows where we want to go, and you
+may be sure there was nothing unwelcome in a circumstance that carried me
+back to Edinburgh and Flora.  From that hour I began to indulge myself
+with the making of imaginary scenes and interviews, in which I confounded
+the aunt, flattered Ronald, and now in the witty, now in the sentimental
+manner, declared my love and received the assurance of its return.  By
+means of this exercise my resolution daily grew stronger, until at last I
+had piled together such a mass of obstinacy as it would have taken a
+cataclysm of nature to subvert.
+
+‘Yes,’ said I to the chambermaid, ‘here is news of my lady-love indeed,
+and very good news too.’
+
+All that day, in the teeth of a keen winter wind, I hugged myself in my
+plaid, and it was as though her arms were flung around me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII—I FOLLOW A COVERED CART NEARLY TO MY DESTINATION
+
+
+At last I began to draw near, by reasonable stages, to the neighbourhood
+of Wakefield; and the name of Mr. Burchell Fenn came to the top in my
+memory.  This was the gentleman (the reader may remember) who made a
+trade of forwarding the escape of French prisoners.  How he did so:
+whether he had a sign-board, _Escapes forwarded_, _apply within_; what he
+charged for his services, or whether they were gratuitous and charitable,
+were all matters of which I was at once ignorant and extremely curious.
+Thanks to my proficiency in English, and Mr. Romaine’s bank-notes, I was
+getting on swimmingly without him; but the trouble was that I could not
+be easy till I had come to the bottom of these mysteries, and it was my
+difficulty that I knew nothing of him beyond the name.  I knew not his
+trade beyond that of Forwarder of Escapes—whether he lived in town or
+country, whether he were rich or poor, nor by what kind of address I was
+to gain his confidence.  It would have a very bad appearance to go along
+the highwayside asking after a man of whom I could give so scanty an
+account; and I should look like a fool, indeed, if I were to present
+myself at his door and find the police in occupation!  The interest of
+the conundrum, however, tempted me, and I turned aside from my direct
+road to pass by Wakefield; kept my ears pricked, as I went, for any
+mention of his name, and relied for the rest on my good fortune.  If Luck
+(who must certainly be feminine) favoured me as far as to throw me in the
+man’s way, I should owe the lady a candle; if not, I could very readily
+console myself.  In this experimental humour, and with so little to help
+me, it was a miracle that I should have brought my enterprise to a good
+end; and there are several saints in the calendar who might be happy to
+exchange with St. Ives!
+
+I had slept that night in a good inn at Wakefield, made my breakfast by
+candle-light with the passengers of an up-coach, and set off in a very
+ill temper with myself and my surroundings.  It was still early; the air
+raw and cold; the sun low, and soon to disappear under a vast canopy of
+rain-clouds that had begun to assemble in the north-west, and from that
+quarter invaded the whole width of the heaven.  Already the rain fell in
+crystal rods; already the whole face of the country sounded with the
+discharge of drains and ditches; and I looked forward to a day of
+downpour and the hell of wet clothes, in which particular I am as dainty
+as a cat.  At a corner of the road, and by the last glint of the drowning
+sun, I spied a covered cart, of a kind that I thought I had never seen
+before, preceding me at the foot’s pace of jaded horses.  Anything is
+interesting to a pedestrian that can help him to forget the miseries of a
+day of rain; and I bettered my pace and gradually overtook the vehicle.
+
+The nearer I came, the more it puzzled me.  It was much such a cart as I
+am told the calico printers use, mounted on two wheels, and furnished
+with a seat in front for the driver.  The interior closed with a door,
+and was of a bigness to contain a good load of calico, or (at a pinch and
+if it were necessary) four or five persons.  But, indeed, if human beings
+were meant to travel there, they had my pity!  They must travel in the
+dark, for there was no sign of a window; and they would be shaken all the
+way like a phial of doctor’s stuff, for the cart was not only ungainly to
+look at—it was besides very imperfectly balanced on the one pair of
+wheels, and pitched unconscionably.  Altogether, if I had any glancing
+idea that the cart was really a carriage, I had soon dismissed it; but I
+was still inquisitive as to what it should contain, and where it had come
+from.  Wheels and horses were splashed with many different colours of
+mud, as though they had come far and across a considerable diversity of
+country.  The driver continually and vainly plied his whip.  It seemed to
+follow they had made a long, perhaps an all-night, stage; and that the
+driver, at that early hour of a little after eight in the morning,
+already felt himself belated.  I looked for the name of the proprietor on
+the shaft, and started outright.  Fortune had favoured the careless: it
+was Burchell Fenn!
+
+‘A wet morning, my man,’ said I.
+
+The driver, a loutish fellow, shock-headed and turnip-faced, returned not
+a word to my salutation, but savagely flogged his horses.  The tired
+animals, who could scarce put the one foot before the other, paid no
+attention to his cruelty; and I continued without effort to maintain my
+position alongside, smiling to myself at the futility of his attempts,
+and at the same time pricked with curiosity as to why he made them.  I
+made no such formidable a figure as that a man should flee when I
+accosted him; and my conscience not being entirely clear, I was more
+accustomed to be uneasy myself than to see others timid.  Presently he
+desisted, and put back his whip in the holster with the air of a man
+vanquished.
+
+‘So you would run away from me?’ said I.  ‘Come, come, that’s not
+English.’
+
+‘Beg pardon, master: no offence meant,’ he said, touching his hat.
+
+‘And none taken!’ cried I.  ‘All I desire is a little gaiety by the way.’
+
+I understood him to say he didn’t ‘take with gaiety.’
+
+‘Then I will try you with something else,’ said I.  ‘Oh, I can be all
+things to all men, like the apostle!  I dare to say I have travelled with
+heavier fellows than you in my time, and done famously well with them.
+Are you going home?’
+
+‘Yes, I’m a goin’ home, I am,’ he said.
+
+‘A very fortunate circumstance for me!’ said I.  ‘At this rate we shall
+see a good deal of each other, going the same way; and, now I come to
+think of it, why should you not give me a cast?  There is room beside you
+on the bench.’
+
+With a sudden snatch, he carried the cart two yards into the roadway.
+The horses plunged and came to a stop.  ‘No, you don’t!’ he said,
+menacing me with the whip.  ‘None o’ that with me.’
+
+‘None of what?’ said I.  ‘I asked you for a lift, but I have no idea of
+taking one by force.’
+
+‘Well, I’ve got to take care of the cart and ’orses, I have,’ says he.
+‘I don’t take up with no runagate vagabones, you see, else.’
+
+‘I ought to thank you for your touching confidence,’ said I, approaching
+carelessly nearer as I spoke.  ‘But I admit the road is solitary
+hereabouts, and no doubt an accident soon happens.  Little fear of
+anything of the kind with you!  I like you for it, like your prudence,
+like that pastoral shyness of disposition.  But why not put it out of my
+power to hurt?  Why not open the door and bestow me here in the box, or
+whatever you please to call it?’ And I laid my hand demonstratively on
+the body of the cart.
+
+He had been timorous before; but at this, he seemed to lose the power of
+speech a moment, and stared at me in a perfect enthusiasm of fear.
+
+‘Why not?’ I continued.  ‘The idea is good.  I should be safe in there if
+I were the monster Williams himself.  The great thing is to have me under
+lock and key.  For it does lock; it is locked now,’ said I, trying the
+door.  ‘_A propos_, what have you for a cargo?  It must be precious.’
+
+He found not a word to answer.
+
+Rat-tat-tat, I went upon the door like a well-drilled footman.
+
+‘Any one at home?’ I said, and stooped to listen.
+
+There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of an
+uncontrollable paroxysm; another followed immediately on the heels of it;
+and then the driver turned with an oath, laid the lash upon the horses
+with so much energy that they found their heels again, and the whole
+equipage fled down the road at a gallop.
+
+At the first sound of the sneeze, I had started back like a man shot.
+The next moment, a great light broke on my mind, and I understood.  Here
+was the secret of Fenn’s trade: this was how he forwarded the escape of
+prisoners, hawking them by night about the country in his covered cart.
+There had been Frenchmen close to me; he who had just sneezed was my
+countryman, my comrade, perhaps already my friend!  I took to my heels in
+pursuit.  ‘Hold hard!’ I shouted.  ‘Stop!  It’s all right!  Stop!’  But
+the driver only turned a white face on me for a moment, and redoubled his
+efforts, bending forward, plying his whip and crying to his horses; these
+lay themselves down to the gallop and beat the highway with flying hoofs;
+and the cart bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a halo of rain
+and spattering mud.  But a minute since, and it had been trundling along
+like a lame cow; and now it was off as though drawn by Apollo’s coursers.
+There is no telling what a man can do, until you frighten him!
+
+It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly, to maintain
+my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so near) was become a
+chief point with me.  A hundred yards farther on the cart whipped out of
+the high-road into a lane embowered with leafless trees, and became lost
+to view.  When I saw it next, the driver had increased his advantage
+considerably, but all danger was at an end, and the horses had again
+declined into a hobbling walk.  Persuaded that they could not escape me,
+I took my time, and recovered my breath as I followed them.
+
+Presently the lane twisted at right angles, and showed me a gate and the
+beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as I continued to
+advance, a red brick house about seventy years old, in a fine style of
+architecture, and presenting a front of many windows to a lawn and
+garden.  Behind, I could see outhouses and the peaked roofs of stacks;
+and I judged that a manor-house had in some way declined to be the
+residence of a tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and
+substantial comfort.  The marks of neglect were visible on every side, in
+flower-bushes straggling beyond the borders, in the ill-kept turf, and in
+the broken windows that were incongruously patched with paper or stuffed
+with rags.  A thicket of trees, mostly evergreen, fenced the place round
+and secluded it from the eyes of prying neighbours.  As I came in view of
+it, on that melancholy winter’s morning, in the deluge of the falling
+rain, and with the wind that now rose in occasional gusts and hooted over
+the old chimneys, the cart had already drawn up at the front-door steps,
+and the driver was already in earnest discourse with Mr. Burchell Fenn.
+He was standing with his hands behind his back—a man of a gross,
+misbegotten face and body, dewlapped like a bull and red as a harvest
+moon; and in his jockey cap, blue coat and top boots, he had much the air
+of a good, solid tenant-farmer.
+
+The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but received me at
+last in a sort of goggling silence.  I had my hat in my hand.
+
+‘I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Burchell Fenn?’ said I.
+
+‘The same, sir,’ replied Mr. Fenn, taking off his jockey cap in answer to
+my civility, but with the distant look and the tardy movements of one who
+continues to think of something else.  ‘And who may you be?’ he asked.
+
+‘I shall tell you afterwards,’ said I.  ‘Suffice it, in the meantime,
+that I come on business.’
+
+He seemed to digest my answer laboriously, his mouth gaping, his little
+eyes never straying from my face.
+
+‘Suffer me to point out to you, sir,’ I resumed, ‘that this is a devil of
+a wet morning; and that the chimney corner, and possibly a glass of
+something hot, are clearly indicated.’
+
+Indeed, the rain was now grown to be a deluge; the gutters of the house
+roared; the air was filled with the continuous, strident crash.  The
+stolidity of his face, on which the rain streamed, was far from
+reassuring me.  On the contrary, I was aware of a distinct qualm of
+apprehension, which was not at all lessened by a view of the driver,
+craning from his perch to observe us with the expression of a fascinated
+bird.  So we stood silent, when the prisoner again began to sneeze from
+the body of the cart; and at the sound, prompt as a transformation, the
+driver had whipped up his horses and was shambling off round the corner
+of the house, and Mr. Fenn, recovering his wits with a gulp, had turned
+to the door behind him.
+
+‘Come in, come in, sir,’ he said.  ‘I beg your pardon, sir; the lock goes
+a trifle hard.’
+
+Indeed, it took him a surprising time to open the door, which was not
+only locked on the outside, but the lock seemed rebellious from disuse;
+and when at last he stood back and motioned me to enter before him, I was
+greeted on the threshold by that peculiar and convincing sound of the
+rain echoing over empty chambers.  The entrance-hall, in which I now
+found myself, was of a good size and good proportions; potted plants
+occupied the corners; the paved floor was soiled with muddy footprints
+and encumbered with straw; on a mahogany hall-table, which was the only
+furniture, a candle had been stuck and suffered to burn down—plainly a
+long while ago, for the gutterings were green with mould.  My mind, under
+these new impressions, worked with unusual vivacity.  I was here shut off
+with Fenn and his hireling in a deserted house, a neglected garden, and a
+wood of evergreens: the most eligible theatre for a deed of darkness.
+There came to me a vision of two flagstones raised in the hall-floor, and
+the driver putting in the rainy afternoon over my grave, and the prospect
+displeased me extremely.  I felt I had carried my pleasantry as far as
+was safe; I must lose no time in declaring my true character, and I was
+even choosing the words in which I was to begin, when the hall-door was
+slammed-to behind me with a bang, and I turned, dropping my stick as I
+did so, in time—and not any more than time—to save my life.
+
+The surprise of the onslaught and the huge weight of my assailant gave
+him the advantage.  He had a pistol in his right hand of a portentous
+size, which it took me all my strength to keep deflected.  With his left
+arm he strained me to his bosom, so that I thought I must be crushed or
+stifled.  His mouth was open, his face crimson, and he panted aloud with
+hard animal sounds.  The affair was as brief as it was hot and sudden.
+The potations which had swelled and bloated his carcase had already
+weakened the springs of energy.  One more huge effort, that came near to
+overpower me, and in which the pistol happily exploded, and I felt his
+grasp slacken and weakness come on his joints; his legs succumbed under
+his weight, and he grovelled on his knees on the stone floor.  ‘Spare
+me!’ he gasped.
+
+I had not only been abominably frightened; I was shocked besides: my
+delicacy was in arms, like a lady to whom violence should have been
+offered by a similar monster.  I plucked myself from his horrid contact,
+I snatched the pistol—even discharged, it was a formidable weapon—and
+menaced him with the butt.  ‘Spare you!’ I cried, ‘you beast!’
+
+His voice died in his fat inwards, but his lips still vehemently framed
+the same words of supplication.  My anger began to pass off, but not all
+my repugnance; the picture he made revolted me, and I was impatient to be
+spared the further view of it.
+
+‘Here,’ said I, ‘stop this performance: it sickens me.  I am not going to
+kill you, do you hear?  I have need of you.’
+
+A look of relief, that I could almost have called beautiful, dawned on
+his countenance.  ‘Anything—anything you wish,’ said he.
+
+Anything is a big word, and his use of it brought me for a moment to a
+stand.  ‘Why, what do you mean?’ I asked.  ‘Do you mean that you will
+blow the gaff on the whole business?’
+
+He answered me Yes with eager asseverations.
+
+‘I know Monsieur de Saint-Yves is in it; it was through his papers we
+traced you,’ I said.  ‘Do you consent to make a clean breast of the
+others?’
+
+‘I do—I will!’ he cried.  ‘The ’ole crew of ’em; there’s good names among
+’em.  I’ll be king’s evidence.’
+
+‘So that all shall hang except yourself?  You damned villain!’ I broke
+out.  ‘Understand at once that I am no spy or thief-taker.  I am a
+kinsman of Monsieur de St. Yves—here in his interest.  Upon my word, you
+have put your foot in it prettily, Mr. Burchell Fenn!  Come, stand up;
+don’t grovel there.  Stand up, you lump of iniquity!’
+
+He scrambled to his feet.  He was utterly unmanned, or it might have gone
+hard with me yet; and I considered him hesitating, as, indeed, there was
+cause.  The man was a double-dyed traitor: he had tried to murder me, and
+I had first baffled his endeavours and then exposed and insulted him.
+Was it wise to place myself any longer at his mercy?  With his help I
+should doubtless travel more quickly; doubtless also far less agreeably;
+and there was everything to show that it would be at a greater risk.  In
+short, I should have washed my hands of him on the spot, but for the
+temptation of the French officers, whom I knew to be so near, and for
+whose society I felt so great and natural an impatience.  If I was to see
+anything of my countrymen, it was clear I had first of all to make my
+peace with Mr. Fenn; and that was no easy matter.  To make friends with
+any one implies concessions on both sides; and what could I concede?
+What could I say of him, but that he had proved himself a villain and a
+fool, and the worse man?
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘here has been rather a poor piece of business, which I
+dare say you can have no pleasure in calling to mind; and, to say truth,
+I would as readily forget it myself.  Suppose we try.  Take back your
+pistol, which smells very ill; put it in your pocket or wherever you had
+it concealed.  There!  Now let us meet for the first time.—Give you good
+morning, Mr. Fenn!  I hope you do very well.  I come on the
+recommendation of my kinsman, the Vicomte de St. Yves.’
+
+‘Do you mean it?’ he cried.  ‘Do you mean you will pass over our little
+scrimmage?’
+
+‘Why, certainly!’ said I.  ‘It shows you are a bold fellow, who may be
+trusted to forget the business when it comes to the point.  There is
+nothing against you in the little scrimmage, unless that your courage is
+greater than your strength.  You are not so young as you once were, that
+is all.’
+
+‘And I beg of you, sir, don’t betray me to the Vis-count,’ he pleaded.
+‘I’ll not deny but what my ’eart failed me a trifle; but it was only a
+word, sir, what anybody might have said in the ’eat of the moment, and
+over with it.’
+
+‘Certainly,’ said I.  ‘That is quite my own opinion.’
+
+‘The way I came to be anxious about the Vis-count,’ he continued, ‘is
+that I believe he might be induced to form an ’asty judgment.  And the
+business, in a pecuniary point of view, is all that I could ask; only
+trying, sir—very trying.  It’s making an old man of me before my time.
+You might have observed yourself, sir, that I ’aven’t got the knees I
+once ’ad.  The knees and the breathing, there’s where it takes me.  But
+I’m very sure, sir, I address a gentleman as would be the last to make
+trouble between friends.’
+
+‘I am sure you do me no more than justice,’ said I; ‘and I shall think it
+quite unnecessary to dwell on any of these passing circumstances in my
+report to the Vicomte.’
+
+‘Which you do favour him (if you’ll excuse me being so bold as to mention
+it) exac’ly!’ said he.  ‘I should have known you anywheres.  May I offer
+you a pot of ’ome-brewed ale, sir?  By your leave!  This way, if you
+please.  I am ’eartily grateful—’eartily pleased to be of any service to
+a gentleman like you, sir, which is related to the Vis-count, and really
+a fambly of which you might well be proud!  Take care of the step, sir.
+You have good news of ’is ’ealth, I trust? as well as that of Monseer the
+Count?’
+
+God forgive me! the horrible fellow was still puffing and panting with
+the fury of his assault, and already he had fallen into an obsequious,
+wheedling familiarity like that of an old servant,—already he was
+flattering me on my family connections!
+
+I followed him through the house into the stable-yard, where I observed
+the driver washing the cart in a shed.  He must have heard the explosion
+of the pistol.  He could not choose but hear it: the thing was shaped
+like a little blunderbuss, charged to the mouth, and made a report like a
+piece of field artillery.  He had heard, he had paid no attention; and
+now, as we came forth by the back-door, he raised for a moment a pale and
+tell-tale face that was as direct as a confession.  The rascal had
+expected to see Fenn come forth alone; he was waiting to be called on for
+that part of sexton, which I had already allotted to him in fancy.
+
+I need not detain the reader very long with any description of my visit
+to the back-kitchen; of how we mulled our ale there, and mulled it very
+well; nor of how we sat talking, Fenn like an old, faithful, affectionate
+dependant, and I—well!  I myself fallen into a mere admiration of so much
+impudence, that transcended words, and had very soon conquered animosity.
+I took a fancy to the man, he was so vast a humbug.  I began to see a
+kind of beauty in him, his _aplomb_ was so majestic.  I never knew a
+rogue to cut so fat; his villainy was ample, like his belly, and I could
+scarce find it in my heart to hold him responsible for either.  He was
+good enough to drop into the autobiographical; telling me how the farm,
+in spite of the war and the high prices, had proved a disappointment; how
+there was ‘a sight of cold, wet land as you come along the ’igh-road’;
+how the winds and rains and the seasons had been misdirected, it seemed
+‘o’ purpose’; how Mrs. Fenn had died—‘I lost her coming two year agone; a
+remarkable fine woman, my old girl, sir! if you’ll excuse me,’ he added,
+with a burst of humility.  In short, he gave me an opportunity of
+studying John Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked—his greed, his
+usuriousness, his hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled
+to the superlative—such as was well worth the little disarray and fluster
+of our passage in the hall.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII—I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN
+
+
+As soon as I judged it safe, and that was not before Burchell Fenn had
+talked himself back into his breath and a complete good humour, I
+proposed he should introduce me to the French officers, henceforth to
+become my fellow-passengers.  There were two of them, it appeared, and my
+heart beat as I approached the door.  The specimen of Perfidious Albion
+whom I had just been studying gave me the stronger zest for my
+fellow-countrymen.  I could have embraced them; I could have wept on
+their necks.  And all the time I was going to a disappointment.
+
+It was in a spacious and low room, with an outlook on the court, that I
+found them bestowed.  In the good days of that house the apartment had
+probably served as a library, for there were traces of shelves along the
+wainscot.  Four or five mattresses lay on the floor in a corner, with a
+frowsy heap of bedding; near by was a basin and a cube of soap; a rude
+kitchen-table and some deal chairs stood together at the far end; and the
+room was illuminated by no less than four windows, and warmed by a
+little, crazy, sidelong grate, propped up with bricks in the vent of a
+hospitable chimney, in which a pile of coals smoked prodigiously and gave
+out a few starveling flames.  An old, frail, white-haired officer sat in
+one of the chairs, which he had drawn close to this apology for a fire.
+He was wrapped in a camlet cloak, of which the collar was turned up, his
+knees touched the bars, his hands were spread in the very smoke, and yet
+he shivered for cold.  The second—a big, florid, fine animal of a man,
+whose every gesture labelled him the cock of the walk and the admiration
+of the ladies—had apparently despaired of the fire, and now strode up and
+down, sneezing hard, bitterly blowing his nose, and proffering a
+continual stream of bluster, complaint, and barrack-room oaths.
+
+Fenn showed me in with the brief form of introduction: ‘Gentlemen all,
+this here’s another fare!’ and was gone again at once.  The old man gave
+me but the one glance out of lack-lustre eyes; and even as he looked a
+shiver took him as sharp as a hiccough.  But the other, who represented
+to admiration the picture of a Beau in a Catarrh, stared at me
+arrogantly.
+
+‘And who are you, sir?’ he asked.
+
+I made the military salute to my superiors.
+
+‘Champdivers, private, Eighth of the Line,’ said I.
+
+‘Pretty business!’ said he.  ‘And you are going on with us?  Three in a
+cart, and a great trolloping private at that!  And who is to pay for you,
+my fine fellow?’ he inquired.
+
+‘If monsieur comes to that,’ I answered civilly, ‘who paid for him?’
+
+‘Oh, if you choose to play the wit!’ said he,—and began to rail at large
+upon his destiny, the weather, the cold, the danger and the expense of
+the escape, and, above all, the cooking of the accursed English.  It
+seemed to annoy him particularly that I should have joined their party.
+‘If you knew what you were doing, thirty thousand millions of pigs! you
+would keep yourself to yourself!  The horses can’t drag the cart; the
+roads are all ruts and swamps.  No longer ago than last night the Colonel
+and I had to march half the way—thunder of God!—half the way to the knees
+in mud—and I with this infernal cold—and the danger of detection!
+Happily we met no one: a desert—a real desert—like the whole abominable
+country!  Nothing to eat—no, sir, there is nothing to eat but raw cow and
+greens boiled in water—nor to drink but Worcestershire sauce!  Now I,
+with my catarrh, I have no appetite; is it not so?  Well, if I were in
+France, I should have a good soup with a crust in it, an omelette, a fowl
+in rice, a partridge in cabbages—things to tempt me, thunder of God!  But
+here—day of God!—what a country!  And cold, too!  They talk about
+Russia—this is all the cold I want!  And the people—look at them!  What a
+race!  Never any handsome men; never any fine officers!’—and he looked
+down complacently for a moment at his waist—‘And the women—what faggots!
+No, that is one point clear, I cannot stomach the English!’
+
+There was something in this man so antipathetic to me, as sent the
+mustard into my nose.  I can never bear your bucks and dandies, even when
+they are decent-looking and well dressed; and the Major—for that was his
+rank—was the image of a flunkey in good luck.  Even to be in agreement
+with him, or to seem to be so, was more than I could make out to endure.
+
+‘You could scarce be expected to stomach them,’ said I civilly, ‘after
+having just digested your parole.’
+
+He whipped round on his heel and turned on me a countenance which I dare
+say he imagined to be awful; but another fit of sneezing cut him off ere
+he could come the length of speech.
+
+‘I have not tried the dish myself,’ I took the opportunity to add.  ‘It
+is said to be unpalatable.  Did monsieur find it so?’
+
+With surprising vivacity the Colonel woke from his lethargy.  He was
+between us ere another word could pass.
+
+‘Shame, gentlemen!’ he said.  ‘Is this a time for Frenchmen and
+fellow-soldiers to fall out?  We are in the midst of our enemies; a
+quarrel, a loud word, may suffice to plunge us back into irretrievable
+distress.  _Monsieur le Commandant_, you have been gravely offended.  I
+make it my request, I make it my prayer—if need be, I give you my
+orders—that the matter shall stand by until we come safe to France.
+Then, if you please, I will serve you in any capacity.  And for you,
+young man, you have shown all the cruelty and carelessness of youth.
+This gentleman is your superior; he is no longer young’—at which word you
+are to conceive the Major’s face.  ‘It is admitted he has broken his
+parole.  I know not his reason, and no more do you.  It might be
+patriotism in this hour of our country’s adversity, it might be humanity,
+necessity; you know not what in the least, and you permit yourself to
+reflect on his honour.  To break parole may be a subject for pity and not
+derision.  I have broken mine—I, a colonel of the Empire.  And why?  I
+have been years negotiating my exchange, and it cannot be managed; those
+who have influence at the Ministry of War continually rush in before me,
+and I have to wait, and my daughter at home is in a decline.  I am going
+to see my daughter at last, and it is my only concern lest I should have
+delayed too long.  She is ill, and very ill,—at death’s door.  Nothing is
+left me but my daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my honour,
+blame me for it who dare!’
+
+At this my heart smote me.
+
+‘For God’s sake,’ I cried, ‘think no more of what I have said!  A parole?
+what is a parole against life and death and love?  I ask your pardon;
+this gentleman’s also.  As long as I shall be with you, you shall not
+have cause to complain of me again.  I pray God you will find your
+daughter alive and restored.’
+
+‘That is past praying for,’ said the Colonel; and immediately the brief
+fire died out of him, and, returning to the hearth, he relapsed into his
+former abstraction.
+
+But I was not so easy to compose.  The knowledge of the poor gentleman’s
+trouble, and the sight of his face, had filled me with the bitterness of
+remorse; and I insisted upon shaking hands with the Major (which he did
+with a very ill grace), and abounded in palinodes and apologies.
+
+‘After all,’ said I, ‘who am I to talk?  I am in the luck to be a private
+soldier; I have no parole to give or to keep; once I am over the rampart,
+I am as free as air.  I beg you to believe that I regret from my soul the
+use of these ungenerous expressions.  Allow me . . . Is there no way in
+this damned house to attract attention?  Where is this fellow, Fenn?’
+
+I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.  Fenn, who was at the
+moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms like one in despair,
+called to me to keep back, plunged into the house, and appeared next
+moment in the doorway of the chamber.
+
+‘Oh, sir!’ says he, ‘keep away from those there windows.  A body might
+see you from the back lane.’
+
+‘It is registered,’ said I.  ‘Henceforward I will be a mouse for
+precaution and a ghost for invisibility.  But in the meantime, for God’s
+sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy!  Your room is as damp as the bottom of
+a well, and these gentlemen are perishing of cold.’
+
+So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be paid in
+advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether because I threw
+greater energy into the business, or because the coals were now warmed
+and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze that made the chimney roar
+again.  The shine of it, in that dark, rainy day, seemed to reanimate the
+Colonel like a blink of sun.  With the outburst of the flames, besides, a
+draught was established, which immediately delivered us from the plague
+of smoke; and by the time Fenn returned, carrying a bottle under his arm
+and a single tumbler in his hand, there was already an air of gaiety in
+the room that did the heart good.
+
+I poured out some of the brandy.
+
+‘Colonel,’ said I, ‘I am a young man and a private soldier.  I have not
+been long in this room, and already I have shown the petulance that
+belongs to the one character and the ill manners that you may look for in
+the other.  Have the humanity to pass these slips over, and honour me so
+far as to accept this glass.’
+
+‘My lad,’ says he, waking up and blinking at me with an air of suspicion,
+‘are you sure you can afford it?’
+
+I assured him I could.
+
+‘I thank you, then: I am very cold.’  He took the glass out, and a little
+colour came in his face.  ‘I thank you again,’ said he.  ‘It goes to the
+heart.’
+
+The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a good deal
+of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the morning, now with
+some sort of apology, now with none at all; and the bottle began to look
+foolish before dinner was served.  It was such a meal as he had himself
+predicted: beef, greens, potatoes, mustard in a teacup, and beer in a
+brown jug that was all over hounds, horses, and hunters, with a fox at
+the fat end and a gigantic John Bull—for all the world like Fenn—sitting
+in the midst in a bob-wig and smoking tobacco.  The beer was a good brew,
+but not good enough for the Major; he laced it with brandy—for his cold,
+he said; and in this curative design the remainder of the bottle ebbed
+away.  He called my attention repeatedly to the circumstance; helped me
+pointedly to the dregs, threw the bottle in the air and played tricks
+with it; and at last, having exhausted his ingenuity, and seeing me
+remain quite blind to every hint, he ordered and paid for another
+himself.
+
+As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and only awoke
+occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he was supposed to be
+doing.  On each of these occasions he showed a gratitude and kind
+courtesy that endeared him to me beyond expression.  ‘Champdivers, my
+lad, your health!’ he would say.  ‘The Major and I had a very arduous
+march last night, and I positively thought I should have eaten nothing,
+but your fortunate idea of the brandy has made quite a new man of
+me—quite a new man.’  And he would fall to with a great air of
+heartiness, cut himself a mouthful, and, before he had swallowed it,
+would have forgotten his dinner, his company, the place where he then
+was, and the escape he was engaged on, and become absorbed in the vision
+of a sick-room and a dying girl in France.  The pathos of this continual
+preoccupation, in a man so old, sick, and over-weary, and whom I looked
+upon as a mere bundle of dying bones and death-pains, put me wholly from
+my victuals: it seemed there was an element of sin, a kind of rude
+bravado of youth, in the mere relishing of food at the same table with
+this tragic father; and though I was well enough used to the coarse,
+plain diet of the English, I ate scarce more than himself.  Dinner was
+hardly over before he succumbed to a lethargic sleep; lying on one of the
+mattresses with his limbs relaxed, and his breath seemingly suspended—the
+very image of dissolution.
+
+This left the Major and myself alone at the table.  You must not suppose
+our _tête-à-tête_ was long, but it was a lively period while it lasted.
+He drank like a fish or an Englishman; shouted, beat the table, roared
+out songs, quarrelled, made it up again, and at last tried to throw the
+dinner-plates through the window, a feat of which he was at that time
+quite incapable.  For a party of fugitives, condemned to the most
+rigorous discretion, there was never seen so noisy a carnival; and
+through it all the Colonel continued to sleep like a child.  Seeing the
+Major so well advanced, and no retreat possible, I made a fair wind of a
+foul one, keeping his glass full, pushing him with toasts; and sooner
+than I could have dared to hope, he became drowsy and incoherent.  With
+the wrong-headedness of all such sots, he would not be persuaded to lie
+down upon one of the mattresses until I had stretched myself upon
+another.  But the comedy was soon over; soon he slept the sleep of the
+just, and snored like a military music; and I might get up again and face
+(as best I could) the excessive tedium of the afternoon.
+
+I had passed the night before in a good bed; I was denied the resource of
+slumber; and there was nothing open for me but to pace the apartment,
+maintain the fire, and brood on my position.  I compared yesterday and
+to-day—the safety, comfort, jollity, open-air exercise and pleasant
+roadside inns of the one, with the tedium, anxiety, and discomfort of the
+other.  I remembered that I was in the hands of Fenn, who could not be
+more false—though he might be more vindictive—than I fancied him.  I
+looked forward to nights of pitching in the covered cart, and days of
+monotony in I knew not what hiding-places; and my heart failed me, and I
+was in two minds whether to slink off ere it was too late, and return to
+my former solitary way of travel.  But the Colonel stood in the path.  I
+had not seen much of him; but already I judged him a man of a childlike
+nature—with that sort of innocence and courtesy that, I think, is only to
+be found in old soldiers or old priests—and broken with years and sorrow.
+I could not turn my back on his distress; could not leave him alone with
+the selfish trooper who snored on the next mattress.  ‘Champdivers, my
+lad, your health!’ said a voice in my ear, and stopped me—and there are
+few things I am more glad of in the retrospect than that it did.
+
+It must have been about four in the afternoon—at least the rain had taken
+off, and the sun was setting with some wintry pomp—when the current of my
+reflections was effectually changed by the arrival of two visitors in a
+gig.  They were farmers of the neighbourhood, I suppose—big, burly
+fellows in great-coats and top-boots, mightily flushed with liquor when
+they arrived, and, before they left, inimitably drunk.  They stayed long
+in the kitchen with Burchell, drinking, shouting, singing, and keeping it
+up; and the sound of their merry minstrelsy kept me a kind of company.
+The night fell, and the shine of the fire brightened and blinked on the
+panelled wall.  Our illuminated windows must have been visible not only
+from the back lane of which Fenn had spoken, but from the court where the
+farmers’ gig awaited them.  In the far end of the firelit room lay my
+companions, the one silent, the other clamorously noisy, the images of
+death and drunkenness.  Little wonder if I were tempted to join in the
+choruses below, and sometimes could hardly refrain from laughter, and
+sometimes, I believe, from tears—so unmitigated was the tedium, so cruel
+the suspense, of this period.
+
+At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy minstrels appeared
+in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern, and knocking together as
+they came.  The visitors clambered noisily into the gig, one of them
+shook the reins, and they were snatched out of sight and hearing with a
+suddenness that partook of the nature of prodigy.  I am well aware there
+is a Providence for drunken men, that holds the reins for them and
+presides over their troubles; doubtless he had his work cut out for him
+with this particular gigful!  Fenn rescued his toes with an ejaculation
+from under the departing wheels, and turned at once with uncertain steps
+and devious lantern to the far end of the court.  There, through the open
+doors of a coach-house, the shock-headed lad was already to be seen
+drawing forth the covered cart.  If I wished any private talk with our
+host, it must be now or never.
+
+Accordingly I groped my way downstairs, and came to him as he looked on
+at and lighted the harnessing of the horses.
+
+‘The hour approaches when we have to part,’ said I; ‘and I shall be
+obliged if you will tell your servant to drop me at the nearest point for
+Dunstable.  I am determined to go so far with our friends, Colonel X and
+Major Y, but my business is peremptory, and it takes me to the
+neighbourhood of Dunstable.’
+
+Orders were given to my satisfaction, with an obsequiousness that seemed
+only inflamed by his potations.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV—TRAVELS OF THE COVERED CART
+
+
+My companions were aroused with difficulty: the Colonel, poor old
+gentleman, to a sort of permanent dream, in which you could say of him
+only that he was very deaf and anxiously polite; the Major still maudlin
+drunk.  We had a dish of tea by the fireside, and then issued like
+criminals into the scathing cold of the night.  For the weather had in
+the meantime changed.  Upon the cessation of the rain, a strict frost had
+succeeded.  The moon, being young, was already near the zenith when we
+started, glittered everywhere on sheets of ice, and sparkled in ten
+thousand icicles.  A more unpromising night for a journey it was hard to
+conceive.  But in the course of the afternoon the horses had been well
+roughed; and King (for such was the name of the shock-headed lad) was
+very positive that he could drive us without misadventure.  He was as
+good as his word; indeed, despite a gawky air, he was simply invaluable
+in his present employment, showing marked sagacity in all that concerned
+the care of horses, and guiding us by one short cut after another for
+days, and without a fault.
+
+The interior of that engine of torture, the covered cart, was fitted with
+a bench, on which we took our places; the door was shut; in a moment, the
+night closed upon us solid and stifling; and we felt that we were being
+driven carefully out of the courtyard.  Careful was the word all night,
+and it was an alleviation of our miseries that we did not often enjoy.
+In general, as we were driven the better part of the night and day, often
+at a pretty quick pace and always through a labyrinth of the most
+infamous country lanes and by-roads, we were so bruised upon the bench,
+so dashed against the top and sides of the cart, that we reached the end
+of a stage in truly pitiable case, sometimes flung ourselves down without
+the formality of eating, made but one sleep of it until the hour of
+departure returned, and were only properly awakened by the first jolt of
+the renewed journey.  There were interruptions, at times, that we hailed
+as alleviations.  At times the cart was bogged, once it was upset, and we
+must alight and lend the driver the assistance of our arms; at times, too
+(as on the occasion when I had first encountered it), the horses gave
+out, and we had to trail alongside in mud or frost until the first peep
+of daylight, or the approach to a hamlet or a high road, bade us
+disappear like ghosts into our prison.
+
+The main roads of England are incomparable for excellence, of a beautiful
+smoothness, very ingeniously laid down, and so well kept that in most
+weathers you could take your dinner off any part of them without
+distaste.  On them, to the note of the bugle, the mail did its sixty
+miles a day; innumerable chaises whisked after the bobbing postboys; or
+some young blood would flit by in a curricle and tandem, to the vast
+delight and danger of the lieges.  On them, the slow-pacing waggons made
+a music of bells, and all day long the travellers on horse-back and the
+travellers on foot (like happy Mr. St. Ives so little a while before!)
+kept coming and going, and baiting and gaping at each other, as though a
+fair were due, and they were gathering to it from all England.  No,
+nowhere in the world is travel so great a pleasure as in that country.
+But unhappily our one need was to be secret; and all this rapid and
+animated picture of the road swept quite apart from us, as we lumbered up
+hill and down dale, under hedge and over stone, among circuitous byways.
+Only twice did I receive, as it were, a whiff of the highway.  The first
+reached my ears alone.  I might have been anywhere.  I only knew I was
+walking in the dark night and among ruts, when I heard very far off, over
+the silent country that surrounded us, the guard’s horn wailing its
+signal to the next post-house for a change of horses.  It was like the
+voice of the day heard in darkness, a voice of the world heard in prison,
+the note of a cock crowing in the mid-seas—in short, I cannot tell you
+what it was like, you will have to fancy for yourself—but I could have
+wept to hear it.  Once we were belated: the cattle could hardly crawl,
+the day was at hand, it was a nipping, rigorous morning, King was lashing
+his horses, I was giving an arm to the old Colonel, and the Major was
+coughing in our rear.  I must suppose that King was a thought careless,
+being nearly in desperation about his team, and, in spite of the cold
+morning, breathing hot with his exertions.  We came, at last, a little
+before sunrise to the summit of a hill, and saw the high-road passing at
+right angles through an open country of meadows and hedgerow pollards;
+and not only the York mail, speeding smoothly at the gallop of the four
+horses, but a post-chaise besides, with the post-boy titupping briskly,
+and the traveller himself putting his head out of the window, but whether
+to breathe the dawn, or the better to observe the passage of the mail, I
+do not know.  So that we enjoyed for an instant a picture of free life on
+the road, in its most luxurious forms of despatch and comfort.  And
+thereafter, with a poignant feeling of contrast in our hearts, we must
+mount again into our wheeled dungeon.
+
+We came to our stages at all sorts of odd hours, and they were in all
+kinds of odd places.  I may say at once that my first experience was my
+best.  Nowhere again were we so well entertained as at Burchell Fenn’s.
+And this, I suppose, was natural, and indeed inevitable, in so long and
+secret a journey.  The first stop, we lay six hours in a barn standing by
+itself in a poor, marshy orchard, and packed with hay; to make it more
+attractive, we were told it had been the scene of an abominable murder,
+and was now haunted.  But the day was beginning to break, and our fatigue
+was too extreme for visionary terrors.  The second or third, we alighted
+on a barren heath about midnight, built a fire to warm us under the
+shelter of some thorns, supped like beggars on bread and a piece of cold
+bacon, and slept like gipsies with our feet to the fire.  In the
+meanwhile, King was gone with the cart, I know not where, to get a change
+of horses, and it was late in the dark morning when he returned and we
+were able to resume our journey.  In the middle of another night, we came
+to a stop by an ancient, whitewashed cottage of two stories; a privet
+hedge surrounded it; the frosty moon shone blankly on the upper windows;
+but through those of the kitchen the firelight was seen glinting on the
+roof and reflected from the dishes on the wall.  Here, after much
+hammering on the door, King managed to arouse an old crone from the
+chimney-corner chair, where she had been dozing in the watch; and we were
+had in, and entertained with a dish of hot tea.  This old lady was an
+aunt of Burchell Fenn’s—and an unwilling partner in his dangerous trade.
+Though the house stood solitary, and the hour was an unlikely one for any
+passenger upon the road, King and she conversed in whispers only.  There
+was something dismal, something of the sick-room, in this perpetual,
+guarded sibilation.  The apprehensions of our hostess insensibly
+communicated themselves to every one present.  We ate like mice in a
+cat’s ear; if one of us jingled a teaspoon, all would start; and when the
+hour came to take the road again, we drew a long breath of relief, and
+climbed to our places in the covered cart with a positive sense of
+escape.  The most of our meals, however, were taken boldly at hedgerow
+alehouses, usually at untimely hours of the day, when the clients were in
+the field or the farmyard at labour.  I shall have to tell presently of
+our last experience of the sort, and how unfortunately it miscarried; but
+as that was the signal for my separation from my fellow-travellers, I
+must first finish with them.
+
+I had never any occasion to waver in my first judgment of the Colonel.
+The old gentleman seemed to me, and still seems in the retrospect, the
+salt of the earth.  I had occasion to see him in the extremes of
+hardship, hunger and cold; he was dying, and he looked it; and yet I
+cannot remember any hasty, harsh, or impatient word to have fallen from
+his lips.  On the contrary, he ever showed himself careful to please; and
+even if he rambled in his talk, rambled always gently—like a humane,
+half-witted old hero, true to his colours to the last.  I would not dare
+to say how often he awoke suddenly from a lethargy, and told us again, as
+though we had never heard it, the story of how he had earned the cross,
+how it had been given him by the hand of the Emperor, and of the
+innocent—and, indeed, foolish—sayings of his daughter when he returned
+with it on his bosom.  He had another anecdote which he was very apt to
+give, by way of a rebuke, when the Major wearied us beyond endurance with
+dispraises of the English.  This was an account of the _braves gens_ with
+whom he had been boarding.  True enough, he was a man so simple and
+grateful by nature, that the most common civilities were able to touch
+him to the heart, and would remain written in his memory; but from a
+thousand inconsiderable but conclusive indications, I gathered that this
+family had really loved him, and loaded him with kindness.  They made a
+fire in his bedroom, which the sons and daughters tended with their own
+hands; letters from France were looked for with scarce more eagerness by
+himself than by these alien sympathisers; when they came, he would read
+them aloud in the parlour to the assembled family, translating as he
+went.  The Colonel’s English was elementary; his daughter not in the
+least likely to be an amusing correspondent; and, as I conceived these
+scenes in the parlour, I felt sure the interest centred in the Colonel
+himself, and I thought I could feel in my own heart that mixture of the
+ridiculous and the pathetic, the contest of tears and laughter, which
+must have shaken the bosoms of the family.  Their kindness had continued
+till the end.  It appears they were privy to his flight, the camlet cloak
+had been lined expressly for him, and he was the bearer of a letter from
+the daughter of the house to his own daughter in Paris.  The last
+evening, when the time came to say good-night, it was tacitly known to
+all that they were to look upon his face no more.  He rose, pleading
+fatigue, and turned to the daughter, who had been his chief ally: ‘You
+will permit me, my dear—to an old and very unhappy soldier—and may God
+bless you for your goodness!’  The girl threw her arms about his neck and
+sobbed upon his bosom; the lady of the house burst into tears; ‘_et je
+vous le jure_, _le père se mouchait_!’ quoth the Colonel, twisting his
+moustaches with a cavalry air, and at the same time blinking the water
+from his eyes at the mere recollection.
+
+It was a good thought to me that he had found these friends in captivity;
+that he had started on this fatal journey from so cordial a farewell.  He
+had broken his parole for his daughter: that he should ever live to reach
+her sick-bed, that he could continue to endure to an end the hardships,
+the crushing fatigue, the savage cold, of our pilgrimage, I had early
+ceased to hope.  I did for him what I was able,—nursed him, kept him
+covered, watched over his slumbers, sometimes held him in my arms at the
+rough places of the road.  ‘Champdivers,’ he once said, ‘you are like a
+son to me—like a son.’  It is good to remember, though at the time it put
+me on the rack.  All was to no purpose.  Fast as we were travelling
+towards France, he was travelling faster still to another destination.
+Daily he grew weaker and more indifferent.  An old rustic accent of Lower
+Normandy reappeared in his speech, from which it had long been banished,
+and grew stronger; old words of the _patois_, too: _Ouistreham_,
+_matrassé_, and others, the sense of which we were sometimes unable to
+guess.  On the very last day he began again his eternal story of the
+cross and the Emperor.  The Major, who was particularly ill, or at least
+particularly cross, uttered some angry words of protest.
+‘_Pardonnez-moi_, _monsieur le commandant_, _mais c’est pour monsieur_,’
+said the Colonel: ‘Monsieur has not yet heard the circumstance, and is
+good enough to feel an interest.’  Presently after, however, he began to
+lose the thread of his narrative; and at last: ‘_Qué que j’ai_?  _Je
+m’embrouille_!’ says he, ‘_Suffit_: _s’m’a la donné_, _et Berthe en était
+bien contente_.’  It struck me as the falling of the curtain or the
+closing of the sepulchre doors.
+
+Sure enough, in but a little while after, he fell into a sleep as gentle
+as an infant’s, which insensibly changed into the sleep of death.  I had
+my arm about his body at the time and remarked nothing, unless it were
+that he once stretched himself a little, so kindly the end came to that
+disastrous life.  It was only at our evening halt that the Major and I
+discovered we were travelling alone with the poor clay.  That night we
+stole a spade from a field—I think near Market Bosworth—and a little
+farther on, in a wood of young oak trees and by the light of King’s
+lantern, we buried the old soldier of the Empire with both prayers and
+tears.
+
+We had needs invent Heaven if it had not been revealed to us; there are
+some things that fall so bitterly ill on this side Time!  As for the
+Major, I have long since forgiven him.  He broke the news to the poor
+Colonel’s daughter; I am told he did it kindly; and sure, nobody could
+have done it without tears!  His share of purgatory will be brief; and in
+this world, as I could not very well praise him, I have suppressed his
+name.  The Colonel’s also, for the sake of his parole.  _Requiescat_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV—THE ADVENTURE OF THE ATTORNEY’S CLERK
+
+
+I have mentioned our usual course, which was to eat in inconsiderable
+wayside hostelries, known to King.  It was a dangerous business; we went
+daily under fire to satisfy our appetite, and put our head in the loin’s
+mouth for a piece of bread.  Sometimes, to minimise the risk, we would
+all dismount before we came in view of the house, straggle in severally,
+and give what orders we pleased, like disconnected strangers.  In like
+manner we departed, to find the cart at an appointed place, some half a
+mile beyond.  The Colonel and the Major had each a word or two of
+English—God help their pronunciation!  But they did well enough to order
+a rasher and a pot or call a reckoning; and, to say truth, these country
+folks did not give themselves the pains, and had scarce the knowledge, to
+be critical.
+
+About nine or ten at night the pains of hunger and cold drove us to an
+alehouse in the flats of Bedfordshire, not far from Bedford itself.  In
+the inn kitchen was a long, lean, characteristic-looking fellow of
+perhaps forty, dressed in black.  He sat on a settle by the fireside,
+smoking a long pipe, such as they call a yard of clay.  His hat and wig
+were hanged upon the knob behind him, his head as bald as a bladder of
+lard, and his expression very shrewd, cantankerous, and inquisitive.  He
+seemed to value himself above his company, to give himself the airs of a
+man of the world among that rustic herd; which was often no more than his
+due; being, as I afterwards discovered, an attorney’s clerk.  I took upon
+myself the more ungrateful part of arriving last; and by the time I
+entered on the scene the Major was already served at a side table.  Some
+general conversation must have passed, and I smelled danger in the air.
+The Major looked flustered, the attorney’s clerk triumphant, and three or
+four peasants in smock-frocks (who sat about the fire to play chorus) had
+let their pipes go out.
+
+‘Give you good evening, sir!’ said the attorney’s clerk to me.
+
+‘The same to you, sir,’ said I.
+
+‘I think this one will do,’ quoth the clerk to the yokels with a wink;
+and then, as soon as I had given my order, ‘Pray, sir, whither are you
+bound?’ he added.
+
+‘Sir,’ said I, ‘I am not one of those who speak either of their business
+or their destination in houses of public entertainment.’
+
+‘A good answer,’ said he, ‘and an excellent principle.  Sir, do you speak
+French?’
+
+‘Why, no, sir,’ said I.  ‘A little Spanish at your service.’
+
+‘But you know the French accent, perhaps?’ said the clerk.
+
+‘Well do I do that!’ said I.  ‘The French accent?  Why, I believe I can
+tell a Frenchman in ten words.’
+
+‘Here is a puzzle for you, then!’ he said.  ‘I have no material doubt
+myself, but some of these gentlemen are more backward.  The lack of
+education, you know.  I make bold to say that a man cannot walk, cannot
+hear, and cannot see, without the blessings of education.’
+
+He turned to the Major, whose food plainly stuck in his throat.
+
+‘Now, sir,’ pursued the clerk, ‘let me have the pleasure to hear your
+voice again.  Where are you going, did you say?’
+
+‘Sare, I am go-ing to Lon-don,’ said the Major.
+
+I could have flung my plate at him to be such an ass, and to have so
+little a gift of languages where that was the essential.
+
+‘What think ye of that?’ said the clerk.  ‘Is that French enough?’
+
+‘Good God!’ cried I, leaping up like one who should suddenly perceive an
+acquaintance, ‘is this you, Mr. Dubois?  Why, who would have dreamed of
+encountering you so far from home?’  As I spoke, I shook hands with the
+Major heartily; and turning to our tormentor, ‘Oh, sir, you may be
+perfectly reassured!  This is a very honest fellow, a late neighbour of
+mine in the city of Carlisle.’
+
+I thought the attorney looked put out; I little knew the man!
+
+‘But he is French,’ said he, ‘for all that?’
+
+‘Ay, to be sure!’ said I.  ‘A Frenchman of the emigration!  None of your
+Buonaparte lot.  I will warrant his views of politics to be as sound as
+your own.’
+
+‘What is a little strange,’ said the clerk quietly, ‘is that Mr. Dubois
+should deny it.’
+
+I got it fair in the face, and took it smiling; but the shock was rude,
+and in the course of the next words I contrived to do what I have rarely
+done, and make a slip in my English.  I kept my liberty and life by my
+proficiency all these months, and for once that I failed, it is not to be
+supposed that I would make a public exhibition of the details.  Enough,
+that it was a very little error, and one that might have passed
+ninety-nine times in a hundred.  But my limb of the law was as swift to
+pick it up as though he had been by trade a master of languages.
+
+‘Aha!’ cries he; ‘and you are French, too!  Your tongue bewrays you.  Two
+Frenchmen coming into an alehouse, severally and accidentally, not
+knowing each other, at ten of the clock at night, in the middle of
+Bedfordshire?  No, sir, that shall not pass!  You are all prisoners
+escaping, if you are nothing worse.  Consider yourselves under arrest.  I
+have to trouble you for your papers.’
+
+‘Where is your warrant, if you come to that?’ said I.  ‘My papers!  A
+likely thing that I would show my papers on the _ipse dixit_ of an
+unknown fellow in a hedge alehouse!’
+
+‘Would you resist the law?’ says he.
+
+‘Not the law, sir!’ said I.  ‘I hope I am too good a subject for that.
+But for a nameless fellow with a bald head and a pair of gingham
+small-clothes, why certainly!  ’Tis my birthright as an Englishman.
+Where’s _Magna Charta_, else?’
+
+‘We will see about that,’ says he; and then, addressing the assistants,
+‘where does the constable live?’
+
+‘Lord love you, sir!’ cried the landlord, ‘what are you thinking of?  The
+constable at past ten at night!  Why, he’s abed and asleep, and good and
+drunk two hours agone!’
+
+‘Ah that a’ be!’ came in chorus from the yokels.
+
+The attorney’s clerk was put to a stand.  He could not think of force;
+there was little sign of martial ardour about the landlord, and the
+peasants were indifferent—they only listened, and gaped, and now
+scratched a head, and now would get a light to their pipes from the
+embers on the hearth.  On the other hand, the Major and I put a bold
+front on the business and defied him, not without some ground of law.  In
+this state of matters he proposed I should go along with him to one
+Squire Merton, a great man of the neighbourhood, who was in the
+commission of the peace, the end of his avenue but three lanes away.  I
+told him I would not stir a foot for him if it were to save his soul.
+Next he proposed I should stay all night where I was, and the constable
+could see to my affair in the morning, when he was sober.  I replied I
+should go when and where I pleased; that we were lawful travellers in the
+fear of God and the king, and I for one would suffer myself to be stayed
+by nobody.  At the same time, I was thinking the matter had lasted
+altogether too long, and I determined to bring it to an end at once.
+
+‘See here,’ said I, getting up, for till now I had remained carelessly
+seated, ‘there’s only one way to decide a thing like this—only one way
+that’s right _English_—and that’s man to man.  Take off your coat, sir,
+and these gentlemen shall see fair play.’  At this there came a look in
+his eye that I could not mistake.  His education had been neglected in
+one essential and eminently British particular: he could not box.  No
+more could I, you may say; but then I had the more impudence—and I had
+made the proposal.
+
+‘He says I’m no Englishman, but the proof of the pudding is the eating of
+it,’ I continued.  And here I stripped my coat and fell into the proper
+attitude, which was just about all I knew of this barbarian art.  ‘Why,
+sir, you seem to me to hang back a little,’ said I.  ‘Come, I’ll meet
+you; I’ll give you an appetiser—though hang me if I can understand the
+man that wants any enticement to hold up his hands.’  I drew a bank-note
+out of my fob and tossed it to the landlord.  ‘There are the stakes,’
+said I.  ‘I’ll fight you for first blood, since you seem to make so much
+work about it.  If you tap my claret first, there are five guineas for
+you, and I’ll go with you to any squire you choose to mention.  If I tap
+yours, you’ll perhaps let on that I’m the better man, and allow me to go
+about my lawful business at my own time and convenience, by God; is that
+fair, my lads?’ says I, appealing to the company.
+
+‘Ay, ay,’ said the chorus of chawbacons; ‘he can’t say no fairer nor
+that, he can’t.  Take off thy coat master!’
+
+The limb of the law was now on the wrong side of public opinion, and,
+what heartened me to go on, the position was rapidly changing in our
+favour.  Already the Major was paying his shot to the very indifferent
+landlord, and I could see the white face of King at the back-door, making
+signals of haste.
+
+‘Oho!’ quoth my enemy, ‘you are as full of doubles as a fox, are you not?
+But I see through you; I see through and through you.  You would change
+the venue, would you?’
+
+‘I may be transparent, sir,’ says I, ‘but if you’ll do me the favour to
+stand up, you’ll find I can hit dam hard.’
+
+‘Which is a point, if you will observe, that I had never called in
+question,’ said he.  ‘Why, you ignorant clowns,’ he proceeded, addressing
+the company, ‘can’t you see the fellow’s gulling you before your eyes?
+Can’t you see that he has changed the point upon me?  I say he’s a French
+prisoner, and he answers that he can box!  What has that to do with it?
+I would not wonder but what he can dance, too—they’re all dancing masters
+over there.  I say, and I stick to it, that he’s a Frenchy.  He says he
+isn’t.  Well then, let him out with his papers, if he has them!  If he
+had, would he not show them?  If he had, would he not jump at the idea of
+going to Squire Merton, a man you all know?  Now, you are all plain,
+straightforward Bedfordshire men, and I wouldn’t ask a better lot to
+appeal to.  You’re not the kind to be talked over with any French gammon,
+and he’s plenty of that.  But let me tell him, he can take his pigs to
+another market; they’ll never do here; they’ll never go down in
+Bedfordshire.  Why! look at the man!  Look at his feet!  Has anybody got
+a foot in the room like that?  See how he stands! do any of you fellows
+stand like that?  Does the landlord, there?  Why, he has Frenchman wrote
+all over him, as big as a sign-post!’
+
+This was all very well; and in a different scene I might even have been
+gratified by his remarks; but I saw clearly, if I were to allow him to
+talk, he might turn the tables on me altogether.  He might not be much of
+a hand at boxing; but I was much mistaken, or he had studied forensic
+eloquence in a good school.  In this predicament I could think of nothing
+more ingenious than to burst out of the house, under the pretext of an
+ungovernable rage.  It was certainly not very ingenious—it was
+elementary, but I had no choice.
+
+‘You white-livered dog!’ I broke out.  ‘Do you dare to tell me you’re an
+Englishman, and won’t fight?  But I’ll stand no more of this!  I leave
+this place, where I’ve been insulted!  Here! what’s to pay?  Pay
+yourself!’ I went on, offering the landlord a handful of silver, ‘and
+give me back my bank-note!’
+
+The landlord, following his usual policy of obliging everybody, offered
+no opposition to my design.  The position of my adversary was now
+thoroughly bad.  He had lost my two companions.  He was on the point of
+losing me also.  There was plainly no hope of arousing the company to
+help; and watching him with a corner of my eye, I saw him hesitate for a
+moment.  The next, he had taken down his hat and his wig, which was of
+black horsehair; and I saw him draw from behind the settle a vast hooded
+great-coat and a small valise.  ‘The devil!’ thought I: ‘is the rascal
+going to follow me?’
+
+I was scarce clear of the inn before the limb of the law was at my heels.
+I saw his face plain in the moonlight; and the most resolute purpose
+showed in it, along with an unmoved composure.  A chill went over me.
+‘This is no common adventure,’ thinks I to myself.  ‘You have got hold of
+a man of character, St. Ives!  A bite-hard, a bull-dog, a weasel is on
+your trail; and how are you to throw him off?’  Who was he?  By some of
+his expressions I judged he was a hanger-on of courts.  But in what
+character had he followed the assizes?  As a simple spectator, as a
+lawyer’s clerk, as a criminal himself, or—last and worst supposition—as a
+Bow-street ‘runner’?
+
+The cart would wait for me, perhaps, half a mile down our onward road,
+which I was already following.  And I told myself that in a few minutes’
+walking, Bow-street runner or not, I should have him at my mercy.  And
+then reflection came to me in time.  Of all things, one was out of the
+question.  Upon no account must this obtrusive fellow see the cart.
+Until I had killed or shook him off, I was quite divorced from my
+companions—alone, in the midst of England, on a frosty by-way leading
+whither I knew not, with a sleuth-hound at my heels, and never a friend
+but the holly-stick!
+
+We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes.  The branch to the left
+was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and dark.  Not a ray of moonlight
+penetrated its recesses; and I took it at a venture.  The wretch followed
+my example in silence; and for some time we crunched together over frozen
+pools without a word.  Then he found his voice, with a chuckle.
+
+‘This is not the way to Mr. Merton’s,’ said he.
+
+‘No?’ said I. ‘It is mine, however.’
+
+‘And therefore mine,’ said he.
+
+Again we fell silent; and we may thus have covered half a mile before the
+lane, taking a sudden turn, brought us forth again into the moonshine.
+With his hooded great-coat on his back, his valise in his hand, his black
+wig adjusted, and footing it on the ice with a sort of sober doggedness
+of manner, my enemy was changed almost beyond recognition: changed in
+everything but a certain dry, polemical, pedantic air, that spoke of a
+sedentary occupation and high stools.  I observed, too, that his valise
+was heavy; and, putting this and that together, hit upon a plan.
+
+‘A seasonable night, sir,’ said I.  ‘What do you say to a bit of running?
+The frost has me by the toes.’
+
+‘With all the pleasure in life,’ says he.
+
+His voice seemed well assured, which pleased me little.  However, there
+was nothing else to try, except violence, for which it would always be
+too soon.  I took to my heels accordingly, he after me; and for some time
+the slapping of our feet on the hard road might have been heard a mile
+away.  He had started a pace behind me, and he finished in the same
+position.  For all his extra years and the weight of his valise, he had
+not lost a hair’s breadth.  The devil might race him for me—I had enough
+of it!
+
+And, besides, to run so fast was contrary to my interests.  We could not
+run long without arriving somewhere.  At any moment we might turn a
+corner and find ourselves at the lodge-gate of some Squire Merton, in the
+midst of a village whose constable was sober, or in the hands of a
+patrol.  There was no help for it—I must finish with him on the spot, as
+long as it was possible.  I looked about me, and the place seemed
+suitable; never a light, never a house—nothing but stubble-fields,
+fallows, and a few stunted trees.  I stopped and eyed him in the
+moonlight with an angry stare.
+
+‘Enough of this foolery!’ said I.
+
+He had tamed, and now faced me full, very pale, but with no sign of
+shrinking.
+
+‘I am quite of your opinion,’ said he.  ‘You have tried me at the
+running; you can try me next at the high jump.  It will be all the same.
+It must end the one way.’
+
+I made my holly whistle about my head.
+
+‘I believe you know what way!’ said I.  ‘We are alone, it is night, and I
+am wholly resolved.  Are you not frightened?’
+
+‘No,’ he said, ‘not in the smallest.  I do not box, sir; but I am not a
+coward, as you may have supposed.  Perhaps it will simplify our relations
+if I tell you at the outset that I walk armed.’
+
+Quick as lightning I made a feint at his head; as quickly he gave ground,
+and at the same time I saw a pistol glitter in his hand.
+
+‘No more of that, Mr. French-Prisoner!’ he said.  ‘It will do me no good
+to have your death at my door.’
+
+‘Faith, nor me either!’ said I; and I lowered my stick and considered the
+man, not without a twinkle of admiration.  ‘You see,’ I said, ‘there is
+one consideration that you appear to overlook: there are a great many
+chances that your pistol may miss fire.’
+
+‘I have a pair,’ he returned.  ‘Never travel without a brace of barkers.’
+
+‘I make you my compliment,’ said I.  ‘You are able to take care of
+yourself, and that is a good trait.  But, my good man! let us look at
+this matter dispassionately.  You are not a coward, and no more am I; we
+are both men of excellent sense; I have good reason, whatever it may be,
+to keep my concerns to myself and to walk alone.  Now I put it to you
+pointedly, am I likely to stand it?  Am I likely to put up with your
+continued and—excuse me—highly impudent _ingérence_ into my private
+affairs?’
+
+‘Another French word,’ says he composedly.
+
+‘Oh! damn your French words!’ cried I.  ‘You seem to be a Frenchman
+yourself!’
+
+‘I have had many opportunities by which I have profited,’ he explained.
+‘Few men are better acquainted with the similarities and differences,
+whether of idiom or accent, of the two languages.’
+
+‘You are a pompous fellow, too!’ said I.
+
+‘Oh, I can make distinctions, sir,’ says he.  ‘I can talk with
+Bedfordshire peasants; and I can express myself becomingly, I hope, in
+the company of a gentleman of education like yourself.’
+
+‘If you set up to be a gentleman—’ I began.
+
+‘Pardon me,’ he interrupted: ‘I make no such claim.  I only see the
+nobility and gentry in the way of business.  I am quite a plain person.’
+
+‘For the Lord’s sake,’ I exclaimed, ‘set my mind at rest upon one point.
+In the name of mystery, who and what are you?’
+
+‘I have no cause to be ashamed of my name, sir,’ said he, ‘nor yet my
+trade.  I am Thomas Dudgeon, at your service, clerk to Mr. Daniel
+Romaine, solicitor of London; High Holborn is our address, sir.’
+
+It was only by the ecstasy of the relief that I knew how horribly I had
+been frightened.  I flung my stick on the road.
+
+‘Romaine?’ I cried.  ‘Daniel Romaine?  An old hunks with a red face and a
+big head, and got up like a Quaker?  My dear friend, to my arms!’
+
+‘Keep back, I say!’ said Dudgeon weakly.
+
+I would not listen to him.  With the end of my own alarm, I felt as if I
+must infallibly be at the end of all dangers likewise; as if the pistol
+that he held in one hand were no more to be feared than the valise that
+he carried with the other, and now put up like a barrier against my
+advance.
+
+‘Keep back, or I declare I will fire,’ he was crying.  ‘Have a care, for
+God’s sake!  My pistol—’
+
+He might scream as be pleased.  Willy nilly, I folded him to my breast, I
+pressed him there, I kissed his ugly mug as it had never been kissed
+before and would never be kissed again; and in the doing so knocked his
+wig awry and his hat off.  He bleated in my embrace; so bleats the sheep
+in the arms of the butcher.  The whole thing, on looking back, appears
+incomparably reckless and absurd; I no better than a madman for offering
+to advance on Dudgeon, and he no better than a fool for not shooting me
+while I was about it.  But all’s well that ends well; or, as the people
+in these days kept singing and whistling on the streets:—
+
+    ‘There’s a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft
+    And looks out for the life of poor Jack.’
+
+‘There!’ said I, releasing him a little, but still keeping my hands on
+his shoulders, ‘_je vous ai bel et bien embrassé_—and, as you would say,
+there is another French word.’  With his wig over one eye, he looked
+incredibly rueful and put out.  ‘Cheer up, Dudgeon; the ordeal is over,
+you shall be embraced no more.  But do, first of all, for God’s-sake, put
+away your pistol; you handle it as if you were a cockatrice; some time or
+other, depend upon it, it will certainly go off.  Here is your hat.  No,
+let me put it on square, and the wig before it.  Never suffer any stress
+of circumstances to come between you and the duty you owe to yourself.
+If you have nobody else to dress for, dress for God!
+
+    ‘Put your wig straight
+    On your bald pate,
+    Keep your chin scraped,
+    And your figure draped.
+
+Can you match me that?  The whole duty of man in a quatrain!  And remark,
+I do not set up to be a professional bard; these are the outpourings of a
+_dilettante_.’
+
+‘But, my dear sir!’ he exclaimed.
+
+‘But, my dear sir!’ I echoed, ‘I will allow no man to interrupt the flow
+of my ideas.  Give me your opinion on my quatrain, or I vow we shall have
+a quarrel of it.’
+
+‘Certainly you are quite an original,’ he said.
+
+‘Quite,’ said I; ‘and I believe I have my counterpart before me.’
+
+‘Well, for a choice,’ says he, smiling, ‘and whether for sense or poetry,
+give me
+
+    ‘“Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow:
+    The rest is all but leather and prunello.”’
+
+‘Oh, but that’s not fair—that’s Pope!  It’s not original, Dudgeon.
+Understand me,’ said I, wringing his breast-button, ‘the first duty of
+all poetry is to be mine, sir—mine.  Inspiration now swells in my bosom,
+because—to tell you the plain truth, and descend a little in style—I am
+devilish relieved at the turn things have taken.  So, I dare say, are you
+yourself, Dudgeon, if you would only allow it.  And _à propos_, let me
+ask you a home question.  Between friends, have you ever fired that
+pistol?’
+
+‘Why, yes, sir,’ he replied.  ‘Twice—at hedgesparrows.’
+
+‘And you would have fired at me, you bloody-minded man?’ I cried.
+
+‘If you go to that, you seemed mighty reckless with your stick,’ said
+Dudgeon.
+
+‘Did I indeed?  Well, well, ’tis all past history; ancient as King
+Pharamond—which is another French word, if you cared to accumulate more
+evidence,’ says I.  ‘But happily we are now the best of friends, and have
+all our interests in common.’
+
+‘You go a little too fast, if you’ll excuse me, Mr. ---: I do not know
+your name, that I am aware,’ said Dudgeon.
+
+‘No, to be sure!’ said I.  ‘Never heard of it!’
+
+‘A word of explanation—’ he began.
+
+‘No, Dudgeon!’ I interrupted.  ‘Be practical; I know what you want, and
+the name of it is supper.  _Rien ne creuse comme l’emotion_.  I am hungry
+myself, and yet I am more accustomed to warlike palpitations than you,
+who are but a hunter of hedgesparrows.  Let me look at your face
+critically: your bill of fare is three slices of cold rare roast beef, a
+Welsh rabbit, a pot of stout, and a glass or two of sound tawny port, old
+in bottle—the right milk of Englishmen.’  Methought there seemed a
+brightening in his eye and a melting about his mouth at this enumeration.
+
+‘The night is young,’ I continued; ‘not much past eleven, for a wager.
+Where can we find a good inn?  And remark that I say _good_, for the port
+must be up to the occasion—not a headache in a pipe of it.’
+
+‘Really, sir,’ he said, smiling a little, ‘you have a way of carrying
+things—’
+
+‘Will nothing make you stick to the subject?’ I cried; ‘you have the most
+irrelevant mind!  How do you expect to rise in your profession?  The
+inn?’
+
+‘Well, I will say you are a facetious gentleman!’ said he.  ‘You must
+have your way, I see.  We are not three miles from Bedford by this very
+road.’
+
+‘Done!’ cried I.  ‘Bedford be it!’
+
+I tucked his arm under mine, possessed myself of the valise, and walked
+him off unresisting.  Presently we came to an open piece of country lying
+a thought downhill.  The road was smooth and free of ice, the moonshine
+thin and bright over the meadows and the leafless trees.  I was now
+honestly done with the purgatory of the covered cart; I was close to my
+great-uncle’s; I had no more fear of Mr. Dudgeon; which were all grounds
+enough for jollity.  And I was aware, besides, of us two as of a pair of
+tiny and solitary dolls under the vast frosty cupola of the midnight; the
+rooms decked, the moon burnished, the least of the stars lighted, the
+floor swept and waxed, and nothing wanting but for the band to strike up
+and the dancing to begin.  In the exhilaration of my heart I took the
+music on myself—
+
+    ‘Merrily danced the Quaker’s wife,
+    And merrily danced the Quaker.’
+
+I broke into that animated and appropriate air, clapped my arm about
+Dudgeon’s waist, and away down the hill at a dancing step!  He hung back
+a little at the start, but the impulse of the tune, the night, and my
+example, were not to be resisted.  A man made of putty must have danced,
+and even Dudgeon showed himself to be a human being.  Higher and higher
+were the capers that we cut; the moon repeated in shadow our antic
+footsteps and gestures; and it came over my mind of a sudden—really like
+balm—what appearance of man I was dancing with, what a long bilious
+countenance he had shown under his shaven pate, and what a world of
+trouble the rascal had given me in the immediate past.
+
+Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.  My Puritanic companion
+stopped and disengaged himself.
+
+‘This is a trifle _infra dig._, sir, is it not?’ said he.  ‘A party might
+suppose we had been drinking.’
+
+‘And so you shall be, Dudgeon,’ said I.  ‘You shall not only be drinking,
+you old hypocrite, but you shall be drunk—dead drunk, sir—and the boots
+shall put you to bed!  We’ll warn him when we go in.  Never neglect a
+precaution; never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day!’
+
+But he had no more frivolity to complain of.  We finished our stage and
+came to the inn-door with decorum, to find the house still alight and in
+a bustle with many late arrivals; to give our orders with a prompt
+severity which ensured obedience, and to be served soon after at a
+side-table, close to the fire and in a blaze of candle-light, with such a
+meal as I had been dreaming of for days past.  For days, you are to
+remember, I had been skulking in the covered cart, a prey to cold,
+hunger, and an accumulation of discomforts that might have daunted the
+most brave; and the white table napery, the bright crystal, the
+reverberation of the fire, the red curtains, the Turkey carpet, the
+portraits on the coffee-room wall, the placid faces of the two or three
+late guests who were silently prolonging the pleasures of digestion, and
+(last, but not by any means least) a glass of an excellent light dry
+port, put me in a humour only to be described as heavenly.  The thought
+of the Colonel, of how he would have enjoyed this snug room and roaring
+fire, and of his cold grave in the wood by Market Bosworth, lingered on
+my palate, _amari aliquid_, like an after-taste, but was not able—I say
+it with shame—entirely to dispel my self-complacency.  After all, in this
+world every dog hangs by its own tail.  I was a free adventurer, who had
+just brought to a successful end—or, at least, within view of it—an
+adventure very difficult and alarming; and I looked across at Mr.
+Dudgeon, as the port rose to his cheeks, and a smile, that was
+semi-confidential and a trifle foolish, began to play upon his leathery
+features, not only with composure, but with a suspicion of kindness.  The
+rascal had been brave, a quality for which I would value the devil; and
+if he had been pertinacious in the beginning, he had more than made up
+for it before the end.
+
+‘And now, Dudgeon, to explain,’ I began.  ‘I know your master, he knows
+me, and he knows and approves of my errand.  So much I may tell you, that
+I am on my way to Amersham Place.’
+
+‘Oho!’ quoth Dudgeon, ‘I begin to see.’
+
+‘I am heartily glad of it,’ said I, passing the bottle, ‘because that is
+about all I can tell you.  You must take my word for the remainder.
+Either believe me or don’t.  If you don’t, let’s take a chaise; you can
+carry me to-morrow to High Holborn, and confront me with Mr. Romaine; the
+result of which will be to set your mind at rest—and to make the holiest
+disorder in your master’s plans.  If I judge you aright (for I find you a
+shrewd fellow), this will not be at all to your mind.  You know what a
+subordinate gets by officiousness; if I can trust my memory, old Romaine
+has not at all the face that I should care to see in anger; and I venture
+to predict surprising results upon your weekly salary—if you are paid by
+the week, that is.  In short, let me go free, and ’tis an end of the
+matter; take me to London, and ’tis only a beginning—and, by my opinion,
+a beginning of troubles.  You can take your choice.’
+
+‘And that is soon taken,’ said he.  ‘Go to Amersham tomorrow, or go to
+the devil if you prefer—I wash my hands of you and the whole transaction.
+No, you don’t find me putting my head in between Romaine and a client!  A
+good man of business, sir, but hard as millstone grit.  I might get the
+sack, and I shouldn’t wonder!  But, it’s a pity, too,’ he added, and
+sighed, shook his head, and took his glass off sadly.
+
+‘That reminds me,’ said I.  ‘I have a great curiosity, and you can
+satisfy it.  Why were you so forward to meddle with poor Mr. Dubois?  Why
+did you transfer your attentions to me?  And generally, what induced you
+to make yourself such a nuisance?’
+
+He blushed deeply.
+
+‘Why, sir,’ says he, ‘there is such a thing as patriotism, I hope.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI—THE HOME-COMING OF MR. ROWLEY’S VISCOUNT
+
+
+By eight the next morning Dudgeon and I had made our parting.  By that
+time we had grown to be extremely familiar; and I would very willingly
+have kept him by me, and even carried him to Amersham Place.  But it
+appeared he was due at the public-house where we had met, on some affairs
+of my great-uncle the Count, who had an outlying estate in that part of
+the shire.  If Dudgeon had had his way the night before, I should have
+been arrested on my uncle’s land and by my uncle’s agent, a culmination
+of ill-luck.
+
+A little after noon I started, in a hired chaise, by way of Dunstable.
+The mere mention of the name Amersham Place made every one supple and
+smiling.  It was plainly a great house, and my uncle lived there in
+style.  The fame of it rose as we approached, like a chain of mountains;
+at Bedford they touched their caps, but in Dunstable they crawled upon
+their bellies.  I thought the landlady would have kissed me; such a
+flutter of cordiality, such smiles, such affectionate attentions were
+called forth, and the good lady bustled on my service in such a pother of
+ringlets and with such a jingling of keys.  ‘You’re probably expected,
+sir, at the Place?  I do trust you may ’ave better accounts of his
+lordship’s ’elth, sir.  We understood that his lordship, Mosha de
+Carwell, was main bad.  Ha, sir, we shall all feel his loss, poor, dear,
+noble gentleman; and I’m sure nobody more polite!  They do say, sir, his
+wealth is enormous, and before the Revolution, quite a prince in his own
+country!  But I beg your pardon, sir; ’ow I do run on, to be sure; and
+doubtless all beknown to you already!  For you do resemble the family,
+sir.  I should have known you anywheres by the likeness to the dear
+viscount.  Ha, poor gentleman, he must ’ave a ’eavy ’eart these days.’
+
+In the same place I saw out of the inn-windows a man-servant passing in
+the livery of my house, which you are to think I had never before seen
+worn, or not that I could remember.  I had often enough, indeed, pictured
+myself advanced to be a Marshal, a Duke of the Empire, a Grand Cross of
+the Legion of Honour, and some other kickshaws of the kind, with a
+perfect rout of flunkeys correctly dressed in my own colours.  But it is
+one thing to imagine, and another to see; it would be one thing to have
+these liveries in a house of my own in Paris—it was quite another to find
+them flaunting in the heart of hostile England; and I fear I should have
+made a fool of myself, if the man had not been on the other side of the
+street, and I at a one-pane window.  There was something illusory in this
+transplantation of the wealth and honours of a family, a thing by its
+nature so deeply rooted in the soil; something ghostly in this sense of
+home-coming so far from home.
+
+From Dunstable I rolled away into a crescendo of similar impressions.
+There are certainly few things to be compared with these castles, or
+rather country seats, of the English nobility and gentry; nor anything at
+all to equal the servility of the population that dwells in their
+neighbourhood.  Though I was but driving in a hired chaise, word of my
+destination seemed to have gone abroad, and the women curtseyed and the
+men louted to me by the wayside.  As I came near, I began to appreciate
+the roots of this widespread respect.  The look of my uncle’s park wall,
+even from the outside, had something of a princely character; and when I
+came in view of the house itself, a sort of madness of vicarious
+vain-glory struck me dumb and kept me staring.  It was about the size of
+the Tuileries.  It faced due north; and the last rays of the sun, that
+was setting like a red-hot shot amidst a tumultuous gathering of snow
+clouds, were reflected on the endless rows of windows.  A portico of
+Doric columns adorned the front, and would have done honour to a temple.
+The servant who received me at the door was civil to a fault—I had almost
+said, to offence; and the hall to which he admitted me through a pair of
+glass doors was warmed and already partly lighted by a liberal chimney
+heaped with the roots of beeches.
+
+‘Vicomte Anne de St. Yves,’ said I, in answer to the man’s question;
+whereupon he bowed before me lower still, and stepping upon one side
+introduced me to the truly awful presence of the major-domo.  I have seen
+many dignitaries in my time, but none who quite equalled this eminent
+being; who was good enough to answer to the unassuming name of Dawson.
+From him I learned that my uncle was extremely low, a doctor in close
+attendance, Mr. Romaine expected at any moment, and that my cousin, the
+Vicomte de St. Yves, had been sent for the same morning.
+
+‘It was a sudden seizure, then?’ I asked.
+
+Well, he would scarcely go as far as that.  It was a decline, a fading
+away, sir; but he was certainly took bad the day before, had sent for Mr.
+Romaine, and the major-domo had taken it on himself a little later to
+send word to the Viscount.  ‘It seemed to me, my lord,’ said he, ‘as if
+this was a time when all the fambly should be called together.’
+
+I approved him with my lips, but not in my heart.  Dawson was plainly in
+the interests of my cousin.
+
+‘And when can I expect to see my great-uncle, the Count?’ said I.
+
+In the evening, I was told; in the meantime he would show me to my room,
+which had been long prepared for me, and I should be expected to dine in
+about an hour with the doctor, if my lordship had no objections.
+
+My lordship had not the faintest.
+
+‘At the same time,’ I said, ‘I have had an accident: I have unhappily
+lost my baggage, and am here in what I stand in.  I don’t know if the
+doctor be a formalist, but it is quite impossible I should appear at
+table as I ought.’
+
+He begged me to be under no anxiety.  ‘We have been long expecting you,’
+said he.  ‘All is ready.’
+
+Such I found to be the truth.  A great room had been prepared for me;
+through the mullioned windows the last flicker of the winter sunset
+interchanged with the reverberation of a royal fire; the bed was open, a
+suit of evening clothes was airing before the blaze, and from the far
+corner a boy came forward with deprecatory smiles.  The dream in which I
+had been moving seemed to have reached its pitch.  I might have quitted
+this house and room only the night before; it was my own place that I had
+come to; and for the first time in my life I understood the force of the
+words home and welcome.
+
+‘This will be all as you would want, sir?’ said Mr. Dawson.  ‘This ’ere
+boy, Rowley, we place entirely at your disposition.  ’E’s not exactly a
+trained vallet, but Mossho Powl, the Viscount’s gentleman, ’ave give him
+the benefick of a few lessons, and it is ’oped that he may give
+sitisfection.  Hanythink that you may require, if you will be so good as
+to mention the same to Rowley, I will make it my business myself, sir, to
+see you sitisfied.’
+
+So saying, the eminent and already detested Mr. Dawson took his
+departure, and I was left alone with Rowley.  A man who may be said to
+have wakened to consciousness in the prison of the Abbaye, among those
+ever graceful and ever tragic figures of the brave and fair, awaiting the
+hour of the guillotine and denuded of every comfort, I had never known
+the luxuries or the amenities of my rank in life.  To be attended on by
+servants I had only been accustomed to in inns.  My toilet had long been
+military, to a moment, at the note of a bugle, too often at a ditch-side.
+And it need not be wondered at if I looked on my new valet with a certain
+diffidence.  But I remembered that if he was my first experience of a
+valet, I was his first trial as a master.  Cheered by which
+consideration, I demanded my bath in a style of good assurance.  There
+was a bathroom contiguous; in an incredibly short space of time the hot
+water was ready; and soon after, arrayed in a shawl dressing-gown, and in
+a luxury of contentment and comfort, I was reclined in an easy-chair
+before the mirror, while Rowley, with a mixture of pride and anxiety
+which I could well understand, laid out his razors.
+
+‘Hey, Rowley?’ I asked, not quite resigned to go under fire with such an
+inexperienced commander.  ‘It’s all right, is it?  You feel pretty sure
+of your weapons?’
+
+‘Yes, my lord,’ he replied.  ‘It’s all right, I assure your lordship.’
+
+‘I beg your pardon, Mr. Rowley, ‘but for the sake of shortness, would you
+mind not belording me in private?’ said I.  ‘It will do very well if you
+call me Mr. Anne.  It is the way of my country, as I dare say you know.’
+
+Mr. Rowley looked blank.
+
+‘But you’re just as much a Viscount as Mr. Powl’s, are you not?’ he said.
+
+‘As Mr. Powl’s Viscount?’ said I, laughing.  ‘Oh, keep your mind easy,
+Mr. Rowley’s is every bit as good.  Only, you see, as I am of the younger
+line, I bear my Christian name along with the title.  Alain is the
+_Viscount_; I am the _Viscount Anne_.  And in giving me the name of Mr.
+Anne, I assure you you will be quite regular.’
+
+‘Yes, Mr. Anne,’ said the docile youth.  ‘But about the shaving, sir, you
+need be under no alarm.  Mr. Powl says I ’ave excellent dispositions.’
+
+‘Mr. Powl?’ said I.  ‘That doesn’t seem to me very like a French name.’
+
+‘No, sir, indeed, my lord,’ said he, with a burst of confidence.  ‘No,
+indeed, Mr. Anne, and it do not surely.  I should say now, it was more
+like Mr. Pole.’
+
+‘And Mr. Powl is the Viscount’s man?’
+
+‘Yes, Mr. Anne,’ said he.  ‘He ’ave a hard billet, he do.  The Viscount
+is a very particular gentleman.  I don’t think as you’ll be, Mr. Anne?’
+he added, with a confidential smile in the mirror.
+
+He was about sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry, freckled face,
+and a pair of dancing eyes.  There was an air at once deprecatory and
+insinuating about the rascal that I thought I recognised.  There came to
+me from my own boyhood memories of certain passionate admirations long
+passed away, and the objects of them long ago discredited or dead.  I
+remembered how anxious I had been to serve those fleeting heroes, how
+readily I told myself I would have died for _them_, how much greater and
+handsomer than life they had appeared.  And looking in the mirror, it
+seemed to me that I read the face of Rowley, like an echo or a ghost, by
+the light of my own youth.  I have always contended (somewhat against the
+opinion of my friends) that I am first of all an economist; and the last
+thing that I would care to throw away is that very valuable piece of
+property—a boy’s hero-worship.
+
+‘Why,’ said I, ‘you shave like an angel, Mr. Rowley!’
+
+‘Thank you, my lord,’ says he.  ‘Mr. Powl had no fear of me. You may be
+sure, sir, I should never ’ave had this berth if I ’adn’t ’ave been up to
+Dick.  We been expecting of you this month back.  My eye!  I never see
+such preparations.  Every day the fires has been kep’ up, the bed made,
+and all!  As soon as it was known you were coming, sir, I got the
+appointment; and I’ve been up and down since then like a Jack-in-the-box.
+A wheel couldn’t sound in the avenue but what I was at the window!  I’ve
+had a many disappointments; but to-night, as soon as you stepped out of
+the shay, I knew it was my—it was you.  Oh, you had been expected!  Why,
+when I go down to supper, I’ll be the ’ero of the servants’ ’all: the
+’ole of the staff is that curious!’
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘I hope you may be able to give a fair account of
+me—sober, steady, industrious, good-tempered, and with a first-rate
+character from my last place?’
+
+He laughed an embarrassed laugh.  ‘Your hair curls beautiful,’ he said,
+by way of changing the subject.  ‘The Viscount’s the boy for curls,
+though; and the richness of it is, Mr. Powl tells me his don’t curl no
+more than that much twine—by nature.  Gettin’ old, the Viscount is.  He
+’_ave_ gone the pace, ’aven’t ’e, sir?’
+
+‘The fact is,’ said I, ‘that I know very little about him.  Our family
+has been much divided, and I have been a soldier from a child.’
+
+‘A soldier, Mr. Anne, sir?’ cried Rowley, with a sudden feverish
+animation.  ‘Was you ever wounded?’
+
+It is contrary to my principles to discourage admiration for myself; and,
+slipping back the shoulder of the dressing-gown, I silently exhibited the
+scar which I had received in Edinburgh Castle.  He looked at it with awe.
+
+‘Ah, well!’ he continued, ‘there’s where the difference comes in!  It’s
+in the training.  The other Viscount have been horse-racing, and dicing,
+and carrying on all his life.  All right enough, no doubt; but what I do
+say is, that it don’t lead to nothink.  Whereas—’
+
+‘Whereas Mr. Rowley’s?’ I put in.
+
+‘My Viscount?’ said he.  ‘Well, sir, I _did_ say it; and now that I’ve
+seen you, I say it again!’
+
+I could not refrain from smiling at this outburst, and the rascal caught
+me in the mirror and smiled to me again.
+
+‘I’d say it again, Mr. Hanne,’ he said.  ‘I know which side my bread’s
+buttered.  I know when a gen’leman’s a gen’leman.  Mr. Powl can go to
+Putney with his one!  Beg your pardon, Mr. Anne, for being so familiar,’
+said he, blushing suddenly scarlet.  ‘I was especially warned against it
+by Mr. Powl.’
+
+‘Discipline before all,’ said I.  ‘Follow your front-rank man.
+
+With that, we began to turn our attention to the clothes.  I was amazed
+to find them fit so well: not _à la diable_, in the haphazard manner of a
+soldier’s uniform or a ready-made suit; but with nicety, as a trained
+artist might rejoice to make them for a favourite subject.
+
+‘’Tis extraordinary,’ cried I: ‘these things fit me perfectly.’
+
+‘Indeed, Mr. Anne, you two be very much of a shape,’ said Rowley.
+
+‘Who?  What two?’ said I.
+
+‘The Viscount,’ he said.
+
+‘Damnation!  Have I the man’s clothes on me, too?’ cried I.
+
+But Rowley hastened to reassure me.  On the first word of my coming, the
+Count had put the matter of my wardrobe in the hands of his own and my
+cousin’s tailors; and on the rumour of our resemblance, my clothes had
+been made to Alain’s measure.
+
+‘But they were all made for you express, Mr. Anne.  You may be certain
+the Count would never do nothing by ’alf: fires kep’ burning; the finest
+of clothes ordered, I’m sure, and a body-servant being trained
+a-purpose.’
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘it’s a good fire, and a good set-out of clothes; and
+what a valet, Mr. Rowley!  And there’s one thing to be said for my
+cousin—I mean for Mr. Powl’s Viscount—he has a very fair figure.’
+
+‘Oh, don’t you be took in, Mr. Anne,’ quoth the faithless Rowley: ‘he has
+to be hyked into a pair of stays to get them things on!’
+
+‘Come, come, Mr. Rowley,’ said I, ‘this is telling tales out of school!
+Do not you be deceived.  The greatest men of antiquity, including Caesar
+and Hannibal and Pope Joan, may have been very glad, at my time of life
+or Alain’s, to follow his example.  ’Tis a misfortune common to all; and
+really,’ said I, bowing to myself before the mirror like one who should
+dance the minuet, ‘when the result is so successful as this, who would do
+anything but applaud?’
+
+My toilet concluded, I marched on to fresh surprises.  My chamber, my new
+valet and my new clothes had been beyond hope: the dinner, the soup, the
+whole bill of fare was a revelation of the powers there are in man.  I
+had not supposed it lay in the genius of any cook to create, out of
+common beef and mutton, things so different and dainty.  The wine was of
+a piece, the doctor a most agreeable companion; nor could I help
+reflecting on the prospect that all this wealth, comfort and handsome
+profusion might still very possibly become mine.  Here were a change
+indeed, from the common soldier and the camp kettle, the prisoner and his
+prison rations, the fugitive and the horrors of the covered cart!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII—THE DESPATCH-BOX
+
+
+The doctor had scarce finished his meal before he hastened with an
+apology to attend upon his patient; and almost immediately after I was
+myself summoned and ushered up the great staircase and along interminable
+corridors to the bedside of my great-uncle the Count.  You are to think
+that up to the present moment I had not set eyes on this formidable
+personage, only on the evidences of his wealth and kindness.  You are to
+think besides that I had heard him miscalled and abused from my earliest
+childhood up.  The first of the _émigrés_ could never expect a good word
+in the society in which my father moved.  Even yet the reports I received
+were of a doubtful nature; even Romaine had drawn of him no very amiable
+portrait; and as I was ushered into the room, it was a critical eye that
+I cast on my great-uncle.  He lay propped on pillows in a little cot no
+greater than a camp-bed, not visibly breathing.  He was about eighty
+years of age, and looked it; not that his face was much lined, but all
+the blood and colour seemed to have faded from his body, and even his
+eyes, which last he kept usually closed as though the light distressed
+him.  There was an unspeakable degree of slyness in his expression, which
+kept me ill at ease; he seemed to lie there with his arms folded, like a
+spider waiting for prey.  His speech was very deliberate and courteous,
+but scarce louder than a sigh.
+
+‘I bid you welcome, _Monsieur le Vicomte Anne_,’ said he, looking at me
+hard with his pale eyes, but not moving on his pillows.  ‘I have sent for
+you, and I thank you for the obliging expedition you have shown.  It is
+my misfortune that I cannot rise to receive you.  I trust you have been
+reasonably well entertained?’
+
+‘_Monsieur mon oncle_,’ I said, bowing very low, ‘I am come at the
+summons of the head of my family.’
+
+‘It is well,’ he said.  ‘Be seated.  I should be glad to hear some
+news—if that can be called news that is already twenty years old—of how I
+have the pleasure to see you here.’
+
+By the coldness of his address, not more than by the nature of the times
+that he bade me recall, I was plunged in melancholy.  I felt myself
+surrounded as with deserts of friendlessness, and the delight of my
+welcome was turned to ashes in my mouth.
+
+‘That is soon told, _monseigneur_,’ said I.  ‘I understand that I need
+tell you nothing of the end of my unhappy parents?  It is only the story
+of the lost dog.’
+
+‘You are right.  I am sufficiently informed of that deplorable affair; it
+is painful to me.  My nephew, your father, was a man who would not be
+advised,’ said he.  ‘Tell me, if you please, simply of yourself.’
+
+‘I am afraid I must run the risk of harrowing your sensibility in the
+beginning,’ said I, with a bitter smile, ‘because my story begins at the
+foot of the guillotine.  When the list came out that night, and her name
+was there, I was already old enough, not in years but in sad experience,
+to understand the extent of my misfortune.  She—’  I paused.  ‘Enough
+that she arranged with a friend, Madame de Chasserades, that she should
+take charge of me, and by the favour of our jailers I was suffered to
+remain in the shelter of the _Abbaye_.  That was my only refuge; there
+was no corner of France that I could rest the sole of my foot upon except
+the prison.  Monsieur le Comte, you are as well aware as I can be what
+kind of a life that was, and how swiftly death smote in that society.  I
+did not wait long before the name of Madame de Chasserades succeeded to
+that of my mother on the list.  She passed me on to Madame de Noytot;
+she, in her turn, to Mademoiselle de Braye; and there were others.  I was
+the one thing permanent; they were all transient as clouds; a day or two
+of their care, and then came the last farewell and—somewhere far off in
+that roaring Paris that surrounded us—the bloody scene.  I was the
+cherished one, the last comfort, of these dying women.  I have been in
+pitched fights, my lord, and I never knew such courage.  It was all done
+smiling, in the tone of good society; _belle maman_ was the name I was
+taught to give to each; and for a day or two the new “pretty mamma” would
+make much of me, show me off, teach me the minuet, and to say my prayers;
+and then, with a tender embrace, would go the way of her predecessors,
+smiling.  There were some that wept too.  There was a childhood!  All the
+time Monsieur de Culemberg kept his eye on me, and would have had me out
+of the _Abbaye_ and in his own protection, but my “pretty mammas” one
+after another resisted the idea.  Where could I be safer? they argued;
+and what was to become of them without the darling of the prison?  Well,
+it was soon shown how safe I was!  The dreadful day of the massacre came;
+the prison was overrun; none paid attention to me, not even the last of
+my “pretty mammas,” for she had met another fate.  I was wandering
+distracted, when I was found by some one in the interests of Monsieur de
+Culemberg.  I understand he was sent on purpose; I believe, in order to
+reach the interior of the prison, he had set his hand to nameless
+barbarities: such was the price paid for my worthless, whimpering little
+life!  He gave me his hand; it was wet, and mine was reddened; he led me
+unresisting.  I remember but the one circumstance of my flight—it was my
+last view of my last pretty mamma.  Shall I describe it to you?’ I asked
+the Count, with a sudden fierceness.
+
+‘Avoid unpleasant details,’ observed my great-uncle gently.
+
+At these words a sudden peace fell upon me.  I had been angry with the
+man before; I had not sought to spare him; and now, in a moment, I saw
+that there was nothing to spare.  Whether from natural heartlessness or
+extreme old age, the soul was not at home; and my benefactor, who had
+kept the fire lit in my room for a month past—my only relative except
+Alain, whom I knew already to be a hired spy—had trodden out the last
+sparks of hope and interest.
+
+‘Certainly,’ said I; ‘and, indeed, the day for them is nearly over.  I
+was taken to Monsieur de Culemberg’s,—I presume, sir, that you know the
+Abbe de Culemberg?’
+
+He indicated assent without opening his eyes.
+
+‘He was a very brave and a very learned man—’
+
+‘And a very holy one,’ said my uncle civilly.
+
+‘And a very holy one, as you observe,’ I continued.  ‘He did an infinity
+of good, and through all the Terror kept himself from the guillotine.  He
+brought me up, and gave me such education as I have.  It was in his house
+in the country at Dammarie, near Melun, that I made the acquaintance of
+your agent, Mr. Vicary, who lay there in hiding, only to fall a victim at
+the last to a gang of _chauffeurs_.’
+
+‘That poor Mr. Vicary!’ observed my uncle.  ‘He had been many times in my
+interests to France, and this was his first failure.  _Quel charmant
+homme_, _n’est-ce pas_?’
+
+‘Infinitely so,’ said I.  ‘But I would not willingly detain you any
+further with a story, the details of which it must naturally be more or
+less unpleasant for you to hear.  Suffice it that, by M. de Culemberg’s
+own advice, I said farewell at eighteen to that kind preceptor and his
+books, and entered the service of France; and have since then carried
+arms in such a manner as not to disgrace my family.’
+
+‘You narrate well; _vous aves la voix chaude_,’ said my uncle, turning on
+his pillows as if to study me.  ‘I have a very good account of you by
+Monsieur de Mauseant, whom you helped in Spain.  And you had some
+education from the Abbe de Culemberg, a man of a good house?  Yes, you
+will do very well.  You have a good manner and a handsome person, which
+hurts nothing.  We are all handsome in the family; even I myself, I have
+had my successes, the memories of which still charm me.  It is my
+intention, my nephew, to make of you my heir.  I am not very well content
+with my other nephew, Monsieur le Vicomte: he has not been respectful,
+which is the flattery due to age.  And there are other matters.’
+
+I was half tempted to throw back in his face that inheritance so coldly
+offered.  At the same time I had to consider that he was an old man, and,
+after all, my relation; and that I was a poor one, in considerable
+straits, with a hope at heart which that inheritance might yet enable me
+to realise.  Nor could I forget that, however icy his manners, he had
+behaved to me from the first with the extreme of liberality and—I was
+about to write, kindness, but the word, in that connection, would not
+come.  I really owed the man some measure of gratitude, which it would be
+an ill manner to repay if I were to insult him on his deathbed.
+
+‘Your will, monsieur, must ever be my rule,’ said I, bowing.
+
+‘You have wit, _monsieur mon neveu_,’ said he, ‘the best wit—the wit of
+silence.  Many might have deafened me with their gratitude.  Gratitude!’
+he repeated, with a peculiar intonation, and lay and smiled to himself.
+‘But to approach what is more important.  As a prisoner of war, will it
+be possible for you to be served heir to English estates?  I have no
+idea: long as I have dwelt in England, I have never studied what they
+call their laws.  On the other hand, how if Romaine should come too late?
+I have two pieces of business to be transacted—to die, and to make my
+will; and, however desirous I may be to serve you, I cannot postpone the
+first in favour of the second beyond a very few hours.’
+
+‘Well, sir, I must then contrive to be doing as I did before,’ said I.
+
+‘Not so,’ said the Count.  ‘I have an alternative.  I have just drawn my
+balance at my banker’s, a considerable sum, and I am now to place it in
+your hands.  It will be so much for you and so much less—’ he paused, and
+smiled with an air of malignity that surprised me.  ‘But it is necessary
+it should be done before witnesses.  _Monsieur le Vicomte_ is of a
+particular disposition, and an unwitnessed donation may very easily be
+twisted into a theft.’
+
+He touched a bell, which was answered by a man having the appearance of a
+confidential valet.  To him he gave a key.
+
+‘Bring me the despatch-box that came yesterday, La Ferriere,’ said he.
+‘You will at the same time present my compliments to Dr. Hunter and M.
+l’Abbe, and request them to step for a few moments to my room.’
+
+The despatch-box proved to be rather a bulky piece of baggage, covered
+with Russia leather.  Before the doctor and an excellent old smiling
+priest it was passed over into my hands with a very clear statement of
+the disposer’s wishes; immediately after which, though the witnesses
+remained behind to draw up and sign a joint note of the transaction,
+Monsieur de Kéroual dismissed me to my own room, La Ferriere following
+with the invaluable box.
+
+At my chamber door I took it from him with thanks, and entered alone.
+Everything had been already disposed for the night, the curtains drawn
+and the fire trimmed; and Rowley was still busy with my bedclothes.  He
+turned round as I entered with a look of welcome that did my heart good.
+Indeed, I had never a much greater need of human sympathy, however
+trivial, than at that moment when I held a fortune in my arms.  In my
+uncle’s room I had breathed the very atmosphere of disenchantment.  He
+had gorged my pockets; he had starved every dignified or affectionate
+sentiment of a man.  I had received so chilling an impression of age and
+experience that the mere look of youth drew me to confide in Rowley: he
+was only a boy, his heart must beat yet, he must still retain some
+innocence and natural feelings, he could blurt out follies with his
+mouth, he was not a machine to utter perfect speech!  At the same time, I
+was beginning to outgrow the painful impressions of my interview; my
+spirits were beginning to revive; and at the jolly, empty looks of Mr.
+Rowley, as he ran forward to relieve me of the box, St. Ives became
+himself again.
+
+‘Now, Rowley, don’t be in a hurry,’ said I.  ‘This is a momentous
+juncture.  Man and boy, you have been in my service about three hours.
+You must already have observed that I am a gentleman of a somewhat morose
+disposition, and there is nothing that I more dislike than the smallest
+appearance of familiarity.  Mr. Pole or Mr. Powl, probably in the spirit
+of prophecy, warned you against this danger.’
+
+‘Yes, Mr. Anne,’ said Rowley blankly.
+
+‘Now there has just arisen one of those rare cases, in which I am willing
+to depart from my principles.  My uncle has given me a box—what you would
+call a Christmas box.  I don’t know what’s in it, and no more do you:
+perhaps I am an April fool, or perhaps I am already enormously wealthy;
+there might be five hundred pounds in this apparently harmless
+receptacle!’
+
+‘Lord, Mr. Anne!’ cried Rowley.
+
+‘Now, Rowley, hold up your right hand and repeat the words of the oath
+after me,’ said I, laying the despatch-box on the table.  ‘Strike me blue
+if I ever disclose to Mr. Powl, or Mr. Powl’s Viscount, or anything that
+is Mr. Powl’s, not to mention Mr. Dawson and the doctor, the treasures of
+the following despatch-box; and strike me sky-blue scarlet if I do not
+continually maintain, uphold, love, honour and obey, serve, and follow to
+the four corners of the earth and the waters that are under the earth,
+the hereinafter before-mentioned (only that I find I have neglected to
+mention him) Viscount Anne de Kéroual de St.-Yves, commonly known as Mr.
+Rowley’s Viscount.  So be it.  Amen.’
+
+He took the oath with the same exaggerated seriousness as I gave it to
+him.
+
+‘Now,’ said I.  ‘Here is the key for you; I will hold the lid with both
+hands in the meanwhile.’  He turned the key.  ‘Bring up all the candles
+in the room, and range them along-side.  What is it to be?  A live
+gorgon, a Jack-in-the-box, or a spring that fires a pistol?  On your
+knees, sir, before the prodigy!’
+
+So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the table.  At
+sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay in front of us, between
+the candles, or rolled upon the floor alongside, I stood astonished.
+
+‘O Lord!’ cried Mr. Rowley; ‘oh Lordy, Lordy, Lord!’ and he scrambled
+after the fallen guineas.  ‘O my, Mr. Anne! what a sight o’ money!  Why,
+it’s like a blessed story-book.  It’s like the Forty Thieves.’
+
+‘Now Rowley, let’s be cool, let’s be businesslike,’ said I.  ‘Riches are
+deceitful, particularly when you haven’t counted them; and the first
+thing we have to do is to arrive at the amount of my—let me say, modest
+competency.  If I’m not mistaken, I have enough here to keep you in gold
+buttons all the rest of your life.  You collect the gold, and I’ll take
+the paper.’
+
+Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for some time
+there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the jingling of guineas,
+broken occasionally by the exulting exclamations of Rowley.  The
+arithmetical operation on which we were embarked took long, and it might
+have been tedious to others; not to me nor to my helper.
+
+‘Ten thousand pounds!’ I announced at last.
+
+‘Ten thousand!’ echoed Mr. Rowley.
+
+And we gazed upon each other.
+
+The greatness of this fortune took my breath away.  With that sum in my
+hands, I need fear no enemies.  People are arrested, in nine cases out of
+ten, not because the police are astute, but because they themselves run
+short of money; and I had here before me in the despatch-box a succession
+of devices and disguises that insured my liberty.  Not only so; but, as I
+felt with a sudden and overpowering thrill, with ten thousand pounds in
+my hands I was become an eligible suitor.  What advances I had made in
+the past, as a private soldier in a military prison, or a fugitive by the
+wayside, could only be qualified or, indeed, excused as acts of
+desperation.  And now, I might come in by the front door; I might
+approach the dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and rich settlements to
+offer.  The poor French prisoner, Champdivers, might be in a perpetual
+danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman, St.-Ives, in his
+post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side, could smile at fate and
+laugh at locksmiths.  I repeated the proverb, exulting, _Love laughs at
+locksmiths_!  In a moment, by the mere coming of this money, my love had
+become possible—it had come near, it was under my hand—and it may be by
+one of the curiosities of human nature, but it burned that instant
+brighter.
+
+‘Rowley,’ said I, ‘your Viscount is a made man.’
+
+‘Why, we both are, sir,’ said Rowley.
+
+‘Yes, both,’ said I; ‘and you shall dance at the wedding;’ and I flung at
+his head a bundle of bank notes, and had just followed it up with a
+handful of guineas, when the door opened, and Mr. Romaine appeared upon
+the threshold.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII—MR. ROMAINE CALLS ME NAMES
+
+
+Feeling very much of a fool to be thus taken by surprise, I scrambled to
+my feet and hastened to make my visitor welcome.  He did not refuse me
+his hand; but he gave it with a coldness and distance for which I was
+quite unprepared, and his countenance, as he looked on me, was marked in
+a strong degree with concern and severity.
+
+‘So, sir, I find you here?’ said he, in tones of little encouragement.
+‘Is that you, George?  You can run away; I have business with your
+master.’
+
+He showed Rowley out, and locked the door behind him.  Then he sat down
+in an armchair on one side of the fire, and looked at me with
+uncompromising sternness.
+
+‘I am hesitating how to begin,’ said he.  ‘In this singular labyrinth of
+blunders and difficulties that you have prepared for us, I am positively
+hesitating where to begin.  It will perhaps be best that you should read,
+first of all, this paragraph.’  And he handed over to me a newspaper.
+
+The paragraph in question was brief.  It announced the recapture of one
+of the prisoners recently escaped from Edinburgh Castle; gave his name,
+Clausel, and added that he had entered into the particulars of the recent
+revolting murder in the Castle, and denounced the murderer:—
+
+    ‘It is a common soldier called Champdivers, who had himself escaped,
+    and is in all probability involved in the common fate of his
+    comrades.  In spite of the activity along all the Forth and the East
+    Coast, nothing has yet been seen of the sloop which these desperadoes
+    seized at Grangemouth, and it is now almost certain that they have
+    found a watery grave.’
+
+At the reading of this paragraph, my heart turned over.  In a moment I
+saw my castle in the air ruined; myself changed from a mere military
+fugitive into a hunted murderer, fleeing from the gallows; my love, which
+had a moment since appeared so near to me, blotted from the field of
+possibility.  Despair, which was my first sentiment, did not, however,
+endure for more than a moment.  I saw that my companions had indeed
+succeeded in their unlikely design; and that I was supposed to have
+accompanied and perished along with them by shipwreck—a most probable
+ending to their enterprise.  If they thought me at the bottom of the
+North Sea, I need not fear much vigilance on the streets of Edinburgh.
+Champdivers was wanted: what was to connect him with St. Ives?  Major
+Chevenix would recognise me if he met me; that was beyond bargaining: he
+had seen me so often, his interest had been kindled to so high a point,
+that I could hope to deceive him by no stratagem of disguise.  Well, even
+so; he would have a competition of testimony before him: he knew Clausel,
+he knew me, and I was sure he would decide for honour.  At the same time
+the image of Flora shot up in my mind’s eye with such a radiancy as
+fairly overwhelmed all other considerations; the blood sprang to every
+corner of my body, and I vowed I would see and win her, if it cost my
+neck.
+
+‘Very annoying, no doubt,’ said I, as I returned the paper to Mr.
+Romaine.
+
+‘Is annoying your word for it?’ said he.
+
+‘Exasperating, if you like,’ I admitted.
+
+‘And true?’ he inquired.
+
+‘Well, true in a sense,’ said I.  ‘But perhaps I had better answer that
+question by putting you in possession of the facts?’
+
+‘I think so, indeed,’ said he.
+
+I narrated to him as much as seemed necessary of the quarrel, the duel,
+the death of Goguelat, and the character of Clausel.  He heard me through
+in a forbidding silence, nor did he at all betray the nature of his
+sentiments, except that, at the episode of the scissors, I could observe
+his mulberry face to turn three shades paler.
+
+‘I suppose I may believe you?’ said he, when I had done.
+
+‘Or else conclude this interview,’ said I.
+
+‘Can you not understand that we are here discussing matters of the
+gravest import?  Can you not understand that I feel myself weighed with a
+load of responsibility on your account—that you should take this occasion
+to air your fire-eating manners against your own attorney?  There are
+serious hours in life, Mr. Anne,’ he said severely.  ‘A capital charge,
+and that of a very brutal character and with singularly unpleasant
+details; the presence of the man Clausel, who (according to your account
+of it) is actuated by sentiments of real malignity, and prepared to swear
+black white; all the other witnesses scattered and perhaps drowned at
+sea; the natural prejudice against a Frenchman and a runaway prisoner:
+this makes a serious total for your lawyer to consider, and is by no
+means lessened by the incurable folly and levity of your own
+disposition.’
+
+‘I beg your pardon!’ said I.
+
+‘Oh, my expressions have been selected with scrupulous accuracy,’ he
+replied.  ‘How did I find you, sir, when I came to announce this
+catastrophe?  You were sitting on the hearthrug playing, like a silly
+baby, with a servant, were you not, and the floor all scattered with gold
+and bank paper?  There was a tableau for you!  It was I who came, and you
+were lucky in that.  It might have been any one—your cousin as well as
+another.’
+
+‘You have me there, sir,’ I admitted.  ‘I had neglected all precautions,
+and you do right to be angry.  _Apropos_, Mr. Romaine, how did you come
+yourself, and how long have you been in the house?’ I added, surprised,
+on the retrospect, not to have heard him arrive.
+
+‘I drove up in a chaise and pair,’ he returned.  ‘Any one might have
+heard me.  But you were not listening, I suppose? being so extremely at
+your ease in the very house of your enemy, and under a capital charge!
+And I have been long enough here to do your business for you.  Ah, yes, I
+did it, God forgive me!—did it before I so much as asked you the
+explanation of the paragraph.  For some time back the will has been
+prepared; now it is signed; and your uncle has heard nothing of your
+recent piece of activity.  Why?  Well, I had no fancy to bother him on
+his death-bed: you might be innocent; and at bottom I preferred the
+murderer to the spy.’
+
+No doubt of it but the man played a friendly part; no doubt also that, in
+his ill-temper and anxiety, he expressed himself unpalatably.
+
+‘You will perhaps find me over delicate,’ said I.  ‘There is a word you
+employed—’
+
+‘I employ the words of my brief, sir,’ he cried, striking with his hand
+on the newspaper.  ‘It is there in six letters.  And do not be so
+certain—you have not stood your trial yet.  It is an ugly affair, a fishy
+business.  It is highly disagreeable.  I would give my hand off—I mean I
+would give a hundred pound down, to have nothing to do with it.  And,
+situated as we are, we must at once take action.  There is here no
+choice.  You must at once quit this country, and get to France, or
+Holland, or, indeed, to Madagascar.’
+
+‘There may be two words to that,’ said I.
+
+‘Not so much as one syllable!’ he retorted.  ‘Here is no room for
+argument.  The case is nakedly plain.  In the disgusting position in
+which you have found means to place yourself, all that is to be hoped for
+is delay.  A time may come when we shall be able to do better.  It cannot
+be now: now it would be the gibbet.’
+
+‘You labour under a false impression, Mr. Romaine,’ said I.  ‘I have no
+impatience to figure in the dock.  I am even as anxious as yourself to
+postpone my first appearance there.  On the other hand, I have not the
+slightest intention of leaving this country, where I please myself
+extremely.  I have a good address, a ready tongue, an English accent that
+passes, and, thanks to the generosity of my uncle, as much money as I
+want.  It would be hard indeed if, with all these advantages, Mr. St.
+Ives should not be able to live quietly in a private lodging, while the
+authorities amuse themselves by looking for Champdivers.  You forget,
+there is no connection between these two personages.’
+
+‘And you forget your cousin,’ retorted Romaine.  ‘There is the link.
+There is the tongue of the buckle.  He knows you are Champdivers.’  He
+put up his hand as if to listen.  ‘And, for a wager, here he is himself!’
+he exclaimed.
+
+As when a tailor takes a piece of goods upon his counter, and rends it
+across, there came to our ears from the avenue the long tearing sound of
+a chaise and four approaching at the top speed of the horses.  And,
+looking out between the curtains, we beheld the lamps skimming on the
+smooth ascent.
+
+‘Ay,’ said Romaine, wiping the window-pane that he might see more
+clearly.  ‘Ay, that is he by the driving!  So he squanders money along
+the king’s highway, the triple idiot! gorging every man he meets with
+gold for the pleasure of arriving—where?  Ah, yes, where but a debtor’s
+jail, if not a criminal prison!’
+
+‘Is he that kind of a man?’ I said, staring on these lamps as though I
+could decipher in them the secret of my cousin’s character.
+
+‘You will find him a dangerous kind,’ answered the lawyer.  ‘For you,
+these are the lights on a lee shore!  I find I fall in a muse when I
+consider of him; what a formidable being he once was, and what a
+personable! and how near he draws to the moment that must break him
+utterly! we none of us like him here; we hate him, rather; and yet I have
+a sense—I don’t think at my time of life it can be pity—but a reluctance
+rather, to break anything so big and figurative, as though he were a big
+porcelain pot or a big picture of high price.  Ay, there is what I was
+waiting for!’ he cried, as the lights of a second chaise swam in sight.
+‘It is he beyond a doubt.  The first was the signature and the next the
+flourish.  Two chaises, the second following with the baggage, which is
+always copious and ponderous, and one of his valets: he cannot go a step
+without a valet.’
+
+‘I hear you repeat the word big,’ said I.  ‘But it cannot be that he is
+anything out of the way in stature.’
+
+‘No,’ said the attorney.  ‘About your height, as I guessed for the
+tailors, and I see nothing wrong with the result.  But, somehow, he
+commands an atmosphere; he has a spacious manner; and he has kept up, all
+through life, such a volume of racket about his personality, with his
+chaises and his racers and his dicings, and I know not what—that somehow
+he imposes!  It seems, when the farce is done, and he locked in Fleet
+prison—and nobody left but Buonaparte and Lord Wellington and the Hetman
+Platoff to make a work about—the world will be in a comparison quite
+tranquil.  But this is beside the mark,’ he added, with an effort,
+turning again from the window.  ‘We are now under fire, Mr. Anne, as you
+soldiers would say, and it is high time we should prepare to go into
+action.  He must not see you; that would be fatal.  All that he knows at
+present is that you resemble him, and that is much more than enough.  If
+it were possible, it would be well he should not know you were in the
+house.’
+
+‘Quite impossible, depend upon it,’ said I.  ‘Some of the servants are
+directly in his interests, perhaps in his pay: Dawson, for an example.’
+
+‘My own idea!’ cried Romaine.  ‘And at least,’ he added, as the first of
+the chaises drew up with a dash in front of the portico, ‘it is now too
+late.  Here he is.’
+
+We stood listening, with a strange anxiety, to the various noises that
+awoke in the silent house: the sound of doors opening and closing, the
+sound of feet near at hand and farther off.  It was plain the arrival of
+my cousin was a matter of moment, almost of parade, to the household.
+And suddenly, out of this confused and distant bustle, a rapid and light
+tread became distinguishable.  We heard it come upstairs, draw near along
+the corridor, pause at the door, and a stealthy and hasty rapping
+succeeded.
+
+‘Mr. Anne—Mr. Anne, sir!  Let me in!’ said the voice of Rowley.
+
+We admitted the lad, and locked the door again behind him.
+
+‘It’s _him_, sir,’ he panted.  ‘He’ve come.’
+
+‘You mean the Viscount?’ said I.  ‘So we supposed.  But come, Rowley—out
+with the rest of it!  You have more to tell us, or your face belies you!’
+
+‘Mr. Anne, I do,’ he said.  ‘Mr. Romaine, sir, you’re a friend of his,
+ain’t you?’
+
+‘Yes, George, I am a friend of his,’ said Romaine, and, to my great
+surprise, laid his hand upon my shoulder.
+
+‘Well, it’s this way,’ said Rowley—‘Mr. Powl have been at me!  It’s to
+play the spy!  I thought he was at it from the first!  From the first I
+see what he was after—coming round and round, and hinting things!  But
+to-night he outs with it plump!  I’m to let him hear all what you’re to
+do beforehand, he says; and he gave me this for an arnest’—holding up
+half a guinea; ‘and I took it, so I did!  Strike me sky-blue scarlet?’
+says he, adducing the words of the mock oath; and he looked askance at me
+as he did so.
+
+I saw that he had forgotten himself, and that he knew it.  The expression
+of his eye changed almost in the passing of the glance from the
+significant to the appealing—from the look of an accomplice to that of a
+culprit; and from that moment he became the model of a well-drilled
+valet.
+
+‘Sky-blue scarlet?’ repeated the lawyer.  ‘Is the fool delirious?’
+
+‘No,’ said I; ‘he is only reminding me of something.’
+
+‘Well—and I believe the fellow will be faithful,’ said Romaine.  ‘So you
+are a friend of Mr. Anne’s’ too?’ he added to Rowley.
+
+‘If you please, sir,’ said Rowley.
+
+‘’Tis something sudden,’ observed Romaine; ‘but it may be genuine enough.
+I believe him to be honest.  He comes of honest people.  Well, George
+Rowley, you might embrace some early opportunity to earn that
+half-guinea, by telling Mr. Powl that your master will not leave here
+till noon to-morrow, if he go even then.  Tell him there are a hundred
+things to be done here, and a hundred more that can only be done properly
+at my office in Holborn.  Come to think of it—we had better see to that
+first of all,’ he went on, unlocking the door.  ‘Get hold of Powl, and
+see.  And be quick back, and clear me up this mess.’
+
+Mr. Rowley was no sooner gone than the lawyer took a pinch of snuff, and
+regarded me with somewhat of a more genial expression.
+
+‘Sir,’ said he, ‘it is very fortunate for you that your face is so strong
+a letter of recommendation.  Here am I, a tough old practitioner, mixing
+myself up with your very distressing business; and here is this farmer’s
+lad, who has the wit to take a bribe and the loyalty to come and tell you
+of it—all, I take it, on the strength of your appearance.  I wish I could
+imagine how it would impress a jury!’ says he.
+
+‘And how it would affect the hangman, sir?’ I asked
+
+‘_Absit omen_!’ said Mr. Romaine devoutly.
+
+We were just so far in our talk, when I heard a sound that brought my
+heart into my mouth: the sound of some one slyly trying the handle of the
+door.  It had been preceded by no audible footstep.  Since the departure
+of Rowley our wing of the house had been entirely silent.  And we had
+every right to suppose ourselves alone, and to conclude that the
+new-comer, whoever he might be, was come on a clandestine, if not a
+hostile, errand.
+
+‘Who is there?’ asked Romaine.
+
+‘It’s only me, sir,’ said the soft voice of Dawson.  ‘It’s the Viscount,
+sir.  He is very desirous to speak with you on business.’
+
+‘Tell him I shall come shortly, Dawson,’ said the lawyer.  ‘I am at
+present engaged.’
+
+‘Thank you, sir!’ said Dawson.
+
+And we heard his feet draw off slowly along the corridor.
+
+‘Yes,’ said Mr. Romaine, speaking low, and maintaining the attitude of
+one intently listening, ‘there is another foot.  I cannot be deceived!’
+
+‘I think there was indeed!’ said I.  ‘And what troubles me—I am not sure
+that the other has gone entirely away.  By the time it got the length of
+the head of the stair the tread was plainly single.’
+
+‘Ahem—blockaded?’ asked the lawyer.
+
+‘A siege _en règle_!’ I exclaimed.
+
+‘Let us come farther from the door,’ said Romaine, ‘and reconsider this
+damnable position.  Without doubt, Alain was this moment at the door.  He
+hoped to enter and get a view of you, as if by accident.  Baffled in
+this, has he stayed himself, or has he planted Dawson here by way of
+sentinel?’
+
+‘Himself, beyond a doubt,’ said I.  ‘And yet to what end?  He cannot
+think to pass the night there!’
+
+‘If it were only possible to pay no heed!’ said Mr. Romaine.  ‘But this
+is the accursed drawback of your position.  We can do nothing openly.  I
+must smuggle you out of this room and out of this house like seizable
+goods; and how am I to set about it with a sentinel planted at your very
+door?’
+
+‘There is no good in being agitated,’ said I.
+
+‘None at all,’ he acquiesced.  ‘And, come to think of it, it is droll
+enough that I should have been that very moment commenting on your
+personal appearance, when your cousin came upon this mission.  I was
+saying, if you remember, that your face was as good or better than a
+letter of recommendation.  I wonder if M. Alain would be like the rest of
+us—I wonder what he would think of it?’
+
+Mr. Romaine was sitting in a chair by the fire with his back to the
+windows, and I was myself kneeling on the hearthrug and beginning
+mechanically to pick up the scattered bills, when a honeyed voice joined
+suddenly in our conversation.
+
+‘He thinks well of it, Mr. Romaine.  He begs to join himself to that
+circle of admirers which you indicate to exist already.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX—THE DEVIL AND ALL AT AMERSHAM PLACE
+
+
+Never did two human creatures get to their feet with more alacrity than
+the lawyer and myself.  We had locked and barred the main gates of the
+citadel; but unhappily we had left open the bath-room sally-port; and
+here we found the voice of the hostile trumpets sounding from within, and
+all our defences taken in reverse.  I took but the time to whisper Mr.
+Romaine in the ear: ‘Here is another tableau for you!’ at which he looked
+at me a moment with a kind of pathos, as who should say, ‘Don’t hit a man
+when he’s down.’  Then I transferred my eyes to my enemy.
+
+He had his hat on, a little on one side: it was a very tall hat, raked
+extremely, and had a narrow curling brim.  His hair was all curled out in
+masses like an Italian mountebank—a most unpardonable fashion.  He
+sported a huge tippeted overcoat of frieze, such as watchmen wear, only
+the inside was lined with costly furs, and he kept it half open to
+display the exquisite linen, the many-coloured waistcoat, and the profuse
+jewellery of watch-chains and brooches underneath.  The leg and the ankle
+were turned to a miracle.  It is out of the question that I should deny
+the resemblance altogether, since it has been remarked by so many
+different persons whom I cannot reasonably accuse of a conspiracy.  As a
+matter of fact, I saw little of it and confessed to nothing.  Certainly
+he was what some might call handsome, of a pictorial, exuberant style of
+beauty, all attitude, profile, and impudence: a man whom I could see in
+fancy parade on the grand stand at a race-meeting or swagger in
+Piccadilly, staring down the women, and stared at himself with admiration
+by the coal-porters.  Of his frame of mind at that moment his face
+offered a lively if an unconscious picture.  He was lividly pale, and his
+lip was caught up in a smile that could almost be called a snarl, of a
+sheer, arid malignity that appalled me and yet put me on my mettle for
+the encounter.  He looked me up and down, then bowed and took off his hat
+to me.
+
+‘My cousin, I presume?’ he said.
+
+‘I understand I have that honour,’ I replied.
+
+‘The honour is mine,’ said he, and his voice shook as he said it.
+
+‘I should make you welcome, I believe,’ said I.
+
+‘Why?’ he inquired.  ‘This poor house has been my home for longer than I
+care to claim.  That you should already take upon yourself the duties of
+host here is to be at unnecessary pains.  Believe me, that part would be
+more becomingly mine.  And, by the way, I must not fail to offer you my
+little compliment.  It is a gratifying surprise to meet you in the dress
+of a gentleman, and to see’—with a circular look upon the scattered
+bills—‘that your necessities have already been so liberally relieved.’
+
+I bowed with a smile that was perhaps no less hateful than his own.
+
+‘There are so many necessities in this world,’ said I.  ‘Charity has to
+choose.  One gets relieved, and some other, no less indigent, perhaps
+indebted, must go wanting.’
+
+‘Malice is an engaging trait,’ said he.
+
+‘And envy, I think?’ was my reply.
+
+He must have felt that he was not getting wholly the better of this
+passage at arms; perhaps even feared that he should lose command of his
+temper, which he reined in throughout the interview as with a red-hot
+curb, for he flung away from me at the word, and addressed the lawyer
+with insulting arrogance.
+
+‘Mr. Romaine,’ he said, ‘since when have you presumed to give orders in
+this house?’
+
+‘I am not prepared to admit that I have given any,’ replied Romaine;
+‘certainly none that did not fall in the sphere of my responsibilities.’
+
+‘By whose orders, then, am I denied entrance to my uncle’s room?’ said my
+cousin.
+
+‘By the doctor’s, sir,’ replied Romaine; ‘and I think even you will admit
+his faculty to give them.’
+
+‘Have a care, sir,’ cried Alain.  ‘Do not be puffed up with your
+position.  It is none so secure, Master Attorney.  I should not wonder in
+the least if you were struck off the rolls for this night’s work, and the
+next I should see of you were when I flung you alms at a pothouse door to
+mend your ragged elbows.  The doctor’s orders?  But I believe I am not
+mistaken!  You have to-night transacted business with the Count; and this
+needy young gentleman has enjoyed the privilege of still another
+interview, in which (as I am pleased to see) his dignity has not
+prevented his doing very well for himself.  I wonder that you should care
+to prevaricate with me so idly.’
+
+‘I will confess so much,’ said Mr. Romaine, ‘if you call it
+prevarication.  The order in question emanated from the Count himself.
+He does not wish to see you.’
+
+‘For which I must take the word of Mr. Daniel Romaine?’ asked Alain.
+
+‘In default of any better,’ said Romaine.
+
+There was an instantaneous convulsion in my cousin’s face, and I
+distinctly heard him gnash his teeth at this reply; but, to my surprise,
+he resumed in tones of almost good humour:
+
+‘Come, Mr. Romaine, do not let us be petty!’  He drew in a chair and sat
+down.  ‘Understand you have stolen a march upon me.  You have introduced
+your soldier of Napoleon, and (how, I cannot conceive) he has been
+apparently accepted with favour.  I ask no better proof than the funds
+with which I find him literally surrounded—I presume in consequence of
+some extravagance of joy at the first sight of so much money.  The odds
+are so far in your favour, but the match is not yet won.  Questions will
+arise of undue influence, of sequestration, and the like: I have my
+witnesses ready.  I tell it you cynically, for you cannot profit by the
+knowledge; and, if the worst come to the worst, I have good hopes of
+recovering my own and of ruining you.’
+
+‘You do what you please,’ answered Romaine; ‘but I give it you for a
+piece of good advice, you had best do nothing in the matter.  You will
+only make yourself ridiculous; you will only squander money, of which you
+have none too much, and reap public mortification.’
+
+‘Ah, but there you make the common mistake, Mr. Romaine!’ returned Alain.
+‘You despise your adversary.  Consider, if you please, how very
+disagreeable I could make myself, if I chose.  Consider the position of
+your _protégé_—an escaped prisoner!  But I play a great game.  I condemn
+such petty opportunities.’
+
+At this Romaine and I exchanged a glance of triumph.  It seemed manifest
+that Alain had as yet received no word of Clausel’s recapture and
+denunciation.  At the same moment the lawyer, thus relieved of the
+instancy of his fear, changed his tactics.  With a great air of
+unconcern, he secured the newspaper, which still lay open before him on
+the table.
+
+‘I think, Monsieur Alain, that you labour under some illusion,’ said he.
+‘Believe me, this is all beside the mark.  You seem to be pointing to
+some compromise.  Nothing is further from my views.  You suspect me of an
+inclination to trifle with you, to conceal how things are going.  I
+cannot, on the other hand, be too early or too explicit in giving you
+information which concerns you (I must say) capitally.  Your great-uncle
+has to-night cancelled his will, and made a new one in favour of your
+cousin Anne.  Nay, and you shall hear it from his own lips, if you
+choose!  I will take so much upon me,’ said the lawyer, rising.  ‘Follow
+me, if you please, gentlemen.’
+
+Mr. Romaine led the way out of the room so briskly, and was so briskly
+followed by Alain, that I had hard ado to get the remainder of the money
+replaced and the despatch-box locked, and to overtake them, even by
+running ere they should be lost in that maze of corridors, my uncle’s
+house.  As it was, I went with a heart divided; and the thought of my
+treasure thus left unprotected, save by a paltry lid and lock that any
+one might break or pick open, put me in a perspiration whenever I had the
+time to remember it.  The lawyer brought us to a room, begged us to be
+seated while he should hold a consultation with the doctor, and, slipping
+out of another door, left Alain and myself closeted together.
+
+Truly he had done nothing to ingratiate himself; his every word had been
+steeped in unfriendliness, envy, and that contempt which (as it is born
+of anger) it is possible to support without humiliation.  On my part, I
+had been little more conciliating; and yet I began to be sorry for this
+man, hired spy as I knew him to be.  It seemed to me less than decent
+that he should have been brought up in the expectation of this great
+inheritance, and now, at the eleventh hour, be tumbled forth out of the
+house door and left to himself, his poverty and his debts—those debts of
+which I had so ungallantly reminded him so short a time before.  And we
+were scarce left alone ere I made haste to hang out a flag of truce.
+
+‘My cousin,’ said I, ‘trust me, you will not find me inclined to be your
+enemy.’
+
+He paused in front of me—for he had not accepted the lawyer’s invitation
+to be seated, but walked to and fro in the apartment—took a pinch of
+snuff, and looked at me while he was taking it with an air of much
+curiosity.
+
+‘Is it even so?’ said he.  ‘Am I so far favoured by fortune as to have
+your pity?  Infinitely obliged, my cousin Anne!  But these sentiments are
+not always reciprocal, and I warn you that the day when I set my foot on
+your neck, the spine shall break.  Are you acquainted with the properties
+of the spine?’ he asked with an insolence beyond qualification.
+
+It was too much.  ‘I am acquainted also with the properties of a pair of
+pistols,’ said I, toising him.
+
+‘No, no, no!’ says he, holding up his finger.  ‘I will take my revenge
+how and when I please.  We are enough of the same family to understand
+each other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had you arrested on
+your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in the first clump of
+evergreens, to await and prevent your coming—I, who knew all, before whom
+that pettifogger, Romaine, has been conspiring in broad daylight to
+supplant me—is simply this: that I had not made up my mind how I was to
+take my revenge.’
+
+At that moment he was interrupted by the tolling of a bell.  As we stood
+surprised and listening, it was succeeded by the sound of many feet
+trooping up the stairs and shuffling by the door of our room.  Both, I
+believe, had a great curiosity to set it open, which each, owing to the
+presence of the other, resisted; and we waited instead in silence, and
+without moving, until Romaine returned and bade us to my uncle’s
+presence.
+
+He led the way by a little crooked passage, which brought us out in the
+sick-room, and behind the bed.  I believe I have forgotten to remark that
+the Count’s chamber was of considerable dimensions.  We beheld it now
+crowded with the servants and dependants of the house, from the doctor
+and the priest to Mr. Dawson and the housekeeper, from Dawson down to
+Rowley and the last footman in white calves, the last plump chambermaid
+in her clean gown and cap, and the last ostler in a stable waiscoat.
+This large congregation of persons (and I was surprised to see how large
+it was) had the appearance, for the most part, of being ill at ease and
+heartily bewildered, standing on one foot, gaping like zanies, and those
+who were in the corners nudging each other and grinning aside.  My uncle,
+on the other hand, who was raised higher than I had yet seen him on his
+pillows, wore an air of really imposing gravity.  No sooner had we
+appeared behind him, than he lifted his voice to a good loudness, and
+addressed the assemblage.
+
+‘I take you all to witness—can you hear me?—I take you all to witness
+that I recognise as my heir and representative this gentleman, whom most
+of you see for the first time, the Viscount Anne de St.-Yves, my nephew
+of the younger line.  And I take you to witness at the same time that,
+for very good reasons known to myself, I have discarded and disinherited
+this other gentleman whom you all know, the Viscount de St.-Yves.  I have
+also to explain the unusual trouble to which I have put you all—and,
+since your supper was not over, I fear I may even say annoyance.  It has
+pleased M. Alain to make some threats of disputing my will, and to
+pretend that there are among your number certain estimable persons who
+may be trusted to swear as he shall direct them.  It pleases me thus to
+put it out of his power and to stop the mouths of his false witnesses.  I
+am infinitely obliged by your politeness, and I have the honour to wish
+you all a very good evening.’
+
+As the servants, still greatly mystified, crowded out of the sickroom
+door, curtseying, pulling the forelock, scraping with the foot, and so
+on, according to their degree, I turned and stole a look at my cousin.
+He had borne this crushing public rebuke without change of countenance.
+He stood, now, very upright, with folded arms, and looking inscrutably at
+the roof of the apartment.  I could not refuse him at that moment the
+tribute of my admiration.  Still more so when, the last of the domestics
+having filed through the doorway and left us alone with my great-uncle
+and the lawyer, he took one step forward towards the bed, made a
+dignified reverence, and addressed the man who had just condemned him to
+ruin.
+
+‘My lord,’ said he, ‘you are pleased to treat me in a manner which my
+gratitude, and your state, equally forbid me to call in question.  It
+will be only necessary for me to call your attention to the length of
+time in which I have been taught to regard myself as your heir.  In that
+position, I judged it only loyal to permit myself a certain scale of
+expenditure.  If I am now to be cut off with a shilling as the reward of
+twenty years of service, I shall be left not only a beggar, but a
+bankrupt.’
+
+Whether from the fatigue of his recent exertion, or by a well-inspired
+ingenuity of hate, my uncle had once more closed his eyes; nor did he
+open them now.  ‘Not with a shilling,’ he contented himself with
+replying; and there stole, as he said it, a sort of smile over his face,
+that flickered there conspicuously for the least moment of time, and then
+faded and left behind the old impenetrable mask of years, cunning, and
+fatigue.  There could be no mistake: my uncle enjoyed the situation as he
+had enjoyed few things in the last quarter of a century.  The fires of
+life scarce survived in that frail body; but hatred, like some immortal
+quality, was still erect and unabated.
+
+Nevertheless my cousin persevered.
+
+‘I speak at a disadvantage,’ he resumed.  ‘My supplanter, with perhaps
+more wisdom than delicacy, remains in the room,’ and he cast a glance at
+me that might have withered an oak tree.
+
+I was only too willing to withdraw, and Romaine showed as much alacrity
+to make way for my departure.  But my uncle was not to be moved.  In the
+same breath of a voice, and still without opening his eyes, he bade me
+remain.
+
+‘It is well,’ said Alain.  ‘I cannot then go on to remind you of the
+twenty years that have passed over our heads in England, and the services
+I may have rendered you in that time.  It would be a position too odious.
+Your lordship knows me too well to suppose I could stoop to such
+ignominy.  I must leave out all my defence—your lordship wills it so!  I
+do not know what are my faults; I know only my punishment, and it is
+greater than I have the courage to face.  My uncle, I implore your pity:
+pardon me so far; do not send me for life into a debtors’ jail—a pauper
+debtor.’
+
+‘_Chat et vieux_, _pardonnez_?’ said my uncle, quoting from La Fontaine;
+and then, opening a pale-blue eye full on Alain, he delivered with some
+emphasis:
+
+    ‘La jeunesse se flatte et croit tout obtenir;
+    La vieillesse est impitoyable.’
+
+The blood leaped darkly into Alain’s face.  He turned to Romaine and me,
+and his eyes flashed.
+
+‘It is your turn now,’ he said.  ‘At least it shall be prison for prison
+with the two viscounts.’
+
+‘Not so, Mr. Alain, by your leave,’ said Romaine.  ‘There are a few
+formalities to be considered first.’
+
+But Alain was already striding towards the door.
+
+‘Stop a moment, stop a moment!’ cried Romaine.  ‘Remember your own
+counsel not to despise an adversary.’
+
+Alain turned.
+
+‘If I do not despise I hate you!’ he cried, giving a loose to his
+passion.  ‘Be warned of that, both of you.’
+
+‘I understand you to threaten Monsieur le Vicomte Anne,’ said the lawyer.
+‘Do you know, I would not do that.  I am afraid, I am very much afraid,
+if you were to do as you propose, you might drive me into extremes.’
+
+‘You have made me a beggar and a bankrupt,’ said Alain.  What extreme is
+left?’
+
+‘I scarce like to put a name upon it in this company,’ replied Romaine.
+‘But there are worse things than even bankruptcy, and worse places than a
+debtors’ jail.’
+
+The words were so significantly said that there went a visible thrill
+through Alain; sudden as a sword-stroke, he fell pale again.
+
+‘I do not understand you,’ said he.
+
+‘O yes, you do,’ returned Romaine.  ‘I believe you understand me very
+well.  You must not suppose that all this time, while you were so very
+busy, others were entirely idle.  You must not fancy, because I am an
+Englishman, that I have not the intelligence to pursue an inquiry.  Great
+as is my regard for the honour of your house, M. Alain de St.-Yves, if I
+hear of you moving directly or indirectly in this matter, I shall do my
+duty, let it cost what it will: that is, I shall communicate the real
+name of the Buonapartist spy who signs his letters _Rue Grégoire de
+Tours_.’
+
+I confess my heart was already almost altogether on the side of my
+insulted and unhappy cousin; and if it had not been before, it must have
+been so now, so horrid was the shock with which he heard his infamy
+exposed.  Speech was denied him; he carried his hand to his neckcloth; he
+staggered; I thought he must have fallen.  I ran to help him, and at that
+he revived, recoiled before me, and stood there with arms stretched forth
+as if to preserve himself from the outrage of my touch.
+
+‘Hands off!’ he somehow managed to articulate.
+
+‘You will now, I hope,’ pursued the lawyer, without any change of voice,
+‘understand the position in which you are placed, and how delicately it
+behoves you to conduct yourself.  Your arrest hangs, if I may so express
+myself, by a hair; and as you will be under the perpetual vigilance of
+myself and my agents, you must look to it narrowly that you walk
+straight.  Upon the least dubiety, I will take action.’  He snuffed,
+looking critically at the tortured man.  ‘And now let me remind you that
+your chaise is at the door.  This interview is agitating to his
+lordship—it cannot be agreeable for you—and I suggest that it need not be
+further drawn out.  It does not enter into the views of your uncle, the
+Count, that you should again sleep under this roof.’
+
+As Alain turned and passed without a word or a sign from the apartment, I
+instantly followed.  I suppose I must be at bottom possessed of some
+humanity; at least, this accumulated torture, this slow butchery of a man
+as by quarters of rock, had wholly changed my sympathies.  At that moment
+I loathed both my uncle and the lawyer for their coldblooded cruelty.
+
+Leaning over the banisters, I was but in time to hear his hasty footsteps
+in that hall that had been crowded with servants to honour his coming,
+and was now left empty against his friendless departure.  A moment later,
+and the echoes rang, and the air whistled in my ears, as he slammed the
+door on his departing footsteps.  The fury of the concussion gave me (had
+one been still wanted) a measure of the turmoil of his passions.  In a
+sense, I felt with him; I felt how he would have gloried to slam that
+door on my uncle, the lawyer, myself, and the whole crowd of those who
+had been witnesses to his humiliation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX—AFTER THE STORM
+
+
+No sooner was the house clear of my cousin than I began to reckon up,
+ruefully enough, the probable results of what had passed.  Here were a
+number of pots broken, and it looked to me as if I should have to pay for
+all!  Here had been this proud, mad beast goaded and baited both publicly
+and privately, till he could neither hear nor see nor reason; whereupon
+the gate had been set open, and he had been left free to go and contrive
+whatever vengeance he might find possible.  I could not help thinking it
+was a pity that, whenever I myself was inclined to be upon my good
+behaviour, some friends of mine should always determine to play a piece
+of heroics and cast me for the hero—or the victim—which is very much the
+same.  The first duty of heroics is to be of your own choosing.  When
+they are not that, they are nothing.  And I assure you, as I walked back
+to my own room, I was in no very complaisant humour: thought my uncle and
+Mr. Romaine to have played knuckle-bones with my life and prospects;
+cursed them for it roundly; had no wish more urgent than to avoid the
+pair of them; and was quite knocked out of time, as they say in the ring,
+to find myself confronted with the lawyer.
+
+He stood on my hearthrug, leaning on the chimney-piece, with a gloomy,
+thoughtful brow, as I was pleased to see, and not in the least as though
+he were vain of the late proceedings.
+
+‘Well?’ said I.  ‘You have done it now!’
+
+‘Is he gone?’ he asked.
+
+‘He is gone,’ said I.  ‘We shall have the devil to pay with him when he
+comes back.’
+
+‘You are right,’ said the lawyer, ‘and very little to pay him with but
+flams and fabrications, like to-night’s.’
+
+‘To-night’s?’ I repeated.
+
+‘Ay, to-night’s!’ said he.
+
+‘To-night’s _what_?’ I cried.
+
+‘To-night’s flams and fabrications.’
+
+‘God be good to me, sir,’ said I, ‘have I something more to admire in
+your conduct than ever _I_ had suspected?  You cannot think how you
+interest me!  That it was severe, I knew; I had already chuckled over
+that.  But that it should be false also!  In what sense, dear sir?’
+
+I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but the lawyer
+paid no heed.
+
+‘False in all senses of the word,’ he replied seriously.  ‘False in the
+sense that they were not true, and false in the sense that they were not
+real; false in the sense that I boasted, and in the sense that I lied.
+How can I arrest him?  Your uncle burned the papers!  I told you so—but
+doubtless you have forgotten—the day I first saw you in Edinburgh Castle.
+It was an act of generosity; I have seen many of these acts, and always
+regretted—always regretted!  “That shall be his inheritance,” he said, as
+the papers burned; he did not mean that it should have proved so rich a
+one.  How rich, time will tell.’
+
+‘I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times, my dear sir, but it strikes
+me you have the impudence—in the circumstances, I may call it the
+indecency—to appear cast down?’
+
+‘It is true,’ said he: ‘I am.  I am cast down.  I am literally cast down.
+I feel myself quite helpless against your cousin.’
+
+‘Now, really!’ I asked.  ‘Is this serious?  And is it perhaps the reason
+why you have gorged the poor devil with every species of insult? and why
+you took such surprising pains to supply me with what I had so little
+need of—another enemy?  That you were helpless against them?  “Here is my
+last missile,” say you; “my ammunition is quite exhausted: just wait till
+I get the last in—it will irritate, it cannot hurt him.  There—you
+see!—he is furious now, and I am quite helpless.  One more prod, another
+kick: now he is a mere lunatic!  Stand behind me; I am quite helpless!”
+Mr. Romaine, I am asking myself as to the background or motive of this
+singular jest, and whether the name of it should not be called
+treachery?’
+
+‘I can scarce wonder,’ said he.  ‘In truth it has been a singular
+business, and we are very fortunate to be out of it so well.  Yet it was
+not treachery: no, no, Mr. Anne, it was not treachery; and if you will do
+me the favour to listen to me for the inside of a minute, I shall
+demonstrate the same to you beyond cavil.’  He seemed to wake up to his
+ordinary briskness.  ‘You see the point?’ he began.  ‘He had not yet read
+the newspaper, but who could tell when he might?  He might have had that
+damned journal in his pocket, and how should we know?  We were—I may say,
+we are—at the mercy of the merest twopenny accident.’
+
+‘Why, true,’ said I: ‘I had not thought of that.’
+
+‘I warrant you,’ cried Romaine, ‘you had supposed it was nothing to be
+the hero of an interesting notice in the journals!  You had supposed, as
+like as not, it was a form of secrecy!  But not so in the least.  A part
+of England is already buzzing with the name of Champdivers; a day or two
+more and the mail will have carried it everywhere: so wonderful a machine
+is this of ours for disseminating intelligence!  Think of it!  When my
+father was born—but that is another story.  To return: we had here the
+elements of such a combustion as I dread to think of—your cousin and the
+journal.  Let him but glance an eye upon that column of print, and where
+were we?  It is easy to ask; not so easy to answer, my young friend.  And
+let me tell you, this sheet is the Viscount’s usual reading.  It is my
+conviction he had it in his pocket.’
+
+‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said I.  ‘I have been unjust.  I did not
+appreciate my danger.’
+
+‘I think you never do,’ said he.
+
+‘But yet surely that public scene—’ I began.
+
+‘It was madness.  I quite agree with you,’ Mr. Romaine interrupted.  ‘But
+it was your uncle’s orders, Mr. Anne, and what could I do?  Tell him you
+were the murderer of Goguelat?  I think not.’
+
+‘No, sure!’ said I.  ‘That would but have been to make the trouble
+thicker.  We were certainly in a very ill posture.’
+
+‘You do not yet appreciate how grave it was,’ he replied.  ‘It was
+necessary for you that your cousin should go, and go at once.  You
+yourself had to leave to-night under cover of darkness, and how could you
+have done that with the Viscount in the next room?  He must go, then; he
+must leave without delay.  And that was the difficulty.’
+
+‘Pardon me, Mr. Romaine, but could not my uncle have bidden him go?’ I
+asked.
+
+‘Why, I see I must tell you that this is not so simple as it sounds,’ he
+replied.  ‘You say this is your uncle’s house, and so it is.  But to all
+effects and purposes it is your cousin’s also.  He has rooms here; has
+had them coming on for thirty years now, and they are filled with a
+prodigious accumulation of trash—stays, I dare say, and powder-puffs, and
+such effeminate idiocy—to which none could dispute his title, even
+suppose any one wanted to.  We had a perfect right to bid him go, and he
+had a perfect right to reply, “Yes, I will go, but not without my stays
+and cravats.  I must first get together the nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine
+chestsfull of insufferable rubbish, that I have spent the last thirty
+years collecting—and may very well spend the next thirty hours a-packing
+of.”  And what should we have said to that?’
+
+‘By way of repartee?’ I asked.  ‘Two tall footmen and a pair of crabtree
+cudgels, I suggest.’
+
+‘The Lord deliver me from the wisdom of laymen!’ cried Romaine.  ‘Put
+myself in the wrong at the beginning of a lawsuit?  No, indeed!  There
+was but one thing to do, and I did it, and burned my last cartridge in
+the doing of it.  I stunned him.  And it gave us three hours, by which we
+should make haste to profit; for if there is one thing sure, it is that
+he will be up to time again to-morrow in the morning.’
+
+‘Well,’ said I, ‘I own myself an idiot.  Well do they say, _an old
+soldier_, _an old innocent_!  For I guessed nothing of all this.’
+
+‘And, guessing it, have you the same objections to leave England?’ he
+inquired.
+
+‘The same,’ said I.
+
+‘It is indispensable,’ he objected.
+
+‘And it cannot be,’ I replied.  ‘Reason has nothing to say in the matter;
+and I must not let you squander any of yours.  It will be enough to tell
+you this is an affair of the heart.’
+
+‘Is it even so?’ quoth Romaine, nodding his head.  ‘And I might have been
+sure of it.  Place them in a hospital, put them in a jail in yellow
+overalls, do what you will, young Jessamy finds young Jenny.  O, have it
+your own way; I am too old a hand to argue with young gentlemen who
+choose to fancy themselves in love; I have too much experience, thank
+you.  Only, be sure that you appreciate what you risk: the prison, the
+dock, the gallows, and the halter—terribly vulgar circumstances, my young
+friend; grim, sordid, earnest; no poetry in that!’
+
+‘And there I am warned,’ I returned gaily.  ‘No man could be warned more
+finely or with a greater eloquence.  And I am of the same opinion still.
+Until I have again seen that lady, nothing shall induce me to quit Great
+Britain.  I have besides—’
+
+And here I came to a full stop.  It was upon my tongue to have told him
+the story of the drovers, but at the first word of it my voice died in my
+throat.  There might be a limit to the lawyer’s toleration, I reflected.
+I had not been so long in Britain altogether; for the most part of that
+time I had been by the heels in limbo in Edinburgh Castle; and already I
+had confessed to killing one man with a pair of scissors; and now I was
+to go on and plead guilty to having settled another with a holly stick!
+A wave of discretion went over me as cold and as deep as the sea.
+
+‘In short, sir, this is a matter of feeling,’ I concluded, ‘and nothing
+will prevent my going to Edinburgh.’
+
+If I had fired a pistol in his ear he could not have been more startled.
+
+‘To Edinburgh?’ he repeated.  ‘Edinburgh? where the very paving-stones
+know you!’
+
+‘Then is the murder out!’ said I.  ‘But, Mr. Romaine, is there not
+sometimes safety in boldness?  Is it not a common-place of strategy to
+get where the enemy least expects you?  And where would he expect me
+less?’
+
+‘Faith, there is something in that, too!’ cried the lawyer.  ‘Ay,
+certainly, a great deal in that.  All the witnesses drowned but one, and
+he safe in prison; you yourself changed beyond recognition—let us
+hope—and walking the streets of the very town you have illustrated by
+your—well, your eccentricity!  It is not badly combined, indeed!’
+
+‘You approve it, then?’ said I.
+
+‘O, approve!’ said he; ‘there is no question of approval.  There is only
+one course which I could approve, and that were to escape to France
+instanter.’
+
+‘You do not wholly disapprove, at least?’ I substituted.
+
+‘Not wholly; and it would not matter if I did,’ he replied.  ‘Go your own
+way; you are beyond argument.  And I am not sure that you will run more
+danger by that course than by any other.  Give the servants time to get
+to bed and fall asleep, then take a country cross-road and walk, as the
+rhyme has it, like blazes all night.  In the morning take a chaise or
+take the mail at pleasure, and continue your journey with all the decorum
+and reserve of which you shall be found capable.’
+
+‘I am taking the picture in,’ I said.  ‘Give me time.  ’Tis the _tout
+ensemble_ I must see: the whole as opposed to the details.’
+
+‘Mountebank!’ he murmured.
+
+‘Yes, I have it now; and I see myself with a servant, and that servant is
+Rowley,’ said I.
+
+‘So as to have one more link with your uncle?’ suggested the lawyer.
+‘Very judicious!’
+
+‘And, pardon me, but that is what it is,’ I exclaimed.  ‘Judicious is the
+word.  I am not making a deception fit to last for thirty years; I do not
+found a palace in the living granite for the night.  This is a shelter
+tent—a flying picture—seen, admired, and gone again in the wink of an
+eye.  What is wanted, in short, is a _trompe-l’œil_ that shall be good
+enough for twelve hours at an inn: is it not so?’
+
+‘It is, and the objection holds.  Rowley is but another danger,’ said
+Romaine.
+
+‘Rowley,’ said I, ‘will pass as a servant from a distance—as a creature
+seen poised on the dicky of a bowling chaise.  He will pass at hand as a
+smart, civil fellow one meets in the inn corridor, and looks back at, and
+asks, and is told, “Gentleman’s servant in Number 4.”  He will pass, in
+fact, all round, except with his personal friends!  My dear sir, pray
+what do you expect?  Of course if we meet my cousin, or if we meet
+anybody who took part in the judicious exhibition of this evening, we are
+lost; and who’s denying it?  To every disguise, however good and safe,
+there is always the weak point; you must always take (let us say—and to
+take a simile from your own waistcoat pocket) a snuff box-full of risk.
+You’ll get it just as small with Rowley as with anybody else.  And the
+long and short of it is, the lad’s honest, he likes me, I trust him; he
+is my servant, or nobody.’
+
+‘He might not accept,’ said Romaine.
+
+‘I bet you a thousand pounds he does!’ cried I.  ‘But no matter; all you
+have to do is to send him out to-night on this cross-country business,
+and leave the thing to me.  I tell you, he will be my servant, and I tell
+you, he will do well.’
+
+I had crossed the room, and was already overhauling my wardrobe as I
+spoke.
+
+‘Well,’ concluded the lawyer, with a shrug, ‘one risk with another: _à la
+guerre comme à la guerre_, as you would say.  Let the brat come and be
+useful, at least.’  And he was about to ring the bell, when his eye was
+caught by my researches in the wardrobe.  ‘Do not fall in love with these
+coats, waistcoats, cravats, and other panoply and accoutrements by which
+you are now surrounded.  You must not run the post as a dandy.  It is not
+the fashion, even.’
+
+‘You are pleased to be facetious, sir,’ said I; ‘and not according to
+knowledge.  These clothes are my life, they are my disguise; and since I
+can take but few of them, I were a fool indeed if I selected hastily!
+Will you understand, once and for all, what I am seeking?  To be
+invisible, is the first point; the second, to be invisible in a
+post-chaise and with a servant.  Can you not perceive the delicacy of the
+quest?  Nothing must be too coarse, nothing too fine; _rien de voyant_,
+_rien qui détonne_; so that I may leave everywhere the inconspicuous
+image of a handsome young man of a good fortune travelling in proper
+style, whom the landlord will forget in twelve hours—and the chambermaid
+perhaps remember, God bless her! with a sigh.  This is the very fine art
+of dress.’
+
+‘I have practised it with success for fifty years,’ said Romaine, with a
+chuckle.  ‘A black suit and a clean shirt is my infallible recipe.’
+
+‘You surprise me; I did not think you would be shallow!’ said I,
+lingering between two coats.  ‘Pray, Mr. Romaine, have I your head? or
+did you travel post and with a smartish servant?’
+
+‘Neither, I admit,’ said he.
+
+‘Which change the whole problem,’ I continued.  ‘I have to dress for a
+smartish servant and a Russia leather despatch-box.’  That brought me to
+a stand.  I came over and looked at the box with a moment’s hesitation.
+‘Yes,’ I resumed.  ‘Yes, and for the despatch-box!  It looks moneyed and
+landed; it means I have a lawyer.  It is an invaluable property.  But I
+could have wished it to hold less money.  The responsibility is crushing.
+Should I not do more wisely to take five hundred pounds, and intrust the
+remainder with you, Mr. Romaine?’
+
+‘If you are sure you will not want it,’ answered Romaine.
+
+‘I am far from sure of that,’ cried I.  ‘In the first place, as a
+philosopher.  This is the first time I have been at the head of a large
+sum, and it is conceivable—who knows himself?—that I may make it fly.  In
+the second place, as a fugitive.  Who knows what I may need?  The whole
+of it may be inadequate.  But I can always write for more.’
+
+‘You do not understand,’ he replied.  ‘I break off all communication with
+you here and now.  You must give me a power of attorney ere you start
+to-night, and then be done with me trenchantly until better days.’
+
+I believe I offered some objection.
+
+‘Think a little for once of me!’ said Romaine.  ‘I must not have seen you
+before to-night.  To-night we are to have had our only interview, and you
+are to have given me the power; and to-night I am to have lost sight of
+you again—I know not whither, you were upon business, it was none of my
+affairs to question you!  And this, you are to remark, in the interests
+of your own safety much more than mine.’
+
+‘I am not even to write to you?’ I said, a little bewildered.
+
+‘I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects you with common
+sense,’ he replied.  ‘But that is the plain English of it.  You are not
+even to write; and if you did, I would not answer.’
+
+‘A letter, however—’ I began.
+
+‘Listen to me,’ interrupted Romaine.  ‘So soon as your cousin reads the
+paragraph, what will he do?  Put the police upon looking into my
+correspondence!  So soon as you write to me, in short, you write to Bow
+Street; and if you will take my advice, you will date that letter from
+France.’
+
+‘The devil!’ said I, for I began suddenly to see that this might put me
+out of the way of my business.
+
+‘What is it now?’ says he.
+
+‘There will be more to be done, then, before we can part,’ I answered.
+
+‘I give you the whole night,’ said he.  ‘So long as you are off ere
+daybreak, I am content.’
+
+‘In short, Mr. Romaine,’ said I, ‘I have had so much benefit of your
+advice and services that I am loth to sever the connection, and would
+even ask a substitute.  I would be obliged for a letter of introduction
+to one of your own cloth in Edinburgh—an old man for choice, very
+experienced, very respectable, and very secret.  Could you favour me with
+such a letter?’
+
+‘Why, no,’ said he.  ‘Certainly not.  I will do no such thing, indeed.’
+
+‘It would be a great favour, sir,’ I pleaded.
+
+‘It would be an unpardonable blunder,’ he replied.  ‘What?  Give you a
+letter of introduction? and when the police come, I suppose, I must
+forget the circumstance?  No, indeed.  Talk of it no more.’
+
+‘You seem to be always in the right,’ said I.  ‘The letter would be out
+of the question, I quite see that.  But the lawyer’s name might very well
+have dropped from you in the way of conversation; having heard him
+mentioned, I might profit by the circumstance to introduce myself; and in
+this way my business would be the better done, and you not in the least
+compromised.’
+
+‘What is this business?’ said Romaine.
+
+‘I have not said that I had any,’ I replied.  ‘It might arise.  This is
+only a possibility that I must keep in view.’
+
+‘Well,’ said he, with a gesture of the hands, ‘I mention Mr. Robbie; and
+let that be an end of it!—Or wait!’ he added, ‘I have it.  Here is
+something that will serve you for an introduction, and cannot compromise
+me.’  And he wrote his name and the Edinburgh lawyer’s address on a piece
+of card and tossed it to me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI—I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED CHAISE
+
+
+What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an excellent cold
+supper in the lawyer’s room, it was past two in the morning before we
+were ready for the road.  Romaine himself let us out of a window in a
+part of the house known to Rowley: it appears it served as a kind of
+postern to the servants’ hall, by which (when they were in the mind for a
+clandestine evening) they would come regularly in and out; and I remember
+very well the vinegar aspect of the lawyer on the receipt of this piece
+of information—how he pursed his lips, jutted his eyebrows, and kept
+repeating, ‘This must be seen to, indeed! this shall be barred to-morrow
+in the morning!’  In this preoccupation, I believe he took leave of me
+without observing it; our things were handed out; we heard the window
+shut behind us; and became instantly lost in a horrid intricacy of
+blackness and the shadow of woods.
+
+A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling again; it
+seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually leaving off; and the
+darkness was intense.  Time and again we walked into trees; time and
+again found ourselves adrift among garden borders or stuck like a ram in
+the thicket.  Rowley had possessed himself of the matches, and he was
+neither to be terrified nor softened.  ‘No, I will not, Mr. Anne, sir,’
+he would reply.  ‘You know he tell me to wait till we were over the ’ill.
+It’s only a little way now.  Why, and I thought you was a soldier, too!’
+I was at least a very glad soldier when my valet consented at last to
+kindle a thieves’ match.  From this, we easily lit the lantern; and
+thenceforward, through a labyrinth of woodland paths, were conducted by
+its uneasy glimmer.  Both booted and great-coated, with tall hats much of
+a shape, and laden with booty in the form of a despatch-box, a case of
+pistols, and two plump valises, I thought we had very much the look of a
+pair of brothers returning from the sack of Amersham Place.
+
+We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk abreast and
+without precaution.  It was nine miles to Aylesbury, our immediate
+destination; by a watch, which formed part of my new outfit, it should be
+about half-past three in the morning; and as we did not choose to arrive
+before daylight, time could not be said to press.  I gave the order to
+march at ease.
+
+‘Now, Rowley,’ said I, ‘so far so good.  You have come, in the most
+obliging manner in the world, to carry these valises.  The question is,
+what next?  What are we to do at Aylesbury? or, more particularly, what
+are you?  Thence, I go on a journey.  Are you to accompany me?’
+
+He gave a little chuckle.  ‘That’s all settled already, Mr. Anne, sir,’
+he replied.  ‘Why, I’ve got my things here in the valise—a half a dozen
+shirts and what not; I’m all ready, sir: just you lead on: _you’ll_ see.’
+
+‘The devil you have!’ said I.  ‘You made pretty sure of your welcome.’
+
+‘If you please, sir,’ said Rowley.
+
+He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish shyness
+and triumph that awoke my conscience.  I could never let this innocent
+involve himself in the perils and difficulties that beset my course,
+without some hint of warning, which it was a matter of extreme delicacy
+to make plain enough and not too plain.
+
+‘No, no,’ said I; ‘you may think you have made a choice, but it was
+blindfold, and you must make it over again.  The Count’s service is a
+good one; what are you leaving it for?  Are you not throwing away the
+substance for the shadow?  No, do not answer me yet.  You imagine that I
+am a prosperous nobleman, just declared my uncle’s heir, on the threshold
+of the best of good fortune, and, from the point of view of a judicious
+servant, a jewel of a master to serve and stick to?  Well, my boy, I am
+nothing of the kind, nothing of the kind.’
+
+As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the lantern to his
+face.  He stood before me, brilliantly illuminated on the background of
+impenetrable night and falling snow, stricken to stone between his double
+burden like an ass between two panniers, and gaping at me like a
+blunderbuss.  I had never seen a face so predestined to be astonished, or
+so susceptible of rendering the emotion of surprise; and it tempted me as
+an open piano tempts the musician.
+
+‘Nothing of the sort, Rowley,’ I continued, in a churchyard voice.
+‘These are appearances, petty appearances.  I am in peril, homeless,
+hunted.  I count scarce any one in England who is not my enemy.  From
+this hour I drop my name, my title; I become nameless; my name is
+proscribed.  My liberty, my life, hang by a hair.  The destiny which you
+will accept, if you go forth with me, is to be tracked by spies, to hide
+yourself under a false name, to follow the desperate pretences and
+perhaps share the fate of a murderer with a price upon his head.’
+
+His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from one depth to
+another of tragic astonishment, and really worth paying to see; but at
+this it suddenly cleared.  ‘Oh, I ain’t afraid!’ he said; and then,
+choking into laughter, ‘why, I see it from the first!’
+
+I could have beaten him.  But I had so grossly overshot the mark that I
+suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour of elocution
+to persuade him I had been in earnest.  In the course of which I became
+so interested in demonstrating my present danger that I forgot all about
+my future safety, and not only told him the story of Goguelat, but threw
+in the business of the drovers as well, and ended by blurting out that I
+was a soldier of Napoleon’s and a prisoner of war.
+
+This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common complaint of
+me that I have a long tongue.  I believe it is a fault beloved by
+fortune.  Which of you considerate fellows would have done a thing at
+once so foolhardy and so wise as to make a confidant of a boy in his
+teens, and positively smelling of the nursery?  And when had I cause to
+repent it?  There is none so apt as a boy to be the adviser of any man in
+difficulties such as mine.  To the beginnings of virile common sense he
+adds the last lights of the child’s imagination; and he can fling himself
+into business with that superior earnestness that properly belongs to
+play.  And Rowley was a boy made to my hand.  He had a high sense of
+romance, and a secret cultus for all soldiers and criminals.  His
+travelling library consisted of a chap-book life of Wallace and some
+sixpenny parts of the ‘Old Bailey Sessions Papers’ by Gurney the
+shorthand writer; and the choice depicts his character to a hair.  You
+can imagine how his new prospects brightened on a boy of this
+disposition.  To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a soldier,
+and a murderer, rolled in one—to live by stratagems, disguises, and false
+names, in an atmosphere of midnight and mystery so thick that you could
+cut it with a knife—was really, I believe, more dear to him than his
+meals, though he was a great trencherman, and something of a glutton
+besides.  For myself, as the peg by which all this romantic business
+hung, I was simply idolised from that moment; and he would rather have
+sacrificed his hand than surrendered the privilege of serving me.
+
+We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in the snow,
+which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall to purpose.  I
+chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from its likeness to Romaine;
+Rowley, from an irresistible conversion of ideas, I dubbed Gammon.  His
+distress was laughable to witness: his own choice of an unassuming
+nickname had been Claude Duval!  We settled our procedure at the various
+inns where we should alight, rehearsed our little manners like a piece of
+drill until it seemed impossible we should ever be taken unprepared; and
+in all these dispositions, you maybe sure the despatch-box was not
+forgotten.  Who was to pick it up, who was to set it down, who was to
+remain beside it, who was to sleep with it—there was no contingency
+omitted, all was gone into with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant on
+the one hand and a child with a new plaything on the other.
+
+‘I say, wouldn’t it look queer if you and me was to come to the
+post-house with all this luggage?’ said Rowley.
+
+‘I dare say,’ I replied.  ‘But what else is to be done?’
+
+‘Well, now, sir—you hear me,’ says Rowley.  ‘I think it would look more
+natural-like if you was to come to the post-house alone, and with nothing
+in your ’ands—more like a gentleman, you know.  And you might say that
+your servant and baggage was a-waiting for you up the road.  I think I
+could manage, somehow, to make a shift with all them dratted
+things—leastways if you was to give me a ’and up with them at the start.’
+
+‘And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to try, Mr. Rowley!’
+I cried.  ‘Why, you would be quite defenceless!  A footpad that was an
+infant child could rob you.  And I should probably come driving by to
+find you in a ditch with your throat cut.  But there is something in your
+idea, for all that; and I propose we put it in execution no farther
+forward than the next corner of a lane.’
+
+Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we headed by
+cross-roads for some point to the northward of it, whither I might assist
+Rowley with the baggage, and where I might leave him to await my return
+in the post-chaise.
+
+It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and ourselves walking
+snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the morning showed us an inn upon
+the highwayside.  Some distance off, under the shelter of a corner of the
+road and a clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with the whole of our
+possessions, and watched him till he staggered in safety into the doors
+of the _Green Dragon_, which was the sign of the house.  Thence I walked
+briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in my freedom and the causeless good
+spirits that belong to a snowy morning; though, to be sure, long before I
+had arrived the snow had again ceased to fall, and the eaves of Aylesbury
+were smoking in the level sun.  There was an accumulation of gigs and
+chaises in the yard, and a great bustle going forward in the coffee-room
+and about the doors of the inn.  At these evidences of so much travel on
+the road I was seized with a misgiving lest it should be impossible to
+get horses, and I should be detained in the precarious neighbourhood of
+my cousin.  Hungry as I was, I made my way first of all to the
+postmaster, where he stood—a big, athletic, horsey-looking man, blowing
+into a key in the corner of the yard.
+
+On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference into what
+seemed passion.
+
+‘A po’-shay and ’osses!’ he cried.  ‘Do I look as if I ’ad a po’-shay and
+’osses?  Damn me, if I ’ave such a thing on the premises.  I don’t _make_
+’osses and chaises—I ’_ire_ ’em.  You might be God Almighty!’ said he;
+and instantly, as if he had observed me for the first time, he broke off,
+and lowered his voice into the confidential.  ‘Why, now that I see you
+are a gentleman,’ said he, ‘I’ll tell you what!  If you like to _buy_, I
+have the article to fit you.  Second-’and shay by Lycett, of London.
+Latest style; good as new.  Superior fittin’s, net on the roof, baggage
+platform, pistol ’olsters—the most com-plete and the most gen-teel
+turn-out I ever see!  The ’ole for seventy-five pound!  It’s as good as
+givin’ her away!’
+
+‘Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a hawker’s barrow?’ said
+I.  ‘Why, my good man, if I had to stop here, anyway, I should prefer to
+buy a house and garden!’
+
+‘Come and look at her!’ he cried; and, with the word, links his arm in
+mine and carries me to the outhouse where the chaise was on view.
+
+It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my purpose:
+eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though I thought the
+postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree with him so far.  The
+body was painted a dark claret, and the wheels an invisible green.  The
+lamp and glasses were bright as silver; and the whole equipage had an air
+of privacy and reserve that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm suspicion.
+With a servant like Rowley, and a chaise like this, I felt that I could
+go from the Land’s End to John o’ Groat’s House amid a population of
+bowing ostlers.  And I suppose I betrayed in my manner the degree in
+which the bargain tempted me.
+
+‘Come,’ cried the postmaster—‘I’ll make it seventy, to oblige a friend!’
+
+‘The point is: the horses,’ said I.
+
+‘Well,’ said he, consulting his watch, ‘it’s now gone the ’alf after
+eight.  What time do you want her at the door?’
+
+‘Horses and all?’ said I.
+
+‘’Osses and all!’ says he.  ‘One good turn deserves another.  You give me
+seventy pound for the shay, and I’ll ’oss it for you.  I told you I
+didn’t _make_ ’osses; but I _can_ make ’em, to oblige a friend.’
+
+What would you have?  It was not the wisest thing in the world to buy a
+chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle’s house; but in this way I got my
+horses for the next stage.  And by any other it appeared that I should
+have to wait.  Accordingly I paid the money down—perhaps twenty pounds
+too much, though it was certainly a well-made and well-appointed
+vehicle—ordered it round in half an hour, and proceeded to refresh myself
+with breakfast.
+
+The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a bay-window, and
+commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I continued to be amused
+by the successive departures of travellers—the fussy and the offhand, the
+niggardly and the lavish—all exhibiting their different characters in
+that diagnostic moment of the farewell: some escorted to the stirrup or
+the chaise door by the chamberlain, the chambermaids and the waiters
+almost in a body, others moving off under a cloud, without human
+countenance.  In the course of this I became interested in one for whom
+this ovation began to assume the proportions of a triumph; not only the
+under-servants, but the barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the
+postmaster himself, crowding about the steps to speed his departure.  I
+was aware, at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though the
+traveller were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to air it in
+that society.  I leaned forward with a lively curiosity; and the next
+moment I had blotted myself behind the teapot.  The popular traveller had
+turned to wave a farewell; and behold! he was no other than my cousin
+Alain.  It was a change of the sharpest from the angry, pallid man I had
+seen at Amersham Place.  Ruddy to a fault, illuminated with vintages,
+crowned with his curls like Bacchus, he now stood before me for an
+instant, the perfect master of himself, smiling with airs of conscious
+popularity and insufferable condescension.  He reminded me at once of a
+royal duke, or an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman
+who should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman.  A moment after
+he was gliding noiselessly on the road to London.
+
+I breathed again.  I recognised, with heartfelt gratitude, how lucky I
+had been to go in by the stable-yard instead of the hostelry door, and
+what a fine occasion of meeting my cousin I had lost by the purchase of
+the claret-coloured chaise!  The next moment I remembered that there was
+a waiter present.  No doubt but he must have observed me when I crouched
+behind the breakfast equipage; no doubt but he must have commented on
+this unusual and undignified behaviour; and it was essential that I
+should do something to remove the impression.
+
+‘Waiter!’ said I, ‘that was the nephew of Count Carwell that just drove
+off, wasn’t it?’
+
+‘Yes, sir: Viscount Carwell we calls him,’ he replied.
+
+‘Ah, I thought as much,’ said I.  ‘Well, well, damn all these Frenchmen,
+say I!’
+
+‘You may say so indeed, sir,’ said the waiter.  ‘They ain’t not to say in
+the same field with our ’ome-raised gentry.’
+
+‘Nasty tempers?’ I suggested.
+
+‘Beas’ly temper, sir, the Viscount ’ave,’ said the waiter with feeling.
+‘Why, no longer agone than this morning, he was sitting breakfasting and
+reading in his paper.  I suppose, sir, he come on some pilitical
+information, or it might be about ’orses, but he raps his ’and upon the
+table sudden and calls for curacoa.  It gave me quite a turn, it did; he
+did it that sudden and ’ard.  Now, sir, that may be manners in France,
+but hall I can say is, that I’m not used to it.’
+
+‘Reading the paper, was he?’ said I.  ‘What paper, eh?’
+
+‘Here it is, sir,’ exclaimed the waiter.  ‘Seems like as if he’d dropped
+it.’
+
+And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.
+
+I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what to expect;
+but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped beating.  There it was:
+the fulfilment of Romaine’s apprehension was before me; the paper was
+laid open at the capture of Clausel.  I felt as if I could take a little
+curacoa myself, but on second thoughts called for brandy.  It was badly
+wanted; and suddenly I observed the waiter’s eye to sparkle, as it were,
+with some recognition; made certain he had remarked the resemblance
+between me and Alain; and became aware—as by a revelation—of the fool’s
+part I had been playing.  For I had now managed to put my identification
+beyond a doubt, if Alain should choose to make his inquiries at
+Aylesbury; and, as if that were not enough, I had added, at an expense of
+seventy pounds, a clue by which he might follow me through the length and
+breadth of England, in the shape of the claret-coloured chaise!  That
+elegant equipage (which I began to regard as little better than a
+claret-coloured ante-room to the hangman’s cart) coming presently to the
+door, I left my breakfast in the middle and departed; posting to the
+north as diligently as my cousin Alain was posting to the south, and
+putting my trust (such as it was) in an opposite direction and equal
+speed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII—CHARACTER AND ACQUIREMENTS OF MR.  ROWLEY
+
+
+I am not certain that I had ever really appreciated before that hour the
+extreme peril of the adventure on which I was embarked.  The sight of my
+cousin, the look of his face—so handsome, so jovial at the first sight,
+and branded with so much malignity as you saw it on the second—with his
+hyperbolical curls in order, with his neckcloth tied as if for the
+conquests of love, setting forth (as I had no doubt in the world he was
+doing) to clap the Bow Street runners on my trail, and cover England with
+handbills, each dangerous as a loaded musket, convinced me for the first
+time that the affair was no less serious than death.  I believe it came
+to a near touch whether I should not turn the horses’ heads at the next
+stage and make directly for the coast.  But I was now in the position of
+a man who should have thrown his gage into the den of lions; or, better
+still, like one who should have quarrelled overnight under the influence
+of wine, and now, at daylight, in a cold winter’s morning, and humbly
+sober, must make good his words.  It is not that I thought any the less,
+or any the less warmly, of Flora.  But, as I smoked a grim segar that
+morning in a corner of the chaise, no doubt I considered, in the first
+place, that the letter-post had been invented, and admitted privately to
+myself, in the second, that it would have been highly possible to write
+her on a piece of paper, seal it, and send it skimming by the mail,
+instead of going personally into these egregious dangers, and through a
+country that I beheld crowded with gibbets and Bow Street officers.  As
+for Sim and Candlish, I doubt if they crossed my mind.
+
+At the Green Dragon Rowley was waiting on the doorsteps with the luggage,
+and really was bursting with unpalatable conversation.
+
+‘Who do you think we’ve ’ad ’ere, sir?’ he began breathlessly, as the
+chaise drove off.  ‘Red Breasts’; and he nodded his head portentously.
+
+‘Red Breasts?’ I repeated, for I stupidly did not understand at the
+moment an expression I had often heard.
+
+‘Ah!’ said he.  ‘Red weskits.  Runners.  Bow Street runners.  Two on’ em,
+and one was Lavender himself!  I hear the other say quite plain, “Now,
+Mr. Lavender, _if_ you’re ready.”  They was breakfasting as nigh me as I
+am to that postboy.  They’re all right; they ain’t after us.  It’s a
+forger; and I didn’t send them off on a false scent—O no!  I thought
+there was no use in having them over our way; so I give them “very
+valuable information,” Mr. Lavender said, and tipped me a tizzy for
+myself; and they’re off to Luton.  They showed me the ’andcuffs, too—the
+other one did—and he clicked the dratted things on my wrist; and I tell
+you, I believe I nearly went off in a swound!  There’s something so
+beastly in the feel of them!  Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne,’ he added,
+with one of his delicious changes from the character of the confidential
+schoolboy into that of the trained, respectful servant.
+
+Well, I must not be proud!  I cannot say I found the subject of handcuffs
+to my fancy; and it was with more asperity than was needful that I
+reproved him for the slip about the name.
+
+‘Yes, Mr. Ramornie,’ says he, touching his hat.  ‘Begging your pardon,
+Mr. Ramornie.  But I’ve been very piticular, sir, up to now; and you may
+trust me to be very piticular in the future.  It were only a slip, sir.’
+
+‘My good boy,’ said I, with the most imposing severity, ‘there must be no
+slips.  Be so good as to remember that my life is at stake.’
+
+I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had made myself.
+It is my principle that an officer must never be wrong.  I have seen two
+divisions beating their brains out for a fortnight against a worthless
+and quite impregnable castle in a pass: I knew we were only doing it for
+discipline, because the General had said so at first, and had not yet
+found any way out of his own words; and I highly admired his force of
+character, and throughout these operations thought my life exposed in a
+very good cause.  With fools and children, which included Rowley, the
+necessity was even greater.  I proposed to myself to be infallible; and
+even when he expressed some wonder at the purchase of the claret-coloured
+chaise, I put him promptly in his place.  In our situation, I told him,
+everything had to be sacrificed to appearances; doubtless, in a hired
+chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look at the dignity!  I was
+so positive, that I had sometimes almost convinced myself.  Not for long,
+you may be certain!  This detestable conveyance always appeared to me to
+be laden with Bow Street officers, and to have a placard upon the back of
+it publishing my name and crimes.  If I had paid seventy pounds to get
+the thing, I should not have stuck at seven hundred to be safely rid of
+it.
+
+And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the despatch-box and
+its golden cargo!  I had never had a care but to draw my pay and spend
+it; I had lived happily in the regiment, as in my father’s house, fed by
+the great Emperor’s commissariat as by ubiquitous doves of Elijah—or, my
+faith! if anything went wrong with the commissariat, helping myself with
+the best grace in the world from the next peasant!  And now I began to
+feel at the same time the burthen of riches and the fear of destitution.
+There were ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box, but I reckoned in
+French money, and had two hundred and fifty thousand agonies; I kept it
+under my hand all day, I dreamed of it at night.  In the inns, I was
+afraid to go to dinner and afraid to go to sleep.  When I walked up a
+hill I durst not leave the doors of the claret-coloured chaise.
+Sometimes I would change the disposition of the funds: there were days
+when I carried as much as five or six thousand pounds on my own person,
+and only the residue continued to voyage in the treasure-chest—days when
+I bulked all over like my cousin, crackled to a touch with bank paper,
+and had my pockets weighed to bursting-point with sovereigns.  And there
+were other days when I wearied of the thing—or grew ashamed of it—and put
+all the money back where it had come from: there let it take its chance,
+like better people!  In short, I set Rowley a poor example of
+consistency, and in philosophy, none at all.
+
+Little he cared!  All was one to him so long as he was amused, and I
+never knew any one amused more easily.  He was thrillingly interested in
+life, travel, and his own melodramatic position.  All day he would be
+looking from the chaise windows with ebullitions of gratified curiosity,
+that were sometimes justified and sometimes not, and that (taken
+altogether) it occasionally wearied me to be obliged to share.  I can
+look at horses, and I can look at trees too, although not fond of it.
+But why should I look at a lame horse, or a tree that was like the letter
+Y?  What exhilaration could I feel in viewing a cottage that was the same
+colour as ‘the second from the miller’s’ in some place where I had never
+been, and of which I had not previously heard?  I am ashamed to complain,
+but there were moments when my juvenile and confidential friend weighed
+heavy on my hands.  His cackle was indeed almost continuous, but it was
+never unamiable.  He showed an amiable curiosity when he was asking
+questions; an amiable guilelessness when he was conferring information.
+And both he did largely.  I am in a position to write the biographies of
+Mr. Rowley, Mr. Rowley’s father and mother, his Aunt Eliza, and the
+miller’s dog; and nothing but pity for the reader, and some misgivings as
+to the law of copyright, prevail on me to withhold them.
+
+A general design to mould himself upon my example became early apparent,
+and I had not the heart to check it.  He began to mimic my carriage; he
+acquired, with servile accuracy, a little manner I had of shrugging the
+shoulders; and I may say it was by observing it in him that I first
+discovered it in myself.  One day it came out by chance that I was of the
+Catholic religion.  He became plunged in thought, at which I was gently
+glad.  Then suddenly—
+
+‘Odd-rabbit it!  I’ll be Catholic too!’ he broke out.  ‘You must teach me
+it, Mr. Anne—I mean, Ramornie.’
+
+I dissuaded him: alleging that he would find me very imperfectly informed
+as to the grounds and doctrines of the Church, and that, after all, in
+the matter of religions, it was a very poor idea to change.  ‘Of course,
+my Church is the best,’ said I; ‘but that is not the reason why I belong
+to it: I belong to it because it was the faith of my house.  I wish to
+take my chances with my own people, and so should you.  If it is a
+question of going to hell, go to hell like a gentleman with your
+ancestors.’
+
+‘Well, it wasn’t that,’ he admitted.  ‘I don’t know that I was exactly
+thinking of hell.  Then there’s the inquisition, too.  That’s rather a
+cawker, you know.’
+
+‘And I don’t believe you were thinking of anything in the world,’ said
+I—which put a period to his respectable conversion.
+
+He consoled himself by playing for awhile on a cheap flageolet, which was
+one of his diversions, and to which I owed many intervals of peace.  When
+he first produced it, in the joints, from his pocket, he had the
+duplicity to ask me if I played upon it.  I answered, no; and he put the
+instrument away with a sigh and the remark that he had thought I might.
+For some while he resisted the unspeakable temptation, his fingers
+visibly itching and twittering about his pocket, even his interest in the
+landscape and in sporadic anecdote entirely lost.  Presently the pipe was
+in his hands again; he fitted, unfitted, refitted, and played upon it in
+dumb show for some time.
+
+‘I play it myself a little,’ says he.
+
+‘Do you?’ said I, and yawned.
+
+And then he broke down.
+
+‘Mr. Ramornie, if you please, would it disturb you, sir, if I was to play
+a chune?’ he pleaded.  And from that hour, the tootling of the flageolet
+cheered our way.
+
+He was particularly keen on the details of battles, single combats,
+incidents of scouting parties, and the like.  These he would make haste
+to cap with some of the exploits of Wallace, the only hero with whom he
+had the least acquaintance.  His enthusiasm was genuine and pretty.  When
+he learned we were going to Scotland, ‘Well, then,’ he broke out, ‘I’ll
+see where Wallace lived!’  And presently after, he fell to moralising.
+‘It’s a strange thing, sir,’ he began, ‘that I seem somehow to have
+always the wrong sow by the ear.  I’m English after all, and I glory in
+it.  My eye! don’t I, though!  Let some of your Frenchies come over here
+to invade, and you’ll see whether or not!  Oh, yes, I’m English to the
+backbone, I am.  And yet look at me!  I got hold of this ’ere William
+Wallace and took to him right off; I never heard of such a man before!
+And then you came along, and I took to you.  And both the two of you were
+my born enemies!  I—I beg your pardon, Mr. Ramornie, but would you mind
+it very much if you didn’t go for to do anything against England’—he
+brought the word out suddenly, like something hot—‘when I was along of
+you?’
+
+I was more affected than I can tell.
+
+‘Rowley,’ I said, ‘you need have no fear.  By how much I love my own
+honour, by so much I will take care to protect yours.  We are but
+fraternising at the outposts, as soldiers do.  When the bugle calls, my
+boy, we must face each other, one for England, one for France, and may
+God defend the right!’
+
+So I spoke at the moment; but for all my brave airs, the boy had wounded
+me in a vital quarter.  His words continued to ring in my hearing.  There
+was no remission all day of my remorseful thoughts; and that night (which
+we lay at Lichfield, I believe) there was no sleep for me in my bed.  I
+put out the candle and lay down with a good resolution; and in a moment
+all was light about me like a theatre, and I saw myself upon the stage of
+it playing ignoble parts.  I remembered France and my Emperor, now
+depending on the arbitrament of war, bent down, fighting on their knees
+and with their teeth against so many and such various assailants.  And I
+burned with shame to be here in England, cherishing an English fortune,
+pursuing an English mistress, and not there, to handle a musket in my
+native fields, and to manure them with my body if I fell.  I remembered
+that I belonged to France.  All my fathers had fought for her, and some
+had died; the voice in my throat, the sight of my eyes, the tears that
+now sprang there, the whole man of me, was fashioned of French earth and
+born of a French mother; I had been tended and caressed by a succession
+of the daughters of France, the fairest, the most ill-starred; and I had
+fought and conquered shoulder to shoulder with her sons.  A soldier, a
+noble, of the proudest and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to
+the prattle of a hobbledehoy lackey in an English chaise to recall me to
+the consciousness of duty.
+
+When I saw how it was I did not lose time in indecision.  The old
+classical conflict of love and honour being once fairly before me, it did
+not cost me a thought.  I was a Saint-Yves de Kéroual; and I decided to
+strike off on the morrow for Wakefield and Burchell Fenn, and embark, as
+soon as it should be morally possible, for the succour of my downtrodden
+fatherland and my beleaguered Emperor.  Pursuant on this resolve, I
+leaped from bed, made a light, and as the watchman was crying half-past
+two in the dark streets of Lichfield, sat down to pen a letter of
+farewell to Flora.  And then—whether it was the sudden chill of the
+night, whether it came by association of ideas from the remembrance of
+Swanston Cottage I know not, but there appeared before me—to the barking
+of sheep-dogs—a couple of snuffy and shambling figures, each wrapped in a
+plaid, each armed with a rude staff; and I was immediately bowed down to
+have forgotten them so long, and of late to have thought of them so
+cavalierly.
+
+Sure enough there was my errand!  As a private person I was neither
+French nor English; I was something else first: a loyal gentleman, an
+honest man.  Sim and Candlish must not be left to pay the penalty of my
+unfortunate blow.  They held my honour tacitly pledged to succour them;
+and it is a sort of stoical refinement entirely foreign to my nature to
+set the political obligation above the personal and private.  If France
+fell in the interval for the lack of Anne de St.-Yves, fall she must!
+But I was both surprised and humiliated to have had so plain a duty bound
+upon me for so long—and for so long to have neglected and forgotten it.
+I think any brave man will understand me when I say that I went to bed
+and to sleep with a conscience very much relieved, and woke again in the
+morning with a light heart.  The very danger of the enterprise reassured
+me: to save Sim and Candlish (suppose the worst to come to the worst) it
+would be necessary for me to declare myself in a court of justice, with
+consequences which I did not dare to dwell upon; it could never be said
+that I had chosen the cheap and the easy—only that in a very perplexing
+competition of duties I had risked my life for the most immediate.
+
+We resumed the journey with more diligence: thenceforward posted day and
+night; did not halt beyond what was necessary for meals; and the
+postillions were excited by gratuities, after the habit of my cousin
+Alain.  For twopence I could have gone farther and taken four horses; so
+extreme was my haste, running as I was before the terrors of an awakened
+conscience.  But I feared to be conspicuous.  Even as it was, we
+attracted only too much attention, with our pair and that white elephant,
+the seventy-pounds-worth of claret-coloured chaise.
+
+Meanwhile I was ashamed to look Rowley in the face.  The young shaver had
+contrived to put me wholly in the wrong; he had cost me a night’s rest
+and a severe and healthful humiliation; and I was grateful and
+embarrassed in his society.  This would never do; it was contrary to all
+my ideas of discipline; if the officer has to blush before the private,
+or the master before the servant, nothing is left to hope for but
+discharge or death.  I hit upon the idea of teaching him French; and
+accordingly, from Lichfield, I became the distracted master, and he the
+scholar—how shall I say? indefatigable, but uninspired.  His interest
+never flagged.  He would hear the same word twenty times with profound
+refreshment, mispronounce it in several different ways, and forget it
+again with magical celerity.  Say it happened to be _stirrup_.  ‘No, I
+don’t seem to remember that word, Mr. Anne,’ he would say: ‘it don’t seem
+to stick to me, that word don’t.’  And then, when I had told it him
+again, ‘_Etrier_!’ he would cry.  ‘To be sure!  I had it on the tip of my
+tongue.  _Eterier_!’ (going wrong already, as if by a fatal instinct).
+‘What will I remember it by, now?  Why, _interior_, to be sure!  I’ll
+remember it by its being something that ain’t in the interior of a
+horse.’  And when next I had occasion to ask him the French for stirrup,
+it was a toss-up whether he had forgotten all about it, or gave me
+_exterior_ for an answer.  He was never a hair discouraged.  He seemed to
+consider that he was covering the ground at a normal rate.  He came up
+smiling day after day.  ‘Now, sir, shall we do our French?’ he would say;
+and I would put questions, and elicit copious commentary and explanation,
+but never the shadow of an answer.  My hands fell to my sides; I could
+have wept to hear him.  When I reflected that he had as yet learned
+nothing, and what a vast deal more there was for him to learn, the period
+of these lessons seemed to unroll before me vast as eternity, and I saw
+myself a teacher of a hundred, and Rowley a pupil of ninety, still
+hammering on the rudiments!  The wretched boy, I should say, was quite
+unspoiled by the inevitable familiarities of the journey.  He turned out
+at each stage the pink of serving-lads, deft, civil, prompt, attentive,
+touching his hat like an automaton, raising the status of Mr. Ramornie in
+the eyes of all the inn by his smiling service, and seeming capable of
+anything in the world but the one thing I had chosen—learning French!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII—THE ADVENTURE OF THE RUNAWAY COUPLE
+
+
+The country had for some time back been changing in character.  By a
+thousand indications I could judge that I was again drawing near to
+Scotland.  I saw it written in the face of the hills, in the growth of
+the trees, and in the glint of the waterbrooks that kept the high-road
+company.  It might have occurred to me, also, that I was, at the same
+time, approaching a place of some fame in Britain—Gretna Green.  Over
+these same leagues of road—which Rowley and I now traversed in the
+claret-coloured chaise, to the note of the flageolet and the French
+lesson—how many pairs of lovers had gone bowling northwards to the music
+of sixteen scampering horseshoes; and how many irate persons, parents,
+uncles, guardians, evicted rivals, had come tearing after, clapping the
+frequent red face to the chaise-window, lavishly shedding their gold
+about the post-houses, sedulously loading and re-loading, as they went,
+their avenging pistols!  But I doubt if I had thought of it at all,
+before a wayside hazard swept me into the thick of an adventure of this
+nature; and I found myself playing providence with other people’s lives,
+to my own admiration at the moment—and subsequently to my own brief but
+passionate regret.
+
+At rather an ugly corner of an uphill reach I came on the wreck of a
+chaise lying on one side in the ditch, a man and a woman in animated
+discourse in the middle of the road, and the two postillions, each with
+his pair of horses, looking on and laughing from the saddle.
+
+‘Morning breezes! here’s a smash!’ cried Rowley, pocketing his flageolet
+in the middle of the _Tight Little Island_.
+
+I was perhaps more conscious of the moral smash than the physical—more
+alive to broken hearts than to broken chaises; for, as plain as the sun
+at morning, there was a screw loose in this runaway match.  It is always
+a bad sign when the lower classes laugh: their taste in humour is both
+poor and sinister; and for a man, running the posts with four horses,
+presumably with open pockets, and in the company of the most entrancing
+little creature conceivable, to have come down so far as to be laughed at
+by his own postillions, was only to be explained on the double
+hypothesis, that he was a fool and no gentleman.
+
+I have said they were man and woman.  I should have said man and child.
+She was certainly not more than seventeen, pretty as an angel, just plump
+enough to damn a saint, and dressed in various shades of blue, from her
+stockings to her saucy cap, in a kind of taking gamut, the top note of
+which she flung me in a beam from her too appreciative eye.  There was no
+doubt about the case: I saw it all.  From a boarding-school, a
+black-board, a piano, and Clementi’s _Sonatinas_, the child had made a
+rash adventure upon life in the company of a half-bred hawbuck; and she
+was already not only regretting it, but expressing her regret with point
+and pungency.
+
+As I alighted they both paused with that unmistakable air of being
+interrupted in a scene.  I uncovered to the lady and placed my services
+at their disposal.
+
+It was the man who answered.  ‘There’s no use in shamming, sir,’ said he.
+‘This lady and I have run away, and her father’s after us: road to
+Gretna, sir.  And here have these nincompoops spilt us in the ditch and
+smashed the chaise!’
+
+‘Very provoking,’ said I.
+
+‘I don’t know when I’ve been so provoked!’ cried he, with a glance down
+the road, of mortal terror.
+
+‘The father is no doubt very much incensed?’ I pursued civilly.
+
+‘O God!’ cried the hawbuck.  ‘In short, you see, we must get out of this.
+And I’ll tell you what—it may seem cool, but necessity has no law—if you
+would lend us your chaise to the next post-house, it would be the very
+thing, sir.’
+
+‘I confess it seems cool,’ I replied.
+
+‘What’s that you say, sir?’ he snapped.
+
+‘I was agreeing with you,’ said I.  ‘Yes, it does seem cool; and what is
+more to the point, it seems unnecessary.  This thing can be arranged in a
+more satisfactory manner otherwise, I think.  You can doubtless ride?’
+
+This opened a door on the matter of their previous dispute, and the
+fellow appeared life-sized in his true colours.  ‘That’s what I’ve been
+telling her: that, damn her! she must ride!’ he broke out.  ‘And if the
+gentleman’s of the same mind, why, damme, you shall!’
+
+As he said so, he made a snatch at her wrist, which she evaded with
+horror.
+
+I stepped between them.
+
+‘No, sir,’ said I; ‘the lady shall not.’
+
+He turned on me raging.  ‘And who are you to interfere?’ he roared.
+
+‘There is here no question of who I am,’ I replied.  ‘I may be the devil
+or the Archbishop of Canterbury for what you know, or need know.  The
+point is that I can help you—it appears that nobody else can; and I will
+tell you how I propose to do it.  I will give the lady a seat in my
+chaise, if you will return the compliment by allowing my servant to ride
+one of your horses.’
+
+I thought he would have sprung at my throat.
+
+‘You have always the alternative before you: to wait here for the arrival
+of papa,’ I added.
+
+And that settled him.  He cast another haggard look down the road, and
+capitulated.
+
+‘I am sure, sir, the lady is very much obliged to you,’ he said, with an
+ill grace.
+
+I gave her my hand; she mounted like a bird into the chaise; Rowley,
+grinning from ear to ear, closed the door behind us; the two impudent
+rascals of post-boys cheered and laughed aloud as we drove off; and my
+own postillion urged his horses at once into a rattling trot.  It was
+plain I was supposed by all to have done a very dashing act, and ravished
+the bride from the ravisher.
+
+In the meantime I stole a look at the little lady.  She was in a state of
+pitiable discomposure, and her arms shook on her lap in her black lace
+mittens.
+
+‘Madam—’ I began.
+
+And she, in the same moment, finding her voice: ‘O, what you must think
+of me!’
+
+‘Madam,’ said I, ‘what must any gentleman think when he sees youth,
+beauty and innocence in distress?  I wish I could tell you that I was old
+enough to be your father; I think we must give that up,’ I continued,
+with a smile.  ‘But I will tell you something about myself which ought to
+do as well, and to set that little heart at rest in my society.  I am a
+lover.  May I say it of myself—for I am not quite used to all the
+niceties of English—that I am a true lover?  There is one whom I admire,
+adore, obey; she is no less good than she is beautiful; if she were here,
+she would take you to her arms: conceive that she has sent me—that she
+has said to me, “Go, be her knight!”’
+
+‘O, I know she must be sweet, I know she must be worthy of you!’ cried
+the little lady.  ‘She would never forget female decorum—nor make the
+terrible _erratum_ I’ve done!’
+
+And at this she lifted up her voice and wept.
+
+This did not forward matters: it was in vain that I begged her to be more
+composed and to tell me a plain, consecutive tale of her misadventures;
+but she continued instead to pour forth the most extraordinary mixture of
+the correct school miss and the poor untutored little piece of womanhood
+in a false position—of engrafted pedantry and incoherent nature.
+
+‘I am certain it must have been judicial blindness,’ she sobbed.  ‘I
+can’t think how I didn’t see it, but I didn’t; and he isn’t, is he?  And
+then a curtain rose . . . O, what a moment was that!  But I knew at once
+that _you were_; you had but to appear from your carriage, and I knew it,
+O, she must be a fortunate young lady!  And I have no fear with you,
+none—a perfect confidence.’
+
+‘Madam,’ said I, ‘a gentleman.’
+
+‘That’s what I mean—a gentleman,’ she exclaimed.  ‘And he—and that—_he_
+isn’t.  O, how shall I dare meet father!’  And disclosing to me her
+tear-stained face, and opening her arms with a tragic gesture: ‘And I am
+quite disgraced before all the young ladies, my school-companions!’ she
+added.
+
+‘O, not so bad as that!’ I cried.  ‘Come, come, you exaggerate, my dear
+Miss—?  Excuse me if I am too familiar: I have not yet heard your name.’
+
+‘My name is Dorothy Greensleeves, sir: why should I conceal it?  I fear
+it will only serve to point an adage to future generations, and I had
+meant so differently!  There was no young female in the county more
+emulous to be thought well of than I.  And what a fall was there!  O,
+dear me, what a wicked, piggish donkey of a girl I have made of myself,
+to be sure!  And there is no hope! O, Mr.—’
+
+And at that she paused and asked my name.
+
+I am not writing my eulogium for the Academy; I will admit it was
+unpardonably imbecile, but I told it her.  If you had been there—and seen
+her, ravishingly pretty and little, a baby in years and mind—and heard
+her talking like a book, with so much of schoolroom propriety in her
+manner, with such an innocent despair in the matter—you would probably
+have told her yours.  She repeated it after me.
+
+‘I shall pray for you all my life,’ she said.  ‘Every night, when I
+retire to rest, the last thing I shall do is to remember you by name.’
+
+Presently I succeeded in winning from her her tale, which was much what I
+had anticipated: a tale of a schoolhouse, a walled garden, a fruit-tree
+that concealed a bench, an impudent raff posturing in church, an exchange
+of flowers and vows over the garden wall, a silly schoolmate for a
+confidante, a chaise and four, and the most immediate and perfect
+disenchantment on the part of the little lady.  ‘And there is nothing to
+be done!’ she wailed in conclusion.  ‘My error is irretrievable, I am
+quite forced to that conclusion.  O, Monsieur de Saint-Yves! who would
+have thought that I could have been such a blind, wicked donkey!’
+
+I should have said before—only that I really do not know when it came
+in—that we had been overtaken by the two post-boys, Rowley and Mr.
+Bellamy, which was the hawbuck’s name, bestriding the four post-horses;
+and that these formed a sort of cavalry escort, riding now before, now
+behind the chaise, and Bellamy occasionally posturing at the window and
+obliging us with some of his conversation.  He was so ill-received that I
+declare I was tempted to pity him, remembering from what a height he had
+fallen, and how few hours ago it was since the lady had herself fled to
+his arms, all blushes and ardour.  Well, these great strokes of fortune
+usually befall the unworthy, and Bellamy was now the legitimate object of
+my commiseration and the ridicule of his own post-boys!
+
+‘Miss Dorothy,’ said I, ‘you wish to be delivered from this man?’
+
+‘O, if it were possible!’ she cried.  ‘But not by violence.’
+
+‘Not in the least, ma’am,’ I replied.  ‘The simplest thing in life.  We
+are in a civilised country; the man’s a malefactor—’
+
+‘O, never!’ she cried.  ‘Do not even dream it!  With all his faults, I
+know he is not _that_.’
+
+‘Anyway, he’s in the wrong in this affair—on the wrong side of the law,
+call it what you please,’ said I; and with that, our four horsemen having
+for the moment headed us by a considerable interval, I hailed my post-boy
+and inquired who was the nearest magistrate and where he lived.
+Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a prodigious dignitary, and one who
+lived but a lane or two back, and at the distance of only a mile or two
+out of the direct road.  I showed him the king’s medallion.
+
+‘Take the lady there, and at full gallop,’ I cried.
+
+‘Right, sir!  Mind yourself,’ says the postillion.
+
+And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the carriage
+to the rightabout and we were galloping south.
+
+Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre, and came
+flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate shouting; so that the
+fine, sober picture of a carriage and escort, that we had presented but a
+moment back, was transformed in the twinkling of an eye into the image of
+a noisy fox-chase.  The two postillions and my own saucy rogue were, of
+course, disinterested actors in the comedy; they rode for the mere sport,
+keeping in a body, their mouths full of laughter, waving their hats as
+they came on, and crying (as the fancy struck them) Tally-ho!’  ‘Stop,
+thief!’  ‘A highwayman!  A highwayman!’  It was otherguess work with
+Bellamy.  That gentleman no sooner observed our change of direction than
+he turned his horse with so much violence that the poor animal was almost
+cast upon its side, and launched her in immediate and desperate pursuit.
+As he approached I saw that his face was deadly white and that he carried
+a drawn pistol in his hand.  I turned at once to the poor little bride
+that was to have been, and now was not to be; she, upon her side,
+deserting the other window, turned as if to meet me.
+
+‘O, O, don’t let him kill me!’ she screamed.
+
+‘Never fear,’ I replied.
+
+Her face was distorted with terror.  Her hands took hold upon me with the
+instinctive clutch of an infant.  The chaise gave a flying lurch, which
+took the feet from under me and tumbled us anyhow upon the seat.  And
+almost in the same moment the head of Bellamy appeared in the window
+which Missy had left free for him.
+
+Conceive the situation!  The little lady and I were falling—or had just
+fallen—backward on the seat, and offered to the eye a somewhat ambiguous
+picture.  The chaise was speeding at a furious pace, and with the most
+violent leaps and lurches, along the highway.  Into this bounding
+receptacle Bellamy interjected his head, his pistol arm, and his pistol;
+and since his own horse was travelling still faster than the chaise, he
+must withdraw all of them again in the inside of the fraction of a
+minute.  He did so, but he left the charge of the pistol behind
+him—whether by design or accident I shall never know, and I dare say he
+has forgotten!  Probably he had only meant to threaten, in hopes of
+causing us to arrest our flight.  In the same moment came the explosion
+and a pitiful cry from Missy; and my gentleman, making certain he had
+struck her, went down the road pursued by the furies, turned at the first
+corner, took a flying leap over the thorn hedge, and disappeared across
+country in the least possible time.
+
+Rowley was ready and eager to pursue; but I withheld him, thinking we
+were excellently quit of Mr. Bellamy, at no more cost than a scratch on
+the forearm and a bullet-hole in the left-hand claret-coloured panel.
+And accordingly, but now at a more decent pace, we proceeded on our way
+to Archdeacon Clitheroe’s, Missy’s gratitude and admiration were aroused
+to a high pitch by this dramatic scene, and what she was pleased to call
+my wound.  She must dress it for me with her handkerchief, a service
+which she rendered me even with tears.  I could well have spared them,
+not loving on the whole to be made ridiculous, and the injury being in
+the nature of a cat’s scratch.  Indeed, I would have suggested for her
+kind care rather the cure of my coat-sleeve, which had suffered worse in
+the encounter; but I was too wise to risk the anti-climax.  That she had
+been rescued by a hero, that the hero should have been wounded in the
+affray, and his wound bandaged with her handkerchief (which it could not
+even bloody), ministered incredibly to the recovery of her self-respect;
+and I could hear her relate the incident to ‘the young ladies, my
+school-companions,’ in the most approved manner of Mrs. Radcliffe!  To
+have insisted on the torn coat-sleeve would have been unmannerly, if not
+inhuman.
+
+Presently the residence of the archdeacon began to heave in sight.  A
+chaise and four smoking horses stood by the steps, and made way for us on
+our approach; and even as we alighted there appeared from the interior of
+the house a tall ecclesiastic, and beside him a little, headstrong, ruddy
+man, in a towering passion, and brandishing over his head a roll of
+paper.  At sight of him Miss Dorothy flung herself on her knees with the
+most moving adjurations, calling him father, assuring him she was wholly
+cured and entirely repentant of her disobedience, and entreating
+forgiveness; and I soon saw that she need fear no great severity from Mr.
+Greensleeves, who showed himself extraordinarily fond, loud, greedy of
+caresses and prodigal of tears.
+
+To give myself a countenance, as well as to have all ready for the road
+when I should find occasion, I turned to quit scores with Bellamy’s two
+postillions.  They had not the least claim on me, but one of which they
+were quite ignorant—that I was a fugitive.  It is the worst feature of
+that false position that every gratuity becomes a case of conscience.
+You must not leave behind you any one discontented nor any one grateful.
+But the whole business had been such a ‘hurrah-boys’ from the beginning,
+and had gone off in the fifth act so like a melodrama, in explosions,
+reconciliations, and the rape of a post-horse, that it was plainly
+impossible to keep it covered.  It was plain it would have to be talked
+over in all the inn-kitchens for thirty miles about, and likely for six
+months to come.  It only remained for me, therefore, to settle on that
+gratuity which should be least conspicuous—so large that nobody could
+grumble, so small that nobody would be tempted to boast.  My decision was
+hastily and nor wisely taken.  The one fellow spat on his tip (so he
+called it) for luck; the other developing a sudden streak of piety,
+prayed God bless me with fervour.  It seemed a demonstration was brewing,
+and I determined to be off at once.  Bidding my own post-boy and Rowley
+be in readiness for an immediate start, I reascended the terrace and
+presented myself, hat in hand, before Mr. Greensleeves and the
+archdeacon.
+
+‘You will excuse me, I trust,’ said I.  ‘I think shame to interrupt this
+agreeable scene of family effusion, which I have been privileged in some
+small degree to bring about.’
+
+And at these words the storm broke.
+
+‘Small degree! small degree, sir!’ cries the father; ‘that shall not
+pass, Mr. St. Eaves!  If I’ve got my darling back, and none the worse for
+that vagabone rascal, I know whom I have to thank.  Shake hands with
+me—up to the elbows, sir!  A Frenchman you may be, but you’re one of the
+right breed, by God!  And, by God, sir, you may have anything you care to
+ask of me, down to Dolly’s hand, by God!’
+
+All this he roared out in a voice surprisingly powerful from so small a
+person.  Every word was thus audible to the servants, who had followed
+them out of the house and now congregated about us on the terrace, as
+well as to Rowley and the five postillions on the gravel sweep below.
+The sentiments expressed were popular; some ass, whom the devil moved to
+be my enemy, proposed three cheers, and they were given with a will.  To
+hear my own name resounding amid acclamations in the hills of Westmorland
+was flattering, perhaps; but it was inconvenient at a moment when (as I
+was morally persuaded) police handbills were already speeding after me at
+the rate of a hundred miles a day.
+
+Nor was that the end of it.  The archdeacon must present his compliments,
+and pressed upon me some of his West India sherry, and I was carried into
+a vastly fine library, where I was presented to his lady wife.  While we
+were at sherry in the library, ale was handed round upon the terrace.
+Speeches were made, hands were shaken, Missy (at her father’s request)
+kissed me farewell, and the whole party reaccompanied me to the terrace,
+where they stood waving hats and handkerchiefs, and crying farewells to
+all the echoes of the mountains until the chaise had disappeared.
+
+The echoes of the mountains were engaged in saying to me privately: ‘You
+fool, you have done it now!’
+
+‘They do seem to have got ’old of your name, Mr. Anne,’ said Rowley.  ‘It
+weren’t my fault this time.’
+
+‘It was one of those accidents that can never be foreseen,’ said I,
+affecting a dignity that I was far from feeling.  ‘Some one recognised
+me.’
+
+‘Which on ’em, Mr. Anne?’ said the rascal.
+
+‘That is a senseless question; it can make no difference who it was,’ I
+returned.
+
+‘No, nor that it can’t!’ cried Rowley.  ‘I say, Mr. Anne, sir, it’s what
+you would call a jolly mess, ain’t it? looks like “clean bowled-out in
+the middle stump,” don’t it?’
+
+‘I fail to understand you, Rowley.’
+
+‘Well, what I mean is, what are we to do about this one?’ pointing to the
+postillion in front of us, as he alternately hid and revealed his patched
+breeches to the trot of his horse.  ‘He see you get in this morning under
+_Mr. Ramornie_—I was very piticular to _Mr. Ramornie_ you, if you
+remember, sir—and he see you get in again under Mr. Saint Eaves, and
+whatever’s he going to see you get out under? that’s what worries me,
+sir.  It don’t seem to me like as if the position was what you call
+_stratetegic_!’
+
+‘_Parrrbleu_! will you let me be!’ I cried.  ‘I have to think; you cannot
+imagine how your constant idiotic prattle annoys me.’
+
+‘Beg pardon, Mr. Anne,’ said he; and the next moment, ‘You wouldn’t like
+for us to do our French now, would you, Mr. Anne?’
+
+‘Certainly not,’ said I.  ‘Play upon your flageolet.’
+
+The which he did with what seemed to me to be irony.
+
+Conscience doth make cowards of us all!  I was so downcast by my pitiful
+mismanagement of the morning’s business that I shrank from the eye of my
+own hired infant, and read offensive meanings into his idle tootling.
+
+I took off my coat, and set to mending it, soldier-fashion, with a needle
+and thread.  There is nothing more conducive to thought, above all in
+arduous circumstances; and as I sewed, I gradually gained a clearness
+upon my affairs.  I must be done with the claret-coloured chaise at once.
+It should be sold at the next stage for what it would bring.  Rowley and
+I must take back to the road on our four feet, and after a decent
+interval of trudging, get places on some coach for Edinburgh again under
+new names!  So much trouble and toil, so much extra risk and expense and
+loss of time, and all for a slip of the tongue to a little lady in blue!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV—THE INN-KEEPER OF KIRKBY-LONSDALE
+
+
+I had hitherto conceived and partly carried out an ideal that was dear to
+my heart.  Rowley and I descended from our claret-coloured chaise, a
+couple of correctly dressed, brisk, bright-eyed young fellows, like a
+pair of aristocratic mice; attending singly to our own affairs,
+communicating solely with each other, and that with the niceties and
+civilities of drill.  We would pass through the little crowd before the
+door with high-bred preoccupation, inoffensively haughty, after the best
+English pattern; and disappear within, followed by the envy and
+admiration of the bystanders, a model master and servant, point-device in
+every part.  It was a heavy thought to me, as we drew up before the inn
+at Kirkby-Lonsdale, that this scene was now to be enacted for the last
+time.  Alas! and had I known it, it was to go of with so inferior a
+grace!
+
+I had been injudiciously liberal to the post-boys of the chaise and four.
+My own post-boy, he of the patched breeches, now stood before me, his
+eyes glittering with greed, his hand advanced.  It was plain he
+anticipated something extraordinary by way of a _pourboire_; and
+considering the marches and counter-marches by which I had extended the
+stage, the military character of our affairs with Mr. Bellamy, and the
+bad example I had set before him at the archdeacon’s, something
+exceptional was certainly to be done.  But these are always nice
+questions, to a foreigner above all: a shade too little will suggest
+niggardliness, a shilling too much smells of hush-money.  Fresh from the
+scene at the archdeacon’s, and flushed by the idea that I was now nearly
+done with the responsibilities of the claret-coloured chaise, I put into
+his hands five guineas; and the amount served only to waken his cupidity.
+
+‘O, come, sir, you ain’t going to fob me of with this?  Why, I seen fire
+at your side!’ he cried.
+
+It would never do to give him more; I felt I should become the fable of
+Kirkby-Lonsdale if I did; and I looked him in the face, sternly but still
+smiling, and addressed him with a voice of uncompromising firmness.
+
+‘If you do not like it, give it back,’ said I.
+
+He pocketed the guineas with the quickness of a conjurer, and, like a
+base-born cockney as he was, fell instantly to casting dirt.
+
+‘’Ave your own way of it, Mr. Ramornie—leastways Mr. St. Eaves, or
+whatever your blessed name may be.  Look ’ere’—turning for sympathy to
+the stable-boys—‘this is a blessed business.  Blessed ’ard, I calls it.
+’Ere I takes up a blessed son of a pop-gun what calls hisself anything
+you care to mention, and turns out to be a blessed _mounseer_ at the end
+of it!  ’Ere ’ave I been drivin’ of him up and down all day, a-carrying
+off of gals, a-shootin’ of pistyils, and a-drinkin’ of sherry and hale;
+and wot does he up and give me but a blank, blank, blanketing blank!’
+
+The fellow’s language had become too powerful for reproduction, and I
+passed it by.
+
+Meanwhile I observed Rowley fretting visibly at the bit; another moment,
+and he would have added a last touch of the ridiculous to our arrival by
+coming to his hands with the postillion.
+
+‘Rowley!’ cried I reprovingly.
+
+Strictly it should have been Gammon; but in the hurry of the moment, my
+fault (I can only hope) passed unperceived.  At the same time I caught
+the eye of the postmaster.  He was long and lean, and brown and bilious;
+he had the drooping nose of the humourist, and the quick attention of a
+man of parts.  He read my embarrassment in a glance, stepped instantly
+forward, sent the post-boy to the rightabout with half a word, and was
+back next moment at my side.
+
+‘Dinner in a private room, sir?  Very well.  John, No. 4!  What wine
+would you care to mention?  Very well, sir.  Will you please to order
+fresh horses?  Not, sir?  Very well.’
+
+Each of these expressions was accompanied by something in the nature of a
+bow, and all were prefaced by something in the nature of a smile, which I
+could very well have done without.  The man’s politeness was from the
+teeth outwards; behind and within, I was conscious of a perpetual
+scrutiny: the scene at his doorstep, the random confidences of the
+post-boy, had not been thrown away on this observer; and it was under a
+strong fear of coming trouble that I was shown at last into my private
+room.  I was in half a mind to have put off the whole business.  But the
+truth is, now my name had got abroad, my fear of the mail that was
+coming, and the handbills it should contain, had waxed inordinately, and
+I felt I could never eat a meal in peace till I had severed my connection
+with the claret-coloured chaise.
+
+Accordingly, as soon as I had done with dinner, I sent my compliments to
+the landlord and requested he should take a glass of wine with me.  He
+came; we exchanged the necessary civilities, and presently I approached
+my business.
+
+‘By the bye,’ said I, ‘we had a brush down the road to-day.  I dare say
+you may have heard of it?’
+
+He nodded.
+
+‘And I was so unlucky as to get a pistol ball in the panel of my chaise,’
+I continued, ‘which makes it simply useless to me.  Do you know any one
+likely to buy?’
+
+‘I can well understand that,’ said the landlord, ‘I was looking at it
+just now; it’s as good as ruined, is that chaise.  General rule, people
+don’t like chaises with bullet-holes.’
+
+‘Too much _Romance of the Forest_?’ I suggested, recalling my little
+friend of the morning, and what I was sure had been her favourite
+reading—Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels.
+
+‘Just so,’ said he.  ‘They may be right, they may be wrong; I’m not the
+judge.  But I suppose it’s natural, after all, for respectable people to
+like things respectable about them; not bullet-holes, nor puddles of
+blood, nor men with aliases.’
+
+I took a glass of wine and held it up to the light to show that my hand
+was steady.
+
+‘Yes,’ said I, ‘I suppose so.’
+
+‘You have papers, of course, showing you are the proper owner?’ he
+inquired.
+
+‘There is the bill, stamped and receipted,’ said I, tossing it across to
+him.
+
+He looked at it.
+
+‘This all you have?’ he asked.
+
+‘It is enough, at least,’ said I.  ‘It shows you where I bought and what
+I paid for it.’
+
+‘Well, I don’t know,’ he said.  ‘You want some paper of identification.’
+
+‘To identify the chaise?’ I inquired.
+
+‘Not at all: to identify _you_,’ said he.
+
+‘My good sir, remember yourself!’ said I.  ‘The title-deeds of my estate
+are in that despatch-box; but you do not seriously suppose that I should
+allow you to examine them?’
+
+‘Well, you see, this paper proves that some Mr. Ramornie paid seventy
+guineas for a chaise,’ said the fellow.  ‘That’s all well and good; but
+who’s to prove to me that you are Mr. Ramornie?’
+
+‘Fellow!’ cried I.
+
+‘O, fellow as much as you please!’ said he.  ‘Fellow, with all my heart!
+That changes nothing.  I am fellow, of course—obtrusive fellow, impudent
+fellow, if you like—but who are you?  I hear of you with two names; I
+hear of you running away with young ladies, and getting cheered for a
+Frenchman, which seems odd; and one thing I will go bail for, that you
+were in a blue fright when the post-boy began to tell tales at my door.
+In short, sir, you may be a very good gentleman; but I don’t know enough
+about you, and I’ll trouble you for your papers, or to go before a
+magistrate.  Take your choice; if I’m not fine enough, I hope the
+magistrates are.’
+
+‘My good man,’ I stammered, for though I had found my voice, I could
+scarce be said to have recovered my wits, ‘this is most unusual, most
+rude.  Is it the custom in Westmorland that gentlemen should be
+insulted?’
+
+‘That depends,’ said he.  ‘When it’s suspected that gentlemen are spies
+it _is_ the custom; and a good custom, too.  No no,’ he broke out,
+perceiving me to make a movement.  ‘Both hands upon the table, my
+gentleman!  I want no pistol balls in my chaise panels.’
+
+‘Surely, sir, you do me strange injustice!’ said I, now the master of
+myself.  ‘You see me sitting here, a monument of tranquillity: pray may I
+help myself to wine without umbraging you?’
+
+I took this attitude in sheer despair.  I had no plan, no hope.  The best
+I could imagine was to spin the business out some minutes longer, then
+capitulate.  At least, I would not capituatle one moment too soon.
+
+‘Am I to take that for _no_?’ he asked.
+
+‘Referring to your former obliging proposal?’ said I.  ‘My good sir, you
+are to take it, as you say, for “No.”  Certainly I will not show you my
+deeds; certainly I will not rise from table and trundle out to see your
+magistrates.  I have too much respect for my digestion, and too little
+curiosity in justices of the peace.’
+
+He leaned forward, looked me nearly in the face, and reached out one hand
+to the bell-rope.  ‘See here, my fine fellow!’ said he.  ‘Do you see that
+bell-rope?  Let me tell you, there’s a boy waiting below: one jingle, and
+he goes to fetch the constable.’
+
+‘Do you tell me so?’ said I.  ‘Well, there’s no accounting for tastes!  I
+have a prejudice against the society of constables, but if it is your
+fancy to have one in for the dessert—’  I shrugged my shoulders lightly.
+‘Really, you know,’ I added, ‘this is vastly entertaining.  I assure you,
+I am looking on, with all the interest of a man of the world, at the
+development of your highly original character.’
+
+He continued to study my face without speech, his hand still on the
+button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the decisive heat.
+My face seemed to myself to dislimn under his gaze, my expression to
+change, the smile (with which I had began) to degenerate into the grin of
+the man upon the rack.  I was besides harassed with doubts.  An innocent
+man, I argued, would have resented the fellow’s impudence an hour ago;
+and by my continued endurance of the ordeal, I was simply signing and
+sealing my confession; in short, I had reached the end of my powers.
+
+‘Have you any objection to my putting my hands in my breeches pockets?’ I
+inquired.  ‘Excuse me mentioning it, but you showed yourself so extremely
+nervous a moment back.’  My voice was not all I could have wished, but it
+sufficed.  I could hear it tremble, but the landlord apparently could
+not.  He turned away and drew a long breath, and you may be sure I was
+quick to follow his example.
+
+‘You’re a cool hand at least, and that’s the sort I like,’ said he.  ‘Be
+you what you please, I’ll deal square.  I’ll take the chaise for a
+hundred pound down, and throw the dinner in.’
+
+‘I beg your pardon,’ I cried, wholly mystified by this form of words.
+
+‘You pay me a hundred down,’ he repeated, ‘and I’ll take the chaise.
+It’s very little more than it cost,’ he added, with a grin, ‘and you know
+you must get it off your hands somehow.’
+
+I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this impudent
+proposal.  It was broadly funny, and I suppose the least tempting offer
+in the world.  For all that, it came very welcome, for it gave me the
+occasion to laugh.  This I did with the most complete abandonment, till
+the tears ran down my cheeks; and ever and again, as the fit abated, I
+would get another view of the landlord’s face, and go off into another
+paroxysm.
+
+‘You droll creature, you will be the death of me yet!’ I cried, drying my
+eyes.
+
+My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to look, nor yet
+what to say; and began for the first time to conceive it possible he was
+mistaken.
+
+‘You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir,’ said he.
+
+‘O, yes!  I am quite an original,’ I replied, and laughed again.
+
+Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for the
+chaise; I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the offer: indeed, I
+was glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it was not in the desire of
+gain, but with the view at any price of securing a safe retreat.  For
+although hostilities were suspended, he was yet far from satisfied; and I
+could read his continued suspicions in the cloudy eye that still hovered
+about my face.  At last they took shape in words.
+
+‘This is all very well,’ says he: ‘you carry it off well; but for all
+that, I must do my duty.’
+
+I had my strong effect in reserve; it was to burn my ships with a
+vengeance!  I rose.  ‘Leave the room,’ said I.  ‘This is insuperable.  Is
+the man mad?’  And then, as if already half-ashamed of my passion: ‘I can
+take a joke as well as any one,’ I added; ‘but this passes measure.  Send
+my servant and the bill.’
+
+When he had left me alone, I considered my own valour with amazement.  I
+had insulted him; I had sent him away alone; now, if ever, he would take
+what was the only sensible resource, and fetch the constable.  But there
+was something instinctively treacherous about the man which shrank from
+plain courses.  And, with all his cleverness, he missed the occasion of
+fame.  Rowley and I were suffered to walk out of his door, with all our
+baggage, on foot, with no destination named, except in the vague
+statement that we were come ‘to view the lakes’; and my friend only
+watched our departure with his chin in his hand, still moodily
+irresolute.
+
+I think this one of my great successes.  I was exposed, unmasked,
+summoned to do a perfectly natural act, which must prove my doom and
+which I had not the slightest pretext for refusing.  I kept my head,
+stuck to my guns, and, against all likelihood, here I was once more at
+liberty and in the king’s highway.  This was a strong lesson never to
+despair; and, at the same time, how many hints to be cautious! and what a
+perplexed and dubious business the whole question of my escape now
+appeared!  That I should have risked perishing upon a trumpery question
+of a _pourboire_, depicted in lively colours the perils that perpetually
+surrounded us.  Though, to be sure, the initial mistake had been
+committed before that; and if I had not suffered myself to be drawn a
+little deep in confidences to the innocent Dolly, there need have been no
+tumble at the inn of Kirkby-Lonsdale.  I took the lesson to heart, and
+promised myself in the future to be more reserved.  It was none of my
+business to attend to broken chaises or shipwrecked travellers.  I had my
+hands full of my own affairs; and my best defence would be a little more
+natural selfishness and a trifle less imbecile good-nature.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV—I MEET A CHEERFUL EXTRAVAGANT
+
+
+I pass over the next fifty or sixty leagues of our journey without
+comment.  The reader must be growing weary of scenes of travel; and for
+my own part I have no cause to recall these particular miles with any
+pleasure.  We were mainly occupied with attempts to obliterate our trail,
+which (as the result showed) were far from successful; for, on my cousin
+following, he was able to run me home with the least possible loss of
+time, following the claret-coloured chaise to Kirkby-Lonsdale, where I
+think the landlord must have wept to learn what he had missed, and
+tracing us thereafter to the doors of the coach-office in Edinburgh
+without a single check.  Fortune did not favour me, and why should I
+recapitulate the details of futile precautions which deceived nobody, and
+wearisome arts which proved to be artless?
+
+The day was drawing to an end when Mr. Rowley and I bowled into Edinburgh
+to the stirring sound of the guard’s bugle and the clattering team.  I
+was here upon my field of battle; on the scene of my former captivity,
+escape and exploits; and in the same city with my love.  My heart
+expanded; I have rarely felt more of a hero.  All down the Bridges I sat
+by the driver with my arms folded and my face set, unflinchingly meeting
+every eye, and prepared every moment for a cry of recognition.  Hundreds
+of the population were in the habit of visiting the Castle, where it was
+my practice (before the days of Flora) to make myself conspicuous among
+the prisoners; and I think it an extraordinary thing that I should have
+encountered so few to recognise me.  But doubtless a clean chin is a
+disguise in itself; and the change is great from a suit of sulphur-yellow
+to fine linen, a well-fitting mouse-coloured great-coat furred in black,
+a pair of tight trousers of fashionable cut, and a hat of inimitable
+curl.  After all, it was more likely that I should have recognised our
+visitors, than that they should have identified the modish gentleman with
+the miserable prisoner in the Castle.
+
+I was glad to set foot on the flagstones, and to escape from the crowd
+that had assembled to receive the mail.  Here we were, with but little
+daylight before us, and that on Saturday afternoon, the eve of the famous
+Scottish Sabbath, adrift in the New Town of Edinburgh, and overladen with
+baggage.  We carried it ourselves.  I would not take a cab, nor so much
+as hire a porter, who might afterwards serve as a link between my
+lodgings and the mail, and connect me again with the claret-coloured
+chaise and Aylesbury.  For I was resolved to break the chain of evidence
+for good, and to begin life afresh (so far as regards caution) with a new
+character.  The first step was to find lodgings, and to find them
+quickly.  This was the more needful as Mr. Rowley and I, in our smart
+clothes and with our cumbrous burthen, made a noticeable appearance in
+the streets at that time of the day and in that quarter of the town,
+which was largely given up to fine folk, bucks and dandies and young
+ladies, or respectable professional men on their way home to dinner.
+
+On the north side of St. James’ Square I was so happy as to spy a bill in
+a third-floor window.  I was equally indifferent to cost and convenience
+in my choice of a lodging—‘any port in a storm’ was the principle on
+which I was prepared to act; and Rowley and I made at once for the common
+entrance and sealed the stair.
+
+We were admitted by a very sour-looking female in bombazine.  I gathered
+she had all her life been depressed by a series of bereavements, the last
+of which might very well have befallen her the day before; and I
+instinctively lowered my voice when I addressed her.  She admitted she
+had rooms to let—even showed them to us—a sitting-room and bedroom in a
+_suite_, commanding a fine prospect to the Firth and Fifeshire, and in
+themselves well proportioned and comfortably furnished, with pictures on
+the wall, shells on the mantelpiece, and several books upon the table
+which I found afterwards to be all of a devotional character, and all
+presentation copies, ‘to my Christian friend,’ or ‘to my devout
+acquaintance in the Lord, Bethiah McRankine.’  Beyond this my ‘Christian
+friend’ could not be made to advance: no, not even to do that which
+seemed the most natural and pleasing thing in the world—I mean to name
+her price—but stood before us shaking her head, and at times mourning
+like the dove, the picture of depression and defence.  She had a voice
+the most querulous I have ever heard, and with this she produced a whole
+regiment of difficulties and criticisms.
+
+She could not promise an attendance.
+
+‘Well, madam,’ said I, ‘and what is my servant for?’
+
+‘Him?’ she asked.  ‘Be gude to us!  Is _he_ your servant?’
+
+‘I am sorry, ma’am, he meets with your disapproval.’
+
+‘Na, I never said that.  But he’s young.  He’ll be a great breaker, I’m
+thinkin’.  Ay! he’ll be a great responsibeelity to ye, like.  Does he
+attend to his releegion?’
+
+‘Yes, m’m,’ returned Rowley, with admirable promptitude, and, immediately
+closing his eyes, as if from habit, repeated the following distich with
+more celerity than fervour:—
+
+    ‘Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
+    Bless the bed that I lie on!’
+
+‘Nhm!’ said the lady, and maintained an awful silence.
+
+‘Well, ma’am,’ said I, ‘it seems we are never to hear the beginning of
+your terms, let alone the end of them.  Come—a good movement! and let us
+be either off or on.’
+
+She opened her lips slowly.  ‘Ony raferences?’ she inquired, in a voice
+like a bell.
+
+I opened my pocket-book and showed her a handful of bank bills.  ‘I
+think, madam, that these are unexceptionable,’ said I.
+
+‘Ye’ll be wantin’ breakfast late?’ was her reply.
+
+‘Madam, we want breakfast at whatever hour it suits you to give it, from
+four in the morning till four in the afternoon!’ I cried.  ‘Only tell us
+your figure, if your mouth be large enough to let it out!’
+
+‘I couldnae give ye supper the nicht,’ came the echo.
+
+‘We shall go out to supper, you incorrigible female!’ I vowed, between
+laughter and tears.  ‘Here—this is going to end!  I want you for a
+landlady—let me tell you that!—and I am going to have my way.  You won’t
+tell me what you charge?  Very well; I will do without!  I can trust you!
+You don’t seem to know when you have a good lodger; but I know perfectly
+when I have an honest landlady!  Rowley, unstrap the valises!’
+
+Will it be credited?  The monomaniac fell to rating me for my
+indiscretion!  But the battle was over; these were her last guns, and
+more in the nature of a salute than of renewed hostilities.  And
+presently she condescended on very moderate terms, and Rowley and I were
+able to escape in quest of supper.  Much time had, however, been lost;
+the sun was long down, the lamps glimmered along the streets, and the
+voice of a watchman already resounded in the neighbouring Leith Road.  On
+our first arrival I had observed a place of entertainment not far off, in
+a street behind the Register House.  Thither we found our way, and sat
+down to a late dinner alone.  But we had scarce given our orders before
+the door opened, and a tall young fellow entered with something of a
+lurch, looked about him, and approached the same table.
+
+‘Give you good evening, most grave and reverend seniors!’ said he.  ‘Will
+you permit a wanderer, a pilgrim—the pilgrim of love, in short—to come to
+temporary anchor under your lee?  I care not who knows it, but I have a
+passionate aversion from the bestial practice of solitary feeding!’
+
+‘You are welcome, sir,’ said I, ‘if I may take upon me so far to play the
+host in a public place.’
+
+He looked startled, and fixed a hazy eye on me, as he sat down.
+
+‘Sir,’ said he, ‘you are a man not without some tincture of letters, I
+perceive!  What shall we drink, sir?’
+
+I mentioned I had already called for a pot of porter.
+
+‘A modest pot—the seasonable quencher?’ said he.  ‘Well, I do not know
+but what I could look at a modest pot myself!  I am, for the moment, in
+precarious health.  Much study hath heated my brain, much walking wearied
+my—well, it seems to be more my eyes!’
+
+‘You have walked far, I dare say?’ I suggested.
+
+‘Not so much far as often,’ he replied.  ‘There is in this city—to which,
+I think, you are a stranger?  Sir, to your very good health and our
+better acquaintance!—there is, in this city of Dunedin, a certain
+implication of streets which reflects the utmost credit on the designer
+and the publicans—at every hundred yards is seated the Judicious Tavern,
+so that persons of contemplative mind are secure, at moderate distances,
+of refreshment.  I have been doing a trot in that favoured quarter,
+favoured by art and nature.  A few chosen comrades—enemies of publicity
+and friends to wit and wine—obliged me with their society.  “Along the
+cool, sequestered vale of Register Street we kept the uneven tenor of our
+way,” sir.’
+
+‘It struck me, as you came in—’ I began.
+
+‘O, don’t make any bones about it!’ he interrupted.  ‘Of course it struck
+you! and let me tell you I was devilish lucky not to strike myself.  When
+I entered this apartment I shone “with all the pomp and prodigality of
+brandy and water,” as the poet Gray has in another place expressed it.
+Powerful bard, Gray! but a niminy-piminy creature, afraid of a petticoat
+and a bottle—not a man, sir, not a man!  Excuse me for being so
+troublesome, but what the devil have I done with my fork?  Thank you, I
+am sure.  _Temulentia_, _quoad me ipsum_, _brevis colligo est_.  I sit
+and eat, sir, in a London fog.  I should bring a link-boy to table with
+me; and I would too, if the little brutes were only washed!  I intend to
+found a Philanthropical Society for Washing the Deserving Poor and
+Shaving Soldiers.  I am pleased to observe that, although not of an
+unmilitary bearing, you are apparently shaved.  In my calendar of the
+virtues shaving comes next to drinking.  A gentleman may be a low-minded
+ruffian without sixpence, but he will always be close shaved.  See me,
+with the eye of fancy, in the chill hours of the morning, say about a
+quarter to twelve, noon—see me awake!  First thing of all, without one
+thought of the plausible but unsatisfactory small beer, or the healthful
+though insipid soda-water, I take the deadly razor in my vacillating
+grasp; I proceed to skate upon the margin of eternity.  Stimulating
+thought!  I bleed, perhaps, but with medicable wounds.  The stubble
+reaped, I pass out of my chamber, calm but triumphant.  To employ a
+hackneyed phrase, I would not call Lord Wellington my uncle!  I, too,
+have dared, perhaps bled, before the imminent deadly shaving-table.’
+
+In this manner the bombastic fellow continued to entertain me all through
+dinner, and by a common error of drunkards, because he had been extremely
+talkative himself, leaped to the conclusion that he had chanced on very
+genial company.  He told me his name, his address; he begged we should
+meet again; finally he proposed that I should dine with him in the
+country at an early date.
+
+‘The dinner is official,’ he explained.  ‘The office-bearers and Senatus
+of the University of Cramond—an educational institution in which I have
+the honour to be Professor of Nonsense—meet to do honour to our friend
+Icarus, at the old-established _howff_, Cramond Bridge.  One place is
+vacant, fascinating stranger,—I offer it to you!’
+
+‘And who is your friend Icarus?’ I asked,
+
+‘The aspiring son of Daedalus!’ said he.  ‘Is it possible that you have
+never heard the name of Byfield?’
+
+‘Possible and true,’ said I.
+
+‘And is fame so small a thing?’ cried he.  ‘Byfield, sir, is an aeronaut.
+He apes the fame of a Lunardi, and is on the point of offering to the
+inhabitants—I beg your pardon, to the nobility and gentry of our
+neighbourhood—the spectacle of an ascension.  As one of the gentry
+concerned I may be permitted to remark that I am unmoved.  I care not a
+Tinker’s Damn for his ascension.  No more—I breathe it in your ear—does
+anybody else.  The business is stale, sir, stale.  Lunardi did it, and
+overdid it.  A whimsical, fiddling, vain fellow, by all accounts—for I
+was at that time rocking in my cradle.  But once was enough.  If Lunardi
+went up and came down, there was the matter settled.  We prefer to grant
+the point.  We do not want to see the experiment repeated _ad nauseam_ by
+Byfield, and Brown, and Butler, and Brodie, and Bottomley.  Ah! if they
+would go up and _not_ come down again!  But this is by the question.  The
+University of Cramond delights to honour merit in the man, sir, rather
+than utility in the profession; and Byfield, though an ignorant dog, is a
+sound reliable drinker, and really not amiss over his cups.  Under the
+radiance of the kindly jar partiality might even credit him with wit.’
+
+It will be seen afterwards that this was more my business than I thought
+it at the time.  Indeed, I was impatient to be gone.  Even as my friend
+maundered ahead a squall burst, the jaws of the rain were opened against
+the coffee-house windows, and at that inclement signal I remembered I was
+due elsewhere.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI—THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT
+
+
+At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence of the
+squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting words.  All the way along
+Princes Street (whither my way led) the wind hunted me behind and
+screamed in my ears.  The city was flushed with bucketfuls of rain that
+tasted salt from the neighbouring ocean.  It seemed to darken and lighten
+again in the vicissitudes of the gusts.  Now you would say the lamps had
+been blown out from end to end of the long thoroughfare; now, in a lull,
+they would revive, re-multiply, shine again on the wet pavements, and
+make darkness sparingly visible.
+
+By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there was a
+distinct improvement.  For one thing, I had now my shoulder to the wind;
+for a second, I came in the lee of my old prison-house, the Castle; and,
+at any rate, the excessive fury of the blast was itself moderating.  The
+thought of what errand I was on re-awoke within me, and I seemed to
+breast the rough weather with increasing ease.  With such a destination,
+what mattered a little buffeting of wind or a sprinkle of cold water?  I
+recalled Flora’s image, I took her in fancy to my arms, and my heart
+throbbed.  And the next moment I had recognised the inanity of that
+fool’s paradise.  If I could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might
+count myself lucky.
+
+I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and now deep
+in mire.  So soon as I was clear of the last street lamp, darkness
+received me—a darkness only pointed by the lights of occasional rustic
+farms, where the dogs howled with uplifted heads as I went by.  The wind
+continued to decline: it had been but a squall, not a tempest.  The rain,
+on the other hand, settled into a steady deluge, which had soon drenched
+me thoroughly.  I continued to tramp forward in the night, contending
+with gloomy thoughts and accompanied by the dismal ululation of the dogs.
+What ailed them that they should have been thus wakeful, and perceived
+the small sound of my steps amid the general reverberation of the rain,
+was more than I could fancy.  I remembered tales with which I had been
+entertained in childhood.  I told myself some murderer was going by, and
+the brutes perceived upon him the faint smell of blood; and the next
+moment, with a physical shock, I had applied the words to my own case!
+
+Here was a dismal disposition for a lover.  ‘Was ever lady in this humour
+wooed?’ I asked myself, and came near turning back.  It is never wise to
+risk a critical interview when your spirits are depressed, your clothes
+muddy, and your hands wet!  But the boisterous night was in itself
+favourable to my enterprise: now, or perhaps never, I might find some way
+to have an interview with Flora; and if I had one interview (wet clothes,
+low spirits and all), I told myself there would certainly be another.
+
+Arrived in the cottage-garden I found the circumstances mighty inclement.
+From the round holes in the shutters of the parlour, shafts of
+candle-light streamed forth; elsewhere the darkness was complete.  The
+trees, the thickets, were saturated; the lower parts of the garden turned
+into a morass.  At intervals, when the wind broke forth again, there
+passed overhead a wild coil of clashing branches; and between whiles the
+whole enclosure continuously and stridently resounded with the rain.  I
+advanced close to the window and contrived to read the face of my watch.
+It was half-past seven; they would not retire before ten, they might not
+before midnight, and the prospect was unpleasant.  In a lull of the wind
+I could hear from the inside the voice of Flora reading aloud; the words
+of course inaudible—only a flow of undecipherable speech, quiet, cordial,
+colourless, more intimate and winning, more eloquent of her personality,
+but not less beautiful than song.  And the next moment the clamour of a
+fresh squall broke out about the cottage; the voice was drowned in its
+bellowing, and I was glad to retreat from my dangerous post.
+
+For three egregious hours I must now suffer the elements to do their
+worst upon me, and continue to hold my ground in patience.  I recalled
+the least fortunate of my services in the field: being out-sentry of the
+pickets in weather no less vile, sometimes unsuppered and with nothing to
+look forward to by way of breakfast but musket-balls; and they seemed
+light in comparison.  So strangely are we built: so much more strong is
+the love of woman than the mere love of life.
+
+At last my patience was rewarded.  The light disappeared from the parlour
+and reappeared a moment after in the room above.  I was pretty well
+informed for the enterprise that lay before me.  I knew the lair of the
+dragon—that which was just illuminated.  I knew the bower of my Rosamond,
+and how excellently it was placed on the ground-level, round the flank of
+the cottage and out of earshot of her formidable aunt.  Nothing was left
+but to apply my knowledge.  I was then at the bottom of the garden,
+whether I had gone (Heaven save the mark!) for warmth, that I might walk
+to and fro unheard and keep myself from perishing.  The night had fallen
+still, the wind ceased; the noise of the rain had much lightened, if it
+had not stopped, and was succeeded by the dripping of the garden trees.
+In the midst of this lull, and as I was already drawing near to the
+cottage, I was startled by the sound of a window-sash screaming in its
+channels; and a step or two beyond I became aware of a gush of light upon
+the darkness.  It fell from Flora’s window, which she had flung open on
+the night, and where she now sat, roseate and pensive, in the shine of
+two candles falling from behind, her tresses deeply embowering and
+shading her; the suspended comb still in one hand, the other idly
+clinging to the iron stanchions with which the window was barred.
+
+Keeping to the turf, and favoured by the darkness of the night and the
+patter of the rain which was now returning, though without wind, I
+approached until I could almost have touched her.  It seemed a grossness
+of which I was incapable to break up her reverie by speech.  I stood and
+drank her in with my eyes; how the light made a glory in her hair, and
+(what I have always thought the most ravishing thing in nature) how the
+planes ran into each other, and were distinguished, and how the hues
+blended and varied, and were shaded off, between the cheek and neck.  At
+first I was abashed: she wore her beauty like an immediate halo of
+refinement; she discouraged me like an angel, or what I suspect to be the
+next most discouraging, a modern lady.  But as I continued to gaze, hope
+and life returned to me; I forgot my timidity, I forgot the sickening
+pack of wet clothes with which I stood burdened, I tingled with new
+blood.
+
+Still unconscious of my presence, still gazing before her upon the
+illuminated image of the window, the straight shadows of the bars, the
+glinting of pebbles on the path, and the impenetrable night on the garden
+and the hills beyond it, she heaved a deep breath that struck upon my
+heart like an appeal.
+
+‘Why does Miss Gilchrist sigh?’ I whispered.  ‘Does she recall absent
+friends?’
+
+She turned her head swiftly in my direction; it was the only sign of
+surprise she deigned to make.  At the same time I stepped into the light
+and bowed profoundly.
+
+‘You!’ she said.  ‘Here?’
+
+‘Yes, I am here,’ I replied.  ‘I have come very far, it may be a hundred
+and fifty leagues, to see you.  I have waited all this night in your
+garden.  Will Miss Gilchrist not offer her hand—to a friend in trouble?’
+
+She extended it between the bars, and I dropped upon one knee on the wet
+path and kissed it twice.  At the second it was withdrawn suddenly,
+methought with more of a start than she had hitherto displayed.  I
+regained my former attitude, and we were both silent awhile.  My timidity
+returned on me tenfold.  I looked in her face for any signals of anger,
+and seeing her eyes to waver and fall aside from mine, augured that all
+was well.
+
+‘You must have been mad to come here!’ she broke out.  ‘Of all places
+under heaven this is no place for you to come.  And I was just thinking
+you were safe in France!’
+
+‘You were thinking of me!’ I cried.
+
+‘Mr. St. Ives, you cannot understand your danger,’ she replied.  ‘I am
+sure of it, and yet I cannot find it in my heart to tell you.  O, be
+persuaded, and go!’
+
+‘I believe I know the worst.  But I was never one to set an undue value
+on life, the life that we share with beasts.  My university has been in
+the wars, not a famous place of education, but one where a man learns to
+carry his life in his hand as lightly as a glove, and for his lady or his
+honour to lay it as lightly down.  You appeal to my fears, and you do
+wrong.  I have come to Scotland with my eyes quite open to see you and to
+speak with you—it may be for the last time.  With my eyes quite open, I
+say; and if I did not hesitate at the beginning do you think that I would
+draw back now?’
+
+‘You do not know!’ she cried, with rising agitation.  ‘This country, even
+this garden, is death to you.  They all believe it; I am the only one
+that does not.  If they hear you now, if they heard a whisper—I dread to
+think of it.  O, go, go this instant.  It is my prayer.’
+
+‘Dear lady, do not refuse me what I have come so far to seek; and
+remember that out of all the millions in England there is no other but
+yourself in whom I can dare confide.  I have all the world against me;
+you are my only ally; and as I have to speak, you have to listen.  All is
+true that they say of me, and all of it false at the same time.  I did
+kill this man Goguelat—it was that you meant?’
+
+She mutely signed to me that it was; she had become deadly pale.
+
+‘But I killed him in fair fight.  Till then, I had never taken a life
+unless in battle, which is my trade.  But I was grateful, I was on fire
+with gratitude, to one who had been good to me, who had been better to me
+than I could have dreamed of an angel, who had come into the darkness of
+my prison like sunrise.  The man Goguelat insulted her.  O, he had
+insulted me often, it was his favourite pastime, and he might insult me
+as he pleased—for who was I?  But with that lady it was different.  I
+could never forgive myself if I had let it pass.  And we fought, and he
+fell, and I have no remorse.’
+
+I waited anxiously for some reply.  The worst was now out, and I knew
+that she had heard of it before; but it was impossible for me to go on
+with my narrative without some shadow of encouragement.
+
+‘You blame me?’
+
+‘No, not at all.  It is a point I cannot speak on—I am only a girl.  I am
+sure you were in the right: I have always said so—to Ronald.  Not, of
+course, to my aunt.  I am afraid I let her speak as she will.  You must
+not think me a disloyal friend; and even with the Major—I did not tell
+you he had become quite a friend of ours—Major Chevenix, I mean—he has
+taken such a fancy to Ronald!  It was he that brought the news to us of
+that hateful Clausel being captured, and all that he was saying.  I was
+indignant with him.  I said—I dare say I said too much—and I must say he
+was very good-natured.  He said, “You and I, who are his friends, _know_
+that Champdivers is innocent.  But what is the use of saying it?”  All
+this was in the corner of the room in what they call an aside.  And then
+he said, “Give me a chance to speak to you in private, I have much to
+tell you.”  And he did.  And told me just what you did—that it was an
+affair of honour, and no blame attached to you.  O, I must say I like
+that Major Chevenix!’
+
+At this I was seized with a great pang of jealousy.  I remembered the
+first time that he had seen her, the interest that he seemed immediately
+to conceive; and I could not but admire the dog for the use he had been
+ingenious enough to make of our acquaintance in order to supplant me.
+All is fair in love and war.  For all that, I was now no less anxious to
+do the speaking myself than I had been before to hear Flora.  At least, I
+could keep clear of the hateful image of Major Chevenix.  Accordingly I
+burst at once on the narrative of my adventures.  It was the same as you
+have read, but briefer, and told with a very different purpose.  Now
+every incident had a particular bearing, every by-way branched off to
+Rome—and that was Flora.
+
+When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel withoutside the
+low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and lowered my voice to the
+most confidential whisper.  Flora herself must kneel upon the other side,
+and this brought our heads upon a level with only the bars between us.
+So placed, so separated, it seemed that our proximity, and the continuous
+and low sounds of my pleading voice, worked progressively and powerfully
+on her heart, and perhaps not less so on my own.  For these spells are
+double-edged.  The silly birds may be charmed with the pipe of the
+fowler, which is but a tube of reeds.  Not so with a bird of our own
+feather!  As I went on, and my resolve strengthened, and my voice found
+new modulations, and our faces were drawn closer to the bars and to each
+other, not only she, but I, succumbed to the fascination, and were
+kindled by the charm.  We make love, and thereby ourselves fall the
+deeper in it.  It is with the heart only that one captures a heart.
+
+‘And now,’ I continued, ‘I will tell you what you can still do for me.  I
+run a little risk just now, and you see for yourself how unavoidable it
+is for any man of honour.  But if—but in case of the worst I do not
+choose to enrich either my enemies or the Prince Regent.  I have here the
+bulk of what my uncle gave me.  Eight thousand odd pounds.  Will you take
+care of it for me?  Do not think of it merely as money; take and keep it
+as a relic of your friend or some precious piece of him.  I may have
+bitter need of it ere long.  Do you know the old country story of the
+giant who gave his heart to his wife to keep for him, thinking it safer
+to repose on her loyalty than his own strength?  Flora, I am the giant—a
+very little one: will you be the keeper of my life?  It is my heart I
+offer you in this symbol.  In the sight of God, if you will have it, I
+give you my name, I endow you with my money.  If the worst come, if I may
+never hope to call you wife, let me at least think that you will use my
+uncle’s legacy as my widow.’
+
+‘No, not that,’ she said.  ‘Never that.’
+
+‘What then?’ I said.  ‘What else, my angel?  What are words to me?  There
+is but one name that I care to know you by.  Flora, my love!’
+
+‘Anne!’ she said.
+
+What sound is so full of music as one’s own name uttered for the first
+time in the voice of her we love!
+
+‘My darling!’ said I.
+
+The jealous bars, set at the top and bottom in stone and lime, obstructed
+the rapture of the moment; but I took her to myself as wholly as they
+allowed.  She did not shun my lips.  My arms were wound round her body,
+which yielded itself generously to my embrace.  As we so remained,
+entwined and yet severed, bruising our faces unconsciously on the cold
+bars, the irony of the universe—or as I prefer to say, envy of some of
+the gods—again stirred up the elements of that stormy night.  The wind
+blew again in the tree-tops; a volley of cold sea-rain deluged the
+garden, and, as the deuce would have it, a gutter which had been hitherto
+choked up began suddenly to play upon my head and shoulders with the
+vivacity of a fountain.  We parted with a shock; I sprang to my feet, and
+she to hers, as though we had been discovered.  A moment after, but now
+both standing, we had again approached the window on either side.
+
+‘Flora,’ I said, ‘this is but a poor offer I can make you.’
+
+She took my hand in hers and clasped it to her bosom.
+
+‘Rich enough for a queen!’ she said, with a lift in her breathing that
+was more eloquent than words.  ‘Anne, my brave Anne!  I would be glad to
+be your maidservant; I could envy that boy Rowley.  But, no!’ she broke
+off, ‘I envy no one—I need not—I am yours.’
+
+‘Mine,’ said I, ‘for ever!  By this and this, mine!’
+
+‘All of me,’ she repeated.  ‘Altogether and forever!’
+
+And if the god were envious, he must have seen with mortification how
+little he could do to mar the happiness of mortals.  I stood in a mere
+waterspout; she herself was wet, not from my embrace only, but from the
+splashing of the storm.  The candles had guttered out; we were in
+darkness.  I could scarce see anything but the shining of her eyes in the
+dark room.  To her I must have appeared as a silhouette, haloed by rain
+and the spouting of the ancient Gothic gutter above my head.
+
+Presently we became more calm and confidential; and when that squall,
+which proved to be the last of the storm, had blown by, fell into a talk
+of ways and means.  It seemed she knew Mr. Robbie, to whom I had been so
+slenderly accredited by Romaine—was even invited to his house for the
+evening of Monday, and gave me a sketch of the old gentleman’s character
+which implied a great deal of penetration in herself, and proved of great
+use to me in the immediate sequel.  It seemed he was an enthusiastic
+antiquary, and in particular a fanatic of heraldry.  I heard it with
+delight, for I was myself, thanks to M. de Culemberg, fairly grounded in
+that science, and acquainted with the blazons of most families of note in
+Europe.  And I had made up my mind—even as she spoke, it was my fixed
+determination, though I was a hundred miles from saying it—to meet Flora
+on Monday night as a fellow-guest in Mr. Robbie’s house.
+
+I gave her my money—it was, of course, only paper I had brought.  I gave
+it her, to be her marriage-portion, I declared.
+
+‘Not so bad a marriage-portion for a private soldier,’ I told her,
+laughing, as I passed it through the bars.
+
+‘O, Anne, and where am I to keep it?’ she cried.  ‘If my aunt should find
+it!  What would I say!’
+
+‘Next your heart,’ I suggested.
+
+‘Then you will always be near your treasure,’ she cried, ‘for you are
+always there!’
+
+We were interrupted by a sudden clearness that fell upon the night.  The
+clouds dispersed; the stars shone in every part of the heavens; and,
+consulting my watch, I was startled to find it already hard on five in
+the morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII—THE SABBATH DAY
+
+
+It was indeed high time I should be gone from Swanston; but what I was to
+do in the meanwhile was another question.  Rowley had received his orders
+last night: he was to say that I had met a friend, and Mrs. McRankine was
+not to expect me before morning.  A good enough tale in itself; but the
+dreadful pickle I was in made it out of the question.  I could not go
+home till I had found harbourage, a fire to dry my clothes at, and a bed
+where I might lie till they were ready.
+
+Fortune favoured me again.  I had scarce got to the top of the first hill
+when I spied a light on my left, about a furlong away.  It might be a
+case of sickness; what else it was likely to be—in so rustic a
+neighbourhood, and at such an ungodly time of the morning—was beyond my
+fancy.  A faint sound of singing became audible, and gradually swelled as
+I drew near, until at last I could make out the words, which were
+singularly appropriate both to the hour and to the condition of the
+singers.  ‘The cock may craw, the day may daw,’ they sang; and sang it
+with such laxity both in time and tune, and such sentimental complaisance
+in the expression, as assured me they had got far into the third bottle
+at least.
+
+I found a plain rustic cottage by the wayside, of the sort called double,
+with a signboard over the door; and, the lights within streaming forth
+and somewhat mitigating the darkness of the morning, I was enabled to
+decipher the inscription: ‘The Hunters’ Tryst, by Alexander Hendry.
+Porter Ales, and British Spirits.  Beds.’
+
+My first knock put a period to the music, and a voice challenged tipsily
+from within.
+
+‘Who goes there?’ it said; and I replied, ‘A lawful traveller.’
+
+Immediately after, the door was unbarred by a company of the tallest lads
+my eyes had ever rested on, all astonishingly drunk and very decently
+dressed, and one (who was perhaps the drunkest of the lot) carrying a
+tallow candle, from which he impartially bedewed the clothes of the whole
+company.  As soon as I saw them I could not help smiling to myself to
+remember the anxiety with which I had approached.  They received me and
+my hastily-concocted story, that I had been walking from Peebles and had
+lost my way, with incoherent benignity; jostled me among them into the
+room where they had been sitting, a plain hedgerow alehouse parlour, with
+a roaring fire in the chimney and a prodigious number of empty bottles on
+the floor; and informed me that I was made, by this reception, a
+temporary member of the _Six-Feet-High Club_, an athletic society of
+young men in a good station, who made of the Hunters’ Tryst a frequent
+resort.  They told me I had intruded on an ‘all-night sitting,’ following
+upon an ‘all-day Saturday tramp’ of forty miles; and that the members
+would all be up and ‘as right as ninepence’ for the noonday service at
+some neighbouring church—Collingwood, if memory serves me right.  At this
+I could have laughed, but the moment seemed ill-chosen.  For, though six
+feet was their standard, they all exceeded that measurement considerably;
+and I tasted again some of the sensations of childhood, as I looked up to
+all these lads from a lower plane, and wondered what they would do next.
+But the Six-Footers, if they were very drunk, proved no less kind.  The
+landlord and servants of the Hunters’ Tryst were in bed and asleep long
+ago.  Whether by natural gift or acquired habit they could suffer
+pandemonium to reign all over the house, and yet lie ranked in the
+kitchen like Egyptian mummies, only that the sound of their snoring rose
+and fell ceaselessly like the drone of a bagpipe.  Here the Six-Footers
+invaded them—in their citadel, so to speak; counted the bunks and the
+sleepers; proposed to put me in bed to one of the lasses, proposed to
+have one of the lasses out to make room for me, fell over chairs, and
+made noise enough to waken the dead: the whole illuminated by the same
+young torch-bearer, but now with two candles, and rapidly beginning to
+look like a man in a snowstorm.  At last a bed was found for me, my
+clothes were hung out to dry before the parlour fire, and I was
+mercifully left to my repose.
+
+I awoke about nine with the sun shining in my eyes.  The landlord came at
+my summons, brought me my clothes dried and decently brushed, and gave me
+the good news that the Six-Feet-High Club were all abed and sleeping off
+their excesses.  Where they were bestowed was a puzzle to me until (as I
+was strolling about the garden patch waiting for breakfast) I came on a
+barn door, and, looking in, saw all the red face mixed in the straw like
+plums in a cake.  Quoth the stalwart maid who brought me my porridge and
+bade me ’eat them while they were hot,’ ‘Ay, they were a’ on the ran-dan
+last nicht!  Hout! they’re fine lads, and they’ll be nane the waur of it.
+Forby Farbes’s coat.  I dinna see wha’s to get the creish off that!’ she
+added, with a sigh; in which, identifying Forbes as the torch-bearer, I
+mentally joined.
+
+It was a brave morning when I took the road; the sun shone, spring seemed
+in the air, it smelt like April or May, and some over-venturous birds
+sang in the coppices as I went by.  I had plenty to think of, plenty to
+be grateful for, that gallant morning; and yet I had a twitter at my
+heart.  To enter the city by daylight might be compared to marching on a
+battery; every face that I confronted would threaten me like the muzzle
+of a gun; and it came into my head suddenly with how much better a
+countenance I should be able to do it if I could but improvise a
+companion.  Hard by Merchiston I was so fortunate as to observe a bulky
+gentleman in broadcloth and gaiters, stooping with his head almost
+between his knees, before a stone wall.  Seizing occasion by the
+forelock, I drew up as I came alongside and inquired what he had found to
+interest him.
+
+He turned upon me a countenance not much less broad than his back.
+
+‘Why, sir,’ he replied, ‘I was even marvelling at my own indefeasible
+stupeedity: that I should walk this way every week of my life, weather
+permitting, and should never before have _notticed_ that stone,’ touching
+it at the same time with a goodly oak staff.
+
+I followed the indication.  The stone, which had been built sideways into
+the wall, offered traces of heraldic sculpture.  At once there came a
+wild idea into my mind: his appearance tallied with Flora’s description
+of Mr. Robbie; a knowledge of heraldry would go far to clinch the proof;
+and what could be more desirable than to scrape an informal acquaintance
+with the man whom I must approach next day with my tale of the drovers,
+and whom I yet wished to please?  I stooped in turn.
+
+‘A chevron,’ I said; ‘on a chief three mullets?  Looks like Douglas, does
+it not?’
+
+‘Yes, sir, it does; you are right,’ said he: ‘it _does_ look like
+Douglas; though, without the tinctures, and the whole thing being so
+battered and broken up, who shall venture an opinion?  But allow me to be
+more personal, sir.  In these degenerate days I am astonished you should
+display so much proficiency.’
+
+‘O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman, a friend of my
+family, and I may say my guardian,’ said I; ‘but I have forgotten it
+since.  God forbid I should delude you into thinking me a herald, sir!  I
+am only an ungrammatical amateur.’
+
+‘And a little modesty does no harm even in a herald,’ says my new
+acquaintance graciously.
+
+In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained very
+amicable discourse along what remained of the country road, past the
+suburbs, and on into the streets of the New Town, which was as deserted
+and silent as a city of the dead.  The shops were closed, no vehicle ran,
+cats sported in the midst of the sunny causeway; and our steps and voices
+re-echoed from the quiet houses.  It was the high-water, full and
+strange, of that weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is
+subjected: the apotheosis of the _Sawbath_; and I confess the spectacle
+wanted not grandeur, however much it may have lacked cheerfulness.  There
+are few religious ceremonies more imposing.  As we thus walked and talked
+in a public seclusion the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds
+of the city, and the streets began immediately to be thronged with decent
+church-goers.
+
+‘Ah!’ said my companion, ‘there are the bells!  Now, sir, as you are a
+stranger I must offer you the hospitality of my pew.  I do not know
+whether you are at all used with our Scottish form; but in case you are
+not I will find your places for you; and Dr. Henry Gray, of St. Mary’s
+(under whom I sit), is as good a preacher as we have to show you.’
+
+This put me in a quandary.  It was a degree of risk I was scarce prepared
+for.  Dozens of people, who might pass me by in the street with no more
+than a second look, would go on from the second to the third, and from
+that to a final recognition, if I were set before them, immobilised in a
+pew, during the whole time of service.  An unlucky turn of the head would
+suffice to arrest their attention.  ‘Who is that?’ they would think:
+‘surely I should know him!’ and, a church being the place in all the
+world where one has least to think of, it was ten to one they would end
+by remembering me before the benediction.  However, my mind was made up:
+I thanked my obliging friend, and placed myself at his disposal.
+
+Our way now led us into the north-east quarter of the town, among
+pleasant new faubourgs, to a decent new church of a good size, where I
+was soon seated by the side of my good Samaritan, and looked upon by a
+whole congregation of menacing faces.  At first the possibility of danger
+kept me awake; but by the time I had assured myself there was none to be
+apprehended, and the service was not in the least likely to be enlivened
+by the arrest of a French spy, I had to resign myself to the task of
+listening to Dr. Henry Gray.
+
+As we moved out, after this ordeal was over, my friend was at once
+surrounded and claimed by his acquaintances of the congregation; and I
+was rejoiced to hear him addressed by the expected name of Robbie.
+
+So soon as we were clear of the crowd—‘Mr. Robbie?’ said I, bowing.
+
+‘The very same, sir,’ said he.
+
+‘If I mistake not, a lawyer?’
+
+‘A writer to His Majesty’s Signet, at your service.’
+
+‘It seems we were predestined to be acquaintances!’ I exclaimed.  ‘I have
+here a card in my pocket intended for you.  It is from my family lawyer.
+It was his last word, as I was leaving, to ask to be remembered kindly,
+and to trust you would pass over so informal an introduction.’
+
+And I offered him the card.
+
+‘Ay, ay, my old friend Daniel!’ says he, looking on the card.  ‘And how
+does my old friend Daniel?’
+
+I gave a favourable view of Mr. Romaine’s health.
+
+‘Well, this is certainly a whimsical incident,’ he continued.  ‘And since
+we are thus met already—and so much to my advantage!—the simplest thing
+will be to prosecute the acquaintance instantly.  Let me propose a snack
+between sermons, a bottle of my particular green seal—and when nobody is
+looking we can talk blazons, Mr. Ducie!’—which was the name I then used
+and had already incidentally mentioned, in the vain hope of provoking a
+return in kind.
+
+‘I beg your pardon, sir: do I understand you to invite me to your house?’
+said I.
+
+‘That was the idea I was trying to convey,’ said he.  ‘We have the name
+of hospitable people up here, and I would like you to try mine.’
+
+‘Mr. Robbie, I shall hope to try it some day, but not yet,’ I replied.
+‘I hope you will not misunderstand me.  My business, which brings me to
+your city, is of a peculiar kind.  Till you shall have heard it, and,
+indeed, till its issue is known, I should feel as if I had stolen your
+invitation.’
+
+‘Well, well,’ said he, a little sobered, ‘it must be as you wish, though
+you would hardly speak otherwise if you had committed homicide!  Mine is
+the loss.  I must eat alone; a very pernicious thing for a person of my
+habit of body, content myself with a pint of skinking claret, and
+meditate the discourse.  But about this business of yours: if it is so
+particular as all that, it will doubtless admit of no delay.’
+
+‘I must confess, sir, it presses,’ I acknowledged.
+
+‘Then, let us say to-morrow at half-past eight in the morning,’ said he;
+‘and I hope, when your mind is at rest (and it does you much honour to
+take it as you do), that you will sit down with me to the postponed meal,
+not forgetting the bottle.  You have my address?’ he added, and gave it
+me—which was the only thing I wanted.
+
+At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual civilities,
+and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of people returning
+from church, to my lodgings in St. James’ Square.
+
+Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my landlady in a
+dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in her wake: no less
+than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a smart pair of tops to his
+boots!  When I said he was in the lady’s wake I spoke but in metaphor.
+As a matter of fact he was squiring her, with the utmost dignity, on his
+arm; and I followed them up the stairs, smiling to myself.
+
+Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and Mrs.
+McRankine inquired where I had been.  I told her boastfully, giving her
+the name of the church and the divine, and ignorantly supposing I should
+have gained caste.  But she soon opened my eyes.  In the roots of the
+Scottish character there are knots and contortions that not only no
+stranger can understand, but no stranger can follow; he walks among
+explosives; and his best course is to throw himself upon their
+mercy—‘Just as I am, without one plea,’ a citation from one of the lady’s
+favourite hymns.
+
+The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was impossible
+to be written down; and I at once executed the manoeuvre I have
+recommended.
+
+‘You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your city,’ said I.  ‘If I
+have done wrong, it was in mere ignorance, my dear lady; and this
+afternoon, if you will be so good as to take me, I shall accompany
+_you_.’
+
+But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to her own
+quarters murmuring.
+
+‘Well, Rowley,’ said I; ‘and have you been to church?’
+
+‘If you please, sir,’ he said.
+
+‘Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I have,’ I returned.  ‘And
+how did you get on with the Scottish form?’
+
+‘Well, sir, it was pretty ’ard, the form was, and reether narrow,’ he
+replied.  ‘I don’t know w’y it is, but it seems to me like as if things
+were a good bit changed since William Wallace!  That was a main queer
+church she took me to, Mr. Anne!  I don’t know as I could have sat it
+out, if she ’adn’t ’a’ give me peppermints.  She ain’t a bad one at
+bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit, and she do worry, but, law
+bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain’t nothink really—she don’t _mean_ it.  W’y,
+she was down on me like a ’undredweight of bricks this morning.  You see,
+last night she ’ad me in to supper, and, I beg your pardon, sir, but I
+took the freedom of playing her a chune or two.  She didn’t mind a bit;
+so this morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced in, and flew
+up, and carried on no end about Sunday!’
+
+‘You see, Rowley,’ said I, ‘they’re all mad up here, and you have to
+humour them.  See and don’t quarrel with Mrs. McRankine; and, above all,
+don’t argue with her, or you’ll get the worst of it.  Whatever she says,
+touch your forelock and say, “If you please!” or “I beg pardon, ma’am.”
+And let me tell you one thing: I am sorry, but you have to go to church
+with her again this afternoon.  That’s duty, my boy!’
+
+As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs. McRankine
+presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang up with readiness
+and offered her my arm.  Rowley followed behind.  I was beginning to grow
+accustomed to the risks of my stay in Edinburgh, and it even amused me to
+confront a new churchful.  I confess the amusement did not last until the
+end; for if Dr. Gray were long, Mr. McCraw was not only longer, but more
+incoherent, and the matter of his sermon (which was a direct attack,
+apparently, on all the Churches of the world, my own among the number),
+where it had not the tonic quality of personal insult, rather inclined me
+to slumber.  But I braced myself for my life, kept up Rowley with the end
+of a pin, and came through it awake, but no more.
+
+Bethiah was quite conquered by this ‘mark of grace,’ though, I am afraid,
+she was also moved by more worldly considerations.  The first is, the
+lady had not the least objection to go to church on the arm of an
+elegantly dressed young gentleman, and be followed by a spruce servant
+with a cockade in his hat.  I could see it by the way she took possession
+of us, found us the places in the Bible, whispered to me the name of the
+minister, passed us lozenges, which I (for my part) handed on to Rowley,
+and at each fresh attention stole a little glance about the church to
+make sure she was observed.  Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me
+if I also remembered that I was a favourable-looking young man.  When we
+grow elderly, how the room brightens, and begins to look as it ought to
+look, on the entrance of youth, grace, health, and comeliness!  You do
+not want them for yourself, perhaps not even for your son, but you look
+on smiling; and when you recall their images—again, it is with a smile.
+I defy you to see or think of them and not smile with an infinite and
+intimate, but quite impersonal, pleasure.  Well, either I know nothing of
+women, or that was the case with Bethiah McRankine.  She had been to
+church with a cockade behind her, on the one hand; on the other, her
+house was brightened by the presence of a pair of good-looking young
+fellows of the other sex, who were always pleased and deferential in her
+society and accepted her views as final.
+
+These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from
+church—if church it could be called—I adopted a most insidious device to
+magnify her interest.  I took her into the confidence, that is, of my
+love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young lady with whom my
+affections were engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.
+
+‘Is she bonny?’ she inquired.
+
+I gave her full assurances upon that.
+
+‘To what denoamination does she beloang?’ came next, and was so
+unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.
+
+‘Upon my word, ma’am, I have never inquired,’ cried I; ‘I only know that
+she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.’
+
+‘Ay!’ she sighed, ‘if she has the root of the maitter!  There’s a remnant
+practically in most of the denoaminations.  There’s some in the
+McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites, and mony in the McMillanites,
+and there’s a leeven even in the Estayblishment.’
+
+‘I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,’ said I.
+
+‘Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel’!’ she cried.
+
+‘Why, my dear madam!  I only—’ I began.
+
+‘You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,’ she interrupted.
+
+On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our idyll with
+avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of cream; and,
+strange to say—and so expansive a passion is that of love!—that I derived
+a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding in that breast of iron.  It
+made an immediate bond: from that hour we seemed to be welded into a
+family-party; and I had little difficulty in persuading her to join us
+and to preside over our tea-table.  Surely there was never so ill-matched
+a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount Anne!  But I am of the
+Apostle’s way, with a difference: all things to all women!  When I cannot
+please a woman, hang me in my cravat!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII—EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER’S PARTY
+
+
+By half-past eight o’clock on the next morning, I was ringing the bell of
+the lawyer’s office in Castle Street, where I found him ensconced at a
+business table, in a room surrounded by several tiers of green tin cases.
+He greeted me like an old friend.
+
+‘Come away, sir, come away!’ said he.  ‘Here is the dentist ready for
+you, and I think I can promise you that the operation will be practically
+painless.’
+
+‘I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,’ I replied, as I shook hands with
+him.  ‘But at least there shall be no time lost with me.’
+
+I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and their
+cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or half-murdered
+a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to having suffered a
+couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in prison on a charge from
+which I could have immediately freed them.  All this I gave him first of
+all, to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took with gravity,
+but without the least appearance of surprise.
+
+‘Now, sir,’ I continued, ‘I expect to have to pay for my unhappy frolic,
+but I would like very well if it could be managed without my personal
+appearance or even the mention of my real name.  I had so much wisdom as
+to sail under false colours in this foolish jaunt of mine; my family
+would be extremely concerned if they had wind of it; but at the same
+time, if the case of this Faa has terminated fatally, and there are
+proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not going to stand by and see
+them vexed, far less punished; and I authorise you to give me up for
+trial if you think that best—or, if you think it unnecessary, in the
+meanwhile to make preparations for their defence.  I hope, sir, that I am
+as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined to be just.’
+
+‘Very fairly spoken,’ said Mr. Robbie.  ‘It is not much in my line, as
+doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have told you.  I rarely mix
+myself up with anything on the criminal side, or approaching it.
+However, for a young gentleman like you, I may stretch a point, and I
+dare say I may be able to accomplish more than perhaps another.  I will
+go at once to the Procurator Fiscal’s office and inquire.’
+
+‘Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,’ said I.  ‘You forget the chapter of
+expenses.  I had thought, for a beginning, of placing a thousand pounds
+in your hands.’
+
+‘My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,’ said Mr.
+Robbie severely.’
+
+‘It seemed to me,’ I protested, ‘that coming to you almost as a stranger,
+and placing in your hands a piece of business so contrary to your habits,
+some substantial guarantee of my good faith—’
+
+‘Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,’ he interrupted, with
+an air of closing the dispute.
+
+‘And yet, Mr. Robbie,’ I continued, ‘I must ask you to allow me to
+proceed.  I do not merely refer to the expenses of the case.  I have my
+eye besides on Todd and Candlish.  They are thoroughly deserving fellows;
+they have been subjected through me to a considerable term of
+imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that you should not spare money for
+their indemnification.  This will explain,’ I added smiling, ‘my offer of
+the thousand pounds.  It was in the nature of a measure by which you
+should judge the scale on which I can afford to have this business
+carried through.’
+
+‘I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,’ said he.  ‘But the sooner I am off,
+the better this affair is like to be guided.  My clerk will show you into
+the waiting-room and give you the day’s _Caledonian Mercury_ and the last
+_Register_ to amuse yourself with in the interval.’
+
+I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.  I saw him descend
+from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was shown again
+into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led me to augur the
+worst.  For some time he had the inhumanity to read me a lecture as to
+the incredible silliness, ‘not to say immorality,’ of my behaviour.  ‘I
+have the satisfaction in telling you my opinion, because it appears that
+you are going to get off scot free,’ he continued, where, indeed, I
+thought he might have begun.
+
+‘The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd and
+Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been for
+their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie—or Mr. St. Ivey, as I
+believe I should now call you.  Never a word would either of the two old
+fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence of such a
+person; and when they were confronted with Faa’s version of the affair,
+they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their own former
+declarations, as well as with each other, that the Fiscal was quite
+nonplussed, and imaigined there was something behind it.  You may believe
+I soon laughed him out of that!  And I had the satisfaction of seeing
+your two friends set free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.’
+
+‘Oh, sir,’ I cried, ‘you should have brought them here.’
+
+‘No instructions, Mr. Ducie!’ said he.  ‘How did I know you wished to
+renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated so fortunately?  And,
+indeed, to be frank with you, I should have set my face against it, if
+you had!  Let them go!  They are paid and contented, and have the highest
+possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey!  When I gave them fifty pounds
+apiece—which was rather more than enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may
+think—the man Todd, who has the only tongue of the party, struck his
+staff on the ground.  “Weel,” says he, “I aye said he was a gentleman!”
+“Man, Todd,” said I, “that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of yourself!”’
+
+‘So it was a case of “Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet.”’
+
+‘No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of your life,
+and a good riddance!  They are fine fellows in their way, but no proper
+associates for the like of yourself; and do you finally agree to be done
+with all eccentricity—take up with no more drovers, or tinkers, but enjoy
+the naitural pleesures for which your age, your wealth, your
+intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your appearance so
+completely fit you.  And the first of these,’ quoth he, looking at his
+watch, ‘will be to step through to my dining-room and share a bachelor’s
+luncheon.’
+
+Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the same
+theme.  ‘You’re, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?’ said he.
+‘Well, on Thursday night there is the Assembly Ball.  You must certainly
+go there, and you must permit me besides to do the honours of the ceety
+and send you a ticket.  I am a thorough believer in a young man being a
+young man—but no more drovers or rovers, if you love me!  Talking of
+which puts me in mind that you may be short of partners at the
+Assembly—oh, I have been young myself!—and if ye care to come to anything
+so portentiously tedious as a tea-party at the house of a bachelor
+lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces and nephews, and his grand-nieces
+and grand-nephews, and his wards, and generally the whole clan of the
+descendants of his clients, you might drop in to-night towards seven
+o’clock.  I think I can show you one or two that are worth looking at,
+and you can dance with them later on at the Assembly.’
+
+He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young ladies’
+whom I might expect to meet.  ‘And then there’s my parteecular friend,
+Miss Flora,’ said he.  ‘But I’ll make no attempt of a description.  You
+shall see her for yourself.’
+
+It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation; and returned
+home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet and the good news of
+which I was the bearer.  The toilette, I have reason to believe, was a
+success.  Mr. Rowley dismissed me with a farewell: ‘Crikey!  Mr. Anne,
+but you do look prime!’  Even the stony Bethiah was—how shall I
+say?—dazzled, but scandalised, by my appearance; and while, of course,
+she deplored the vanity that led to it, she could not wholly prevent
+herself from admiring the result.
+
+‘Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a wayfaring Christian man!’
+she said.  ‘Wi’ Christ despised and rejectit in all pairts of the world
+and the flag of the Covenant flung doon, you will be muckle better on
+your knees!  However, I’ll have to confess that it sets you weel.  And if
+it’s the lassie ye’re gaun to see the nicht, I suppose I’ll just have to
+excuse ye!  Bairns maun be bairns!’ she said, with a sigh.  ‘I mind when
+Mr. McRankine came courtin’, and that’s lang by-gane—I mind I had a green
+gown, passementit, that was thocht to become me to admiration.  I was nae
+just exactly what ye would ca’ bonny; but I was pale, penetratin’, and
+interestin’.’  And she leaned over the stair-rail with a candle to watch
+my descent as long as it should be possible.
+
+It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie’s—by which, I do not so much mean
+that there were few people, for the rooms were crowded, as that there was
+very little attempted to entertain them.  In one apartment there were
+tables set out, where the elders were solemnly engaged upon whist; in the
+other and larger one, a great number of youth of both sexes entertained
+themselves languidly, the ladies sitting upon chairs to be courted, the
+gentlemen standing about in various attitudes of insinuation or
+indifference.  Conversation appeared the sole resource, except in so far
+as it was modified by a number of keepsakes and annuals which lay
+dispersed upon the tables, and of which the young beaux displayed the
+illustrations to the ladies.  Mr. Robbie himself was customarily in the
+card-room; only now and again, when he cut out, he made an incursion
+among the young folks, and rolled about jovially from one to another, the
+very picture of the general uncle.
+
+It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the afternoon.
+‘Now, Miss Flora,’ he had said, ‘come early, for I have a Phoenix to show
+you—one Mr. Ducie, a new client of mine that, I vow, I have fallen in
+love with’; and he was so good as to add a word or two on my appearance,
+from which Flora conceived a suspicion of the truth.  She had come to the
+party, in consequence, on the knife-edge of anticipation and alarm; had
+chosen a place by the door, where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded
+by a posse of vapid youths; and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me
+in the most natural manner in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared
+form of words.
+
+‘How do you do, Mr. Ducie?’ she said.  ‘It is quite an age since I have
+seen you!’
+
+‘I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,’ I replied.  ‘May I sit down?’
+
+For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the judicious use of
+her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty by her side.
+
+She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths had the
+discretion to melt before us.  As soon as I was once seated her fan flew
+out, and she whispered behind it:
+
+‘Are you mad?’
+
+‘Madly in love,’ I replied; ‘but in no other sense.’
+
+‘I have no patience!  You cannot understand what I am suffering!’ she
+said.  ‘What are you to say to Ronald, to Major Chevenix, to my aunt?’
+
+Your aunt?’ I cried, with a start.  ‘_Peccavi_! is she here?’
+
+‘She is in the card-room at whist,’ said Flora.
+
+‘Where she will probably stay all the evening?’ I suggested.
+
+‘She may,’ she admitted; ‘she generally does!’
+
+‘Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,’ said I, ‘which is very much
+what I had counted upon doing.  I did not come here to play cards, but to
+contemplate a certain young lady to my heart’s content—if it can ever be
+contented!—and to tell her some good news.’
+
+‘But there are still Ronald and the Major!’ she persisted.  ‘They are not
+card-room fixtures!  Ronald will be coming and going.  And as for Mr.
+Chevenix, he—’
+
+‘Always sits with Miss Flora?’ I interrupted.  ‘And they talk of poor St.
+Ives?  I had gathered as much, my dear; and Mr. Ducie has come to prevent
+it!  But pray dismiss these fears!  I mind no one but your aunt.’
+
+‘Why my aunt?’
+
+‘Because your aunt is a lady, my dear, and a very clever lady, and, like
+all clever ladies, a very rash lady,’ said I.  ‘You can never count upon
+them, unless you are sure of getting them in a corner, as I have got you,
+and talking them over rationally, as I am just engaged on with yourself!
+It would be quite the same to your aunt to make the worst kind of a
+scandal, with an equal indifference to my danger and to the feelings of
+our good host!’
+
+‘Well,’ she said, ‘and what of Ronald, then?  Do you think _he_ is above
+making a scandal?  You must know him very little!’
+
+‘On the other hand, it is my pretension that I know him very well!’ I
+replied.  ‘I must speak to Ronald first—not Ronald to me—that is all!’
+
+‘Then, please, go and speak to him at once!’ she pleaded.  He is there—do
+you see?—at the upper end of the room, talking to that girl in pink.’
+
+‘And so lose this seat before I have told you my good news?’ I exclaimed.
+‘Catch me!  And, besides, my dear one, think a little of me and my good
+news!  I thought the bearer of good news was always welcome!  I hoped he
+might be a little welcome for himself!  Consider!  I have but one friend;
+and let me stay by her!  And there is only one thing I care to hear; and
+let me hear it!’
+
+‘Oh, Anne,’ she sighed, ‘if I did not love you, why should I be so
+uneasy?  I am turned into a coward, dear!  Think, if it were the other
+way round—if you were quite safe and I was in, oh, such danger!’
+
+She had no sooner said it than I was convicted of being a dullard.  ‘God
+forgive me, dear!’  I made haste to reply.  ‘I never saw before that
+there were two sides to this!’  And I told her my tale as briefly as I
+could, and rose to seek Ronald.  ‘You see, my dear, you are obeyed,’ I
+said.
+
+She gave me a look that was a reward in itself; and as I turned away from
+her, with a strong sense of turning away from the sun, I carried that
+look in my bosom like a caress.  The girl in pink was an arch, ogling
+person, with a good deal of eyes and teeth, and a great play of shoulders
+and rattle of conversation.  There could be no doubt, from Mr. Ronald’s
+attitude, that he worshipped the very chair she sat on.  But I was quite
+ruthless.  I laid my hand on his shoulder, as he was stooping over her
+like a hen over a chicken.
+
+‘Excuse me for one moment, Mr. Gilchrist!’ said I.
+
+He started and span about in answer to my touch, and exhibited a face of
+inarticulate wonder.
+
+ ‘Yes!’ I continued, ‘it is even myself!  Pardon me for interrupting so
+agreeable a _tête-à-tête_, but you know, my good fellow, we owe a first
+duty to Mr. Robbie.  It would never do to risk making a scene in the
+man’s drawing-room; so the first thing I had to attend to was to have you
+warned.  The name I go by is Ducie, too, in case of accidents.’
+
+‘I—I say, you know!’ cried Ronald.  ‘Deuce take it, what are you doing
+here?’
+
+‘Hush, hush!’ said I.  ‘Not the place, my dear fellow—not the place.
+Come to my rooms, if you like, to-night after the party, or to-morrow in
+the morning, and we can talk it out over a segar.  But here, you know, it
+really won’t do at all.’
+
+Before he could collect his mind for an answer, I had given him my
+address in St. James Square, and had again mingled with the crowd.  Alas!
+I was not fated to get back to Flora so easily!  Mr. Robbie was in the
+path: he was insatiably loquacious; and as he continued to palaver I
+watched the insipid youths gather again about my idol, and cursed my fate
+and my host.  He remembered suddenly that I was to attend the Assembly
+Ball on Thursday, and had only attended to-night by way of a preparative.
+This put it into his head to present me to another young lady; but I
+managed this interview with so much art that, while I was scrupulously
+polite and even cordial to the fair one, I contrived to keep Robbie
+beside me all the time and to leave along with him when the ordeal was
+over.  We were just walking away arm in arm, when I spied my friend the
+Major approaching, stiff as a ramrod and, as usual, obtrusively clean.
+
+‘Oh! there’s a man I want to know,’ said I, taking the bull by the horns.
+‘Won’t you introduce me to Major Chevenix?’
+
+‘At a word, my dear fellow,’ said Robbie; and ‘Major!’ he cried, ‘come
+here and let me present to you my friend Mr. Ducie, who desires the
+honour of your acquaintance.’
+
+The Major flushed visibly, but otherwise preserved his composure.  He
+bowed very low.  ‘I’m not very sure,’ he said: ‘I have an idea we have
+met before?’
+
+‘Informally,’ I said, returning his bow; ‘and I have long looked forward
+to the pleasure of regularising our acquaintance.’
+
+‘You are very good, Mr. Ducie,’ he returned.  ‘Perhaps you could aid my
+memory a little?  Where was it that I had the pleasure?’
+
+‘Oh, that would be telling tales out of school,’ said I, with a laugh,
+‘and before my lawyer, too!’
+
+‘I’ll wager,’ broke in Mr. Robbie, ‘that, when you knew my client,
+Chevenix—the past of our friend Mr. Ducie is an obscure chapter full of
+horrid secrets—I’ll wager, now, you knew him as St. Ivey,’ says he,
+nudging me violently.
+
+‘I think not, sir,’ said the Major, with pinched lips.
+
+‘Well, I wish he may prove all right!’ continued the lawyer, with
+certainly the worst-inspired jocularity in the world.  ‘I know nothing by
+him!  He may be a swell mobsman for me with his aliases.  You must put
+your memory on the rack, Major, and when ye’ve remembered when and where
+ye met him, be sure ye tell me.’
+
+‘I will not fail, sir,’ said Chevenix.
+
+‘Seek to him!’ cried Robbie, waving his hand as he departed.
+
+The Major, as soon as we were alone, turned upon me his impassive
+countenance.
+
+‘Well,’ he said, ‘you have courage.’
+
+‘It is undoubted as your honour, sir,’ I returned, bowing.
+
+‘Did you expect to meet me, may I ask?’ said he.
+
+‘You saw, at least, that I courted the presentation,’ said I.
+
+‘And you were not afraid?’ said Chevenix.
+
+‘I was perfectly at ease.  I knew I was dealing with a gentleman.  Be
+that your epitaph.’
+
+‘Well, there are some other people looking for you,’ he said, ‘who will
+make no bones about the point of honour.  The police, my dear sir, are
+simply agog about you.’
+
+‘And I think that that was coarse,’ said I.
+
+‘You have seen Miss Gilchrist?’ he inquired, changing the subject.
+
+‘With whom, I am led to understand, we are on a footing of rivalry?’ I
+asked.  ‘Yes, I have seen her.’
+
+‘And I was just seeking her,’ he replied.
+
+I was conscious of a certain thrill of temper; so, I suppose, was he.  We
+looked each other up and down.
+
+‘The situation is original,’ he resumed.
+
+‘Quite,’ said I.  ‘But let me tell you frankly you are blowing a cold
+coal.  I owe you so much for your kindness to the prisoner Champdivers.’
+
+‘Meaning that the lady’s affections are more advantageously disposed of?’
+he asked, with a sneer.  ‘Thank you, I am sure.  And, since you have
+given me a lead, just hear a word of good advice in your turn.  Is it
+fair, is it delicate, is it like a gentleman, to compromise the young
+lady by attentions which (as you know very well) can come to nothing?’
+
+I was utterly unable to find words in answer.
+
+‘Excuse me if I cut this interview short,’ he went on.  ‘It seems to me
+doomed to come to nothing, and there is more attractive metal.’
+
+‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘as you say, it cannot amount to much.  You are
+impotent, bound hand and foot in honour.  You know me to be a man falsely
+accused, and even if you did not know it, from your position as my rival
+you have only the choice to stand quite still or to be infamous.’
+
+‘I would not say that,’ he returned, with another change of colour.  ‘I
+may hear it once too often.’
+
+With which he moved off straight for where Flora was sitting amidst her
+court of vapid youths, and I had no choice but to follow him, a bad
+second, and reading myself, as I went, a sharp lesson on the command of
+temper.
+
+It is a strange thing how young men in their teens go down at the mere
+wind of the coming of men of twenty-five and upwards!  The vapid ones
+fled without thought of resistance before the Major and me; a few dallied
+awhile in the neighbourhood—so to speak, with their fingers in their
+mouths—but presently these also followed the rout, and we remained face
+to face before Flora.  There was a draught in that corner by the door;
+she had thrown her pelisse over her bare arms and neck, and the dark fur
+of the trimming set them off.  She shone by contrast; the light played on
+her smooth skin to admiration, and the colour changed in her excited
+face.  For the least fraction of a second she looked from one to the
+other of her pair of rival swains, and seemed to hesitate.  Then she
+addressed Chevenix:—
+
+‘You are coming to the Assembly, of course, Major Chevenix?’ said she.
+
+‘I fear not; I fear I shall be otherwise engaged,’ he replied.  ‘Even the
+pleasure of dancing with you, Miss Flora, must give way to duty.’
+
+For awhile the talk ran harmlessly on the weather, and then branched off
+towards the war.  It seemed to be by no one’s fault; it was in the air,
+and had to come.
+
+‘Good news from the scene of operations,’ said the Major.
+
+‘Good news while it lasts,’ I said.  ‘But will Miss Gilchrist tell us her
+private thought upon the war?  In her admiration for the victors, does
+not there mingle some pity for the vanquished?’
+
+‘Indeed, sir,’ she said, with animation, ‘only too much of it!  War is a
+subject that I do not think should be talked of to a girl.  I am, I have
+to be—what do you call it?—a non-combatant?  And to remind me of what
+others have to do and suffer: no, it is not fair!’
+
+‘Miss Gilchrist has the tender female heart,’ said Chevenix.
+
+‘Do not be too sure of that!’ she cried.  ‘I would love to be allowed to
+fight myself!’
+
+‘On which side?’ I asked.
+
+‘Can you ask?’ she exclaimed.  ‘I am a Scottish girl!’
+
+‘She is a Scottish girl!’ repeated the Major, looking at me.  ‘And no one
+grudges you her pity!’
+
+‘And I glory in every grain of it she has to spare,’ said I.  ‘Pity is
+akin to love.’
+
+‘Well, and let us put that question to Miss Gilchrist.  It is for her to
+decide, and for us to bow to the decision.  Is pity, Miss Flora, or is
+admiration, nearest love?’
+
+‘Oh come,’ said I, ‘let us be more concrete.  Lay before the lady a
+complete case: describe your man, then I’ll describe _mine_, and Miss
+Flora shall decide.’
+
+‘I think I see your meaning,’ said he, ‘and I’ll try.  You think that
+pity—and the kindred sentiments—have the greatest power upon the heart.
+I think more nobly of women.  To my view, the man they love will first of
+all command their respect; he will be steadfast—proud, if you please;
+dry, possibly—but of all things steadfast.  They will look at him in
+doubt; at last they will see that stern face which he presents to all the
+rest of the world soften to them alone.  First, trust, I say.  It is so
+that a woman loves who is worthy of heroes.’
+
+‘Your man is very ambitious, sir,’ said I, ‘and very much of a hero!
+Mine is a humbler, and, I would fain think, a more human dog.  He is one
+with no particular trust in himself, with no superior steadfastness to be
+admired for, who sees a lady’s face, who hears her voice, and, without
+any phrase about the matter, falls in love.  What does he ask for, then,
+but pity?—pity for his weakness, pity for his love, which is his life.
+You would make women always the inferiors, gaping up at your imaginary
+lover; he, like a marble statue, with his nose in the air!  But God has
+been wiser than you; and the most steadfast of your heroes may prove
+human, after all.  We appeal to the queen for judgment,’ I added, turning
+and bowing before Flora.
+
+‘And how shall the queen judge?’ she asked.  ‘I must give you an answer
+that is no answer at all.  “The wind bloweth where it listeth”: she goes
+where her heart goes.’
+
+Her face flushed as she said it; mine also, for I read in it a
+declaration, and my heart swelled for joy.  But Chevenix grew pale.
+
+‘You make of life a very dreadful kind of lottery, ma’am,’ said he.  ‘But
+I will not despair.  Honest and unornamental is still my choice.’
+
+And I must say he looked extremely handsome and very amusingly like the
+marble statue with its nose in the air to which I had compared him.
+
+‘I cannot imagine how we got upon this subject,’ said Flora.
+
+‘Madame, it was through the war,’ replied Chevenix.
+
+‘All roads lead to Rome,’ I commented.  ‘What else would you expect Mr.
+Chevenix and myself to talk of?’
+
+About this time I was conscious of a certain bustle and movement in the
+room behind me, but did not pay to it that degree of attention which
+perhaps would have been wise.  There came a certain change in Flora’s
+face; she signalled repeatedly with her fan; her eyes appealed to me
+obsequiously; there could be no doubt that she wanted something—as well
+as I could make out, that I should go away and leave the field clear for
+my rival, which I had not the least idea of doing.  At last she rose from
+her chair with impatience.
+
+‘I think it time you were saying good-night, Mr Ducie!’ she said.
+
+I could not in the least see why, and said so.
+
+Whereupon she gave me this appalling answer, ‘My aunt is coming out of
+the card-room.’
+
+In less time than it takes to tell, I had made my bow and my escape.
+Looking back from the doorway, I was privileged to see, for a moment, the
+august profile and gold eyeglasses of Miss Gilchrist issuing from the
+card-room; and the sight lent me wings.  I stood not on the order of my
+going; and a moment after, I was on the pavement of Castle Street, and
+the lighted windows shone down on me, and were crossed by ironical
+shadows of those who had remained behind.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX—EVENTS OF TUESDAY: THE TOILS CLOSING
+
+
+This day began with a surprise.  I found a letter on my breakfast-table
+addressed to Edward Ducie, Esquire; and at first I was startled beyond
+measure.  ‘Conscience doth make cowards of us all!’  When I had opened
+it, it proved to be only a note from the lawyer, enclosing a card for the
+Assembly Ball on Thursday evening.  Shortly after, as I was composing my
+mind with a segar at one of the windows of the sitting-room, and Rowley,
+having finished the light share of work that fell to him, sat not far off
+tootling with great spirit and a marked preference for the upper octave,
+Ronald was suddenly shown in.  I got him a segar, drew in a chair to the
+side of the fire, and installed him there—I was going to say, at his
+ease, but no expression could be farther from the truth.  He was plainly
+on pins and needles, did not know whether to take or to refuse the segar,
+and, after he had taken it, did not know whether to light or to return
+it.  I saw he had something to say; I did not think it was his own
+something; and I was ready to offer a large bet it was really something
+of Major Chevenix’s.
+
+‘Well, and so here you are!’ I observed, with pointless cordiality, for I
+was bound I should do nothing to help him out.  If he were, indeed, here
+running errands for my rival, he might have a fair field, but certainly
+no favour.
+
+‘The fact is,’ he began, ‘I would rather see you alone.’
+
+‘Why, certainly,’ I replied.  ‘Rowley, you can step into the bedroom.  My
+dear fellow,’ I continued, ‘this sounds serious.  Nothing wrong, I
+trust.’
+
+‘Well, I’ll be quite honest,’ said he.  ‘I _am_ a good deal bothered.’
+
+‘And I bet I know why!’ I exclaimed.  ‘And I bet I can put you to rights,
+too!’
+
+‘What do you mean!’ he asked.
+
+‘You must be hard up,’ said I, ‘and all I can say is, you’ve come to the
+right place.  If you have the least use for a hundred pounds, or any such
+trifling sum as that, please mention it.  It’s here, quite at your
+service.’
+
+‘I am sure it is most kind of you,’ said Ronald, ‘and the truth is,
+though I can’t think how you guessed it, that I really _am_ a little
+behind board.  But I haven’t come to talk about that.’
+
+‘No, I dare say!’ cried I.  ‘Not worth talking about!  But remember,
+Ronald, you and I are on different sides of the business.  Remember that
+you did me one of those services that make men friends for ever.  And
+since I have had the fortune to come into a fair share of money, just
+oblige me, and consider so much of it as your own.’
+
+‘No,’ he said, ‘I couldn’t take it; I couldn’t, really.  Besides, the
+fact is, I’ve come on a very different matter.  It’s about my sister, St.
+Ives,’ and he shook his head menacingly at me.
+
+‘You’re quite sure?’ I persisted.  ‘It’s here, at your service—up to five
+hundred pounds, if you like.  Well, all right; only remember where it is,
+when you do want it.’
+
+‘Oh, please let me alone!’ cried Ronald: ‘I’ve come to say something
+unpleasant; and how on earth can I do it, if you don’t give a fellow a
+chance?  It’s about my sister, as I said.  You can see for yourself that
+it can’t be allowed to go on.  It’s compromising; it don’t lead to
+anything; and you’re not the kind of man (you must feel it yourself) that
+I can allow my female relatives to have anything to do with.  I hate
+saying this, St. Ives; it looks like hitting a man when he’s down, you
+know; and I told the Major I very much disliked it from the first.
+However, it had to be said; and now it has been, and, between gentlemen,
+it shouldn’t be necessary to refer to it again.’
+
+‘It’s compromising; it doesn’t lead to anything; not the kind of man,’ I
+repeated thoughtfully.  ‘Yes, I believe I understand, and shall make
+haste to put myself _en règle_.’  I stood up, and laid my segar down.
+‘Mr. Gilchrist,’ said I, with a bow, ‘in answer to your very natural
+observations, I beg to offer myself as a suitor for your sister’s hand.
+I am a man of title, of which we think lightly in France, but of ancient
+lineage, which is everywhere prized.  I can display thirty-two
+quarterings without a blot.  My expectations are certainly above the
+average: I believe my uncle’s income averages about thirty thousand
+pounds, though I admit I was not careful to inform myself.  Put it
+anywhere between fifteen and fifty thousand; it is certainly not less.’
+
+‘All this is very easy to say,’ said Ronald, with a pitying smile.
+‘Unfortunately, these things are in the air.’
+
+‘Pardon me,—in Buckinghamshire,’ said I, smiling.
+
+‘Well, what I mean is, my dear St. Ives, that you _can’t prove_ them,’ he
+continued.  ‘They might just as well not be: do you follow me?  You can’t
+bring us any third party to back you.’
+
+‘Oh, come!’ cried I, springing up and hurrying to the table.  ‘You must
+excuse me!’  I wrote Romaine’s address.  ‘There is my reference, Mr.
+Gilchrist.  Until you have written to him, and received his negative
+answer, I have a right to be treated, and I shall see that you treat me,
+as a gentleman.’  He was brought up with a round turn at that.
+
+‘I beg your pardon, St. Ives,’ said he.  ‘Believe me, I had no wish to be
+offensive.  But there’s the difficulty of this affair; I can’t make any
+of my points without offence!  You must excuse me, it’s not my fault.
+But, at any rate, you must see for yourself this proposal of marriage
+is—is merely impossible, my dear fellow.  It’s nonsense!  Our countries
+are at war; you are a prisoner.’
+
+‘My ancestor of the time of the Ligue,’ I replied, ‘married a Huguenot
+lady out of the Saintonge, riding two hundred miles through an enemy’s
+country to bring off his bride; and it was a happy marriage.’
+
+‘Well!’ he began; and then looked down into the fire, and became silent.
+
+‘Well?’ I asked.
+
+‘Well, there’s this business of—Goguelat,’ said he, still looking at the
+coals in the grate.
+
+‘What!’ I exclaimed, starting in my chair.  ‘What’s that you say?’
+
+‘This business about Goguelat,’ he repeated.
+
+‘Ronald,’ said I, ‘this is not your doing.  These are not your own words.
+I know where they came from: a coward put them in your mouth.’
+
+‘St. Ives!’ he cried, ‘why do you make it so hard for me? and where’s the
+use of insulting other people?  The plain English is, that I can’t hear
+of any proposal of marriage from a man under a charge like that.  You
+must see it for yourself, man!  It’s the most absurd thing I ever heard
+of!  And you go on forcing me to argue with you, too!’
+
+‘Because I have had an affair of honour which terminated unhappily, you—a
+young soldier, or next-door to it—refuse my offer?  Do I understand you
+aright?’ said I.
+
+‘My dear fellow!’ he wailed, ‘of course you can twist my words, if you
+like.  You _say_ it was an affair of honour.  Well, I can’t, of course,
+tell you that—I can’t—I mean, you must see that that’s just the point!
+Was it?  I don’t know.’
+
+‘I have the honour to inform you,’ said I.
+
+‘Well, other people say the reverse, you see!’
+
+‘They lie, Ronald, and I will prove it in time.’
+
+‘The short and the long of it is, that any man who is so unfortunate as
+to have such things said about him is not the man to be my
+brother-in-law!’ he cried.
+
+‘Do you know who will be my first witness at the court?  Arthur
+Chevenix!’ said I.
+
+‘I don’t care!’ he cried, rising from his chair and beginning to pace
+outrageously about the room.  ‘What do you mean, St. Ives?  What is this
+about?  It’s like a dream, I declare!  You made an offer, and I have
+refused it.  I don’t like it, I don’t want it; and whatever I did, or
+didn’t, wouldn’t matter—my aunt wouldn’t bear of it anyway!  Can’t you
+take your answer, man?’
+
+‘You must remember, Ronald, that we are playing with edged tools,’ said
+I.  ‘An offer of marriage is a delicate subject to handle.  You have
+refused, and you have justified your refusal by several statements:
+first, that I was an impostor; second, that our countries were at war;
+and third— No, I will speak,’ said I; ‘you can answer when I have
+done,—and third, that I had dishonourably killed—or was said to have done
+so—the man Goguelat.  Now, my dear fellow, these are very awkward grounds
+to be taking.  From any one else’s lips I need scarce tell you how I
+should resent them; but my hands are tied.  I have so much gratitude to
+you, without talking of the love I bear your sister, that you insult me,
+when you do so, under the cover of a complete impunity.  I must feel the
+pain—and I do feel it acutely—I can do nothing to protect myself.’  He
+had been anxious enough to interrupt me in the beginning; but now, and
+after I had ceased, he stood a long while silent.
+
+‘St. Ives,’ he said at last, ‘I think I had better go away.  This has
+been very irritating.  I never at all meant to say anything of the kind,
+and I apologise to you.  I have all the esteem for you that one gentleman
+should have for another.  I only meant to tell you—to show you what had
+influenced my mind; and that, in short, the thing was impossible.  One
+thing you may be quite sure of: I shall do nothing against you.  Will you
+shake hands before I go away?’ he blurted out.
+
+‘Yes,’ said I, ‘I agree with you—the interview has been irritating.  Let
+bygones be bygones.  Good-bye, Ronald.’
+
+‘Good-bye, St. Ives!’ he returned.  ‘I’m heartily sorry.’
+
+And with that he was gone.
+
+The windows of my own sitting-room looked towards the north; but the
+entrance passage drew its light from the direction of the square.  Hence
+I was able to observe Ronald’s departure, his very disheartened gait, and
+the fact that he was joined, about half-way, by no less a man than Major
+Chevenix.  At this, I could scarce keep from smiling; so unpalatable an
+interview must be before the pair of them, and I could hear their voices,
+clashing like crossed swords, in that eternal antiphony of ‘I told you,’
+and ‘I told you not.’  Without doubt, they had gained very little by
+their visit; but then I had gained less than nothing, and had been
+bitterly dispirited into the bargain.  Ronald had stuck to his guns and
+refused me to the last.  It was no news; but, on the other hand, it could
+not be contorted into good news.  I was now certain that during my
+temporary absence in France, all irons would be put into the fire, and
+the world turned upside down, to make Flora disown the obtrusive
+Frenchman and accept Chevenix.  Without doubt she would resist these
+instances: but the thought of them did not please me, and I felt she
+should be warned and prepared for the battle.
+
+It was no use to try and see her now, but I promised myself early that
+evening to return to Swanston.  In the meantime I had to make all my
+preparations, and look the coming journey in the face.  Here in Edinburgh
+I was within four miles of the sea, yet the business of approaching
+random fishermen with my hat in the one hand and a knife in the other,
+appeared so desperate, that I saw nothing for it but to retrace my steps
+over the northern counties, and knock a second time at the doors of
+Birchell Fenn.  To do this, money would be necessary; and after leaving
+my paper in the hands of Flora I had still a balance of about fifteen
+hundred pounds.  Or rather I may say I had them and I had them not; for
+after my luncheon with Mr. Robbie I had placed the amount, all but thirty
+pounds of change, in a bank in George Street, on a deposit receipt in the
+name of Mr. Rowley.  This I had designed to be my gift to him, in case I
+must suddenly depart.  But now, thinking better of the arrangement, I
+despatched my little man, cockade and all, to lift the fifteen hundred.
+
+He was not long gone, and returned with a flushed face, and the deposit
+receipt still in his hand.
+
+‘No go, Mr. Anne,’ says he.
+
+‘How’s that?’ I inquired,
+
+‘Well, sir, I found the place all right, and no mistake,’ said he.  ‘But
+I tell you what gave me a blue fright!  There was a customer standing by
+the door, and I reckonised him!  Who do you think it was, Mr. Anne?  W’y,
+that same Red-Breast—him I had breakfast with near Aylesbury.’
+
+‘You are sure you are not mistaken?’ I asked.
+
+‘Certain sure,’ he replied.  ‘Not Mr. Lavender, I don’t mean, sir; I mean
+the other party.  “Wot’s he doing here?’ says I.  It don’t look right.”’
+
+‘Not by any means,’ I agreed.
+
+I walked to and fro in the apartment reflecting.  This particular Bow
+Street runner might be here by accident; but it was to imagine a singular
+play of coincidence that he, who had met Rowley and spoken with him in
+the ‘Green Dragon,’ hard by Aylesbury, should be now in Scotland, where
+he could have no legitimate business, and by the doors of the bank where
+Rowley kept his account.
+
+‘Rowley,’ said I, ‘he didn’t see you, did he?’
+
+‘Never a fear,’ quoth Rowley.  ‘W’y Mr. Anne, sir, if he ’ad, you
+wouldn’t have seen _me_ any more!  I ain’t a hass, sir!’
+
+‘Well, my boy, you can put that receipt in your pocket.  You’ll have no
+more use for it till you’re quite clear of me.  Don’t lose it, though;
+it’s your share of the Christmas-box: fifteen hundred pounds all for
+yourself.’
+
+‘Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne, sir, but wot for!’ said Rowley.
+
+‘To set up a public-house upon,’ said I.
+
+‘If you’ll excuse me, sir, I ain’t got any call to set up a public-house,
+sir,’ he replied stoutly.  ‘And I tell you wot, sir, it seems to me I’m
+reether young for the billet.  I’m your body servant, Mr. Anne, or else
+I’m nothink.’
+
+‘Well, Rowley,’ I said, ‘I’ll tell you what it’s for.  It’s for the good
+service you have done me, of which I don’t care—and don’t dare—to speak.
+It’s for your loyalty and cheerfulness, my dear boy.  I had meant it for
+you; but to tell you the truth, it’s past mending now—it has to be yours.
+Since that man is waiting by the bank, the money can’t be touched until
+I’m gone.’
+
+‘Until you’re gone, sir?’ re-echoed Rowley.  ‘You don’t go anywheres
+without me, I can tell you that, Mr. Anne, sir!’
+
+‘Yes, my boy,’ said I, ‘we are going to part very soon now; probably
+to-morrow.  And it’s for my sake, Rowley!  Depend upon it, if there was
+any reason at all for that Bow Street man being at the bank, he was not
+there to look out for you.  How they could have found out about the
+account so early is more than I can fathom; some strange coincidence must
+have played me false!  But there the fact is; and Rowley, I’ll not only
+have to say farewell to you presently, I’ll have to ask you to stay
+indoors until I can say it.  Remember, my boy, it’s only so that you can
+serve me now.’
+
+‘W’y, sir, you say the word, and of course I’ll do it!’ he cried.
+‘“Nothink by ’alves,” is my motto!  I’m your man, through thick and thin,
+live or die, I am!’
+
+In the meantime there was nothing to be done till towards sunset.  My
+only chance now was to come again as quickly as possible to speech of
+Flora, who was my only practicable banker; and not before evening was it
+worth while to think of that.  I might compose myself as well as I was
+able over the _Caledonian Mercury_, with its ill news of the campaign of
+France and belated documents about the retreat from Russia; and, as I sat
+there by the fire, I was sometimes all awake with anger and mortification
+at what I was reading, and sometimes again I would be three parts asleep
+as I dozed over the barren items of home intelligence.  ‘Lately
+arrived’—this is what I suddenly stumbled on—‘at Dumbreck’s Hotel, the
+Viscount of Saint-Yves.’
+
+‘Rowley,’ said I.
+
+‘If you please, Mr. Anne, sir,’ answered the obsequious, lowering his
+pipe.
+
+‘Come and look at this, my boy,’ said I, holding out the paper.
+
+‘My crikey!’ said he.  ‘That’s ’im, sir, sure enough!’
+
+‘Sure enough, Rowley,’ said I.  ‘He’s on the trail.  He has fairly caught
+up with us.  He and this Bow Street man have come together, I would
+swear.  And now here is the whole field, quarry, hounds and hunters, all
+together in this city of Edinburgh.’
+
+‘And wot are you goin’ to do now, sir?  Tell you wot, let me take it in
+’and, please!  Gimme a minute, and I’ll disguise myself, and go out to
+this Dum--- to this hotel, leastways, sir—and see wot he’s up to.  You
+put your trust in me, Mr. Anne: I’m fly, don’t you make no mistake about
+it.  I’m all a-growing and a-blowing, I am.’
+
+‘Not one foot of you,’ said I.  ‘You are a prisoner, Rowley, and make up
+your mind to that.  So am I, or next door to it.  I showed it you for a
+caution; if you go on the streets, it spells death to me, Rowley.’
+
+‘If you please, sir,’ says Rowley.
+
+‘Come to think of it,’ I continued, ‘you must take a cold, or something.
+No good of awakening Mrs. McRankine’s suspicions.’
+
+‘A cold?’ he cried, recovering immediately from his depression.  ‘I can
+do it, Mr. Anne.’
+
+And he proceeded to sneeze and cough and blow his nose, till I could not
+restrain myself from smiling.
+
+‘Oh, I tell you, I know a lot of them dodges,’ he observed proudly.
+
+‘Well, they come in very handy,’ said I.
+
+‘I’d better go at once and show it to the old gal, ’adn’t I?’ he asked.
+
+I told him, by all means; and he was gone upon the instant, gleeful as
+though to a game of football.
+
+I took up the paper and read carelessly on, my thoughts engaged with my
+immediate danger, till I struck on the next paragraph:—
+
+    ‘In connection with the recent horrid murder in the Castle, we are
+    desired to make public the following intelligence.  The soldier,
+    Champdivers, is supposed to be in the neighbourhood of this city.  He
+    is about the middle height or rather under, of a pleasing appearance
+    and highly genteel address.  When last heard of he wore a fashionable
+    suit of pearl-grey, and boots with fawn-coloured tops.  He is
+    accompanied by a servant about sixteen years of age, speaks English
+    without any accent, and passed under the _alias_ of Ramornie.  A
+    reward is offered for his apprehension.’
+
+In a moment I was in the next room, stripping from me the pearl-coloured
+suit!
+
+I confess I was now a good deal agitated.  It is difficult to watch the
+toils closing slowly and surely about you, and to retain your composure;
+and I was glad that Rowley was not present to spy on my confusion.  I was
+flushed, my breath came thick; I cannot remember a time when I was more
+put out.
+
+And yet I must wait and do nothing, and partake of my meals, and
+entertain the ever-garrulous Rowley, as though I were entirely my own
+man.  And if I did not require to entertain Mrs. McRankine also, that was
+but another drop of bitterness in my cup!  For what ailed my landlady,
+that she should hold herself so severely aloof, that she should refuse
+conversation, that her eyes should be reddened, that I should so
+continually hear the voice of her private supplications sounding through
+the house?  I was much deceived, or she had read the insidious paragraph
+and recognised the comminated pearl-grey suit.  I remember now a certain
+air with which she had laid the paper on my table, and a certain sniff,
+between sympathy and defiance, with which she had announced it: ‘There’s
+your _Mercury_ for ye!’
+
+In this direction, at least, I saw no pressing danger; her tragic
+countenance betokened agitation; it was plain she was wrestling with her
+conscience, and the battle still hung dubious.  The question of what to
+do troubled me extremely.  I could not venture to touch such an intricate
+and mysterious piece of machinery as my landlady’s spiritual nature: it
+might go off at a word, and in any direction, like a badly-made firework.
+And while I praised myself extremely for my wisdom in the past, that I
+had made so much a friend of her, I was all abroad as to my conduct in
+the present.  There seemed an equal danger in pressing and in neglecting
+the accustomed marks of familiarity.  The one extreme looked like
+impudence, and might annoy, the other was a practical confession of
+guilt.  Altogether, it was a good hour for me when the dusk began to fall
+in earnest on the streets of Edinburgh, and the voice of an early
+watchman bade me set forth.
+
+I reached the neighbourhood of the cottage before seven; and as I
+breasted the steep ascent which leads to the garden wall, I was struck
+with surprise to hear a dog.  Dogs I had heard before, but only from the
+hamlet on the hillside above.  Now, this dog was in the garden itself,
+where it roared aloud in paroxysms of fury, and I could hear it leaping
+and straining on the chain.  I waited some while, until the brute’s fit
+of passion had roared itself out.  Then, with the utmost precaution, I
+drew near again; and finally approached the garden wall.  So soon as I
+had clapped my head above the level, however, the barking broke forth
+again with redoubled energy.  Almost at the same time, the door of the
+cottage opened, and Ronald and the Major appeared upon the threshold with
+a lantern.  As they so stood, they were almost immediately below me,
+strongly illuminated, and within easy earshot.  The Major pacified the
+dog, who took instead to low, uneasy growling intermingled with
+occasional yelps.
+
+‘Good thing I brought Towzer!’ said Chevenix.
+
+‘Damn him, I wonder where he is!’ said Ronald; and he moved the lantern
+up and down, and turned the night into a shifting puzzle-work of gleam
+and shadow.  ‘I think I’ll make a sally.’
+
+‘I don’t think you will,’ replied Chevenix.  ‘When I agreed to come out
+here and do sentry-go, it was on one condition, Master Ronald: don’t you
+forget that!  Military discipline, my boy!  Our beat is this path close
+about the house.  Down, Towzer! good boy, good boy—gently, then!’ he went
+on, caressing his confounded monster.
+
+‘To think!  The beggar may be hearing us this minute!’ cried Ronald.
+
+‘Nothing more probable,’ said the Major.  ‘You there, St. Ives?’ he
+added, in a distinct but guarded voice.  ‘I only want to tell you, you
+had better go home.  Mr. Gilchrist and I take watch and watch.’
+
+The game was up.  ‘_Beaucoup de plaisir_!’ I replied, in the same tones.
+‘_Il fait un peu froid pour veiller_; _gardez-vous des engelures_!’
+
+I suppose it was done in a moment of ungovernable rage; but in spite of
+the excellent advice he had given to Ronald the moment before, Chevenix
+slipped the chain, and the dog sprang, straight as an arrow, up the bank.
+I stepped back, picked up a stone of about twelve pounds weight, and
+stood ready.  With a bound the beast landed on the cope-stone of the
+wall; and, almost in the same instant, my missile caught him fair in the
+face.  He gave a stifled cry, went tumbling back where he had come from,
+and I could hear the twelve-pounder accompany him in his fall.  Chevenix,
+at the same moment, broke out in a roaring voice: ‘The hell-hound!  If
+he’s killed my dog!’ and I judged, upon all grounds, it was as well to be
+off.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX—EVENTS OF WEDNESDAY; THE UNIVERSITY OF CRAMOND
+
+
+I awoke to much diffidence, even to a feeling that might be called the
+beginnings of panic, and lay for hours in my bed considering the
+situation.  Seek where I pleased, there was nothing to encourage me and
+plenty to appal.  They kept a close watch about the cottage; they had a
+beast of a watch-dog—at least, unless I had settled it; and if I had, I
+knew its bereaved master would only watch the more indefatigably for the
+loss.  In the pardonable ostentation of love I had given all the money I
+could spare to Flora; I had thought it glorious that the hunted exile
+should come down, like Jupiter, in a shower of gold, and pour thousands
+in the lap of the beloved.  Then I had in an hour of arrant folly buried
+what remained to me in a bank in George Street.  And now I must get back
+the one or the other; and which? and how?
+
+As I tossed in my bed, I could see three possible courses, all extremely
+perilous.  First, Rowley might have been mistaken; the bank might not be
+watched; it might still be possible for him to draw the money on the
+deposit receipt.  Second, I might apply again to Robbie.  Or, third, I
+might dare everything, go to the Assembly Ball, and speak with Flora
+under the eyes of all Edinburgh.  This last alternative, involving as it
+did the most horrid risks, and the delay of forty-eight hours, I did but
+glance at with an averted head, and turned again to the consideration of
+the others.  It was the likeliest thing in the world that Robbie had been
+warned to have no more to do with me. The whole policy of the Gilchrists
+was in the hands of Chevenix; and I thought this was a precaution so
+elementary that he was certain to have taken it.  If he had not, of
+course I was all right: Robbie would manage to communicate with Flora;
+and by four o’clock I might be on the south road and, I was going to say,
+a free man.  Lastly, I must assure myself with my own eyes whether the
+bank in George Street were beleaguered.
+
+I called to Rowley and questioned him tightly as to the appearance of the
+Bow Street officer.
+
+‘What sort of looking man is he, Rowley?’ I asked, as I began to dress.
+
+‘Wot sort of a looking man he is?’ repeated Rowley.  ‘Well, I don’t very
+well know wot you would say, Mr. Anne.  He ain’t a beauty, any’ow.’
+
+‘Is he tall?’
+
+‘Tall?  Well, no, I shouldn’t say _tall_ Mr. Anne.’
+
+‘Well, then, is he short?’
+
+‘Short?  No, I don’t think I would say he was what you would call
+_short_.  No, not piticular short, sir.’
+
+‘Then, I suppose, he must be about the middle height?’
+
+‘Well, you might say it, sir; but not remarkable so.’
+
+I smothered an oath.
+
+‘Is he clean-shaved?’ I tried him again.
+
+‘Clean-shaved?’ he repeated, with the same air of anxious candour.
+
+‘Good heaven, man, don’t repeat my words like a parrot!’ I cried.  ‘Tell
+me what the man was like: it is of the first importance that I should be
+able to recognise him.’
+
+‘I’m trying to, Mr. Anne.  But _clean-shaved_?  I don’t seem to rightly
+get hold of that p’int.  Sometimes it might appear to me like as if he
+was; and sometimes like as if he wasn’t.  No, it wouldn’t surprise me now
+if you was to tell me he ’ad a bit o’ whisker.’
+
+‘Was the man red-faced?’ I roared, dwelling on each syllable.
+
+‘I don’t think you need go for to get cross about it, Mr. Anne!’ said he.
+‘I’m tellin’ you every blessed thing I see!  Red-faced?  Well, no, not as
+you would remark upon.’
+
+A dreadful calm fell upon me.
+
+‘Was he anywise pale?’ I asked.
+
+‘Well, it don’t seem to me as though he were.  But I tell you truly, I
+didn’t take much heed to that.’
+
+‘Did he look like a drinking man?’
+
+‘Well, no.  If you please, sir, he looked more like an eating one.’
+
+‘Oh, he was stout, was he?’
+
+‘No, sir.  I couldn’t go so far as that.  No, he wasn’t not to say
+_stout_.  If anything, lean rather.’
+
+I need not go on with the infuriating interview.  It ended as it began,
+except that Rowley was in tears, and that I had acquired one fact.  The
+man was drawn for me as being of any height you like to mention, and of
+any degree of corpulence or leanness; clean-shaved or not, as the case
+might be; the colour of his hair Rowley ‘could not take it upon himself
+to put a name on’; that of his eyes he thought to have been blue—nay, it
+was the one point on which he attained to a kind of tearful certainty.
+‘I’ll take my davy on it,’ he asseverated.  They proved to have been as
+black as sloes, very little and very near together.  So much for the
+evidence of the artless!  And the fact, or rather the facts, acquired?
+Well, they had to do not with the person but with his clothing.  The man
+wore knee-breeches and white stockings; his coat was ‘some kind of a
+lightish colour—or betwixt that and dark’; and he wore a ‘mole-skin
+weskit.’  As if this were not enough, he presently haled me from my
+breakfast in a prodigious flutter, and showed me an honest and rather
+venerable citizen passing in the Square.
+
+‘That’s _him_, sir,’ he cried, ‘the very moral of him!  Well, this one is
+better dressed, and p’r’aps a trifler taller; and in the face he don’t
+favour him noways at all, sir.  No, not when I come to look again, ’e
+don’t seem to favour him noways.’
+
+‘Jackass!’ said I, and I think the greatest stickler for manners will
+admit the epithet to have been justified.
+
+Meanwhile the appearance of my landlady added a great load of anxiety to
+what I already suffered.  It was plain that she had not slept; equally
+plain that she had wept copiously.  She sighed, she groaned, she drew in
+her breath, she shook her head, as she waited on table.  In short, she
+seemed in so precarious a state, like a petard three times charged with
+hysteria, that I did not dare to address her; and stole out of the house
+on tiptoe, and actually ran downstairs, in the fear that she might call
+me back.  It was plain that this degree of tension could not last long.
+
+It was my first care to go to George Street, which I reached (by good
+luck) as a boy was taking down the bank shutters.  A man was conversing
+with him; he had white stockings and a moleskin waistcoat, and was as
+ill-looking a rogue as you would want to see in a day’s journey.  This
+seemed to agree fairly well with Rowley’s _signalement_: he had declared
+emphatically (if you remember), and had stuck to it besides, that the
+companion of the great Lavender was no beauty.
+
+Thence I made my way to Mr. Robbie’s, where I rang the bell.  A servant
+answered the summons, and told me the lawyer was engaged, as I had half
+expected.
+
+‘Wha shall I say was callin’?’ she pursued; and when I had told her ‘Mr.
+Ducie,’ ‘I think this’ll be for you, then?’ she added, and handed me a
+letter from the hall table.  It ran:
+
+    ‘DEAR MR. DUCIE,
+
+    ‘My single advice to you is to leave _quam primum_ for the South.
+
+                                                        Yours, T. ROBBIE.’
+
+That was short and sweet.  It emphatically extinguished hope in one
+direction.  No more was to be gotten of Robbie; and I wondered, from my
+heart, how much had been told him.  Not too much, I hoped, for I liked
+the lawyer who had thus deserted me, and I placed a certain reliance in
+the discretion of Chevenix.  He would not be merciful; on the other hand,
+I did not think he would be cruel without cause.
+
+It was my next affair to go back along George Street, and assure myself
+whether the man in the moleskin vest was still on guard.  There was no
+sign of him on the pavement.  Spying the door of a common stair nearly
+opposite the bank, I took it in my head that this would be a good point
+of observation, crossed the street, entered with a businesslike air and
+fell immediately against the man in the moleskin vest.  I stopped and
+apologised to him; he replied in an unmistakable English accent, thus
+putting the matter almost beyond doubt.  After this encounter I must, of
+course, ascend to the top story, ring the bell of a suite of apartments,
+inquire for Mr. Vavasour, learn (with no great surprise) that he did not
+live there, come down again and, again politely saluting the man from Bow
+Street, make my escape at last into the street.
+
+I was now driven back upon the Assembly Ball.  Robbie had failed me.  The
+bank was watched; it would never do to risk Rowley in that neighbourhood.
+All I could do was to wait until the morrow evening, and present myself
+at the Assembly, let it end as it might.  But I must say I came to this
+decision with a good deal of genuine fright; and here I came for the
+first time to one of those places where my courage stuck.  I do not mean
+that my courage boggled and made a bit of a bother over it, as it did
+over the escape from the Castle; I mean, stuck, like a stopped watch or a
+dead man.  Certainly I would go to the ball; certainly I must see this
+morning about my clothes.  That was all decided.  But the most of the
+shops were on the other side of the valley, in the Old Town; and it was
+now my strange discovery that I was physically unable to cross the North
+Bridge!  It was as though a precipice had stood between us, or the deep
+sea had intervened.  Nearer to the Castle my legs refused to bear me.
+
+I told myself this was mere superstition; I made wagers with myself—and
+gained them; I went down on the esplanade of Princes Street, walked and
+stood there, alone and conspicuous, looking across the garden at the old
+grey bastions of the fortress, where all these troubles had begun.  I
+cocked my hat, set my hand on my hip, and swaggered on the pavement,
+confronting detection.  And I found I could do all this with a sense of
+exhilaration that was not unpleasing, and with a certain _crânerie_ of
+manner that raised me in my own esteem.  And yet there was one thing I
+could not bring my mind to face up to, or my limbs to execute; and that
+was to cross the valley into the Old Town.  It seemed to me I must be
+arrested immediately if I had done so; I must go straight into the
+twilight of a prison cell, and pass straight thence to the gross and
+final embraces of the nightcap and the halter.  And yet it was from no
+reasoned fear of the consequences that I could not go.  I was unable.  My
+horse baulked, and there was an end!
+
+My nerve was gone: here was a discovery for a man in such imminent peril,
+set down to so desperate a game, which I could only hope to win by
+continual luck and unflagging effrontery!  The strain had been too long
+continued, and my nerve was gone.  I fell into what they call panic fear,
+as I have seen soldiers do on the alarm of a night attack, and turned out
+of Princes Street at random as though the devil were at my heels.  In St.
+Andrew Square, I remember vaguely hearing some one call out.  I paid no
+heed, but pressed on blindly.  A moment after, a hand fell heavily on my
+shoulder, and I thought I had fainted.  Certainly the world went black
+about me for some seconds; and when that spasm passed I found myself
+standing face to face with the ‘cheerful extravagant,’ in what sort of
+disarray I really dare not imagine, dead white at least, shaking like an
+aspen, and mowing at the man with speechless lips.  And this was the
+soldier of Napoleon, and the gentleman who intended going next night to
+an Assembly Ball!  I am the more particular in telling of my breakdown,
+because it was my only experience of the sort; and it is a good tale for
+officers.  I will allow no man to call me coward; I have made my proofs;
+few men more.  And yet I (come of the best blood in France and inured to
+danger from a child) did, for some ten or twenty minutes, make this
+hideous exhibition of myself on the streets of the New Town of Edinburgh.
+
+With my first available breath I begged his pardon.  I was of an
+extremely nervous disposition, recently increased by late hours; I could
+not bear the slightest start.
+
+He seemed much concerned.  ‘You must be in a devil of a state!’ said he;
+‘though of course it was my fault—damnably silly, vulgar sort of thing to
+do!  A thousand apologies!  But you really must be run down; you should
+consult a medico.  My dear sir, a hair of the dog that bit you is clearly
+indicated.  A touch of Blue Ruin, now?  Or, come: it’s early, but is man
+the slave of hours? what do you say to a chop and a bottle in Dumbreck’s
+Hotel?’
+
+I refused all false comfort; but when he went on to remind me that this
+was the day when the University of Cramond met; and to propose a
+five-mile walk into the country and a dinner in the company of young
+asses like himself, I began to think otherwise.  I had to wait until
+to-morrow evening, at any rate; this might serve as well as anything else
+to bridge the dreary hours.  The country was the very place for me: and
+walking is an excellent sedative for the nerves.  Remembering poor
+Rowley, feigning a cold in our lodgings and immediately under the guns of
+the formidable and now doubtful Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my
+servant.  ‘Poor devil! it is dull for him,’ I explained.
+
+‘The merciful man is merciful to his ass,’ observed my sententious
+friend.  ‘Bring him by all means!
+
+    “The harp, his sole remaining joy,
+    Was carried by an orphan boy;”
+
+and I have no doubt the orphan boy can get some cold victuals in the
+kitchen, while the Senatus dines.’
+
+Accordingly, being now quite recovered from my unmanly condition, except
+that nothing could yet induce me to cross the North Bridge, I arranged
+for my ball dress at a shop in Leith Street, where I was not served ill,
+cut out Rowley from his seclusion, and was ready along with him at the
+trysting-place, the corner of Duke Street and York Place, by a little
+after two.  The University was represented in force: eleven persons,
+including ourselves, Byfield the aeronaut, and the tall lad, Forbes, whom
+I had met on the Sunday morning, bedewed with tallow, at the ‘Hunters’
+Rest.’  I was introduced; and we set off by way of Newhaven and the sea
+beach; at first through pleasant country roads, and afterwards along a
+succession of bays of a fairylike prettiness, to our destination—Cramond
+on the Almond—a little hamlet on a little river, embowered in woods, and
+looking forth over a great flat of quicksand to where a little islet
+stood planted in the sea.  It was miniature scenery, but charming of its
+kind.  The air of this good February afternoon was bracing, but not cold.
+All the way my companions were skylarking, jesting and making puns, and I
+felt as if a load had been taken off my lungs and spirits, and skylarked
+with the best of them.
+
+Byfield I observed, because I had heard of him before, and seen his
+advertisements, not at all because I was disposed to feel interest in the
+man.  He was dark and bilious and very silent; frigid in his manners, but
+burning internally with a great fire of excitement; and he was so good as
+to bestow a good deal of his company and conversation (such as it was)
+upon myself, who was not in the least grateful.  If I had known how I was
+to be connected with him in the immediate future, I might have taken more
+pains.
+
+In the hamlet of Cramond there is a hostelry of no very promising
+appearance, and here a room had been prepared for us, and we sat down to
+table.
+
+‘Here you will find no guttling or gormandising, no turtle or
+nightingales’ tongues,’ said the extravagant, whose name, by the way, was
+Dalmahoy.  ‘The device, sir, of the University of Cramond is Plain Living
+and High Drinking.’
+
+Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic Latin, which
+I could by no means follow, only I could hear it rhymed, and I guessed it
+to be more witty than reverent.  After which the _Senatus Academicus_ sat
+down to rough plenty in the shape of rizzar’d haddocks and mustard, a
+sheep’s head, a haggis, and other delicacies of Scotland.  The dinner was
+washed down with brown stout in bottle, and as soon as the cloth was
+removed, glasses, boiling water, sugar, and whisky were set out for the
+manufacture of toddy.  I played a good knife and fork, did not shun the
+bowl, and took part, so far as I was able, in the continual fire of
+pleasantry with which the meal was seasoned.  Greatly daring, I ventured,
+before all these Scotsmen, to tell Sim’s Tale of Tweedie’s dog; and I was
+held to have done such extraordinary justice to the dialect, ‘for a
+Southron,’ that I was immediately voted into the Chair of Scots, and
+became, from that moment, a full member of the University of Cramond.  A
+little after, I found myself entertaining them with a song; and a little
+after—perhaps a little in consequence—it occurred to me that I had had
+enough, and would be very well inspired to take French leave.  It was not
+difficult to manage, for it was nobody’s business to observe my
+movements, and conviviality had banished suspicion.
+
+I got easily forth of the chamber, which reverberated with the voices of
+these merry and learned gentlemen, and breathed a long breath.  I had
+passed an agreeable afternoon and evening, and I had apparently escaped
+scot free.  Alas! when I looked into the kitchen, there was my monkey,
+drunk as a lord, toppling on the edge of the dresser, and performing on
+the flageolet to an audience of the house lasses and some neighbouring
+ploughmen.
+
+I routed him promptly from his perch, stuck his hat on, put his
+instrument in his pocket, and set off with him for Edinburgh.
+
+His limbs were of paper, his mind quite in abeyance; I must uphold and
+guide him, prevent his frantic dives, and set him continually on his legs
+again.  At first he sang wildly, with occasional outbursts of causeless
+laughter.  Gradually an inarticulate melancholy succeeded; he wept gently
+at times; would stop in the middle of the road, say firmly ‘No, no, no,’
+and then fall on his back: or else address me solemnly as ‘M’lord’ and
+fall on his face by way of variety.  I am afraid I was not always so
+gentle with the little pig as I might have been, but really the position
+was unbearable.  We made no headway at all, and I suppose we were scarce
+gotten a mile away from Cramond, when the whole _Senatus Academicus_ was
+heard hailing, and doubling the pace to overtake its.
+
+Some of them were fairly presentable; and they were all Christian martyrs
+compared to Rowley; but they were in a frolicsome and rollicking humour
+that promised danger as we approached the town.  They sang songs, they
+ran races, they fenced with their walking-sticks and umbrellas; and, in
+spite of this violent exercise, the fun grew only the more extravagant
+with the miles they traversed.  Their drunkenness was deep-seated and
+permanent, like fire in a peat; or rather—to be quite just to them—it was
+not so much to be called drunkenness at all, as the effect of youth and
+high spirits—a fine night, and the night young, a good road under foot,
+and the world before you!
+
+I had left them once somewhat unceremoniously; I could not attempt it a
+second time; and, burthened as I was with Mr. Rowley, I was really glad
+of assistance.  But I saw the lamps of Edinburgh draw near on their
+hill-top with a good deal of uneasiness, which increased, after we had
+entered the lighted streets, to positive alarm.  All the passers-by were
+addressed, some of them by name.  A worthy man was stopped by Forbes.
+‘Sir,’ said he, ‘in the name of the Senatus of the University of Cramond,
+I confer upon you the degree of LL.D.,’ and with the words he bonneted
+him.  Conceive the predicament of St. Ives, committed to the society of
+these outrageous youths, in a town where the police and his cousin were
+both looking for him!  So far, we had pursued our way unmolested,
+although raising a clamour fit to wake the dead; but at last, in
+Abercromby Place, I believe—at least it was a crescent of highly
+respectable houses fronting on a garden—Byfield and I, having fallen
+somewhat in the rear with Rowley, came to a simultaneous halt.  Our
+ruffians were beginning to wrench off bells and door-plates!
+
+‘Oh, I say!’ says Byfield, ‘this is too much of a good thing!  Confound
+it, I’m a respectable man—a public character, by George!  I can’t afford
+to get taken up by the police.’
+
+‘My own case exactly,’ said I.
+
+‘Here, let’s bilk them,’ said he.
+
+And we turned back and took our way down hill again.
+
+It was none too soon: voices and alarm bells sounded; watchmen here and
+there began to spring their rattles; it was plain the University of
+Cramond would soon be at blows with the police of Edinburgh!  Byfield and
+I, running the semi-inanimate Rowley before us, made good despatch, and
+did not stop till we were several streets away, and the hubbub was
+already softened by distance.
+
+‘Well, sir,’ said he, ‘we are well out of that!  Did ever any one see
+such a pack of young barbarians?’
+
+‘We are properly punished, Mr. Byfield; we had no business there,’ I
+replied.
+
+‘No, indeed, sir, you may well say that!  Outrageous!  And my ascension
+announced for Friday, you know!’ cried the aeronaut.  ‘A pretty scandal!
+Byfield the aeronaut at the police-court!  Tut-tut!  Will you be able to
+get your rascal home, sir?  Allow me to offer you my card.  I am staying
+at Walker and Poole’s Hotel, sir, where I should be pleased to see you.’
+
+‘The pleasure would be mutual, sir,’ said I, but I must say my heart was
+not in my words, and as I watched Mr. Byfield departing I desired nothing
+less than to pursue the acquaintance
+
+One more ordeal remained for me to pass.  I carried my senseless load
+upstairs to our lodging, and was admitted by the landlady in a tall white
+nightcap and with an expression singularly grim.  She lighted us into the
+sitting-room; where, when I had seated Rowley in a chair, she dropped me
+a cast-iron courtesy.  I smelt gunpowder on the woman.  Her voice,
+tottered with emotion.
+
+‘I give ye nottice, Mr. Ducie,’ said she.  ‘Dacent folks’ houses . . .’
+
+And at that apparently temper cut off her utterance, and she took herself
+off without more words.
+
+I looked about me at the room, the goggling Rowley, the extinguished
+fire; my mind reviewed the laughable incidents of the day and night; and
+I laughed out loud to myself—lonely and cheerless laughter!.......
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+             [_At this point the Author’s_ MS. _breaks off_]
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes
+
+
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+
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, St. Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson, Edited
+by Sidney Colvin
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: St. Ives
+       being The Adventures of a French Prison in England
+
+
+Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+Editor: Sidney Colvin
+
+Release Date: October 30, 2010  [eBook #322]
+First Posted: September 1995
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. IVES***
+</pre>
+<p>Transcribed 1898 William Heinemann edition by David Price,
+email ccx074@pflaf.org</p>
+<h1>St. Ives</h1>
+<p style="text-align: center">Being</p>
+<p style="text-align: center">The Adventures of a French
+Prisoner<br />
+in England</p>
+<p style="text-align: center">By</p>
+<p style="text-align: center">Robert Louis Stevenson</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap"><i>second
+edition</i></span></p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center">London<br />
+William Heinemann<br />
+1898</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><!-- page iv--><a
+name="pageiv"></a><span class="pagenum">p. iv</span><i>First
+Edition</i>, <i>May</i> 5, 1897; <i>Reprinted May</i> 6, 1897</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><i>All rights reserved</i></p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p><i>The following tale was taken down from Mr.
+Stevenson&rsquo;s dictation by his stepdaughter and
+amanuensis</i>, <i>Mrs. Strong</i>, <i>at intervals between
+January</i> 1893 <i>and October</i> 1894 (<i>see</i> Vailima
+Letters, <i>pp.</i> 242&ndash;246, 299, 324 <i>and</i>
+350).&nbsp; <i>About six weeks before his death he laid the story
+aside to take up</i> Weir of Hermiston.&nbsp; <i>The thirty
+chapters of</i> St. Ives <i>which he had written</i> (<i>the last
+few of them apparently unrevised</i>) <i>brought the tale within
+sight of its conclusion</i>, <i>and the intended course of the
+remainder was known in outline to Mrs. Strong</i>.&nbsp; <i>For
+the benefit of those readers who do not like a story to be left
+unfinished</i>, <i>the delicate task of supplying the missing
+chapters has been entrusted to Mr. Quiller-Couch</i>, <i>whose
+work begins at Chap. XXXI.</i> <a name="citation0"></a><a
+href="#footnote0" class="citation">[0]</a></p>
+<p style="text-align: right">[<i>S. C.</i>]</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER I&mdash;A TALE OF A LION RAMPANT</h2>
+<p>It was in the month of May 1813 that I was so unlucky as to
+fall at last into the hands of the enemy.&nbsp; My knowledge of
+the English language had marked me out for a certain
+employment.&nbsp; Though I cannot conceive a soldier refusing to
+incur the risk, yet to be hanged for a spy is a disgusting
+business; and I was relieved to be held a prisoner of war.&nbsp;
+Into the Castle of Edinburgh, standing in the midst of that city
+on the summit of an extraordinary rock, I was cast with several
+hundred fellow-sufferers, all privates like myself, and the more
+part of them, by an accident, very ignorant, plain fellows.&nbsp;
+My English, which had brought me into that scrape, now helped me
+very materially to bear it.&nbsp; I had a thousand
+advantages.&nbsp; I was often called to play the part of an
+interpreter, whether of orders or complaints, and thus brought in
+relations, sometimes of mirth, sometimes almost of friendship,
+with the officers in charge.&nbsp; A young lieutenant singled me
+out to be his adversary at chess, a game in which I was extremely
+proficient, and would reward me for my gambits with excellent
+cigars.&nbsp; The major of the battalion took lessons of French
+from me while at breakfast, and was sometimes so obliging as to
+have me join him at the meal.&nbsp; Chevenix was his name.&nbsp;
+He was stiff as a drum-major and selfish as an Englishman, but a
+fairly conscientious pupil and a fairly upright man.&nbsp; Little
+did I suppose that his ramrod body and frozen face would, in the
+end, step in between me and all my dearest wishes; that upon this
+precise, regular, icy soldier-man my fortunes should so nearly
+shipwreck!&nbsp; I never liked, but yet I trusted him; and though
+it may seem but a trifle, I found his snuff-box with the bean in
+it come very welcome.</p>
+<p>For it is strange how grown men and seasoned soldiers can go
+back in life; so that after but a little while in prison, which
+is after all the next thing to being in the nursery, they grow
+absorbed in the most pitiful, childish interests, and a sugar
+biscuit or a pinch of snuff become things to follow after and
+scheme for!</p>
+<p>We made but a poor show of prisoners.&nbsp; The officers had
+been all offered their parole, and had taken it.&nbsp; They lived
+mostly in suburbs of the city, lodging with modest families, and
+enjoyed their freedom and supported the almost continual evil
+tidings of the Emperor as best they might.&nbsp; It chanced I was
+the only gentleman among the privates who remained.&nbsp; A great
+part were ignorant Italians, of a regiment that had suffered
+heavily in Catalonia.&nbsp; The rest were mere diggers of the
+soil, treaders of grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly
+and violently preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.&nbsp;
+We had but the one interest in common: each of us who had any
+skill with his fingers passed the hours of his captivity in the
+making of little toys and <i>articles of Paris</i>; and the
+prison was daily visited at certain hours by a concourse of
+people of the country, come to exult over our distress,
+or&mdash;it is more tolerant to suppose&mdash;their own vicarious
+triumph.&nbsp; Some moved among us with a decency of shame or
+sympathy.&nbsp; Others were the most offensive personages in the
+world, gaped at us as if we had been baboons, sought to
+evangelise us to their rustic, northern religion, as though we
+had been savages, or tortured us with intelligence of disasters
+to the arms of France.&nbsp; Good, bad, and indifferent, there
+was one alleviation to the annoyance of these visitors; for it
+was the practice of almost all to purchase some specimen of our
+rude handiwork.&nbsp; This led, amongst the prisoners, to a
+strong spirit of competition.&nbsp; Some were neat of hand, and
+(the genius of the French being always distinguished) could place
+upon sale little miracles of dexterity and taste.&nbsp; Some had
+a more engaging appearance; fine features were found to do as
+well as fine merchandise, and an air of youth in particular (as
+it appealed to the sentiment of pity in our visitors) to be a
+source of profit.&nbsp; Others again enjoyed some acquaintance
+with the language, and were able to recommend the more agreeably
+to purchasers such trifles as they had to sell.&nbsp; To the
+first of these advantages I could lay no claim, for my fingers
+were all thumbs.&nbsp; Some at least of the others I possessed;
+and finding much entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer
+my advantages to rust.&nbsp; I have never despised the social
+arts, in which it is a national boast that every Frenchman should
+excel.&nbsp; For the approach of particular sorts of visitors, I
+had a particular manner of address, and even of appearance, which
+I could readily assume and change on the occasion rising.&nbsp; I
+never lost an opportunity to flatter either the person of my
+visitor, if it should be a lady, or, if it should be a man, the
+greatness of his country in war.&nbsp; And in case my compliments
+should miss their aim, I was always ready to cover my retreat
+with some agreeable pleasantry, which would often earn me the
+name of an &lsquo;oddity&rsquo; or a &lsquo;droll
+fellow.&rsquo;&nbsp; In this way, although I was so left-handed a
+toy-maker, I made out to be rather a successful merchant; and
+found means to procure many little delicacies and alleviations,
+such as children or prisoners desire.</p>
+<p>I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy
+man.&nbsp; It is not indeed my character; and I had, in a
+comparison with my comrades, many reasons for content.&nbsp; In
+the first place, I had no family: I was an orphan and a bachelor;
+neither wife nor child awaited me in France.&nbsp; In the second,
+I had never wholly forgot the emotions with which I first found
+myself a prisoner; and although a military prison be not
+altogether a garden of delights, it is still preferable to a
+gallows.&nbsp; In the third, I am almost ashamed to say it, but I
+found a certain pleasure in our place of residence: being an
+obsolete and really mediaeval fortress, high placed and
+commanding extraordinary prospects, not only over sea, mountain,
+and champaign but actually over the thoroughfares of a capital
+city, which we could see blackened by day with the moving crowd
+of the inhabitants, and at night shining with lamps.&nbsp; And
+lastly, although I was not insensible to the restraints of prison
+or the scantiness of our rations, I remembered I had sometimes
+eaten quite as ill in Spain, and had to mount guard and march
+perhaps a dozen leagues into the bargain.&nbsp; The first of my
+troubles, indeed, was the costume we were obliged to wear.&nbsp;
+There is a horrible practice in England to trick out in
+ridiculous uniforms, and as it were to brand in mass, not only
+convicts but military prisoners, and even the children in charity
+schools.&nbsp; I think some malignant genius had found his
+masterpiece of irony in the dress which we were condemned to
+wear: jacket, waistcoat, and trousers of a sulphur or mustard
+yellow, and a shirt or blue-and-white striped cotton.&nbsp; It
+was conspicuous, it was cheap, it pointed us out to
+laughter&mdash;we, who were old soldiers, used to arms, and some
+of us showing noble scars,&mdash;like a set of lugubrious zanies
+at a fair.&nbsp; The old name of that rock on which our prison
+stood was (I have heard since then) the <i>Painted
+Hill</i>.&nbsp; Well, now it was all painted a bright yellow with
+our costumes; and the dress of the soldiers who guarded us being
+of course the essential British red rag, we made up together the
+elements of a lively picture of hell.&nbsp; I have again and
+again looked round upon my fellow-prisoners, and felt my anger
+rise, and choked upon tears, to behold them thus parodied.&nbsp;
+The more part, as I have said, were peasants, somewhat bettered
+perhaps by the drill-sergeant, but for all that ungainly, loutish
+fellows, with no more than a mere barrack-room smartness of
+address: indeed, you could have seen our army nowhere more
+discreditably represented than in this Castle of Edinburgh.&nbsp;
+And I used to see myself in fancy, and blush.&nbsp; It seemed
+that my more elegant carriage would but point the insult of the
+travesty.&nbsp; And I remembered the days when I wore the coarse
+but honourable coat of a soldier; and remembered further back how
+many of the noble, the fair, and the gracious had taken a delight
+to tend my childhood. . . .&nbsp; But I must not recall these
+tender and sorrowful memories twice; their place is further on,
+and I am now upon another business.&nbsp; The perfidy of the
+Britannic Government stood nowhere more openly confessed than in
+one particular of our discipline: that we were shaved twice in
+the week.&nbsp; To a man who has loved all his life to be fresh
+shaven, can a more irritating indignity be devised?&nbsp; Monday
+and Thursday were the days.&nbsp; Take the Thursday, and conceive
+the picture I must present by Sunday evening!&nbsp; And Saturday,
+which was almost as bad, was the great day for visitors.</p>
+<p>Those who came to our market were of all qualities, men and
+women, the lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly
+pretty.&nbsp; Sure, if people at all understood the power of
+beauty, there would be no prayers addressed except to Venus; and
+the mere privilege of beholding a comely woman is worth paying
+for.&nbsp; Our visitors, upon the whole, were not much to boast
+of; and yet, sitting in a corner and very much ashamed of myself
+and my absurd appearance, I have again and again tasted the
+finest, the rarest, and the most ethereal pleasures in a glance
+of an eye that I should never see again&mdash;and never wanted
+to.&nbsp; The flower of the hedgerow and the star in heaven
+satisfy and delight us: how much more the look of that exquisite
+being who was created to bear and rear, to madden and rejoice,
+mankind!</p>
+<p>There was one young lady in particular, about eighteen or
+nineteen, tall, of a gallant carriage, and with a profusion of
+hair in which the sun found threads of gold.&nbsp; As soon as she
+came in the courtyard (and she was a rather frequent visitor) it
+seemed I was aware of it.&nbsp; She had an air of angelic
+candour, yet of a high spirit; she stepped like a Diana, every
+movement was noble and free.&nbsp; One day there was a strong
+east wind; the banner was straining at the flagstaff; below us
+the smoke of the city chimneys blew hither and thither in a
+thousand crazy variations; and away out on the Forth we could see
+the ships lying down to it and scudding.&nbsp; I was thinking
+what a vile day it was, when she appeared.&nbsp; Her hair blew in
+the wind with changes of colour; her garments moulded her with
+the accuracy of sculpture; the ends of her shawl fluttered about
+her ear and were caught in again with an inimitable
+deftness.&nbsp; You have seen a pool on a gusty day, how it
+suddenly sparkles and flashes like a thing alive?&nbsp; So this
+lady&rsquo;s face had become animated and coloured; and as I saw
+her standing, somewhat inclined, her lips parted, a divine
+trouble in her eyes, I could have clapped my hands in applause,
+and was ready to acclaim her a genuine daughter of the
+winds.&nbsp; What put it in my head, I know not: perhaps because
+it was a Thursday and I was new from the razor; but I determined
+to engage her attention no later than that day.&nbsp; She was
+approaching that part of the court in which I sat with my
+merchandise, when I observed her handkerchief to escape from her
+hands and fall to the ground; the next moment the wind had taken
+it up and carried it within my reach.&nbsp; I was on foot at
+once: I had forgot my mustard-coloured clothes, I had forgot the
+private soldier and his salute.&nbsp; Bowing deeply, I offered
+her the slip of cambric.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;your handkerchief.&nbsp;
+The wind brought it me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I met her eyes fully.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I thank you, sir,&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The wind brought it me,&rsquo; I repeated.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;May I not take it for an omen?&nbsp; You have an English
+proverb, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s an ill wind that blows nobody
+good.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; she said, with a smile, &lsquo;&ldquo;One
+good turn deserves another.&rdquo;&nbsp; I will see what you
+have.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She followed me to where my wares were spread out under lee of
+a piece of cannon.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Alas, mademoiselle!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am no very
+perfect craftsman.&nbsp; This is supposed to be a house, and you
+see the chimneys are awry.&nbsp; You may call this a box if you
+are very indulgent; but see where my tool slipped!&nbsp; Yes, I
+am afraid you may go from one to another, and find a flaw in
+everything.&nbsp; <i>Failures for Sale</i> should be on my
+signboard.&nbsp; I do not keep a shop; I keep a Humorous
+Museum.&rsquo;&nbsp; I cast a smiling glance about my display,
+and then at her, and instantly became grave.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Strange, is it not,&rsquo; I added, &lsquo;that a grown
+man and a soldier should be engaged upon such trash, and a sad
+heart produce anything so funny to look at?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>An unpleasant voice summoned her at this moment by the name of
+Flora, and she made a hasty purchase and rejoined her party.</p>
+<p>A few days after she came again.&nbsp; But I must first tell
+you how she came to be so frequent.&nbsp; Her aunt was one of
+those terrible British old maids, of which the world has heard
+much; and having nothing whatever to do, and a word or two of
+French, she had taken what she called an <i>interest in the
+French prisoners</i>.&nbsp; A big, bustling, bold old lady, she
+flounced about our market-place with insufferable airs of
+patronage and condescension.&nbsp; She bought, indeed, with
+liberality, but her manner of studying us through a
+quizzing-glass, and playing cicerone to her followers, acquitted
+us of any gratitude.&nbsp; She had a tail behind her of heavy,
+obsequious old gentlemen, or dull, giggling misses, to whom she
+appeared to be an oracle.&nbsp; &lsquo;This one can really carve
+prettily: is he not a quiz with his big whiskers?&rsquo; she
+would say.&nbsp; &lsquo;And this one,&rsquo; indicating myself
+with her gold eye-glass, &lsquo;is, I assure you, quite an
+oddity.&rsquo;&nbsp; The oddity, you may be certain, ground his
+teeth.&nbsp; She had a way of standing in our midst, nodding
+around, and addressing us in what she imagined to be French:
+&lsquo;<i>Bienne</i>, <i>hommes</i>! <i>&ccedil;a va
+bienne</i>?&rsquo;&nbsp; I took the freedom to reply in the same
+lingo: <i>Bienne</i>, <i>femme</i>! <i>&ccedil;a va couci-couci
+tout d&rsquo;m&ecirc;me</i>, <i>la bourgeoise</i>!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And at that, when we had all laughed with a little more
+heartiness than was entirely civil, &lsquo;I told you he was
+quite an oddity!&rsquo; says she in triumph.&nbsp; Needless to
+say, these passages were before I had remarked the niece.</p>
+<p>The aunt came on the day in question with a following rather
+more than usually large, which she manoeuvred to and fro about
+the market and lectured to at rather more than usual length, and
+with rather less than her accustomed tact.&nbsp; I kept my eyes
+down, but they were ever fixed in the same direction, quite in
+vain.&nbsp; The aunt came and went, and pulled us out, and showed
+us off, like caged monkeys; but the niece kept herself on the
+outskirts of the crowd and on the opposite side of the courtyard,
+and departed at last as she had come, without a sign.&nbsp;
+Closely as I had watched her, I could not say her eyes had ever
+rested on me for an instant; and my heart was overwhelmed with
+bitterness and blackness.&nbsp; I tore out her detested image; I
+felt I was done with her for ever; I laughed at myself savagely,
+because I had thought to please; when I lay down at night sleep
+forsook me, and I lay, and rolled, and gloated on her charms, and
+cursed her insensibility, for half the night.&nbsp; How trivial I
+thought her! and how trivial her sex!&nbsp; A man might be an
+angel or an Apollo, and a mustard-coloured coat would wholly
+blind them to his merits.&nbsp; I was a prisoner, a slave, a
+contemned and despicable being, the butt of her sniggering
+countrymen.&nbsp; I would take the lesson: no proud daughter of
+my foes should have the chance to mock at me again; none in the
+future should have the chance to think I had looked at her with
+admiration.&nbsp; You cannot imagine any one of a more resolute
+and independent spirit, or whose bosom was more wholly mailed
+with patriotic arrogance, than I.&nbsp; Before I dropped asleep,
+I had remembered all the infamies of Britain, and debited them in
+an overwhelming column to Flora.</p>
+<p>The next day, as I sat in my place, I became conscious there
+was some one standing near; and behold, it was herself!&nbsp; I
+kept my seat, at first in the confusion of my mind, later on from
+policy; and she stood, and leaned a little over me, as in
+pity.&nbsp; She was very still and timid; her voice was
+low.&nbsp; Did I suffer in my captivity? she asked me.&nbsp; Had
+I to complain of any hardship?</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mademoiselle, I have not learned to complain,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am a soldier of Napoleon.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She sighed.&nbsp; &lsquo;At least you must regret <i>La
+France</i>,&rsquo; said she, and coloured a little as she
+pronounced the words, which she did with a pretty strangeness of
+accent.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What am I to say?&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;If you
+were carried from this country, for which you seem so wholly
+suited, where the very rains and winds seem to become you like
+ornaments, would you regret, do you think?&nbsp; We must surely
+all regret! the son to his mother, the man to his country; these
+are native feelings.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have a mother?&rsquo; she asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In heaven, mademoiselle,&rsquo; I answered.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;She, and my father also, went by the same road to heaven
+as so many others of the fair and brave: they followed their
+queen upon the scaffold.&nbsp; So, you see, I am not so much to
+be pitied in my prison,&rsquo; I continued: &lsquo;there are none
+to wait for me; I am alone in the world.&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis a
+different case, for instance, with yon poor fellow in the cloth
+cap.&nbsp; His bed is next to mine, and in the night I hear him
+sobbing to himself.&nbsp; He has a tender character, full of
+tender and pretty sentiments; and in the dark at night, and
+sometimes by day when he can get me apart with him, he laments a
+mother and a sweetheart.&nbsp; Do you know what made him take me
+for a confidant?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She parted her lips with a look, but did not speak.&nbsp; The
+look burned all through me with a sudden vital heat.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Because I had once seen, in marching by, the belfry of
+his village!&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;The circumstance is
+quaint enough.&nbsp; It seems to bind up into one the whole
+bundle of those human instincts that make life beautiful, and
+people and places dear&mdash;and from which it would seem I am
+cut off!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I rested my chin on my knee and looked before me on the
+ground.&nbsp; I had been talking until then to hold her; but I
+was now not sorry she should go: an impression is a thing so
+delicate to produce and so easy to overthrow!&nbsp; Presently she
+seemed to make an effort.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I will take this toy,&rsquo; she said, laid a
+five-and-sixpenny piece in my hand, and was gone ere I could
+thank her.</p>
+<p>I retired to a place apart near the ramparts and behind a
+gun.&nbsp; The beauty, the expression of her eyes, the tear that
+had trembled there, the compassion in her voice, and a kind of
+wild elegance that consecrated the freedom of her movements, all
+combined to enslave my imagination and inflame my heart.&nbsp;
+What had she said?&nbsp; Nothing to signify; but her eyes had met
+mine, and the fire they had kindled burned inextinguishably in my
+veins.&nbsp; I loved her; and I did not fear to hope.&nbsp; Twice
+I had spoken with her; and in both interviews I had been well
+inspired, I had engaged her sympathies, I had found words that
+she must remember, that would ring in her ears at night upon her
+bed.&nbsp; What mattered if I were half shaved and my clothes a
+caricature?&nbsp; I was still a man, and I had drawn my image on
+her memory.&nbsp; I was still a man, and, as I trembled to
+realise, she was still a woman.&nbsp; Many waters cannot quench
+love; and love, which is the law of the world, was on my
+side.&nbsp; I closed my eyes, and she sprang up on the background
+of the darkness, more beautiful than in life.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; thought I, &lsquo;and you too, my dear, you too
+must carry away with you a picture, that you are still to behold
+again and still to embellish.&nbsp; In the darkness of night, in
+the streets by day, still you are to have my voice and face,
+whispering, making love for me, encroaching on your shy
+heart.&nbsp; Shy as your heart is, <i>it</i> is lodged
+there&mdash;<i>I</i> am lodged there; let the hours do their
+office&mdash;let time continue to draw me ever in more lively,
+ever in more insidious colours.&rsquo;&nbsp; And then I had a
+vision of myself, and burst out laughing.</p>
+<p>A likely thing, indeed, that a beggar-man, a private soldier,
+a prisoner in a yellow travesty, was to awake the interest of
+this fair girl!&nbsp; I would not despair; but I saw the game
+must be played fine and close.&nbsp; It must be my policy to hold
+myself before her, always in a pathetic or pleasing attitude;
+never to alarm or startle her; to keep my own secret locked in my
+bosom like a story of disgrace, and let hers (if she could be
+induced to have one) grow at its own rate; to move just so fast,
+and not by a hair&rsquo;s-breadth any faster, than the
+inclination of her heart.&nbsp; I was the man, and yet I was
+passive, tied by the foot in prison.&nbsp; I could not go to her;
+I must cast a spell upon her at each visit, so that she should
+return to me; and this was a matter of nice management.&nbsp; I
+had done it the last time&mdash;it seemed impossible she should
+not come again after our interview; and for the next I had
+speedily ripened a fresh plan.&nbsp; A prisoner, if he has one
+great disability for a lover, has yet one considerable advantage:
+there is nothing to distract him, and he can spend all his hours
+ripening his love and preparing its manifestations.&nbsp; I had
+been then some days upon a piece of carving,&mdash;no less than
+the emblem of Scotland, the Lion Rampant.&nbsp; This I proceeded
+to finish with what skill I was possessed of; and when at last I
+could do no more to it (and, you may be sure, was already
+regretting I had done so much), added on the base the following
+dedication.&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">&Agrave; LA BELLE
+FLORA<br />
+<span class="smcap">le prisonnier reconnaissant</span><br />
+<span class="smcap">A. d. St.&nbsp; Y. d. K.</span></p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>I put my heart into the carving of these letters.&nbsp; What
+was done with so much ardour, it seemed scarce possible that any
+should behold with indifference; and the initials would at least
+suggest to her my noble birth.&nbsp; I thought it better to
+suggest: I felt that mystery was my stock-in-trade; the contrast
+between my rank and manners, between my speech and my clothing,
+and the fact that she could only think of me by a combination of
+letters, must all tend to increase her interest and engage her
+heart.</p>
+<p>This done, there was nothing left for me but to wait and to
+hope.&nbsp; And there is nothing further from my character: in
+love and in war, I am all for the forward movement; and these
+days of waiting made my purgatory.&nbsp; It is a fact that I
+loved her a great deal better at the end of them, for love comes,
+like bread, from a perpetual rehandling.&nbsp; And besides, I was
+fallen into a panic of fear.&nbsp; How, if she came no more, how
+was I to continue to endure my empty days? how was I to fall back
+and find my interest in the major&rsquo;s lessons, the
+lieutenant&rsquo;s chess, in a twopenny sale in the market, or a
+halfpenny addition to the prison fare?</p>
+<p>Days went by, and weeks; I had not the courage to calculate,
+and to-day I have not the courage to remember; but at last she
+was there.&nbsp; At last I saw her approach me in the company of
+a boy about her own age, and whom I divined at once to be her
+brother.</p>
+<p>I rose and bowed in silence.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This is my brother, Mr. Ronald Gilchrist,&rsquo; said
+she.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have told him of your sufferings.&nbsp; He is
+so sorry for you!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is more than I have the right to ask,&rsquo; I
+replied; &lsquo;but among gentlefolk these generous sentiments
+are natural.&nbsp; If your brother and I were to meet in the
+field, we should meet like tigers; but when he sees me here
+disarmed and helpless, he forgets his animosity.&rsquo;&nbsp; (At
+which, as I had ventured to expect, this beardless champion
+coloured to the ears for pleasure.)&nbsp; &lsquo;Ah, my dear
+young lady,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;there are many of your
+countrymen languishing in my country, even as I do here.&nbsp; I
+can but hope there is found some French lady to convey to each of
+them the priceless consolation of her sympathy.&nbsp; You have
+given me alms; and more than alms&mdash;hope; and while you were
+absent I was not forgetful.&nbsp; Suffer me to be able to tell
+myself that I have at least tried to make a return; and for the
+prisoner&rsquo;s sake deign to accept this trifle.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, I offered her my lion, which she took, looked at in
+some embarrassment, and then, catching sight of the dedication,
+broke out with a cry.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, how did you know my name?&rsquo; she
+exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;When names are so appropriate, they should be easily
+guessed,&rsquo; said I, bowing.&nbsp; &lsquo;But indeed, there
+was no magic in the matter.&nbsp; A lady called you by name on
+the day I found your handkerchief, and I was quick to remark and
+cherish it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is very, very beautiful,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;and
+I shall be always proud of the inscription.&mdash;Come, Ronald,
+we must be going.&rsquo;&nbsp; She bowed to me as a lady bows to
+her equal, and passed on (I could have sworn) with a heightened
+colour.</p>
+<p>I was overjoyed: my innocent ruse had succeeded; she had taken
+my gift without a hint of payment, and she would scarce sleep in
+peace till she had made it up to me.&nbsp; No greenhorn in
+matters of the heart, I was besides aware that I had now a
+resident ambassador at the court of my lady.&nbsp; The lion might
+be ill chiselled; it was mine.&nbsp; My hands had made and held
+it; my knife&mdash;or, to speak more by the mark, my rusty
+nail&mdash;had traced those letters; and simple as the words
+were, they would keep repeating to her that I was grateful and
+that I found her fair.&nbsp; The boy had looked like a gawky, and
+blushed at a compliment; I could see besides that he regarded me
+with considerable suspicion; yet he made so manly a figure of a
+lad, that I could not withhold from him my sympathy.&nbsp; And as
+for the impulse that had made her bring and introduce him, I
+could not sufficiently admire it.&nbsp; It seemed to me finer
+than wit, and more tender than a caress.&nbsp; It said (plain as
+language), &lsquo;I do not and I cannot know you.&nbsp; Here is
+my brother&mdash;you can know him; this is the way to
+me&mdash;follow it.&rsquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II&mdash;A TALE OF A PAIR OF SCISSORS</h2>
+<p>I was still plunged in these thoughts when the bell was rung
+that discharged our visitors into the street.&nbsp; Our little
+market was no sooner closed than we were summoned to the
+distribution, and received our rations, which we were then
+allowed to eat according to fancy in any part of our
+quarters.</p>
+<p>I have said the conduct of some of our visitors was unbearably
+offensive; it was possibly more so than they dreamed&mdash;as the
+sight-seers at a menagerie may offend in a thousand ways, and
+quite without meaning it, the noble and unfortunate animals
+behind the bars; and there is no doubt but some of my compatriots
+were susceptible beyond reason.&nbsp; Some of these old
+whiskerandos, originally peasants, trained since boyhood in
+victorious armies, and accustomed to move among subject and
+trembling populations, could ill brook their change of
+circumstance.&nbsp; There was one man of the name of Goguelat, a
+brute of the first water, who had enjoyed no touch of
+civilisation beyond the military discipline, and had risen by an
+extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which he was otherwise
+unfitted&mdash;that of <i>mar&eacute;chal des logis</i> in the
+22nd of the line.&nbsp; In so far as a brute can be a good
+soldier, he was a good soldier; the Cross was on his breast, and
+gallantly earned; but in all things outside his line of duty the
+man was no other than a brawling, bruising ignorant pillar of low
+pothouses.&nbsp; As a gentleman by birth, and a scholar by taste
+and education, I was the type of all that he least understood and
+most detested; and the mere view of our visitors would leave him
+daily in a transport of annoyance, which he would make haste to
+wreak on the nearest victim, and too often on myself.</p>
+<p>It was so now.&nbsp; Our rations were scarce served out, and I
+had just withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived
+him drawing near.&nbsp; He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of
+young fools, among whom he passed for a wit, followed him with
+looks of expectation; and I saw I was about to be the object of
+some of his insufferable pleasantries.&nbsp; He took a place
+beside me, spread out his rations, drank to me derisively from
+his measure of prison beer, and began.&nbsp; What he said it
+would be impossible to print; but his admirers, who believed
+their wit to have surpassed himself, actually rolled among the
+gravel.&nbsp; For my part, I thought at first I should have
+died.&nbsp; I had not dreamed the wretch was so observant; but
+hate sharpens the ears, and he had counted our interviews and
+actually knew Flora by her name.&nbsp; Gradually my coolness
+returned to me, accompanied by a volume of living anger that
+surprised myself.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Are you nearly done?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Because if you are, I am about to say a word or two
+myself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, fair play!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Turn
+about!&nbsp; The Marquis of Carabas to the tribune.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Very well,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have to inform
+you that I am a gentleman.&nbsp; You do not know what that means,
+hey?&nbsp; Well, I will tell you.&nbsp; It is a comical sort of
+animal; springs from another strange set of creatures they call
+ancestors; and, in common with toads and other vermin, has a
+thing that he calls feelings.&nbsp; The lion is a gentleman; he
+will not touch carrion.&nbsp; I am a gentleman, and I cannot bear
+to soil my fingers with such a lump of dirt.&nbsp; Sit still,
+Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not say a word, or I shall
+know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are upon us.&nbsp;
+Here is your health!&rsquo; said I, and pledged him in the prison
+beer.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a
+young child,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;who might be your
+daughter, and who was giving alms to me and some others of us
+mendicants.&nbsp; If the
+Emperor&rsquo;&mdash;saluting&mdash;&lsquo;if my Emperor could
+hear you, he would pluck off the Cross from your gross
+body.&nbsp; I cannot do that; I cannot take away what His Majesty
+has given; but one thing I promise you&mdash;I promise you,
+Goguelat, you shall be dead to-night.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought
+there was no end to my forbearance, and he was at first
+amazed.&nbsp; But I have the pleasure to think that some of my
+expressions had pierced through his thick hide; and besides, the
+brute was truly a hero of valour, and loved fighting for
+itself.&nbsp; Whatever the cause, at least, he had soon pulled
+himself together, and took the thing (to do him justice)
+handsomely.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I promise you, by the devil&rsquo;s horns, that you
+shall have the chance!&rsquo; said he, and pledged me again; and
+again I did him scrupulous honour.</p>
+<p>The news of this defiance spread from prisoner to prisoner
+with the speed of wings; every face was seen to be illuminated
+like those of the spectators at a horse-race; and indeed you must
+first have tasted the active life of a soldier, and then
+mouldered for a while in the tedium of a jail, in order to
+understand, perhaps even to excuse, the delight of our
+companions.&nbsp; Goguelat and I slept in the same squad, which
+greatly simplified the business; and a committee of honour was
+accordingly formed of our shed-mates.&nbsp; They chose for
+president a sergeant-major in the 4th Dragoons, a greybeard of
+the army, an excellent military subject, and a good man.&nbsp; He
+took the most serious view of his functions, visited us both, and
+reported our replies to the committee.&nbsp; Mine was of a decent
+firmness.&nbsp; I told him the young lady of whom Goguelat had
+spoken had on several occasions given me alms.&nbsp; I reminded
+him that, if we were now reduced to hold out our hands and sell
+pill-boxes for charity, it was something very new for soldiers of
+the Empire.&nbsp; We had all seen bandits standing at a corner of
+a wood truckling for copper halfpence, and after their
+benefactors were gone spitting out injuries and curses.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I trust that none of us will
+fall so low.&nbsp; As a Frenchman and a soldier, I owe that young
+child gratitude, and am bound to protect her character, and to
+support that of the army.&nbsp; You are my elder and my superior:
+tell me if I am not right.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He was a quiet-mannered old fellow, and patted me with three
+fingers on the back.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>C&rsquo;est bien</i>, <i>mon
+enfant</i>,&rsquo; says he, and returned to his committee.</p>
+<p>Goguelat was no more accommodating than myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+do not like apologies nor those that make them,&rsquo; was his
+only answer.&nbsp; And there remained nothing but to arrange the
+details of the meeting.&nbsp; So far as regards place and time we
+had no choice; we must settle the dispute at night, in the dark,
+after a round had passed by, and in the open middle of the shed
+under which we slept.&nbsp; The question of arms was more
+obscure.&nbsp; We had a good many tools, indeed, which we
+employed in the manufacture of our toys; but they were none of
+them suited for a single combat between civilised men, and, being
+nondescript, it was found extremely hard to equalise the chances
+of the combatants.&nbsp; At length a pair of scissors was
+unscrewed; and a couple of tough wands being found in a corner of
+the courtyard, one blade of the scissors was lashed solidly to
+each with resined twine&mdash;the twine coming I know not whence,
+but the resin from the green pillars of the shed, which still
+sweated from the axe.&nbsp; It was a strange thing to feel in
+one&rsquo;s hand this weapon, which was no heavier than a
+riding-rod, and which it was difficult to suppose would prove
+more dangerous.&nbsp; A general oath was administered and taken,
+that no one should interfere in the duel nor (suppose it to
+result seriously) betray the name of the survivor.&nbsp; And with
+that, all being then ready, we composed ourselves to await the
+moment.</p>
+<p>The evening fell cloudy; not a star was to be seen when the
+first round of the night passed through our shed and wound off
+along the ramparts; and as we took our places, we could still
+hear, over the murmurs of the surrounding city, the sentries
+challenging its further passage.&nbsp; Leclos, the
+sergeant-major, set us in our stations, engaged our wands, and
+left us.&nbsp; To avoid blood-stained clothing, my adversary and
+I had stripped to the shoes; and the chill of the night enveloped
+our bodies like a wet sheet.&nbsp; The man was better at fencing
+than myself; he was vastly taller than I, being of a stature
+almost gigantic, and proportionately strong.&nbsp; In the inky
+blackness of the shed, it was impossible to see his eyes; and
+from the suppleness of the wands, I did not like to trust to a
+parade.&nbsp; I made up my mind accordingly to profit, if I
+might, by my defect; and as soon as the signal should be given,
+to throw myself down and lunge at the same moment.&nbsp; It was
+to play my life upon one card: should I not mortally wound him,
+no defence would be left me; what was yet more appalling, I thus
+ran the risk of bringing my own face against his scissor with the
+double force of our assaults, and my face and eyes are not that
+part of me that I would the most readily expose.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;<i>Allez</i>!&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.</p>
+<p>Both lunged in the same moment with an equal fury, and but for
+my manoeuvre both had certainly been spitted.&nbsp; As it was, he
+did no more than strike my shoulder, while my scissor plunged
+below the girdle into a mortal part; and that great bulk of a
+man, falling from his whole height, knocked me immediately
+senseless.</p>
+<p>When I came to myself I was laid in my own sleeping-place, and
+could make out in the darkness the outline of perhaps a dozen
+heads crowded around me.&nbsp; I sat up.&nbsp; &lsquo;What is
+it?&rsquo; I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Hush!&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Blessed be God, all is well.&rsquo;&nbsp; I felt him clasp
+my hand, and there were tears in his voice.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis but a scratch, my child; here is papa, who is
+taking good care of you.&nbsp; Your shoulder is bound up; we have
+dressed you in your clothes again, and it will all be
+well.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this I began to remember.&nbsp; &lsquo;And Goguelat?&rsquo;
+I gasped.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He cannot bear to be moved; he has his bellyful;
+&rsquo;tis a bad business,&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.</p>
+<p>The idea of having killed a man with such an instrument as
+half a pair of scissors seemed to turn my stomach.&nbsp; I am
+sure I might have killed a dozen with a firelock, a sabre, a
+bayonet, or any accepted weapon, and been visited by no such
+sickness of remorse.&nbsp; And to this feeling every unusual
+circumstance of our rencounter, the darkness in which we had
+fought, our nakedness, even the resin on the twine, appeared to
+contribute.&nbsp; I ran to my fallen adversary, kneeled by him,
+and could only sob his name.</p>
+<p>He bade me compose myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have given me the
+key of the fields, comrade,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Sans
+rancune</i>!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this my horror redoubled.&nbsp; Here had we two expatriated
+Frenchmen engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of
+beasts.&nbsp; Here was he, who had been all his life so great a
+ruffian, dying in a foreign land of this ignoble injury, and
+meeting death with something of the spirit of a Bayard.&nbsp; I
+insisted that the guards should be summoned and a doctor
+brought.&nbsp; &lsquo;It may still be possible to save
+him,&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;If you had been wounded,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you must
+have lain there till the patrol came by and found you.&nbsp; It
+happens to be Goguelat&mdash;and so must he!&nbsp; Come, child,
+time to go to by-by.&rsquo;&nbsp; And as I still resisted,
+&lsquo;Champdivers!&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;this is
+weakness.&nbsp; You pain me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, off to your beds with you!&rsquo; said Goguelat,
+and named us in a company with one of his jovial gross
+epithets.</p>
+<p>Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what
+they certainly were far from experiencing, sleep.&nbsp; It was
+not yet late.&nbsp; The city, from far below, and all around us,
+sent up a sound of wheels and feet and lively voices.&nbsp; Yet
+awhile, and the curtain of the cloud was rent across, and in the
+space of sky between the eaves of the shed and the irregular
+outline of the ramparts a multitude of stars appeared.&nbsp;
+Meantime, in the midst of us lay Goguelat, and could not always
+withhold himself from groaning.</p>
+<p>We heard the round far off; heard it draw slowly nearer.&nbsp;
+Last of all, it turned the corner and moved into our field of
+vision: two file of men and a corporal with a lantern, which he
+swung to and fro, so as to cast its light in the recesses of the
+yards and sheds.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Hullo!&rsquo; cried the corporal, pausing as he came by
+Goguelat.</p>
+<p>He stooped with his lantern.&nbsp; All our hearts were
+flying.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What devil&rsquo;s work is this?&rsquo; he cried, and
+with a startling voice summoned the guard.</p>
+<p>We were all afoot upon the instant; more lanterns and soldiers
+crowded in front of the shed; an officer elbowed his way
+in.&nbsp; In the midst was the big naked body, soiled with
+blood.&nbsp; Some one had covered him with his blanket; but as he
+lay there in agony, he had partly thrown it off.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This is murder!&rsquo; cried the officer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You wild beasts, you will hear of this
+to-morrow.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As Goguelat was raised and laid upon a stretcher, he cried to
+us a cheerful and blasphemous farewell.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III&mdash;MAJOR CHEVENIX COMES INTO THE STORY, AND
+GOGUELAT GOES OUT</h2>
+<p>There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost
+in getting the man&rsquo;s deposition.&nbsp; He gave but the one
+account of it: that he had committed suicide because he was sick
+of seeing so many Englishmen.&nbsp; The doctor vowed it was
+impossible, the nature and direction of the wound forbidding
+it.&nbsp; Goguelat replied that he was more ingenious than the
+other thought for, and had propped up the weapon in the ground
+and fallen on the point&mdash;&lsquo;just like
+Nebuchadnezzar,&rsquo; he added, winking to the assistants.&nbsp;
+The doctor, who was a little, spruce, ruddy man of an impatient
+temper, pished and pshawed and swore over his patient.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Nothing to be made of him!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;A
+perfect heathen.&nbsp; If we could only find the
+weapon!&rsquo;&nbsp; But the weapon had ceased to exist.&nbsp; A
+little resined twine was perhaps blowing about in the castle
+gutters; some bits of broken stick may have trailed in corners;
+and behold, in the pleasant air of the morning, a dandy prisoner
+trimming his nails with a pair of scissors!</p>
+<p>Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the
+authorities did not leave the rest of us in peace.&nbsp; No stone
+was left unturned.&nbsp; We were had in again and again to be
+examined, now singly, now in twos and threes.&nbsp; We were
+threatened with all sorts of impossible severities and tempted
+with all manner of improbable rewards.&nbsp; I suppose I was five
+times interrogated, and came off from each with flying
+colours.&nbsp; I am like old Souvaroff, I cannot understand a
+soldier being taken aback by any question; he should answer, as
+he marches on the fire, with an instant briskness and
+gaiety.&nbsp; I may have been short of bread, gold or grace; I
+was never yet found wanting in an answer.&nbsp; My comrades, if
+they were not all so ready, were none of them less staunch; and I
+may say here at once that the inquiry came to nothing at the
+time, and the death of Goguelat remained a mystery of the
+prison.&nbsp; Such were the veterans of France!&nbsp; And yet I
+should be disingenuous if I did not own this was a case apart; in
+ordinary circumstances, some one might have stumbled or been
+intimidated into an admission; and what bound us together with a
+closeness beyond that of mere comrades was a secret to which we
+were all committed and a design in which all were equally
+engaged.&nbsp; No need to inquire as to its nature: there is only
+one desire, and only one kind of design, that blooms in
+prisons.&nbsp; And the fact that our tunnel was near done
+supported and inspired us.</p>
+<p>I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the
+sittings of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no
+one listens to; and yet I was unmasked&mdash;I, whom my very
+adversary defended, as good as confessed, as good as told the
+nature of the quarrel, and by so doing prepared for myself in the
+future a most anxious, disagreeable adventure.&nbsp; It was the
+third morning after the duel, and Goguelat was still in life,
+when the time came round for me to give Major Chevenix a
+lesson.&nbsp; I was fond of this occupation; not that he paid me
+much&mdash;no more, indeed, than eighteenpence a month, the
+customary figure, being a miser in the grain; but because I liked
+his breakfasts and (to some extent) himself.&nbsp; At least, he
+was a man of education; and of the others with whom I had any
+opportunity of speech, those that would not have held a book
+upsidedown would have torn the pages out for pipe-lights.&nbsp;
+For I must repeat again that our body of prisoners was
+exceptional: there was in Edinburgh Castle none of that
+educational busyness that distinguished some of the other
+prisons, so that men entered them unable to read, and left them
+fit for high employments.&nbsp; Chevenix was handsome, and
+surprisingly young to be a major: six feet in his stockings, well
+set up, with regular features and very clear grey eyes.&nbsp; It
+was impossible to pick a fault in him, and yet the sum-total was
+displeasing.&nbsp; Perhaps he was too clean; he seemed to bear
+about with him the smell of soap.&nbsp; Cleanliness is good, but
+I cannot bear a man&rsquo;s nails to seem japanned.&nbsp; And
+certainly he was too self-possessed and cold.&nbsp; There was
+none of the fire of youth, none of the swiftness of the soldier,
+in this young officer.&nbsp; His kindness was cold, and cruel
+cold; his deliberation exasperating.&nbsp; And perhaps it was
+from this character, which is very much the opposite of my own,
+that even in these days, when he was of service to me, I
+approached him with suspicion and reserve.</p>
+<p>I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six
+faults.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;H&rsquo;m.&nbsp; Six,&rsquo; says he, looking at the
+paper.&nbsp; &lsquo;Very annoying!&nbsp; I can never get it
+right.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, but you make excellent progress!&rsquo; I
+said.&nbsp; I would not discourage him, you understand, but he
+was congenitally unable to learn French.&nbsp; Some fire, I
+think, is needful, and he had quenched his fire in soapsuds.</p>
+<p>He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and
+looked at me with clear, severe eyes.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think we must have a little talk,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am entirely at your disposition,&rsquo; I replied;
+but I quaked, for I knew what subject to expect.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have been some time giving me these lessons,&rsquo;
+he went on, &lsquo;and I am tempted to think rather well of
+you.&nbsp; I believe you are a gentleman.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have that honour, sir,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have seen me for the same period.&nbsp; I do not
+know how I strike you; but perhaps you will be prepared to
+believe that I also am a man of honour,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I require no assurances; the thing is manifest,&rsquo;
+and I bowed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Very well, then,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+about this Goguelat?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You heard me yesterday before the court,&rsquo; I
+began.&nbsp; &lsquo;I was awakened only&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh yes; I &ldquo;heard you yesterday before the
+court,&rdquo; no doubt,&rsquo; he interrupted, &lsquo;and I
+remember perfectly that you were &ldquo;awakened
+only.&rdquo;&nbsp; I could repeat the most of it by rote,
+indeed.&nbsp; But do you suppose that I believed you for a
+moment?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it
+here,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I may be wrong&mdash;we shall soon see,&rsquo; says he;
+&lsquo;but my impression is that you will not &ldquo;repeat it
+here.&rdquo;&nbsp; My impression is that you have come into this
+room, and that you will tell me something before you go
+out.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I shrugged my shoulders.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Let me explain,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your
+evidence, of course, is nonsense.&nbsp; I put it by, and the
+court put it by.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My compliments and thanks!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You <i>must</i> know&mdash;that&rsquo;s the short and
+the long,&rsquo; he proceeded.&nbsp; &lsquo;All of you in shed B
+are bound to know.&nbsp; And I want to ask you where is the
+common-sense of keeping up this farce, and maintaining this
+cock-and-bull story between friends.&nbsp; Come, come, my good
+fellow, own yourself beaten, and laugh at it yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I hear you, go ahead,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You put your heart in it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He crossed his legs slowly.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can very well
+understand,&rsquo; he began, &lsquo;that precautions have had to
+be taken.&nbsp; I dare say an oath was administered.&nbsp; I can
+comprehend that perfectly.&rsquo;&nbsp; (He was watching me all
+the time with his cold, bright eyes.)&nbsp; &lsquo;And I can
+comprehend that, about an affair of honour, you would be very
+particular to keep it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;About an affair of honour?&rsquo; I repeated, like a
+man quite puzzled.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It was not an affair of honour, then?&rsquo; he
+asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What was not?&nbsp; I do not follow,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat awhile silent, and
+began again in the same placid and good-natured voice: &lsquo;The
+court and I were at one in setting aside your evidence.&nbsp; It
+could not deceive a child.&nbsp; But there was a difference
+between myself and the other officers, because <i>I knew my
+man</i> and they did not.&nbsp; They saw in you a common soldier,
+and I knew you for a gentleman.&nbsp; To them your evidence was a
+leash of lies, which they yawned to hear you telling.&nbsp; Now,
+I was asking myself, how far will a gentleman go?&nbsp; Not
+surely so far as to help hush a murder up?&nbsp; So
+that&mdash;when I heard you tell how you knew nothing of the
+matter, and were only awakened by the corporal, and all the rest
+of it&mdash;I translated your statements into something
+else.&nbsp; Now, Champdivers,&rsquo; he cried, springing up
+lively and coming towards me with animation, &lsquo;I am going to
+tell you what that was, and you are going to help me to see
+justice done: how, I don&rsquo;t know, for of course you are
+under oath&mdash;but somehow.&nbsp; Mark what I&rsquo;m going to
+say.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder;
+and whether he said anything more or came to a full stop at once,
+I am sure I could not tell you to this day.&nbsp; For, as the
+devil would have it, the shoulder he laid hold of was the one
+Goguelat had pinked.&nbsp; The wound was but a scratch; it was
+healing with the first intention; but in the clutch of Major
+Chevenix it gave me agony.&nbsp; My head swam; the sweat poured
+off my face; I must have grown deadly pale.</p>
+<p>He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What is wrong with you?&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is nothing,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A
+qualm.&nbsp; It has gone by.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Are you sure?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are as
+white as a sheet.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh no, I assure you!&nbsp; Nothing whatever.&nbsp; I am
+my own man again,&rsquo; I said, though I could scarce command my
+tongue.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, shall I go on again?&rsquo; says he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Can you follow me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, by all means!&rsquo; said I, and mopped my
+streaming face upon my sleeve, for you may be sure in those days
+I had no handkerchief.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you are sure you can follow me.&nbsp; That was a
+very sudden and sharp seizure,&rsquo; he said doubtfully.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But if you are sure, all right, and here goes.&nbsp; An
+affair of honour among you fellows would, naturally, be a little
+difficult to carry out, perhaps it would be impossible to have it
+wholly regular.&nbsp; And yet a duel might be very irregular in
+form, and, under the peculiar circumstances of the case, loyal
+enough in effect.&nbsp; Do you take me?&nbsp; Now, as a gentleman
+and a soldier.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me.&nbsp; I
+could bear no more, and winced away from him.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; I cried,&nbsp; &lsquo;not that.&nbsp; Do not
+put your hand upon my shoulder.&nbsp; I cannot bear it.&nbsp; It
+is rheumatism,&rsquo; I made haste to add.&nbsp; &lsquo;My
+shoulder is inflamed and very painful.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sorry about your shoulder,&rsquo; he said at
+last.&nbsp; &lsquo;Let me send for the doctor.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not in the least,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is a
+trifle.&nbsp; I am quite used to it.&nbsp; It does not trouble me
+in the smallest.&nbsp; At any rate, I don&rsquo;t believe in
+doctors.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;All right,&rsquo; said he, and sat and smoked a good
+while in a silence which I would have given anything to
+break.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,&rsquo; he began presently, &lsquo;I
+believe there is nothing left for me to learn.&nbsp; I presume I
+may say that I know all.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;About what?&rsquo; said I boldly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;About Goguelat,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon.&nbsp; I cannot conceive,&rsquo; said
+I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh,&rsquo; says the major, &lsquo;the man fell in a
+duel, and by your hand!&nbsp; I am not an infant.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By no means,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But you seem
+to me to be a good deal of a theorist.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Shall we test it?&rsquo; he asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+doctor is close by.&nbsp; If there is not an open wound on your
+shoulder, I am wrong.&nbsp; If there is&mdash;&rsquo;&nbsp; He
+waved his hand.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I advise you to think
+twice.&nbsp; There is a deuce of a nasty drawback to the
+experiment&mdash;that what might have remained private between us
+two becomes public property.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, well!&rsquo; said I, with a laugh, &lsquo;anything
+rather than a doctor!&nbsp; I cannot bear the breed.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still
+far from comfortable.</p>
+<p>Major Chevenix smoked awhile, looking now at his cigar ash,
+now at me.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m a soldier myself,&rsquo; he
+says presently, &lsquo;and I&rsquo;ve been out in my time and hit
+my man.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t want to run any one into a corner for
+an affair that was at all necessary or correct.&nbsp; At the same
+time, I want to know that much, and I&rsquo;ll take your word of
+honour for it.&nbsp; Otherwise, I shall be very sorry, but the
+doctor must be called in.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I neither admit anything nor deny anything,&rsquo; I
+returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;But if this form of words will suffice
+you, here is what I say: I give you my parole, as a gentleman and
+a soldier, there has nothing taken place amongst us prisoners
+that was not honourable as the day.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;All right,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;That was all I
+wanted.&nbsp; You can go now, Champdivers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And as I was going out he added, with a laugh: &lsquo;By the
+bye, I ought to apologise: I had no idea I was applying the
+torture!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a
+piece of paper in his hand.&nbsp; He seemed hot and angry, and
+had certainly no mind to be polite.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Which of you
+fellows knows any English?&nbsp; Oh!&rsquo;&mdash;spying
+me&mdash;&lsquo;there you are, what&rsquo;s your name!&nbsp;
+<i>You&rsquo;ll</i> do.&nbsp; Tell these fellows that the other
+fellow&rsquo;s dying.&nbsp; He&rsquo;s booked; no use talking; I
+expect he&rsquo;ll go by evening.&nbsp; And tell them I
+don&rsquo;t envy the feelings of the fellow who spiked him.&nbsp;
+Tell them that first.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I did so.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then you can tell &rsquo;em,&rsquo; he resumed,
+&lsquo;that the fellow, Goggle&mdash;what&rsquo;s his
+name?&mdash;wants to see some of them before he gets his marching
+orders.&nbsp; If I got it right, he wants to kiss or embrace you,
+or some sickening stuff.&nbsp; Got that?&nbsp; Then here&rsquo;s
+a list he&rsquo;s had written, and you&rsquo;d better read it out
+to them&mdash;I can&rsquo;t make head or tail of your beastly
+names&mdash;and they can answer <i>present</i>, and fall in
+against that wall.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I
+read the first name on the list.&nbsp; I had no wish to look
+again on my own handiwork; my flesh recoiled from the idea; and
+how could I be sure what reception he designed to give me?&nbsp;
+The cure was in my own hand; I could pass that first name
+over&mdash;the doctor would not know&mdash;and I might stay
+away.&nbsp; But to the subsequent great gladness of my heart, I
+did not dwell for an instant on the thought, walked over to the
+designated wall, faced about, read out the name
+&lsquo;Champdivers,&rsquo; and answered myself with the word
+&lsquo;Present.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>There were some half dozen on the list, all told; and as soon
+as we were mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and
+we followed after, like a fatigue party, in single file.&nbsp; At
+the door he paused, told us &lsquo;the fellow&rsquo; would see
+each of us alone, and, as soon as I had explained that, sent me
+by myself into the ward.&nbsp; It was a small room, whitewashed;
+a south window stood open on a vast depth of air and a spacious
+and distant prospect; and from deep below, in the Grassmarket the
+voices of hawkers came up clear and far away.&nbsp; Hard by, on a
+little bed, lay Goguelat.&nbsp; The sunburn had not yet faded
+from his face, and the stamp of death was already there.&nbsp;
+There was something wild and unmannish in his smile, that took me
+by the throat; only death and love know or have ever seen
+it.&nbsp; And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse
+talk.</p>
+<p>He held out his arms as if to embrace me.&nbsp; I drew near
+with incredible shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms
+with overwhelming disgust.&nbsp; But he only drew my ear down to
+his lips.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Trust me,&rsquo; he whispered.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Je suis
+bon bougre</i>, <i>moi</i>.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll take it to hell with
+me, and tell the devil.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and
+trivialities?&nbsp; All that he thought, at that hour, was even
+noble, though he could not clothe it otherwise than in the
+language of a brutal farce.&nbsp; Presently he bade me call the
+doctor; and when that officer had come in, raised a little up in
+his bed, pointed first to himself and then to me, who stood
+weeping by his side, and several times repeated the expression,
+&lsquo;Frinds&mdash;frinds&mdash;dam frinds.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much
+affected.&nbsp; He nodded his little bob-wigged head at us, and
+said repeatedly, &lsquo;All right, Johnny&mdash;me
+comprong.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I
+went out of the room sobbing like an infant.</p>
+<p>How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable
+fellows make the happiest exits!&nbsp; It is a fate we may well
+envy them.&nbsp; Goguelat was detested in life; in the last three
+days, by his admirable staunchness and consideration, he won
+every heart; and when word went about the prison the same evening
+that he was no more, the voice of conversation became hushed as
+in a house of mourning.</p>
+<p>For myself I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what
+ailed me: when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it;
+but that night I was filled with a gloomy fury of the
+nerves.&nbsp; I had killed him; he had done his utmost to protect
+me; I had seen him with that awful smile.&nbsp; And so illogical
+and useless is this sentiment of remorse, that I was ready, at a
+word or a look, to quarrel with somebody else.&nbsp; I presume
+the disposition of my mind was imprinted on my face; and when, a
+little after, I overtook, saluted and addressed the doctor, he
+looked on me with commiseration and surprise.</p>
+<p>I had asked him if it was true.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;the fellow&rsquo;s
+gone.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Did he suffer much?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb,&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; He looked on me a little, and I saw his hand go to his
+fob.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here, take that! no sense in fretting,&rsquo;
+he said, and, putting a silver two-penny-bit in my hand, he left
+me.</p>
+<p>I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall,
+for it was the man&rsquo;s one act of charity in all my knowledge
+of him.&nbsp; Instead of that, I stood looking at it in my hand
+and laughed out bitterly, as I realised his mistake; then went to
+the ramparts, and flung it far into the air like blood
+money.&nbsp; The night was falling; through an embrasure and
+across the gardened valley I saw the lamplighters hasting along
+Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and looked on moodily.&nbsp;
+As I was so standing a hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I
+turned about.&nbsp; It was Major Chevenix, dressed for the
+evening, and his neckcloth really admirably folded.&nbsp; I never
+denied the man could dress.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;I thought it was you,
+Champdivers.&nbsp; So he&rsquo;s gone?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I nodded.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come, come,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you must cheer
+up.&nbsp; Of course it&rsquo;s very distressing, very painful and
+all that.&nbsp; But do you know, it ain&rsquo;t such a bad thing
+either for you or me?&nbsp; What with his death and your visit to
+him I am entirely reassured.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I had rather not discuss it,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;one word more, and
+I&rsquo;ll agree to bury the subject.&nbsp; What did you fight
+about?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, what do men ever fight about?&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A lady?&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>I shrugged my shoulders.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Deuce you did!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I should
+scarce have thought it of him.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;He!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;He never dared to address
+her&mdash;only to look at her and vomit his vile insults!&nbsp;
+She may have given him sixpence: if she did, it may take him to
+heaven yet!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a
+considering look, and brought up sharply.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Good night to
+you, Champdivers.&nbsp; Come to me at breakfast-time to-morrow,
+and we&rsquo;ll talk of other subjects.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I fully admit the man&rsquo;s conduct was not bad: in writing
+it down so long after the events I can even see that it was
+good.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV&mdash;ST. IVES GETS A BUNDLE OF BANK NOTES</h2>
+<p>I was surprised one morning, shortly after, to find myself the
+object of marked consideration by a civilian and a
+stranger.&nbsp; This was a man of the middle age; he had a face
+of a mulberry colour, round black eyes, comical tufted eyebrows,
+and a protuberant forehead; and was dressed in clothes of a
+Quakerish cut.&nbsp; In spite of his plainness, he had that
+inscrutable air of a man well-to-do in his affairs.&nbsp; I
+conceived he had been some while observing me from a distance,
+for a sparrow sat betwixt us quite unalarmed on the breech of a
+piece of cannon.&nbsp; So soon as our eyes met, he drew near and
+addressed me in the French language, which he spoke with a good
+fluency but an abominable accent.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have the pleasure of addressing Monsieur le Vicomte
+Anne de K&eacute;roual de Saint-Yves?&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I do not call myself all
+that; but I have a right to, if I chose.&nbsp; In the meanwhile I
+call myself plain Champdivers, at your disposal.&nbsp; It was my
+mother&rsquo;s name, and good to go soldiering with.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think not quite,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;for if I
+remember rightly, your mother also had the particle.&nbsp; Her
+name was Florimonde de Champdivers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Right again!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and I am extremely
+pleased to meet a gentleman so well informed in my
+quarterings.&nbsp; Is monsieur Born himself?&rsquo;&nbsp; This I
+said with a great air of assumption, partly to conceal the degree
+of curiosity with which my visitor had inspired me, and in part
+because it struck me as highly incongruous and comical in my
+prison garb and on the lips of a private soldier.</p>
+<p>He seemed to think so too, for he laughed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, sir,&rsquo; he returned, speaking this time in
+English; &lsquo;I am not &ldquo;<i>born</i>,&rdquo; as you call
+it, and must content myself with <i>dying</i>, of which I am
+equally susceptible with the best of you.&nbsp; My name is Mr.
+Romaine&mdash;Daniel Romaine&mdash;a solicitor of London City, at
+your service; and, what will perhaps interest you more, I am here
+at the request of your great-uncle, the Count.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What!&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;does M. de K&eacute;roual
+de St.-Yves remember the existence of such a person as myself,
+and will he deign to count kinship with a soldier of
+Napoleon?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You speak English well,&rsquo; observed my visitor.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It has been a second language to me from a
+child,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I had an English nurse; my
+father spoke English with me; and I was finished by a countryman
+of yours and a dear friend of mine, a Mr. Vicary.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>A strong expression of interest came into the lawyer&rsquo;s
+face.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What!&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;you knew poor
+Vicary?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;For more than a year,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and shared
+his hiding-place for many months.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I was his clerk, and have succeeded him in
+business,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Excellent man!&nbsp; It
+was on the affairs of M. de K&eacute;roual that he went to that
+accursed country, from which he was never destined to
+return.&nbsp; Do you chance to know his end, sir?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sorry,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I do.&nbsp; He
+perished miserably at the hands of a gang of banditti, such as we
+call <i>chauffeurs</i>.&nbsp; In a word, he was tortured, and
+died of it.&nbsp; See,&rsquo; I added, kicking off one shoe, for
+I had no stockings; &lsquo;I was no more than a child, and see
+how they had begun to treat myself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He looked at the mark of my old burn with a certain
+shrinking.&nbsp; &lsquo;Beastly people!&rsquo; I heard him mutter
+to himself.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The English may say so with a good grace,&rsquo; I
+observed politely.</p>
+<p>Such speeches were the coin in which I paid my way among this
+credulous race.&nbsp; Ninety per cent. of our visitors would have
+accepted the remark as natural in itself and creditable to my
+powers of judgment, but it appeared my lawyer was more acute.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are not entirely a fool, I perceive,&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;not wholly.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And yet it is well to beware of the ironical
+mood,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is a dangerous
+instrument.&nbsp; Your great-uncle has, I believe, practised it
+very much, until it is now become a problem what he
+means.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And that brings me back to what you will admit is a
+most natural inquiry,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;To what do I
+owe the pleasure of this visit? how did you recognise me? and how
+did you know I was here?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Carefull separating his coat skirts, the lawyer took a seat
+beside me on the edge of the flags.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is rather an odd story,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;and,
+with your leave, I&rsquo;ll answer the second question
+first.&nbsp; It was from a certain resemblance you bear to your
+cousin, M. le Vicomte.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I trust, sir, that I resemble him
+advantageously?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I hasten to reassure you,&rsquo; was the reply:
+&lsquo;you do.&nbsp; To my eyes, M. Alain de St.-Yves has scarce
+a pleasing exterior.&nbsp; And yet, when I knew you were here,
+and was actually looking for you&mdash;why, the likeness
+helped.&nbsp; As for how I came to know your whereabouts, by an
+odd enough chance, it is again M. Alain we have to thank.&nbsp; I
+should tell you, he has for some time made it his business to
+keep M. de K&eacute;roual informed of your career; with what
+purpose I leave you to judge.&nbsp; When he first brought the
+news of your&mdash;that you were serving Buonaparte, it seemed it
+might be the death of the old gentleman, so hot was his
+resentment.&nbsp; But from one thing to another, matters have a
+little changed.&nbsp; Or I should rather say, not a little.&nbsp;
+We learned you were under orders for the Peninsula, to fight the
+English; then that you had been commissioned for a piece of
+bravery, and were again reduced to the ranks.&nbsp; And from one
+thing to another (as I say), M. de K&eacute;roual became used to
+the idea that you were his kinsman and yet served with
+Buonaparte, and filled instead with wonder that he should have
+another kinsman who was so remarkably well informed of events in
+France.&nbsp; And it now became a very disagreeable question,
+whether the young gentleman was not a spy?&nbsp; In short, sir,
+in seeking to disserve you, he had accumulated against himself a
+load of suspicions.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>My visitor now paused, took snuff, and looked at me with an
+air of benevolence.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good God, sir!&rsquo; says I, &lsquo;this is a curious
+story.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will say so before I have done,&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;For there have two events followed.&nbsp; The
+first of these was an encounter of M. de K&eacute;roual and M. de
+Mauseant.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I know the man to my cost,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;it was
+through him I lost my commission.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you tell me so?&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why,
+here is news!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, I cannot complain!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+was in the wrong.&nbsp; I did it with my eyes open.&nbsp; If a
+man gets a prisoner to guard and lets him go, the least he can
+expect is to be degraded.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will be paid for it,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You did well for yourself and better for your
+king.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If I had thought I was injuring my emperor,&rsquo; said
+I, &lsquo;I would have let M. de Mauseant burn in hell ere I had
+helped him, and be sure of that!&nbsp; I saw in him only a
+private person in a difficulty: I let him go in private charity;
+not even to profit myself will I suffer it to be
+misunderstood.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said the lawyer, &lsquo;no matter
+now.&nbsp; This is a foolish warmth&mdash;a very misplaced
+enthusiasm, believe me!&nbsp; The point of the story is that M.
+de Mauseant spoke of you with gratitude, and drew your character
+in such a manner as greatly to affect your uncle&rsquo;s
+views.&nbsp; Hard upon the back of which, in came your humble
+servant, and laid before him the direct proof of what we had been
+so long suspecting.&nbsp; There was no dubiety permitted.&nbsp;
+M. Alain&rsquo;s expensive way of life, his clothes and
+mistresses, his dicing and racehorses, were all explained: he was
+in the pay of Buonaparte, a hired spy, and a man that held the
+strings of what I can only call a convolution of extremely fishy
+enterprises.&nbsp; To do M. de K&eacute;roual justice, he took it
+in the best way imaginable, destroyed the evidences of the one
+great-nephew&rsquo;s disgrace&mdash;and transferred his interest
+wholly to the other.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What am I to understand by that?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I will tell you,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;There is
+a remarkable inconsistency in human nature which gentlemen of my
+cloth have a great deal of occasion to observe.&nbsp; Selfish
+persons can live without chick or child, they can live without
+all mankind except perhaps the barber and the apothecary; but
+when it comes to dying, they seem physically unable to die
+without an heir.&nbsp; You can apply this principle for
+yourself.&nbsp; Viscount Alain, though he scarce guesses it, is
+no longer in the field.&nbsp; Remains, Viscount Anne.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I see,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you give a very
+unfavourable impression of my uncle, the Count.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I had not meant it,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;He has
+led a loose life&mdash;sadly loose&mdash;but he is a man it is
+impossible to know and not to admire; his courtesy is
+exquisite.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And so you think there is actually a chance for
+me?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Understand,&rsquo; said he: &lsquo;in saying as much as
+I have done, I travel quite beyond my brief.&nbsp; I have been
+clothed with no capacity to talk of wills, or heritages, or your
+cousin.&nbsp; I was sent here to make but the one communication:
+that M. de K&eacute;roual desires to meet his
+great-nephew.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, looking about me on the
+battlements by which we sat surrounded, &lsquo;this is a case in
+which Mahomet must certainly come to the mountain.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pardon me,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine; &lsquo;you know
+already your uncle is an aged man; but I have not yet told you
+that he is quite broken up, and his death shortly looked
+for.&nbsp; No, no, there is no doubt about it&mdash;it is the
+mountain that must come to Mahomet.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;From an Englishman, the remark is certainly
+significant,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but you are of course, and by
+trade, a keeper of men&rsquo;s secrets, and I see you keep that
+of Cousin Alain, which is not the mark of a truculent patriotism,
+to say the least.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am first of all the lawyer of your family!&rsquo;
+says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That being so,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I can perhaps
+stretch a point myself.&nbsp; This rock is very high, and it is
+very steep; a man might come by a devil of a fall from almost any
+part of it, and yet I believe I have a pair of wings that might
+carry me just so far as to the bottom.&nbsp; Once at the bottom I
+am helpless.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And perhaps it is just then that I could step
+in,&rsquo; returned the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Suppose by some
+contingency, at which I make no guess, and on which I offer no
+opinion&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>But here I interrupted him.&nbsp; &lsquo;One word ere you go
+further.&nbsp; I am under no parole,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I understood so much,&rsquo; he replied,
+&lsquo;although some of you French gentry find their word sit
+lightly on them.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sir, I am not one of those,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To do you plain justice, I do not think you one,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Suppose yourself, then, set free and at the
+bottom of the rock,&rsquo; he continued, &lsquo;although I may
+not be able to do much, I believe I can do something to help you
+on your road.&nbsp; In the first place I would carry this,
+whether in an inside pocket or my shoe.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he
+passed me a bundle of bank notes.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No harm in that,&rsquo; said I, at once concealing
+them.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In the second place,&rsquo; he resumed, &lsquo;it is a
+great way from here to where your uncle lives&mdash;Amersham
+Place, not far from Dunstable; you have a great part of Britain
+to get through; and for the first stages, I must leave you to
+your own luck and ingenuity.&nbsp; I have no acquaintance here in
+Scotland, or at least&rsquo; (with a grimace) &lsquo;no dishonest
+ones.&nbsp; But further to the south, about Wakefield, I am told
+there is a gentleman called Burchell Fenn, who is not so
+particular as some others, and might be willing to give you a
+cast forward.&nbsp; In fact, sir, I believe it&rsquo;s the
+man&rsquo;s trade: a piece of knowledge that burns my
+mouth.&nbsp; But that is what you get by meddling with rogues;
+and perhaps the biggest rogue now extant, M. de Saint-Yves, is
+your cousin, M. Alain.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If this be a man of my cousin&rsquo;s,&rsquo; I
+observed, &lsquo;I am perhaps better to keep clear of
+him?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It was through some paper of your cousin&rsquo;s that
+we came across his trail,&rsquo; replied the lawyer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But I am inclined to think, so far as anything is safe in
+such a nasty business, you might apply to the man Fenn.&nbsp; You
+might even, I think, use the Viscount&rsquo;s name; and the
+little trick of family resemblance might come in.&nbsp; How, for
+instance, if you were to call yourself his brother?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It might be done,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But look
+here a moment?&nbsp; You propose to me a very difficult game: I
+have apparently a devil of an opponent in my cousin; and, being a
+prisoner of war, I can scarcely be said to hold good cards.&nbsp;
+For what stakes, then, am I playing?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;They are very large,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your
+great-uncle is immensely rich&mdash;immensely rich.&nbsp; He was
+wise in time; he smelt the revolution long before; sold all that
+he could, and had all that was movable transported to England
+through my firm.&nbsp; There are considerable estates in England;
+Amersham Place itself is very fine; and he has much money, wisely
+invested.&nbsp; He lives, indeed, like a prince.&nbsp; And of
+what use is it to him?&nbsp; He has lost all that was worth
+living for&mdash;his family, his country; he has seen his king
+and queen murdered; he has seen all these miseries and
+infamies,&rsquo; pursued the lawyer, with a rising inflection and
+a heightening colour; and then broke suddenly
+off,&mdash;&lsquo;In short, sir, he has seen all the advantages
+of that government for which his nephew carries arms, and he has
+the misfortune not to like them.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must
+excuse,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;yet which of us has the more reason
+to be bitter?&nbsp; This man, my uncle, M. de K&eacute;roual,
+fled.&nbsp; My parents, who were less wise perhaps,
+remained.&nbsp; In the beginning, they were even republicans; to
+the end they could not be persuaded to despair of the
+people.&nbsp; It was a glorious folly, for which, as a son, I
+reverence them.&nbsp; First one and then the other
+perished.&nbsp; If I have any mark of a gentleman, all who taught
+me died upon the scaffold, and my last school of manners was the
+prison of the Abbaye.&nbsp; Do you think you can teach bitterness
+to a man with a history like mine?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have no wish to try,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;And
+yet there is one point I cannot understand: I cannot understand
+that one of your blood and experience should serve the
+Corsican.&nbsp; I cannot understand it: it seems as though
+everything generous in you must rise against
+that&mdash;domination.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And perhaps,&rsquo; I retorted, &lsquo;had your
+childhood passed among wolves, you would have been overjoyed
+yourself to see the Corsican Shepherd.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; replied Mr. Romaine, &lsquo;it may
+be.&nbsp; There are things that do not bear
+discussion.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a
+flight of steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V&mdash;ST. IVES IS SHOWN A HOUSE</h2>
+<p>The lawyer was scarce gone before I remembered many omissions;
+and chief among these, that I had neglected to get Mr. Burchell
+Fenn&rsquo;s address.&nbsp; Here was an essential point
+neglected; and I ran to the head of the stairs to find myself
+already too late.&nbsp; The lawyer was beyond my view; in the
+archway that led downward to the castle gate, only the red coat
+and the bright arms of a sentry glittered in the shadow; and I
+could but return to my place upon the ramparts.</p>
+<p>I am not very sure that I was properly entitled to this
+corner.&nbsp; But I was a high favourite; not an officer, and
+scarce a private, in the castle would have turned me back, except
+upon a thing of moment; and whenever I desired to be solitary, I
+was suffered to sit here behind my piece of cannon
+unmolested.&nbsp; The cliff went down before me almost sheer, but
+mantled with a thicket of climbing trees; from farther down, an
+outwork raised its turret; and across the valley I had a view of
+that long terrace of Princes Street which serves as a promenade
+to the fashionable inhabitants of Edinburgh.&nbsp; A singularity
+in a military prison, that it should command a view on the chief
+thoroughfare!</p>
+<p>It is not necessary that I should trouble you with the train
+of my reflections, which turned upon the interview I had just
+concluded and the hopes that were now opening before me.&nbsp;
+What is more essential, my eye (even while I thought) kept
+following the movement of the passengers on Princes Street, as
+they passed briskly to and fro&mdash;met, greeted, and bowed to
+each other&mdash;or entered and left the shops, which are in that
+quarter, and, for a town of the Britannic provinces, particularly
+fine.&nbsp; My mind being busy upon other things, the course of
+my eye was the more random; and it chanced that I followed, for
+some time, the advance of a young gentleman with a red head and a
+white great-coat, for whom I cared nothing at the moment, and of
+whom it is probable I shall be gathered to my fathers without
+learning more.&nbsp; He seemed to have a large acquaintance: his
+hat was for ever in his hand; and I daresay I had already
+observed him exchanging compliments with half a dozen, when he
+drew up at last before a young man and a young lady whose tall
+persons and gallant carriage I thought I recognised.</p>
+<p>It was impossible at such a distance that I could be sure, but
+the thought was sufficient, and I craned out of the embrasure to
+follow them as long as possible.&nbsp; To think that such
+emotions, that such a concussion of the blood, may have been
+inspired by a chance resemblance, and that I may have stood and
+thrilled there for a total stranger!&nbsp; This distant view, at
+least, whether of Flora or of some one else, changed in a moment
+the course of my reflections.&nbsp; It was all very well, and it
+was highly needful, I should see my uncle; but an uncle, a
+great-uncle at that, and one whom I had never seen, leaves the
+imagination cold; and if I were to leave the castle, I might
+never again have the opportunity of finding Flora.&nbsp; The
+little impression I had made, even supposing I had made any, how
+soon it would die out! how soon I should sink to be a phantom
+memory, with which (in after days) she might amuse a husband and
+children!&nbsp; No, the impression must be clenched, the wax
+impressed with the seal, ere I left Edinburgh.&nbsp; And at this
+the two interests that were now contending in my bosom came
+together and became one.&nbsp; I wished to see Flora again; and I
+wanted some one to further me in my flight and to get me new
+clothes.&nbsp; The conclusion was apparent.&nbsp; Except for
+persons in the garrison itself, with whom it was a point of
+honour and military duty to retain me captive, I knew, in the
+whole country of Scotland, these two alone.&nbsp; If it were to
+be done at all, they must be my helpers.&nbsp; To tell them of my
+designed escape while I was still in bonds, would be to lay
+before them a most difficult choice.&nbsp; What they might do in
+such a case, I could not in the least be sure of, for (the same
+case arising) I was far from sure what I should do myself.&nbsp;
+It was plain I must escape first.&nbsp; When the harm was done,
+when I was no more than a poor wayside fugitive, I might apply to
+them with less offence and more security.&nbsp; To this end it
+became necessary that I should find out where they lived and how
+to reach it; and feeling a strong confidence that they would soon
+return to visit me, I prepared a series of baits with which to
+angle for my information.&nbsp; It will be seen the first was
+good enough.</p>
+<p>Perhaps two days after, Master Ronald put in an appearance by
+himself.&nbsp; I had no hold upon the boy, and pretermitted my
+design till I should have laid court to him and engaged his
+interest.&nbsp; He was prodigiously embarrassed, not having
+previously addressed me otherwise than by a bow and blushes; and
+he advanced to me with an air of one stubbornly performing a
+duty, like a raw soldier under fire.&nbsp; I laid down my
+carving; greeted him with a good deal of formality, such as I
+thought he would enjoy; and finding him to remain silent,
+branched off into narratives of my campaigns such as Goguelat
+himself might have scrupled to endorse.&nbsp; He visibly thawed
+and brightened; drew more near to where I sat; forgot his
+timidity so far as to put many questions; and at last, with
+another blush, informed me he was himself expecting a
+commission.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;they are fine troops, your
+British troops in the Peninsula.&nbsp; A young gentleman of
+spirit may well be proud to be engaged at the head of such
+soldiers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I know that,&rsquo; he said; &lsquo;I think of nothing
+else.&nbsp; I think shame to be dangling here at home and going
+through with this foolery of education, while others, no older
+than myself, are in the field.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I cannot blame you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have
+felt the same myself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There are&mdash;there are no troops, are there, quite
+so good as ours?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;there is a point about
+them: they have a defect,&mdash;they are not to be trusted in a
+retreat.&nbsp; I have seen them behave very ill in a
+retreat.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I believe that is our national character,&rsquo; he
+said&mdash;God forgive him!&mdash;with an air of pride.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have seen your national character running away at
+least, and had the honour to run after it!&rsquo; rose to my
+lips, but I was not so ill advised as to give it utterance.&nbsp;
+Every one should be flattered, but boys and women without stint;
+and I put in the rest of the afternoon narrating to him tales of
+British heroism, for which I should not like to engage that they
+were all true.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am quite surprised,&rsquo; he said at last.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;People tell you the French are insincere.&nbsp; Now, I
+think your sincerity is beautiful.&nbsp; I think you have a noble
+character.&nbsp; I admire you very much.&nbsp; I am very grateful
+for your kindness to&mdash;to one so young,&rsquo; and he offered
+me his hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I shall see you again soon?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, now!&nbsp; Yes, very soon,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I&mdash;I wish to tell you.&nbsp; I would not let
+Flora&mdash;Miss Gilchrist, I mean&mdash;come to-day.&nbsp; I
+wished to see more of you myself.&nbsp; I trust you are not
+offended: you know, one should be careful about
+strangers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I approved his caution, and he took himself away: leaving me
+in a mixture of contrarious feelings, part ashamed to have played
+on one so gullible, part raging that I should have burned so much
+incense before the vanity of England; yet, in the bottom of my
+soul, delighted to think I had made a friend&mdash;or, at least,
+begun to make a friend&mdash;of Flora&rsquo;s brother.</p>
+<p>As I had half expected, both made their appearance the next
+day.&nbsp; I struck so fine a shade betwixt the pride that is
+allowed to soldiers and the sorrowful humility that befits a
+captive, that I declare, as I went to meet them, I might have
+afforded a subject for a painter.&nbsp; So much was high comedy,
+I must confess; but so soon as my eyes lighted full on her dark
+face and eloquent eyes, the blood leaped into my cheeks&mdash;and
+that was nature!&nbsp; I thanked them, but not the least with
+exultation; it was my cue to be mournful, and to take the pair of
+them as one.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have been thinking,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;you have
+been so good to me, both of you, stranger and prisoner as I am,
+that I have been thinking how I could testify to my
+gratitude.&nbsp; It may seem a strange subject for a confidence,
+but there is actually no one here, even of my comrades, that
+knows me by my name and title.&nbsp; By these I am called plain
+Champdivers, a name to which I have a right, but not the name
+which I should bear, and which (but a little while ago) I must
+hide like a crime.&nbsp; Miss Flora, suffer me to present to you
+the Vicomte Anne de K&eacute;roual de Saint-Yves, a private
+soldier.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I knew it!&rsquo; cried the boy; &lsquo;I knew he was a
+noble!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And I thought the eyes of Miss Flora said the same, but more
+persuasively.&nbsp; All through this interview she kept them on
+the ground, or only gave them to me for a moment at a time, and
+with a serious sweetness.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You may conceive, my friends, that this is rather a
+painful confession,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;To stand
+here before you, vanquished, a prisoner in a fortress, and take
+my own name upon my lips, is painful to the proud.&nbsp; And yet
+I wished that you should know me.&nbsp; Long after this, we may
+yet hear of one another&mdash;perhaps Mr. Gilchrist and myself in
+the field and from opposing camps&mdash;and it would be a pity if
+we heard and did not recognise.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>They were both moved; and began at once to press upon me
+offers of service, such as to lend me books, get me tobacco if I
+used it, and the like.&nbsp; This would have been all mighty
+welcome, before the tunnel was ready.&nbsp; Now it signified no
+more to me than to offer the transition I required.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear friends,&rsquo; I said&mdash;&lsquo;for you
+must allow me to call you that, who have no others within so many
+hundred leagues&mdash;perhaps you will think me fanciful and
+sentimental; and perhaps indeed I am; but there is one service
+that I would beg of you before all others.&nbsp; You see me set
+here on the top of this rock in the midst of your city.&nbsp;
+Even with what liberty I have, I have the opportunity to see a
+myriad roofs, and I dare to say, thirty leagues of sea and
+land.&nbsp; All this hostile!&nbsp; Under all these roofs my
+enemies dwell; wherever I see the smoke of a house rising, I must
+tell myself that some one sits before the chimney and reads with
+joy of our reverses.&nbsp; Pardon me, dear friends, I know that
+you must do the same, and I do not grudge at it!&nbsp; With you,
+it is all different.&nbsp; Show me your house then, were it only
+the chimney, or, if that be not visible, the quarter of the town
+in which it lies!&nbsp; So, when I look all about me, I shall be
+able to say: &ldquo;<i>There is one house in which I am not quite
+unkindly thought of</i>.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Flora stood a moment.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is a pretty thought,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;and, as
+far as regards Ronald and myself, a true one.&nbsp; Come, I
+believe I can show you the very smoke out of our
+chimney.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, she carried me round the battlements towards the
+opposite or southern side of the fortress, and indeed to a
+bastion almost immediately overlooking the place of our projected
+flight.&nbsp; Thence we had a view of some foreshortened suburbs
+at our feet, and beyond of a green, open, and irregular country
+rising towards the Pentland Hills.&nbsp; The face of one of these
+summits (say two leagues from where we stood) is marked with a
+procession of white scars.&nbsp; And to this she directed my
+attention.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You see these marks?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;We
+call them the Seven Sisters.&nbsp; Follow a little lower with
+your eye, and you will see a fold of the hill, the tops of some
+trees, and a tail of smoke out of the midst of them.&nbsp; That
+is Swanston Cottage, where my brother and I are living with my
+aunt.&nbsp; If it gives you pleasure to see it, I am glad.&nbsp;
+We, too, can see the castle from a corner in the garden, and we
+go there in the morning often&mdash;do we not, Ronald?&mdash;and
+we think of you, M. de Saint-Yves; but I am afraid it does not
+altogether make us glad.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mademoiselle!&rsquo; said I, and indeed my voice was
+scarce under command, &lsquo;if you knew how your generous
+words&mdash;how even the sight of you&mdash;relieved the horrors
+of this place, I believe, I hope, I know, you would be
+glad.&nbsp; I will come here daily and look at that dear chimney
+and these green hills, and bless you from the heart, and dedicate
+to you the prayers of this poor sinner.&nbsp; Ah!&nbsp; I do not
+say they can avail!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who can say that, M. de Saint-Yves?&rsquo; she said
+softly.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I think it is time we should be
+going.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;High time,&rsquo; said Ronald, whom (to say the truth)
+I had a little forgotten.</p>
+<p>On the way back, as I was laying myself out to recover lost
+ground with the youth, and to obliterate, if possible, the memory
+of my last and somewhat too fervent speech, who should come past
+us but the major?&nbsp; I had to stand aside and salute as he
+went by, but his eyes appeared entirely occupied with Flora.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who is that man?&rsquo; she asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He is a friend of mine,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+give him lessons in French, and he has been very kind to
+me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He stared,&rsquo; she said,&mdash;&lsquo;I do not say,
+rudely; but why should he stare?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you do not wish to be stared at, mademoiselle,
+suffer me to recommend a veil,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>She looked at me with what seemed anger.&nbsp; &lsquo;I tell
+you the man stared,&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>And Ronald added.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh, I don&rsquo;t think he
+meant any harm.&nbsp; I suppose he was just surprised to see us
+walking about with a pr--- with M. Saint-Yves.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>But the next morning, when I went to Chevenix&rsquo;s rooms,
+and after I had dutifully corrected his exercise&mdash;&lsquo;I
+compliment you on your taste,&rsquo; said he to me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh no, I beg yours,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+understand me perfectly, just as I do you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I murmured something about enigmas.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, shall I give you the key to the enigma?&rsquo;
+said he, leaning back.&nbsp; &lsquo;That was the young lady whom
+Goguelat insulted and whom you avenged.&nbsp; I do not blame
+you.&nbsp; She is a heavenly creature.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;With all my heart, to the last of it!&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And to the first also, if it amuses you!&nbsp;
+You are become so very acute of late that I suppose you must have
+your own way.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What is her name?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, really!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you think
+it likely she has told me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think it certain,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>I could not restrain my laughter.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, then, do
+you think it likely I would tell you?&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not a bit.&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But come, to
+our lesson!&rsquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI&mdash;THE ESCAPE</h2>
+<p>The time for our escape drew near, and the nearer it came the
+less we seemed to enjoy the prospect.&nbsp; There is but one side
+on which this castle can be left either with dignity or safety;
+but as there is the main gate and guard, and the chief street of
+the upper city, it is not to be thought of by escaping
+prisoners.&nbsp; In all other directions an abominable precipice
+surrounds it, down the face of which (if anywhere at all) we must
+regain our liberty.&nbsp; By our concurrent labours in many a
+dark night, working with the most anxious precautions against
+noise, we had made out to pierce below the curtain about the
+south-west corner, in a place they call the <i>Devil&rsquo;s
+Elbow</i>.&nbsp; I have never met that celebrity; nor (if the
+rest of him at all comes up to what they called his elbow) have I
+the least desire of his acquaintance.&nbsp; From the heel of the
+masonry, the rascally, breakneck precipice descended sheer among
+waste lands, scattered suburbs of the city, and houses in the
+building.&nbsp; I had never the heart to look for any length of
+time&mdash;the thought that I must make the descent in person
+some dark night robbing me of breath; and, indeed, on anybody not
+a seaman or a steeple-jack, the mere sight of the
+<i>Devil&rsquo;s Elbow</i> wrought like an emetic.</p>
+<p>I don&rsquo;t know where the rope was got, and doubt if I much
+cared.&nbsp; It was not that which gravelled me, but whether, now
+that we had it, it would serve our turn.&nbsp; Its length,
+indeed, we made a shift to fathom out; but who was to tell us how
+that length compared with the way we had to go?&nbsp; Day after
+day, there would be always some of us stolen out to the
+<i>Devil&rsquo;s Elbow</i> and making estimates of the descent,
+whether by a bare guess or the dropping of stones.&nbsp; A
+private of pioneers remembered the formula for that&mdash;or else
+remembered part of it and obligingly invented the
+remainder.&nbsp; I had never any real confidence in that formula;
+and even had we got it from a book, there were difficulties in
+the way of the application that might have daunted
+Archimedes.&nbsp; We durst not drop any considerable pebble lest
+the sentinels should hear, and those that we dropped we could not
+hear ourselves.&nbsp; We had never a watch&mdash;or none that had
+a second-hand; and though every one of us could guess a second to
+a nicety, all somehow guessed it differently.&nbsp; In short, if
+any two set forth upon this enterprise, they invariably returned
+with two opinions, and often with a black eye in the
+bargain.&nbsp; I looked on upon these proceedings, although not
+without laughter, yet with impatience and disgust.&nbsp; I am one
+that cannot bear to see things botched or gone upon with
+ignorance; and the thought that some poor devil was to hazard his
+bones upon such premises, revolted me.&nbsp; Had I guessed the
+name of that unhappy first adventurer, my sentiments might have
+been livelier still.</p>
+<p>The designation of this personage was indeed all that remained
+for us to do; and even in that we had advanced so far that the
+lot had fallen on Shed B.&nbsp; It had been determined to mingle
+the bitter and the sweet; and whoever went down first, the whole
+of his shed-mates were to follow next in order.&nbsp; This caused
+a good deal of joy in Shed B, and would have caused more if it
+had not still remained to choose our pioneer.&nbsp; In view of
+the ambiguity in which we lay as to the length of the rope and
+the height of the precipice&mdash;and that this gentleman was to
+climb down from fifty to seventy fathoms on a pitchy night, on a
+rope entirely free, and with not so much as an infant child to
+steady it at the bottom, a little backwardness was perhaps
+excusable.&nbsp; But it was, in our case, more than a
+little.&nbsp; The truth is, we were all womanish fellows about a
+height; and I have myself been put, more than once, <i>hors de
+combat</i> by a less affair than the rock of Edinburgh
+Castle.</p>
+<p>We discussed it in the dark and between the passage of the
+rounds; and it was impossible for any body of men to show a less
+adventurous spirit.&nbsp; I am sure some of us, and myself first
+among the number, regretted Goguelat.&nbsp; Some were persuaded
+it was safe, and could prove the same by argument; but if they
+had good reasons why some one else should make the trial, they
+had better still why it should not be themselves.&nbsp; Others,
+again, condemned the whole idea as insane; among these, as
+ill-luck would have it, a seaman of the fleet; who was the most
+dispiriting of all.&nbsp; The height, he reminded us, was greater
+than the tallest ship&rsquo;s mast, the rope entirely free; and
+he as good as defied the boldest and strongest to succeed.&nbsp;
+We were relieved from this dead-lock by our sergeant-major of
+dragoons.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Comrades,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;I believe I rank you
+all; and for that reason, if you really wish it, I will be the
+first myself.&nbsp; At the same time, you are to consider what
+the chances are that I may prove to be the last, as well.&nbsp; I
+am no longer young&mdash;I was sixty near a month ago.&nbsp;
+Since I have been a prisoner, I have made for myself a little
+<i>bedaine</i>.&nbsp; My arms are all gone to fat.&nbsp; And you
+must promise not to blame me, if I fall and play the devil with
+the whole thing.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;We cannot hear of such a thing!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;M. Laclas is the oldest man here; and, as such, he should
+be the very last to offer.&nbsp; It is plain, we must draw
+lots.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said M. Laclas; &lsquo;you put something
+else in my head!&nbsp; There is one here who owes a pretty candle
+to the others, for they have kept his secret.&nbsp; Besides, the
+rest of us are only rabble; and he is another affair
+altogether.&nbsp; Let Champdivers&mdash;let the noble go the
+first.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I confess there was a notable pause before the noble in
+question got his voice.&nbsp; But there was no room for
+choice.&nbsp; I had been so ill-advised, when I first joined the
+regiment, as to take ground on my nobility.&nbsp; I had been
+often rallied on the matter in the ranks, and had passed under
+the by-names of <i>Monseigneur</i> and <i>the Marquis</i>.&nbsp;
+It was now needful I should justify myself and take a fair
+revenge.</p>
+<p>Any little hesitation I may have felt passed entirely
+unnoticed, from the lucky incident of a round happening at that
+moment to go by.&nbsp; And during the interval of silence there
+occurred something that sent my blood to the boil.&nbsp; There
+was a private in our shed called Clausel, a man of a very ugly
+disposition.&nbsp; He had made one of the followers of Goguelat;
+but, whereas Goguelat had always a kind of monstrous gaiety about
+him, Clausel was no less morose than he was evil-minded.&nbsp; He
+was sometimes called <i>the General</i>, and sometimes by a name
+too ill-mannered for repetition.&nbsp; As we all sat listening,
+this man&rsquo;s hand was laid on my shoulder, and his voice
+whispered in my ear: &lsquo;If you don&rsquo;t go, I&rsquo;ll
+have you hanged, Marquis!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As soon as the round was past&mdash;&lsquo;Certainly,
+gentlemen!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I will give you a lead,
+with all the pleasure in the world.&nbsp; But, first of all,
+there is a hound here to be punished.&nbsp; M. Clausel has just
+insulted me, and dishonoured the French army; and I demand that
+he run the gauntlet of this shed.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>There was but one voice asking what he had done, and, as soon
+as I had told them, but one voice agreeing to the
+punishment.&nbsp; The General was, in consequence, extremely
+roughly handled, and the next day was congratulated by all who
+saw him on his <i>new decorations</i>.&nbsp; It was lucky for us
+that he was one of the prime movers and believers in our project
+of escape, or he had certainly revenged himself by a
+denunciation.&nbsp; As for his feelings towards myself, they
+appeared, by his looks, to surpass humanity; and I made up my
+mind to give him a wide berth in the future.</p>
+<p>Had I been to go down that instant, I believe I could have
+carried it well.&nbsp; But it was already too late&mdash;the day
+was at hand.&nbsp; The rest had still to be summoned.&nbsp; Nor
+was this the extent of my misfortune; for the next night, and the
+night after, were adorned with a perfect galaxy of stars, and
+showed every cat that stirred in a quarter of a mile.&nbsp;
+During this interval, I have to direct your sympathies on the
+Vicomte de Saint-Yves!&nbsp; All addressed me softly, like folk
+round a sickbed.&nbsp; Our Italian corporal, who had got a dozen
+of oysters from a fishwife, laid them at my feet, as though I
+were a Pagan idol; and I have never since been wholly at my ease
+in the society of shellfish.&nbsp; He who was the best of our
+carvers brought me a snuff-box, which he had just completed, and
+which, while it was yet in hand, he had often declared he would
+not part with under fifteen dollars.&nbsp; I believe the piece
+was worth the money too!&nbsp; And yet the voice stuck in my
+throat with which I must thank him.&nbsp; I found myself, in a
+word, to be fed up like a prisoner in a camp of anthropophagi,
+and honoured like the sacrificial bull.&nbsp; And what with these
+annoyances, and the risky venture immediately ahead, I found my
+part a trying one to play.</p>
+<p>It was a good deal of a relief when the third evening closed
+about the castle with volumes of sea-fog.&nbsp; The lights of
+Princes Street sometimes disappeared, sometimes blinked across at
+us no brighter than the eyes of cats; and five steps from one of
+the lanterns on the ramparts it was already groping dark.&nbsp;
+We made haste to lie down.&nbsp; Had our jailers been upon the
+watch, they must have observed our conversation to die out
+unusually soon.&nbsp; Yet I doubt if any of us slept.&nbsp; Each
+lay in his place, tortured at once with the hope of liberty and
+the fear of a hateful death.&nbsp; The guard call sounded; the
+hum of the town declined by little and little.&nbsp; On all sides
+of us, in their different quarters, we could hear the watchman
+cry the hours along the street.&nbsp; Often enough, during my
+stay in England, have I listened to these gruff or broken voices;
+or perhaps gone to my window when I lay sleepless, and watched
+the old gentleman hobble by upon the causeway with his cape and
+his cap, his hanger and his rattle.&nbsp; It was ever a thought
+with me how differently that cry would re-echo in the chamber of
+lovers, beside the bed of death, or in the condemned cell.&nbsp;
+I might be said to hear it that night myself in the condemned
+cell!&nbsp; At length a fellow with a voice like a bull&rsquo;s
+began to roar out in the opposite thoroughfare:</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Past yin o&rsquo;cloak, and a dark, haary
+moarnin&rsquo;.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At which we were all silently afoot.</p>
+<p>As I stole about the battlements towards the&mdash;gallows, I
+was about to write&mdash;the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of
+my resolution, kept close by me, and occasionally proffered the
+most indigestible reassurances in my ear.&nbsp; At last I could
+bear them no longer.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Be so obliging as to let me be!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am neither a coward nor a fool.&nbsp; What do <i>you</i>
+know of whether the rope be long enough?&nbsp; But I shall know
+it in ten minutes!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted
+me.</p>
+<p>It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper
+before a friend alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had
+to go handsomely.&nbsp; It was then my time to come on the stage;
+and I hope I took it handsomely.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, gentlemen,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;if the rope is
+ready, here is the criminal!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope
+extended.&nbsp; As I moved forward to the place, many of my
+comrades caught me by the hand and wrung it, an attention I could
+well have done without.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Keep an eye on Clausel!&rsquo; I whispered to Laclas;
+and with that, got down on my elbows and knees took the rope in
+both hands, and worked myself, feet foremost, through the
+tunnel.&nbsp; When the earth failed under my feet, I thought my
+heart would have stopped; and a moment after I was demeaning
+myself in mid-air like a drunken jumping-jack.&nbsp; I have never
+been a model of piety, but at this juncture prayers and a cold
+sweat burst from me simultaneously.</p>
+<p>The line was knotted at intervals of eighteen inches; and to
+the inexpert it may seem as if it should have been even easy to
+descend.&nbsp; The trouble was, this devil of a piece of rope
+appeared to be inspired, not with life alone, but with a personal
+malignity against myself.&nbsp; It turned to the one side, paused
+for a moment, and then spun me like a toasting-jack to the other;
+slipped like an eel from the clasp of my feet; kept me all the
+time in the most outrageous fury of exertion; and dashed me at
+intervals against the face of the rock.&nbsp; I had no eyes to
+see with; and I doubt if there was anything to see but
+darkness.&nbsp; I must occasionally have caught a gasp of breath,
+but it was quite unconscious.&nbsp; And the whole forces of my
+mind were so consumed with losing hold and getting it again, that
+I could scarce have told whether I was going up or coming
+down.</p>
+<p>Of a sudden I knocked against the cliff with such a thump as
+almost bereft me of my sense; and, as reason twinkled back, I was
+amazed to find that I was in a state of rest, that the face of
+the precipice here inclined outwards at an angle which relieved
+me almost wholly of the burthen of my own weight, and that one of
+my feet was safely planted on a ledge.&nbsp; I drew one of the
+sweetest breaths in my experience, hugged myself against the
+rope, and closed my eyes in a kind of ecstasy of relief.&nbsp; It
+occurred to me next to see how far I was advanced on my unlucky
+journey, a point on which I had not a shadow of a guess.&nbsp; I
+looked up: there was nothing above me but the blackness of the
+night and the fog.&nbsp; I craned timidly forward and looked
+down.&nbsp; There, upon a floor of darkness, I beheld a certain
+pattern of hazy lights, some of them aligned as in thoroughfares,
+others standing apart as in solitary houses; and before I could
+well realise it, or had in the least estimated my distance, a
+wave of nausea and vertigo warned me to lie back and close my
+eyes.&nbsp; In this situation I had really but the one wish, and
+that was: something else to think of!&nbsp; Strange to say, I got
+it: a veil was torn from my mind, and I saw what a fool I
+was&mdash;what fools we had all been&mdash;and that I had no
+business to be thus dangling between earth and heaven by my
+arms.&nbsp; The only thing to have done was to have attached me
+to a rope and lowered me, and I had never the wit to see it till
+that moment!</p>
+<p>I filled my lungs, got a good hold on my rope, and once more
+launched myself on the descent.&nbsp; As it chanced, the worst of
+the danger was at an end, and I was so fortunate as to be never
+again exposed to any violent concussion.&nbsp; Soon after I must
+have passed within a little distance of a bush of wallflower, for
+the scent of it came over me with that impression of reality
+which characterises scents in darkness.&nbsp; This made me a
+second landmark, the ledge being my first.&nbsp; I began
+accordingly to compute intervals of time: so much to the ledge,
+so much again to the wallflower, so much more below.&nbsp; If I
+were not at the bottom of the rock, I calculated I must be near
+indeed to the end of the rope, and there was no doubt that I was
+not far from the end of my own resources.&nbsp; I began to be
+light-headed and to be tempted to let go,&mdash;now arguing that
+I was certainly arrived within a few feet of the level and could
+safely risk a fall, anon persuaded I was still close at the top
+and it was idle to continue longer on the rock.&nbsp; In the
+midst of which I came to a bearing on plain ground, and had
+nearly wept aloud.&nbsp; My hands were as good as flayed, my
+courage entirely exhausted, and, what with the long strain and
+the sudden relief, my limbs shook under me with more than the
+violence of ague, and I was glad to cling to the rope.</p>
+<p>But this was no time to give way.&nbsp; I had (by God&rsquo;s
+single mercy) got myself alive out of that fortress; and now I
+had to try to get the others, my comrades.&nbsp; There was about
+a fathom of rope to spare; I got it by the end, and searched the
+whole ground thoroughly for anything to make it fast to.&nbsp; In
+vain: the ground was broken and stony, but there grew not there
+so much as a bush of furze.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now then,&rsquo; thought I to myself, &lsquo;here
+begins a new lesson, and I believe it will prove richer than the
+first.&nbsp; I am not strong enough to keep this rope
+extended.&nbsp; If I do not keep it extended the next man will be
+dashed against the precipice.&nbsp; There is no reason why he
+should have my extravagant good luck.&nbsp; I see no reason why
+he should not fall&mdash;nor any place for him to fall on but my
+head.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible,
+as the fog lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which
+gave me a measure of the height he had to fall and the horrid
+force that he must strike me with.&nbsp; What was yet worse, we
+had agreed to do without signals: every so many minutes by
+Laclas&rsquo; watch another man was to be started from the
+battlements.&nbsp; Now, I had seemed to myself to be about half
+an hour in my descent, and it seemed near as long again that I
+waited, straining on the rope for my next comrade to begin.&nbsp;
+I began to be afraid that our conspiracy was out, that my friends
+were all secured, and that I should pass the remainder of the
+night, and be discovered in the morning, vainly clinging to the
+rope&rsquo;s end like a hooked fish upon an angle.&nbsp; I could
+not refrain, at this ridiculous image, from a chuckle of
+laughter.&nbsp; And the next moment I knew, by the jerking of the
+rope, that my friend had crawled out of the tunnel and was fairly
+launched on his descent.&nbsp; It appears it was the sailor who
+had insisted on succeeding me: as soon as my continued silence
+had assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier, for that was
+his name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself so
+extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.&nbsp; It was like
+the fellow, who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive
+selfishness.&nbsp; But he was like to have paid pretty dearly for
+the privilege.&nbsp; Do as I would, I could not keep the rope as
+I could have wished it; and he ended at last by falling on me
+from a height of several yards, so that we both rolled together
+on the ground.&nbsp; As soon as he could breathe he cursed me
+beyond belief, wept over his finger, which he had broken, and
+cursed me again.&nbsp; I bade him be still and think shame of
+himself to be so great a cry-baby.&nbsp; Did he not hear the
+round going by above? I asked; and who could tell but what the
+noise of his fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the
+very moment leaning upon the battlements to listen?</p>
+<p>The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the
+third man came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of
+course, child&rsquo;s play; and before there were ten of us
+collected, it seemed to me that, without the least injustice to
+my comrades, I might proceed to take care of myself.</p>
+<p>I knew their plan: they had a map and an almanack, and
+designed for Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.&nbsp;
+Suppose them to do so, I had no idea they were qualified to
+manage it after it was stolen.&nbsp; Their whole escape, indeed,
+was the most haphazard thing imaginable; only the impatience of
+captives and the ignorance of private soldiers would have
+entertained so misbegotten a device; and though I played the good
+comrade and worked with them upon the tunnel, but for the
+lawyer&rsquo;s message I should have let them go without
+me.&nbsp; Well, now they were beyond my help, as they had always
+been beyond my counselling; and, without word said or leave
+taken, I stole out of the little crowd.&nbsp; It is true I would
+rather have waited to shake hands with Laclas, but in the last
+man who had descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and since
+the scene in the shed my distrust of Clausel was perfect.&nbsp; I
+believed the man to be capable of any infamy, and events have
+since shown that I was right.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII&mdash;SWANSTON COTTAGE</h2>
+<p>I had two views.&nbsp; The first was, naturally, to get clear
+of Edinburgh Castle and the town, to say nothing of my
+fellow-prisoners; the second to work to the southward so long as
+it was night, and be near Swanston Cottage by morning.&nbsp; What
+I should do there and then, I had no guess, and did not greatly
+care, being a devotee of a couple of divinities called Chance and
+Circumstance.&nbsp; Prepare, if possible; where it is impossible,
+work straight forward, and keep your eyes open and your tongue
+oiled.&nbsp; Wit and a good exterior&mdash;there is all life in a
+nutshell.</p>
+<p>I had at first a rather chequered journey: got involved in
+gardens, butted into houses, and had even once the misfortune to
+awake a sleeping family, the father of which, as I suppose,
+menaced me from the window with a blunderbuss.&nbsp; Altogether,
+though I had been some time gone from my companions, I was still
+at no great distance, when a miserable accident put a period to
+the escape.&nbsp; Of a sudden the night was divided by a
+scream.&nbsp; This was followed by the sound of something
+falling, and that again by the report of a musket from the Castle
+battlements.&nbsp; It was strange to hear the alarm spread
+through the city.&nbsp; In the fortress drums were beat and a
+bell rung backward.&nbsp; On all hands the watchmen sprang their
+rattles.&nbsp; Even in that limbo or no-man&rsquo;s-land where I
+was wandering, lights were made in the houses; sashes were flung
+up; I could hear neighbouring families converse from window to
+window, and at length I was challenged myself.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Wha&rsquo;s that?&rsquo; cried a big voice.</p>
+<p>I could see it proceeded from a big man in a big nightcap,
+leaning from a one-pair window; and as I was not yet abreast of
+his house, I judged it was more wise to answer.&nbsp; This was
+not the first time I had had to stake my fortunes on the goodness
+of my accent in a foreign tongue; and I have always found the
+moment inspiriting, as a gambler should.&nbsp; Pulling around me
+a sort of great-coat I had made of my blanket, to cover my
+sulphur-coloured livery,&mdash;&lsquo;A friend!&rsquo; said
+I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What like&rsquo;s all this collieshangie?&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>I had never heard of a collieshangie in my days, but with the
+racket all about us in the city, I could have no doubt as to the
+man&rsquo;s meaning.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I do not know, sir, really,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but I
+suppose some of the prisoners will have escaped.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Bedamned!&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, sir, they will be soon taken,&rsquo; I replied:
+&lsquo;it has been found in time.&nbsp; Good morning,
+sir!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ye walk late, sir?&rsquo; he added.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, surely not,&rsquo; said I, with a laugh.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Earlyish, if you like!&rsquo; which brought me finally
+beyond him, highly pleased with my success.</p>
+<p>I was now come forth on a good thoroughfare, which led (as
+well as I could judge) in my direction.&nbsp; It brought me
+almost immediately through a piece of street, whence I could hear
+close by the springing of a watchman&rsquo;s rattle, and where I
+suppose a sixth part of the windows would be open, and the
+people, in all sorts of night gear, talking with a kind of tragic
+gusto from one to another.&nbsp; Here, again, I must run the
+gauntlet of a half-dozen questions, the rattle all the while
+sounding nearer; but as I was not walking inordinately quick, as
+I spoke like a gentleman, and the lamps were too dim to show my
+dress, I carried it off once more.&nbsp; One person, indeed,
+inquired where I was off to at that hour.</p>
+<p>I replied vaguely and cheerfully, and as I escaped at one end
+of this dangerous pass I could see the watchman&rsquo;s lantern
+entering by the other.&nbsp; I was now safe on a dark country
+highway, out of sight of lights and out of the fear of
+watchmen.&nbsp; And yet I had not gone above a hundred yards
+before a fellow made an ugly rush at me from the roadside.&nbsp;
+I avoided him with a leap, and stood on guard, cursing my empty
+hands, wondering whether I had to do with an officer or a mere
+footpad, and scarce knowing which to wish.&nbsp; My assailant
+stood a little; in the thick darkness I could see him bob and
+sidle as though he were feinting at me for an advantageous
+onfall.&nbsp; Then he spoke.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My goo&rsquo; frien&rsquo;,&rsquo; says he, and at the
+first word I pricked my ears, &lsquo;my goo&rsquo; frien&rsquo;,
+will you oblishe me with lil neshary infamation?&nbsp; Whish
+roa&rsquo; t&rsquo; Cramond?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I laughed out clear and loud, stepped up to the convivialist,
+took him by the shoulders and faced him about.&nbsp; &lsquo;My
+good friend,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I believe I know what is best
+for you much better than yourself, and may God forgive you the
+fright you have given me!&nbsp; There, get you gone to
+Edinburgh!&rsquo;&nbsp; And I gave a shove, which he obeyed with
+the passive agility of a ball, and disappeared incontinently in
+the darkness down the road by which I had myself come.</p>
+<p>Once clear of this foolish fellow, I went on again up a
+gradual hill, descended on the other side through the houses of a
+country village, and came at last to the bottom of the main
+ascent leading to the Pentlands and my destination.&nbsp; I was
+some way up when the fog began to lighten; a little farther, and
+I stepped by degrees into a clear starry night, and saw in front
+of me, and quite distinct, the summits of the Pentlands, and
+behind, the valley of the Forth and the city of my late captivity
+buried under a lake of vapour.&nbsp; I had but one
+encounter&mdash;that of a farm-cart, which I heard, from a great
+way ahead of me, creaking nearer in the night, and which passed
+me about the point of dawn like a thing seen in a dream, with two
+silent figures in the inside nodding to the horse&rsquo;s
+steps.&nbsp; I presume they were asleep; by the shawl about her
+head and shoulders, one of them should be a woman.&nbsp; Soon, by
+concurrent steps, the day began to break and the fog to subside
+and roll away.&nbsp; The east grew luminous and was barred with
+chilly colours, and the Castle on its rock, and the spires and
+chimneys of the upper town, took gradual shape, and arose, like
+islands, out of the receding cloud.&nbsp; All about me was still
+and sylvan; the road mounting and winding, with nowhere a sign of
+any passenger, the birds chirping, I suppose for warmth, the
+boughs of the trees knocking together, and the red leaves falling
+in the wind.</p>
+<p>It was broad day, but still bitter cold and the sun not up,
+when I came in view of my destination.&nbsp; A single gable and
+chimney of the cottage peeped over the shoulder of the hill; not
+far off, and a trifle higher on the mountain, a tall old
+white-washed farmhouse stood among the trees, beside a falling
+brook; beyond were rough hills of pasture.&nbsp; I bethought me
+that shepherd folk were early risers, and if I were once seen
+skulking in that neighbourhood it might prove the ruin of my
+prospects; took advantage of a line of hedge, and worked myself
+up in its shadow till I was come under the garden wall of my
+friends&rsquo; house.&nbsp; The cottage was a little quaint place
+of many rough-cast gables and grey roofs.&nbsp; It had something
+the air of a rambling infinitesimal cathedral, the body of it
+rising in the midst two storeys high, with a steep-pitched roof,
+and sending out upon all hands (as it were chapter-houses,
+chapels, and transepts) one-storeyed and dwarfish
+projections.&nbsp; To add to this appearance, it was grotesquely
+decorated with crockets and gargoyles, ravished from some
+medieval church.&nbsp; The place seemed hidden away, being not
+only concealed in the trees of the garden, but, on the side on
+which I approached it, buried as high as the eaves by the rising
+of the ground.&nbsp; About the walls of the garden there went a
+line of well-grown elms and beeches, the first entirely bare, the
+last still pretty well covered with red leaves, and the centre
+was occupied with a thicket of laurel and holly, in which I could
+see arches cut and paths winding.</p>
+<p>I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the
+better.&nbsp; The house appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to
+wake any one, I had no guarantee it might not prove either the
+aunt with the gold eyeglasses (whom I could only remember with
+trembling), or some ass of a servant-maid who should burst out
+screaming at sight of me.&nbsp; Higher up I could hear and see a
+shepherd shouting to his dogs and striding on the rough sides of
+the mountain, and it was clear I must get to cover without loss
+of time.&nbsp; No doubt the holly thickets would have proved a
+very suitable retreat, but there was mounted on the wall a sort
+of signboard not uncommon in the country of Great Britain, and
+very damping to the adventurous: <span class="smcap">Spring Guns
+and Man-Traps</span> was the legend that it bore.&nbsp; I have
+learned since that these advertisements, three times out of four,
+were in the nature of Quaker guns on a disarmed battery, but I
+had not learned it then, and even so, the odds would not have
+been good enough.&nbsp; For a choice, I would a hundred times
+sooner be returned to Edinburgh Castle and my corner in the
+bastion, than to leave my foot in a steel trap or have to digest
+the contents of an automatic blunderbuss.&nbsp; There was but one
+chance left&mdash;that Ronald or Flora might be the first to come
+abroad; and in order to profit by this chance if it occurred, I
+got me on the cope of the wall in a place where it was screened
+by the thick branches of a beech, and sat there waiting.</p>
+<p>As the day wore on, the sun came very pleasantly out.&nbsp; I
+had been awake all night, I had undergone the most violent
+agitations of mind and body, and it is not so much to be wondered
+at, as it was exceedingly unwise and foolhardy, that I should
+have dropped into a doze.&nbsp; From this I awakened to the
+characteristic sound of digging, looked down, and saw immediately
+below me the back view of a gardener in a stable waistcoat.&nbsp;
+Now he would appear steadily immersed in his business; anon, to
+my more immediate terror, he would straighten his back, stretch
+his arms, gaze about the otherwise deserted garden, and relish a
+deep pinch of snuff.&nbsp; It was my first thought to drop from
+the wall upon the other side.&nbsp; A glance sufficed to show me
+that even the way by which I had come was now cut off, and the
+field behind me already occupied by a couple of shepherds&rsquo;
+assistants and a score or two of sheep.&nbsp; I have named the
+talismans on which I habitually depend, but here was a
+conjuncture in which both were wholly useless.&nbsp; The
+copestone of a wall arrayed with broken bottles is no favourable
+rostrum; and I might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as fascinating
+as Richelieu, and neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads
+would care a halfpenny.&nbsp; In short, there was no escape
+possible from my absurd position: there I must continue to sit
+until one or other of my neighbours should raise his eyes and
+give the signal for my capture.</p>
+<p>The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could
+be scarce less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of
+the beech which made a fashion of sheltering me were already
+partly fallen; and I was thus not only perilously exposed myself,
+but enabled to command some part of the garden walks and (under
+an evergreen arch) the front lawn and windows of the
+cottage.&nbsp; For long nothing stirred except my friend with the
+spade; then I heard the opening of a sash; and presently after
+saw Miss Flora appear in a morning wrapper and come strolling
+hitherward between the borders, pausing and visiting her
+flowers&mdash;herself as fair.&nbsp; <i>There</i> was a friend;
+<i>here</i>, immediately beneath me, an unknown
+quantity&mdash;the gardener: how to communicate with the one and
+not attract the notice of the other?&nbsp; To make a noise was
+out of the question; I dared scarce to breathe.&nbsp; I held
+myself ready to make a gesture as soon as she should look, and
+she looked in every possible direction but the one.&nbsp; She was
+interested in the vilest tuft of chickweed, she gazed at the
+summit of the mountain, she came even immediately below me and
+conversed on the most fastidious topics with the gardener; but to
+the top of that wall she would not dedicate a glance!&nbsp; At
+last she began to retrace her steps in the direction of the
+cottage; whereupon, becoming quite desperate, I broke off a piece
+of plaster, took a happy aim, and hit her with it in the nape of
+the neck.&nbsp; She clapped her hand to the place, turned about,
+looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying me (as indeed
+I was parting the branches to make it the more easy), half
+uttered and half swallowed down again a cry of surprise.</p>
+<p>The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What&rsquo;s your wull, miss?&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>Her readiness amazed me.&nbsp; She had already turned and was
+gazing in the opposite direction.&nbsp; &lsquo;There&rsquo;s a
+child among the artichokes,&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The Plagues of Egyp&rsquo;!&nbsp; <i>I&rsquo;ll</i> see
+to them!&rsquo; cried the gardener truculently, and with a
+hurried waddle disappeared among the evergreens.</p>
+<p>That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms
+stretched out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with
+heavenly blushes, the next pale as death.&nbsp; &lsquo;Monsieur
+de. Saint-Yves!&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear young lady,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;this is the
+damnedest liberty&mdash;I know it!&nbsp; But what else was I to
+do?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have escaped?&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you call this escape,&rsquo; I replied.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But you cannot possibly stop there!&rsquo; she
+cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I know it,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And where am I
+to go?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She struck her hands together.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have it!&rsquo;
+she exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Come down by the beech
+trunk&mdash;you must leave no footprint in the
+border&mdash;quickly, before Robie can get back!&nbsp; I am the
+hen-wife here: I keep the key; you must go into the
+hen-house&mdash;for the moment.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was by her side at once.&nbsp; Both cast a hasty glance at
+the blank windows of the cottage and so much as was visible of
+the garden alleys; it seemed there was none to observe us.&nbsp;
+She caught me by the sleeve and ran.&nbsp; It was no time for
+compliments; hurry breathed upon our necks; and I ran along with
+her to the next corner of the garden, where a wired court and a
+board hovel standing in a grove of trees advertised my place of
+refuge.&nbsp; She thrust me in without a word; the bulk of the
+fowls were at the same time emitted; and I found myself the next
+moment locked in alone with half a dozen sitting hens.&nbsp; In
+the twilight of the place all fixed their eyes on me severely,
+and seemed to upbraid me with some crying impropriety.&nbsp;
+Doubtless the hen has always a puritanic appearance, although (in
+its own behaviour) I could never observe it to be more particular
+than its neighbours.&nbsp; But conceive a British hen!</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII&mdash;THE HEN-HOUSE</h2>
+<p>I was half an hour at least in the society of these
+distressing bipeds, and alone with my own reflections and
+necessities.&nbsp; I was in great pain of my flayed hands, and
+had nothing to treat them with; I was hungry and thirsty, and had
+nothing to eat or to drink; I was thoroughly tired, and there was
+no place for me to sit.&nbsp; To be sure there was the floor, but
+nothing could be imagined less inviting.</p>
+<p>At the sound of approaching footsteps, my good-humour was
+restored.&nbsp; The key rattled in the lock, and Master Ronald
+entered, closed the door behind him, and leaned his back to
+it.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I say, you know!&rsquo; he said, and shook a sullen
+young head.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I know it&rsquo;s a liberty,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It&rsquo;s infernally awkward: my position is
+infernally embarrassing,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and what do you think of
+mine?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>This seemed to pose him entirely, and he remained gazing upon
+me with a convincing air of youth and innocence.&nbsp; I could
+have laughed, but I was not so inhumane.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am in your hands,&rsquo; said I, with a little
+gesture.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must do with me what you think
+right.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah, yes!&rsquo; he cried: &lsquo;if I knew!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You see,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it would be different if
+you had received your commission.&nbsp; Properly speaking, you
+are not yet a combatant; I have ceased to be one; and I think it
+arguable that we are just in the position of one ordinary
+gentleman to another, where friendship usually comes before the
+law.&nbsp; Observe, I only say <i>arguable</i>.&nbsp; For
+God&rsquo;s sake, don&rsquo;t think I wish to dictate an
+opinion.&nbsp; These are the sort of nasty little businesses,
+inseparable from war, which every gentleman must decide for
+himself.&nbsp; If I were in your place&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, what would you do, then?&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Upon my word, I do not know,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Hesitate, as you are doing, I believe.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I will tell you,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a
+kinsman, and it is what <i>he</i> would think, that I am
+thinking.&nbsp; It is General Graham of Lynedoch&mdash;Sir Thomas
+Graham.&nbsp; I scarcely know him, but I believe I admire him
+more than I do God.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I admire him a good deal myself,&rsquo; said I,
+&lsquo;and have good reason to.&nbsp; I have fought with him,
+been beaten, and run away.&nbsp; <i>Veni</i>, <i>victus sum</i>,
+<i>evasi</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;You were at
+Barossa?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There and back, which many could not say,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It was a pretty affair and a hot one, and the
+Spaniards behaved abominably, as they usually did in a pitched
+field; the Marshal Duke of Belluno made a fool of himself, and
+not for the first time; and your friend Sir Thomas had the best
+of it, so far as there was any best.&nbsp; He is a brave and
+ready officer.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, then, you will understand!&rsquo; said the
+boy.&nbsp; &lsquo;I wish to please Sir Thomas: what would he
+do?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I can tell you a story,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;a
+true one too, and about this very combat of Chiclana, or Barossa
+as you call it.&nbsp; I was in the Eighth of the Line; we lost
+the eagle of the First Battalion, more betoken, but it cost you
+dear.&nbsp; Well, we had repulsed more charges than I care to
+count, when your 87th Regiment came on at a foot&rsquo;s pace,
+very slow but very steady; in front of them a mounted officer,
+his hat in his hand, white-haired, and talking very quietly to
+the battalions.&nbsp; Our Major, Vigo-Roussillon, set spurs to
+his horse and galloped out to sabre him, but seeing him an old
+man, very handsome, and as composed as if he were in a
+coffee-house, lost heart and galloped back again.&nbsp; Only, you
+see, they had been very close together for the moment, and looked
+each other in the eyes.&nbsp; Soon after the Major was wounded,
+taken prisoner, and carried into Cadiz.&nbsp; One fine day they
+announced to him the visit of the General, Sir Thomas
+Graham.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, sir,&rdquo; said the General, taking
+him by the hand, &ldquo;I think we were face to face upon the
+field.&rdquo;&nbsp; It was the white-haired officer!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; cried the boy,&mdash;his eyes were
+burning.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, and here is the point,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Sir Thomas fed the Major from his own table from that day,
+and served him with six covers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, it is a beautiful&mdash;a beautiful story,&rsquo;
+said Ronald.&nbsp; &lsquo;And yet somehow it is not the
+same&mdash;is it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I admit it freely,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>The boy stood awhile brooding.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, I take my
+risk of it,&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;I believe it&rsquo;s
+treason to my sovereign&mdash;I believe there is an infamous
+punishment for such a crime&mdash;and yet I&rsquo;m hanged if I
+can give you up.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was as much moved as he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I could almost beg you
+to do otherwise,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I was a brute to
+come to you, a brute and a coward.&nbsp; You are a noble enemy;
+you will make a noble soldier.&rsquo;&nbsp; And with rather a
+happy idea of a compliment for this warlike youth, I stood up
+straight and gave him the salute.</p>
+<p>He was for a moment confused; his face flushed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Well, well, I must be getting you something to eat, but it
+will not be for six,&rsquo; he added, with a smile: &lsquo;only
+what we can get smuggled out.&nbsp; There is my aunt in the road,
+you see,&rsquo; and he locked me in again with the indignant
+hens.</p>
+<p>I always smile when I recall that young fellow; and yet, if
+the reader were to smile also, I should feel ashamed.&nbsp; If my
+son shall be only like him when he comes to that age, it will be
+a brave day for me and not a bad one for his country.</p>
+<p>At the same time I cannot pretend that I was sorry when his
+sister succeeded in his place.&nbsp; She brought me a few crusts
+of bread and a jug of milk, which she had handsomely laced with
+whisky after the Scottish manner.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am so sorry,&rsquo; she said: &lsquo;I dared not
+bring on anything more.&nbsp; We are so small a family, and my
+aunt keeps such an eye upon the servants.&nbsp; I have put some
+whisky in the milk&mdash;it is more wholesome so&mdash;and with
+eggs you will be able to make something of a meal.&nbsp; How many
+eggs will you be wanting to that milk? for I must be taking the
+others to my aunt&mdash;that is my excuse for being here.&nbsp; I
+should think three or four.&nbsp; Do you know how to beat them?
+or shall I do it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Willing to detain her a while longer in the hen-house, I
+displayed my bleeding palms; at which she cried aloud.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear Miss Flora, you cannot make an omelette without
+breaking eggs,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and it is no bagatelle to
+escape from Edinburgh Castle.&nbsp; One of us, I think, was even
+killed.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And you are as white as a rag, too,&rsquo; she
+exclaimed, &lsquo;and can hardly stand!&nbsp; Here is my shawl,
+sit down upon it here in the corner, and I will beat your
+eggs.&nbsp; See, I have brought a fork too; I should have been a
+good person to take care of Jacobites or Covenanters in old
+days!&nbsp; You shall have more to eat this evening; Ronald is to
+bring it you from town.&nbsp; We have money enough, although no
+food that we can call our own.&nbsp; Ah, if Ronald and I kept
+house, you should not be lying in this shed!&nbsp; He admires you
+so much.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear friend,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;for God&rsquo;s
+sake do not embarrass me with more alms.&nbsp; I loved to receive
+them from that hand, so long as they were needed; but they are so
+no more, and whatever else I may lack&mdash;and I lack
+everything&mdash;it is not money.&rsquo;&nbsp; I pulled out my
+sheaf of notes and detached the top one: it was written for ten
+pounds, and signed by that very famous individual, Abraham
+Newlands.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oblige me, as you would like me to oblige
+your brother if the parts were reversed, and take this note for
+the expenses.&nbsp; I shall need not only food, but
+clothes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Lay it on the ground,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+must not stop my beating.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are not offended?&rsquo; I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>She answered me by a look that was a reward in itself, and
+seemed to imply the most heavenly offers for the future.&nbsp;
+There was in it a shadow of reproach, and such warmth of
+communicative cordiality as left me speechless.&nbsp; I watched
+her instead till her hens&rsquo; milk was ready.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;taste that.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I did so, and swore it was nectar.&nbsp; She collected her
+eggs and crouched in front of me to watch me eat.&nbsp; There was
+about this tall young lady at the moment an air of motherliness
+delicious to behold.&nbsp; I am like the English general, and to
+this day I still wonder at my moderation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What sort of clothes will you be wanting?&rsquo; said
+she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The clothes of a gentleman,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Right or wrong, I think it is the part I am best qualified
+to play.&nbsp; Mr. St. Ives (for that&rsquo;s to be my name upon
+the journey) I conceive as rather a theatrical figure, and his
+make-up should be to match.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And yet there is a difficulty,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;If you got coarse clothes the fit would hardly
+matter.&nbsp; But the clothes of a fine gentleman&mdash;O, it is
+absolutely necessary that these should fit!&nbsp; And above all,
+with your&rsquo;&mdash;she paused a moment&mdash;&lsquo;to our
+ideas somewhat noticeable manners.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Alas for my poor manners!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But my dear friend Flora, these little noticeabilities are
+just what mankind has to suffer under.&nbsp; Yourself, you see,
+you&rsquo;re very noticeable even when you come in a crowd to
+visit poor prisoners in the Castle.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was afraid I should frighten my good angel visitant away,
+and without the smallest breath of pause went on to add a few
+directions as to stuffs and colours.</p>
+<p>She opened big eyes upon me.&nbsp; &lsquo;O, Mr. St.
+Ives!&rsquo; she cried&mdash;&lsquo;if that is to be your
+name&mdash;I do not say they would not be becoming; but for a
+journey, do you think they would be wise?&nbsp; I am
+afraid&rsquo;&mdash;she gave a pretty break of
+laughter&mdash;&lsquo;I am afraid they would be
+daft-like!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, and am I not daft?&rsquo; I asked her.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I do begin to think you are,&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There it is, then!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have
+been long enough a figure of fun.&nbsp; Can you not feel with me
+that perhaps the bitterest thing in this captivity has been the
+clothes?&nbsp; Make me a captive&mdash;bind me with chains if you
+like&mdash;but let me be still myself.&nbsp; You do not know what
+it is to be a walking travesty&mdash;among foes,&rsquo; I added
+bitterly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, but you are too unjust!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You speak as though any one ever dreamed of laughing at
+you.&nbsp; But no one did.&nbsp; We were all pained to the
+heart.&nbsp; Even my aunt&mdash;though sometimes I do think she
+was not quite in good taste&mdash;you should have seen her and
+heard her at home!&nbsp; She took so much interest.&nbsp; Every
+patch in your clothes made us sorry; it should have been a
+sister&rsquo;s work.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That is what I never had&mdash;a sister,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But since you say that I did not make you
+laugh&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, Mr. St. Ives! never!&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Not for one moment.&nbsp; It was all too sad.&nbsp; To see
+a gentleman&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In the clothes of a harlequin, and begging?&rsquo; I
+suggested.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To see a gentleman in distress, and nobly supporting
+it,&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And do you not understand, my fair foe,&rsquo; said I,
+&lsquo;that even if all were as you say&mdash;even if you had
+thought my travesty were becoming&mdash;I should be only the more
+anxious, for my sake, for my country&rsquo;s sake, and for the
+sake of your kindness, that you should see him whom you have
+helped as God meant him to be seen? that you should have
+something to remember him by at least more characteristic than a
+misfitting sulphur-yellow suit, and half a week&rsquo;s
+beard?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You think a great deal too much of clothes,&rsquo; she
+said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am not that kind of girl.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I am afraid I am that kind of man,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But do not think of me too harshly for
+that.&nbsp; I talked just now of something to remember by.&nbsp;
+I have many of them myself, of these beautiful reminders, of
+these keepsakes, that I cannot be parted from until I lose memory
+and life.&nbsp; Many of them are great things, many of them are
+high virtues&mdash;charity, mercy, faith.&nbsp; But some of them
+are trivial enough.&nbsp; Miss Flora, do you remember the day
+that I first saw you, the day of the strong east wind?&nbsp; Miss
+Flora, shall I tell you what you wore?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>We had both risen to our feet, and she had her hand already on
+the door to go.&nbsp; Perhaps this attitude emboldened me to
+profit by the last seconds of our interview; and it certainly
+rendered her escape the more easy.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, you are too romantic!&rsquo; she said, laughing; and
+with that my sun was blown out, my enchantress had fled away, and
+I was again left alone in the twilight with the lady hens.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX&mdash;THREE IS COMPANY, AND FOUR NONE</h2>
+<p>The rest of the day I slept in the corner of the hen-house
+upon Flora&rsquo;s shawl.&nbsp; Nor did I awake until a light
+shone suddenly in my eyes, and starting up with a gasp (for,
+indeed, at the moment I dreamed I was still swinging from the
+Castle battlements) I found Ronald bending over me with a
+lantern.&nbsp; It appeared it was past midnight, that I had slept
+about sixteen hours, and that Flora had returned her poultry to
+the shed and I had heard her not.&nbsp; I could not but wonder if
+she had stooped to look at me as I slept.&nbsp; The puritan hens
+now slept irremediably; and being cheered with the promise of
+supper I wished them an ironical good-night, and was lighted
+across the garden and noiselessly admitted to a bedroom on the
+ground floor of the cottage.&nbsp; There I found soap, water,
+razors&mdash;offered me diffidently by my beardless
+host&mdash;and an outfit of new clothes.&nbsp; To be shaved again
+without depending on the barber of the gaol was a source of a
+delicious, if a childish joy.&nbsp; My hair was sadly too long,
+but I was none so unwise as to make an attempt on it
+myself.&nbsp; And, indeed, I thought it did not wholly misbecome
+me as it was, being by nature curly.&nbsp; The clothes were about
+as good as I expected.&nbsp; The waistcoat was of toilenet, a
+pretty piece, the trousers of fine kerseymere, and the coat sat
+extraordinarily well.&nbsp; Altogether, when I beheld this
+changeling in the glass, I kissed my hand to him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear fellow,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;have you no
+scent?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good God, no!&rsquo; cried Ronald.&nbsp; &lsquo;What do
+you want with scent?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Capital thing on a campaign,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But I can do without.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was now led, with the same precautions against noise, into
+the little bow-windowed dining-room of the cottage.&nbsp; The
+shutters were up, the lamp guiltily turned low; the beautiful
+Flora greeted me in a whisper; and when I was set down to table,
+the pair proceeded to help me with precautions that might have
+seemed excessive in the Ear of Dionysius.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;She sleeps up there,&rsquo; observed the boy, pointing
+to the ceiling; and the knowledge that I was so imminently near
+to the resting-place of that gold eyeglass touched even myself
+with some uneasiness.</p>
+<p>Our excellent youth had imported from the city a meat pie, and
+I was glad to find it flanked with a decanter of really admirable
+wine of Oporto.&nbsp; While I ate, Ronald entertained me with the
+news of the city, which had naturally rung all day with our
+escape: troops and mounted messengers had followed each other
+forth at all hours and in all directions; but according to the
+last intelligence no recapture had been made.&nbsp; Opinion in
+town was very favourable to us: our courage was applauded, and
+many professed regret that our ultimate chance of escape should
+be so small.&nbsp; The man who had fallen was one Sombref, a
+peasant; he was one who slept in a different part of the Castle;
+and I was thus assured that the whole of my former companions had
+attained their liberty, and Shed A was untenanted.</p>
+<p>From this we wandered insensibly into other topics.&nbsp; It
+is impossible to exaggerate the pleasure I took to be thus
+sitting at the same table with Flora, in the clothes of a
+gentleman, at liberty and in the full possession of my spirits
+and resources; of all of which I had need, because it was
+necessary that I should support at the same time two opposite
+characters, and at once play the cavalier and lively soldier for
+the eyes of Ronald, and to the ears of Flora maintain the same
+profound and sentimental note that I had already sounded.&nbsp;
+Certainly there are days when all goes well with a man; when his
+wit, his digestion, his mistress are in a conspiracy to spoil
+him, and even the weather smiles upon his wishes.&nbsp; I will
+only say of myself upon that evening that I surpassed my
+expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.&nbsp;
+Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution;
+until at last we were brought back to earth by a catastrophe that
+might very easily have been foreseen, but was not the less
+astonishing to us when it occurred.</p>
+<p>I had filled all the glasses.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a toast to
+propose,&rsquo; I whispered, &lsquo;or rather three, but all so
+inextricably interwoven that they will not bear dividing.&nbsp; I
+wish first to drink to the health of a brave and therefore a
+generous enemy.&nbsp; He found me disarmed, a fugitive and
+helpless.&nbsp; Like the lion, he disdained so poor a triumph;
+and when he might have vindicated an easy valour, he preferred to
+make a friend.&nbsp; I wish that we should next drink to a fairer
+and a more tender foe.&nbsp; She found me in prison; she cheered
+me with a priceless sympathy; what she has done since, I know she
+has done in mercy, and I only pray&mdash;I dare scarce
+hope&mdash;her mercy may prove to have been merciful.&nbsp; And I
+wish to conjoin with these, for the first, and perhaps the last
+time, the health&mdash;and I fear I may already say the
+memory&mdash;of one who has fought, not always without success,
+against the soldiers of your nation; but who came here,
+vanquished already, only to be vanquished again by the loyal hand
+of the one, by the unforgettable eyes of the other.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It is to be feared I may have lent at times a certain
+resonancy to my voice; it is to be feared that Ronald, who was
+none the better for his own hospitality, may have set down his
+glass with something of a clang.&nbsp; Whatever may have been the
+cause, at least, I had scarce finished my compliment before we
+were aware of a thump upon the ceiling overhead.&nbsp; It was to
+be thought some very solid body had descended to the floor from
+the level (possibly) of a bed.&nbsp; I have never seen
+consternation painted in more lively colours than on the faces of
+my hosts.&nbsp; It was proposed to smuggle me forth into the
+garden, or to conceal my form under a horsehair sofa which stood
+against the wall.&nbsp; For the first expedient, as was now plain
+by the approaching footsteps, there was no longer time; from the
+second I recoiled with indignation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear creatures,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us die,
+but do not let us be ridiculous.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The words were still upon my lips when the door opened and my
+friend of the gold eyeglass appeared, a memorable figure, on the
+threshold.&nbsp; In one hand she bore a bedroom candlestick; in
+the other, with the steadiness of a dragoon, a
+horse-pistol.&nbsp; She was wound about in shawls which did not
+wholly conceal the candid fabric of her nightdress, and
+surmounted by a nightcap of portentous architecture.&nbsp; Thus
+accoutred, she made her entrance; laid down the candle and
+pistol, as no longer called for; looked about the room with a
+silence more eloquent than oaths; and then, in a thrilling
+voice&mdash;&lsquo;To whom have I the pleasure?&rsquo; she said,
+addressing me with a ghost of a bow.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam, I am charmed, I am sure,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The story is a little long; and our meeting, however
+welcome, was for the moment entirely unexpected by myself.&nbsp;
+I am sure&mdash;&rsquo; but here I found I was quite sure of
+nothing, and tried again.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have the honour,&rsquo;
+I began, and found I had the honour to be only exceedingly
+confused.&nbsp; With that, I threw myself outright upon her
+mercy.&nbsp; &lsquo;Madam, I must be more frank with you,&rsquo;
+I resumed.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have already proved your charity and
+compassion for the French prisoners, I am one of these; and if my
+appearance be not too much changed, you may even yet recognise in
+me that <i>Oddity</i> who had the good fortune more than once to
+make you smile.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Still gazing upon me through her glass, she uttered an
+uncompromising grunt; and then, turning to her
+niece&mdash;&lsquo;Flora,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;how comes he
+here?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The culprits poured out for a while an antiphony of
+explanations, which died out at last in a miserable silence.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think at least you might have told your aunt,&rsquo;
+she snorted.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; I interposed, &lsquo;they were about to
+do so.&nbsp; It is my fault if it be not done already.&nbsp; But
+I made it my prayer that your slumbers might be respected, and
+this necessary formula of my presentation should be delayed until
+to-morrow in the morning.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The old lady regarded me with undissembled incredulity, to
+which I was able to find no better repartee than a profound and I
+trust graceful reverence.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;French prisoners are very well in their place,&rsquo;
+she said, &lsquo;but I cannot see that their place is in my
+private dining-room.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I hope it may be said
+without offence, but (except the Castle of Edinburgh) I cannot
+think upon the spot from which I would so readily be
+absent.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this, to my relief, I thought I could perceive a vestige of
+a smile to steal upon that iron countenance and to be bitten
+immediately in.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And if it is a fair question, what do they call
+ye?&rsquo; she asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;At your service, the Vicomte Anne de St.-Yves,&rsquo;
+said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mosha the Viscount,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;I am afraid
+you do us plain people a great deal too much honour.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear lady,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us be serious
+for a moment.&nbsp; What was I to do?&nbsp; Where was I to
+go?&nbsp; And how can you be angry with these benevolent children
+who took pity on one so unfortunate as myself?&nbsp; Your humble
+servant is no such terrific adventurer that you should come out
+against him with horse-pistol
+and&rsquo;&mdash;smiling&mdash;&lsquo;bedroom candlesticks.&nbsp;
+It is but a young gentleman in extreme distress, hunted upon
+every side, and asking no more than to escape from his
+pursuers.&nbsp; I know your character, I read it in your
+face&rsquo;&mdash;the heart trembled in my body as I said these
+daring words.&nbsp; &lsquo;There are unhappy English prisoners in
+France at this day, perhaps at this hour.&nbsp; Perhaps at this
+hour they kneel as I do; they take the hand of her who might
+conceal and assist them; they press it to their lips as I
+do&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here, here!&rsquo; cried the old lady, breaking from my
+solicitations.&nbsp; &lsquo;Behave yourself before folk!&nbsp;
+Saw ever anyone the match of that?&nbsp; And on earth, my dears,
+what are we to do with him?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pack him off, my dear lady,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;pack
+off the impudent fellow double-quick!&nbsp; And if it may be, and
+if your good heart allows it, help him a little on the way he has
+to go.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What&rsquo;s this pie?&rsquo; she cried
+stridently.&nbsp; &lsquo;Where is this pie from,
+Flora?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>No answer was vouchsafed by my unfortunate and (I may say)
+extinct accomplices.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is that my port?&rsquo; she pursued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Hough!&nbsp; Will somebody give me a glass of my port
+wine?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I made haste to serve her.</p>
+<p>She looked at me over the rim with an extraordinary
+expression.&nbsp; &lsquo;I hope ye liked it?&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is even a magnificent wine,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Aweel, it was my father laid it down,&rsquo; said
+she.&nbsp; &lsquo;There were few knew more about port wine than
+my father, God rest him!&rsquo;&nbsp; She settled herself in a
+chair with an alarming air of resolution.&nbsp; &lsquo;And so
+there is some particular direction that you wish to go in?&rsquo;
+said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O,&rsquo; said I, following her example, &lsquo;I am by
+no means such a vagrant as you suppose.&nbsp; I have good
+friends, if I could get to them, for which all I want is to be
+once clear of Scotland; and I have money for the
+road.&rsquo;&nbsp; And I produced my bundle.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;English bank-notes?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s not very handy for Scotland.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+been some fool of an Englishman that&rsquo;s given you these,
+I&rsquo;m thinking.&nbsp; How much is it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I declare to heaven I never thought to count!&rsquo; I
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;But that is soon remedied.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And I counted out ten notes of ten pound each, all in the name
+of Abraham Newlands, and five bills of country bankers for as
+many guineas.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;One hundred and twenty six pound five,&rsquo; cried the
+old lady.&nbsp; &lsquo;And you carry such a sum about you, and
+have not so much as counted it!&nbsp; If you are not a thief, you
+must allow you are very thief-like.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And yet, madam, the money is legitimately mine,&rsquo;
+said I.</p>
+<p>She took one of the bills and held it up.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is
+there any probability, now, that this could be traced?&rsquo; she
+asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;None, I should suppose; and if it were, it would be no
+matter,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;With your usual penetration,
+you guessed right.&nbsp; An Englishman brought it me.&nbsp; It
+reached me, through the hands of his English solicitor, from my
+great-uncle, the Comte de K&eacute;roual de Saint-Yves, I believe
+the richest <i>&eacute;migr&eacute;</i> in London.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I can do no more than take your word for it,&rsquo;
+said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I trust, madam, not less,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;at this rate the matter
+may be feasible.&nbsp; I will cash one of these five-guinea
+bills, less the exchange, and give you silver and Scots notes to
+bear you as far as the border.&nbsp; Beyond that, Mosha the
+Viscount, you will have to depend upon yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I could not but express a civil hesitation as to whether the
+amount would suffice, in my case, for so long a journey.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;but you havenae heard me
+out.&nbsp; For if you are not too fine a gentleman to travel with
+a pair of drovers, I believe I have found the very thing, and the
+Lord forgive me for a treasonable old wife!&nbsp; There are a
+couple stopping up by with the shepherd-man at the farm;
+to-morrow they will take the road for England, probably by
+skriegh of day&mdash;and in my opinion you had best be travelling
+with the stots,&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;For Heaven&rsquo;s sake do not suppose me to be so
+effeminate a character!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;An old
+soldier of Napoleon is certainly beyond suspicion.&nbsp; But,
+dear lady, to what end? and how is the society of these excellent
+gentlemen supposed to help me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear sir,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;you do not at all
+understand your own predicament, and must just leave your matters
+in the hands of those who do.&nbsp; I dare say you have never
+even heard tell of the drove-roads or the drovers; and I am
+certainly not going to sit up all night to explain it to
+you.&nbsp; Suffice it, that it is me who is arranging this
+affair&mdash;the more shame to me!&mdash;and that is the way ye
+have to go.&nbsp; Ronald,&rsquo; she continued, &lsquo;away up-by
+to the shepherds; rowst them out of their beds, and make it
+perfectly distinct that Sim is not to leave till he has seen
+me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Ronald was nothing loath to escape from his aunt&rsquo;s
+neighbourhood, and left the room and the cottage with a silent
+expedition that was more like flight than mere obedience.&nbsp;
+Meanwhile the old lady turned to her niece.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I would like to know what we are to do with him the
+night!&rsquo; she cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ronald and I meant to put him in the hen-house,&rsquo;
+said the encrimsoned Flora.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I can tell you he is to go to no such a
+place,&rsquo; replied the aunt.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hen-house,
+indeed!&nbsp; If a guest he is to be, he shall sleep in no mortal
+hen-house.&nbsp; Your room is the most fit, I think, if he will
+consent to occupy it on so great a suddenty.&nbsp; And as for
+you, Flora, you shall sleep with me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I could not help admiring the prudence and tact of this old
+dowager, and of course it was not for me to make
+objections.&nbsp; Ere I well knew how, I was alone with a flat
+candlestick, which is not the most sympathetic of companions, and
+stood studying the snuff in a frame of mind between triumph and
+chagrin.&nbsp; All had gone well with my flight: the masterful
+lady who had arrogated to herself the arrangement of the details
+gave me every confidence; and I saw myself already arriving at my
+uncle&rsquo;s door.&nbsp; But, alas! it was another story with my
+love affair.&nbsp; I had seen and spoken with her alone; I had
+ventured boldly; I had been not ill received; I had seen her
+change colour, had enjoyed the undissembled kindness of her eyes;
+and now, in a moment, down comes upon the scene that apocalyptic
+figure with the nightcap and the horse-pistol, and with the very
+wind of her coming behold me separated from my love!&nbsp;
+Gratitude and admiration contended in my breast with the extreme
+of natural rancour.&nbsp; My appearance in her house at past
+midnight had an air (I could not disguise it from myself) that
+was insolent and underhand, and could not but minister to the
+worst suspicions.&nbsp; And the old lady had taken it well.&nbsp;
+Her generosity was no more to be called in question than her
+courage, and I was afraid that her intelligence would be found to
+match.&nbsp; Certainly, Miss Flora had to support some shrewd
+looks, and certainly she had been troubled.&nbsp; I could see but
+the one way before me: to profit by an excellent bed, to try to
+sleep soon, to be stirring early, and to hope for some renewed
+occasion in the morning.&nbsp; To have said so much and yet to
+say no more, to go out into the world upon so half-hearted a
+parting, was more than I could accept.</p>
+<p>It is my belief that the benevolent fiend sat up all night to
+baulk me.&nbsp; She was at my bedside with a candle long ere day,
+roused me, laid out for me a damnable misfit of clothes, and bade
+me pack my own (which were wholly unsuited to the journey) in a
+bundle.&nbsp; Sore grudging, I arrayed myself in a suit of some
+country fabric, as delicate as sackcloth and about as becoming as
+a shroud; and, on coming forth, found the dragon had prepared for
+me a hearty breakfast.&nbsp; She took the head of the table,
+poured out the tea, and entertained me as I ate with a great deal
+of good sense and a conspicuous lack of charm.&nbsp; How often
+did I not regret the change!&mdash;how often compare her, and
+condemn her in the comparison, with her charming niece!&nbsp; But
+if my entertainer was not beautiful, she had certainly been busy
+in my interest.&nbsp; Already she was in communication with my
+destined fellow-travellers; and the device on which she had
+struck appeared entirely suitable.&nbsp; I was a young Englishman
+who had outrun the constable; warrants were out against me in
+Scotland, and it had become needful I should pass the border
+without loss of time, and privately.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have given a very good account of you,&rsquo; said
+she, &lsquo;which I hope you may justify.&nbsp; I told them there
+was nothing against you beyond the fact that you were put to the
+haw (if that is the right word) for debt.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I pray God you have the expression incorrectly,
+ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I do not give myself out
+for a person easily alarmed; but you must admit there is
+something barbarous and mediaeval in the sound well qualified to
+startle a poor foreigner.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is the name of a process in Scots Law, and need
+alarm no honest man,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;But you are a
+very idle-minded young gentleman; you must still have your joke,
+I see: I only hope you will have no cause to regret
+it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I pray you not to suppose, because I speak lightly,
+that I do not feel deeply,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your
+kindness has quite conquered me; I lay myself at your
+disposition, I beg you to believe, with real tenderness; I pray
+you to consider me from henceforth as the most devoted of your
+friends.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;here comes your
+devoted friend the drover.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m thinking he will be
+eager for the road; and I will not be easy myself till I see you
+well off the premises, and the dishes washed, before my
+servant-woman wakes.&nbsp; Praise God, we have gotten one that is
+a treasure at the sleeping!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The morning was already beginning to be blue in the trees of
+the garden, and to put to shame the candle by which I had
+breakfasted.&nbsp; The lady rose from table, and I had no choice
+but to follow her example.&nbsp; All the time I was beating my
+brains for any means by which I should be able to get a word
+apart with Flora, or find the time to write her a billet.&nbsp;
+The windows had been open while I breakfasted, I suppose to
+ventilate the room from any traces of my passage there; and,
+Master Ronald appearing on the front lawn, my ogre leaned forth
+to address him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ronald,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;wasn&rsquo;t that Sim
+that went by the wall?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I snatched my advantage.&nbsp; Right at her back there was
+pen, ink, and paper laid out.&nbsp; I wrote: &lsquo;I love
+you&rsquo;; and before I had time to write more, or so much as to
+blot what I had written, I was again under the guns of the gold
+eyeglasses.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It&rsquo;s time,&rsquo; she began; and then, as she
+observed my occupation, &lsquo;Umph!&rsquo; she broke off.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Ye have something to write?&rsquo; she demanded.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Some notes, madam,&rsquo; said I, bowing with
+alacrity.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Notes,&rsquo; she said; &lsquo;or a note?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There is doubtless some <i>finesse</i> of the English
+language that I do not comprehend,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll contrive, however, to make my meaning very
+plain to ye, Mosha le Viscount,&rsquo; she continued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I suppose you desire to be considered a
+gentleman?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Can you doubt it, madam?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I doubt very much, at least, whether you go to the
+right way about it,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have come
+here to me, I cannot very well say how; I think you will admit
+you owe me some thanks, if it was only for the breakfast I made
+ye.&nbsp; But what are you to me?&nbsp; A waif young man, not so
+far to seek for looks and manners, with some English notes in
+your pocket and a price upon your head.&nbsp; I am a lady; I have
+been your hostess, with however little will; and I desire that
+this random acquaintance of yours with my family will cease and
+determine.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I believe I must have coloured.&nbsp; &lsquo;Madam,&rsquo;
+said I, &lsquo;the notes are of no importance; and your least
+pleasure ought certainly to be my law.&nbsp; You have felt, and
+you have been pleased to express, a doubt of me.&nbsp; I tear
+them up.&rsquo;&nbsp; Which you may be sure I did thoroughly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There&rsquo;s a good lad!&rsquo; said the dragon, and
+immediately led the way to the front lawn.</p>
+<p>The brother and sister were both waiting us here, and, as well
+as I could make out in the imperfect light, bore every appearance
+of having passed through a rather cruel experience.&nbsp; Ronald
+seemed ashamed to so much as catch my eye in the presence of his
+aunt, and was the picture of embarrassment.&nbsp; As for Flora,
+she had scarce the time to cast me one look before the dragon
+took her by the arm, and began to march across the garden in the
+extreme first glimmer of the dawn without exchanging
+speech.&nbsp; Ronald and I followed in equal silence.</p>
+<p>There was a door in that same high wall on the top of which I
+had sat perched no longer gone than yesterday morning.&nbsp; This
+the old lady set open with a key; and on the other side we were
+aware of a rough-looking, thick-set man, leaning with his arms
+(through which was passed a formidable staff) on a dry-stone
+dyke.&nbsp; Him the old lady immediately addressed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sim,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;this is the young
+gentleman.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Sim replied with an inarticulate grumble of sound, and a
+movement of one arm and his head, which did duty for a
+salutation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, Mr. St. Ives,&rsquo; said the old lady,
+&lsquo;it&rsquo;s high time for you to be taking the road.&nbsp;
+But first of all let me give the change of your five-guinea
+bill.&nbsp; Here are four pounds of it in British Linen notes,
+and the balance in small silver, less sixpence.&nbsp; Some charge
+a shilling, I believe, but I have given you the benefit of the
+doubt.&nbsp; See and guide it with all the sense that you
+possess.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And here, Mr. St. Ives,&rsquo; said Flora, speaking for
+the first time, &lsquo;is a plaid which you will find quite
+necessary on so rough a journey.&nbsp; I hope you will take it
+from the hands of a Scotch friend,&rsquo; she added, and her
+voice trembled.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Genuine holly: I cut it myself,&rsquo; said Ronald, and
+gave me as good a cudgel as a man could wish for in a row.</p>
+<p>The formality of these gifts, and the waiting figure of the
+driver, told me loudly that I must be gone.&nbsp; I dropped on
+one knee and bade farewell to the aunt, kissing her hand.&nbsp; I
+did the like&mdash;but with how different a passion!&mdash;to her
+niece; as for the boy, I took him to my arms and embraced him
+with a cordiality that seemed to strike him speechless.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Farewell!&rsquo; and &lsquo;Farewell!&rsquo; I said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I shall never forget my friends.&nbsp; Keep me sometimes
+in memory.&nbsp; Farewell!&rsquo; With that I turned my back and
+began to walk away; and had scarce done so, when I heard the door
+in the high wall close behind me.&nbsp; Of course this was the
+aunt&rsquo;s doing; and of course, if I know anything of human
+character, she would not let me go without some tart
+expressions.&nbsp; I declare, even if I had heard them, I should
+not have minded in the least, for I was quite persuaded that,
+whatever admirers I might be leaving behind me in Swanston
+Cottage, the aunt was not the least sincere.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER X&mdash;THE DROVERS</h2>
+<p>It took me a little effort to come abreast of my new
+companion; for though he walked with an ugly roll and no great
+appearance of speed, he could cover the around at a good rate
+when he wanted to.&nbsp; Each looked at the other: I with natural
+curiosity, he with a great appearance of distaste.&nbsp; I have
+heard since that his heart was entirely set against me; he had
+seen me kneel to the ladies, and diagnosed me for a
+&lsquo;gesterin&rsquo; eediot.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So, ye&rsquo;re for England, are ye?&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>I told him yes.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Weel, there&rsquo;s waur places, I believe,&rsquo; was
+his reply; and he relapsed into a silence which was not broken
+during a quarter of an hour of steady walking.</p>
+<p>This interval brought us to the foot of a bare green valley,
+which wound upwards and backwards among the hills.&nbsp; A little
+stream came down the midst and made a succession of clear pools;
+near by the lowest of which I was aware of a drove of shaggy
+cattle, and a man who seemed the very counterpart of Mr. Sim
+making a breakfast upon bread and cheese.&nbsp; This second
+drover (whose name proved to be Candlish) rose on our
+approach.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here&rsquo;s a mannie that&rsquo;s to gang through with
+us,&rsquo; said Sim.&nbsp; &lsquo;It was the auld wife,
+Gilchrist, wanted it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Aweel, aweel,&rsquo; said the other; and presently,
+remembering his manners, and looking on me with a solemn grin,
+&lsquo;A fine day!&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>I agreed with him, and asked him how he did.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Brawly,&rsquo; was the reply; and without further
+civilities, the pair proceeded to get the cattle under way.&nbsp;
+This, as well as almost all the herding, was the work of a pair
+of comely and intelligent dogs, directed by Sim or Candlish in
+little more than monosyllables.&nbsp; Presently we were ascending
+the side of the mountain by a rude green track, whose presence I
+had not hitherto observed.&nbsp; A continual sound of munching
+and the crying of a great quantity of moor birds accompanied our
+progress, which the deliberate pace and perennial appetite of the
+cattle rendered wearisomely slow.&nbsp; In the midst my two
+conductors marched in a contented silence that I could not but
+admire.&nbsp; The more I looked at them, the more I was impressed
+by their absurd resemblance to each other.&nbsp; They were
+dressed in the same coarse homespun, carried similar sticks, were
+equally begrimed about the nose with snuff, and each wound in an
+identical plaid of what is called the shepherd&rsquo;s
+tartan.&nbsp; In a back view they might be described as
+indistinguishable; and even from the front they were much
+alike.&nbsp; An incredible coincidence of humours augmented the
+impression.&nbsp; Thrice and four times I attempted to pave the
+way for some exchange of thought, sentiment, or&mdash;at the
+least of it&mdash;human words.&nbsp; An <i>Ay</i> or an
+<i>Nhm</i> was the sole return, and the topic died on the
+hill-side without echo.&nbsp; I can never deny that I was
+chagrined; and when, after a little more walking, Sim turned
+towards me and offered me a ram&rsquo;s horn of snuff, with the
+question &lsquo;Do ye use it?&rsquo; I answered, with some
+animation, &lsquo;Faith, sir, I would use pepper to introduce a
+little cordiality.&rsquo;&nbsp; But even this sally failed to
+reach, or at least failed to soften, my companions.</p>
+<p>At this rate we came to the summit of a ridge, and saw the
+track descend in front of us abruptly into a desert vale, about a
+league in length, and closed at the farther end by no less barren
+hilltops.&nbsp; Upon this point of vantage Sim came to a halt,
+took off his hat, and mopped his brow.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Weel,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;here we&rsquo;re at the
+top o&rsquo; Howden.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The top o&rsquo; Howden, sure eneuch,&rsquo; said
+Candlish.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivey, are ye dry?&rsquo; said the first.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, really,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;is not this Satan
+reproving sin?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What ails ye, man?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;m offerin&rsquo; ye a dram.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, if it be anything to drink,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I
+am as dry as my neighbours.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Whereupon Sim produced from the corner of his plaid a black
+bottle, and we all drank and pledged each other.&nbsp; I found
+these gentlemen followed upon such occasions an invariable
+etiquette, which you may be certain I made haste to
+imitate.&nbsp; Each wiped his mouth with the back of his left
+hand, held up the bottle in his right, remarked with emphasis,
+&lsquo;Here&rsquo;s to ye!&rsquo; and swallowed as much of the
+spirit as his fancy prompted.&nbsp; This little ceremony, which
+was the nearest thing to manners I could perceive in either of my
+companions, was repeated at becoming intervals, generally after
+an ascent.&nbsp; Occasionally we shared a mouthful of ewe-milk
+cheese and an inglorious form of bread, which I understood (but
+am far from engaging my honour on the point) to be called
+&lsquo;shearer&rsquo;s bannock.&rsquo;&nbsp; And that may be said
+to have concluded our whole active intercourse for the first
+day.</p>
+<p>I had the more occasion to remark the extraordinarily desolate
+nature of that country, through which the drove road continued,
+hour after hour and even day after day, to wind.&nbsp; A
+continual succession of insignificant shaggy hills, divided by
+the course of ten thousand brooks, through which we had to wade,
+or by the side of which we encamped at night; infinite
+perspectives of heather, infinite quantities of moorfowl; here
+and there, by a stream side, small and pretty clumps of willows
+or the silver birch; here and there, the ruins of ancient and
+inconsiderable fortresses&mdash;made the unchanging characters of
+the scene.&nbsp; Occasionally, but only in the distance, we could
+perceive the smoke of a small town or of an isolated farmhouse or
+cottage on the moors; more often, a flock of sheep and its
+attendant shepherd, or a rude field of agriculture perhaps not
+yet harvested.&nbsp; With these alleviations, we might almost be
+said to pass through an unbroken desert&mdash;sure, one of the
+most impoverished in Europe; and when I recalled to mind that we
+were yet but a few leagues from the chief city (where the law
+courts sat every day with a press of business, soldiers
+garrisoned the castle, and men of admitted parts were carrying on
+the practice of letters and the investigations of science), it
+gave me a singular view of that poor, barren, and yet illustrious
+country through which I travelled.&nbsp; Still more, perhaps, did
+it commend the wisdom of Miss Gilchrist in sending me with these
+uncouth companions and by this unfrequented path.</p>
+<p>My itinerary is by no means clear to me; the names and
+distances I never clearly knew, and have now wholly forgotten;
+and this is the more to be regretted as there is no doubt that,
+in the course of those days, I must have passed and camped among
+sites which have been rendered illustrious by the pen of Walter
+Scott.&nbsp; Nay, more, I am of opinion that I was still more
+favoured by fortune, and have actually met and spoken with that
+inimitable author.&nbsp; Our encounter was of a tall, stoutish,
+elderly gentleman, a little grizzled, and of a rugged but
+cheerful and engaging countenance.&nbsp; He sat on a hill pony,
+wrapped in a plaid over his green coat, and was accompanied by a
+horse-woman, his daughter, a young lady of the most charming
+appearance.&nbsp; They overtook us on a stretch of heath, reined
+up as they came alongside, and accompanied us for perhaps a
+quarter of an hour before they galloped off again across the
+hillsides to our left.&nbsp; Great was my amazement to find the
+unconquerable Mr. Sim thaw immediately on the accost of this
+strange gentleman, who hailed him with a ready familiarity,
+proceeded at once to discuss with him the trade of droving and
+the prices of cattle, and did not disdain to take a pinch from
+the inevitable ram&rsquo;s horn.&nbsp; Presently I was aware that
+the stranger&rsquo;s eye was directed on myself; and there ensued
+a conversation, some of which I could not help overhearing at the
+time, and the rest have pieced together more or less plausibly
+from the report of Sim.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Surely that must be an <i>amateur drover</i> ye have
+gotten there?&rsquo; the gentleman seems to have asked.</p>
+<p>Sim replied, I was a young gentleman that had a reason of his
+own to travel privately.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well, ye must tell me nothing of that.&nbsp; I am
+in the law, you know, and <i>tace</i> is the Latin for a
+candle,&rsquo; answered the gentleman.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I hope
+it&rsquo;s nothing bad.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Sim told him it was no more than debt.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, Lord, if that be all!&rsquo; cried the gentleman;
+and turning to myself, &lsquo;Well, sir,&rsquo; he added,
+&lsquo;I understand you are taking a tramp through our forest
+here for the pleasure of the thing?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, yes, sir,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and I must say I
+am very well entertained.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I envy you,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have jogged
+many miles of it myself when I was younger.&nbsp; My youth lies
+buried about here under every heather-bush, like the soul of the
+licentiate Lucius.&nbsp; But you should have a guide.&nbsp; The
+pleasure of this country is much in the legends, which grow as
+plentiful as blackberries.&rsquo;&nbsp; And directing my
+attention to a little fragment of a broken wall no greater than a
+tombstone, he told me for an example a story of its earlier
+inhabitants.&nbsp; Years after it chanced that I was one day
+diverting myself with a Waverley Novel, when what should I come
+upon but the identical narrative of my green-coated gentleman
+upon the moors!&nbsp; In a moment the scene, the tones of his
+voice, his northern accent, and the very aspect of the earth and
+sky and temperature of the weather, flashed back into my mind
+with the reality of dreams.&nbsp; The unknown in the green-coat
+had been the Great Unknown!&nbsp; I had met Scott; I had heard a
+story from his lips; I should have been able to write, to claim
+acquaintance, to tell him that his legend still tingled in my
+ears.&nbsp; But the discovery came too late, and the great man
+had already succumbed under the load of his honours and
+misfortunes.</p>
+<p>Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us
+farewell and disappeared with his daughter over the hills.&nbsp;
+And when I applied to Sim for information, his answer of
+&lsquo;The Shirra, man!&nbsp; A&rsquo;body kens the
+Shirra!&rsquo; told me, unfortunately, nothing.</p>
+<p>A more considerable adventure falls to be related.&nbsp; We
+were now near the border.&nbsp; We had travelled for long upon
+the track beaten and browsed by a million herds, our
+predecessors, and had seen no vestige of that traffic which had
+created it.&nbsp; It was early in the morning when we at last
+perceived, drawing near to the drove road, but still at a
+distance of about half a league, a second caravan, similar to but
+larger than our own.&nbsp; The liveliest excitement was at once
+exhibited by both my comrades.&nbsp; They climbed hillocks, they
+studied the approaching drove from under their hand, they
+consulted each other with an appearance of alarm that seemed to
+me extraordinary.&nbsp; I had learned by this time that their
+stand-off manners implied, at least, no active enmity; and I made
+bold to ask them what was wrong.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Bad yins,&rsquo; was Sim&rsquo;s emphatic answer.</p>
+<p>All day the dogs were kept unsparingly on the alert, and the
+drove pushed forward at a very unusual and seemingly unwelcome
+speed.&nbsp; All day Sim and Candlish, with a more than ordinary
+expenditure both of snuff and of words, continued to debate the
+position.&nbsp; It seems that they had recognised two of our
+neighbours on the road&mdash;one Faa, and another by the name of
+Gillies.&nbsp; Whether there was an old feud between them still
+unsettled I could never learn; but Sim and Candlish were prepared
+for every degree of fraud or violence at their hands.&nbsp;
+Candlish repeatedly congratulated himself on having left
+&lsquo;the watch at home with the mistress&rsquo;; and Sim
+perpetually brandished his cudgel, and cursed his ill-fortune
+that it should be sprung.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I willna care a damn to gie the daashed scoon&rsquo;rel
+a fair clout wi&rsquo; it,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+daashed thing micht come sindry in ma hand.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, gentlemen,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;suppose they do
+come on, I think we can give a very good account of
+them.&rsquo;&nbsp; And I made my piece of holly, Ronald&rsquo;s
+gift, the value of which I now appreciated, sing about my
+head.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, man?&nbsp; Are ye stench?&rsquo; inquired Sim, with
+a gleam of approval in his wooden countenance.</p>
+<p>The same evening, somewhat wearied with our day-long
+expedition, we encamped on a little verdant mound, from the midst
+of which there welled a spring of clear water scarce great enough
+to wash the hands in.&nbsp; We had made our meal and lain down,
+but were not yet asleep, when a growl from one of the collies set
+us on the alert.&nbsp; All three sat up, and on a second impulse
+all lay down again, but now with our cudgels ready.&nbsp; A man
+must be an alien and an outlaw, an old soldier and a young man in
+the bargain, to take adventure easily.&nbsp; With no idea as to
+the rights of the quarrel or the probable consequences of the
+encounter, I was as ready to take part with my two drovers, as
+ever to fall in line on the morning of a battle.&nbsp; Presently
+there leaped three men out of the heather; we had scarce time to
+get to our feet before we were assailed; and in a moment each one
+of us was engaged with an adversary whom the deepening twilight
+scarce permitted him to see.&nbsp; How the battle sped in other
+quarters I am in no position to describe.&nbsp; The rogue that
+fell to my share was exceedingly agile and expert with his
+weapon; had and held me at a disadvantage from the first assault;
+forced me to give ground continually, and at last, in mere
+self-defence, to let him have the point.&nbsp; It struck him in
+the throat, and he went down like a ninepin and moved no
+more.</p>
+<p>It seemed this was the signal for the engagement to be
+discontinued.&nbsp; The other combatants separated at once; our
+foes were suffered, without molestation, to lift up and bear away
+their fallen comrade; so that I perceived this sort of war to be
+not wholly without laws of chivalry, and perhaps rather to
+partake of the character of a tournament than of a battle
+<i>&agrave; outrance</i>.&nbsp; There was no doubt, at least,
+that I was supposed to have pushed the affair too
+seriously.&nbsp; Our friends the enemy removed their wounded
+companion with undisguised consternation; and they were no sooner
+over the top of the brae, than Sim and Candlish roused up their
+wearied drove and set forth on a night march.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;m thinking Faa&rsquo;s unco bad,&rsquo; said
+the one.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said the other, &lsquo;he lookit dooms
+gash.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He did that,&rsquo; said the first.</p>
+<p>And their weary silence fell upon them again.</p>
+<p>Presently Sim turned to me.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ye&rsquo;re unco
+ready with the stick,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Too ready, I&rsquo;m afraid,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am afraid Mr. Faa (if that be his name) has got his
+gruel.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Weel, I wouldnae wonder,&rsquo; replied Sim.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And what is likely to happen?&rsquo; I inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Aweel,&rsquo; said Sim, snuffing profoundly, &lsquo;if
+I were to offer an opeenion, it would not be conscientious.&nbsp;
+For the plain fac&rsquo; is, Mr. St. Ivy, that I div not
+ken.&nbsp; We have had crackit heids&mdash;and rowth of
+them&mdash;ere now; and we have had a broken leg or maybe twa;
+and the like of that we drover bodies make a kind of a practice
+like to keep among oursel&rsquo;s.&nbsp; But a corp we have none
+of us ever had to deal with, and I could set nae leemit to what
+Gillies micht consider proper in the affair.&nbsp; Forbye that,
+he would be in raither a hobble himsel&rsquo;, if he was to gang
+hame wantin&rsquo; Faa.&nbsp; Folk are awfu&rsquo; throng with
+their questions, and parteecularly when they&rsquo;re no
+wantit.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That&rsquo;s a fac&rsquo;,&rsquo; said Candlish.</p>
+<p>I considered this prospect ruefully; and then making the best
+of it, &lsquo;Upon all which accounts,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;the
+best will be to get across the border and there separate.&nbsp;
+If you are troubled, you can very truly put the blame upon your
+late companion; and if I am pursued, I must just try to keep out
+of the way.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; said Sim, with something resembling
+enthusiasm, &lsquo;no&rsquo; a word mair!&nbsp; I have met in
+wi&rsquo; mony kinds o&rsquo; gentry ere now; I hae seen o&rsquo;
+them that was the tae thing, and I hae seen o&rsquo; them that
+was the tither; but the wale of a gentleman like you I have no
+sae very frequently seen the bate of.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Our night march was accordingly pursued with unremitting
+diligence.&nbsp; The stars paled, the east whitened, and we were
+still, both dogs and men, toiling after the wearied cattle.&nbsp;
+Again and again Sim and Candlish lamented the necessity: it was
+&lsquo;fair ruin on the bestial,&rsquo; they declared; but the
+thought of a judge and a scaffold hunted them ever forward.&nbsp;
+I myself was not so much to be pitied.&nbsp; All that night, and
+during the whole of the little that remained before us of our
+conjunct journey, I enjoyed a new pleasure, the reward of my
+prowess, in the now loosened tongue of Mr. Sim.&nbsp; Candlish
+was still obdurately taciturn: it was the man&rsquo;s nature; but
+Sim, having finally appraised and approved me, displayed without
+reticence a rather garrulous habit of mind and a pretty talent
+for narration.&nbsp; The pair were old and close companions,
+co-existing in these endless moors in a brotherhood of silence
+such as I have heard attributed to the trappers of the
+west.&nbsp; It seems absurd to mention love in connection with so
+ugly and snuffy a couple; at least, their trust was absolute; and
+they entertained a surprising admiration for each other&rsquo;s
+qualities; Candlish exclaiming that Sim was &lsquo;grand
+company!&rsquo; and Sim frequently assuring me in an aside that
+for &lsquo;a rale, auld, stench bitch, there was nae the bate of
+Candlish in braid Scotland.&rsquo;&nbsp; The two dogs appeared to
+be entirely included in this family compact, and I remarked that
+their exploits and traits of character were constantly and
+minutely observed by the two masters.&nbsp; Dog stories
+particularly abounded with them; and not only the dogs of the
+present but those of the past contributed their quota.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But that was naething,&rsquo; Sim would begin:
+&lsquo;there was a herd in Manar, they ca&rsquo;d him
+Tweedie&mdash;ye&rsquo;ll mind Tweedie,
+Can&rsquo;lish?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Fine, that!&rsquo; said
+Candlish.&nbsp; &lsquo;Aweel, Tweedie had a
+dog&mdash;&rsquo;&nbsp; The story I have forgotten; I dare say it
+was dull, and I suspect it was not true; but indeed, my travels
+with the drove rendered me indulgent, and perhaps even credulous,
+in the matter of dog stories.&nbsp; Beautiful, indefatigable
+beings! as I saw them at the end of a long day&rsquo;s journey
+frisking, barking, bounding, striking attitudes, slanting a bushy
+tail, manifestly playing to the spectator&rsquo;s eye, manifestly
+rejoicing in their grace and beauty&mdash;and turned to observe
+Sim and Candlish unornamentally plodding in the rear with the
+plaids about their bowed shoulders and the drop at their snuffy
+nose&mdash;I thought I would rather claim kinship with the dogs
+than with the men!&nbsp; My sympathy was unreturned; in their
+eyes I was a creature light as air; and they would scarce spare
+me the time for a perfunctory caress or perhaps a hasty lap of
+the wet tongue, ere they were back again in sedulous attendance
+on those dingy deities, their masters&mdash;and their masters, as
+like as not, damning their stupidity.</p>
+<p>Altogether the last hours of our tramp were infinitely the
+most agreeable to me, and I believe to all of us; and by the time
+we came to separate, there had grown up a certain familiarity and
+mutual esteem that made the parting harder.&nbsp; It took place
+about four of the afternoon on a bare hillside from which I could
+see the ribbon of the great north road, henceforth to be my
+conductor.&nbsp; I asked what was to pay.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Naething,&rsquo; replied Sim.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What in the name of folly is this?&rsquo; I
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have led me, you have fed me, you
+have filled me full of whisky, and now you will take
+nothing!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ye see we indentit for that,&rsquo; replied Sim.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;&lsquo;Indented?&rsquo; I repeated; &lsquo;what does the
+man mean?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; said Sim, &lsquo;this is a maitter
+entirely between Candlish and me and the auld wife,
+Gilchrist.&nbsp; You had naething to say to it; weel, ye can have
+naething to do with it, then.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My good man,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I can allow myself
+to be placed in no such ridiculous position.&nbsp; Mrs. Gilchrist
+is nothing to me, and I refuse to be her debtor.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I dinna exac&rsquo;ly see what way ye&rsquo;re gaun to
+help it,&rsquo; observed my drover.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By paying you here and now,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There&rsquo;s aye twa to a bargain, Mr. St.
+Ives,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You mean that you will not take it?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There or thereabout,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Forbye, that it would set ye a heap better to keep your
+siller for them you awe it to.&nbsp; Ye&rsquo;re young, Mr. St.
+Ivy, and thoughtless; but it&rsquo;s my belief that, wi&rsquo;
+care and circumspection, ye may yet do credit to
+yoursel&rsquo;.&nbsp; But just you bear this in mind: that him
+that <i>awes</i> siller should never <i>gie</i>
+siller.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Well, what was there to say?&nbsp; I accepted his rebuke, and
+bidding the pair farewell, set off alone upon my southward
+way.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; was the last word of Sim, &lsquo;I
+was never muckle ta&rsquo;en up in Englishry; but I think that I
+really ought to say that ye seem to me to have the makings of
+quite a decent lad.&rsquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI&mdash;THE GREAT NORTH ROAD</h2>
+<p>It chanced that as I went down the hill these last words of my
+friend the drover echoed not unfruitfully in my head.&nbsp; I had
+never told these men the least particulars as to my race or
+fortune, as it was a part, and the best part, of their civility
+to ask no questions: yet they had dubbed me without hesitation
+English.&nbsp; Some strangeness in the accent they had doubtless
+thus explained.&nbsp; And it occurred to me, that if I could pass
+in Scotland for an Englishman, I might be able to reverse the
+process and pass in England for a Scot.&nbsp; I thought, if I was
+pushed to it, I could make a struggle to imitate the brogue;
+after my experience with Candlish and Sim, I had a rich provision
+of outlandish words at my command; and I felt I could tell the
+tale of Tweedie&rsquo;s dog so as to deceive a native.&nbsp; At
+the same time, I was afraid my name of St. Ives was scarcely
+suitable; till I remembered there was a town so called in the
+province of Cornwall, thought I might yet be glad to claim it for
+my place of origin, and decided for a Cornish family and a Scots
+education.&nbsp; For a trade, as I was equally ignorant of all,
+and as the most innocent might at any moment be the means of my
+exposure, it was best to pretend to none.&nbsp; And I dubbed
+myself a young gentleman of a sufficient fortune and an idle,
+curious habit of mind, rambling the country at my own charges, in
+quest of health, information, and merry adventures.</p>
+<p>At Newcastle, which was the first town I reached, I completed
+my preparations for the part, before going to the inn, by the
+purchase of a knapsack and a pair of leathern gaiters.&nbsp; My
+plaid I continued to wear from sentiment.&nbsp; It was warm,
+useful to sleep in if I were again benighted, and I had
+discovered it to be not unbecoming for a man of gallant
+carriage.&nbsp; Thus equipped, I supported my character of the
+light-hearted pedestrian not amiss.&nbsp; Surprise was indeed
+expressed that I should have selected such a season of the year;
+but I pleaded some delays of business, and smilingly claimed to
+be an eccentric.&nbsp; The devil was in it, I would say, if any
+season of the year was not good enough for me; I was not made of
+sugar, I was no mollycoddle to be afraid of an ill-aired bed or a
+sprinkle of snow; and I would knock upon the table with my fist
+and call for t&rsquo;other bottle, like the noisy and
+free-hearted young gentleman I was.&nbsp; It was my policy (if I
+may so express myself) to talk much and say little.&nbsp; At the
+inn tables, the country, the state of the roads, the business
+interest of those who sat down with me, and the course of public
+events, afforded me a considerable field in which I might
+discourse at large and still communicate no information about
+myself.&nbsp; There was no one with less air of reticence; I
+plunged into my company up to the neck; and I had a long
+cock-and-bull story of an aunt of mine which must have convinced
+the most suspicious of my innocence.&nbsp; &lsquo;What!&rsquo;
+they would have said, &lsquo;that young ass to be concealing
+anything!&nbsp; Why, he has deafened me with an aunt of his until
+my head aches.&nbsp; He only wants you should give him a line,
+and he would tell you his whole descent from Adam downward, and
+his whole private fortune to the last shilling.&rsquo; A
+responsible solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my
+inexperience as to give me a word or two of good advice: that I
+was but a young man after all&mdash;I had at this time a
+deceptive air of youth that made me easily pass for
+one-and-twenty, and was, in the circumstances, worth a
+fortune&mdash;that the company at inns was very mingled, that I
+should do well to be more careful, and the like; to all which I
+made answer that I meant no harm myself and expected none from
+others, or the devil was in it.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are one of those
+d---d prudent fellows that I could never abide with,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are the kind of man that has a long
+head.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s all the world, my dear sir: the
+long-heads and the short-horns!&nbsp; Now, I am a
+short-horn.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I doubt,&rsquo; says he,
+&lsquo;that you will not go very far without getting
+sheared.&rsquo;&nbsp; I offered to bet with him on that, and he
+made off, shaking his head.</p>
+<p>But my particular delight was to enlarge on politics and the
+war.&nbsp; None damned the French like me; none was more bitter
+against the Americans.&nbsp; And when the north-bound mail
+arrived, crowned with holly, and the coachman and guard hoarse
+with shouting victory, I went even so far as to entertain the
+company to a bowl of punch, which I compounded myself with no
+illiberal hand, and doled out to such sentiments as the
+following:&mdash;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Our glorious victory on the Nivelle&rsquo;!&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Lord Wellington, God bless him! and may victory ever
+attend upon his arms!&rsquo; and, &lsquo;Soult, poor devil! and
+may he catch it again to the same tune!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Never was oratory more applauded to the echo&mdash;never any
+one was more of the popular man than I.&nbsp; I promise you, we
+made a night of it.&nbsp; Some of the company supported each
+other, with the assistance of boots, to their respective
+bedchambers, while the rest slept on the field of glory where we
+had left them; and at the breakfast table the next morning there
+was an extraordinary assemblage of red eyes and shaking
+fists.&nbsp; I observed patriotism to burn much lower by
+daylight.&nbsp; Let no one blame me for insensibility to the
+reverses of France!&nbsp; God knows how my heart raged.&nbsp; How
+I longed to fall on that herd of swine and knock their heads
+together in the moment of their revelry!&nbsp; But you are to
+consider my own situation and its necessities; also a certain
+lightheartedness, eminently Gallic, which forms a leading trait
+in my character, and leads me to throw myself into new
+circumstances with the spirit of a schoolboy.&nbsp; It is
+possible that I sometimes allowed this impish humour to carry me
+further than good taste approves: and I was certainly punished
+for it once.</p>
+<p>This was in the episcopal city of Durham.&nbsp; We sat down, a
+considerable company, to dinner, most of us fine old vatted
+English tories of that class which is often so enthusiastic as to
+be inarticulate.&nbsp; I took and held the lead from the
+beginning; and, the talk having turned on the French in the
+Peninsula, I gave them authentic details (on the authority of a
+cousin of mine, an ensign) of certain cannibal orgies in Galicia,
+in which no less a person than General Caffarelli had taken a
+part.&nbsp; I always disliked that commander, who once ordered me
+under arrest for insubordination; and it is possible that a spice
+of vengeance added to the rigour of my picture.&nbsp; I have
+forgotten the details; no doubt they were high-coloured.&nbsp; No
+doubt I rejoiced to fool these jolter-heads; and no doubt the
+sense of security that I drank from their dull, gasping faces
+encouraged me to proceed extremely far.&nbsp; And for my sins,
+there was one silent little man at table who took my story at the
+true value.&nbsp; It was from no sense of humour, to which he was
+quite dead.&nbsp; It was from no particular intelligence, for he
+had not any.&nbsp; The bond of sympathy, of all things in the
+world, had rendered him clairvoyant.</p>
+<p>Dinner was no sooner done than I strolled forth into the
+streets with some design of viewing the cathedral; and the little
+man was silently at my heels.&nbsp; A few doors from the inn, in
+a dark place of the street, I was aware of a touch on my arm,
+turned suddenly, and found him looking up at me with eyes
+pathetically bright.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir; but that story of yours was
+particularly rich.&nbsp; He&mdash;he!&nbsp; Particularly
+racy,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I tell you, sir, I took you
+wholly!&nbsp; I <i>smoked</i> you!&nbsp; I believe you and I,
+sir, if we had a chance to talk, would find we had a good many
+opinions in common.&nbsp; Here is the &ldquo;Blue Bell,&rdquo; a
+very comfortable place.&nbsp; They draw good ale, sir.&nbsp;
+Would you be so condescending as to share a pot with
+me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>There was something so ambiguous and secret in the little
+man&rsquo;s perpetual signalling, that I confess my curiosity was
+much aroused.&nbsp; Blaming myself, even as I did so, for the
+indiscretion, I embraced his proposal, and we were soon face to
+face over a tankard of mulled ale.&nbsp; He lowered his voice to
+the least attenuation of a whisper.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here, sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;is to the Great
+Man.&nbsp; I think you take me?&nbsp; No?&rsquo;&nbsp; He leaned
+forward till our noses touched.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here is to the
+Emperor!&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>I was extremely embarrassed, and, in spite of the
+creature&rsquo;s innocent appearance, more than half
+alarmed.&nbsp; I thought him too ingenious, and, indeed, too
+daring for a spy.&nbsp; Yet if he were honest he must be a man of
+extraordinary indiscretion, and therefore very unfit to be
+encouraged by an escaped prisoner.&nbsp; I took a half course,
+accordingly&mdash;accepted his toast in silence, and drank it
+without enthusiasm.</p>
+<p>He proceeded to abound in the praises of Napoleon, such as I
+had never heard in France, or at least only on the lips of
+officials paid to offer them.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And this Caffarelli, now,&rsquo; he pursued: &lsquo;he
+is a splendid fellow, too, is he not?&nbsp; I have not heard
+vastly much of him myself.&nbsp; No details, sir&mdash;no
+details!&nbsp; We labour under huge difficulties here as to
+unbiassed information.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I believe I have heard the same complaint in other
+countries,&rsquo; I could not help remarking.&nbsp; &lsquo;But as
+to Caffarelli, he is neither lame nor blind, he has two legs and
+a nose in the middle of his face.&nbsp; And I care as much about
+him as you care for the dead body of Mr. Perceval!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He studied me with glowing eyes.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You cannot deceive me!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You have served under him.&nbsp; You are a
+Frenchman!&nbsp; I hold by the hand, at last, one of that noble
+race, the pioneers of the glorious principles of liberty and
+brotherhood.&nbsp; Hush!&nbsp; No, it is all right.&nbsp; I
+thought there had been somebody at the door.&nbsp; In this
+wretched, enslaved country we dare not even call our souls our
+own.&nbsp; The spy and the hangman, sir&mdash;the spy and the
+hangman!&nbsp; And yet there is a candle burning, too.&nbsp; The
+good leaven is working, sir&mdash;working underneath.&nbsp; Even
+in this town there are a few brave spirits, who meet every
+Wednesday.&nbsp; You must stay over a day or so, and join
+us.&nbsp; We do not use this house.&nbsp; Another, and a
+quieter.&nbsp; They draw fine ale, however&mdash;fair, mild
+ale.&nbsp; You will find yourself among friends, among
+brothers.&nbsp; You will hear some very daring sentiments
+expressed!&rsquo; he cried, expanding his small chest.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Monarchy, Christianity&mdash;all the trappings of a
+bloated past&mdash;the Free Confraternity of Durham and Tyneside
+deride.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Here was a devil of a prospect for a gentleman whose whole
+design was to avoid observation!&nbsp; The Free Confraternity had
+no charms for me; daring sentiments were no part of my baggage;
+and I tried, instead, a little cold water.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You seem to forget, sir, that my Emperor has
+re-established Christianity,&rsquo; I observed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah, sir, but that was policy!&rsquo; he
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;You do not understand Napoleon.&nbsp; I
+have followed his whole career.&nbsp; I can explain his policy
+from first to last.&nbsp; Now for instance in the Peninsula, on
+which you were so very amusing, if you will come to a
+friend&rsquo;s house who has a map of Spain, I can make the whole
+course of the war quite clear to you, I venture to say, in half
+an hour.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>This was intolerable.&nbsp; Of the two extremes, I found I
+preferred the British tory; and, making an appointment for the
+morrow, I pleaded sudden headache, escaped to the inn, packed my
+knapsack, and fled, about nine at night, from this accursed
+neighbourhood.&nbsp; It was cold, starry, and clear, and the road
+dry, with a touch of frost.&nbsp; For all that, I had not the
+smallest intention to make a long stage of it; and about ten
+o&rsquo;clock, spying on the right-hand side of the way the
+lighted windows of an alehouse, I determined to bait there for
+the night.</p>
+<p>It was against my principle, which was to frequent only the
+dearest inns; and the misadventure that befell me was sufficient
+to make me more particular in the future.&nbsp; A large company
+was assembled in the parlour, which was heavy with clouds of
+tobacco smoke, and brightly lighted up by a roaring fire of
+coal.&nbsp; Hard by the chimney stood a vacant chair in what I
+thought an enviable situation, whether for warmth or the pleasure
+of society; and I was about to take it, when the nearest of the
+company stopped me with his hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Beg thy pardon, sir,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;but that
+there chair belongs to a British soldier.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>A chorus of voices enforced and explained.&nbsp; It was one of
+Lord Wellington&rsquo;s heroes.&nbsp; He had been wounded under
+Rowland Hill.&nbsp; He was Colbourne&rsquo;s right-hand
+man.&nbsp; In short, this favoured individual appeared to have
+served with every separate corps, and under every individual
+general in the Peninsula.&nbsp; Of course I apologised.&nbsp; I
+had not known.&nbsp; The devil was in it if a soldier had not a
+right to the best in England.&nbsp; And with that sentiment,
+which was loudly applauded, I found a corner of a bench, and
+awaited, with some hopes of entertainment, the return of the
+hero.&nbsp; He proved, of course, to be a private soldier.&nbsp;
+I say of course, because no officer could possibly enjoy such
+heights of popularity.&nbsp; He had been wounded before San
+Sebastian, and still wore his arm in a sling.&nbsp; What was a
+great deal worse for him, every member of the company had been
+plying him with drink.&nbsp; His honest yokel&rsquo;s countenance
+blazed as if with fever, his eyes were glazed and looked the two
+ways, and his feet stumbled as, amidst a murmur of applause, he
+returned to the midst of his admirers.</p>
+<p>Two minutes afterwards I was again posting in the dark along
+the highway; to explain which sudden movement of retreat I must
+trouble the reader with a reminiscence of my services.</p>
+<p>I lay one night with the out-pickets in Castile.&nbsp; We were
+in close touch with the enemy; the usual orders had been issued
+against smoking, fires, and talk, and both armies lay as quiet as
+mice, when I saw the English sentinel opposite making a signal by
+holding up his musket.&nbsp; I repeated it, and we both crept
+together in the dry bed of a stream, which made the demarcation
+of the armies.&nbsp; It was wine he wanted, of which we had a
+good provision, and the English had quite run out.&nbsp; He gave
+me the money, and I, as was the custom, left him my firelock in
+pledge, and set off for the canteen.&nbsp; When I returned with a
+skin of wine, behold, it had pleased some uneasy devil of an
+English officer to withdraw the outposts!&nbsp; Here was a
+situation with a vengeance, and I looked for nothing but ridicule
+in the present and punishment in the future.&nbsp; Doubtless our
+officers winked pretty hard at this interchange of courtesies,
+but doubtless it would be impossible to wink at so gross a fault,
+or rather so pitiable a misadventure as mine; and you are to
+conceive me wandering in the plains of Castile, benighted,
+charged with a wine-skin for which I had no use, and with no
+knowledge whatever of the whereabouts of my musket, beyond that
+it was somewhere in my Lord Wellington&rsquo;s army.&nbsp; But my
+Englishman was either a very honest fellow, or else extremely
+thirsty, and at last contrived to advertise me of his new
+position.&nbsp; Now, the English sentry in Castile, and the
+wounded hero in the Durham public-house, were one and the same
+person; and if he had been a little less drunk, or myself less
+lively in getting away, the travels of M. St. Ives might have
+come to an untimely end.</p>
+<p>I suppose this woke me up; it stirred in me besides a spirit
+of opposition, and in spite of cold, darkness, the highwaymen and
+the footpads, I determined to walk right on till breakfast-time:
+a happy resolution, which enabled me to observe one of those
+traits of manners which at once depict a country and condemn
+it.&nbsp; It was near midnight when I saw, a great way ahead of
+me, the light of many torches; presently after, the sound of
+wheels reached me, and the slow tread of feet, and soon I had
+joined myself to the rear of a sordid, silent, and lugubrious
+procession, such as we see in dreams.&nbsp; Close on a hundred
+persons marched by torchlight in unbroken silence; in their midst
+a cart, and in the cart, on an inclined platform, the dead body
+of a man&mdash;the centre-piece of this solemnity, the hero whose
+obsequies we were come forth at this unusual hour to
+celebrate.&nbsp; It was but a plain, dingy old fellow of fifty or
+sixty, his throat cut, his shirt turned over as though to show
+the wound.&nbsp; Blue trousers and brown socks completed his
+attire, if we can talk so of the dead.&nbsp; He had a horrid look
+of a waxwork.&nbsp; In the tossing of the lights he seemed to
+make faces and mouths at us, to frown, and to be at times upon
+the point of speech.&nbsp; The cart, with this shabby and tragic
+freight, and surrounded by its silent escort and bright torches,
+continued for some distance to creak along the high-road, and I
+to follow it in amazement, which was soon exchanged for
+horror.&nbsp; At the corner of a lane the procession stopped,
+and, as the torches ranged themselves along the hedgerow-side, I
+became aware of a grave dug in the midst of the thoroughfare, and
+a provision of quicklime piled in the ditch.&nbsp; The cart was
+backed to the margin, the body slung off the platform and dumped
+into the grave with an irreverent roughness.&nbsp; A sharpened
+stake had hitherto served it for a pillow.&nbsp; It was now
+withdrawn, held in its place by several volunteers, and a fellow
+with a heavy mallet (the sound of which still haunts me at night)
+drove it home through the bosom of the corpse.&nbsp; The hole was
+filled with quicklime, and the bystanders, as if relieved of some
+oppression, broke at once into a sound of whispered speech.</p>
+<p>My shirt stuck to me, my heart had almost ceased beating, and
+I found my tongue with difficulty.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon,&rsquo; I gasped to a neighbour,
+&lsquo;what is this? what has he done? is it allowed?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, where do you come from?&rsquo; replied the
+man.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am a traveller, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and a
+total stranger in this part of the country.&nbsp; I had lost my
+way when I saw your torches, and came by chance on
+this&mdash;this incredible scene.&nbsp; Who was the
+man?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A suicide,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ay, he was a
+bad one, was Johnnie Green.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It appeared this was a wretch who had committed many barbarous
+murders, and being at last upon the point of discovery fell of
+his own hand.&nbsp; And the nightmare at the crossroads was the
+regular punishment, according to the laws of England, for an act
+which the Romans honoured as a virtue!&nbsp; Whenever an
+Englishman begins to prate of civilisation (as, indeed,
+it&rsquo;s a defect they are rather prone to), I hear the
+measured blows of a mallet, see the bystanders crowd with torches
+about the grave, smile a little to myself in conscious
+superiority&mdash;and take a thimbleful of brandy for the
+stomach&rsquo;s sake.</p>
+<p>I believe it must have been at my next stage, for I remember
+going to bed extremely early, that I came to the model of a good
+old-fashioned English inn, and was attended on by the picture of
+a pretty chambermaid.&nbsp; We had a good many pleasant passages
+as she waited table or warmed my bed for me with a devil of a
+brass warming pan, fully larger than herself; and as she was no
+less pert than she was pretty, she may be said to have given
+rather better than she took.&nbsp; I cannot tell why (unless it
+were for the sake of her saucy eyes), but I made her my
+confidante, told her I was attached to a young lady in Scotland,
+and received the encouragement of her sympathy, mingled and
+connected with a fair amount of rustic wit.&nbsp; While I slept
+the down-mail stopped for supper; it chanced that one of the
+passengers left behind a copy of the <i>Edinburgh Courant</i>,
+and the next morning my pretty chambermaid set the paper before
+me at breakfast, with the remark that there was some news from my
+lady-love.&nbsp; I took it eagerly, hoping to find some further
+word of our escape, in which I was disappointed; and I was about
+to lay it down, when my eye fell on a paragraph immediately
+concerning me.&nbsp; Faa was in hospital, grievously sick, and
+warrants were out for the arrest of Sim and Candlish.&nbsp; These
+two men had shown themselves very loyal to me.&nbsp; This trouble
+emerging, the least I could do was to be guided by a similar
+loyalty to them.&nbsp; Suppose my visit to my uncle crowned with
+some success, and my finances re-established, I determined I
+should immediately return to Edinburgh, put their case in the
+hands of a good lawyer, and await events.&nbsp; So my mind was
+very lightly made up to what proved a mighty serious
+matter.&nbsp; Candlish and Sim were all very well in their way,
+and I do sincerely trust I should have been at some pains to help
+them, had there been nothing else.&nbsp; But in truth my heart
+and my eyes were set on quite another matter, and I received the
+news of their tribulation almost with joy.&nbsp; That is never a
+bad wind that blows where we want to go, and you may be sure
+there was nothing unwelcome in a circumstance that carried me
+back to Edinburgh and Flora.&nbsp; From that hour I began to
+indulge myself with the making of imaginary scenes and
+interviews, in which I confounded the aunt, flattered Ronald, and
+now in the witty, now in the sentimental manner, declared my love
+and received the assurance of its return.&nbsp; By means of this
+exercise my resolution daily grew stronger, until at last I had
+piled together such a mass of obstinacy as it would have taken a
+cataclysm of nature to subvert.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I to the chambermaid, &lsquo;here is
+news of my lady-love indeed, and very good news too.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>All that day, in the teeth of a keen winter wind, I hugged
+myself in my plaid, and it was as though her arms were flung
+around me.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII&mdash;I FOLLOW A COVERED CART NEARLY TO MY
+DESTINATION</h2>
+<p>At last I began to draw near, by reasonable stages, to the
+neighbourhood of Wakefield; and the name of Mr. Burchell Fenn
+came to the top in my memory.&nbsp; This was the gentleman (the
+reader may remember) who made a trade of forwarding the escape of
+French prisoners.&nbsp; How he did so: whether he had a
+sign-board, <i>Escapes forwarded</i>, <i>apply within</i>; what
+he charged for his services, or whether they were gratuitous and
+charitable, were all matters of which I was at once ignorant and
+extremely curious.&nbsp; Thanks to my proficiency in English, and
+Mr. Romaine&rsquo;s bank-notes, I was getting on swimmingly
+without him; but the trouble was that I could not be easy till I
+had come to the bottom of these mysteries, and it was my
+difficulty that I knew nothing of him beyond the name.&nbsp; I
+knew not his trade beyond that of Forwarder of
+Escapes&mdash;whether he lived in town or country, whether he
+were rich or poor, nor by what kind of address I was to gain his
+confidence.&nbsp; It would have a very bad appearance to go along
+the highwayside asking after a man of whom I could give so scanty
+an account; and I should look like a fool, indeed, if I were to
+present myself at his door and find the police in
+occupation!&nbsp; The interest of the conundrum, however, tempted
+me, and I turned aside from my direct road to pass by Wakefield;
+kept my ears pricked, as I went, for any mention of his name, and
+relied for the rest on my good fortune.&nbsp; If Luck (who must
+certainly be feminine) favoured me as far as to throw me in the
+man&rsquo;s way, I should owe the lady a candle; if not, I could
+very readily console myself.&nbsp; In this experimental humour,
+and with so little to help me, it was a miracle that I should
+have brought my enterprise to a good end; and there are several
+saints in the calendar who might be happy to exchange with St.
+Ives!</p>
+<p>I had slept that night in a good inn at Wakefield, made my
+breakfast by candle-light with the passengers of an up-coach, and
+set off in a very ill temper with myself and my
+surroundings.&nbsp; It was still early; the air raw and cold; the
+sun low, and soon to disappear under a vast canopy of rain-clouds
+that had begun to assemble in the north-west, and from that
+quarter invaded the whole width of the heaven.&nbsp; Already the
+rain fell in crystal rods; already the whole face of the country
+sounded with the discharge of drains and ditches; and I looked
+forward to a day of downpour and the hell of wet clothes, in
+which particular I am as dainty as a cat.&nbsp; At a corner of
+the road, and by the last glint of the drowning sun, I spied a
+covered cart, of a kind that I thought I had never seen before,
+preceding me at the foot&rsquo;s pace of jaded horses.&nbsp;
+Anything is interesting to a pedestrian that can help him to
+forget the miseries of a day of rain; and I bettered my pace and
+gradually overtook the vehicle.</p>
+<p>The nearer I came, the more it puzzled me.&nbsp; It was much
+such a cart as I am told the calico printers use, mounted on two
+wheels, and furnished with a seat in front for the driver.&nbsp;
+The interior closed with a door, and was of a bigness to contain
+a good load of calico, or (at a pinch and if it were necessary)
+four or five persons.&nbsp; But, indeed, if human beings were
+meant to travel there, they had my pity!&nbsp; They must travel
+in the dark, for there was no sign of a window; and they would be
+shaken all the way like a phial of doctor&rsquo;s stuff, for the
+cart was not only ungainly to look at&mdash;it was besides very
+imperfectly balanced on the one pair of wheels, and pitched
+unconscionably.&nbsp; Altogether, if I had any glancing idea that
+the cart was really a carriage, I had soon dismissed it; but I
+was still inquisitive as to what it should contain, and where it
+had come from.&nbsp; Wheels and horses were splashed with many
+different colours of mud, as though they had come far and across
+a considerable diversity of country.&nbsp; The driver continually
+and vainly plied his whip.&nbsp; It seemed to follow they had
+made a long, perhaps an all-night, stage; and that the driver, at
+that early hour of a little after eight in the morning, already
+felt himself belated.&nbsp; I looked for the name of the
+proprietor on the shaft, and started outright.&nbsp; Fortune had
+favoured the careless: it was Burchell Fenn!</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A wet morning, my man,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>The driver, a loutish fellow, shock-headed and turnip-faced,
+returned not a word to my salutation, but savagely flogged his
+horses.&nbsp; The tired animals, who could scarce put the one
+foot before the other, paid no attention to his cruelty; and I
+continued without effort to maintain my position alongside,
+smiling to myself at the futility of his attempts, and at the
+same time pricked with curiosity as to why he made them.&nbsp; I
+made no such formidable a figure as that a man should flee when I
+accosted him; and my conscience not being entirely clear, I was
+more accustomed to be uneasy myself than to see others
+timid.&nbsp; Presently he desisted, and put back his whip in the
+holster with the air of a man vanquished.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So you would run away from me?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Come, come, that&rsquo;s not English.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Beg pardon, master: no offence meant,&rsquo; he said,
+touching his hat.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And none taken!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;All I
+desire is a little gaiety by the way.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I understood him to say he didn&rsquo;t &lsquo;take with
+gaiety.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then I will try you with something else,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh, I can be all things to all men, like the
+apostle!&nbsp; I dare to say I have travelled with heavier
+fellows than you in my time, and done famously well with
+them.&nbsp; Are you going home?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, I&rsquo;m a goin&rsquo; home, I am,&rsquo; he
+said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A very fortunate circumstance for me!&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;At this rate we shall see a good deal of each
+other, going the same way; and, now I come to think of it, why
+should you not give me a cast?&nbsp; There is room beside you on
+the bench.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>With a sudden snatch, he carried the cart two yards into the
+roadway.&nbsp; The horses plunged and came to a stop.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;No, you don&rsquo;t!&rsquo; he said, menacing me with the
+whip.&nbsp; &lsquo;None o&rsquo; that with me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;None of what?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I asked you
+for a lift, but I have no idea of taking one by force.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve got to take care of the cart and
+&rsquo;orses, I have,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t
+take up with no runagate vagabones, you see, else.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I ought to thank you for your touching
+confidence,&rsquo; said I, approaching carelessly nearer as I
+spoke.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I admit the road is solitary hereabouts,
+and no doubt an accident soon happens.&nbsp; Little fear of
+anything of the kind with you!&nbsp; I like you for it, like your
+prudence, like that pastoral shyness of disposition.&nbsp; But
+why not put it out of my power to hurt?&nbsp; Why not open the
+door and bestow me here in the box, or whatever you please to
+call it?&rsquo; And I laid my hand demonstratively on the body of
+the cart.</p>
+<p>He had been timorous before; but at this, he seemed to lose
+the power of speech a moment, and stared at me in a perfect
+enthusiasm of fear.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why not?&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;The idea is
+good.&nbsp; I should be safe in there if I were the monster
+Williams himself.&nbsp; The great thing is to have me under lock
+and key.&nbsp; For it does lock; it is locked now,&rsquo; said I,
+trying the door.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>A propos</i>, what have you for
+a cargo?&nbsp; It must be precious.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He found not a word to answer.</p>
+<p>Rat-tat-tat, I went upon the door like a well-drilled
+footman.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Any one at home?&rsquo; I said, and stooped to
+listen.</p>
+<p>There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of
+an uncontrollable paroxysm; another followed immediately on the
+heels of it; and then the driver turned with an oath, laid the
+lash upon the horses with so much energy that they found their
+heels again, and the whole equipage fled down the road at a
+gallop.</p>
+<p>At the first sound of the sneeze, I had started back like a
+man shot.&nbsp; The next moment, a great light broke on my mind,
+and I understood.&nbsp; Here was the secret of Fenn&rsquo;s
+trade: this was how he forwarded the escape of prisoners, hawking
+them by night about the country in his covered cart.&nbsp; There
+had been Frenchmen close to me; he who had just sneezed was my
+countryman, my comrade, perhaps already my friend!&nbsp; I took
+to my heels in pursuit.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hold hard!&rsquo; I
+shouted.&nbsp; &lsquo;Stop!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s all right!&nbsp;
+Stop!&rsquo;&nbsp; But the driver only turned a white face on me
+for a moment, and redoubled his efforts, bending forward, plying
+his whip and crying to his horses; these lay themselves down to
+the gallop and beat the highway with flying hoofs; and the cart
+bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a halo of rain and
+spattering mud.&nbsp; But a minute since, and it had been
+trundling along like a lame cow; and now it was off as though
+drawn by Apollo&rsquo;s coursers.&nbsp; There is no telling what
+a man can do, until you frighten him!</p>
+<p>It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly,
+to maintain my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so
+near) was become a chief point with me.&nbsp; A hundred yards
+farther on the cart whipped out of the high-road into a lane
+embowered with leafless trees, and became lost to view.&nbsp;
+When I saw it next, the driver had increased his advantage
+considerably, but all danger was at an end, and the horses had
+again declined into a hobbling walk.&nbsp; Persuaded that they
+could not escape me, I took my time, and recovered my breath as I
+followed them.</p>
+<p>Presently the lane twisted at right angles, and showed me a
+gate and the beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as
+I continued to advance, a red brick house about seventy years
+old, in a fine style of architecture, and presenting a front of
+many windows to a lawn and garden.&nbsp; Behind, I could see
+outhouses and the peaked roofs of stacks; and I judged that a
+manor-house had in some way declined to be the residence of a
+tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and substantial
+comfort.&nbsp; The marks of neglect were visible on every side,
+in flower-bushes straggling beyond the borders, in the ill-kept
+turf, and in the broken windows that were incongruously patched
+with paper or stuffed with rags.&nbsp; A thicket of trees, mostly
+evergreen, fenced the place round and secluded it from the eyes
+of prying neighbours.&nbsp; As I came in view of it, on that
+melancholy winter&rsquo;s morning, in the deluge of the falling
+rain, and with the wind that now rose in occasional gusts and
+hooted over the old chimneys, the cart had already drawn up at
+the front-door steps, and the driver was already in earnest
+discourse with Mr. Burchell Fenn.&nbsp; He was standing with his
+hands behind his back&mdash;a man of a gross, misbegotten face
+and body, dewlapped like a bull and red as a harvest moon; and in
+his jockey cap, blue coat and top boots, he had much the air of a
+good, solid tenant-farmer.</p>
+<p>The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but
+received me at last in a sort of goggling silence.&nbsp; I had my
+hat in my hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Burchell
+Fenn?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The same, sir,&rsquo; replied Mr. Fenn, taking off his
+jockey cap in answer to my civility, but with the distant look
+and the tardy movements of one who continues to think of
+something else.&nbsp; &lsquo;And who may you be?&rsquo; he
+asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I shall tell you afterwards,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Suffice it, in the meantime, that I come on
+business.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He seemed to digest my answer laboriously, his mouth gaping,
+his little eyes never straying from my face.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Suffer me to point out to you, sir,&rsquo; I resumed,
+&lsquo;that this is a devil of a wet morning; and that the
+chimney corner, and possibly a glass of something hot, are
+clearly indicated.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Indeed, the rain was now grown to be a deluge; the gutters of
+the house roared; the air was filled with the continuous,
+strident crash.&nbsp; The stolidity of his face, on which the
+rain streamed, was far from reassuring me.&nbsp; On the contrary,
+I was aware of a distinct qualm of apprehension, which was not at
+all lessened by a view of the driver, craning from his perch to
+observe us with the expression of a fascinated bird.&nbsp; So we
+stood silent, when the prisoner again began to sneeze from the
+body of the cart; and at the sound, prompt as a transformation,
+the driver had whipped up his horses and was shambling off round
+the corner of the house, and Mr. Fenn, recovering his wits with a
+gulp, had turned to the door behind him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come in, come in, sir,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+beg your pardon, sir; the lock goes a trifle hard.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Indeed, it took him a surprising time to open the door, which
+was not only locked on the outside, but the lock seemed
+rebellious from disuse; and when at last he stood back and
+motioned me to enter before him, I was greeted on the threshold
+by that peculiar and convincing sound of the rain echoing over
+empty chambers.&nbsp; The entrance-hall, in which I now found
+myself, was of a good size and good proportions; potted plants
+occupied the corners; the paved floor was soiled with muddy
+footprints and encumbered with straw; on a mahogany hall-table,
+which was the only furniture, a candle had been stuck and
+suffered to burn down&mdash;plainly a long while ago, for the
+gutterings were green with mould.&nbsp; My mind, under these new
+impressions, worked with unusual vivacity.&nbsp; I was here shut
+off with Fenn and his hireling in a deserted house, a neglected
+garden, and a wood of evergreens: the most eligible theatre for a
+deed of darkness.&nbsp; There came to me a vision of two
+flagstones raised in the hall-floor, and the driver putting in
+the rainy afternoon over my grave, and the prospect displeased me
+extremely.&nbsp; I felt I had carried my pleasantry as far as was
+safe; I must lose no time in declaring my true character, and I
+was even choosing the words in which I was to begin, when the
+hall-door was slammed-to behind me with a bang, and I turned,
+dropping my stick as I did so, in time&mdash;and not any more
+than time&mdash;to save my life.</p>
+<p>The surprise of the onslaught and the huge weight of my
+assailant gave him the advantage.&nbsp; He had a pistol in his
+right hand of a portentous size, which it took me all my strength
+to keep deflected.&nbsp; With his left arm he strained me to his
+bosom, so that I thought I must be crushed or stifled.&nbsp; His
+mouth was open, his face crimson, and he panted aloud with hard
+animal sounds.&nbsp; The affair was as brief as it was hot and
+sudden.&nbsp; The potations which had swelled and bloated his
+carcase had already weakened the springs of energy.&nbsp; One
+more huge effort, that came near to overpower me, and in which
+the pistol happily exploded, and I felt his grasp slacken and
+weakness come on his joints; his legs succumbed under his weight,
+and he grovelled on his knees on the stone floor.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Spare me!&rsquo; he gasped.</p>
+<p>I had not only been abominably frightened; I was shocked
+besides: my delicacy was in arms, like a lady to whom violence
+should have been offered by a similar monster.&nbsp; I plucked
+myself from his horrid contact, I snatched the pistol&mdash;even
+discharged, it was a formidable weapon&mdash;and menaced him with
+the butt.&nbsp; &lsquo;Spare you!&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;you
+beast!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>His voice died in his fat inwards, but his lips still
+vehemently framed the same words of supplication.&nbsp; My anger
+began to pass off, but not all my repugnance; the picture he made
+revolted me, and I was impatient to be spared the further view of
+it.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;stop this performance: it
+sickens me.&nbsp; I am not going to kill you, do you hear?&nbsp;
+I have need of you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>A look of relief, that I could almost have called beautiful,
+dawned on his countenance.&nbsp; &lsquo;Anything&mdash;anything
+you wish,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>Anything is a big word, and his use of it brought me for a
+moment to a stand.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, what do you mean?&rsquo; I
+asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you mean that you will blow the gaff on
+the whole business?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He answered me Yes with eager asseverations.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I know Monsieur de Saint-Yves is in it; it was through
+his papers we traced you,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you
+consent to make a clean breast of the others?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I do&mdash;I will!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+&rsquo;ole crew of &rsquo;em; there&rsquo;s good names among
+&rsquo;em.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll be king&rsquo;s evidence.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So that all shall hang except yourself?&nbsp; You
+damned villain!&rsquo; I broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Understand at
+once that I am no spy or thief-taker.&nbsp; I am a kinsman of
+Monsieur de St. Yves&mdash;here in his interest.&nbsp; Upon my
+word, you have put your foot in it prettily, Mr. Burchell
+Fenn!&nbsp; Come, stand up; don&rsquo;t grovel there.&nbsp; Stand
+up, you lump of iniquity!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He scrambled to his feet.&nbsp; He was utterly unmanned, or it
+might have gone hard with me yet; and I considered him
+hesitating, as, indeed, there was cause.&nbsp; The man was a
+double-dyed traitor: he had tried to murder me, and I had first
+baffled his endeavours and then exposed and insulted him.&nbsp;
+Was it wise to place myself any longer at his mercy?&nbsp; With
+his help I should doubtless travel more quickly; doubtless also
+far less agreeably; and there was everything to show that it
+would be at a greater risk.&nbsp; In short, I should have washed
+my hands of him on the spot, but for the temptation of the French
+officers, whom I knew to be so near, and for whose society I felt
+so great and natural an impatience.&nbsp; If I was to see
+anything of my countrymen, it was clear I had first of all to
+make my peace with Mr. Fenn; and that was no easy matter.&nbsp;
+To make friends with any one implies concessions on both sides;
+and what could I concede?&nbsp; What could I say of him, but that
+he had proved himself a villain and a fool, and the worse
+man?</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;here has been rather a poor
+piece of business, which I dare say you can have no pleasure in
+calling to mind; and, to say truth, I would as readily forget it
+myself.&nbsp; Suppose we try.&nbsp; Take back your pistol, which
+smells very ill; put it in your pocket or wherever you had it
+concealed.&nbsp; There!&nbsp; Now let us meet for the first
+time.&mdash;Give you good morning, Mr. Fenn!&nbsp; I hope you do
+very well.&nbsp; I come on the recommendation of my kinsman, the
+Vicomte de St. Yves.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you mean it?&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you
+mean you will pass over our little scrimmage?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, certainly!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It shows
+you are a bold fellow, who may be trusted to forget the business
+when it comes to the point.&nbsp; There is nothing against you in
+the little scrimmage, unless that your courage is greater than
+your strength.&nbsp; You are not so young as you once were, that
+is all.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I beg of you, sir, don&rsquo;t betray me to the
+Vis-count,&rsquo; he pleaded.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll not deny
+but what my &rsquo;eart failed me a trifle; but it was only a
+word, sir, what anybody might have said in the &rsquo;eat of the
+moment, and over with it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Certainly,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That is quite my
+own opinion.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The way I came to be anxious about the
+Vis-count,&rsquo; he continued, &lsquo;is that I believe he might
+be induced to form an &rsquo;asty judgment.&nbsp; And the
+business, in a pecuniary point of view, is all that I could ask;
+only trying, sir&mdash;very trying.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s making an
+old man of me before my time.&nbsp; You might have observed
+yourself, sir, that I &rsquo;aven&rsquo;t got the knees I once
+&rsquo;ad.&nbsp; The knees and the breathing, there&rsquo;s where
+it takes me.&nbsp; But I&rsquo;m very sure, sir, I address a
+gentleman as would be the last to make trouble between
+friends.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sure you do me no more than justice,&rsquo; said
+I; &lsquo;and I shall think it quite unnecessary to dwell on any
+of these passing circumstances in my report to the
+Vicomte.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Which you do favour him (if you&rsquo;ll excuse me
+being so bold as to mention it) exac&rsquo;ly!&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I should have known you anywheres.&nbsp; May I
+offer you a pot of &rsquo;ome-brewed ale, sir?&nbsp; By your
+leave!&nbsp; This way, if you please.&nbsp; I am &rsquo;eartily
+grateful&mdash;&rsquo;eartily pleased to be of any service to a
+gentleman like you, sir, which is related to the Vis-count, and
+really a fambly of which you might well be proud!&nbsp; Take care
+of the step, sir.&nbsp; You have good news of &rsquo;is
+&rsquo;ealth, I trust? as well as that of Monseer the
+Count?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>God forgive me! the horrible fellow was still puffing and
+panting with the fury of his assault, and already he had fallen
+into an obsequious, wheedling familiarity like that of an old
+servant,&mdash;already he was flattering me on my family
+connections!</p>
+<p>I followed him through the house into the stable-yard, where I
+observed the driver washing the cart in a shed.&nbsp; He must
+have heard the explosion of the pistol.&nbsp; He could not choose
+but hear it: the thing was shaped like a little blunderbuss,
+charged to the mouth, and made a report like a piece of field
+artillery.&nbsp; He had heard, he had paid no attention; and now,
+as we came forth by the back-door, he raised for a moment a pale
+and tell-tale face that was as direct as a confession.&nbsp; The
+rascal had expected to see Fenn come forth alone; he was waiting
+to be called on for that part of sexton, which I had already
+allotted to him in fancy.</p>
+<p>I need not detain the reader very long with any description of
+my visit to the back-kitchen; of how we mulled our ale there, and
+mulled it very well; nor of how we sat talking, Fenn like an old,
+faithful, affectionate dependant, and I&mdash;well!&nbsp; I
+myself fallen into a mere admiration of so much impudence, that
+transcended words, and had very soon conquered animosity.&nbsp; I
+took a fancy to the man, he was so vast a humbug.&nbsp; I began
+to see a kind of beauty in him, his <i>aplomb</i> was so
+majestic.&nbsp; I never knew a rogue to cut so fat; his villainy
+was ample, like his belly, and I could scarce find it in my heart
+to hold him responsible for either.&nbsp; He was good enough to
+drop into the autobiographical; telling me how the farm, in spite
+of the war and the high prices, had proved a disappointment; how
+there was &lsquo;a sight of cold, wet land as you come along the
+&rsquo;igh-road&rsquo;; how the winds and rains and the seasons
+had been misdirected, it seemed &lsquo;o&rsquo; purpose&rsquo;;
+how Mrs. Fenn had died&mdash;&lsquo;I lost her coming two year
+agone; a remarkable fine woman, my old girl, sir! if you&rsquo;ll
+excuse me,&rsquo; he added, with a burst of humility.&nbsp; In
+short, he gave me an opportunity of studying John Bull, as I may
+say, stuffed naked&mdash;his greed, his usuriousness, his
+hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled to the
+superlative&mdash;such as was well worth the little disarray and
+fluster of our passage in the hall.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII&mdash;I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN</h2>
+<p>As soon as I judged it safe, and that was not before Burchell
+Fenn had talked himself back into his breath and a complete good
+humour, I proposed he should introduce me to the French officers,
+henceforth to become my fellow-passengers.&nbsp; There were two
+of them, it appeared, and my heart beat as I approached the
+door.&nbsp; The specimen of Perfidious Albion whom I had just
+been studying gave me the stronger zest for my
+fellow-countrymen.&nbsp; I could have embraced them; I could have
+wept on their necks.&nbsp; And all the time I was going to a
+disappointment.</p>
+<p>It was in a spacious and low room, with an outlook on the
+court, that I found them bestowed.&nbsp; In the good days of that
+house the apartment had probably served as a library, for there
+were traces of shelves along the wainscot.&nbsp; Four or five
+mattresses lay on the floor in a corner, with a frowsy heap of
+bedding; near by was a basin and a cube of soap; a rude
+kitchen-table and some deal chairs stood together at the far end;
+and the room was illuminated by no less than four windows, and
+warmed by a little, crazy, sidelong grate, propped up with bricks
+in the vent of a hospitable chimney, in which a pile of coals
+smoked prodigiously and gave out a few starveling flames.&nbsp;
+An old, frail, white-haired officer sat in one of the chairs,
+which he had drawn close to this apology for a fire.&nbsp; He was
+wrapped in a camlet cloak, of which the collar was turned up, his
+knees touched the bars, his hands were spread in the very smoke,
+and yet he shivered for cold.&nbsp; The second&mdash;a big,
+florid, fine animal of a man, whose every gesture labelled him
+the cock of the walk and the admiration of the ladies&mdash;had
+apparently despaired of the fire, and now strode up and down,
+sneezing hard, bitterly blowing his nose, and proffering a
+continual stream of bluster, complaint, and barrack-room
+oaths.</p>
+<p>Fenn showed me in with the brief form of introduction:
+&lsquo;Gentlemen all, this here&rsquo;s another fare!&rsquo; and
+was gone again at once.&nbsp; The old man gave me but the one
+glance out of lack-lustre eyes; and even as he looked a shiver
+took him as sharp as a hiccough.&nbsp; But the other, who
+represented to admiration the picture of a Beau in a Catarrh,
+stared at me arrogantly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And who are you, sir?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>I made the military salute to my superiors.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Champdivers, private, Eighth of the Line,&rsquo; said
+I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pretty business!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;And you
+are going on with us?&nbsp; Three in a cart, and a great
+trolloping private at that!&nbsp; And who is to pay for you, my
+fine fellow?&rsquo; he inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If monsieur comes to that,&rsquo; I answered civilly,
+&lsquo;who paid for him?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, if you choose to play the wit!&rsquo; said
+he,&mdash;and began to rail at large upon his destiny, the
+weather, the cold, the danger and the expense of the escape, and,
+above all, the cooking of the accursed English.&nbsp; It seemed
+to annoy him particularly that I should have joined their
+party.&nbsp; &lsquo;If you knew what you were doing, thirty
+thousand millions of pigs! you would keep yourself to
+yourself!&nbsp; The horses can&rsquo;t drag the cart; the roads
+are all ruts and swamps.&nbsp; No longer ago than last night the
+Colonel and I had to march half the way&mdash;thunder of
+God!&mdash;half the way to the knees in mud&mdash;and I with this
+infernal cold&mdash;and the danger of detection!&nbsp; Happily we
+met no one: a desert&mdash;a real desert&mdash;like the whole
+abominable country!&nbsp; Nothing to eat&mdash;no, sir, there is
+nothing to eat but raw cow and greens boiled in water&mdash;nor
+to drink but Worcestershire sauce!&nbsp; Now I, with my catarrh,
+I have no appetite; is it not so?&nbsp; Well, if I were in
+France, I should have a good soup with a crust in it, an
+omelette, a fowl in rice, a partridge in cabbages&mdash;things to
+tempt me, thunder of God!&nbsp; But here&mdash;day of
+God!&mdash;what a country!&nbsp; And cold, too!&nbsp; They talk
+about Russia&mdash;this is all the cold I want!&nbsp; And the
+people&mdash;look at them!&nbsp; What a race!&nbsp; Never any
+handsome men; never any fine officers!&rsquo;&mdash;and he looked
+down complacently for a moment at his waist&mdash;&lsquo;And the
+women&mdash;what faggots!&nbsp; No, that is one point clear, I
+cannot stomach the English!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>There was something in this man so antipathetic to me, as sent
+the mustard into my nose.&nbsp; I can never bear your bucks and
+dandies, even when they are decent-looking and well dressed; and
+the Major&mdash;for that was his rank&mdash;was the image of a
+flunkey in good luck.&nbsp; Even to be in agreement with him, or
+to seem to be so, was more than I could make out to endure.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You could scarce be expected to stomach them,&rsquo;
+said I civilly, &lsquo;after having just digested your
+parole.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He whipped round on his heel and turned on me a countenance
+which I dare say he imagined to be awful; but another fit of
+sneezing cut him off ere he could come the length of speech.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have not tried the dish myself,&rsquo; I took the
+opportunity to add.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is said to be
+unpalatable.&nbsp; Did monsieur find it so?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>With surprising vivacity the Colonel woke from his
+lethargy.&nbsp; He was between us ere another word could
+pass.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Shame, gentlemen!&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is this
+a time for Frenchmen and fellow-soldiers to fall out?&nbsp; We
+are in the midst of our enemies; a quarrel, a loud word, may
+suffice to plunge us back into irretrievable distress.&nbsp;
+<i>Monsieur le Commandant</i>, you have been gravely
+offended.&nbsp; I make it my request, I make it my
+prayer&mdash;if need be, I give you my orders&mdash;that the
+matter shall stand by until we come safe to France.&nbsp; Then,
+if you please, I will serve you in any capacity.&nbsp; And for
+you, young man, you have shown all the cruelty and carelessness
+of youth.&nbsp; This gentleman is your superior; he is no longer
+young&rsquo;&mdash;at which word you are to conceive the
+Major&rsquo;s face.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is admitted he has broken his
+parole.&nbsp; I know not his reason, and no more do you.&nbsp; It
+might be patriotism in this hour of our country&rsquo;s
+adversity, it might be humanity, necessity; you know not what in
+the least, and you permit yourself to reflect on his
+honour.&nbsp; To break parole may be a subject for pity and not
+derision.&nbsp; I have broken mine&mdash;I, a colonel of the
+Empire.&nbsp; And why?&nbsp; I have been years negotiating my
+exchange, and it cannot be managed; those who have influence at
+the Ministry of War continually rush in before me, and I have to
+wait, and my daughter at home is in a decline.&nbsp; I am going
+to see my daughter at last, and it is my only concern lest I
+should have delayed too long.&nbsp; She is ill, and very
+ill,&mdash;at death&rsquo;s door.&nbsp; Nothing is left me but my
+daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my honour, blame
+me for it who dare!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this my heart smote me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;For God&rsquo;s sake,&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;think no
+more of what I have said!&nbsp; A parole? what is a parole
+against life and death and love?&nbsp; I ask your pardon; this
+gentleman&rsquo;s also.&nbsp; As long as I shall be with you, you
+shall not have cause to complain of me again.&nbsp; I pray God
+you will find your daughter alive and restored.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That is past praying for,&rsquo; said the Colonel; and
+immediately the brief fire died out of him, and, returning to the
+hearth, he relapsed into his former abstraction.</p>
+<p>But I was not so easy to compose.&nbsp; The knowledge of the
+poor gentleman&rsquo;s trouble, and the sight of his face, had
+filled me with the bitterness of remorse; and I insisted upon
+shaking hands with the Major (which he did with a very ill
+grace), and abounded in palinodes and apologies.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;After all,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;who am I to
+talk?&nbsp; I am in the luck to be a private soldier; I have no
+parole to give or to keep; once I am over the rampart, I am as
+free as air.&nbsp; I beg you to believe that I regret from my
+soul the use of these ungenerous expressions.&nbsp; Allow me . .
+. Is there no way in this damned house to attract
+attention?&nbsp; Where is this fellow, Fenn?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.&nbsp; Fenn, who
+was at the moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms
+like one in despair, called to me to keep back, plunged into the
+house, and appeared next moment in the doorway of the
+chamber.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, sir!&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;keep away from those
+there windows.&nbsp; A body might see you from the back
+lane.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is registered,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Henceforward I will be a mouse for precaution and a ghost
+for invisibility.&nbsp; But in the meantime, for God&rsquo;s
+sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy!&nbsp; Your room is as damp as
+the bottom of a well, and these gentlemen are perishing of
+cold.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be
+paid in advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether
+because I threw greater energy into the business, or because the
+coals were now warmed and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze
+that made the chimney roar again.&nbsp; The shine of it, in that
+dark, rainy day, seemed to reanimate the Colonel like a blink of
+sun.&nbsp; With the outburst of the flames, besides, a draught
+was established, which immediately delivered us from the plague
+of smoke; and by the time Fenn returned, carrying a bottle under
+his arm and a single tumbler in his hand, there was already an
+air of gaiety in the room that did the heart good.</p>
+<p>I poured out some of the brandy.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Colonel,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am a young man and a
+private soldier.&nbsp; I have not been long in this room, and
+already I have shown the petulance that belongs to the one
+character and the ill manners that you may look for in the
+other.&nbsp; Have the humanity to pass these slips over, and
+honour me so far as to accept this glass.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My lad,&rsquo; says he, waking up and blinking at me
+with an air of suspicion, &lsquo;are you sure you can afford
+it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I assured him I could.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I thank you, then: I am very cold.&rsquo;&nbsp; He took
+the glass out, and a little colour came in his face.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I thank you again,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;It goes to
+the heart.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a
+good deal of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the
+morning, now with some sort of apology, now with none at all; and
+the bottle began to look foolish before dinner was served.&nbsp;
+It was such a meal as he had himself predicted: beef, greens,
+potatoes, mustard in a teacup, and beer in a brown jug that was
+all over hounds, horses, and hunters, with a fox at the fat end
+and a gigantic John Bull&mdash;for all the world like
+Fenn&mdash;sitting in the midst in a bob-wig and smoking
+tobacco.&nbsp; The beer was a good brew, but not good enough for
+the Major; he laced it with brandy&mdash;for his cold, he said;
+and in this curative design the remainder of the bottle ebbed
+away.&nbsp; He called my attention repeatedly to the
+circumstance; helped me pointedly to the dregs, threw the bottle
+in the air and played tricks with it; and at last, having
+exhausted his ingenuity, and seeing me remain quite blind to
+every hint, he ordered and paid for another himself.</p>
+<p>As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and
+only awoke occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he
+was supposed to be doing.&nbsp; On each of these occasions he
+showed a gratitude and kind courtesy that endeared him to me
+beyond expression.&nbsp; &lsquo;Champdivers, my lad, your
+health!&rsquo; he would say.&nbsp; &lsquo;The Major and I had a
+very arduous march last night, and I positively thought I should
+have eaten nothing, but your fortunate idea of the brandy has
+made quite a new man of me&mdash;quite a new man.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And he would fall to with a great air of heartiness, cut himself
+a mouthful, and, before he had swallowed it, would have forgotten
+his dinner, his company, the place where he then was, and the
+escape he was engaged on, and become absorbed in the vision of a
+sick-room and a dying girl in France.&nbsp; The pathos of this
+continual preoccupation, in a man so old, sick, and over-weary,
+and whom I looked upon as a mere bundle of dying bones and
+death-pains, put me wholly from my victuals: it seemed there was
+an element of sin, a kind of rude bravado of youth, in the mere
+relishing of food at the same table with this tragic father; and
+though I was well enough used to the coarse, plain diet of the
+English, I ate scarce more than himself.&nbsp; Dinner was hardly
+over before he succumbed to a lethargic sleep; lying on one of
+the mattresses with his limbs relaxed, and his breath seemingly
+suspended&mdash;the very image of dissolution.</p>
+<p>This left the Major and myself alone at the table.&nbsp; You
+must not suppose our <i>t&ecirc;te-&agrave;-t&ecirc;te</i> was
+long, but it was a lively period while it lasted.&nbsp; He drank
+like a fish or an Englishman; shouted, beat the table, roared out
+songs, quarrelled, made it up again, and at last tried to throw
+the dinner-plates through the window, a feat of which he was at
+that time quite incapable.&nbsp; For a party of fugitives,
+condemned to the most rigorous discretion, there was never seen
+so noisy a carnival; and through it all the Colonel continued to
+sleep like a child.&nbsp; Seeing the Major so well advanced, and
+no retreat possible, I made a fair wind of a foul one, keeping
+his glass full, pushing him with toasts; and sooner than I could
+have dared to hope, he became drowsy and incoherent.&nbsp; With
+the wrong-headedness of all such sots, he would not be persuaded
+to lie down upon one of the mattresses until I had stretched
+myself upon another.&nbsp; But the comedy was soon over; soon he
+slept the sleep of the just, and snored like a military music;
+and I might get up again and face (as best I could) the excessive
+tedium of the afternoon.</p>
+<p>I had passed the night before in a good bed; I was denied the
+resource of slumber; and there was nothing open for me but to
+pace the apartment, maintain the fire, and brood on my
+position.&nbsp; I compared yesterday and to-day&mdash;the safety,
+comfort, jollity, open-air exercise and pleasant roadside inns of
+the one, with the tedium, anxiety, and discomfort of the
+other.&nbsp; I remembered that I was in the hands of Fenn, who
+could not be more false&mdash;though he might be more
+vindictive&mdash;than I fancied him.&nbsp; I looked forward to
+nights of pitching in the covered cart, and days of monotony in I
+knew not what hiding-places; and my heart failed me, and I was in
+two minds whether to slink off ere it was too late, and return to
+my former solitary way of travel.&nbsp; But the Colonel stood in
+the path.&nbsp; I had not seen much of him; but already I judged
+him a man of a childlike nature&mdash;with that sort of innocence
+and courtesy that, I think, is only to be found in old soldiers
+or old priests&mdash;and broken with years and sorrow.&nbsp; I
+could not turn my back on his distress; could not leave him alone
+with the selfish trooper who snored on the next mattress.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Champdivers, my lad, your health!&rsquo; said a voice in
+my ear, and stopped me&mdash;and there are few things I am more
+glad of in the retrospect than that it did.</p>
+<p>It must have been about four in the afternoon&mdash;at least
+the rain had taken off, and the sun was setting with some wintry
+pomp&mdash;when the current of my reflections was effectually
+changed by the arrival of two visitors in a gig.&nbsp; They were
+farmers of the neighbourhood, I suppose&mdash;big, burly fellows
+in great-coats and top-boots, mightily flushed with liquor when
+they arrived, and, before they left, inimitably drunk.&nbsp; They
+stayed long in the kitchen with Burchell, drinking, shouting,
+singing, and keeping it up; and the sound of their merry
+minstrelsy kept me a kind of company.&nbsp; The night fell, and
+the shine of the fire brightened and blinked on the panelled
+wall.&nbsp; Our illuminated windows must have been visible not
+only from the back lane of which Fenn had spoken, but from the
+court where the farmers&rsquo; gig awaited them.&nbsp; In the far
+end of the firelit room lay my companions, the one silent, the
+other clamorously noisy, the images of death and
+drunkenness.&nbsp; Little wonder if I were tempted to join in the
+choruses below, and sometimes could hardly refrain from laughter,
+and sometimes, I believe, from tears&mdash;so unmitigated was the
+tedium, so cruel the suspense, of this period.</p>
+<p>At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy
+minstrels appeared in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern,
+and knocking together as they came.&nbsp; The visitors clambered
+noisily into the gig, one of them shook the reins, and they were
+snatched out of sight and hearing with a suddenness that partook
+of the nature of prodigy.&nbsp; I am well aware there is a
+Providence for drunken men, that holds the reins for them and
+presides over their troubles; doubtless he had his work cut out
+for him with this particular gigful!&nbsp; Fenn rescued his toes
+with an ejaculation from under the departing wheels, and turned
+at once with uncertain steps and devious lantern to the far end
+of the court.&nbsp; There, through the open doors of a
+coach-house, the shock-headed lad was already to be seen drawing
+forth the covered cart.&nbsp; If I wished any private talk with
+our host, it must be now or never.</p>
+<p>Accordingly I groped my way downstairs, and came to him as he
+looked on at and lighted the harnessing of the horses.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The hour approaches when we have to part,&rsquo; said
+I; &lsquo;and I shall be obliged if you will tell your servant to
+drop me at the nearest point for Dunstable.&nbsp; I am determined
+to go so far with our friends, Colonel X and Major Y, but my
+business is peremptory, and it takes me to the neighbourhood of
+Dunstable.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Orders were given to my satisfaction, with an obsequiousness
+that seemed only inflamed by his potations.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV&mdash;TRAVELS OF THE COVERED CART</h2>
+<p>My companions were aroused with difficulty: the Colonel, poor
+old gentleman, to a sort of permanent dream, in which you could
+say of him only that he was very deaf and anxiously polite; the
+Major still maudlin drunk.&nbsp; We had a dish of tea by the
+fireside, and then issued like criminals into the scathing cold
+of the night.&nbsp; For the weather had in the meantime
+changed.&nbsp; Upon the cessation of the rain, a strict frost had
+succeeded.&nbsp; The moon, being young, was already near the
+zenith when we started, glittered everywhere on sheets of ice,
+and sparkled in ten thousand icicles.&nbsp; A more unpromising
+night for a journey it was hard to conceive.&nbsp; But in the
+course of the afternoon the horses had been well roughed; and
+King (for such was the name of the shock-headed lad) was very
+positive that he could drive us without misadventure.&nbsp; He
+was as good as his word; indeed, despite a gawky air, he was
+simply invaluable in his present employment, showing marked
+sagacity in all that concerned the care of horses, and guiding us
+by one short cut after another for days, and without a fault.</p>
+<p>The interior of that engine of torture, the covered cart, was
+fitted with a bench, on which we took our places; the door was
+shut; in a moment, the night closed upon us solid and stifling;
+and we felt that we were being driven carefully out of the
+courtyard.&nbsp; Careful was the word all night, and it was an
+alleviation of our miseries that we did not often enjoy.&nbsp; In
+general, as we were driven the better part of the night and day,
+often at a pretty quick pace and always through a labyrinth of
+the most infamous country lanes and by-roads, we were so bruised
+upon the bench, so dashed against the top and sides of the cart,
+that we reached the end of a stage in truly pitiable case,
+sometimes flung ourselves down without the formality of eating,
+made but one sleep of it until the hour of departure returned,
+and were only properly awakened by the first jolt of the renewed
+journey.&nbsp; There were interruptions, at times, that we hailed
+as alleviations.&nbsp; At times the cart was bogged, once it was
+upset, and we must alight and lend the driver the assistance of
+our arms; at times, too (as on the occasion when I had first
+encountered it), the horses gave out, and we had to trail
+alongside in mud or frost until the first peep of daylight, or
+the approach to a hamlet or a high road, bade us disappear like
+ghosts into our prison.</p>
+<p>The main roads of England are incomparable for excellence, of
+a beautiful smoothness, very ingeniously laid down, and so well
+kept that in most weathers you could take your dinner off any
+part of them without distaste.&nbsp; On them, to the note of the
+bugle, the mail did its sixty miles a day; innumerable chaises
+whisked after the bobbing postboys; or some young blood would
+flit by in a curricle and tandem, to the vast delight and danger
+of the lieges.&nbsp; On them, the slow-pacing waggons made a
+music of bells, and all day long the travellers on horse-back and
+the travellers on foot (like happy Mr. St. Ives so little a while
+before!) kept coming and going, and baiting and gaping at each
+other, as though a fair were due, and they were gathering to it
+from all England.&nbsp; No, nowhere in the world is travel so
+great a pleasure as in that country.&nbsp; But unhappily our one
+need was to be secret; and all this rapid and animated picture of
+the road swept quite apart from us, as we lumbered up hill and
+down dale, under hedge and over stone, among circuitous
+byways.&nbsp; Only twice did I receive, as it were, a whiff of
+the highway.&nbsp; The first reached my ears alone.&nbsp; I might
+have been anywhere.&nbsp; I only knew I was walking in the dark
+night and among ruts, when I heard very far off, over the silent
+country that surrounded us, the guard&rsquo;s horn wailing its
+signal to the next post-house for a change of horses.&nbsp; It
+was like the voice of the day heard in darkness, a voice of the
+world heard in prison, the note of a cock crowing in the
+mid-seas&mdash;in short, I cannot tell you what it was like, you
+will have to fancy for yourself&mdash;but I could have wept to
+hear it.&nbsp; Once we were belated: the cattle could hardly
+crawl, the day was at hand, it was a nipping, rigorous morning,
+King was lashing his horses, I was giving an arm to the old
+Colonel, and the Major was coughing in our rear.&nbsp; I must
+suppose that King was a thought careless, being nearly in
+desperation about his team, and, in spite of the cold morning,
+breathing hot with his exertions.&nbsp; We came, at last, a
+little before sunrise to the summit of a hill, and saw the
+high-road passing at right angles through an open country of
+meadows and hedgerow pollards; and not only the York mail,
+speeding smoothly at the gallop of the four horses, but a
+post-chaise besides, with the post-boy titupping briskly, and the
+traveller himself putting his head out of the window, but whether
+to breathe the dawn, or the better to observe the passage of the
+mail, I do not know.&nbsp; So that we enjoyed for an instant a
+picture of free life on the road, in its most luxurious forms of
+despatch and comfort.&nbsp; And thereafter, with a poignant
+feeling of contrast in our hearts, we must mount again into our
+wheeled dungeon.</p>
+<p>We came to our stages at all sorts of odd hours, and they were
+in all kinds of odd places.&nbsp; I may say at once that my first
+experience was my best.&nbsp; Nowhere again were we so well
+entertained as at Burchell Fenn&rsquo;s.&nbsp; And this, I
+suppose, was natural, and indeed inevitable, in so long and
+secret a journey.&nbsp; The first stop, we lay six hours in a
+barn standing by itself in a poor, marshy orchard, and packed
+with hay; to make it more attractive, we were told it had been
+the scene of an abominable murder, and was now haunted.&nbsp; But
+the day was beginning to break, and our fatigue was too extreme
+for visionary terrors.&nbsp; The second or third, we alighted on
+a barren heath about midnight, built a fire to warm us under the
+shelter of some thorns, supped like beggars on bread and a piece
+of cold bacon, and slept like gipsies with our feet to the
+fire.&nbsp; In the meanwhile, King was gone with the cart, I know
+not where, to get a change of horses, and it was late in the dark
+morning when he returned and we were able to resume our
+journey.&nbsp; In the middle of another night, we came to a stop
+by an ancient, whitewashed cottage of two stories; a privet hedge
+surrounded it; the frosty moon shone blankly on the upper
+windows; but through those of the kitchen the firelight was seen
+glinting on the roof and reflected from the dishes on the
+wall.&nbsp; Here, after much hammering on the door, King managed
+to arouse an old crone from the chimney-corner chair, where she
+had been dozing in the watch; and we were had in, and entertained
+with a dish of hot tea.&nbsp; This old lady was an aunt of
+Burchell Fenn&rsquo;s&mdash;and an unwilling partner in his
+dangerous trade.&nbsp; Though the house stood solitary, and the
+hour was an unlikely one for any passenger upon the road, King
+and she conversed in whispers only.&nbsp; There was something
+dismal, something of the sick-room, in this perpetual, guarded
+sibilation.&nbsp; The apprehensions of our hostess insensibly
+communicated themselves to every one present.&nbsp; We ate like
+mice in a cat&rsquo;s ear; if one of us jingled a teaspoon, all
+would start; and when the hour came to take the road again, we
+drew a long breath of relief, and climbed to our places in the
+covered cart with a positive sense of escape.&nbsp; The most of
+our meals, however, were taken boldly at hedgerow alehouses,
+usually at untimely hours of the day, when the clients were in
+the field or the farmyard at labour.&nbsp; I shall have to tell
+presently of our last experience of the sort, and how
+unfortunately it miscarried; but as that was the signal for my
+separation from my fellow-travellers, I must first finish with
+them.</p>
+<p>I had never any occasion to waver in my first judgment of the
+Colonel.&nbsp; The old gentleman seemed to me, and still seems in
+the retrospect, the salt of the earth.&nbsp; I had occasion to
+see him in the extremes of hardship, hunger and cold; he was
+dying, and he looked it; and yet I cannot remember any hasty,
+harsh, or impatient word to have fallen from his lips.&nbsp; On
+the contrary, he ever showed himself careful to please; and even
+if he rambled in his talk, rambled always gently&mdash;like a
+humane, half-witted old hero, true to his colours to the
+last.&nbsp; I would not dare to say how often he awoke suddenly
+from a lethargy, and told us again, as though we had never heard
+it, the story of how he had earned the cross, how it had been
+given him by the hand of the Emperor, and of the
+innocent&mdash;and, indeed, foolish&mdash;sayings of his daughter
+when he returned with it on his bosom.&nbsp; He had another
+anecdote which he was very apt to give, by way of a rebuke, when
+the Major wearied us beyond endurance with dispraises of the
+English.&nbsp; This was an account of the <i>braves gens</i> with
+whom he had been boarding.&nbsp; True enough, he was a man so
+simple and grateful by nature, that the most common civilities
+were able to touch him to the heart, and would remain written in
+his memory; but from a thousand inconsiderable but conclusive
+indications, I gathered that this family had really loved him,
+and loaded him with kindness.&nbsp; They made a fire in his
+bedroom, which the sons and daughters tended with their own
+hands; letters from France were looked for with scarce more
+eagerness by himself than by these alien sympathisers; when they
+came, he would read them aloud in the parlour to the assembled
+family, translating as he went.&nbsp; The Colonel&rsquo;s English
+was elementary; his daughter not in the least likely to be an
+amusing correspondent; and, as I conceived these scenes in the
+parlour, I felt sure the interest centred in the Colonel himself,
+and I thought I could feel in my own heart that mixture of the
+ridiculous and the pathetic, the contest of tears and laughter,
+which must have shaken the bosoms of the family.&nbsp; Their
+kindness had continued till the end.&nbsp; It appears they were
+privy to his flight, the camlet cloak had been lined expressly
+for him, and he was the bearer of a letter from the daughter of
+the house to his own daughter in Paris.&nbsp; The last evening,
+when the time came to say good-night, it was tacitly known to all
+that they were to look upon his face no more.&nbsp; He rose,
+pleading fatigue, and turned to the daughter, who had been his
+chief ally: &lsquo;You will permit me, my dear&mdash;to an old
+and very unhappy soldier&mdash;and may God bless you for your
+goodness!&rsquo;&nbsp; The girl threw her arms about his neck and
+sobbed upon his bosom; the lady of the house burst into tears;
+&lsquo;<i>et je vous le jure</i>, <i>le p&egrave;re se
+mouchait</i>!&rsquo; quoth the Colonel, twisting his moustaches
+with a cavalry air, and at the same time blinking the water from
+his eyes at the mere recollection.</p>
+<p>It was a good thought to me that he had found these friends in
+captivity; that he had started on this fatal journey from so
+cordial a farewell.&nbsp; He had broken his parole for his
+daughter: that he should ever live to reach her sick-bed, that he
+could continue to endure to an end the hardships, the crushing
+fatigue, the savage cold, of our pilgrimage, I had early ceased
+to hope.&nbsp; I did for him what I was able,&mdash;nursed him,
+kept him covered, watched over his slumbers, sometimes held him
+in my arms at the rough places of the road.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Champdivers,&rsquo; he once said, &lsquo;you are like a
+son to me&mdash;like a son.&rsquo;&nbsp; It is good to remember,
+though at the time it put me on the rack.&nbsp; All was to no
+purpose.&nbsp; Fast as we were travelling towards France, he was
+travelling faster still to another destination.&nbsp; Daily he
+grew weaker and more indifferent.&nbsp; An old rustic accent of
+Lower Normandy reappeared in his speech, from which it had long
+been banished, and grew stronger; old words of the <i>patois</i>,
+too: <i>Ouistreham</i>, <i>matrass&eacute;</i>, and others, the
+sense of which we were sometimes unable to guess.&nbsp; On the
+very last day he began again his eternal story of the cross and
+the Emperor.&nbsp; The Major, who was particularly ill, or at
+least particularly cross, uttered some angry words of
+protest.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Pardonnez-moi</i>, <i>monsieur le
+commandant</i>, <i>mais c&rsquo;est pour monsieur</i>,&rsquo;
+said the Colonel: &lsquo;Monsieur has not yet heard the
+circumstance, and is good enough to feel an
+interest.&rsquo;&nbsp; Presently after, however, he began to lose
+the thread of his narrative; and at last: &lsquo;<i>Qu&eacute;
+que j&rsquo;ai</i>?&nbsp; <i>Je m&rsquo;embrouille</i>!&rsquo;
+says he, &lsquo;<i>Suffit</i>: <i>s&rsquo;m&rsquo;a la
+donn&eacute;</i>, <i>et Berthe en &eacute;tait bien
+contente</i>.&rsquo;&nbsp; It struck me as the falling of the
+curtain or the closing of the sepulchre doors.</p>
+<p>Sure enough, in but a little while after, he fell into a sleep
+as gentle as an infant&rsquo;s, which insensibly changed into the
+sleep of death.&nbsp; I had my arm about his body at the time and
+remarked nothing, unless it were that he once stretched himself a
+little, so kindly the end came to that disastrous life.&nbsp; It
+was only at our evening halt that the Major and I discovered we
+were travelling alone with the poor clay.&nbsp; That night we
+stole a spade from a field&mdash;I think near Market
+Bosworth&mdash;and a little farther on, in a wood of young oak
+trees and by the light of King&rsquo;s lantern, we buried the old
+soldier of the Empire with both prayers and tears.</p>
+<p>We had needs invent Heaven if it had not been revealed to us;
+there are some things that fall so bitterly ill on this side
+Time!&nbsp; As for the Major, I have long since forgiven
+him.&nbsp; He broke the news to the poor Colonel&rsquo;s
+daughter; I am told he did it kindly; and sure, nobody could have
+done it without tears!&nbsp; His share of purgatory will be
+brief; and in this world, as I could not very well praise him, I
+have suppressed his name.&nbsp; The Colonel&rsquo;s also, for the
+sake of his parole.&nbsp; <i>Requiescat</i>.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XV&mdash;THE ADVENTURE OF THE ATTORNEY&rsquo;S
+CLERK</h2>
+<p>I have mentioned our usual course, which was to eat in
+inconsiderable wayside hostelries, known to King.&nbsp; It was a
+dangerous business; we went daily under fire to satisfy our
+appetite, and put our head in the loin&rsquo;s mouth for a piece
+of bread.&nbsp; Sometimes, to minimise the risk, we would all
+dismount before we came in view of the house, straggle in
+severally, and give what orders we pleased, like disconnected
+strangers.&nbsp; In like manner we departed, to find the cart at
+an appointed place, some half a mile beyond.&nbsp; The Colonel
+and the Major had each a word or two of English&mdash;God help
+their pronunciation!&nbsp; But they did well enough to order a
+rasher and a pot or call a reckoning; and, to say truth, these
+country folks did not give themselves the pains, and had scarce
+the knowledge, to be critical.</p>
+<p>About nine or ten at night the pains of hunger and cold drove
+us to an alehouse in the flats of Bedfordshire, not far from
+Bedford itself.&nbsp; In the inn kitchen was a long, lean,
+characteristic-looking fellow of perhaps forty, dressed in
+black.&nbsp; He sat on a settle by the fireside, smoking a long
+pipe, such as they call a yard of clay.&nbsp; His hat and wig
+were hanged upon the knob behind him, his head as bald as a
+bladder of lard, and his expression very shrewd, cantankerous,
+and inquisitive.&nbsp; He seemed to value himself above his
+company, to give himself the airs of a man of the world among
+that rustic herd; which was often no more than his due; being, as
+I afterwards discovered, an attorney&rsquo;s clerk.&nbsp; I took
+upon myself the more ungrateful part of arriving last; and by the
+time I entered on the scene the Major was already served at a
+side table.&nbsp; Some general conversation must have passed, and
+I smelled danger in the air.&nbsp; The Major looked flustered,
+the attorney&rsquo;s clerk triumphant, and three or four peasants
+in smock-frocks (who sat about the fire to play chorus) had let
+their pipes go out.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Give you good evening, sir!&rsquo; said the
+attorney&rsquo;s clerk to me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The same to you, sir,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think this one will do,&rsquo; quoth the clerk to the
+yokels with a wink; and then, as soon as I had given my order,
+&lsquo;Pray, sir, whither are you bound?&rsquo; he added.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am not one of those who
+speak either of their business or their destination in houses of
+public entertainment.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A good answer,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;and an excellent
+principle.&nbsp; Sir, do you speak French?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, no, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A little
+Spanish at your service.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But you know the French accent, perhaps?&rsquo; said
+the clerk.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well do I do that!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+French accent?&nbsp; Why, I believe I can tell a Frenchman in ten
+words.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here is a puzzle for you, then!&rsquo; he said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I have no material doubt myself, but some of these
+gentlemen are more backward.&nbsp; The lack of education, you
+know.&nbsp; I make bold to say that a man cannot walk, cannot
+hear, and cannot see, without the blessings of
+education.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He turned to the Major, whose food plainly stuck in his
+throat.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, sir,&rsquo; pursued the clerk, &lsquo;let me have
+the pleasure to hear your voice again.&nbsp; Where are you going,
+did you say?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sare, I am go-ing to Lon-don,&rsquo; said the
+Major.</p>
+<p>I could have flung my plate at him to be such an ass, and to
+have so little a gift of languages where that was the
+essential.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What think ye of that?&rsquo; said the clerk.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Is that French enough?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good God!&rsquo; cried I, leaping up like one who
+should suddenly perceive an acquaintance, &lsquo;is this you, Mr.
+Dubois?&nbsp; Why, who would have dreamed of encountering you so
+far from home?&rsquo;&nbsp; As I spoke, I shook hands with the
+Major heartily; and turning to our tormentor, &lsquo;Oh, sir, you
+may be perfectly reassured!&nbsp; This is a very honest fellow, a
+late neighbour of mine in the city of Carlisle.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I thought the attorney looked put out; I little knew the
+man!</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But he is French,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;for all
+that?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, to be sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A Frenchman
+of the emigration!&nbsp; None of your Buonaparte lot.&nbsp; I
+will warrant his views of politics to be as sound as your
+own.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What is a little strange,&rsquo; said the clerk
+quietly, &lsquo;is that Mr. Dubois should deny it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I got it fair in the face, and took it smiling; but the shock
+was rude, and in the course of the next words I contrived to do
+what I have rarely done, and make a slip in my English.&nbsp; I
+kept my liberty and life by my proficiency all these months, and
+for once that I failed, it is not to be supposed that I would
+make a public exhibition of the details.&nbsp; Enough, that it
+was a very little error, and one that might have passed
+ninety-nine times in a hundred.&nbsp; But my limb of the law was
+as swift to pick it up as though he had been by trade a master of
+languages.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Aha!&rsquo; cries he; &lsquo;and you are French,
+too!&nbsp; Your tongue bewrays you.&nbsp; Two Frenchmen coming
+into an alehouse, severally and accidentally, not knowing each
+other, at ten of the clock at night, in the middle of
+Bedfordshire?&nbsp; No, sir, that shall not pass!&nbsp; You are
+all prisoners escaping, if you are nothing worse.&nbsp; Consider
+yourselves under arrest.&nbsp; I have to trouble you for your
+papers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Where is your warrant, if you come to that?&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;My papers!&nbsp; A likely thing that I would show
+my papers on the <i>ipse dixit</i> of an unknown fellow in a
+hedge alehouse!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Would you resist the law?&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not the law, sir!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I hope I
+am too good a subject for that.&nbsp; But for a nameless fellow
+with a bald head and a pair of gingham small-clothes, why
+certainly!&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis my birthright as an Englishman.&nbsp;
+Where&rsquo;s <i>Magna Charta</i>, else?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;We will see about that,&rsquo; says he; and then,
+addressing the assistants, &lsquo;where does the constable
+live?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Lord love you, sir!&rsquo; cried the landlord,
+&lsquo;what are you thinking of?&nbsp; The constable at past ten
+at night!&nbsp; Why, he&rsquo;s abed and asleep, and good and
+drunk two hours agone!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah that a&rsquo; be!&rsquo; came in chorus from the
+yokels.</p>
+<p>The attorney&rsquo;s clerk was put to a stand.&nbsp; He could
+not think of force; there was little sign of martial ardour about
+the landlord, and the peasants were indifferent&mdash;they only
+listened, and gaped, and now scratched a head, and now would get
+a light to their pipes from the embers on the hearth.&nbsp; On
+the other hand, the Major and I put a bold front on the business
+and defied him, not without some ground of law.&nbsp; In this
+state of matters he proposed I should go along with him to one
+Squire Merton, a great man of the neighbourhood, who was in the
+commission of the peace, the end of his avenue but three lanes
+away.&nbsp; I told him I would not stir a foot for him if it were
+to save his soul.&nbsp; Next he proposed I should stay all night
+where I was, and the constable could see to my affair in the
+morning, when he was sober.&nbsp; I replied I should go when and
+where I pleased; that we were lawful travellers in the fear of
+God and the king, and I for one would suffer myself to be stayed
+by nobody.&nbsp; At the same time, I was thinking the matter had
+lasted altogether too long, and I determined to bring it to an
+end at once.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;See here,&rsquo; said I, getting up, for till now I had
+remained carelessly seated, &lsquo;there&rsquo;s only one way to
+decide a thing like this&mdash;only one way that&rsquo;s right
+<i>English</i>&mdash;and that&rsquo;s man to man.&nbsp; Take off
+your coat, sir, and these gentlemen shall see fair
+play.&rsquo;&nbsp; At this there came a look in his eye that I
+could not mistake.&nbsp; His education had been neglected in one
+essential and eminently British particular: he could not
+box.&nbsp; No more could I, you may say; but then I had the more
+impudence&mdash;and I had made the proposal.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He says I&rsquo;m no Englishman, but the proof of the
+pudding is the eating of it,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; And here I
+stripped my coat and fell into the proper attitude, which was
+just about all I knew of this barbarian art.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why,
+sir, you seem to me to hang back a little,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Come, I&rsquo;ll meet you; I&rsquo;ll give you an
+appetiser&mdash;though hang me if I can understand the man that
+wants any enticement to hold up his hands.&rsquo;&nbsp; I drew a
+bank-note out of my fob and tossed it to the landlord.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There are the stakes,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll fight you for first blood, since you seem to
+make so much work about it.&nbsp; If you tap my claret first,
+there are five guineas for you, and I&rsquo;ll go with you to any
+squire you choose to mention.&nbsp; If I tap yours, you&rsquo;ll
+perhaps let on that I&rsquo;m the better man, and allow me to go
+about my lawful business at my own time and convenience, by God;
+is that fair, my lads?&rsquo; says I, appealing to the
+company.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, ay,&rsquo; said the chorus of chawbacons; &lsquo;he
+can&rsquo;t say no fairer nor that, he can&rsquo;t.&nbsp; Take
+off thy coat master!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The limb of the law was now on the wrong side of public
+opinion, and, what heartened me to go on, the position was
+rapidly changing in our favour.&nbsp; Already the Major was
+paying his shot to the very indifferent landlord, and I could see
+the white face of King at the back-door, making signals of
+haste.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oho!&rsquo; quoth my enemy, &lsquo;you are as full of
+doubles as a fox, are you not?&nbsp; But I see through you; I see
+through and through you.&nbsp; You would change the venue, would
+you?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I may be transparent, sir,&rsquo; says I, &lsquo;but if
+you&rsquo;ll do me the favour to stand up, you&rsquo;ll find I
+can hit dam hard.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Which is a point, if you will observe, that I had never
+called in question,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, you
+ignorant clowns,&rsquo; he proceeded, addressing the company,
+&lsquo;can&rsquo;t you see the fellow&rsquo;s gulling you before
+your eyes?&nbsp; Can&rsquo;t you see that he has changed the
+point upon me?&nbsp; I say he&rsquo;s a French prisoner, and he
+answers that he can box!&nbsp; What has that to do with it?&nbsp;
+I would not wonder but what he can dance, too&mdash;they&rsquo;re
+all dancing masters over there.&nbsp; I say, and I stick to it,
+that he&rsquo;s a Frenchy.&nbsp; He says he isn&rsquo;t.&nbsp;
+Well then, let him out with his papers, if he has them!&nbsp; If
+he had, would he not show them?&nbsp; If he had, would he not
+jump at the idea of going to Squire Merton, a man you all
+know?&nbsp; Now, you are all plain, straightforward Bedfordshire
+men, and I wouldn&rsquo;t ask a better lot to appeal to.&nbsp;
+You&rsquo;re not the kind to be talked over with any French
+gammon, and he&rsquo;s plenty of that.&nbsp; But let me tell him,
+he can take his pigs to another market; they&rsquo;ll never do
+here; they&rsquo;ll never go down in Bedfordshire.&nbsp; Why!
+look at the man!&nbsp; Look at his feet!&nbsp; Has anybody got a
+foot in the room like that?&nbsp; See how he stands! do any of
+you fellows stand like that?&nbsp; Does the landlord,
+there?&nbsp; Why, he has Frenchman wrote all over him, as big as
+a sign-post!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>This was all very well; and in a different scene I might even
+have been gratified by his remarks; but I saw clearly, if I were
+to allow him to talk, he might turn the tables on me
+altogether.&nbsp; He might not be much of a hand at boxing; but I
+was much mistaken, or he had studied forensic eloquence in a good
+school.&nbsp; In this predicament I could think of nothing more
+ingenious than to burst out of the house, under the pretext of an
+ungovernable rage.&nbsp; It was certainly not very
+ingenious&mdash;it was elementary, but I had no choice.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You white-livered dog!&rsquo; I broke out.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Do you dare to tell me you&rsquo;re an Englishman, and
+won&rsquo;t fight?&nbsp; But I&rsquo;ll stand no more of
+this!&nbsp; I leave this place, where I&rsquo;ve been
+insulted!&nbsp; Here! what&rsquo;s to pay?&nbsp; Pay
+yourself!&rsquo; I went on, offering the landlord a handful of
+silver, &lsquo;and give me back my bank-note!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The landlord, following his usual policy of obliging
+everybody, offered no opposition to my design.&nbsp; The position
+of my adversary was now thoroughly bad.&nbsp; He had lost my two
+companions.&nbsp; He was on the point of losing me also.&nbsp;
+There was plainly no hope of arousing the company to help; and
+watching him with a corner of my eye, I saw him hesitate for a
+moment.&nbsp; The next, he had taken down his hat and his wig,
+which was of black horsehair; and I saw him draw from behind the
+settle a vast hooded great-coat and a small valise.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The devil!&rsquo; thought I: &lsquo;is the rascal going to
+follow me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was scarce clear of the inn before the limb of the law was
+at my heels.&nbsp; I saw his face plain in the moonlight; and the
+most resolute purpose showed in it, along with an unmoved
+composure.&nbsp; A chill went over me.&nbsp; &lsquo;This is no
+common adventure,&rsquo; thinks I to myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+have got hold of a man of character, St. Ives!&nbsp; A bite-hard,
+a bull-dog, a weasel is on your trail; and how are you to throw
+him off?&rsquo;&nbsp; Who was he?&nbsp; By some of his
+expressions I judged he was a hanger-on of courts.&nbsp; But in
+what character had he followed the assizes?&nbsp; As a simple
+spectator, as a lawyer&rsquo;s clerk, as a criminal himself,
+or&mdash;last and worst supposition&mdash;as a Bow-street
+&lsquo;runner&rsquo;?</p>
+<p>The cart would wait for me, perhaps, half a mile down our
+onward road, which I was already following.&nbsp; And I told
+myself that in a few minutes&rsquo; walking, Bow-street runner or
+not, I should have him at my mercy.&nbsp; And then reflection
+came to me in time.&nbsp; Of all things, one was out of the
+question.&nbsp; Upon no account must this obtrusive fellow see
+the cart.&nbsp; Until I had killed or shook him off, I was quite
+divorced from my companions&mdash;alone, in the midst of England,
+on a frosty by-way leading whither I knew not, with a
+sleuth-hound at my heels, and never a friend but the
+holly-stick!</p>
+<p>We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes.&nbsp; The
+branch to the left was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and
+dark.&nbsp; Not a ray of moonlight penetrated its recesses; and I
+took it at a venture.&nbsp; The wretch followed my example in
+silence; and for some time we crunched together over frozen pools
+without a word.&nbsp; Then he found his voice, with a
+chuckle.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This is not the way to Mr. Merton&rsquo;s,&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No?&rsquo; said I. &lsquo;It is mine,
+however.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And therefore mine,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>Again we fell silent; and we may thus have covered half a mile
+before the lane, taking a sudden turn, brought us forth again
+into the moonshine.&nbsp; With his hooded great-coat on his back,
+his valise in his hand, his black wig adjusted, and footing it on
+the ice with a sort of sober doggedness of manner, my enemy was
+changed almost beyond recognition: changed in everything but a
+certain dry, polemical, pedantic air, that spoke of a sedentary
+occupation and high stools.&nbsp; I observed, too, that his
+valise was heavy; and, putting this and that together, hit upon a
+plan.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A seasonable night, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What do you say to a bit of running?&nbsp; The frost has
+me by the toes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;With all the pleasure in life,&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>His voice seemed well assured, which pleased me little.&nbsp;
+However, there was nothing else to try, except violence, for
+which it would always be too soon.&nbsp; I took to my heels
+accordingly, he after me; and for some time the slapping of our
+feet on the hard road might have been heard a mile away.&nbsp; He
+had started a pace behind me, and he finished in the same
+position.&nbsp; For all his extra years and the weight of his
+valise, he had not lost a hair&rsquo;s breadth.&nbsp; The devil
+might race him for me&mdash;I had enough of it!</p>
+<p>And, besides, to run so fast was contrary to my
+interests.&nbsp; We could not run long without arriving
+somewhere.&nbsp; At any moment we might turn a corner and find
+ourselves at the lodge-gate of some Squire Merton, in the midst
+of a village whose constable was sober, or in the hands of a
+patrol.&nbsp; There was no help for it&mdash;I must finish with
+him on the spot, as long as it was possible.&nbsp; I looked about
+me, and the place seemed suitable; never a light, never a
+house&mdash;nothing but stubble-fields, fallows, and a few
+stunted trees.&nbsp; I stopped and eyed him in the moonlight with
+an angry stare.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Enough of this foolery!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>He had tamed, and now faced me full, very pale, but with no
+sign of shrinking.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am quite of your opinion,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You have tried me at the running; you can try me next at
+the high jump.&nbsp; It will be all the same.&nbsp; It must end
+the one way.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I made my holly whistle about my head.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I believe you know what way!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;We are alone, it is night, and I am wholly resolved.&nbsp;
+Are you not frightened?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;not in the smallest.&nbsp; I
+do not box, sir; but I am not a coward, as you may have
+supposed.&nbsp; Perhaps it will simplify our relations if I tell
+you at the outset that I walk armed.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Quick as lightning I made a feint at his head; as quickly he
+gave ground, and at the same time I saw a pistol glitter in his
+hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No more of that, Mr. French-Prisoner!&rsquo; he
+said.&nbsp; &lsquo;It will do me no good to have your death at my
+door.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Faith, nor me either!&rsquo; said I; and I lowered my
+stick and considered the man, not without a twinkle of
+admiration.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;there is
+one consideration that you appear to overlook: there are a great
+many chances that your pistol may miss fire.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have a pair,&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never
+travel without a brace of barkers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I make you my compliment,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You are able to take care of yourself, and that is a good
+trait.&nbsp; But, my good man! let us look at this matter
+dispassionately.&nbsp; You are not a coward, and no more am I; we
+are both men of excellent sense; I have good reason, whatever it
+may be, to keep my concerns to myself and to walk alone.&nbsp;
+Now I put it to you pointedly, am I likely to stand it?&nbsp; Am
+I likely to put up with your continued and&mdash;excuse
+me&mdash;highly impudent <i>ing&eacute;rence</i> into my private
+affairs?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Another French word,&rsquo; says he composedly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh! damn your French words!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You seem to be a Frenchman yourself!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have had many opportunities by which I have
+profited,&rsquo; he explained.&nbsp; &lsquo;Few men are better
+acquainted with the similarities and differences, whether of
+idiom or accent, of the two languages.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are a pompous fellow, too!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, I can make distinctions, sir,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I can talk with Bedfordshire peasants; and I can express
+myself becomingly, I hope, in the company of a gentleman of
+education like yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you set up to be a gentleman&mdash;&rsquo; I
+began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pardon me,&rsquo; he interrupted: &lsquo;I make no such
+claim.&nbsp; I only see the nobility and gentry in the way of
+business.&nbsp; I am quite a plain person.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;For the Lord&rsquo;s sake,&rsquo; I exclaimed,
+&lsquo;set my mind at rest upon one point.&nbsp; In the name of
+mystery, who and what are you?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have no cause to be ashamed of my name, sir,&rsquo;
+said he, &lsquo;nor yet my trade.&nbsp; I am Thomas Dudgeon, at
+your service, clerk to Mr. Daniel Romaine, solicitor of London;
+High Holborn is our address, sir.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It was only by the ecstasy of the relief that I knew how
+horribly I had been frightened.&nbsp; I flung my stick on the
+road.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Romaine?&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Daniel
+Romaine?&nbsp; An old hunks with a red face and a big head, and
+got up like a Quaker?&nbsp; My dear friend, to my
+arms!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Keep back, I say!&rsquo; said Dudgeon weakly.</p>
+<p>I would not listen to him.&nbsp; With the end of my own alarm,
+I felt as if I must infallibly be at the end of all dangers
+likewise; as if the pistol that he held in one hand were no more
+to be feared than the valise that he carried with the other, and
+now put up like a barrier against my advance.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Keep back, or I declare I will fire,&rsquo; he was
+crying.&nbsp; &lsquo;Have a care, for God&rsquo;s sake!&nbsp; My
+pistol&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He might scream as be pleased.&nbsp; Willy nilly, I folded him
+to my breast, I pressed him there, I kissed his ugly mug as it
+had never been kissed before and would never be kissed again; and
+in the doing so knocked his wig awry and his hat off.&nbsp; He
+bleated in my embrace; so bleats the sheep in the arms of the
+butcher.&nbsp; The whole thing, on looking back, appears
+incomparably reckless and absurd; I no better than a madman for
+offering to advance on Dudgeon, and he no better than a fool for
+not shooting me while I was about it.&nbsp; But all&rsquo;s well
+that ends well; or, as the people in these days kept singing and
+whistling on the streets:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;There&rsquo;s a sweet little cherub that
+sits up aloft<br />
+And looks out for the life of poor Jack.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>&lsquo;There!&rsquo; said I, releasing him a little, but still
+keeping my hands on his shoulders, &lsquo;<i>je vous ai bel et
+bien embrass&eacute;</i>&mdash;and, as you would say, there is
+another French word.&rsquo;&nbsp; With his wig over one eye, he
+looked incredibly rueful and put out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Cheer up,
+Dudgeon; the ordeal is over, you shall be embraced no more.&nbsp;
+But do, first of all, for God&rsquo;s-sake, put away your pistol;
+you handle it as if you were a cockatrice; some time or other,
+depend upon it, it will certainly go off.&nbsp; Here is your
+hat.&nbsp; No, let me put it on square, and the wig before
+it.&nbsp; Never suffer any stress of circumstances to come
+between you and the duty you owe to yourself.&nbsp; If you have
+nobody else to dress for, dress for God!</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Put your wig straight<br />
+On your bald pate,<br />
+Keep your chin scraped,<br />
+And your figure draped.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>Can you match me that?&nbsp; The whole duty of man in a
+quatrain!&nbsp; And remark, I do not set up to be a professional
+bard; these are the outpourings of a
+<i>dilettante</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But, my dear sir!&rsquo; he exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But, my dear sir!&rsquo; I echoed, &lsquo;I will allow
+no man to interrupt the flow of my ideas.&nbsp; Give me your
+opinion on my quatrain, or I vow we shall have a quarrel of
+it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Certainly you are quite an original,&rsquo; he
+said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Quite,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and I believe I have my
+counterpart before me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, for a choice,&rsquo; says he, smiling, &lsquo;and
+whether for sense or poetry, give me</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;&ldquo;Worth makes the man, and want of it
+the fellow:<br />
+The rest is all but leather and prunello.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, but that&rsquo;s not fair&mdash;that&rsquo;s
+Pope!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s not original, Dudgeon.&nbsp; Understand
+me,&rsquo; said I, wringing his breast-button, &lsquo;the first
+duty of all poetry is to be mine, sir&mdash;mine.&nbsp;
+Inspiration now swells in my bosom, because&mdash;to tell you the
+plain truth, and descend a little in style&mdash;I am devilish
+relieved at the turn things have taken.&nbsp; So, I dare say, are
+you yourself, Dudgeon, if you would only allow it.&nbsp; And
+<i>&agrave; propos</i>, let me ask you a home question.&nbsp;
+Between friends, have you ever fired that pistol?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, yes, sir,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Twice&mdash;at hedgesparrows.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And you would have fired at me, you bloody-minded
+man?&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you go to that, you seemed mighty reckless with your
+stick,&rsquo; said Dudgeon.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Did I indeed?&nbsp; Well, well, &rsquo;tis all past
+history; ancient as King Pharamond&mdash;which is another French
+word, if you cared to accumulate more evidence,&rsquo; says
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But happily we are now the best of friends, and
+have all our interests in common.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You go a little too fast, if you&rsquo;ll excuse me,
+Mr. ---: I do not know your name, that I am aware,&rsquo; said
+Dudgeon.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, to be sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never heard
+of it!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A word of explanation&mdash;&rsquo; he began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, Dudgeon!&rsquo; I interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be
+practical; I know what you want, and the name of it is
+supper.&nbsp; <i>Rien ne creuse comme l&rsquo;emotion</i>.&nbsp;
+I am hungry myself, and yet I am more accustomed to warlike
+palpitations than you, who are but a hunter of
+hedgesparrows.&nbsp; Let me look at your face critically: your
+bill of fare is three slices of cold rare roast beef, a Welsh
+rabbit, a pot of stout, and a glass or two of sound tawny port,
+old in bottle&mdash;the right milk of Englishmen.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Methought there seemed a brightening in his eye and a melting
+about his mouth at this enumeration.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The night is young,&rsquo; I continued; &lsquo;not much
+past eleven, for a wager.&nbsp; Where can we find a good
+inn?&nbsp; And remark that I say <i>good</i>, for the port must
+be up to the occasion&mdash;not a headache in a pipe of
+it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Really, sir,&rsquo; he said, smiling a little,
+&lsquo;you have a way of carrying things&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Will nothing make you stick to the subject?&rsquo; I
+cried; &lsquo;you have the most irrelevant mind!&nbsp; How do you
+expect to rise in your profession?&nbsp; The inn?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I will say you are a facetious gentleman!&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must have your way, I see.&nbsp; We are
+not three miles from Bedford by this very road.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Done!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bedford be
+it!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I tucked his arm under mine, possessed myself of the valise,
+and walked him off unresisting.&nbsp; Presently we came to an
+open piece of country lying a thought downhill.&nbsp; The road
+was smooth and free of ice, the moonshine thin and bright over
+the meadows and the leafless trees.&nbsp; I was now honestly done
+with the purgatory of the covered cart; I was close to my
+great-uncle&rsquo;s; I had no more fear of Mr. Dudgeon; which
+were all grounds enough for jollity.&nbsp; And I was aware,
+besides, of us two as of a pair of tiny and solitary dolls under
+the vast frosty cupola of the midnight; the rooms decked, the
+moon burnished, the least of the stars lighted, the floor swept
+and waxed, and nothing wanting but for the band to strike up and
+the dancing to begin.&nbsp; In the exhilaration of my heart I
+took the music on myself&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Merrily danced the Quaker&rsquo;s wife,<br
+/>
+And merrily danced the Quaker.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>I broke into that animated and appropriate air, clapped my arm
+about Dudgeon&rsquo;s waist, and away down the hill at a dancing
+step!&nbsp; He hung back a little at the start, but the impulse
+of the tune, the night, and my example, were not to be
+resisted.&nbsp; A man made of putty must have danced, and even
+Dudgeon showed himself to be a human being.&nbsp; Higher and
+higher were the capers that we cut; the moon repeated in shadow
+our antic footsteps and gestures; and it came over my mind of a
+sudden&mdash;really like balm&mdash;what appearance of man I was
+dancing with, what a long bilious countenance he had shown under
+his shaven pate, and what a world of trouble the rascal had given
+me in the immediate past.</p>
+<p>Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.&nbsp; My
+Puritanic companion stopped and disengaged himself.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This is a trifle <i>infra dig.</i>, sir, is it
+not?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;A party might suppose we had
+been drinking.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And so you shall be, Dudgeon,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You shall not only be drinking, you old hypocrite, but you
+shall be drunk&mdash;dead drunk, sir&mdash;and the boots shall
+put you to bed!&nbsp; We&rsquo;ll warn him when we go in.&nbsp;
+Never neglect a precaution; never put off till to-morrow what you
+can do to-day!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>But he had no more frivolity to complain of.&nbsp; We finished
+our stage and came to the inn-door with decorum, to find the
+house still alight and in a bustle with many late arrivals; to
+give our orders with a prompt severity which ensured obedience,
+and to be served soon after at a side-table, close to the fire
+and in a blaze of candle-light, with such a meal as I had been
+dreaming of for days past.&nbsp; For days, you are to remember, I
+had been skulking in the covered cart, a prey to cold, hunger,
+and an accumulation of discomforts that might have daunted the
+most brave; and the white table napery, the bright crystal, the
+reverberation of the fire, the red curtains, the Turkey carpet,
+the portraits on the coffee-room wall, the placid faces of the
+two or three late guests who were silently prolonging the
+pleasures of digestion, and (last, but not by any means least) a
+glass of an excellent light dry port, put me in a humour only to
+be described as heavenly.&nbsp; The thought of the Colonel, of
+how he would have enjoyed this snug room and roaring fire, and of
+his cold grave in the wood by Market Bosworth, lingered on my
+palate, <i>amari aliquid</i>, like an after-taste, but was not
+able&mdash;I say it with shame&mdash;entirely to dispel my
+self-complacency.&nbsp; After all, in this world every dog hangs
+by its own tail.&nbsp; I was a free adventurer, who had just
+brought to a successful end&mdash;or, at least, within view of
+it&mdash;an adventure very difficult and alarming; and I looked
+across at Mr. Dudgeon, as the port rose to his cheeks, and a
+smile, that was semi-confidential and a trifle foolish, began to
+play upon his leathery features, not only with composure, but
+with a suspicion of kindness.&nbsp; The rascal had been brave, a
+quality for which I would value the devil; and if he had been
+pertinacious in the beginning, he had more than made up for it
+before the end.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And now, Dudgeon, to explain,&rsquo; I began.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I know your master, he knows me, and he knows and approves
+of my errand.&nbsp; So much I may tell you, that I am on my way
+to Amersham Place.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oho!&rsquo; quoth Dudgeon, &lsquo;I begin to
+see.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am heartily glad of it,&rsquo; said I, passing the
+bottle, &lsquo;because that is about all I can tell you.&nbsp;
+You must take my word for the remainder.&nbsp; Either believe me
+or don&rsquo;t.&nbsp; If you don&rsquo;t, let&rsquo;s take a
+chaise; you can carry me to-morrow to High Holborn, and confront
+me with Mr. Romaine; the result of which will be to set your mind
+at rest&mdash;and to make the holiest disorder in your
+master&rsquo;s plans.&nbsp; If I judge you aright (for I find you
+a shrewd fellow), this will not be at all to your mind.&nbsp; You
+know what a subordinate gets by officiousness; if I can trust my
+memory, old Romaine has not at all the face that I should care to
+see in anger; and I venture to predict surprising results upon
+your weekly salary&mdash;if you are paid by the week, that
+is.&nbsp; In short, let me go free, and &rsquo;tis an end of the
+matter; take me to London, and &rsquo;tis only a
+beginning&mdash;and, by my opinion, a beginning of
+troubles.&nbsp; You can take your choice.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And that is soon taken,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Go
+to Amersham tomorrow, or go to the devil if you prefer&mdash;I
+wash my hands of you and the whole transaction.&nbsp; No, you
+don&rsquo;t find me putting my head in between Romaine and a
+client!&nbsp; A good man of business, sir, but hard as millstone
+grit.&nbsp; I might get the sack, and I shouldn&rsquo;t
+wonder!&nbsp; But, it&rsquo;s a pity, too,&rsquo; he added, and
+sighed, shook his head, and took his glass off sadly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That reminds me,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a
+great curiosity, and you can satisfy it.&nbsp; Why were you so
+forward to meddle with poor Mr. Dubois?&nbsp; Why did you
+transfer your attentions to me?&nbsp; And generally, what induced
+you to make yourself such a nuisance?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He blushed deeply.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, sir,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;there is such a thing
+as patriotism, I hope.&rsquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVI&mdash;THE HOME-COMING OF MR. ROWLEY&rsquo;S
+VISCOUNT</h2>
+<p>By eight the next morning Dudgeon and I had made our
+parting.&nbsp; By that time we had grown to be extremely
+familiar; and I would very willingly have kept him by me, and
+even carried him to Amersham Place.&nbsp; But it appeared he was
+due at the public-house where we had met, on some affairs of my
+great-uncle the Count, who had an outlying estate in that part of
+the shire.&nbsp; If Dudgeon had had his way the night before, I
+should have been arrested on my uncle&rsquo;s land and by my
+uncle&rsquo;s agent, a culmination of ill-luck.</p>
+<p>A little after noon I started, in a hired chaise, by way of
+Dunstable.&nbsp; The mere mention of the name Amersham Place made
+every one supple and smiling.&nbsp; It was plainly a great house,
+and my uncle lived there in style.&nbsp; The fame of it rose as
+we approached, like a chain of mountains; at Bedford they touched
+their caps, but in Dunstable they crawled upon their
+bellies.&nbsp; I thought the landlady would have kissed me; such
+a flutter of cordiality, such smiles, such affectionate
+attentions were called forth, and the good lady bustled on my
+service in such a pother of ringlets and with such a jingling of
+keys.&nbsp; &lsquo;You&rsquo;re probably expected, sir, at the
+Place?&nbsp; I do trust you may &rsquo;ave better accounts of his
+lordship&rsquo;s &rsquo;elth, sir.&nbsp; We understood that his
+lordship, Mosha de Carwell, was main bad.&nbsp; Ha, sir, we shall
+all feel his loss, poor, dear, noble gentleman; and I&rsquo;m
+sure nobody more polite!&nbsp; They do say, sir, his wealth is
+enormous, and before the Revolution, quite a prince in his own
+country!&nbsp; But I beg your pardon, sir; &rsquo;ow I do run on,
+to be sure; and doubtless all beknown to you already!&nbsp; For
+you do resemble the family, sir.&nbsp; I should have known you
+anywheres by the likeness to the dear viscount.&nbsp; Ha, poor
+gentleman, he must &rsquo;ave a &rsquo;eavy &rsquo;eart these
+days.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In the same place I saw out of the inn-windows a man-servant
+passing in the livery of my house, which you are to think I had
+never before seen worn, or not that I could remember.&nbsp; I had
+often enough, indeed, pictured myself advanced to be a Marshal, a
+Duke of the Empire, a Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour, and
+some other kickshaws of the kind, with a perfect rout of flunkeys
+correctly dressed in my own colours.&nbsp; But it is one thing to
+imagine, and another to see; it would be one thing to have these
+liveries in a house of my own in Paris&mdash;it was quite another
+to find them flaunting in the heart of hostile England; and I
+fear I should have made a fool of myself, if the man had not been
+on the other side of the street, and I at a one-pane
+window.&nbsp; There was something illusory in this
+transplantation of the wealth and honours of a family, a thing by
+its nature so deeply rooted in the soil; something ghostly in
+this sense of home-coming so far from home.</p>
+<p>From Dunstable I rolled away into a crescendo of similar
+impressions.&nbsp; There are certainly few things to be compared
+with these castles, or rather country seats, of the English
+nobility and gentry; nor anything at all to equal the servility
+of the population that dwells in their neighbourhood.&nbsp;
+Though I was but driving in a hired chaise, word of my
+destination seemed to have gone abroad, and the women curtseyed
+and the men louted to me by the wayside.&nbsp; As I came near, I
+began to appreciate the roots of this widespread respect.&nbsp;
+The look of my uncle&rsquo;s park wall, even from the outside,
+had something of a princely character; and when I came in view of
+the house itself, a sort of madness of vicarious vain-glory
+struck me dumb and kept me staring.&nbsp; It was about the size
+of the Tuileries.&nbsp; It faced due north; and the last rays of
+the sun, that was setting like a red-hot shot amidst a tumultuous
+gathering of snow clouds, were reflected on the endless rows of
+windows.&nbsp; A portico of Doric columns adorned the front, and
+would have done honour to a temple.&nbsp; The servant who
+received me at the door was civil to a fault&mdash;I had almost
+said, to offence; and the hall to which he admitted me through a
+pair of glass doors was warmed and already partly lighted by a
+liberal chimney heaped with the roots of beeches.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Vicomte Anne de St. Yves,&rsquo; said I, in answer to
+the man&rsquo;s question; whereupon he bowed before me lower
+still, and stepping upon one side introduced me to the truly
+awful presence of the major-domo.&nbsp; I have seen many
+dignitaries in my time, but none who quite equalled this eminent
+being; who was good enough to answer to the unassuming name of
+Dawson.&nbsp; From him I learned that my uncle was extremely low,
+a doctor in close attendance, Mr. Romaine expected at any moment,
+and that my cousin, the Vicomte de St. Yves, had been sent for
+the same morning.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It was a sudden seizure, then?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>Well, he would scarcely go as far as that.&nbsp; It was a
+decline, a fading away, sir; but he was certainly took bad the
+day before, had sent for Mr. Romaine, and the major-domo had
+taken it on himself a little later to send word to the
+Viscount.&nbsp; &lsquo;It seemed to me, my lord,&rsquo; said he,
+&lsquo;as if this was a time when all the fambly should be called
+together.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I approved him with my lips, but not in my heart.&nbsp; Dawson
+was plainly in the interests of my cousin.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And when can I expect to see my great-uncle, the
+Count?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>In the evening, I was told; in the meantime he would show me
+to my room, which had been long prepared for me, and I should be
+expected to dine in about an hour with the doctor, if my lordship
+had no objections.</p>
+<p>My lordship had not the faintest.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;At the same time,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;I have had an
+accident: I have unhappily lost my baggage, and am here in what I
+stand in.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t know if the doctor be a formalist,
+but it is quite impossible I should appear at table as I
+ought.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He begged me to be under no anxiety.&nbsp; &lsquo;We have been
+long expecting you,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;All is
+ready.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Such I found to be the truth.&nbsp; A great room had been
+prepared for me; through the mullioned windows the last flicker
+of the winter sunset interchanged with the reverberation of a
+royal fire; the bed was open, a suit of evening clothes was
+airing before the blaze, and from the far corner a boy came
+forward with deprecatory smiles.&nbsp; The dream in which I had
+been moving seemed to have reached its pitch.&nbsp; I might have
+quitted this house and room only the night before; it was my own
+place that I had come to; and for the first time in my life I
+understood the force of the words home and welcome.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This will be all as you would want, sir?&rsquo; said
+Mr. Dawson.&nbsp; &lsquo;This &rsquo;ere boy, Rowley, we place
+entirely at your disposition.&nbsp; &rsquo;E&rsquo;s not exactly
+a trained vallet, but Mossho Powl, the Viscount&rsquo;s
+gentleman, &rsquo;ave give him the benefick of a few lessons, and
+it is &rsquo;oped that he may give sitisfection.&nbsp; Hanythink
+that you may require, if you will be so good as to mention the
+same to Rowley, I will make it my business myself, sir, to see
+you sitisfied.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, the eminent and already detested Mr. Dawson took
+his departure, and I was left alone with Rowley.&nbsp; A man who
+may be said to have wakened to consciousness in the prison of the
+Abbaye, among those ever graceful and ever tragic figures of the
+brave and fair, awaiting the hour of the guillotine and denuded
+of every comfort, I had never known the luxuries or the amenities
+of my rank in life.&nbsp; To be attended on by servants I had
+only been accustomed to in inns.&nbsp; My toilet had long been
+military, to a moment, at the note of a bugle, too often at a
+ditch-side.&nbsp; And it need not be wondered at if I looked on
+my new valet with a certain diffidence.&nbsp; But I remembered
+that if he was my first experience of a valet, I was his first
+trial as a master.&nbsp; Cheered by which consideration, I
+demanded my bath in a style of good assurance.&nbsp; There was a
+bathroom contiguous; in an incredibly short space of time the hot
+water was ready; and soon after, arrayed in a shawl
+dressing-gown, and in a luxury of contentment and comfort, I was
+reclined in an easy-chair before the mirror, while Rowley, with a
+mixture of pride and anxiety which I could well understand, laid
+out his razors.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Hey, Rowley?&rsquo; I asked, not quite resigned to go
+under fire with such an inexperienced commander.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s all right, is it?&nbsp; You feel pretty sure of
+your weapons?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, my lord,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s all right, I assure your lordship.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon, Mr. Rowley, &lsquo;but for the sake
+of shortness, would you mind not belording me in private?&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It will do very well if you call me Mr.
+Anne.&nbsp; It is the way of my country, as I dare say you
+know.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Mr. Rowley looked blank.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But you&rsquo;re just as much a Viscount as Mr.
+Powl&rsquo;s, are you not?&rsquo; he said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;As Mr. Powl&rsquo;s Viscount?&rsquo; said I,
+laughing.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh, keep your mind easy, Mr.
+Rowley&rsquo;s is every bit as good.&nbsp; Only, you see, as I am
+of the younger line, I bear my Christian name along with the
+title.&nbsp; Alain is the <i>Viscount</i>; I am the <i>Viscount
+Anne</i>.&nbsp; And in giving me the name of Mr. Anne, I assure
+you you will be quite regular.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said the docile youth.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But about the shaving, sir, you need be under no
+alarm.&nbsp; Mr. Powl says I &rsquo;ave excellent
+dispositions.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Powl?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That
+doesn&rsquo;t seem to me very like a French name.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, sir, indeed, my lord,&rsquo; said he, with a burst
+of confidence.&nbsp; &lsquo;No, indeed, Mr. Anne, and it do not
+surely.&nbsp; I should say now, it was more like Mr.
+Pole.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And Mr. Powl is the Viscount&rsquo;s man?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;He
+&rsquo;ave a hard billet, he do.&nbsp; The Viscount is a very
+particular gentleman.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t think as you&rsquo;ll
+be, Mr. Anne?&rsquo; he added, with a confidential smile in the
+mirror.</p>
+<p>He was about sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry,
+freckled face, and a pair of dancing eyes.&nbsp; There was an air
+at once deprecatory and insinuating about the rascal that I
+thought I recognised.&nbsp; There came to me from my own boyhood
+memories of certain passionate admirations long passed away, and
+the objects of them long ago discredited or dead.&nbsp; I
+remembered how anxious I had been to serve those fleeting heroes,
+how readily I told myself I would have died for <i>them</i>, how
+much greater and handsomer than life they had appeared.&nbsp; And
+looking in the mirror, it seemed to me that I read the face of
+Rowley, like an echo or a ghost, by the light of my own
+youth.&nbsp; I have always contended (somewhat against the
+opinion of my friends) that I am first of all an economist; and
+the last thing that I would care to throw away is that very
+valuable piece of property&mdash;a boy&rsquo;s hero-worship.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you shave like an angel, Mr.
+Rowley!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Thank you, my lord,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr.
+Powl had no fear of me. You may be sure, sir, I should never
+&rsquo;ave had this berth if I &rsquo;adn&rsquo;t &rsquo;ave been
+up to Dick.&nbsp; We been expecting of you this month back.&nbsp;
+My eye!&nbsp; I never see such preparations.&nbsp; Every day the
+fires has been kep&rsquo; up, the bed made, and all!&nbsp; As
+soon as it was known you were coming, sir, I got the appointment;
+and I&rsquo;ve been up and down since then like a
+Jack-in-the-box.&nbsp; A wheel couldn&rsquo;t sound in the avenue
+but what I was at the window!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ve had a many
+disappointments; but to-night, as soon as you stepped out of the
+shay, I knew it was my&mdash;it was you.&nbsp; Oh, you had been
+expected!&nbsp; Why, when I go down to supper, I&rsquo;ll be the
+&rsquo;ero of the servants&rsquo; &rsquo;all: the &rsquo;ole of
+the staff is that curious!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I hope you may be able to
+give a fair account of me&mdash;sober, steady, industrious,
+good-tempered, and with a first-rate character from my last
+place?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He laughed an embarrassed laugh.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your hair curls
+beautiful,&rsquo; he said, by way of changing the subject.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The Viscount&rsquo;s the boy for curls, though; and the
+richness of it is, Mr. Powl tells me his don&rsquo;t curl no more
+than that much twine&mdash;by nature.&nbsp; Gettin&rsquo; old,
+the Viscount is.&nbsp; He &rsquo;<i>ave</i> gone the pace,
+&rsquo;aven&rsquo;t &rsquo;e, sir?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The fact is,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;that I know very
+little about him.&nbsp; Our family has been much divided, and I
+have been a soldier from a child.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A soldier, Mr. Anne, sir?&rsquo; cried Rowley, with a
+sudden feverish animation.&nbsp; &lsquo;Was you ever
+wounded?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It is contrary to my principles to discourage admiration for
+myself; and, slipping back the shoulder of the dressing-gown, I
+silently exhibited the scar which I had received in Edinburgh
+Castle.&nbsp; He looked at it with awe.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah, well!&rsquo; he continued, &lsquo;there&rsquo;s
+where the difference comes in!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s in the
+training.&nbsp; The other Viscount have been horse-racing, and
+dicing, and carrying on all his life.&nbsp; All right enough, no
+doubt; but what I do say is, that it don&rsquo;t lead to
+nothink.&nbsp; Whereas&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Whereas Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s?&rsquo; I put in.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My Viscount?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, sir, I
+<i>did</i> say it; and now that I&rsquo;ve seen you, I say it
+again!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I could not refrain from smiling at this outburst, and the
+rascal caught me in the mirror and smiled to me again.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;d say it again, Mr. Hanne,&rsquo; he
+said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I know which side my bread&rsquo;s
+buttered.&nbsp; I know when a gen&rsquo;leman&rsquo;s a
+gen&rsquo;leman.&nbsp; Mr. Powl can go to Putney with his
+one!&nbsp; Beg your pardon, Mr. Anne, for being so
+familiar,&rsquo; said he, blushing suddenly scarlet.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I was especially warned against it by Mr. Powl.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Discipline before all,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Follow your front-rank man.</p>
+<p>With that, we began to turn our attention to the
+clothes.&nbsp; I was amazed to find them fit so well: not
+<i>&agrave; la diable</i>, in the haphazard manner of a
+soldier&rsquo;s uniform or a ready-made suit; but with nicety, as
+a trained artist might rejoice to make them for a favourite
+subject.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis extraordinary,&rsquo; cried I: &lsquo;these
+things fit me perfectly.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Indeed, Mr. Anne, you two be very much of a
+shape,&rsquo; said Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who?&nbsp; What two?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The Viscount,&rsquo; he said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Damnation!&nbsp; Have I the man&rsquo;s clothes on me,
+too?&rsquo; cried I.</p>
+<p>But Rowley hastened to reassure me.&nbsp; On the first word of
+my coming, the Count had put the matter of my wardrobe in the
+hands of his own and my cousin&rsquo;s tailors; and on the rumour
+of our resemblance, my clothes had been made to Alain&rsquo;s
+measure.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But they were all made for you express, Mr. Anne.&nbsp;
+You may be certain the Count would never do nothing by
+&rsquo;alf: fires kep&rsquo; burning; the finest of clothes
+ordered, I&rsquo;m sure, and a body-servant being trained
+a-purpose.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it&rsquo;s a good fire, and
+a good set-out of clothes; and what a valet, Mr. Rowley!&nbsp;
+And there&rsquo;s one thing to be said for my cousin&mdash;I mean
+for Mr. Powl&rsquo;s Viscount&mdash;he has a very fair
+figure.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t you be took in, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; quoth
+the faithless Rowley: &lsquo;he has to be hyked into a pair of
+stays to get them things on!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come, come, Mr. Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;this is
+telling tales out of school!&nbsp; Do not you be deceived.&nbsp;
+The greatest men of antiquity, including Caesar and Hannibal and
+Pope Joan, may have been very glad, at my time of life or
+Alain&rsquo;s, to follow his example.&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis a
+misfortune common to all; and really,&rsquo; said I, bowing to
+myself before the mirror like one who should dance the minuet,
+&lsquo;when the result is so successful as this, who would do
+anything but applaud?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>My toilet concluded, I marched on to fresh surprises.&nbsp; My
+chamber, my new valet and my new clothes had been beyond hope:
+the dinner, the soup, the whole bill of fare was a revelation of
+the powers there are in man.&nbsp; I had not supposed it lay in
+the genius of any cook to create, out of common beef and mutton,
+things so different and dainty.&nbsp; The wine was of a piece,
+the doctor a most agreeable companion; nor could I help
+reflecting on the prospect that all this wealth, comfort and
+handsome profusion might still very possibly become mine.&nbsp;
+Here were a change indeed, from the common soldier and the camp
+kettle, the prisoner and his prison rations, the fugitive and the
+horrors of the covered cart!</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVII&mdash;THE DESPATCH-BOX</h2>
+<p>The doctor had scarce finished his meal before he hastened
+with an apology to attend upon his patient; and almost
+immediately after I was myself summoned and ushered up the great
+staircase and along interminable corridors to the bedside of my
+great-uncle the Count.&nbsp; You are to think that up to the
+present moment I had not set eyes on this formidable personage,
+only on the evidences of his wealth and kindness.&nbsp; You are
+to think besides that I had heard him miscalled and abused from
+my earliest childhood up.&nbsp; The first of the
+<i>&eacute;migr&eacute;s</i> could never expect a good word in
+the society in which my father moved.&nbsp; Even yet the reports
+I received were of a doubtful nature; even Romaine had drawn of
+him no very amiable portrait; and as I was ushered into the room,
+it was a critical eye that I cast on my great-uncle.&nbsp; He lay
+propped on pillows in a little cot no greater than a camp-bed,
+not visibly breathing.&nbsp; He was about eighty years of age,
+and looked it; not that his face was much lined, but all the
+blood and colour seemed to have faded from his body, and even his
+eyes, which last he kept usually closed as though the light
+distressed him.&nbsp; There was an unspeakable degree of slyness
+in his expression, which kept me ill at ease; he seemed to lie
+there with his arms folded, like a spider waiting for prey.&nbsp;
+His speech was very deliberate and courteous, but scarce louder
+than a sigh.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I bid you welcome, <i>Monsieur le Vicomte
+Anne</i>,&rsquo; said he, looking at me hard with his pale eyes,
+but not moving on his pillows.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have sent for you,
+and I thank you for the obliging expedition you have shown.&nbsp;
+It is my misfortune that I cannot rise to receive you.&nbsp; I
+trust you have been reasonably well entertained?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;<i>Monsieur mon oncle</i>,&rsquo; I said, bowing very
+low, &lsquo;I am come at the summons of the head of my
+family.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is well,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be
+seated.&nbsp; I should be glad to hear some news&mdash;if that
+can be called news that is already twenty years old&mdash;of how
+I have the pleasure to see you here.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>By the coldness of his address, not more than by the nature of
+the times that he bade me recall, I was plunged in
+melancholy.&nbsp; I felt myself surrounded as with deserts of
+friendlessness, and the delight of my welcome was turned to ashes
+in my mouth.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That is soon told, <i>monseigneur</i>,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I understand that I need tell you nothing of the
+end of my unhappy parents?&nbsp; It is only the story of the lost
+dog.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are right.&nbsp; I am sufficiently informed of that
+deplorable affair; it is painful to me.&nbsp; My nephew, your
+father, was a man who would not be advised,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Tell me, if you please, simply of yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am afraid I must run the risk of harrowing your
+sensibility in the beginning,&rsquo; said I, with a bitter smile,
+&lsquo;because my story begins at the foot of the
+guillotine.&nbsp; When the list came out that night, and her name
+was there, I was already old enough, not in years but in sad
+experience, to understand the extent of my misfortune.&nbsp;
+She&mdash;&rsquo;&nbsp; I paused.&nbsp; &lsquo;Enough that she
+arranged with a friend, Madame de Chasserades, that she should
+take charge of me, and by the favour of our jailers I was
+suffered to remain in the shelter of the <i>Abbaye</i>.&nbsp;
+That was my only refuge; there was no corner of France that I
+could rest the sole of my foot upon except the prison.&nbsp;
+Monsieur le Comte, you are as well aware as I can be what kind of
+a life that was, and how swiftly death smote in that
+society.&nbsp; I did not wait long before the name of Madame de
+Chasserades succeeded to that of my mother on the list.&nbsp; She
+passed me on to Madame de Noytot; she, in her turn, to
+Mademoiselle de Braye; and there were others.&nbsp; I was the one
+thing permanent; they were all transient as clouds; a day or two
+of their care, and then came the last farewell
+and&mdash;somewhere far off in that roaring Paris that surrounded
+us&mdash;the bloody scene.&nbsp; I was the cherished one, the
+last comfort, of these dying women.&nbsp; I have been in pitched
+fights, my lord, and I never knew such courage.&nbsp; It was all
+done smiling, in the tone of good society; <i>belle maman</i> was
+the name I was taught to give to each; and for a day or two the
+new &ldquo;pretty mamma&rdquo; would make much of me, show me
+off, teach me the minuet, and to say my prayers; and then, with a
+tender embrace, would go the way of her predecessors,
+smiling.&nbsp; There were some that wept too.&nbsp; There was a
+childhood!&nbsp; All the time Monsieur de Culemberg kept his eye
+on me, and would have had me out of the <i>Abbaye</i> and in his
+own protection, but my &ldquo;pretty mammas&rdquo; one after
+another resisted the idea.&nbsp; Where could I be safer? they
+argued; and what was to become of them without the darling of the
+prison?&nbsp; Well, it was soon shown how safe I was!&nbsp; The
+dreadful day of the massacre came; the prison was overrun; none
+paid attention to me, not even the last of my &ldquo;pretty
+mammas,&rdquo; for she had met another fate.&nbsp; I was
+wandering distracted, when I was found by some one in the
+interests of Monsieur de Culemberg.&nbsp; I understand he was
+sent on purpose; I believe, in order to reach the interior of the
+prison, he had set his hand to nameless barbarities: such was the
+price paid for my worthless, whimpering little life!&nbsp; He
+gave me his hand; it was wet, and mine was reddened; he led me
+unresisting.&nbsp; I remember but the one circumstance of my
+flight&mdash;it was my last view of my last pretty mamma.&nbsp;
+Shall I describe it to you?&rsquo; I asked the Count, with a
+sudden fierceness.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Avoid unpleasant details,&rsquo; observed my
+great-uncle gently.</p>
+<p>At these words a sudden peace fell upon me.&nbsp; I had been
+angry with the man before; I had not sought to spare him; and
+now, in a moment, I saw that there was nothing to spare.&nbsp;
+Whether from natural heartlessness or extreme old age, the soul
+was not at home; and my benefactor, who had kept the fire lit in
+my room for a month past&mdash;my only relative except Alain,
+whom I knew already to be a hired spy&mdash;had trodden out the
+last sparks of hope and interest.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Certainly,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and, indeed, the day
+for them is nearly over.&nbsp; I was taken to Monsieur de
+Culemberg&rsquo;s,&mdash;I presume, sir, that you know the Abbe
+de Culemberg?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He indicated assent without opening his eyes.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He was a very brave and a very learned
+man&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And a very holy one,&rsquo; said my uncle civilly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And a very holy one, as you observe,&rsquo; I
+continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;He did an infinity of good, and through
+all the Terror kept himself from the guillotine.&nbsp; He brought
+me up, and gave me such education as I have.&nbsp; It was in his
+house in the country at Dammarie, near Melun, that I made the
+acquaintance of your agent, Mr. Vicary, who lay there in hiding,
+only to fall a victim at the last to a gang of
+<i>chauffeurs</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That poor Mr. Vicary!&rsquo; observed my uncle.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;He had been many times in my interests to France, and this
+was his first failure.&nbsp; <i>Quel charmant homme</i>,
+<i>n&rsquo;est-ce pas</i>?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Infinitely so,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I would
+not willingly detain you any further with a story, the details of
+which it must naturally be more or less unpleasant for you to
+hear.&nbsp; Suffice it that, by M. de Culemberg&rsquo;s own
+advice, I said farewell at eighteen to that kind preceptor and
+his books, and entered the service of France; and have since then
+carried arms in such a manner as not to disgrace my
+family.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You narrate well; <i>vous aves la voix
+chaude</i>,&rsquo; said my uncle, turning on his pillows as if to
+study me.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a very good account of you by
+Monsieur de Mauseant, whom you helped in Spain.&nbsp; And you had
+some education from the Abbe de Culemberg, a man of a good
+house?&nbsp; Yes, you will do very well.&nbsp; You have a good
+manner and a handsome person, which hurts nothing.&nbsp; We are
+all handsome in the family; even I myself, I have had my
+successes, the memories of which still charm me.&nbsp; It is my
+intention, my nephew, to make of you my heir.&nbsp; I am not very
+well content with my other nephew, Monsieur le Vicomte: he has
+not been respectful, which is the flattery due to age.&nbsp; And
+there are other matters.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was half tempted to throw back in his face that inheritance
+so coldly offered.&nbsp; At the same time I had to consider that
+he was an old man, and, after all, my relation; and that I was a
+poor one, in considerable straits, with a hope at heart which
+that inheritance might yet enable me to realise.&nbsp; Nor could
+I forget that, however icy his manners, he had behaved to me from
+the first with the extreme of liberality and&mdash;I was about to
+write, kindness, but the word, in that connection, would not
+come.&nbsp; I really owed the man some measure of gratitude,
+which it would be an ill manner to repay if I were to insult him
+on his deathbed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Your will, monsieur, must ever be my rule,&rsquo; said
+I, bowing.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have wit, <i>monsieur mon neveu</i>,&rsquo; said
+he, &lsquo;the best wit&mdash;the wit of silence.&nbsp; Many
+might have deafened me with their gratitude.&nbsp;
+Gratitude!&rsquo; he repeated, with a peculiar intonation, and
+lay and smiled to himself.&nbsp; &lsquo;But to approach what is
+more important.&nbsp; As a prisoner of war, will it be possible
+for you to be served heir to English estates?&nbsp; I have no
+idea: long as I have dwelt in England, I have never studied what
+they call their laws.&nbsp; On the other hand, how if Romaine
+should come too late?&nbsp; I have two pieces of business to be
+transacted&mdash;to die, and to make my will; and, however
+desirous I may be to serve you, I cannot postpone the first in
+favour of the second beyond a very few hours.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, sir, I must then contrive to be doing as I did
+before,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not so,&rsquo; said the Count.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have an
+alternative.&nbsp; I have just drawn my balance at my
+banker&rsquo;s, a considerable sum, and I am now to place it in
+your hands.&nbsp; It will be so much for you and so much
+less&mdash;&rsquo; he paused, and smiled with an air of malignity
+that surprised me.&nbsp; &lsquo;But it is necessary it should be
+done before witnesses.&nbsp; <i>Monsieur le Vicomte</i> is of a
+particular disposition, and an unwitnessed donation may very
+easily be twisted into a theft.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He touched a bell, which was answered by a man having the
+appearance of a confidential valet.&nbsp; To him he gave a
+key.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Bring me the despatch-box that came yesterday, La
+Ferriere,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You will at the same time
+present my compliments to Dr. Hunter and M. l&rsquo;Abbe, and
+request them to step for a few moments to my room.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The despatch-box proved to be rather a bulky piece of baggage,
+covered with Russia leather.&nbsp; Before the doctor and an
+excellent old smiling priest it was passed over into my hands
+with a very clear statement of the disposer&rsquo;s wishes;
+immediately after which, though the witnesses remained behind to
+draw up and sign a joint note of the transaction, Monsieur de
+K&eacute;roual dismissed me to my own room, La Ferriere following
+with the invaluable box.</p>
+<p>At my chamber door I took it from him with thanks, and entered
+alone.&nbsp; Everything had been already disposed for the night,
+the curtains drawn and the fire trimmed; and Rowley was still
+busy with my bedclothes.&nbsp; He turned round as I entered with
+a look of welcome that did my heart good.&nbsp; Indeed, I had
+never a much greater need of human sympathy, however trivial,
+than at that moment when I held a fortune in my arms.&nbsp; In my
+uncle&rsquo;s room I had breathed the very atmosphere of
+disenchantment.&nbsp; He had gorged my pockets; he had starved
+every dignified or affectionate sentiment of a man.&nbsp; I had
+received so chilling an impression of age and experience that the
+mere look of youth drew me to confide in Rowley: he was only a
+boy, his heart must beat yet, he must still retain some innocence
+and natural feelings, he could blurt out follies with his mouth,
+he was not a machine to utter perfect speech!&nbsp; At the same
+time, I was beginning to outgrow the painful impressions of my
+interview; my spirits were beginning to revive; and at the jolly,
+empty looks of Mr. Rowley, as he ran forward to relieve me of the
+box, St. Ives became himself again.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, Rowley, don&rsquo;t be in a hurry,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;This is a momentous juncture.&nbsp; Man and boy,
+you have been in my service about three hours.&nbsp; You must
+already have observed that I am a gentleman of a somewhat morose
+disposition, and there is nothing that I more dislike than the
+smallest appearance of familiarity.&nbsp; Mr. Pole or Mr. Powl,
+probably in the spirit of prophecy, warned you against this
+danger.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said Rowley blankly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now there has just arisen one of those rare cases, in
+which I am willing to depart from my principles.&nbsp; My uncle
+has given me a box&mdash;what you would call a Christmas
+box.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t know what&rsquo;s in it, and no more do
+you: perhaps I am an April fool, or perhaps I am already
+enormously wealthy; there might be five hundred pounds in this
+apparently harmless receptacle!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Lord, Mr. Anne!&rsquo; cried Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, Rowley, hold up your right hand and repeat the
+words of the oath after me,&rsquo; said I, laying the
+despatch-box on the table.&nbsp; &lsquo;Strike me blue if I ever
+disclose to Mr. Powl, or Mr. Powl&rsquo;s Viscount, or anything
+that is Mr. Powl&rsquo;s, not to mention Mr. Dawson and the
+doctor, the treasures of the following despatch-box; and strike
+me sky-blue scarlet if I do not continually maintain, uphold,
+love, honour and obey, serve, and follow to the four corners of
+the earth and the waters that are under the earth, the
+hereinafter before-mentioned (only that I find I have neglected
+to mention him) Viscount Anne de K&eacute;roual de St.-Yves,
+commonly known as Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s Viscount.&nbsp; So be
+it.&nbsp; Amen.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He took the oath with the same exaggerated seriousness as I
+gave it to him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here is the key for
+you; I will hold the lid with both hands in the
+meanwhile.&rsquo;&nbsp; He turned the key.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bring up
+all the candles in the room, and range them along-side.&nbsp;
+What is it to be?&nbsp; A live gorgon, a Jack-in-the-box, or a
+spring that fires a pistol?&nbsp; On your knees, sir, before the
+prodigy!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the
+table.&nbsp; At sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay
+in front of us, between the candles, or rolled upon the floor
+alongside, I stood astonished.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O Lord!&rsquo; cried Mr. Rowley; &lsquo;oh Lordy,
+Lordy, Lord!&rsquo; and he scrambled after the fallen
+guineas.&nbsp; &lsquo;O my, Mr. Anne! what a sight o&rsquo;
+money!&nbsp; Why, it&rsquo;s like a blessed story-book.&nbsp;
+It&rsquo;s like the Forty Thieves.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now Rowley, let&rsquo;s be cool, let&rsquo;s be
+businesslike,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Riches are deceitful,
+particularly when you haven&rsquo;t counted them; and the first
+thing we have to do is to arrive at the amount of my&mdash;let me
+say, modest competency.&nbsp; If I&rsquo;m not mistaken, I have
+enough here to keep you in gold buttons all the rest of your
+life.&nbsp; You collect the gold, and I&rsquo;ll take the
+paper.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for
+some time there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the
+jingling of guineas, broken occasionally by the exulting
+exclamations of Rowley.&nbsp; The arithmetical operation on which
+we were embarked took long, and it might have been tedious to
+others; not to me nor to my helper.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ten thousand pounds!&rsquo; I announced at last.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ten thousand!&rsquo; echoed Mr. Rowley.</p>
+<p>And we gazed upon each other.</p>
+<p>The greatness of this fortune took my breath away.&nbsp; With
+that sum in my hands, I need fear no enemies.&nbsp; People are
+arrested, in nine cases out of ten, not because the police are
+astute, but because they themselves run short of money; and I had
+here before me in the despatch-box a succession of devices and
+disguises that insured my liberty.&nbsp; Not only so; but, as I
+felt with a sudden and overpowering thrill, with ten thousand
+pounds in my hands I was become an eligible suitor.&nbsp; What
+advances I had made in the past, as a private soldier in a
+military prison, or a fugitive by the wayside, could only be
+qualified or, indeed, excused as acts of desperation.&nbsp; And
+now, I might come in by the front door; I might approach the
+dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and rich settlements to
+offer.&nbsp; The poor French prisoner, Champdivers, might be in a
+perpetual danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman,
+St.-Ives, in his post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side,
+could smile at fate and laugh at locksmiths.&nbsp; I repeated the
+proverb, exulting, <i>Love laughs at locksmiths</i>!&nbsp; In a
+moment, by the mere coming of this money, my love had become
+possible&mdash;it had come near, it was under my hand&mdash;and
+it may be by one of the curiosities of human nature, but it
+burned that instant brighter.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;your Viscount is a made
+man.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, we both are, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, both,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and you shall dance at
+the wedding;&rsquo; and I flung at his head a bundle of bank
+notes, and had just followed it up with a handful of guineas,
+when the door opened, and Mr. Romaine appeared upon the
+threshold.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;MR. ROMAINE CALLS ME NAMES</h2>
+<p>Feeling very much of a fool to be thus taken by surprise, I
+scrambled to my feet and hastened to make my visitor
+welcome.&nbsp; He did not refuse me his hand; but he gave it with
+a coldness and distance for which I was quite unprepared, and his
+countenance, as he looked on me, was marked in a strong degree
+with concern and severity.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So, sir, I find you here?&rsquo; said he, in tones of
+little encouragement.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is that you, George?&nbsp; You
+can run away; I have business with your master.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He showed Rowley out, and locked the door behind him.&nbsp;
+Then he sat down in an armchair on one side of the fire, and
+looked at me with uncompromising sternness.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am hesitating how to begin,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;In this singular labyrinth of blunders and difficulties
+that you have prepared for us, I am positively hesitating where
+to begin.&nbsp; It will perhaps be best that you should read,
+first of all, this paragraph.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he handed over to
+me a newspaper.</p>
+<p>The paragraph in question was brief.&nbsp; It announced the
+recapture of one of the prisoners recently escaped from Edinburgh
+Castle; gave his name, Clausel, and added that he had entered
+into the particulars of the recent revolting murder in the
+Castle, and denounced the murderer:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;It is a common soldier called Champdivers,
+who had himself escaped, and is in all probability involved in
+the common fate of his comrades.&nbsp; In spite of the activity
+along all the Forth and the East Coast, nothing has yet been seen
+of the sloop which these desperadoes seized at Grangemouth, and
+it is now almost certain that they have found a watery
+grave.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>At the reading of this paragraph, my heart turned over.&nbsp;
+In a moment I saw my castle in the air ruined; myself changed
+from a mere military fugitive into a hunted murderer, fleeing
+from the gallows; my love, which had a moment since appeared so
+near to me, blotted from the field of possibility.&nbsp; Despair,
+which was my first sentiment, did not, however, endure for more
+than a moment.&nbsp; I saw that my companions had indeed
+succeeded in their unlikely design; and that I was supposed to
+have accompanied and perished along with them by
+shipwreck&mdash;a most probable ending to their enterprise.&nbsp;
+If they thought me at the bottom of the North Sea, I need not
+fear much vigilance on the streets of Edinburgh.&nbsp;
+Champdivers was wanted: what was to connect him with St.
+Ives?&nbsp; Major Chevenix would recognise me if he met me; that
+was beyond bargaining: he had seen me so often, his interest had
+been kindled to so high a point, that I could hope to deceive him
+by no stratagem of disguise.&nbsp; Well, even so; he would have a
+competition of testimony before him: he knew Clausel, he knew me,
+and I was sure he would decide for honour.&nbsp; At the same time
+the image of Flora shot up in my mind&rsquo;s eye with such a
+radiancy as fairly overwhelmed all other considerations; the
+blood sprang to every corner of my body, and I vowed I would see
+and win her, if it cost my neck.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Very annoying, no doubt,&rsquo; said I, as I returned
+the paper to Mr. Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is annoying your word for it?&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Exasperating, if you like,&rsquo; I admitted.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And true?&rsquo; he inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, true in a sense,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+perhaps I had better answer that question by putting you in
+possession of the facts?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think so, indeed,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>I narrated to him as much as seemed necessary of the quarrel,
+the duel, the death of Goguelat, and the character of
+Clausel.&nbsp; He heard me through in a forbidding silence, nor
+did he at all betray the nature of his sentiments, except that,
+at the episode of the scissors, I could observe his mulberry face
+to turn three shades paler.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I suppose I may believe you?&rsquo; said he, when I had
+done.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Or else conclude this interview,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Can you not understand that we are here discussing
+matters of the gravest import?&nbsp; Can you not understand that
+I feel myself weighed with a load of responsibility on your
+account&mdash;that you should take this occasion to air your
+fire-eating manners against your own attorney?&nbsp; There are
+serious hours in life, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; he said severely.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;A capital charge, and that of a very brutal character and
+with singularly unpleasant details; the presence of the man
+Clausel, who (according to your account of it) is actuated by
+sentiments of real malignity, and prepared to swear black white;
+all the other witnesses scattered and perhaps drowned at sea; the
+natural prejudice against a Frenchman and a runaway prisoner:
+this makes a serious total for your lawyer to consider, and is by
+no means lessened by the incurable folly and levity of your own
+disposition.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, my expressions have been selected with scrupulous
+accuracy,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;How did I find you,
+sir, when I came to announce this catastrophe?&nbsp; You were
+sitting on the hearthrug playing, like a silly baby, with a
+servant, were you not, and the floor all scattered with gold and
+bank paper?&nbsp; There was a tableau for you!&nbsp; It was I who
+came, and you were lucky in that.&nbsp; It might have been any
+one&mdash;your cousin as well as another.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have me there, sir,&rsquo; I admitted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I had neglected all precautions, and you do right to be
+angry.&nbsp; <i>Apropos</i>, Mr. Romaine, how did you come
+yourself, and how long have you been in the house?&rsquo; I
+added, surprised, on the retrospect, not to have heard him
+arrive.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I drove up in a chaise and pair,&rsquo; he
+returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;Any one might have heard me.&nbsp; But you
+were not listening, I suppose? being so extremely at your ease in
+the very house of your enemy, and under a capital charge!&nbsp;
+And I have been long enough here to do your business for
+you.&nbsp; Ah, yes, I did it, God forgive me!&mdash;did it before
+I so much as asked you the explanation of the paragraph.&nbsp;
+For some time back the will has been prepared; now it is signed;
+and your uncle has heard nothing of your recent piece of
+activity.&nbsp; Why?&nbsp; Well, I had no fancy to bother him on
+his death-bed: you might be innocent; and at bottom I preferred
+the murderer to the spy.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>No doubt of it but the man played a friendly part; no doubt
+also that, in his ill-temper and anxiety, he expressed himself
+unpalatably.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will perhaps find me over delicate,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;There is a word you employed&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I employ the words of my brief, sir,&rsquo; he cried,
+striking with his hand on the newspaper.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is there
+in six letters.&nbsp; And do not be so certain&mdash;you have not
+stood your trial yet.&nbsp; It is an ugly affair, a fishy
+business.&nbsp; It is highly disagreeable.&nbsp; I would give my
+hand off&mdash;I mean I would give a hundred pound down, to have
+nothing to do with it.&nbsp; And, situated as we are, we must at
+once take action.&nbsp; There is here no choice.&nbsp; You must
+at once quit this country, and get to France, or Holland, or,
+indeed, to Madagascar.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There may be two words to that,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not so much as one syllable!&rsquo; he retorted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Here is no room for argument.&nbsp; The case is nakedly
+plain.&nbsp; In the disgusting position in which you have found
+means to place yourself, all that is to be hoped for is
+delay.&nbsp; A time may come when we shall be able to do
+better.&nbsp; It cannot be now: now it would be the
+gibbet.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You labour under a false impression, Mr.
+Romaine,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have no impatience to
+figure in the dock.&nbsp; I am even as anxious as yourself to
+postpone my first appearance there.&nbsp; On the other hand, I
+have not the slightest intention of leaving this country, where I
+please myself extremely.&nbsp; I have a good address, a ready
+tongue, an English accent that passes, and, thanks to the
+generosity of my uncle, as much money as I want.&nbsp; It would
+be hard indeed if, with all these advantages, Mr. St. Ives should
+not be able to live quietly in a private lodging, while the
+authorities amuse themselves by looking for Champdivers.&nbsp;
+You forget, there is no connection between these two
+personages.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And you forget your cousin,&rsquo; retorted
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;There is the link.&nbsp; There is the
+tongue of the buckle.&nbsp; He knows you are
+Champdivers.&rsquo;&nbsp; He put up his hand as if to
+listen.&nbsp; &lsquo;And, for a wager, here he is himself!&rsquo;
+he exclaimed.</p>
+<p>As when a tailor takes a piece of goods upon his counter, and
+rends it across, there came to our ears from the avenue the long
+tearing sound of a chaise and four approaching at the top speed
+of the horses.&nbsp; And, looking out between the curtains, we
+beheld the lamps skimming on the smooth ascent.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said Romaine, wiping the window-pane that he
+might see more clearly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ay, that is he by the
+driving!&nbsp; So he squanders money along the king&rsquo;s
+highway, the triple idiot! gorging every man he meets with gold
+for the pleasure of arriving&mdash;where?&nbsp; Ah, yes, where
+but a debtor&rsquo;s jail, if not a criminal prison!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is he that kind of a man?&rsquo; I said, staring on
+these lamps as though I could decipher in them the secret of my
+cousin&rsquo;s character.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will find him a dangerous kind,&rsquo; answered the
+lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;For you, these are the lights on a lee
+shore!&nbsp; I find I fall in a muse when I consider of him; what
+a formidable being he once was, and what a personable! and how
+near he draws to the moment that must break him utterly! we none
+of us like him here; we hate him, rather; and yet I have a
+sense&mdash;I don&rsquo;t think at my time of life it can be
+pity&mdash;but a reluctance rather, to break anything so big and
+figurative, as though he were a big porcelain pot or a big
+picture of high price.&nbsp; Ay, there is what I was waiting
+for!&rsquo; he cried, as the lights of a second chaise swam in
+sight.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is he beyond a doubt.&nbsp; The first was
+the signature and the next the flourish.&nbsp; Two chaises, the
+second following with the baggage, which is always copious and
+ponderous, and one of his valets: he cannot go a step without a
+valet.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I hear you repeat the word big,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But it cannot be that he is anything out of the way in
+stature.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said the attorney.&nbsp; &lsquo;About your
+height, as I guessed for the tailors, and I see nothing wrong
+with the result.&nbsp; But, somehow, he commands an atmosphere;
+he has a spacious manner; and he has kept up, all through life,
+such a volume of racket about his personality, with his chaises
+and his racers and his dicings, and I know not what&mdash;that
+somehow he imposes!&nbsp; It seems, when the farce is done, and
+he locked in Fleet prison&mdash;and nobody left but Buonaparte
+and Lord Wellington and the Hetman Platoff to make a work
+about&mdash;the world will be in a comparison quite
+tranquil.&nbsp; But this is beside the mark,&rsquo; he added,
+with an effort, turning again from the window.&nbsp; &lsquo;We
+are now under fire, Mr. Anne, as you soldiers would say, and it
+is high time we should prepare to go into action.&nbsp; He must
+not see you; that would be fatal.&nbsp; All that he knows at
+present is that you resemble him, and that is much more than
+enough.&nbsp; If it were possible, it would be well he should not
+know you were in the house.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Quite impossible, depend upon it,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Some of the servants are directly in his interests,
+perhaps in his pay: Dawson, for an example.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My own idea!&rsquo; cried Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;And at
+least,&rsquo; he added, as the first of the chaises drew up with
+a dash in front of the portico, &lsquo;it is now too late.&nbsp;
+Here he is.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>We stood listening, with a strange anxiety, to the various
+noises that awoke in the silent house: the sound of doors opening
+and closing, the sound of feet near at hand and farther
+off.&nbsp; It was plain the arrival of my cousin was a matter of
+moment, almost of parade, to the household.&nbsp; And suddenly,
+out of this confused and distant bustle, a rapid and light tread
+became distinguishable.&nbsp; We heard it come upstairs, draw
+near along the corridor, pause at the door, and a stealthy and
+hasty rapping succeeded.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Anne&mdash;Mr. Anne, sir!&nbsp; Let me in!&rsquo;
+said the voice of Rowley.</p>
+<p>We admitted the lad, and locked the door again behind him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It&rsquo;s <i>him</i>, sir,&rsquo; he panted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;He&rsquo;ve come.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You mean the Viscount?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;So
+we supposed.&nbsp; But come, Rowley&mdash;out with the rest of
+it!&nbsp; You have more to tell us, or your face belies you
+!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Anne, I do,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr.
+Romaine, sir, you&rsquo;re a friend of his, ain&rsquo;t
+you?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, George, I am a friend of his,&rsquo; said Romaine,
+and, to my great surprise, laid his hand upon my shoulder.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, it&rsquo;s this way,&rsquo; said
+Rowley&mdash;&lsquo;Mr. Powl have been at me!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s to
+play the spy!&nbsp; I thought he was at it from the first!&nbsp;
+From the first I see what he was after&mdash;coming round and
+round, and hinting things!&nbsp; But to-night he outs with it
+plump!&nbsp; I&rsquo;m to let him hear all what you&rsquo;re to
+do beforehand, he says; and he gave me this for an
+arnest&rsquo;&mdash;holding up half a guinea; &lsquo;and I took
+it, so I did!&nbsp; Strike me sky-blue scarlet?&rsquo; says he,
+adducing the words of the mock oath; and he looked askance at me
+as he did so.</p>
+<p>I saw that he had forgotten himself, and that he knew
+it.&nbsp; The expression of his eye changed almost in the passing
+of the glance from the significant to the appealing&mdash;from
+the look of an accomplice to that of a culprit; and from that
+moment he became the model of a well-drilled valet.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sky-blue scarlet?&rsquo; repeated the lawyer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Is the fool delirious?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;he is only reminding me of
+something.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well&mdash;and I believe the fellow will be
+faithful,&rsquo; said Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;So you are a friend
+of Mr. Anne&rsquo;s&rsquo; too?&rsquo; he added to Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis something sudden,&rsquo; observed Romaine;
+&lsquo;but it may be genuine enough.&nbsp; I believe him to be
+honest.&nbsp; He comes of honest people.&nbsp; Well, George
+Rowley, you might embrace some early opportunity to earn that
+half-guinea, by telling Mr. Powl that your master will not leave
+here till noon to-morrow, if he go even then.&nbsp; Tell him
+there are a hundred things to be done here, and a hundred more
+that can only be done properly at my office in Holborn.&nbsp;
+Come to think of it&mdash;we had better see to that first of
+all,&rsquo; he went on, unlocking the door.&nbsp; &lsquo;Get hold
+of Powl, and see.&nbsp; And be quick back, and clear me up this
+mess.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Mr. Rowley was no sooner gone than the lawyer took a pinch of
+snuff, and regarded me with somewhat of a more genial
+expression.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;it is very fortunate for
+you that your face is so strong a letter of recommendation.&nbsp;
+Here am I, a tough old practitioner, mixing myself up with your
+very distressing business; and here is this farmer&rsquo;s lad,
+who has the wit to take a bribe and the loyalty to come and tell
+you of it&mdash;all, I take it, on the strength of your
+appearance.&nbsp; I wish I could imagine how it would impress a
+jury!&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And how it would affect the hangman, sir?&rsquo; I
+asked</p>
+<p>&lsquo;<i>Absit omen</i>!&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine
+devoutly.</p>
+<p>We were just so far in our talk, when I heard a sound that
+brought my heart into my mouth: the sound of some one slyly
+trying the handle of the door.&nbsp; It had been preceded by no
+audible footstep.&nbsp; Since the departure of Rowley our wing of
+the house had been entirely silent.&nbsp; And we had every right
+to suppose ourselves alone, and to conclude that the new-comer,
+whoever he might be, was come on a clandestine, if not a hostile,
+errand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who is there?&rsquo; asked Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It&rsquo;s only me, sir,&rsquo; said the soft voice of
+Dawson.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s the Viscount, sir.&nbsp; He is
+very desirous to speak with you on business.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Tell him I shall come shortly, Dawson,&rsquo; said the
+lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am at present engaged.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Thank you, sir!&rsquo; said Dawson.</p>
+<p>And we heard his feet draw off slowly along the corridor.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine, speaking low, and
+maintaining the attitude of one intently listening, &lsquo;there
+is another foot.&nbsp; I cannot be deceived!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think there was indeed!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And what troubles me&mdash;I am not sure that the other
+has gone entirely away.&nbsp; By the time it got the length of
+the head of the stair the tread was plainly single.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ahem&mdash;blockaded?&rsquo; asked the lawyer.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A siege <i>en r&egrave;gle</i>!&rsquo; I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Let us come farther from the door,&rsquo; said Romaine,
+&lsquo;and reconsider this damnable position.&nbsp; Without
+doubt, Alain was this moment at the door.&nbsp; He hoped to enter
+and get a view of you, as if by accident.&nbsp; Baffled in this,
+has he stayed himself, or has he planted Dawson here by way of
+sentinel?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Himself, beyond a doubt,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And yet to what end?&nbsp; He cannot think to pass the
+night there!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If it were only possible to pay no heed!&rsquo; said
+Mr. Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;But this is the accursed drawback of
+your position.&nbsp; We can do nothing openly.&nbsp; I must
+smuggle you out of this room and out of this house like seizable
+goods; and how am I to set about it with a sentinel planted at
+your very door?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There is no good in being agitated,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;None at all,&rsquo; he acquiesced.&nbsp; &lsquo;And,
+come to think of it, it is droll enough that I should have been
+that very moment commenting on your personal appearance, when
+your cousin came upon this mission.&nbsp; I was saying, if you
+remember, that your face was as good or better than a letter of
+recommendation.&nbsp; I wonder if M. Alain would be like the rest
+of us&mdash;I wonder what he would think of it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Mr. Romaine was sitting in a chair by the fire with his back
+to the windows, and I was myself kneeling on the hearthrug and
+beginning mechanically to pick up the scattered bills, when a
+honeyed voice joined suddenly in our conversation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He thinks well of it, Mr. Romaine.&nbsp; He begs to
+join himself to that circle of admirers which you indicate to
+exist already.&rsquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIX&mdash;THE DEVIL AND ALL AT AMERSHAM PLACE</h2>
+<p>Never did two human creatures get to their feet with more
+alacrity than the lawyer and myself.&nbsp; We had locked and
+barred the main gates of the citadel; but unhappily we had left
+open the bath-room sally-port; and here we found the voice of the
+hostile trumpets sounding from within, and all our defences taken
+in reverse.&nbsp; I took but the time to whisper Mr. Romaine in
+the ear: &lsquo;Here is another tableau for you!&rsquo; at which
+he looked at me a moment with a kind of pathos, as who should
+say, &lsquo;Don&rsquo;t hit a man when he&rsquo;s
+down.&rsquo;&nbsp; Then I transferred my eyes to my enemy.</p>
+<p>He had his hat on, a little on one side: it was a very tall
+hat, raked extremely, and had a narrow curling brim.&nbsp; His
+hair was all curled out in masses like an Italian
+mountebank&mdash;a most unpardonable fashion.&nbsp; He sported a
+huge tippeted overcoat of frieze, such as watchmen wear, only the
+inside was lined with costly furs, and he kept it half open to
+display the exquisite linen, the many-coloured waistcoat, and the
+profuse jewellery of watch-chains and brooches underneath.&nbsp;
+The leg and the ankle were turned to a miracle.&nbsp; It is out
+of the question that I should deny the resemblance altogether,
+since it has been remarked by so many different persons whom I
+cannot reasonably accuse of a conspiracy.&nbsp; As a matter of
+fact, I saw little of it and confessed to nothing.&nbsp;
+Certainly he was what some might call handsome, of a pictorial,
+exuberant style of beauty, all attitude, profile, and impudence:
+a man whom I could see in fancy parade on the grand stand at a
+race-meeting or swagger in Piccadilly, staring down the women,
+and stared at himself with admiration by the coal-porters.&nbsp;
+Of his frame of mind at that moment his face offered a lively if
+an unconscious picture.&nbsp; He was lividly pale, and his lip
+was caught up in a smile that could almost be called a snarl, of
+a sheer, arid malignity that appalled me and yet put me on my
+mettle for the encounter.&nbsp; He looked me up and down, then
+bowed and took off his hat to me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My cousin, I presume?&rsquo; he said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I understand I have that honour,&rsquo; I replied.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The honour is mine,&rsquo; said he, and his voice shook
+as he said it.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I should make you welcome, I believe,&rsquo; said
+I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why?&rsquo; he inquired.&nbsp; &lsquo;This poor house
+has been my home for longer than I care to claim.&nbsp; That you
+should already take upon yourself the duties of host here is to
+be at unnecessary pains.&nbsp; Believe me, that part would be
+more becomingly mine.&nbsp; And, by the way, I must not fail to
+offer you my little compliment.&nbsp; It is a gratifying surprise
+to meet you in the dress of a gentleman, and to
+see&rsquo;&mdash;with a circular look upon the scattered
+bills&mdash;&lsquo;that your necessities have already been so
+liberally relieved.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I bowed with a smile that was perhaps no less hateful than his
+own.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There are so many necessities in this world,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Charity has to choose.&nbsp; One gets
+relieved, and some other, no less indigent, perhaps indebted,
+must go wanting.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Malice is an engaging trait,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And envy, I think?&rsquo; was my reply.</p>
+<p>He must have felt that he was not getting wholly the better of
+this passage at arms; perhaps even feared that he should lose
+command of his temper, which he reined in throughout the
+interview as with a red-hot curb, for he flung away from me at
+the word, and addressed the lawyer with insulting arrogance.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Romaine,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;since when have you
+presumed to give orders in this house?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am not prepared to admit that I have given
+any,&rsquo; replied Romaine; &lsquo;certainly none that did not
+fall in the sphere of my responsibilities.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By whose orders, then, am I denied entrance to my
+uncle&rsquo;s room?&rsquo; said my cousin.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By the doctor&rsquo;s, sir,&rsquo; replied Romaine;
+&lsquo;and I think even you will admit his faculty to give
+them.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Have a care, sir,&rsquo; cried Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do
+not be puffed up with your position.&nbsp; It is none so secure,
+Master Attorney.&nbsp; I should not wonder in the least if you
+were struck off the rolls for this night&rsquo;s work, and the
+next I should see of you were when I flung you alms at a pothouse
+door to mend your ragged elbows.&nbsp; The doctor&rsquo;s
+orders?&nbsp; But I believe I am not mistaken!&nbsp; You have
+to-night transacted business with the Count; and this needy young
+gentleman has enjoyed the privilege of still another interview,
+in which (as I am pleased to see) his dignity has not prevented
+his doing very well for himself.&nbsp; I wonder that you should
+care to prevaricate with me so idly.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I will confess so much,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine,
+&lsquo;if you call it prevarication.&nbsp; The order in question
+emanated from the Count himself.&nbsp; He does not wish to see
+you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;For which I must take the word of Mr. Daniel
+Romaine?&rsquo; asked Alain.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In default of any better,&rsquo; said Romaine.</p>
+<p>There was an instantaneous convulsion in my cousin&rsquo;s
+face, and I distinctly heard him gnash his teeth at this reply;
+but, to my surprise, he resumed in tones of almost good
+humour:</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come, Mr. Romaine, do not let us be petty!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+He drew in a chair and sat down.&nbsp; &lsquo;Understand you have
+stolen a march upon me.&nbsp; You have introduced your soldier of
+Napoleon, and (how, I cannot conceive) he has been apparently
+accepted with favour.&nbsp; I ask no better proof than the funds
+with which I find him literally surrounded&mdash;I presume in
+consequence of some extravagance of joy at the first sight of so
+much money.&nbsp; The odds are so far in your favour, but the
+match is not yet won.&nbsp; Questions will arise of undue
+influence, of sequestration, and the like: I have my witnesses
+ready.&nbsp; I tell it you cynically, for you cannot profit by
+the knowledge; and, if the worst come to the worst, I have good
+hopes of recovering my own and of ruining you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You do what you please,&rsquo; answered Romaine;
+&lsquo;but I give it you for a piece of good advice, you had best
+do nothing in the matter.&nbsp; You will only make yourself
+ridiculous; you will only squander money, of which you have none
+too much, and reap public mortification.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah, but there you make the common mistake, Mr.
+Romaine!&rsquo; returned Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;You despise your
+adversary.&nbsp; Consider, if you please, how very disagreeable I
+could make myself, if I chose.&nbsp; Consider the position of
+your <i>prot&eacute;g&eacute;</i>&mdash;an escaped
+prisoner!&nbsp; But I play a great game.&nbsp; I condemn such
+petty opportunities.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this Romaine and I exchanged a glance of triumph.&nbsp; It
+seemed manifest that Alain had as yet received no word of
+Clausel&rsquo;s recapture and denunciation.&nbsp; At the same
+moment the lawyer, thus relieved of the instancy of his fear,
+changed his tactics.&nbsp; With a great air of unconcern, he
+secured the newspaper, which still lay open before him on the
+table.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think, Monsieur Alain, that you labour under some
+illusion,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Believe me, this is all
+beside the mark.&nbsp; You seem to be pointing to some
+compromise.&nbsp; Nothing is further from my views.&nbsp; You
+suspect me of an inclination to trifle with you, to conceal how
+things are going.&nbsp; I cannot, on the other hand, be too early
+or too explicit in giving you information which concerns you (I
+must say) capitally.&nbsp; Your great-uncle has to-night
+cancelled his will, and made a new one in favour of your cousin
+Anne.&nbsp; Nay, and you shall hear it from his own lips, if you
+choose!&nbsp; I will take so much upon me,&rsquo; said the
+lawyer, rising.&nbsp; &lsquo;Follow me, if you please,
+gentlemen.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Mr. Romaine led the way out of the room so briskly, and was so
+briskly followed by Alain, that I had hard ado to get the
+remainder of the money replaced and the despatch-box locked, and
+to overtake them, even by running ere they should be lost in that
+maze of corridors, my uncle&rsquo;s house.&nbsp; As it was, I
+went with a heart divided; and the thought of my treasure thus
+left unprotected, save by a paltry lid and lock that any one
+might break or pick open, put me in a perspiration whenever I had
+the time to remember it.&nbsp; The lawyer brought us to a room,
+begged us to be seated while he should hold a consultation with
+the doctor, and, slipping out of another door, left Alain and
+myself closeted together.</p>
+<p>Truly he had done nothing to ingratiate himself; his every
+word had been steeped in unfriendliness, envy, and that contempt
+which (as it is born of anger) it is possible to support without
+humiliation.&nbsp; On my part, I had been little more
+conciliating; and yet I began to be sorry for this man, hired spy
+as I knew him to be.&nbsp; It seemed to me less than decent that
+he should have been brought up in the expectation of this great
+inheritance, and now, at the eleventh hour, be tumbled forth out
+of the house door and left to himself, his poverty and his
+debts&mdash;those debts of which I had so ungallantly reminded
+him so short a time before.&nbsp; And we were scarce left alone
+ere I made haste to hang out a flag of truce.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My cousin,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;trust me, you will not
+find me inclined to be your enemy.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He paused in front of me&mdash;for he had not accepted the
+lawyer&rsquo;s invitation to be seated, but walked to and fro in
+the apartment&mdash;took a pinch of snuff, and looked at me while
+he was taking it with an air of much curiosity.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is it even so?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Am I so far
+favoured by fortune as to have your pity?&nbsp; Infinitely
+obliged, my cousin Anne!&nbsp; But these sentiments are not
+always reciprocal, and I warn you that the day when I set my foot
+on your neck, the spine shall break.&nbsp; Are you acquainted
+with the properties of the spine?&rsquo; he asked with an
+insolence beyond qualification.</p>
+<p>It was too much.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am acquainted also with the
+properties of a pair of pistols,&rsquo; said I, toising him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, no, no!&rsquo; says he, holding up his
+finger.&nbsp; &lsquo;I will take my revenge how and when I
+please.&nbsp; We are enough of the same family to understand each
+other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had you arrested on
+your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in the first
+clump of evergreens, to await and prevent your coming&mdash;I,
+who knew all, before whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has been
+conspiring in broad daylight to supplant me&mdash;is simply this:
+that I had not made up my mind how I was to take my
+revenge.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At that moment he was interrupted by the tolling of a
+bell.&nbsp; As we stood surprised and listening, it was succeeded
+by the sound of many feet trooping up the stairs and shuffling by
+the door of our room.&nbsp; Both, I believe, had a great
+curiosity to set it open, which each, owing to the presence of
+the other, resisted; and we waited instead in silence, and
+without moving, until Romaine returned and bade us to my
+uncle&rsquo;s presence.</p>
+<p>He led the way by a little crooked passage, which brought us
+out in the sick-room, and behind the bed.&nbsp; I believe I have
+forgotten to remark that the Count&rsquo;s chamber was of
+considerable dimensions.&nbsp; We beheld it now crowded with the
+servants and dependants of the house, from the doctor and the
+priest to Mr. Dawson and the housekeeper, from Dawson down to
+Rowley and the last footman in white calves, the last plump
+chambermaid in her clean gown and cap, and the last ostler in a
+stable waiscoat.&nbsp; This large congregation of persons (and I
+was surprised to see how large it was) had the appearance, for
+the most part, of being ill at ease and heartily bewildered,
+standing on one foot, gaping like zanies, and those who were in
+the corners nudging each other and grinning aside.&nbsp; My
+uncle, on the other hand, who was raised higher than I had yet
+seen him on his pillows, wore an air of really imposing
+gravity.&nbsp; No sooner had we appeared behind him, than he
+lifted his voice to a good loudness, and addressed the
+assemblage.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I take you all to witness&mdash;can you hear
+me?&mdash;I take you all to witness that I recognise as my heir
+and representative this gentleman, whom most of you see for the
+first time, the Viscount Anne de St.-Yves, my nephew of the
+younger line.&nbsp; And I take you to witness at the same time
+that, for very good reasons known to myself, I have discarded and
+disinherited this other gentleman whom you all know, the Viscount
+de St.-Yves.&nbsp; I have also to explain the unusual trouble to
+which I have put you all&mdash;and, since your supper was not
+over, I fear I may even say annoyance.&nbsp; It has pleased M.
+Alain to make some threats of disputing my will, and to pretend
+that there are among your number certain estimable persons who
+may be trusted to swear as he shall direct them.&nbsp; It pleases
+me thus to put it out of his power and to stop the mouths of his
+false witnesses.&nbsp; I am infinitely obliged by your
+politeness, and I have the honour to wish you all a very good
+evening.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As the servants, still greatly mystified, crowded out of the
+sickroom door, curtseying, pulling the forelock, scraping with
+the foot, and so on, according to their degree, I turned and
+stole a look at my cousin.&nbsp; He had borne this crushing
+public rebuke without change of countenance.&nbsp; He stood, now,
+very upright, with folded arms, and looking inscrutably at the
+roof of the apartment.&nbsp; I could not refuse him at that
+moment the tribute of my admiration.&nbsp; Still more so when,
+the last of the domestics having filed through the doorway and
+left us alone with my great-uncle and the lawyer, he took one
+step forward towards the bed, made a dignified reverence, and
+addressed the man who had just condemned him to ruin.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My lord,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you are pleased to
+treat me in a manner which my gratitude, and your state, equally
+forbid me to call in question.&nbsp; It will be only necessary
+for me to call your attention to the length of time in which I
+have been taught to regard myself as your heir.&nbsp; In that
+position, I judged it only loyal to permit myself a certain scale
+of expenditure.&nbsp; If I am now to be cut off with a shilling
+as the reward of twenty years of service, I shall be left not
+only a beggar, but a bankrupt.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Whether from the fatigue of his recent exertion, or by a
+well-inspired ingenuity of hate, my uncle had once more closed
+his eyes; nor did he open them now.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not with a
+shilling,&rsquo; he contented himself with replying; and there
+stole, as he said it, a sort of smile over his face, that
+flickered there conspicuously for the least moment of time, and
+then faded and left behind the old impenetrable mask of years,
+cunning, and fatigue.&nbsp; There could be no mistake: my uncle
+enjoyed the situation as he had enjoyed few things in the last
+quarter of a century.&nbsp; The fires of life scarce survived in
+that frail body; but hatred, like some immortal quality, was
+still erect and unabated.</p>
+<p>Nevertheless my cousin persevered.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I speak at a disadvantage,&rsquo; he resumed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;My supplanter, with perhaps more wisdom than delicacy,
+remains in the room,&rsquo; and he cast a glance at me that might
+have withered an oak tree.</p>
+<p>I was only too willing to withdraw, and Romaine showed as much
+alacrity to make way for my departure.&nbsp; But my uncle was not
+to be moved.&nbsp; In the same breath of a voice, and still
+without opening his eyes, he bade me remain.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is well,&rsquo; said Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;I cannot
+then go on to remind you of the twenty years that have passed
+over our heads in England, and the services I may have rendered
+you in that time.&nbsp; It would be a position too odious.&nbsp;
+Your lordship knows me too well to suppose I could stoop to such
+ignominy.&nbsp; I must leave out all my defence&mdash;your
+lordship wills it so!&nbsp; I do not know what are my faults; I
+know only my punishment, and it is greater than I have the
+courage to face.&nbsp; My uncle, I implore your pity: pardon me
+so far; do not send me for life into a debtors&rsquo;
+jail&mdash;a pauper debtor.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;<i>Chat et vieux</i>, <i>pardonnez</i>?&rsquo; said my
+uncle, quoting from La Fontaine; and then, opening a pale-blue
+eye full on Alain, he delivered with some emphasis:</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;La jeunesse se flatte et croit tout
+obtenir;<br />
+La vieillesse est impitoyable.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>The blood leaped darkly into Alain&rsquo;s face.&nbsp; He
+turned to Romaine and me, and his eyes flashed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is your turn now,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;At
+least it shall be prison for prison with the two
+viscounts.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not so, Mr. Alain, by your leave,&rsquo; said
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;There are a few formalities to be
+considered first.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>But Alain was already striding towards the door.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Stop a moment, stop a moment!&rsquo; cried
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;Remember your own counsel not to despise an
+adversary.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Alain turned.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If I do not despise I hate you!&rsquo; he cried, giving
+a loose to his passion.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be warned of that, both of
+you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I understand you to threaten Monsieur le Vicomte
+Anne,&rsquo; said the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you know, I would
+not do that.&nbsp; I am afraid, I am very much afraid, if you
+were to do as you propose, you might drive me into
+extremes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have made me a beggar and a bankrupt,&rsquo; said
+Alain.&nbsp; What extreme is left?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I scarce like to put a name upon it in this
+company,&rsquo; replied Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;But there are worse
+things than even bankruptcy, and worse places than a
+debtors&rsquo; jail.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The words were so significantly said that there went a visible
+thrill through Alain; sudden as a sword-stroke, he fell pale
+again.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I do not understand you,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O yes, you do,&rsquo; returned Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+believe you understand me very well.&nbsp; You must not suppose
+that all this time, while you were so very busy, others were
+entirely idle.&nbsp; You must not fancy, because I am an
+Englishman, that I have not the intelligence to pursue an
+inquiry.&nbsp; Great as is my regard for the honour of your
+house, M. Alain de St.-Yves, if I hear of you moving directly or
+indirectly in this matter, I shall do my duty, let it cost what
+it will: that is, I shall communicate the real name of the
+Buonapartist spy who signs his letters <i>Rue Gr&eacute;goire de
+Tours</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I confess my heart was already almost altogether on the side
+of my insulted and unhappy cousin; and if it had not been before,
+it must have been so now, so horrid was the shock with which he
+heard his infamy exposed.&nbsp; Speech was denied him; he carried
+his hand to his neckcloth; he staggered; I thought he must have
+fallen.&nbsp; I ran to help him, and at that he revived, recoiled
+before me, and stood there with arms stretched forth as if to
+preserve himself from the outrage of my touch.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Hands off!&rsquo; he somehow managed to articulate.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will now, I hope,&rsquo; pursued the lawyer,
+without any change of voice, &lsquo;understand the position in
+which you are placed, and how delicately it behoves you to
+conduct yourself.&nbsp; Your arrest hangs, if I may so express
+myself, by a hair; and as you will be under the perpetual
+vigilance of myself and my agents, you must look to it narrowly
+that you walk straight.&nbsp; Upon the least dubiety, I will take
+action.&rsquo;&nbsp; He snuffed, looking critically at the
+tortured man.&nbsp; &lsquo;And now let me remind you that your
+chaise is at the door.&nbsp; This interview is agitating to his
+lordship&mdash;it cannot be agreeable for you&mdash;and I suggest
+that it need not be further drawn out.&nbsp; It does not enter
+into the views of your uncle, the Count, that you should again
+sleep under this roof.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As Alain turned and passed without a word or a sign from the
+apartment, I instantly followed.&nbsp; I suppose I must be at
+bottom possessed of some humanity; at least, this accumulated
+torture, this slow butchery of a man as by quarters of rock, had
+wholly changed my sympathies.&nbsp; At that moment I loathed both
+my uncle and the lawyer for their coldblooded cruelty.</p>
+<p>Leaning over the banisters, I was but in time to hear his
+hasty footsteps in that hall that had been crowded with servants
+to honour his coming, and was now left empty against his
+friendless departure.&nbsp; A moment later, and the echoes rang,
+and the air whistled in my ears, as he slammed the door on his
+departing footsteps.&nbsp; The fury of the concussion gave me
+(had one been still wanted) a measure of the turmoil of his
+passions.&nbsp; In a sense, I felt with him; I felt how he would
+have gloried to slam that door on my uncle, the lawyer, myself,
+and the whole crowd of those who had been witnesses to his
+humiliation.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XX&mdash;AFTER THE STORM</h2>
+<p>No sooner was the house clear of my cousin than I began to
+reckon up, ruefully enough, the probable results of what had
+passed.&nbsp; Here were a number of pots broken, and it looked to
+me as if I should have to pay for all!&nbsp; Here had been this
+proud, mad beast goaded and baited both publicly and privately,
+till he could neither hear nor see nor reason; whereupon the gate
+had been set open, and he had been left free to go and contrive
+whatever vengeance he might find possible.&nbsp; I could not help
+thinking it was a pity that, whenever I myself was inclined to be
+upon my good behaviour, some friends of mine should always
+determine to play a piece of heroics and cast me for the
+hero&mdash;or the victim&mdash;which is very much the same.&nbsp;
+The first duty of heroics is to be of your own choosing.&nbsp;
+When they are not that, they are nothing.&nbsp; And I assure you,
+as I walked back to my own room, I was in no very complaisant
+humour: thought my uncle and Mr. Romaine to have played
+knuckle-bones with my life and prospects; cursed them for it
+roundly; had no wish more urgent than to avoid the pair of them;
+and was quite knocked out of time, as they say in the ring, to
+find myself confronted with the lawyer.</p>
+<p>He stood on my hearthrug, leaning on the chimney-piece, with a
+gloomy, thoughtful brow, as I was pleased to see, and not in the
+least as though he were vain of the late proceedings.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have done it
+now!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is he gone?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He is gone,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;We shall have
+the devil to pay with him when he comes back.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are right,&rsquo; said the lawyer, &lsquo;and very
+little to pay him with but flams and fabrications, like
+to-night&rsquo;s.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s?&rsquo; I repeated.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, to-night&rsquo;s!&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s <i>what</i>?&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s flams and fabrications.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;God be good to me, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;have I
+something more to admire in your conduct than ever <i>I</i> had
+suspected?&nbsp; You cannot think how you interest me!&nbsp; That
+it was severe, I knew; I had already chuckled over that.&nbsp;
+But that it should be false also!&nbsp; In what sense, dear
+sir?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but
+the lawyer paid no heed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;False in all senses of the word,&rsquo; he replied
+seriously.&nbsp; &lsquo;False in the sense that they were not
+true, and false in the sense that they were not real; false in
+the sense that I boasted, and in the sense that I lied.&nbsp; How
+can I arrest him?&nbsp; Your uncle burned the papers!&nbsp; I
+told you so&mdash;but doubtless you have forgotten&mdash;the day
+I first saw you in Edinburgh Castle.&nbsp; It was an act of
+generosity; I have seen many of these acts, and always
+regretted&mdash;always regretted!&nbsp; &ldquo;That shall be his
+inheritance,&rdquo; he said, as the papers burned; he did not
+mean that it should have proved so rich a one.&nbsp; How rich,
+time will tell.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times, my dear
+sir, but it strikes me you have the impudence&mdash;in the
+circumstances, I may call it the indecency&mdash;to appear cast
+down?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is true,&rsquo; said he: &lsquo;I am.&nbsp; I am
+cast down.&nbsp; I am literally cast down.&nbsp; I feel myself
+quite helpless against your cousin.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, really!&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is this
+serious?&nbsp; And is it perhaps the reason why you have gorged
+the poor devil with every species of insult? and why you took
+such surprising pains to supply me with what I had so little need
+of&mdash;another enemy?&nbsp; That you were helpless against
+them?&nbsp; &ldquo;Here is my last missile,&rdquo; say you;
+&ldquo;my ammunition is quite exhausted: just wait till I get the
+last in&mdash;it will irritate, it cannot hurt him.&nbsp;
+There&mdash;you see!&mdash;he is furious now, and I am quite
+helpless.&nbsp; One more prod, another kick: now he is a mere
+lunatic!&nbsp; Stand behind me; I am quite helpless!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Mr. Romaine, I am asking myself as to the background or motive of
+this singular jest, and whether the name of it should not be
+called treachery?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I can scarce wonder,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;In
+truth it has been a singular business, and we are very fortunate
+to be out of it so well.&nbsp; Yet it was not treachery: no, no,
+Mr. Anne, it was not treachery; and if you will do me the favour
+to listen to me for the inside of a minute, I shall demonstrate
+the same to you beyond cavil.&rsquo;&nbsp; He seemed to wake up
+to his ordinary briskness.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see the point?&rsquo;
+he began.&nbsp; &lsquo;He had not yet read the newspaper, but who
+could tell when he might?&nbsp; He might have had that damned
+journal in his pocket, and how should we know?&nbsp; We
+were&mdash;I may say, we are&mdash;at the mercy of the merest
+twopenny accident.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, true,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;I had not thought of
+that.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I warrant you,&rsquo; cried Romaine, &lsquo;you had
+supposed it was nothing to be the hero of an interesting notice
+in the journals!&nbsp; You had supposed, as like as not, it was a
+form of secrecy!&nbsp; But not so in the least.&nbsp; A part of
+England is already buzzing with the name of Champdivers; a day or
+two more and the mail will have carried it everywhere: so
+wonderful a machine is this of ours for disseminating
+intelligence!&nbsp; Think of it!&nbsp; When my father was
+born&mdash;but that is another story.&nbsp; To return: we had
+here the elements of such a combustion as I dread to think
+of&mdash;your cousin and the journal.&nbsp; Let him but glance an
+eye upon that column of print, and where were we?&nbsp; It is
+easy to ask; not so easy to answer, my young friend.&nbsp; And
+let me tell you, this sheet is the Viscount&rsquo;s usual
+reading.&nbsp; It is my conviction he had it in his
+pocket.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+have been unjust.&nbsp; I did not appreciate my
+danger.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think you never do,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But yet surely that public scene&mdash;&rsquo; I
+began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It was madness.&nbsp; I quite agree with you,&rsquo;
+Mr. Romaine interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;But it was your
+uncle&rsquo;s orders, Mr. Anne, and what could I do?&nbsp; Tell
+him you were the murderer of Goguelat?&nbsp; I think
+not.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That would but
+have been to make the trouble thicker.&nbsp; We were certainly in
+a very ill posture.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You do not yet appreciate how grave it was,&rsquo; he
+replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;It was necessary for you that your cousin
+should go, and go at once.&nbsp; You yourself had to leave
+to-night under cover of darkness, and how could you have done
+that with the Viscount in the next room?&nbsp; He must go, then;
+he must leave without delay.&nbsp; And that was the
+difficulty.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pardon me, Mr. Romaine, but could not my uncle have
+bidden him go?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, I see I must tell you that this is not so simple
+as it sounds,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;You say this is
+your uncle&rsquo;s house, and so it is.&nbsp; But to all effects
+and purposes it is your cousin&rsquo;s also.&nbsp; He has rooms
+here; has had them coming on for thirty years now, and they are
+filled with a prodigious accumulation of trash&mdash;stays, I
+dare say, and powder-puffs, and such effeminate idiocy&mdash;to
+which none could dispute his title, even suppose any one wanted
+to.&nbsp; We had a perfect right to bid him go, and he had a
+perfect right to reply, &ldquo;Yes, I will go, but not without my
+stays and cravats.&nbsp; I must first get together the
+nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine chestsfull of insufferable rubbish,
+that I have spent the last thirty years collecting&mdash;and may
+very well spend the next thirty hours a-packing of.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And what should we have said to that?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By way of repartee?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Two
+tall footmen and a pair of crabtree cudgels, I
+suggest.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The Lord deliver me from the wisdom of laymen!&rsquo;
+cried Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;Put myself in the wrong at the
+beginning of a lawsuit?&nbsp; No, indeed!&nbsp; There was but one
+thing to do, and I did it, and burned my last cartridge in the
+doing of it.&nbsp; I stunned him.&nbsp; And it gave us three
+hours, by which we should make haste to profit; for if there is
+one thing sure, it is that he will be up to time again to-morrow
+in the morning.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I own myself an
+idiot.&nbsp; Well do they say, <i>an old soldier</i>, <i>an old
+innocent</i>!&nbsp; For I guessed nothing of all this.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And, guessing it, have you the same objections to leave
+England?&rsquo; he inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The same,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is indispensable,&rsquo; he objected.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And it cannot be,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Reason
+has nothing to say in the matter; and I must not let you squander
+any of yours.&nbsp; It will be enough to tell you this is an
+affair of the heart.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is it even so?&rsquo; quoth Romaine, nodding his
+head.&nbsp; &lsquo;And I might have been sure of it.&nbsp; Place
+them in a hospital, put them in a jail in yellow overalls, do
+what you will, young Jessamy finds young Jenny.&nbsp; O, have it
+your own way; I am too old a hand to argue with young gentlemen
+who choose to fancy themselves in love; I have too much
+experience, thank you.&nbsp; Only, be sure that you appreciate
+what you risk: the prison, the dock, the gallows, and the
+halter&mdash;terribly vulgar circumstances, my young friend;
+grim, sordid, earnest; no poetry in that!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And there I am warned,&rsquo; I returned gaily.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;No man could be warned more finely or with a greater
+eloquence.&nbsp; And I am of the same opinion still.&nbsp; Until
+I have again seen that lady, nothing shall induce me to quit
+Great Britain.&nbsp; I have besides&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And here I came to a full stop.&nbsp; It was upon my tongue to
+have told him the story of the drovers, but at the first word of
+it my voice died in my throat.&nbsp; There might be a limit to
+the lawyer&rsquo;s toleration, I reflected.&nbsp; I had not been
+so long in Britain altogether; for the most part of that time I
+had been by the heels in limbo in Edinburgh Castle; and already I
+had confessed to killing one man with a pair of scissors; and now
+I was to go on and plead guilty to having settled another with a
+holly stick!&nbsp; A wave of discretion went over me as cold and
+as deep as the sea.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In short, sir, this is a matter of feeling,&rsquo; I
+concluded, &lsquo;and nothing will prevent my going to
+Edinburgh.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>If I had fired a pistol in his ear he could not have been more
+startled.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To Edinburgh?&rsquo; he repeated.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Edinburgh? where the very paving-stones know
+you!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then is the murder out!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But, Mr. Romaine, is there not sometimes safety in
+boldness?&nbsp; Is it not a common-place of strategy to get where
+the enemy least expects you?&nbsp; And where would he expect me
+less?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Faith, there is something in that, too!&rsquo; cried
+the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ay, certainly, a great deal in
+that.&nbsp; All the witnesses drowned but one, and he safe in
+prison; you yourself changed beyond recognition&mdash;let us
+hope&mdash;and walking the streets of the very town you have
+illustrated by your&mdash;well, your eccentricity!&nbsp; It is
+not badly combined, indeed!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You approve it, then?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, approve!&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;there is no question
+of approval.&nbsp; There is only one course which I could
+approve, and that were to escape to France instanter.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You do not wholly disapprove, at least?&rsquo; I
+substituted.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not wholly; and it would not matter if I did,&rsquo; he
+replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Go your own way; you are beyond
+argument.&nbsp; And I am not sure that you will run more danger
+by that course than by any other.&nbsp; Give the servants time to
+get to bed and fall asleep, then take a country cross-road and
+walk, as the rhyme has it, like blazes all night.&nbsp; In the
+morning take a chaise or take the mail at pleasure, and continue
+your journey with all the decorum and reserve of which you shall
+be found capable.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am taking the picture in,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Give me time.&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis the <i>tout ensemble</i> I
+must see: the whole as opposed to the details.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mountebank!&rsquo; he murmured.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, I have it now; and I see myself with a servant,
+and that servant is Rowley,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So as to have one more link with your uncle?&rsquo;
+suggested the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Very judicious!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And, pardon me, but that is what it is,&rsquo; I
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Judicious is the word.&nbsp; I am not
+making a deception fit to last for thirty years; I do not found a
+palace in the living granite for the night.&nbsp; This is a
+shelter tent&mdash;a flying picture&mdash;seen, admired, and gone
+again in the wink of an eye.&nbsp; What is wanted, in short, is a
+<i>trompe-l&rsquo;&oelig;il</i> that shall be good enough for
+twelve hours at an inn: is it not so?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is, and the objection holds.&nbsp; Rowley is but
+another danger,&rsquo; said Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;will pass as a servant
+from a distance&mdash;as a creature seen poised on the dicky of a
+bowling chaise.&nbsp; He will pass at hand as a smart, civil
+fellow one meets in the inn corridor, and looks back at, and
+asks, and is told, &ldquo;Gentleman&rsquo;s servant in Number
+4.&rdquo;&nbsp; He will pass, in fact, all round, except with his
+personal friends!&nbsp; My dear sir, pray what do you
+expect?&nbsp; Of course if we meet my cousin, or if we meet
+anybody who took part in the judicious exhibition of this
+evening, we are lost; and who&rsquo;s denying it?&nbsp; To every
+disguise, however good and safe, there is always the weak point;
+you must always take (let us say&mdash;and to take a simile from
+your own waistcoat pocket) a snuff box-full of risk.&nbsp;
+You&rsquo;ll get it just as small with Rowley as with anybody
+else.&nbsp; And the long and short of it is, the lad&rsquo;s
+honest, he likes me, I trust him; he is my servant, or
+nobody.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;He might not accept,&rsquo; said Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I bet you a thousand pounds he does!&rsquo; cried
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But no matter; all you have to do is to send him
+out to-night on this cross-country business, and leave the thing
+to me.&nbsp; I tell you, he will be my servant, and I tell you,
+he will do well.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I had crossed the room, and was already overhauling my
+wardrobe as I spoke.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; concluded the lawyer, with a shrug,
+&lsquo;one risk with another: <i>&agrave; la guerre comme
+&agrave; la guerre</i>, as you would say.&nbsp; Let the brat come
+and be useful, at least.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he was about to ring
+the bell, when his eye was caught by my researches in the
+wardrobe.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do not fall in love with these coats,
+waistcoats, cravats, and other panoply and accoutrements by which
+you are now surrounded.&nbsp; You must not run the post as a
+dandy.&nbsp; It is not the fashion, even.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are pleased to be facetious, sir,&rsquo; said I;
+&lsquo;and not according to knowledge.&nbsp; These clothes are my
+life, they are my disguise; and since I can take but few of them,
+I were a fool indeed if I selected hastily!&nbsp; Will you
+understand, once and for all, what I am seeking?&nbsp; To be
+invisible, is the first point; the second, to be invisible in a
+post-chaise and with a servant.&nbsp; Can you not perceive the
+delicacy of the quest?&nbsp; Nothing must be too coarse, nothing
+too fine; <i>rien de voyant</i>, <i>rien qui d&eacute;tonne</i>;
+so that I may leave everywhere the inconspicuous image of a
+handsome young man of a good fortune travelling in proper style,
+whom the landlord will forget in twelve hours&mdash;and the
+chambermaid perhaps remember, God bless her! with a sigh.&nbsp;
+This is the very fine art of dress.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have practised it with success for fifty
+years,&rsquo; said Romaine, with a chuckle.&nbsp; &lsquo;A black
+suit and a clean shirt is my infallible recipe.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You surprise me; I did not think you would be
+shallow!&rsquo; said I, lingering between two coats.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Pray, Mr. Romaine, have I your head? or did you travel
+post and with a smartish servant?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Neither, I admit,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Which change the whole problem,&rsquo; I
+continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have to dress for a smartish servant
+and a Russia leather despatch-box.&rsquo;&nbsp; That brought me
+to a stand.&nbsp; I came over and looked at the box with a
+moment&rsquo;s hesitation.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; I
+resumed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, and for the despatch-box!&nbsp; It
+looks moneyed and landed; it means I have a lawyer.&nbsp; It is
+an invaluable property.&nbsp; But I could have wished it to hold
+less money.&nbsp; The responsibility is crushing.&nbsp; Should I
+not do more wisely to take five hundred pounds, and intrust the
+remainder with you, Mr. Romaine?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you are sure you will not want it,&rsquo; answered
+Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am far from sure of that,&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;In the first place, as a philosopher.&nbsp; This is the
+first time I have been at the head of a large sum, and it is
+conceivable&mdash;who knows himself?&mdash;that I may make it
+fly.&nbsp; In the second place, as a fugitive.&nbsp; Who knows
+what I may need?&nbsp; The whole of it may be inadequate.&nbsp;
+But I can always write for more.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You do not understand,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I break off all communication with you here and now.&nbsp;
+You must give me a power of attorney ere you start to-night, and
+then be done with me trenchantly until better days.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I believe I offered some objection.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Think a little for once of me!&rsquo; said
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;I must not have seen you before
+to-night.&nbsp; To-night we are to have had our only interview,
+and you are to have given me the power; and to-night I am to have
+lost sight of you again&mdash;I know not whither, you were upon
+business, it was none of my affairs to question you!&nbsp; And
+this, you are to remark, in the interests of your own safety much
+more than mine.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am not even to write to you?&rsquo; I said, a little
+bewildered.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects
+you with common sense,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;But that
+is the plain English of it.&nbsp; You are not even to write; and
+if you did, I would not answer.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A letter, however&mdash;&rsquo; I began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Listen to me,&rsquo; interrupted Romaine.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;So soon as your cousin reads the paragraph, what will he
+do?&nbsp; Put the police upon looking into my
+correspondence!&nbsp; So soon as you write to me, in short, you
+write to Bow Street; and if you will take my advice, you will
+date that letter from France.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The devil!&rsquo; said I, for I began suddenly to see
+that this might put me out of the way of my business.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What is it now?&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There will be more to be done, then, before we can
+part,&rsquo; I answered.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I give you the whole night,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;So long as you are off ere daybreak, I am
+content.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;In short, Mr. Romaine,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I have had
+so much benefit of your advice and services that I am loth to
+sever the connection, and would even ask a substitute.&nbsp; I
+would be obliged for a letter of introduction to one of your own
+cloth in Edinburgh&mdash;an old man for choice, very experienced,
+very respectable, and very secret.&nbsp; Could you favour me with
+such a letter?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, no,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Certainly
+not.&nbsp; I will do no such thing, indeed.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It would be a great favour, sir,&rsquo; I pleaded.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It would be an unpardonable blunder,&rsquo; he
+replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;What?&nbsp; Give you a letter of
+introduction? and when the police come, I suppose, I must forget
+the circumstance?&nbsp; No, indeed.&nbsp; Talk of it no
+more.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You seem to be always in the right,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The letter would be out of the question, I quite
+see that.&nbsp; But the lawyer&rsquo;s name might very well have
+dropped from you in the way of conversation; having heard him
+mentioned, I might profit by the circumstance to introduce
+myself; and in this way my business would be the better done, and
+you not in the least compromised.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What is this business?&rsquo; said Romaine.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have not said that I had any,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It might arise.&nbsp; This is only a possibility that I
+must keep in view.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, with a gesture of the hands,
+&lsquo;I mention Mr. Robbie; and let that be an end of
+it!&mdash;Or wait!&rsquo; he added, &lsquo;I have it.&nbsp; Here
+is something that will serve you for an introduction, and cannot
+compromise me.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he wrote his name and the
+Edinburgh lawyer&rsquo;s address on a piece of card and tossed it
+to me.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXI&mdash;I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED
+CHAISE</h2>
+<p>What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an
+excellent cold supper in the lawyer&rsquo;s room, it was past two
+in the morning before we were ready for the road.&nbsp; Romaine
+himself let us out of a window in a part of the house known to
+Rowley: it appears it served as a kind of postern to the
+servants&rsquo; hall, by which (when they were in the mind for a
+clandestine evening) they would come regularly in and out; and I
+remember very well the vinegar aspect of the lawyer on the
+receipt of this piece of information&mdash;how he pursed his
+lips, jutted his eyebrows, and kept repeating, &lsquo;This must
+be seen to, indeed! this shall be barred to-morrow in the
+morning!&rsquo;&nbsp; In this preoccupation, I believe he took
+leave of me without observing it; our things were handed out; we
+heard the window shut behind us; and became instantly lost in a
+horrid intricacy of blackness and the shadow of woods.</p>
+<p>A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling
+again; it seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually
+leaving off; and the darkness was intense.&nbsp; Time and again
+we walked into trees; time and again found ourselves adrift among
+garden borders or stuck like a ram in the thicket.&nbsp; Rowley
+had possessed himself of the matches, and he was neither to be
+terrified nor softened.&nbsp; &lsquo;No, I will not, Mr. Anne,
+sir,&rsquo; he would reply.&nbsp; &lsquo;You know he tell me to
+wait till we were over the &rsquo;ill.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s only a
+little way now.&nbsp; Why, and I thought you was a soldier,
+too!&rsquo;&nbsp; I was at least a very glad soldier when my
+valet consented at last to kindle a thieves&rsquo; match.&nbsp;
+From this, we easily lit the lantern; and thenceforward, through
+a labyrinth of woodland paths, were conducted by its uneasy
+glimmer.&nbsp; Both booted and great-coated, with tall hats much
+of a shape, and laden with booty in the form of a despatch-box, a
+case of pistols, and two plump valises, I thought we had very
+much the look of a pair of brothers returning from the sack of
+Amersham Place.</p>
+<p>We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk
+abreast and without precaution.&nbsp; It was nine miles to
+Aylesbury, our immediate destination; by a watch, which formed
+part of my new outfit, it should be about half-past three in the
+morning; and as we did not choose to arrive before daylight, time
+could not be said to press.&nbsp; I gave the order to march at
+ease.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;so far so
+good.&nbsp; You have come, in the most obliging manner in the
+world, to carry these valises.&nbsp; The question is, what
+next?&nbsp; What are we to do at Aylesbury? or, more
+particularly, what are you?&nbsp; Thence, I go on a
+journey.&nbsp; Are you to accompany me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He gave a little chuckle.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s all
+settled already, Mr. Anne, sir,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Why, I&rsquo;ve got my things here in the valise&mdash;a
+half a dozen shirts and what not; I&rsquo;m all ready, sir: just
+you lead on: <i>you&rsquo;ll</i> see.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The devil you have!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+made pretty sure of your welcome.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.</p>
+<p>He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish
+shyness and triumph that awoke my conscience.&nbsp; I could never
+let this innocent involve himself in the perils and difficulties
+that beset my course, without some hint of warning, which it was
+a matter of extreme delicacy to make plain enough and not too
+plain.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, no,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;you may think you have
+made a choice, but it was blindfold, and you must make it over
+again.&nbsp; The Count&rsquo;s service is a good one; what are
+you leaving it for?&nbsp; Are you not throwing away the substance
+for the shadow?&nbsp; No, do not answer me yet.&nbsp; You imagine
+that I am a prosperous nobleman, just declared my uncle&rsquo;s
+heir, on the threshold of the best of good fortune, and, from the
+point of view of a judicious servant, a jewel of a master to
+serve and stick to?&nbsp; Well, my boy, I am nothing of the kind,
+nothing of the kind.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the
+lantern to his face.&nbsp; He stood before me, brilliantly
+illuminated on the background of impenetrable night and falling
+snow, stricken to stone between his double burden like an ass
+between two panniers, and gaping at me like a blunderbuss.&nbsp;
+I had never seen a face so predestined to be astonished, or so
+susceptible of rendering the emotion of surprise; and it tempted
+me as an open piano tempts the musician.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Nothing of the sort, Rowley,&rsquo; I continued, in a
+churchyard voice.&nbsp; &lsquo;These are appearances, petty
+appearances.&nbsp; I am in peril, homeless, hunted.&nbsp; I count
+scarce any one in England who is not my enemy.&nbsp; From this
+hour I drop my name, my title; I become nameless; my name is
+proscribed.&nbsp; My liberty, my life, hang by a hair.&nbsp; The
+destiny which you will accept, if you go forth with me, is to be
+tracked by spies, to hide yourself under a false name, to follow
+the desperate pretences and perhaps share the fate of a murderer
+with a price upon his head.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from
+one depth to another of tragic astonishment, and really worth
+paying to see; but at this it suddenly cleared.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh,
+I ain&rsquo;t afraid!&rsquo; he said; and then, choking into
+laughter, &lsquo;why, I see it from the first!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I could have beaten him.&nbsp; But I had so grossly overshot
+the mark that I suppose it took me two good miles of road and
+half an hour of elocution to persuade him I had been in
+earnest.&nbsp; In the course of which I became so interested in
+demonstrating my present danger that I forgot all about my future
+safety, and not only told him the story of Goguelat, but threw in
+the business of the drovers as well, and ended by blurting out
+that I was a soldier of Napoleon&rsquo;s and a prisoner of
+war.</p>
+<p>This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common
+complaint of me that I have a long tongue.&nbsp; I believe it is
+a fault beloved by fortune.&nbsp; Which of you considerate
+fellows would have done a thing at once so foolhardy and so wise
+as to make a confidant of a boy in his teens, and positively
+smelling of the nursery?&nbsp; And when had I cause to repent
+it?&nbsp; There is none so apt as a boy to be the adviser of any
+man in difficulties such as mine.&nbsp; To the beginnings of
+virile common sense he adds the last lights of the child&rsquo;s
+imagination; and he can fling himself into business with that
+superior earnestness that properly belongs to play.&nbsp; And
+Rowley was a boy made to my hand.&nbsp; He had a high sense of
+romance, and a secret cultus for all soldiers and
+criminals.&nbsp; His travelling library consisted of a chap-book
+life of Wallace and some sixpenny parts of the &lsquo;Old Bailey
+Sessions Papers&rsquo; by Gurney the shorthand writer; and the
+choice depicts his character to a hair.&nbsp; You can imagine how
+his new prospects brightened on a boy of this disposition.&nbsp;
+To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a soldier, and a
+murderer, rolled in one&mdash;to live by stratagems, disguises,
+and false names, in an atmosphere of midnight and mystery so
+thick that you could cut it with a knife&mdash;was really, I
+believe, more dear to him than his meals, though he was a great
+trencherman, and something of a glutton besides.&nbsp; For
+myself, as the peg by which all this romantic business hung, I
+was simply idolised from that moment; and he would rather have
+sacrificed his hand than surrendered the privilege of serving
+me.</p>
+<p>We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in
+the snow, which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall
+to purpose.&nbsp; I chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from
+its likeness to Romaine; Rowley, from an irresistible conversion
+of ideas, I dubbed Gammon.&nbsp; His distress was laughable to
+witness: his own choice of an unassuming nickname had been Claude
+Duval!&nbsp; We settled our procedure at the various inns where
+we should alight, rehearsed our little manners like a piece of
+drill until it seemed impossible we should ever be taken
+unprepared; and in all these dispositions, you maybe sure the
+despatch-box was not forgotten.&nbsp; Who was to pick it up, who
+was to set it down, who was to remain beside it, who was to sleep
+with it&mdash;there was no contingency omitted, all was gone into
+with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant on the one hand and a
+child with a new plaything on the other.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I say, wouldn&rsquo;t it look queer if you and me was
+to come to the post-house with all this luggage?&rsquo; said
+Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I dare say,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;But what
+else is to be done?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, now, sir&mdash;you hear me,&rsquo; says
+Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;I think it would look more natural-like if
+you was to come to the post-house alone, and with nothing in your
+&rsquo;ands&mdash;more like a gentleman, you know.&nbsp; And you
+might say that your servant and baggage was a-waiting for you up
+the road.&nbsp; I think I could manage, somehow, to make a shift
+with all them dratted things&mdash;leastways if you was to give
+me a &rsquo;and up with them at the start.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to
+try, Mr. Rowley!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, you would be
+quite defenceless!&nbsp; A footpad that was an infant child could
+rob you.&nbsp; And I should probably come driving by to find you
+in a ditch with your throat cut.&nbsp; But there is something in
+your idea, for all that; and I propose we put it in execution no
+farther forward than the next corner of a lane.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we
+headed by cross-roads for some point to the northward of it,
+whither I might assist Rowley with the baggage, and where I might
+leave him to await my return in the post-chaise.</p>
+<p>It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and
+ourselves walking snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the
+morning showed us an inn upon the highwayside.&nbsp; Some
+distance off, under the shelter of a corner of the road and a
+clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with the whole of our
+possessions, and watched him till he staggered in safety into the
+doors of the <i>Green Dragon</i>, which was the sign of the
+house.&nbsp; Thence I walked briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in
+my freedom and the causeless good spirits that belong to a snowy
+morning; though, to be sure, long before I had arrived the snow
+had again ceased to fall, and the eaves of Aylesbury were smoking
+in the level sun.&nbsp; There was an accumulation of gigs and
+chaises in the yard, and a great bustle going forward in the
+coffee-room and about the doors of the inn.&nbsp; At these
+evidences of so much travel on the road I was seized with a
+misgiving lest it should be impossible to get horses, and I
+should be detained in the precarious neighbourhood of my
+cousin.&nbsp; Hungry as I was, I made my way first of all to the
+postmaster, where he stood&mdash;a big, athletic, horsey-looking
+man, blowing into a key in the corner of the yard.</p>
+<p>On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference
+into what seemed passion.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A po&rsquo;-shay and &rsquo;osses!&rsquo; he
+cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do I look as if I &rsquo;ad a po&rsquo;-shay
+and &rsquo;osses?&nbsp; Damn me, if I &rsquo;ave such a thing on
+the premises.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t <i>make</i> &rsquo;osses and
+chaises&mdash;I &rsquo;<i>ire</i> &rsquo;em.&nbsp; You might be
+God Almighty!&rsquo; said he; and instantly, as if he had
+observed me for the first time, he broke off, and lowered his
+voice into the confidential.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, now that I see you
+are a gentleman,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you
+what!&nbsp; If you like to <i>buy</i>, I have the article to fit
+you.&nbsp; Second-&rsquo;and shay by Lycett, of London.&nbsp;
+Latest style; good as new.&nbsp; Superior fittin&rsquo;s, net on
+the roof, baggage platform, pistol &rsquo;olsters&mdash;the most
+com-plete and the most gen-teel turn-out I ever see!&nbsp; The
+&rsquo;ole for seventy-five pound!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s as good as
+givin&rsquo; her away!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a
+hawker&rsquo;s barrow?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, my good
+man, if I had to stop here, anyway, I should prefer to buy a
+house and garden!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come and look at her!&rsquo; he cried; and, with the
+word, links his arm in mine and carries me to the outhouse where
+the chaise was on view.</p>
+<p>It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my
+purpose: eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though
+I thought the postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree
+with him so far.&nbsp; The body was painted a dark claret, and
+the wheels an invisible green.&nbsp; The lamp and glasses were
+bright as silver; and the whole equipage had an air of privacy
+and reserve that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm
+suspicion.&nbsp; With a servant like Rowley, and a chaise like
+this, I felt that I could go from the Land&rsquo;s End to John
+o&rsquo; Groat&rsquo;s House amid a population of bowing
+ostlers.&nbsp; And I suppose I betrayed in my manner the degree
+in which the bargain tempted me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come,&rsquo; cried the
+postmaster&mdash;&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll make it seventy, to oblige a
+friend!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The point is: the horses,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, consulting his watch,
+&lsquo;it&rsquo;s now gone the &rsquo;alf after eight.&nbsp; What
+time do you want her at the door?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Horses and all?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;&rsquo;Osses and all!&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;One
+good turn deserves another.&nbsp; You give me seventy pound for
+the shay, and I&rsquo;ll &rsquo;oss it for you.&nbsp; I told you
+I didn&rsquo;t <i>make</i> &rsquo;osses; but I <i>can</i> make
+&rsquo;em, to oblige a friend.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>What would you have?&nbsp; It was not the wisest thing in the
+world to buy a chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle&rsquo;s
+house; but in this way I got my horses for the next stage.&nbsp;
+And by any other it appeared that I should have to wait.&nbsp;
+Accordingly I paid the money down&mdash;perhaps twenty pounds too
+much, though it was certainly a well-made and well-appointed
+vehicle&mdash;ordered it round in half an hour, and proceeded to
+refresh myself with breakfast.</p>
+<p>The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a
+bay-window, and commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I
+continued to be amused by the successive departures of
+travellers&mdash;the fussy and the offhand, the niggardly and the
+lavish&mdash;all exhibiting their different characters in that
+diagnostic moment of the farewell: some escorted to the stirrup
+or the chaise door by the chamberlain, the chambermaids and the
+waiters almost in a body, others moving off under a cloud,
+without human countenance.&nbsp; In the course of this I became
+interested in one for whom this ovation began to assume the
+proportions of a triumph; not only the under-servants, but the
+barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the postmaster himself,
+crowding about the steps to speed his departure.&nbsp; I was
+aware, at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though
+the traveller were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to
+air it in that society.&nbsp; I leaned forward with a lively
+curiosity; and the next moment I had blotted myself behind the
+teapot.&nbsp; The popular traveller had turned to wave a
+farewell; and behold! he was no other than my cousin Alain.&nbsp;
+It was a change of the sharpest from the angry, pallid man I had
+seen at Amersham Place.&nbsp; Ruddy to a fault, illuminated with
+vintages, crowned with his curls like Bacchus, he now stood
+before me for an instant, the perfect master of himself, smiling
+with airs of conscious popularity and insufferable
+condescension.&nbsp; He reminded me at once of a royal duke, or
+an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman who
+should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman.&nbsp; A
+moment after he was gliding noiselessly on the road to
+London.</p>
+<p>I breathed again.&nbsp; I recognised, with heartfelt
+gratitude, how lucky I had been to go in by the stable-yard
+instead of the hostelry door, and what a fine occasion of meeting
+my cousin I had lost by the purchase of the claret-coloured
+chaise!&nbsp; The next moment I remembered that there was a
+waiter present.&nbsp; No doubt but he must have observed me when
+I crouched behind the breakfast equipage; no doubt but he must
+have commented on this unusual and undignified behaviour; and it
+was essential that I should do something to remove the
+impression.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Waiter!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;that was the nephew of
+Count Carwell that just drove off, wasn&rsquo;t it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, sir: Viscount Carwell we calls him,&rsquo; he
+replied.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah, I thought as much,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Well, well, damn all these Frenchmen, say I!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You may say so indeed, sir,&rsquo; said the
+waiter.&nbsp; &lsquo;They ain&rsquo;t not to say in the same
+field with our &rsquo;ome-raised gentry.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Nasty tempers?&rsquo; I suggested.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Beas&rsquo;ly temper, sir, the Viscount
+&rsquo;ave,&rsquo; said the waiter with feeling.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Why, no longer agone than this morning, he was sitting
+breakfasting and reading in his paper.&nbsp; I suppose, sir, he
+come on some pilitical information, or it might be about
+&rsquo;orses, but he raps his &rsquo;and upon the table sudden
+and calls for curacoa.&nbsp; It gave me quite a turn, it did; he
+did it that sudden and &rsquo;ard.&nbsp; Now, sir, that may be
+manners in France, but hall I can say is, that I&rsquo;m not used
+to it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Reading the paper, was he?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What paper, eh?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here it is, sir,&rsquo; exclaimed the waiter.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Seems like as if he&rsquo;d dropped it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.</p>
+<p>I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what
+to expect; but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped
+beating.&nbsp; There it was: the fulfilment of Romaine&rsquo;s
+apprehension was before me; the paper was laid open at the
+capture of Clausel.&nbsp; I felt as if I could take a little
+curacoa myself, but on second thoughts called for brandy.&nbsp;
+It was badly wanted; and suddenly I observed the waiter&rsquo;s
+eye to sparkle, as it were, with some recognition; made certain
+he had remarked the resemblance between me and Alain; and became
+aware&mdash;as by a revelation&mdash;of the fool&rsquo;s part I
+had been playing.&nbsp; For I had now managed to put my
+identification beyond a doubt, if Alain should choose to make his
+inquiries at Aylesbury; and, as if that were not enough, I had
+added, at an expense of seventy pounds, a clue by which he might
+follow me through the length and breadth of England, in the shape
+of the claret-coloured chaise!&nbsp; That elegant equipage (which
+I began to regard as little better than a claret-coloured
+ante-room to the hangman&rsquo;s cart) coming presently to the
+door, I left my breakfast in the middle and departed; posting to
+the north as diligently as my cousin Alain was posting to the
+south, and putting my trust (such as it was) in an opposite
+direction and equal speed.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXII&mdash;CHARACTER AND ACQUIREMENTS OF MR.&nbsp;
+ROWLEY</h2>
+<p>I am not certain that I had ever really appreciated before
+that hour the extreme peril of the adventure on which I was
+embarked.&nbsp; The sight of my cousin, the look of his
+face&mdash;so handsome, so jovial at the first sight, and branded
+with so much malignity as you saw it on the second&mdash;with his
+hyperbolical curls in order, with his neckcloth tied as if for
+the conquests of love, setting forth (as I had no doubt in the
+world he was doing) to clap the Bow Street runners on my trail,
+and cover England with handbills, each dangerous as a loaded
+musket, convinced me for the first time that the affair was no
+less serious than death.&nbsp; I believe it came to a near touch
+whether I should not turn the horses&rsquo; heads at the next
+stage and make directly for the coast.&nbsp; But I was now in the
+position of a man who should have thrown his gage into the den of
+lions; or, better still, like one who should have quarrelled
+overnight under the influence of wine, and now, at daylight, in a
+cold winter&rsquo;s morning, and humbly sober, must make good his
+words.&nbsp; It is not that I thought any the less, or any the
+less warmly, of Flora.&nbsp; But, as I smoked a grim segar that
+morning in a corner of the chaise, no doubt I considered, in the
+first place, that the letter-post had been invented, and admitted
+privately to myself, in the second, that it would have been
+highly possible to write her on a piece of paper, seal it, and
+send it skimming by the mail, instead of going personally into
+these egregious dangers, and through a country that I beheld
+crowded with gibbets and Bow Street officers.&nbsp; As for Sim
+and Candlish, I doubt if they crossed my mind.</p>
+<p>At the Green Dragon Rowley was waiting on the doorsteps with
+the luggage, and really was bursting with unpalatable
+conversation.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who do you think we&rsquo;ve &rsquo;ad &rsquo;ere,
+sir?&rsquo; he began breathlessly, as the chaise drove off.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Red Breasts&rsquo;; and he nodded his head
+portentously.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Red Breasts?&rsquo; I repeated, for I stupidly did not
+understand at the moment an expression I had often heard.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Red weskits.&nbsp;
+Runners.&nbsp; Bow Street runners.&nbsp; Two on&rsquo; em, and
+one was Lavender himself!&nbsp; I hear the other say quite plain,
+&ldquo;Now, Mr. Lavender, <i>if</i> you&rsquo;re
+ready.&rdquo;&nbsp; They was breakfasting as nigh me as I am to
+that postboy.&nbsp; They&rsquo;re all right; they ain&rsquo;t
+after us.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s a forger; and I didn&rsquo;t send them
+off on a false scent&mdash;O no!&nbsp; I thought there was no use
+in having them over our way; so I give them &ldquo;very valuable
+information,&rdquo; Mr. Lavender said, and tipped me a tizzy for
+myself; and they&rsquo;re off to Luton.&nbsp; They showed me the
+&rsquo;andcuffs, too&mdash;the other one did&mdash;and he clicked
+the dratted things on my wrist; and I tell you, I believe I
+nearly went off in a swound!&nbsp; There&rsquo;s something so
+beastly in the feel of them!&nbsp; Begging your pardon, Mr.
+Anne,&rsquo; he added, with one of his delicious changes from the
+character of the confidential schoolboy into that of the trained,
+respectful servant.</p>
+<p>Well, I must not be proud!&nbsp; I cannot say I found the
+subject of handcuffs to my fancy; and it was with more asperity
+than was needful that I reproved him for the slip about the
+name.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Ramornie,&rsquo; says he, touching his
+hat.&nbsp; &lsquo;Begging your pardon, Mr. Ramornie.&nbsp; But
+I&rsquo;ve been very piticular, sir, up to now; and you may trust
+me to be very piticular in the future.&nbsp; It were only a slip,
+sir.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My good boy,&rsquo; said I, with the most imposing
+severity, &lsquo;there must be no slips.&nbsp; Be so good as to
+remember that my life is at stake.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had
+made myself.&nbsp; It is my principle that an officer must never
+be wrong.&nbsp; I have seen two divisions beating their brains
+out for a fortnight against a worthless and quite impregnable
+castle in a pass: I knew we were only doing it for discipline,
+because the General had said so at first, and had not yet found
+any way out of his own words; and I highly admired his force of
+character, and throughout these operations thought my life
+exposed in a very good cause.&nbsp; With fools and children,
+which included Rowley, the necessity was even greater.&nbsp; I
+proposed to myself to be infallible; and even when he expressed
+some wonder at the purchase of the claret-coloured chaise, I put
+him promptly in his place.&nbsp; In our situation, I told him,
+everything had to be sacrificed to appearances; doubtless, in a
+hired chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look at the
+dignity!&nbsp; I was so positive, that I had sometimes almost
+convinced myself.&nbsp; Not for long, you may be certain!&nbsp;
+This detestable conveyance always appeared to me to be laden with
+Bow Street officers, and to have a placard upon the back of it
+publishing my name and crimes.&nbsp; If I had paid seventy pounds
+to get the thing, I should not have stuck at seven hundred to be
+safely rid of it.</p>
+<p>And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the
+despatch-box and its golden cargo!&nbsp; I had never had a care
+but to draw my pay and spend it; I had lived happily in the
+regiment, as in my father&rsquo;s house, fed by the great
+Emperor&rsquo;s commissariat as by ubiquitous doves of
+Elijah&mdash;or, my faith! if anything went wrong with the
+commissariat, helping myself with the best grace in the world
+from the next peasant!&nbsp; And now I began to feel at the same
+time the burthen of riches and the fear of destitution.&nbsp;
+There were ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box, but I
+reckoned in French money, and had two hundred and fifty thousand
+agonies; I kept it under my hand all day, I dreamed of it at
+night.&nbsp; In the inns, I was afraid to go to dinner and afraid
+to go to sleep.&nbsp; When I walked up a hill I durst not leave
+the doors of the claret-coloured chaise.&nbsp; Sometimes I would
+change the disposition of the funds: there were days when I
+carried as much as five or six thousand pounds on my own person,
+and only the residue continued to voyage in the
+treasure-chest&mdash;days when I bulked all over like my cousin,
+crackled to a touch with bank paper, and had my pockets weighed
+to bursting-point with sovereigns.&nbsp; And there were other
+days when I wearied of the thing&mdash;or grew ashamed of
+it&mdash;and put all the money back where it had come from: there
+let it take its chance, like better people!&nbsp; In short, I set
+Rowley a poor example of consistency, and in philosophy, none at
+all.</p>
+<p>Little he cared!&nbsp; All was one to him so long as he was
+amused, and I never knew any one amused more easily.&nbsp; He was
+thrillingly interested in life, travel, and his own melodramatic
+position.&nbsp; All day he would be looking from the chaise
+windows with ebullitions of gratified curiosity, that were
+sometimes justified and sometimes not, and that (taken
+altogether) it occasionally wearied me to be obliged to
+share.&nbsp; I can look at horses, and I can look at trees too,
+although not fond of it.&nbsp; But why should I look at a lame
+horse, or a tree that was like the letter Y?&nbsp; What
+exhilaration could I feel in viewing a cottage that was the same
+colour as &lsquo;the second from the miller&rsquo;s&rsquo; in
+some place where I had never been, and of which I had not
+previously heard?&nbsp; I am ashamed to complain, but there were
+moments when my juvenile and confidential friend weighed heavy on
+my hands.&nbsp; His cackle was indeed almost continuous, but it
+was never unamiable.&nbsp; He showed an amiable curiosity when he
+was asking questions; an amiable guilelessness when he was
+conferring information.&nbsp; And both he did largely.&nbsp; I am
+in a position to write the biographies of Mr. Rowley, Mr.
+Rowley&rsquo;s father and mother, his Aunt Eliza, and the
+miller&rsquo;s dog; and nothing but pity for the reader, and some
+misgivings as to the law of copyright, prevail on me to withhold
+them.</p>
+<p>A general design to mould himself upon my example became early
+apparent, and I had not the heart to check it.&nbsp; He began to
+mimic my carriage; he acquired, with servile accuracy, a little
+manner I had of shrugging the shoulders; and I may say it was by
+observing it in him that I first discovered it in myself.&nbsp;
+One day it came out by chance that I was of the Catholic
+religion.&nbsp; He became plunged in thought, at which I was
+gently glad.&nbsp; Then suddenly&mdash;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Odd-rabbit it!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll be Catholic too!&rsquo;
+he broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must teach me it, Mr. Anne&mdash;I
+mean, Ramornie.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I dissuaded him: alleging that he would find me very
+imperfectly informed as to the grounds and doctrines of the
+Church, and that, after all, in the matter of religions, it was a
+very poor idea to change.&nbsp; &lsquo;Of course, my Church is
+the best,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but that is not the reason why I
+belong to it: I belong to it because it was the faith of my
+house.&nbsp; I wish to take my chances with my own people, and so
+should you.&nbsp; If it is a question of going to hell, go to
+hell like a gentleman with your ancestors.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, it wasn&rsquo;t that,&rsquo; he admitted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t know that I was exactly thinking of
+hell.&nbsp; Then there&rsquo;s the inquisition, too.&nbsp;
+That&rsquo;s rather a cawker, you know.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I don&rsquo;t believe you were thinking of anything
+in the world,&rsquo; said I&mdash;which put a period to his
+respectable conversion.</p>
+<p>He consoled himself by playing for awhile on a cheap
+flageolet, which was one of his diversions, and to which I owed
+many intervals of peace.&nbsp; When he first produced it, in the
+joints, from his pocket, he had the duplicity to ask me if I
+played upon it.&nbsp; I answered, no; and he put the instrument
+away with a sigh and the remark that he had thought I
+might.&nbsp; For some while he resisted the unspeakable
+temptation, his fingers visibly itching and twittering about his
+pocket, even his interest in the landscape and in sporadic
+anecdote entirely lost.&nbsp; Presently the pipe was in his hands
+again; he fitted, unfitted, refitted, and played upon it in dumb
+show for some time.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I play it myself a little,&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you?&rsquo; said I, and yawned.</p>
+<p>And then he broke down.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Ramornie, if you please, would it disturb you, sir,
+if I was to play a chune?&rsquo; he pleaded.&nbsp; And from that
+hour, the tootling of the flageolet cheered our way.</p>
+<p>He was particularly keen on the details of battles, single
+combats, incidents of scouting parties, and the like.&nbsp; These
+he would make haste to cap with some of the exploits of Wallace,
+the only hero with whom he had the least acquaintance.&nbsp; His
+enthusiasm was genuine and pretty.&nbsp; When he learned we were
+going to Scotland, &lsquo;Well, then,&rsquo; he broke out,
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll see where Wallace lived!&rsquo;&nbsp; And
+presently after, he fell to moralising.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s a
+strange thing, sir,&rsquo; he began, &lsquo;that I seem somehow
+to have always the wrong sow by the ear.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m English
+after all, and I glory in it.&nbsp; My eye! don&rsquo;t I,
+though!&nbsp; Let some of your Frenchies come over here to
+invade, and you&rsquo;ll see whether or not!&nbsp; Oh, yes,
+I&rsquo;m English to the backbone, I am.&nbsp; And yet look at
+me!&nbsp; I got hold of this &rsquo;ere William Wallace and took
+to him right off; I never heard of such a man before!&nbsp; And
+then you came along, and I took to you.&nbsp; And both the two of
+you were my born enemies!&nbsp; I&mdash;I beg your pardon, Mr.
+Ramornie, but would you mind it very much if you didn&rsquo;t go
+for to do anything against England&rsquo;&mdash;he brought the
+word out suddenly, like something hot&mdash;&lsquo;when I was
+along of you?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was more affected than I can tell.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;you need have no
+fear.&nbsp; By how much I love my own honour, by so much I will
+take care to protect yours.&nbsp; We are but fraternising at the
+outposts, as soldiers do.&nbsp; When the bugle calls, my boy, we
+must face each other, one for England, one for France, and may
+God defend the right!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>So I spoke at the moment; but for all my brave airs, the boy
+had wounded me in a vital quarter.&nbsp; His words continued to
+ring in my hearing.&nbsp; There was no remission all day of my
+remorseful thoughts; and that night (which we lay at Lichfield, I
+believe) there was no sleep for me in my bed.&nbsp; I put out the
+candle and lay down with a good resolution; and in a moment all
+was light about me like a theatre, and I saw myself upon the
+stage of it playing ignoble parts.&nbsp; I remembered France and
+my Emperor, now depending on the arbitrament of war, bent down,
+fighting on their knees and with their teeth against so many and
+such various assailants.&nbsp; And I burned with shame to be here
+in England, cherishing an English fortune, pursuing an English
+mistress, and not there, to handle a musket in my native fields,
+and to manure them with my body if I fell.&nbsp; I remembered
+that I belonged to France.&nbsp; All my fathers had fought for
+her, and some had died; the voice in my throat, the sight of my
+eyes, the tears that now sprang there, the whole man of me, was
+fashioned of French earth and born of a French mother; I had been
+tended and caressed by a succession of the daughters of France,
+the fairest, the most ill-starred; and I had fought and conquered
+shoulder to shoulder with her sons.&nbsp; A soldier, a noble, of
+the proudest and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to the
+prattle of a hobbledehoy lackey in an English chaise to recall me
+to the consciousness of duty.</p>
+<p>When I saw how it was I did not lose time in indecision.&nbsp;
+The old classical conflict of love and honour being once fairly
+before me, it did not cost me a thought.&nbsp; I was a Saint-Yves
+de K&eacute;roual; and I decided to strike off on the morrow for
+Wakefield and Burchell Fenn, and embark, as soon as it should be
+morally possible, for the succour of my downtrodden fatherland
+and my beleaguered Emperor.&nbsp; Pursuant on this resolve, I
+leaped from bed, made a light, and as the watchman was crying
+half-past two in the dark streets of Lichfield, sat down to pen a
+letter of farewell to Flora.&nbsp; And then&mdash;whether it was
+the sudden chill of the night, whether it came by association of
+ideas from the remembrance of Swanston Cottage I know not, but
+there appeared before me&mdash;to the barking of
+sheep-dogs&mdash;a couple of snuffy and shambling figures, each
+wrapped in a plaid, each armed with a rude staff; and I was
+immediately bowed down to have forgotten them so long, and of
+late to have thought of them so cavalierly.</p>
+<p>Sure enough there was my errand!&nbsp; As a private person I
+was neither French nor English; I was something else first: a
+loyal gentleman, an honest man.&nbsp; Sim and Candlish must not
+be left to pay the penalty of my unfortunate blow.&nbsp; They
+held my honour tacitly pledged to succour them; and it is a sort
+of stoical refinement entirely foreign to my nature to set the
+political obligation above the personal and private.&nbsp; If
+France fell in the interval for the lack of Anne de St.-Yves,
+fall she must!&nbsp; But I was both surprised and humiliated to
+have had so plain a duty bound upon me for so long&mdash;and for
+so long to have neglected and forgotten it.&nbsp; I think any
+brave man will understand me when I say that I went to bed and to
+sleep with a conscience very much relieved, and woke again in the
+morning with a light heart.&nbsp; The very danger of the
+enterprise reassured me: to save Sim and Candlish (suppose the
+worst to come to the worst) it would be necessary for me to
+declare myself in a court of justice, with consequences which I
+did not dare to dwell upon; it could never be said that I had
+chosen the cheap and the easy&mdash;only that in a very
+perplexing competition of duties I had risked my life for the
+most immediate.</p>
+<p>We resumed the journey with more diligence: thenceforward
+posted day and night; did not halt beyond what was necessary for
+meals; and the postillions were excited by gratuities, after the
+habit of my cousin Alain.&nbsp; For twopence I could have gone
+farther and taken four horses; so extreme was my haste, running
+as I was before the terrors of an awakened conscience.&nbsp; But
+I feared to be conspicuous.&nbsp; Even as it was, we attracted
+only too much attention, with our pair and that white elephant,
+the seventy-pounds-worth of claret-coloured chaise.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile I was ashamed to look Rowley in the face.&nbsp; The
+young shaver had contrived to put me wholly in the wrong; he had
+cost me a night&rsquo;s rest and a severe and healthful
+humiliation; and I was grateful and embarrassed in his
+society.&nbsp; This would never do; it was contrary to all my
+ideas of discipline; if the officer has to blush before the
+private, or the master before the servant, nothing is left to
+hope for but discharge or death.&nbsp; I hit upon the idea of
+teaching him French; and accordingly, from Lichfield, I became
+the distracted master, and he the scholar&mdash;how shall I say?
+indefatigable, but uninspired.&nbsp; His interest never
+flagged.&nbsp; He would hear the same word twenty times with
+profound refreshment, mispronounce it in several different ways,
+and forget it again with magical celerity.&nbsp; Say it happened
+to be <i>stirrup</i>.&nbsp; &lsquo;No, I don&rsquo;t seem to
+remember that word, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; he would say: &lsquo;it
+don&rsquo;t seem to stick to me, that word
+don&rsquo;t.&rsquo;&nbsp; And then, when I had told it him again,
+&lsquo;<i>Etrier</i>!&rsquo; he would cry.&nbsp; &lsquo;To be
+sure!&nbsp; I had it on the tip of my tongue.&nbsp;
+<i>Eterier</i>!&rsquo; (going wrong already, as if by a fatal
+instinct).&nbsp; &lsquo;What will I remember it by, now?&nbsp;
+Why, <i>interior</i>, to be sure!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll remember it by
+its being something that ain&rsquo;t in the interior of a
+horse.&rsquo;&nbsp; And when next I had occasion to ask him the
+French for stirrup, it was a toss-up whether he had forgotten all
+about it, or gave me <i>exterior</i> for an answer.&nbsp; He was
+never a hair discouraged.&nbsp; He seemed to consider that he was
+covering the ground at a normal rate.&nbsp; He came up smiling
+day after day.&nbsp; &lsquo;Now, sir, shall we do our
+French?&rsquo; he would say; and I would put questions, and
+elicit copious commentary and explanation, but never the shadow
+of an answer.&nbsp; My hands fell to my sides; I could have wept
+to hear him.&nbsp; When I reflected that he had as yet learned
+nothing, and what a vast deal more there was for him to learn,
+the period of these lessons seemed to unroll before me vast as
+eternity, and I saw myself a teacher of a hundred, and Rowley a
+pupil of ninety, still hammering on the rudiments!&nbsp; The
+wretched boy, I should say, was quite unspoiled by the inevitable
+familiarities of the journey.&nbsp; He turned out at each stage
+the pink of serving-lads, deft, civil, prompt, attentive,
+touching his hat like an automaton, raising the status of Mr.
+Ramornie in the eyes of all the inn by his smiling service, and
+seeming capable of anything in the world but the one thing I had
+chosen&mdash;learning French!</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;THE ADVENTURE OF THE RUNAWAY COUPLE</h2>
+<p>The country had for some time back been changing in
+character.&nbsp; By a thousand indications I could judge that I
+was again drawing near to Scotland.&nbsp; I saw it written in the
+face of the hills, in the growth of the trees, and in the glint
+of the waterbrooks that kept the high-road company.&nbsp; It
+might have occurred to me, also, that I was, at the same time,
+approaching a place of some fame in Britain&mdash;Gretna
+Green.&nbsp; Over these same leagues of road&mdash;which Rowley
+and I now traversed in the claret-coloured chaise, to the note of
+the flageolet and the French lesson&mdash;how many pairs of
+lovers had gone bowling northwards to the music of sixteen
+scampering horseshoes; and how many irate persons, parents,
+uncles, guardians, evicted rivals, had come tearing after,
+clapping the frequent red face to the chaise-window, lavishly
+shedding their gold about the post-houses, sedulously loading and
+re-loading, as they went, their avenging pistols!&nbsp; But I
+doubt if I had thought of it at all, before a wayside hazard
+swept me into the thick of an adventure of this nature; and I
+found myself playing providence with other people&rsquo;s lives,
+to my own admiration at the moment&mdash;and subsequently to my
+own brief but passionate regret.</p>
+<p>At rather an ugly corner of an uphill reach I came on the
+wreck of a chaise lying on one side in the ditch, a man and a
+woman in animated discourse in the middle of the road, and the
+two postillions, each with his pair of horses, looking on and
+laughing from the saddle.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Morning breezes! here&rsquo;s a smash!&rsquo; cried
+Rowley, pocketing his flageolet in the middle of the <i>Tight
+Little Island</i>.</p>
+<p>I was perhaps more conscious of the moral smash than the
+physical&mdash;more alive to broken hearts than to broken
+chaises; for, as plain as the sun at morning, there was a screw
+loose in this runaway match.&nbsp; It is always a bad sign when
+the lower classes laugh: their taste in humour is both poor and
+sinister; and for a man, running the posts with four horses,
+presumably with open pockets, and in the company of the most
+entrancing little creature conceivable, to have come down so far
+as to be laughed at by his own postillions, was only to be
+explained on the double hypothesis, that he was a fool and no
+gentleman.</p>
+<p>I have said they were man and woman.&nbsp; I should have said
+man and child.&nbsp; She was certainly not more than seventeen,
+pretty as an angel, just plump enough to damn a saint, and
+dressed in various shades of blue, from her stockings to her
+saucy cap, in a kind of taking gamut, the top note of which she
+flung me in a beam from her too appreciative eye.&nbsp; There was
+no doubt about the case: I saw it all.&nbsp; From a
+boarding-school, a black-board, a piano, and Clementi&rsquo;s
+<i>Sonatinas</i>, the child had made a rash adventure upon life
+in the company of a half-bred hawbuck; and she was already not
+only regretting it, but expressing her regret with point and
+pungency.</p>
+<p>As I alighted they both paused with that unmistakable air of
+being interrupted in a scene.&nbsp; I uncovered to the lady and
+placed my services at their disposal.</p>
+<p>It was the man who answered.&nbsp; &lsquo;There&rsquo;s no use
+in shamming, sir,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;This lady and I
+have run away, and her father&rsquo;s after us: road to Gretna,
+sir.&nbsp; And here have these nincompoops spilt us in the ditch
+and smashed the chaise!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Very provoking,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t know when I&rsquo;ve been so
+provoked!&rsquo; cried he, with a glance down the road, of mortal
+terror.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The father is no doubt very much incensed?&rsquo; I
+pursued civilly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O God!&rsquo; cried the hawbuck.&nbsp; &lsquo;In short,
+you see, we must get out of this.&nbsp; And I&rsquo;ll tell you
+what&mdash;it may seem cool, but necessity has no law&mdash;if
+you would lend us your chaise to the next post-house, it would be
+the very thing, sir.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I confess it seems cool,&rsquo; I replied.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What&rsquo;s that you say, sir?&rsquo; he snapped.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I was agreeing with you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Yes, it does seem cool; and what is more to the point, it
+seems unnecessary.&nbsp; This thing can be arranged in a more
+satisfactory manner otherwise, I think.&nbsp; You can doubtless
+ride?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>This opened a door on the matter of their previous dispute,
+and the fellow appeared life-sized in his true colours.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s what I&rsquo;ve been telling her: that, damn
+her! she must ride!&rsquo; he broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;And if the
+gentleman&rsquo;s of the same mind, why, damme, you
+shall!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As he said so, he made a snatch at her wrist, which she evaded
+with horror.</p>
+<p>I stepped between them.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, sir,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;the lady shall
+not.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He turned on me raging.&nbsp; &lsquo;And who are you to
+interfere?&rsquo; he roared.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There is here no question of who I am,&rsquo; I
+replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I may be the devil or the Archbishop of
+Canterbury for what you know, or need know.&nbsp; The point is
+that I can help you&mdash;it appears that nobody else can; and I
+will tell you how I propose to do it.&nbsp; I will give the lady
+a seat in my chaise, if you will return the compliment by
+allowing my servant to ride one of your horses.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I thought he would have sprung at my throat.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have always the alternative before you: to wait
+here for the arrival of papa,&rsquo; I added.</p>
+<p>And that settled him.&nbsp; He cast another haggard look down
+the road, and capitulated.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sure, sir, the lady is very much obliged to
+you,&rsquo; he said, with an ill grace.</p>
+<p>I gave her my hand; she mounted like a bird into the chaise;
+Rowley, grinning from ear to ear, closed the door behind us; the
+two impudent rascals of post-boys cheered and laughed aloud as we
+drove off; and my own postillion urged his horses at once into a
+rattling trot.&nbsp; It was plain I was supposed by all to have
+done a very dashing act, and ravished the bride from the
+ravisher.</p>
+<p>In the meantime I stole a look at the little lady.&nbsp; She
+was in a state of pitiable discomposure, and her arms shook on
+her lap in her black lace mittens.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam&mdash;&rsquo; I began.</p>
+<p>And she, in the same moment, finding her voice: &lsquo;O, what
+you must think of me!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;what must any gentleman
+think when he sees youth, beauty and innocence in distress?&nbsp;
+I wish I could tell you that I was old enough to be your father;
+I think we must give that up,&rsquo; I continued, with a
+smile.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I will tell you something about myself
+which ought to do as well, and to set that little heart at rest
+in my society.&nbsp; I am a lover.&nbsp; May I say it of
+myself&mdash;for I am not quite used to all the niceties of
+English&mdash;that I am a true lover?&nbsp; There is one whom I
+admire, adore, obey; she is no less good than she is beautiful;
+if she were here, she would take you to her arms: conceive that
+she has sent me&mdash;that she has said to me, &ldquo;Go, be her
+knight!&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, I know she must be sweet, I know she must be worthy
+of you!&rsquo; cried the little lady.&nbsp; &lsquo;She would
+never forget female decorum&mdash;nor make the terrible
+<i>erratum</i> I&rsquo;ve done!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And at this she lifted up her voice and wept.</p>
+<p>This did not forward matters: it was in vain that I begged her
+to be more composed and to tell me a plain, consecutive tale of
+her misadventures; but she continued instead to pour forth the
+most extraordinary mixture of the correct school miss and the
+poor untutored little piece of womanhood in a false
+position&mdash;of engrafted pedantry and incoherent nature.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am certain it must have been judicial
+blindness,&rsquo; she sobbed.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can&rsquo;t think
+how I didn&rsquo;t see it, but I didn&rsquo;t; and he
+isn&rsquo;t, is he?&nbsp; And then a curtain rose . . . O, what a
+moment was that!&nbsp; But I knew at once that <i>you were</i>;
+you had but to appear from your carriage, and I knew it, O, she
+must be a fortunate young lady!&nbsp; And I have no fear with
+you, none&mdash;a perfect confidence.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;a gentleman.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That&rsquo;s what I mean&mdash;a gentleman,&rsquo; she
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;And he&mdash;and that&mdash;<i>he</i>
+isn&rsquo;t.&nbsp; O, how shall I dare meet father!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And disclosing to me her tear-stained face, and opening her arms
+with a tragic gesture: &lsquo;And I am quite disgraced before all
+the young ladies, my school-companions!&rsquo; she added.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, not so bad as that!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Come, come, you exaggerate, my dear Miss&mdash;?&nbsp;
+Excuse me if I am too familiar: I have not yet heard your
+name.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My name is Dorothy Greensleeves, sir: why should I
+conceal it?&nbsp; I fear it will only serve to point an adage to
+future generations, and I had meant so differently!&nbsp; There
+was no young female in the county more emulous to be thought well
+of than I.&nbsp; And what a fall was there!&nbsp; O, dear me,
+what a wicked, piggish donkey of a girl I have made of myself, to
+be sure!&nbsp; And there is no hope! O, Mr.&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And at that she paused and asked my name.</p>
+<p>I am not writing my eulogium for the Academy; I will admit it
+was unpardonably imbecile, but I told it her.&nbsp; If you had
+been there&mdash;and seen her, ravishingly pretty and little, a
+baby in years and mind&mdash;and heard her talking like a book,
+with so much of schoolroom propriety in her manner, with such an
+innocent despair in the matter&mdash;you would probably have told
+her yours.&nbsp; She repeated it after me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I shall pray for you all my life,&rsquo; she
+said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Every night, when I retire to rest, the last
+thing I shall do is to remember you by name.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Presently I succeeded in winning from her her tale, which was
+much what I had anticipated: a tale of a schoolhouse, a walled
+garden, a fruit-tree that concealed a bench, an impudent raff
+posturing in church, an exchange of flowers and vows over the
+garden wall, a silly schoolmate for a confidante, a chaise and
+four, and the most immediate and perfect disenchantment on the
+part of the little lady.&nbsp; &lsquo;And there is nothing to be
+done!&rsquo; she wailed in conclusion.&nbsp; &lsquo;My error is
+irretrievable, I am quite forced to that conclusion.&nbsp; O,
+Monsieur de Saint-Yves! who would have thought that I could have
+been such a blind, wicked donkey!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I should have said before&mdash;only that I really do not know
+when it came in&mdash;that we had been overtaken by the two
+post-boys, Rowley and Mr. Bellamy, which was the hawbuck&rsquo;s
+name, bestriding the four post-horses; and that these formed a
+sort of cavalry escort, riding now before, now behind the chaise,
+and Bellamy occasionally posturing at the window and obliging us
+with some of his conversation.&nbsp; He was so ill-received that
+I declare I was tempted to pity him, remembering from what a
+height he had fallen, and how few hours ago it was since the lady
+had herself fled to his arms, all blushes and ardour.&nbsp; Well,
+these great strokes of fortune usually befall the unworthy, and
+Bellamy was now the legitimate object of my commiseration and the
+ridicule of his own post-boys!</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Miss Dorothy,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you wish to be
+delivered from this man?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, if it were possible!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But not by violence.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not in the least, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The simplest thing in life.&nbsp; We are in a civilised
+country; the man&rsquo;s a malefactor&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, never!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do not even
+dream it!&nbsp; With all his faults, I know he is not
+<i>that</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Anyway, he&rsquo;s in the wrong in this affair&mdash;on
+the wrong side of the law, call it what you please,&rsquo; said
+I; and with that, our four horsemen having for the moment headed
+us by a considerable interval, I hailed my post-boy and inquired
+who was the nearest magistrate and where he lived.&nbsp;
+Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a prodigious dignitary, and one
+who lived but a lane or two back, and at the distance of only a
+mile or two out of the direct road.&nbsp; I showed him the
+king&rsquo;s medallion.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Take the lady there, and at full gallop,&rsquo; I
+cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Right, sir!&nbsp; Mind yourself,&rsquo; says the
+postillion.</p>
+<p>And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the
+carriage to the rightabout and we were galloping south.</p>
+<p>Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre,
+and came flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate
+shouting; so that the fine, sober picture of a carriage and
+escort, that we had presented but a moment back, was transformed
+in the twinkling of an eye into the image of a noisy
+fox-chase.&nbsp; The two postillions and my own saucy rogue were,
+of course, disinterested actors in the comedy; they rode for the
+mere sport, keeping in a body, their mouths full of laughter,
+waving their hats as they came on, and crying (as the fancy
+struck them) Tally-ho!&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Stop,
+thief!&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;A highwayman!&nbsp; A
+highwayman!&rsquo;&nbsp; It was otherguess work with
+Bellamy.&nbsp; That gentleman no sooner observed our change of
+direction than he turned his horse with so much violence that the
+poor animal was almost cast upon its side, and launched her in
+immediate and desperate pursuit.&nbsp; As he approached I saw
+that his face was deadly white and that he carried a drawn pistol
+in his hand.&nbsp; I turned at once to the poor little bride that
+was to have been, and now was not to be; she, upon her side,
+deserting the other window, turned as if to meet me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, O, don&rsquo;t let him kill me!&rsquo; she
+screamed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Never fear,&rsquo; I replied.</p>
+<p>Her face was distorted with terror.&nbsp; Her hands took hold
+upon me with the instinctive clutch of an infant.&nbsp; The
+chaise gave a flying lurch, which took the feet from under me and
+tumbled us anyhow upon the seat.&nbsp; And almost in the same
+moment the head of Bellamy appeared in the window which Missy had
+left free for him.</p>
+<p>Conceive the situation!&nbsp; The little lady and I were
+falling&mdash;or had just fallen&mdash;backward on the seat, and
+offered to the eye a somewhat ambiguous picture.&nbsp; The chaise
+was speeding at a furious pace, and with the most violent leaps
+and lurches, along the highway.&nbsp; Into this bounding
+receptacle Bellamy interjected his head, his pistol arm, and his
+pistol; and since his own horse was travelling still faster than
+the chaise, he must withdraw all of them again in the inside of
+the fraction of a minute.&nbsp; He did so, but he left the charge
+of the pistol behind him&mdash;whether by design or accident I
+shall never know, and I dare say he has forgotten!&nbsp; Probably
+he had only meant to threaten, in hopes of causing us to arrest
+our flight.&nbsp; In the same moment came the explosion and a
+pitiful cry from Missy; and my gentleman, making certain he had
+struck her, went down the road pursued by the furies, turned at
+the first corner, took a flying leap over the thorn hedge, and
+disappeared across country in the least possible time.</p>
+<p>Rowley was ready and eager to pursue; but I withheld him,
+thinking we were excellently quit of Mr. Bellamy, at no more cost
+than a scratch on the forearm and a bullet-hole in the left-hand
+claret-coloured panel.&nbsp; And accordingly, but now at a more
+decent pace, we proceeded on our way to Archdeacon
+Clitheroe&rsquo;s, Missy&rsquo;s gratitude and admiration were
+aroused to a high pitch by this dramatic scene, and what she was
+pleased to call my wound.&nbsp; She must dress it for me with her
+handkerchief, a service which she rendered me even with
+tears.&nbsp; I could well have spared them, not loving on the
+whole to be made ridiculous, and the injury being in the nature
+of a cat&rsquo;s scratch.&nbsp; Indeed, I would have suggested
+for her kind care rather the cure of my coat-sleeve, which had
+suffered worse in the encounter; but I was too wise to risk the
+anti-climax.&nbsp; That she had been rescued by a hero, that the
+hero should have been wounded in the affray, and his wound
+bandaged with her handkerchief (which it could not even bloody),
+ministered incredibly to the recovery of her self-respect; and I
+could hear her relate the incident to &lsquo;the young ladies, my
+school-companions,&rsquo; in the most approved manner of Mrs.
+Radcliffe!&nbsp; To have insisted on the torn coat-sleeve would
+have been unmannerly, if not inhuman.</p>
+<p>Presently the residence of the archdeacon began to heave in
+sight.&nbsp; A chaise and four smoking horses stood by the steps,
+and made way for us on our approach; and even as we alighted
+there appeared from the interior of the house a tall
+ecclesiastic, and beside him a little, headstrong, ruddy man, in
+a towering passion, and brandishing over his head a roll of
+paper.&nbsp; At sight of him Miss Dorothy flung herself on her
+knees with the most moving adjurations, calling him father,
+assuring him she was wholly cured and entirely repentant of her
+disobedience, and entreating forgiveness; and I soon saw that she
+need fear no great severity from Mr. Greensleeves, who showed
+himself extraordinarily fond, loud, greedy of caresses and
+prodigal of tears.</p>
+<p>To give myself a countenance, as well as to have all ready for
+the road when I should find occasion, I turned to quit scores
+with Bellamy&rsquo;s two postillions.&nbsp; They had not the
+least claim on me, but one of which they were quite
+ignorant&mdash;that I was a fugitive.&nbsp; It is the worst
+feature of that false position that every gratuity becomes a case
+of conscience.&nbsp; You must not leave behind you any one
+discontented nor any one grateful.&nbsp; But the whole business
+had been such a &lsquo;hurrah-boys&rsquo; from the beginning, and
+had gone off in the fifth act so like a melodrama, in explosions,
+reconciliations, and the rape of a post-horse, that it was
+plainly impossible to keep it covered.&nbsp; It was plain it
+would have to be talked over in all the inn-kitchens for thirty
+miles about, and likely for six months to come.&nbsp; It only
+remained for me, therefore, to settle on that gratuity which
+should be least conspicuous&mdash;so large that nobody could
+grumble, so small that nobody would be tempted to boast.&nbsp; My
+decision was hastily and nor wisely taken.&nbsp; The one fellow
+spat on his tip (so he called it) for luck; the other developing
+a sudden streak of piety, prayed God bless me with fervour.&nbsp;
+It seemed a demonstration was brewing, and I determined to be off
+at once.&nbsp; Bidding my own post-boy and Rowley be in readiness
+for an immediate start, I reascended the terrace and presented
+myself, hat in hand, before Mr. Greensleeves and the
+archdeacon.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You will excuse me, I trust,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I think shame to interrupt this agreeable scene of family
+effusion, which I have been privileged in some small degree to
+bring about.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And at these words the storm broke.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Small degree! small degree, sir!&rsquo; cries the
+father; &lsquo;that shall not pass, Mr. St. Eaves!&nbsp; If
+I&rsquo;ve got my darling back, and none the worse for that
+vagabone rascal, I know whom I have to thank.&nbsp; Shake hands
+with me&mdash;up to the elbows, sir!&nbsp; A Frenchman you may
+be, but you&rsquo;re one of the right breed, by God!&nbsp; And,
+by God, sir, you may have anything you care to ask of me, down to
+Dolly&rsquo;s hand, by God!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>All this he roared out in a voice surprisingly powerful from
+so small a person.&nbsp; Every word was thus audible to the
+servants, who had followed them out of the house and now
+congregated about us on the terrace, as well as to Rowley and the
+five postillions on the gravel sweep below.&nbsp; The sentiments
+expressed were popular; some ass, whom the devil moved to be my
+enemy, proposed three cheers, and they were given with a
+will.&nbsp; To hear my own name resounding amid acclamations in
+the hills of Westmorland was flattering, perhaps; but it was
+inconvenient at a moment when (as I was morally persuaded) police
+handbills were already speeding after me at the rate of a hundred
+miles a day.</p>
+<p>Nor was that the end of it.&nbsp; The archdeacon must present
+his compliments, and pressed upon me some of his West India
+sherry, and I was carried into a vastly fine library, where I was
+presented to his lady wife.&nbsp; While we were at sherry in the
+library, ale was handed round upon the terrace.&nbsp; Speeches
+were made, hands were shaken, Missy (at her father&rsquo;s
+request) kissed me farewell, and the whole party reaccompanied me
+to the terrace, where they stood waving hats and handkerchiefs,
+and crying farewells to all the echoes of the mountains until the
+chaise had disappeared.</p>
+<p>The echoes of the mountains were engaged in saying to me
+privately: &lsquo;You fool, you have done it now!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;They do seem to have got &rsquo;old of your name, Mr.
+Anne,&rsquo; said Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;It weren&rsquo;t my fault
+this time.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It was one of those accidents that can never be
+foreseen,&rsquo; said I, affecting a dignity that I was far from
+feeling.&nbsp; &lsquo;Some one recognised me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Which on &rsquo;em, Mr. Anne?&rsquo; said the
+rascal.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That is a senseless question; it can make no difference
+who it was,&rsquo; I returned.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, nor that it can&rsquo;t!&rsquo; cried Rowley.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I say, Mr. Anne, sir, it&rsquo;s what you would call a
+jolly mess, ain&rsquo;t it? looks like &ldquo;clean bowled-out in
+the middle stump,&rdquo; don&rsquo;t it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I fail to understand you, Rowley.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, what I mean is, what are we to do about this
+one?&rsquo; pointing to the postillion in front of us, as he
+alternately hid and revealed his patched breeches to the trot of
+his horse.&nbsp; &lsquo;He see you get in this morning under
+<i>Mr. Ramornie</i>&mdash;I was very piticular to <i>Mr.
+Ramornie</i> you, if you remember, sir&mdash;and he see you get
+in again under Mr. Saint Eaves, and whatever&rsquo;s he going to
+see you get out under? that&rsquo;s what worries me, sir.&nbsp;
+It don&rsquo;t seem to me like as if the position was what you
+call <i>stratetegic</i>!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;<i>Parrrbleu</i>! will you let me be!&rsquo; I
+cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have to think; you cannot imagine how your
+constant idiotic prattle annoys me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Beg pardon, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said he; and the next
+moment, &lsquo;You wouldn&rsquo;t like for us to do our French
+now, would you, Mr. Anne?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Certainly not,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Play upon
+your flageolet.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The which he did with what seemed to me to be irony.</p>
+<p>Conscience doth make cowards of us all!&nbsp; I was so
+downcast by my pitiful mismanagement of the morning&rsquo;s
+business that I shrank from the eye of my own hired infant, and
+read offensive meanings into his idle tootling.</p>
+<p>I took off my coat, and set to mending it, soldier-fashion,
+with a needle and thread.&nbsp; There is nothing more conducive
+to thought, above all in arduous circumstances; and as I sewed, I
+gradually gained a clearness upon my affairs.&nbsp; I must be
+done with the claret-coloured chaise at once.&nbsp; It should be
+sold at the next stage for what it would bring.&nbsp; Rowley and
+I must take back to the road on our four feet, and after a decent
+interval of trudging, get places on some coach for Edinburgh
+again under new names!&nbsp; So much trouble and toil, so much
+extra risk and expense and loss of time, and all for a slip of
+the tongue to a little lady in blue!</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;THE INN-KEEPER OF KIRKBY-LONSDALE</h2>
+<p>I had hitherto conceived and partly carried out an ideal that
+was dear to my heart.&nbsp; Rowley and I descended from our
+claret-coloured chaise, a couple of correctly dressed, brisk,
+bright-eyed young fellows, like a pair of aristocratic mice;
+attending singly to our own affairs, communicating solely with
+each other, and that with the niceties and civilities of
+drill.&nbsp; We would pass through the little crowd before the
+door with high-bred preoccupation, inoffensively haughty, after
+the best English pattern; and disappear within, followed by the
+envy and admiration of the bystanders, a model master and
+servant, point-device in every part.&nbsp; It was a heavy thought
+to me, as we drew up before the inn at Kirkby-Lonsdale, that this
+scene was now to be enacted for the last time.&nbsp; Alas! and
+had I known it, it was to go of with so inferior a grace!</p>
+<p>I had been injudiciously liberal to the post-boys of the
+chaise and four.&nbsp; My own post-boy, he of the patched
+breeches, now stood before me, his eyes glittering with greed,
+his hand advanced.&nbsp; It was plain he anticipated something
+extraordinary by way of a <i>pourboire</i>; and considering the
+marches and counter-marches by which I had extended the stage,
+the military character of our affairs with Mr. Bellamy, and the
+bad example I had set before him at the archdeacon&rsquo;s,
+something exceptional was certainly to be done.&nbsp; But these
+are always nice questions, to a foreigner above all: a shade too
+little will suggest niggardliness, a shilling too much smells of
+hush-money.&nbsp; Fresh from the scene at the archdeacon&rsquo;s,
+and flushed by the idea that I was now nearly done with the
+responsibilities of the claret-coloured chaise, I put into his
+hands five guineas; and the amount served only to waken his
+cupidity.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, come, sir, you ain&rsquo;t going to fob me of with
+this?&nbsp; Why, I seen fire at your side!&rsquo; he cried.</p>
+<p>It would never do to give him more; I felt I should become the
+fable of Kirkby-Lonsdale if I did; and I looked him in the face,
+sternly but still smiling, and addressed him with a voice of
+uncompromising firmness.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you do not like it, give it back,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>He pocketed the guineas with the quickness of a conjurer, and,
+like a base-born cockney as he was, fell instantly to casting
+dirt.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;&rsquo;Ave your own way of it, Mr.
+Ramornie&mdash;leastways Mr. St. Eaves, or whatever your blessed
+name may be.&nbsp; Look &rsquo;ere&rsquo;&mdash;turning for
+sympathy to the stable-boys&mdash;&lsquo;this is a blessed
+business.&nbsp; Blessed &rsquo;ard, I calls it.&nbsp; &rsquo;Ere
+I takes up a blessed son of a pop-gun what calls hisself anything
+you care to mention, and turns out to be a blessed
+<i>mounseer</i> at the end of it!&nbsp; &rsquo;Ere &rsquo;ave I
+been drivin&rsquo; of him up and down all day, a-carrying off of
+gals, a-shootin&rsquo; of pistyils, and a-drinkin&rsquo; of
+sherry and hale; and wot does he up and give me but a blank,
+blank, blanketing blank!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The fellow&rsquo;s language had become too powerful for
+reproduction, and I passed it by.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile I observed Rowley fretting visibly at the bit;
+another moment, and he would have added a last touch of the
+ridiculous to our arrival by coming to his hands with the
+postillion.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley!&rsquo; cried I reprovingly.</p>
+<p>Strictly it should have been Gammon; but in the hurry of the
+moment, my fault (I can only hope) passed unperceived.&nbsp; At
+the same time I caught the eye of the postmaster.&nbsp; He was
+long and lean, and brown and bilious; he had the drooping nose of
+the humourist, and the quick attention of a man of parts.&nbsp;
+He read my embarrassment in a glance, stepped instantly forward,
+sent the post-boy to the rightabout with half a word, and was
+back next moment at my side.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Dinner in a private room, sir?&nbsp; Very well.&nbsp;
+John, No. 4!&nbsp; What wine would you care to mention?&nbsp;
+Very well, sir.&nbsp; Will you please to order fresh
+horses?&nbsp; Not, sir?&nbsp; Very well.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Each of these expressions was accompanied by something in the
+nature of a bow, and all were prefaced by something in the nature
+of a smile, which I could very well have done without.&nbsp; The
+man&rsquo;s politeness was from the teeth outwards; behind and
+within, I was conscious of a perpetual scrutiny: the scene at his
+doorstep, the random confidences of the post-boy, had not been
+thrown away on this observer; and it was under a strong fear of
+coming trouble that I was shown at last into my private
+room.&nbsp; I was in half a mind to have put off the whole
+business.&nbsp; But the truth is, now my name had got abroad, my
+fear of the mail that was coming, and the handbills it should
+contain, had waxed inordinately, and I felt I could never eat a
+meal in peace till I had severed my connection with the
+claret-coloured chaise.</p>
+<p>Accordingly, as soon as I had done with dinner, I sent my
+compliments to the landlord and requested he should take a glass
+of wine with me.&nbsp; He came; we exchanged the necessary
+civilities, and presently I approached my business.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;By the bye,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;we had a brush down
+the road to-day.&nbsp; I dare say you may have heard of
+it?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He nodded.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I was so unlucky as to get a pistol ball in the
+panel of my chaise,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;which makes it
+simply useless to me.&nbsp; Do you know any one likely to
+buy?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I can well understand that,&rsquo; said the landlord,
+&lsquo;I was looking at it just now; it&rsquo;s as good as
+ruined, is that chaise.&nbsp; General rule, people don&rsquo;t
+like chaises with bullet-holes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Too much <i>Romance of the Forest</i>?&rsquo; I
+suggested, recalling my little friend of the morning, and what I
+was sure had been her favourite reading&mdash;Mrs.
+Radcliffe&rsquo;s novels.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Just so,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;They may be
+right, they may be wrong; I&rsquo;m not the judge.&nbsp; But I
+suppose it&rsquo;s natural, after all, for respectable people to
+like things respectable about them; not bullet-holes, nor puddles
+of blood, nor men with aliases.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I took a glass of wine and held it up to the light to show
+that my hand was steady.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I suppose so.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have papers, of course, showing you are the proper
+owner?&rsquo; he inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;There is the bill, stamped and receipted,&rsquo; said
+I, tossing it across to him.</p>
+<p>He looked at it.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This all you have?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is enough, at least,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It
+shows you where I bought and what I paid for it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t know,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You want some paper of identification.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To identify the chaise?&rsquo; I inquired.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not at all: to identify <i>you</i>,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My good sir, remember yourself!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The title-deeds of my estate are in that despatch-box; but
+you do not seriously suppose that I should allow you to examine
+them?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, you see, this paper proves that some Mr. Ramornie
+paid seventy guineas for a chaise,&rsquo; said the fellow.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s all well and good; but who&rsquo;s to prove
+to me that you are Mr. Ramornie?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Fellow!&rsquo; cried I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, fellow as much as you please!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Fellow, with all my heart!&nbsp; That changes
+nothing.&nbsp; I am fellow, of course&mdash;obtrusive fellow,
+impudent fellow, if you like&mdash;but who are you?&nbsp; I hear
+of you with two names; I hear of you running away with young
+ladies, and getting cheered for a Frenchman, which seems odd; and
+one thing I will go bail for, that you were in a blue fright when
+the post-boy began to tell tales at my door.&nbsp; In short, sir,
+you may be a very good gentleman; but I don&rsquo;t know enough
+about you, and I&rsquo;ll trouble you for your papers, or to go
+before a magistrate.&nbsp; Take your choice; if I&rsquo;m not
+fine enough, I hope the magistrates are.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My good man,&rsquo; I stammered, for though I had found
+my voice, I could scarce be said to have recovered my wits,
+&lsquo;this is most unusual, most rude.&nbsp; Is it the custom in
+Westmorland that gentlemen should be insulted?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That depends,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;When
+it&rsquo;s suspected that gentlemen are spies it <i>is</i> the
+custom; and a good custom, too.&nbsp; No no,&rsquo; he broke out,
+perceiving me to make a movement.&nbsp; &lsquo;Both hands upon
+the table, my gentleman!&nbsp; I want no pistol balls in my
+chaise panels.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Surely, sir, you do me strange injustice!&rsquo; said
+I, now the master of myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see me sitting
+here, a monument of tranquillity: pray may I help myself to wine
+without umbraging you?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I took this attitude in sheer despair.&nbsp; I had no plan, no
+hope.&nbsp; The best I could imagine was to spin the business out
+some minutes longer, then capitulate.&nbsp; At least, I would not
+capituatle one moment too soon.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Am I to take that for <i>no</i>?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Referring to your former obliging proposal?&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;My good sir, you are to take it, as you say, for
+&ldquo;No.&rdquo;&nbsp; Certainly I will not show you my deeds;
+certainly I will not rise from table and trundle out to see your
+magistrates.&nbsp; I have too much respect for my digestion, and
+too little curiosity in justices of the peace.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He leaned forward, looked me nearly in the face, and reached
+out one hand to the bell-rope.&nbsp; &lsquo;See here, my fine
+fellow!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you see that
+bell-rope?&nbsp; Let me tell you, there&rsquo;s a boy waiting
+below: one jingle, and he goes to fetch the constable.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you tell me so?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,
+there&rsquo;s no accounting for tastes!&nbsp; I have a prejudice
+against the society of constables, but if it is your fancy to
+have one in for the dessert&mdash;&rsquo;&nbsp; I shrugged my
+shoulders lightly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Really, you know,&rsquo; I added,
+&lsquo;this is vastly entertaining.&nbsp; I assure you, I am
+looking on, with all the interest of a man of the world, at the
+development of your highly original character.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He continued to study my face without speech, his hand still
+on the button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the
+decisive heat.&nbsp; My face seemed to myself to dislimn under
+his gaze, my expression to change, the smile (with which I had
+began) to degenerate into the grin of the man upon the
+rack.&nbsp; I was besides harassed with doubts.&nbsp; An innocent
+man, I argued, would have resented the fellow&rsquo;s impudence
+an hour ago; and by my continued endurance of the ordeal, I was
+simply signing and sealing my confession; in short, I had reached
+the end of my powers.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Have you any objection to my putting my hands in my
+breeches pockets?&rsquo; I inquired.&nbsp; &lsquo;Excuse me
+mentioning it, but you showed yourself so extremely nervous a
+moment back.&rsquo;&nbsp; My voice was not all I could have
+wished, but it sufficed.&nbsp; I could hear it tremble, but the
+landlord apparently could not.&nbsp; He turned away and drew a
+long breath, and you may be sure I was quick to follow his
+example.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You&rsquo;re a cool hand at least, and that&rsquo;s the
+sort I like,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be you what you please,
+I&rsquo;ll deal square.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll take the chaise for a
+hundred pound down, and throw the dinner in.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon,&rsquo; I cried, wholly mystified by
+this form of words.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You pay me a hundred down,&rsquo; he repeated,
+&lsquo;and I&rsquo;ll take the chaise.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s very
+little more than it cost,&rsquo; he added, with a grin,
+&lsquo;and you know you must get it off your hands
+somehow.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this
+impudent proposal.&nbsp; It was broadly funny, and I suppose the
+least tempting offer in the world.&nbsp; For all that, it came
+very welcome, for it gave me the occasion to laugh.&nbsp; This I
+did with the most complete abandonment, till the tears ran down
+my cheeks; and ever and again, as the fit abated, I would get
+another view of the landlord&rsquo;s face, and go off into
+another paroxysm.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You droll creature, you will be the death of me
+yet!&rsquo; I cried, drying my eyes.</p>
+<p>My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to
+look, nor yet what to say; and began for the first time to
+conceive it possible he was mistaken.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir,&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, yes!&nbsp; I am quite an original,&rsquo; I replied,
+and laughed again.</p>
+<p>Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for
+the chaise; I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the
+offer: indeed, I was glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it
+was not in the desire of gain, but with the view at any price of
+securing a safe retreat.&nbsp; For although hostilities were
+suspended, he was yet far from satisfied; and I could read his
+continued suspicions in the cloudy eye that still hovered about
+my face.&nbsp; At last they took shape in words.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This is all very well,&rsquo; says he: &lsquo;you carry
+it off well; but for all that, I must do my duty.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I had my strong effect in reserve; it was to burn my ships
+with a vengeance!&nbsp; I rose.&nbsp; &lsquo;Leave the
+room,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;This is insuperable.&nbsp; Is
+the man mad?&rsquo;&nbsp; And then, as if already half-ashamed of
+my passion: &lsquo;I can take a joke as well as any one,&rsquo; I
+added; &lsquo;but this passes measure.&nbsp; Send my servant and
+the bill.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>When he had left me alone, I considered my own valour with
+amazement.&nbsp; I had insulted him; I had sent him away alone;
+now, if ever, he would take what was the only sensible resource,
+and fetch the constable.&nbsp; But there was something
+instinctively treacherous about the man which shrank from plain
+courses.&nbsp; And, with all his cleverness, he missed the
+occasion of fame.&nbsp; Rowley and I were suffered to walk out of
+his door, with all our baggage, on foot, with no destination
+named, except in the vague statement that we were come &lsquo;to
+view the lakes&rsquo;; and my friend only watched our departure
+with his chin in his hand, still moodily irresolute.</p>
+<p>I think this one of my great successes.&nbsp; I was exposed,
+unmasked, summoned to do a perfectly natural act, which must
+prove my doom and which I had not the slightest pretext for
+refusing.&nbsp; I kept my head, stuck to my guns, and, against
+all likelihood, here I was once more at liberty and in the
+king&rsquo;s highway.&nbsp; This was a strong lesson never to
+despair; and, at the same time, how many hints to be cautious!
+and what a perplexed and dubious business the whole question of
+my escape now appeared!&nbsp; That I should have risked perishing
+upon a trumpery question of a <i>pourboire</i>, depicted in
+lively colours the perils that perpetually surrounded us.&nbsp;
+Though, to be sure, the initial mistake had been committed before
+that; and if I had not suffered myself to be drawn a little deep
+in confidences to the innocent Dolly, there need have been no
+tumble at the inn of Kirkby-Lonsdale.&nbsp; I took the lesson to
+heart, and promised myself in the future to be more
+reserved.&nbsp; It was none of my business to attend to broken
+chaises or shipwrecked travellers.&nbsp; I had my hands full of
+my own affairs; and my best defence would be a little more
+natural selfishness and a trifle less imbecile good-nature.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXV&mdash;I MEET A CHEERFUL EXTRAVAGANT</h2>
+<p>I pass over the next fifty or sixty leagues of our journey
+without comment.&nbsp; The reader must be growing weary of scenes
+of travel; and for my own part I have no cause to recall these
+particular miles with any pleasure.&nbsp; We were mainly occupied
+with attempts to obliterate our trail, which (as the result
+showed) were far from successful; for, on my cousin following, he
+was able to run me home with the least possible loss of time,
+following the claret-coloured chaise to Kirkby-Lonsdale, where I
+think the landlord must have wept to learn what he had missed,
+and tracing us thereafter to the doors of the coach-office in
+Edinburgh without a single check.&nbsp; Fortune did not favour
+me, and why should I recapitulate the details of futile
+precautions which deceived nobody, and wearisome arts which
+proved to be artless?</p>
+<p>The day was drawing to an end when Mr. Rowley and I bowled
+into Edinburgh to the stirring sound of the guard&rsquo;s bugle
+and the clattering team.&nbsp; I was here upon my field of
+battle; on the scene of my former captivity, escape and exploits;
+and in the same city with my love.&nbsp; My heart expanded; I
+have rarely felt more of a hero.&nbsp; All down the Bridges I sat
+by the driver with my arms folded and my face set, unflinchingly
+meeting every eye, and prepared every moment for a cry of
+recognition.&nbsp; Hundreds of the population were in the habit
+of visiting the Castle, where it was my practice (before the days
+of Flora) to make myself conspicuous among the prisoners; and I
+think it an extraordinary thing that I should have encountered so
+few to recognise me.&nbsp; But doubtless a clean chin is a
+disguise in itself; and the change is great from a suit of
+sulphur-yellow to fine linen, a well-fitting mouse-coloured
+great-coat furred in black, a pair of tight trousers of
+fashionable cut, and a hat of inimitable curl.&nbsp; After all,
+it was more likely that I should have recognised our visitors,
+than that they should have identified the modish gentleman with
+the miserable prisoner in the Castle.</p>
+<p>I was glad to set foot on the flagstones, and to escape from
+the crowd that had assembled to receive the mail.&nbsp; Here we
+were, with but little daylight before us, and that on Saturday
+afternoon, the eve of the famous Scottish Sabbath, adrift in the
+New Town of Edinburgh, and overladen with baggage.&nbsp; We
+carried it ourselves.&nbsp; I would not take a cab, nor so much
+as hire a porter, who might afterwards serve as a link between my
+lodgings and the mail, and connect me again with the
+claret-coloured chaise and Aylesbury.&nbsp; For I was resolved to
+break the chain of evidence for good, and to begin life afresh
+(so far as regards caution) with a new character.&nbsp; The first
+step was to find lodgings, and to find them quickly.&nbsp; This
+was the more needful as Mr. Rowley and I, in our smart clothes
+and with our cumbrous burthen, made a noticeable appearance in
+the streets at that time of the day and in that quarter of the
+town, which was largely given up to fine folk, bucks and dandies
+and young ladies, or respectable professional men on their way
+home to dinner.</p>
+<p>On the north side of St. James&rsquo; Square I was so happy as
+to spy a bill in a third-floor window.&nbsp; I was equally
+indifferent to cost and convenience in my choice of a
+lodging&mdash;&lsquo;any port in a storm&rsquo; was the principle
+on which I was prepared to act; and Rowley and I made at once for
+the common entrance and sealed the stair.</p>
+<p>We were admitted by a very sour-looking female in
+bombazine.&nbsp; I gathered she had all her life been depressed
+by a series of bereavements, the last of which might very well
+have befallen her the day before; and I instinctively lowered my
+voice when I addressed her.&nbsp; She admitted she had rooms to
+let&mdash;even showed them to us&mdash;a sitting-room and bedroom
+in a <i>suite</i>, commanding a fine prospect to the Firth and
+Fifeshire, and in themselves well proportioned and comfortably
+furnished, with pictures on the wall, shells on the mantelpiece,
+and several books upon the table which I found afterwards to be
+all of a devotional character, and all presentation copies,
+&lsquo;to my Christian friend,&rsquo; or &lsquo;to my devout
+acquaintance in the Lord, Bethiah McRankine.&rsquo;&nbsp; Beyond
+this my &lsquo;Christian friend&rsquo; could not be made to
+advance: no, not even to do that which seemed the most natural
+and pleasing thing in the world&mdash;I mean to name her
+price&mdash;but stood before us shaking her head, and at times
+mourning like the dove, the picture of depression and
+defence.&nbsp; She had a voice the most querulous I have ever
+heard, and with this she produced a whole regiment of
+difficulties and criticisms.</p>
+<p>She could not promise an attendance.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and what is my
+servant for?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Him?&rsquo; she asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be gude to
+us!&nbsp; Is <i>he</i> your servant?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sorry, ma&rsquo;am, he meets with your
+disapproval.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Na, I never said that.&nbsp; But he&rsquo;s
+young.&nbsp; He&rsquo;ll be a great breaker, I&rsquo;m
+thinkin&rsquo;.&nbsp; Ay! he&rsquo;ll be a great responsibeelity
+to ye, like.&nbsp; Does he attend to his releegion?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, m&rsquo;m,&rsquo; returned Rowley, with admirable
+promptitude, and, immediately closing his eyes, as if from habit,
+repeated the following distich with more celerity than
+fervour:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;Matthew, Mark, Luke and John<br />
+Bless the bed that I lie on!&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>&lsquo;Nhm!&rsquo; said the lady, and maintained an awful
+silence.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it seems we
+are never to hear the beginning of your terms, let alone the end
+of them.&nbsp; Come&mdash;a good movement! and let us be either
+off or on.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She opened her lips slowly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ony
+raferences?&rsquo; she inquired, in a voice like a bell.</p>
+<p>I opened my pocket-book and showed her a handful of bank
+bills.&nbsp; &lsquo;I think, madam, that these are
+unexceptionable,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ye&rsquo;ll be wantin&rsquo; breakfast late?&rsquo; was
+her reply.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madam, we want breakfast at whatever hour it suits you
+to give it, from four in the morning till four in the
+afternoon!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Only tell us your figure,
+if your mouth be large enough to let it out!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I couldnae give ye supper the nicht,&rsquo; came the
+echo.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;We shall go out to supper, you incorrigible
+female!&rsquo; I vowed, between laughter and tears.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Here&mdash;this is going to end!&nbsp; I want you for a
+landlady&mdash;let me tell you that!&mdash;and I am going to have
+my way.&nbsp; You won&rsquo;t tell me what you charge?&nbsp; Very
+well; I will do without!&nbsp; I can trust you!&nbsp; You
+don&rsquo;t seem to know when you have a good lodger; but I know
+perfectly when I have an honest landlady!&nbsp; Rowley, unstrap
+the valises!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Will it be credited?&nbsp; The monomaniac fell to rating me
+for my indiscretion!&nbsp; But the battle was over; these were
+her last guns, and more in the nature of a salute than of renewed
+hostilities.&nbsp; And presently she condescended on very
+moderate terms, and Rowley and I were able to escape in quest of
+supper.&nbsp; Much time had, however, been lost; the sun was long
+down, the lamps glimmered along the streets, and the voice of a
+watchman already resounded in the neighbouring Leith Road.&nbsp;
+On our first arrival I had observed a place of entertainment not
+far off, in a street behind the Register House.&nbsp; Thither we
+found our way, and sat down to a late dinner alone.&nbsp; But we
+had scarce given our orders before the door opened, and a tall
+young fellow entered with something of a lurch, looked about him,
+and approached the same table.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Give you good evening, most grave and reverend
+seniors!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Will you permit a wanderer,
+a pilgrim&mdash;the pilgrim of love, in short&mdash;to come to
+temporary anchor under your lee?&nbsp; I care not who knows it,
+but I have a passionate aversion from the bestial practice of
+solitary feeding!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are welcome, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;if I may
+take upon me so far to play the host in a public
+place.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He looked startled, and fixed a hazy eye on me, as he sat
+down.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you are a man not without
+some tincture of letters, I perceive!&nbsp; What shall we drink,
+sir?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I mentioned I had already called for a pot of porter.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A modest pot&mdash;the seasonable quencher?&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, I do not know but what I could look at a
+modest pot myself!&nbsp; I am, for the moment, in precarious
+health.&nbsp; Much study hath heated my brain, much walking
+wearied my&mdash;well, it seems to be more my eyes!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have walked far, I dare say?&rsquo; I
+suggested.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not so much far as often,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There is in this city&mdash;to which, I think, you are a
+stranger?&nbsp; Sir, to your very good health and our better
+acquaintance!&mdash;there is, in this city of Dunedin, a certain
+implication of streets which reflects the utmost credit on the
+designer and the publicans&mdash;at every hundred yards is seated
+the Judicious Tavern, so that persons of contemplative mind are
+secure, at moderate distances, of refreshment.&nbsp; I have been
+doing a trot in that favoured quarter, favoured by art and
+nature.&nbsp; A few chosen comrades&mdash;enemies of publicity
+and friends to wit and wine&mdash;obliged me with their
+society.&nbsp; &ldquo;Along the cool, sequestered vale of
+Register Street we kept the uneven tenor of our way,&rdquo;
+sir.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It struck me, as you came in&mdash;&rsquo; I began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, don&rsquo;t make any bones about it!&rsquo; he
+interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;Of course it struck you! and let me
+tell you I was devilish lucky not to strike myself.&nbsp; When I
+entered this apartment I shone &ldquo;with all the pomp and
+prodigality of brandy and water,&rdquo; as the poet Gray has in
+another place expressed it.&nbsp; Powerful bard, Gray! but a
+niminy-piminy creature, afraid of a petticoat and a
+bottle&mdash;not a man, sir, not a man!&nbsp; Excuse me for being
+so troublesome, but what the devil have I done with my
+fork?&nbsp; Thank you, I am sure.&nbsp; <i>Temulentia</i>,
+<i>quoad me ipsum</i>, <i>brevis colligo est</i>.&nbsp; I sit and
+eat, sir, in a London fog.&nbsp; I should bring a link-boy to
+table with me; and I would too, if the little brutes were only
+washed!&nbsp; I intend to found a Philanthropical Society for
+Washing the Deserving Poor and Shaving Soldiers.&nbsp; I am
+pleased to observe that, although not of an unmilitary bearing,
+you are apparently shaved.&nbsp; In my calendar of the virtues
+shaving comes next to drinking.&nbsp; A gentleman may be a
+low-minded ruffian without sixpence, but he will always be close
+shaved.&nbsp; See me, with the eye of fancy, in the chill hours
+of the morning, say about a quarter to twelve, noon&mdash;see me
+awake!&nbsp; First thing of all, without one thought of the
+plausible but unsatisfactory small beer, or the healthful though
+insipid soda-water, I take the deadly razor in my vacillating
+grasp; I proceed to skate upon the margin of eternity.&nbsp;
+Stimulating thought!&nbsp; I bleed, perhaps, but with medicable
+wounds.&nbsp; The stubble reaped, I pass out of my chamber, calm
+but triumphant.&nbsp; To employ a hackneyed phrase, I would not
+call Lord Wellington my uncle!&nbsp; I, too, have dared, perhaps
+bled, before the imminent deadly shaving-table.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In this manner the bombastic fellow continued to entertain me
+all through dinner, and by a common error of drunkards, because
+he had been extremely talkative himself, leaped to the conclusion
+that he had chanced on very genial company.&nbsp; He told me his
+name, his address; he begged we should meet again; finally he
+proposed that I should dine with him in the country at an early
+date.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The dinner is official,&rsquo; he explained.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The office-bearers and Senatus of the University of
+Cramond&mdash;an educational institution in which I have the
+honour to be Professor of Nonsense&mdash;meet to do honour to our
+friend Icarus, at the old-established <i>howff</i>, Cramond
+Bridge.&nbsp; One place is vacant, fascinating stranger,&mdash;I
+offer it to you!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And who is your friend Icarus?&rsquo; I asked,</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The aspiring son of Daedalus!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Is it possible that you have never heard the name of
+Byfield?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Possible and true,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And is fame so small a thing?&rsquo; cried he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Byfield, sir, is an aeronaut.&nbsp; He apes the fame of a
+Lunardi, and is on the point of offering to the
+inhabitants&mdash;I beg your pardon, to the nobility and gentry
+of our neighbourhood&mdash;the spectacle of an ascension.&nbsp;
+As one of the gentry concerned I may be permitted to remark that
+I am unmoved.&nbsp; I care not a Tinker&rsquo;s Damn for his
+ascension.&nbsp; No more&mdash;I breathe it in your
+ear&mdash;does anybody else.&nbsp; The business is stale, sir,
+stale.&nbsp; Lunardi did it, and overdid it.&nbsp; A whimsical,
+fiddling, vain fellow, by all accounts&mdash;for I was at that
+time rocking in my cradle.&nbsp; But once was enough.&nbsp; If
+Lunardi went up and came down, there was the matter
+settled.&nbsp; We prefer to grant the point.&nbsp; We do not want
+to see the experiment repeated <i>ad nauseam</i> by Byfield, and
+Brown, and Butler, and Brodie, and Bottomley.&nbsp; Ah! if they
+would go up and <i>not</i> come down again!&nbsp; But this is by
+the question.&nbsp; The University of Cramond delights to honour
+merit in the man, sir, rather than utility in the profession; and
+Byfield, though an ignorant dog, is a sound reliable drinker, and
+really not amiss over his cups.&nbsp; Under the radiance of the
+kindly jar partiality might even credit him with wit.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It will be seen afterwards that this was more my business than
+I thought it at the time.&nbsp; Indeed, I was impatient to be
+gone.&nbsp; Even as my friend maundered ahead a squall burst, the
+jaws of the rain were opened against the coffee-house windows,
+and at that inclement signal I remembered I was due
+elsewhere.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT</h2>
+<p>At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence
+of the squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting
+words.&nbsp; All the way along Princes Street (whither my way
+led) the wind hunted me behind and screamed in my ears.&nbsp; The
+city was flushed with bucketfuls of rain that tasted salt from
+the neighbouring ocean.&nbsp; It seemed to darken and lighten
+again in the vicissitudes of the gusts.&nbsp; Now you would say
+the lamps had been blown out from end to end of the long
+thoroughfare; now, in a lull, they would revive, re-multiply,
+shine again on the wet pavements, and make darkness sparingly
+visible.</p>
+<p>By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there
+was a distinct improvement.&nbsp; For one thing, I had now my
+shoulder to the wind; for a second, I came in the lee of my old
+prison-house, the Castle; and, at any rate, the excessive fury of
+the blast was itself moderating.&nbsp; The thought of what errand
+I was on re-awoke within me, and I seemed to breast the rough
+weather with increasing ease.&nbsp; With such a destination, what
+mattered a little buffeting of wind or a sprinkle of cold
+water?&nbsp; I recalled Flora&rsquo;s image, I took her in fancy
+to my arms, and my heart throbbed.&nbsp; And the next moment I
+had recognised the inanity of that fool&rsquo;s paradise.&nbsp;
+If I could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might count myself
+lucky.</p>
+<p>I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and
+now deep in mire.&nbsp; So soon as I was clear of the last street
+lamp, darkness received me&mdash;a darkness only pointed by the
+lights of occasional rustic farms, where the dogs howled with
+uplifted heads as I went by.&nbsp; The wind continued to decline:
+it had been but a squall, not a tempest.&nbsp; The rain, on the
+other hand, settled into a steady deluge, which had soon drenched
+me thoroughly.&nbsp; I continued to tramp forward in the night,
+contending with gloomy thoughts and accompanied by the dismal
+ululation of the dogs.&nbsp; What ailed them that they should
+have been thus wakeful, and perceived the small sound of my steps
+amid the general reverberation of the rain, was more than I could
+fancy.&nbsp; I remembered tales with which I had been entertained
+in childhood.&nbsp; I told myself some murderer was going by, and
+the brutes perceived upon him the faint smell of blood; and the
+next moment, with a physical shock, I had applied the words to my
+own case!</p>
+<p>Here was a dismal disposition for a lover.&nbsp; &lsquo;Was
+ever lady in this humour wooed?&rsquo; I asked myself, and came
+near turning back.&nbsp; It is never wise to risk a critical
+interview when your spirits are depressed, your clothes muddy,
+and your hands wet!&nbsp; But the boisterous night was in itself
+favourable to my enterprise: now, or perhaps never, I might find
+some way to have an interview with Flora; and if I had one
+interview (wet clothes, low spirits and all), I told myself there
+would certainly be another.</p>
+<p>Arrived in the cottage-garden I found the circumstances mighty
+inclement.&nbsp; From the round holes in the shutters of the
+parlour, shafts of candle-light streamed forth; elsewhere the
+darkness was complete.&nbsp; The trees, the thickets, were
+saturated; the lower parts of the garden turned into a
+morass.&nbsp; At intervals, when the wind broke forth again,
+there passed overhead a wild coil of clashing branches; and
+between whiles the whole enclosure continuously and stridently
+resounded with the rain.&nbsp; I advanced close to the window and
+contrived to read the face of my watch.&nbsp; It was half-past
+seven; they would not retire before ten, they might not before
+midnight, and the prospect was unpleasant.&nbsp; In a lull of the
+wind I could hear from the inside the voice of Flora reading
+aloud; the words of course inaudible&mdash;only a flow of
+undecipherable speech, quiet, cordial, colourless, more intimate
+and winning, more eloquent of her personality, but not less
+beautiful than song.&nbsp; And the next moment the clamour of a
+fresh squall broke out about the cottage; the voice was drowned
+in its bellowing, and I was glad to retreat from my dangerous
+post.</p>
+<p>For three egregious hours I must now suffer the elements to do
+their worst upon me, and continue to hold my ground in
+patience.&nbsp; I recalled the least fortunate of my services in
+the field: being out-sentry of the pickets in weather no less
+vile, sometimes unsuppered and with nothing to look forward to by
+way of breakfast but musket-balls; and they seemed light in
+comparison.&nbsp; So strangely are we built: so much more strong
+is the love of woman than the mere love of life.</p>
+<p>At last my patience was rewarded.&nbsp; The light disappeared
+from the parlour and reappeared a moment after in the room
+above.&nbsp; I was pretty well informed for the enterprise that
+lay before me.&nbsp; I knew the lair of the dragon&mdash;that
+which was just illuminated.&nbsp; I knew the bower of my
+Rosamond, and how excellently it was placed on the ground-level,
+round the flank of the cottage and out of earshot of her
+formidable aunt.&nbsp; Nothing was left but to apply my
+knowledge.&nbsp; I was then at the bottom of the garden, whether
+I had gone (Heaven save the mark!) for warmth, that I might walk
+to and fro unheard and keep myself from perishing.&nbsp; The
+night had fallen still, the wind ceased; the noise of the rain
+had much lightened, if it had not stopped, and was succeeded by
+the dripping of the garden trees.&nbsp; In the midst of this
+lull, and as I was already drawing near to the cottage, I was
+startled by the sound of a window-sash screaming in its channels;
+and a step or two beyond I became aware of a gush of light upon
+the darkness.&nbsp; It fell from Flora&rsquo;s window, which she
+had flung open on the night, and where she now sat, roseate and
+pensive, in the shine of two candles falling from behind, her
+tresses deeply embowering and shading her; the suspended comb
+still in one hand, the other idly clinging to the iron stanchions
+with which the window was barred.</p>
+<p>Keeping to the turf, and favoured by the darkness of the night
+and the patter of the rain which was now returning, though
+without wind, I approached until I could almost have touched
+her.&nbsp; It seemed a grossness of which I was incapable to
+break up her reverie by speech.&nbsp; I stood and drank her in
+with my eyes; how the light made a glory in her hair, and (what I
+have always thought the most ravishing thing in nature) how the
+planes ran into each other, and were distinguished, and how the
+hues blended and varied, and were shaded off, between the cheek
+and neck.&nbsp; At first I was abashed: she wore her beauty like
+an immediate halo of refinement; she discouraged me like an
+angel, or what I suspect to be the next most discouraging, a
+modern lady.&nbsp; But as I continued to gaze, hope and life
+returned to me; I forgot my timidity, I forgot the sickening pack
+of wet clothes with which I stood burdened, I tingled with new
+blood.</p>
+<p>Still unconscious of my presence, still gazing before her upon
+the illuminated image of the window, the straight shadows of the
+bars, the glinting of pebbles on the path, and the impenetrable
+night on the garden and the hills beyond it, she heaved a deep
+breath that struck upon my heart like an appeal.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why does Miss Gilchrist sigh?&rsquo; I whispered.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Does she recall absent friends?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She turned her head swiftly in my direction; it was the only
+sign of surprise she deigned to make.&nbsp; At the same time I
+stepped into the light and bowed profoundly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You!&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, I am here,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have
+come very far, it may be a hundred and fifty leagues, to see
+you.&nbsp; I have waited all this night in your garden.&nbsp;
+Will Miss Gilchrist not offer her hand&mdash;to a friend in
+trouble?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She extended it between the bars, and I dropped upon one knee
+on the wet path and kissed it twice.&nbsp; At the second it was
+withdrawn suddenly, methought with more of a start than she had
+hitherto displayed.&nbsp; I regained my former attitude, and we
+were both silent awhile.&nbsp; My timidity returned on me
+tenfold.&nbsp; I looked in her face for any signals of anger, and
+seeing her eyes to waver and fall aside from mine, augured that
+all was well.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You must have been mad to come here!&rsquo; she broke
+out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Of all places under heaven this is no place for
+you to come.&nbsp; And I was just thinking you were safe in
+France!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You were thinking of me!&rsquo; I cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. St. Ives, you cannot understand your danger,&rsquo;
+she replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am sure of it, and yet I cannot find
+it in my heart to tell you.&nbsp; O, be persuaded, and
+go!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I believe I know the worst.&nbsp; But I was never one
+to set an undue value on life, the life that we share with
+beasts.&nbsp; My university has been in the wars, not a famous
+place of education, but one where a man learns to carry his life
+in his hand as lightly as a glove, and for his lady or his honour
+to lay it as lightly down.&nbsp; You appeal to my fears, and you
+do wrong.&nbsp; I have come to Scotland with my eyes quite open
+to see you and to speak with you&mdash;it may be for the last
+time.&nbsp; With my eyes quite open, I say; and if I did not
+hesitate at the beginning do you think that I would draw back
+now?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You do not know!&rsquo; she cried, with rising
+agitation.&nbsp; &lsquo;This country, even this garden, is death
+to you.&nbsp; They all believe it; I am the only one that does
+not.&nbsp; If they hear you now, if they heard a whisper&mdash;I
+dread to think of it.&nbsp; O, go, go this instant.&nbsp; It is
+my prayer.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Dear lady, do not refuse me what I have come so far to
+seek; and remember that out of all the millions in England there
+is no other but yourself in whom I can dare confide.&nbsp; I have
+all the world against me; you are my only ally; and as I have to
+speak, you have to listen.&nbsp; All is true that they say of me,
+and all of it false at the same time.&nbsp; I did kill this man
+Goguelat&mdash;it was that you meant?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She mutely signed to me that it was; she had become deadly
+pale.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But I killed him in fair fight.&nbsp; Till then, I had
+never taken a life unless in battle, which is my trade.&nbsp; But
+I was grateful, I was on fire with gratitude, to one who had been
+good to me, who had been better to me than I could have dreamed
+of an angel, who had come into the darkness of my prison like
+sunrise.&nbsp; The man Goguelat insulted her.&nbsp; O, he had
+insulted me often, it was his favourite pastime, and he might
+insult me as he pleased&mdash;for who was I?&nbsp; But with that
+lady it was different.&nbsp; I could never forgive myself if I
+had let it pass.&nbsp; And we fought, and he fell, and I have no
+remorse.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I waited anxiously for some reply.&nbsp; The worst was now
+out, and I knew that she had heard of it before; but it was
+impossible for me to go on with my narrative without some shadow
+of encouragement.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You blame me?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, not at all.&nbsp; It is a point I cannot speak
+on&mdash;I am only a girl.&nbsp; I am sure you were in the right:
+I have always said so&mdash;to Ronald.&nbsp; Not, of course, to
+my aunt.&nbsp; I am afraid I let her speak as she will.&nbsp; You
+must not think me a disloyal friend; and even with the
+Major&mdash;I did not tell you he had become quite a friend of
+ours&mdash;Major Chevenix, I mean&mdash;he has taken such a fancy
+to Ronald!&nbsp; It was he that brought the news to us of that
+hateful Clausel being captured, and all that he was saying.&nbsp;
+I was indignant with him.&nbsp; I said&mdash;I dare say I said
+too much&mdash;and I must say he was very good-natured.&nbsp; He
+said, &ldquo;You and I, who are his friends, <i>know</i> that
+Champdivers is innocent.&nbsp; But what is the use of saying
+it?&rdquo;&nbsp; All this was in the corner of the room in what
+they call an aside.&nbsp; And then he said, &ldquo;Give me a
+chance to speak to you in private, I have much to tell
+you.&rdquo;&nbsp; And he did.&nbsp; And told me just what you
+did&mdash;that it was an affair of honour, and no blame attached
+to you.&nbsp; O, I must say I like that Major
+Chevenix!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>At this I was seized with a great pang of jealousy.&nbsp; I
+remembered the first time that he had seen her, the interest that
+he seemed immediately to conceive; and I could not but admire the
+dog for the use he had been ingenious enough to make of our
+acquaintance in order to supplant me.&nbsp; All is fair in love
+and war.&nbsp; For all that, I was now no less anxious to do the
+speaking myself than I had been before to hear Flora.&nbsp; At
+least, I could keep clear of the hateful image of Major
+Chevenix.&nbsp; Accordingly I burst at once on the narrative of
+my adventures.&nbsp; It was the same as you have read, but
+briefer, and told with a very different purpose.&nbsp; Now every
+incident had a particular bearing, every by-way branched off to
+Rome&mdash;and that was Flora.</p>
+<p>When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel
+withoutside the low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and
+lowered my voice to the most confidential whisper.&nbsp; Flora
+herself must kneel upon the other side, and this brought our
+heads upon a level with only the bars between us.&nbsp; So
+placed, so separated, it seemed that our proximity, and the
+continuous and low sounds of my pleading voice, worked
+progressively and powerfully on her heart, and perhaps not less
+so on my own.&nbsp; For these spells are double-edged.&nbsp; The
+silly birds may be charmed with the pipe of the fowler, which is
+but a tube of reeds.&nbsp; Not so with a bird of our own
+feather!&nbsp; As I went on, and my resolve strengthened, and my
+voice found new modulations, and our faces were drawn closer to
+the bars and to each other, not only she, but I, succumbed to the
+fascination, and were kindled by the charm.&nbsp; We make love,
+and thereby ourselves fall the deeper in it.&nbsp; It is with the
+heart only that one captures a heart.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And now,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I will tell you
+what you can still do for me.&nbsp; I run a little risk just now,
+and you see for yourself how unavoidable it is for any man of
+honour.&nbsp; But if&mdash;but in case of the worst I do not
+choose to enrich either my enemies or the Prince Regent.&nbsp; I
+have here the bulk of what my uncle gave me.&nbsp; Eight thousand
+odd pounds.&nbsp; Will you take care of it for me?&nbsp; Do not
+think of it merely as money; take and keep it as a relic of your
+friend or some precious piece of him.&nbsp; I may have bitter
+need of it ere long.&nbsp; Do you know the old country story of
+the giant who gave his heart to his wife to keep for him,
+thinking it safer to repose on her loyalty than his own
+strength?&nbsp; Flora, I am the giant&mdash;a very little one:
+will you be the keeper of my life?&nbsp; It is my heart I offer
+you in this symbol.&nbsp; In the sight of God, if you will have
+it, I give you my name, I endow you with my money.&nbsp; If the
+worst come, if I may never hope to call you wife, let me at least
+think that you will use my uncle&rsquo;s legacy as my
+widow.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, not that,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never
+that.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What then?&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;What else, my
+angel?&nbsp; What are words to me?&nbsp; There is but one name
+that I care to know you by.&nbsp; Flora, my love!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Anne!&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>What sound is so full of music as one&rsquo;s own name uttered
+for the first time in the voice of her we love!</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My darling!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>The jealous bars, set at the top and bottom in stone and lime,
+obstructed the rapture of the moment; but I took her to myself as
+wholly as they allowed.&nbsp; She did not shun my lips.&nbsp; My
+arms were wound round her body, which yielded itself generously
+to my embrace.&nbsp; As we so remained, entwined and yet severed,
+bruising our faces unconsciously on the cold bars, the irony of
+the universe&mdash;or as I prefer to say, envy of some of the
+gods&mdash;again stirred up the elements of that stormy
+night.&nbsp; The wind blew again in the tree-tops; a volley of
+cold sea-rain deluged the garden, and, as the deuce would have
+it, a gutter which had been hitherto choked up began suddenly to
+play upon my head and shoulders with the vivacity of a
+fountain.&nbsp; We parted with a shock; I sprang to my feet, and
+she to hers, as though we had been discovered.&nbsp; A moment
+after, but now both standing, we had again approached the window
+on either side.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Flora,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;this is but a poor offer I
+can make you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She took my hand in hers and clasped it to her bosom.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rich enough for a queen!&rsquo; she said, with a lift
+in her breathing that was more eloquent than words.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Anne, my brave Anne!&nbsp; I would be glad to be your
+maidservant; I could envy that boy Rowley.&nbsp; But, no!&rsquo;
+she broke off, &lsquo;I envy no one&mdash;I need not&mdash;I am
+yours.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mine,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;for ever!&nbsp; By this and
+this, mine!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;All of me,&rsquo; she repeated.&nbsp; &lsquo;Altogether
+and forever!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And if the god were envious, he must have seen with
+mortification how little he could do to mar the happiness of
+mortals.&nbsp; I stood in a mere waterspout; she herself was wet,
+not from my embrace only, but from the splashing of the
+storm.&nbsp; The candles had guttered out; we were in
+darkness.&nbsp; I could scarce see anything but the shining of
+her eyes in the dark room.&nbsp; To her I must have appeared as a
+silhouette, haloed by rain and the spouting of the ancient Gothic
+gutter above my head.</p>
+<p>Presently we became more calm and confidential; and when that
+squall, which proved to be the last of the storm, had blown by,
+fell into a talk of ways and means.&nbsp; It seemed she knew Mr.
+Robbie, to whom I had been so slenderly accredited by
+Romaine&mdash;was even invited to his house for the evening of
+Monday, and gave me a sketch of the old gentleman&rsquo;s
+character which implied a great deal of penetration in herself,
+and proved of great use to me in the immediate sequel.&nbsp; It
+seemed he was an enthusiastic antiquary, and in particular a
+fanatic of heraldry.&nbsp; I heard it with delight, for I was
+myself, thanks to M. de Culemberg, fairly grounded in that
+science, and acquainted with the blazons of most families of note
+in Europe.&nbsp; And I had made up my mind&mdash;even as she
+spoke, it was my fixed determination, though I was a hundred
+miles from saying it&mdash;to meet Flora on Monday night as a
+fellow-guest in Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s house.</p>
+<p>I gave her my money&mdash;it was, of course, only paper I had
+brought.&nbsp; I gave it her, to be her marriage-portion, I
+declared.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not so bad a marriage-portion for a private
+soldier,&rsquo; I told her, laughing, as I passed it through the
+bars.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, Anne, and where am I to keep it?&rsquo; she
+cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;If my aunt should find it!&nbsp; What would I
+say!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Next your heart,&rsquo; I suggested.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then you will always be near your treasure,&rsquo; she
+cried, &lsquo;for you are always there!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>We were interrupted by a sudden clearness that fell upon the
+night.&nbsp; The clouds dispersed; the stars shone in every part
+of the heavens; and, consulting my watch, I was startled to find
+it already hard on five in the morning.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;THE SABBATH DAY</h2>
+<p>It was indeed high time I should be gone from Swanston; but
+what I was to do in the meanwhile was another question.&nbsp;
+Rowley had received his orders last night: he was to say that I
+had met a friend, and Mrs. McRankine was not to expect me before
+morning.&nbsp; A good enough tale in itself; but the dreadful
+pickle I was in made it out of the question.&nbsp; I could not go
+home till I had found harbourage, a fire to dry my clothes at,
+and a bed where I might lie till they were ready.</p>
+<p>Fortune favoured me again.&nbsp; I had scarce got to the top
+of the first hill when I spied a light on my left, about a
+furlong away.&nbsp; It might be a case of sickness; what else it
+was likely to be&mdash;in so rustic a neighbourhood, and at such
+an ungodly time of the morning&mdash;was beyond my fancy.&nbsp; A
+faint sound of singing became audible, and gradually swelled as I
+drew near, until at last I could make out the words, which were
+singularly appropriate both to the hour and to the condition of
+the singers.&nbsp; &lsquo;The cock may craw, the day may
+daw,&rsquo; they sang; and sang it with such laxity both in time
+and tune, and such sentimental complaisance in the expression, as
+assured me they had got far into the third bottle at least.</p>
+<p>I found a plain rustic cottage by the wayside, of the sort
+called double, with a signboard over the door; and, the lights
+within streaming forth and somewhat mitigating the darkness of
+the morning, I was enabled to decipher the inscription:
+&lsquo;The Hunters&rsquo; Tryst, by Alexander Hendry.&nbsp;
+Porter Ales, and British Spirits.&nbsp; Beds.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>My first knock put a period to the music, and a voice
+challenged tipsily from within.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Who goes there?&rsquo; it said; and I replied, &lsquo;A
+lawful traveller.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Immediately after, the door was unbarred by a company of the
+tallest lads my eyes had ever rested on, all astonishingly drunk
+and very decently dressed, and one (who was perhaps the drunkest
+of the lot) carrying a tallow candle, from which he impartially
+bedewed the clothes of the whole company.&nbsp; As soon as I saw
+them I could not help smiling to myself to remember the anxiety
+with which I had approached.&nbsp; They received me and my
+hastily-concocted story, that I had been walking from Peebles and
+had lost my way, with incoherent benignity; jostled me among them
+into the room where they had been sitting, a plain hedgerow
+alehouse parlour, with a roaring fire in the chimney and a
+prodigious number of empty bottles on the floor; and informed me
+that I was made, by this reception, a temporary member of the
+<i>Six-Feet-High Club</i>, an athletic society of young men in a
+good station, who made of the Hunters&rsquo; Tryst a frequent
+resort.&nbsp; They told me I had intruded on an &lsquo;all-night
+sitting,&rsquo; following upon an &lsquo;all-day Saturday
+tramp&rsquo; of forty miles; and that the members would all be up
+and &lsquo;as right as ninepence&rsquo; for the noonday service
+at some neighbouring church&mdash;Collingwood, if memory serves
+me right.&nbsp; At this I could have laughed, but the moment
+seemed ill-chosen.&nbsp; For, though six feet was their standard,
+they all exceeded that measurement considerably; and I tasted
+again some of the sensations of childhood, as I looked up to all
+these lads from a lower plane, and wondered what they would do
+next.&nbsp; But the Six-Footers, if they were very drunk, proved
+no less kind.&nbsp; The landlord and servants of the
+Hunters&rsquo; Tryst were in bed and asleep long ago.&nbsp;
+Whether by natural gift or acquired habit they could suffer
+pandemonium to reign all over the house, and yet lie ranked in
+the kitchen like Egyptian mummies, only that the sound of their
+snoring rose and fell ceaselessly like the drone of a
+bagpipe.&nbsp; Here the Six-Footers invaded them&mdash;in their
+citadel, so to speak; counted the bunks and the sleepers;
+proposed to put me in bed to one of the lasses, proposed to have
+one of the lasses out to make room for me, fell over chairs, and
+made noise enough to waken the dead: the whole illuminated by the
+same young torch-bearer, but now with two candles, and rapidly
+beginning to look like a man in a snowstorm.&nbsp; At last a bed
+was found for me, my clothes were hung out to dry before the
+parlour fire, and I was mercifully left to my repose.</p>
+<p>I awoke about nine with the sun shining in my eyes.&nbsp; The
+landlord came at my summons, brought me my clothes dried and
+decently brushed, and gave me the good news that the
+Six-Feet-High Club were all abed and sleeping off their
+excesses.&nbsp; Where they were bestowed was a puzzle to me until
+(as I was strolling about the garden patch waiting for breakfast)
+I came on a barn door, and, looking in, saw all the red face
+mixed in the straw like plums in a cake.&nbsp; Quoth the stalwart
+maid who brought me my porridge and bade me &rsquo;eat them while
+they were hot,&rsquo; &lsquo;Ay, they were a&rsquo; on the
+ran-dan last nicht!&nbsp; Hout! they&rsquo;re fine lads, and
+they&rsquo;ll be nane the waur of it.&nbsp; Forby Farbes&rsquo;s
+coat.&nbsp; I dinna see wha&rsquo;s to get the creish off
+that!&rsquo; she added, with a sigh; in which, identifying Forbes
+as the torch-bearer, I mentally joined.</p>
+<p>It was a brave morning when I took the road; the sun shone,
+spring seemed in the air, it smelt like April or May, and some
+over-venturous birds sang in the coppices as I went by.&nbsp; I
+had plenty to think of, plenty to be grateful for, that gallant
+morning; and yet I had a twitter at my heart.&nbsp; To enter the
+city by daylight might be compared to marching on a battery;
+every face that I confronted would threaten me like the muzzle of
+a gun; and it came into my head suddenly with how much better a
+countenance I should be able to do it if I could but improvise a
+companion.&nbsp; Hard by Merchiston I was so fortunate as to
+observe a bulky gentleman in broadcloth and gaiters, stooping
+with his head almost between his knees, before a stone
+wall.&nbsp; Seizing occasion by the forelock, I drew up as I came
+alongside and inquired what he had found to interest him.</p>
+<p>He turned upon me a countenance not much less broad than his
+back.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, sir,&rsquo; he replied, &lsquo;I was even
+marvelling at my own indefeasible stupeedity: that I should walk
+this way every week of my life, weather permitting, and should
+never before have <i>notticed</i> that stone,&rsquo; touching it
+at the same time with a goodly oak staff.</p>
+<p>I followed the indication.&nbsp; The stone, which had been
+built sideways into the wall, offered traces of heraldic
+sculpture.&nbsp; At once there came a wild idea into my mind: his
+appearance tallied with Flora&rsquo;s description of Mr. Robbie;
+a knowledge of heraldry would go far to clinch the proof; and
+what could be more desirable than to scrape an informal
+acquaintance with the man whom I must approach next day with my
+tale of the drovers, and whom I yet wished to please?&nbsp; I
+stooped in turn.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A chevron,&rsquo; I said; &lsquo;on a chief three
+mullets?&nbsp; Looks like Douglas, does it not?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, sir, it does; you are right,&rsquo; said he:
+&lsquo;it <i>does</i> look like Douglas; though, without the
+tinctures, and the whole thing being so battered and broken up,
+who shall venture an opinion?&nbsp; But allow me to be more
+personal, sir.&nbsp; In these degenerate days I am astonished you
+should display so much proficiency.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman,
+a friend of my family, and I may say my guardian,&rsquo; said I;
+&lsquo;but I have forgotten it since.&nbsp; God forbid I should
+delude you into thinking me a herald, sir!&nbsp; I am only an
+ungrammatical amateur.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And a little modesty does no harm even in a
+herald,&rsquo; says my new acquaintance graciously.</p>
+<p>In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained
+very amicable discourse along what remained of the country road,
+past the suburbs, and on into the streets of the New Town, which
+was as deserted and silent as a city of the dead.&nbsp; The shops
+were closed, no vehicle ran, cats sported in the midst of the
+sunny causeway; and our steps and voices re-echoed from the quiet
+houses.&nbsp; It was the high-water, full and strange, of that
+weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is subjected: the
+apotheosis of the <i>Sawbath</i>; and I confess the spectacle
+wanted not grandeur, however much it may have lacked
+cheerfulness.&nbsp; There are few religious ceremonies more
+imposing.&nbsp; As we thus walked and talked in a public
+seclusion the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds of
+the city, and the streets began immediately to be thronged with
+decent church-goers.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said my companion, &lsquo;there are the
+bells!&nbsp; Now, sir, as you are a stranger I must offer you the
+hospitality of my pew.&nbsp; I do not know whether you are at all
+used with our Scottish form; but in case you are not I will find
+your places for you; and Dr. Henry Gray, of St. Mary&rsquo;s
+(under whom I sit), is as good a preacher as we have to show
+you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>This put me in a quandary.&nbsp; It was a degree of risk I was
+scarce prepared for.&nbsp; Dozens of people, who might pass me by
+in the street with no more than a second look, would go on from
+the second to the third, and from that to a final recognition, if
+I were set before them, immobilised in a pew, during the whole
+time of service.&nbsp; An unlucky turn of the head would suffice
+to arrest their attention.&nbsp; &lsquo;Who is that?&rsquo; they
+would think: &lsquo;surely I should know him!&rsquo; and, a
+church being the place in all the world where one has least to
+think of, it was ten to one they would end by remembering me
+before the benediction.&nbsp; However, my mind was made up: I
+thanked my obliging friend, and placed myself at his
+disposal.</p>
+<p>Our way now led us into the north-east quarter of the town,
+among pleasant new faubourgs, to a decent new church of a good
+size, where I was soon seated by the side of my good Samaritan,
+and looked upon by a whole congregation of menacing faces.&nbsp;
+At first the possibility of danger kept me awake; but by the time
+I had assured myself there was none to be apprehended, and the
+service was not in the least likely to be enlivened by the arrest
+of a French spy, I had to resign myself to the task of listening
+to Dr. Henry Gray.</p>
+<p>As we moved out, after this ordeal was over, my friend was at
+once surrounded and claimed by his acquaintances of the
+congregation; and I was rejoiced to hear him addressed by the
+expected name of Robbie.</p>
+<p>So soon as we were clear of the crowd&mdash;&lsquo;Mr.
+Robbie?&rsquo; said I, bowing.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The very same, sir,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If I mistake not, a lawyer?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A writer to His Majesty&rsquo;s Signet, at your
+service.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It seems we were predestined to be
+acquaintances!&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have here a
+card in my pocket intended for you.&nbsp; It is from my family
+lawyer.&nbsp; It was his last word, as I was leaving, to ask to
+be remembered kindly, and to trust you would pass over so
+informal an introduction.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And I offered him the card.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, ay, my old friend Daniel!&rsquo; says he, looking
+on the card.&nbsp; &lsquo;And how does my old friend
+Daniel?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I gave a favourable view of Mr. Romaine&rsquo;s health.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, this is certainly a whimsical incident,&rsquo; he
+continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;And since we are thus met
+already&mdash;and so much to my advantage!&mdash;the simplest
+thing will be to prosecute the acquaintance instantly.&nbsp; Let
+me propose a snack between sermons, a bottle of my particular
+green seal&mdash;and when nobody is looking we can talk blazons,
+Mr. Ducie!&rsquo;&mdash;which was the name I then used and had
+already incidentally mentioned, in the vain hope of provoking a
+return in kind.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir: do I understand you to invite
+me to your house?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That was the idea I was trying to convey,&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;We have the name of hospitable people up here,
+and I would like you to try mine.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Robbie, I shall hope to try it some day, but not
+yet,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I hope you will not
+misunderstand me.&nbsp; My business, which brings me to your
+city, is of a peculiar kind.&nbsp; Till you shall have heard it,
+and, indeed, till its issue is known, I should feel as if I had
+stolen your invitation.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said he, a little sobered, &lsquo;it
+must be as you wish, though you would hardly speak otherwise if
+you had committed homicide!&nbsp; Mine is the loss.&nbsp; I must
+eat alone; a very pernicious thing for a person of my habit of
+body, content myself with a pint of skinking claret, and meditate
+the discourse.&nbsp; But about this business of yours: if it is
+so particular as all that, it will doubtless admit of no
+delay.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I must confess, sir, it presses,&rsquo; I
+acknowledged.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then, let us say to-morrow at half-past eight in the
+morning,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;and I hope, when your mind is at
+rest (and it does you much honour to take it as you do), that you
+will sit down with me to the postponed meal, not forgetting the
+bottle.&nbsp; You have my address?&rsquo; he added, and gave it
+me&mdash;which was the only thing I wanted.</p>
+<p>At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual
+civilities, and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of
+people returning from church, to my lodgings in St. James&rsquo;
+Square.</p>
+<p>Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my
+landlady in a dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in
+her wake: no less than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a
+smart pair of tops to his boots!&nbsp; When I said he was in the
+lady&rsquo;s wake I spoke but in metaphor.&nbsp; As a matter of
+fact he was squiring her, with the utmost dignity, on his arm;
+and I followed them up the stairs, smiling to myself.</p>
+<p>Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and
+Mrs. McRankine inquired where I had been.&nbsp; I told her
+boastfully, giving her the name of the church and the divine, and
+ignorantly supposing I should have gained caste.&nbsp; But she
+soon opened my eyes.&nbsp; In the roots of the Scottish character
+there are knots and contortions that not only no stranger can
+understand, but no stranger can follow; he walks among
+explosives; and his best course is to throw himself upon their
+mercy&mdash;&lsquo;Just as I am, without one plea,&rsquo; a
+citation from one of the lady&rsquo;s favourite hymns.</p>
+<p>The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was
+impossible to be written down; and I at once executed the
+manoeuvre I have recommended.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your
+city,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;If I have done wrong, it was in
+mere ignorance, my dear lady; and this afternoon, if you will be
+so good as to take me, I shall accompany <i>you</i>.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to
+her own quarters murmuring.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, Rowley,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and have you been
+to church?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; he said.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I
+have,&rsquo; I returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;And how did you get on with
+the Scottish form?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, sir, it was pretty &rsquo;ard, the form was, and
+reether narrow,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t
+know w&rsquo;y it is, but it seems to me like as if things were a
+good bit changed since William Wallace!&nbsp; That was a main
+queer church she took me to, Mr. Anne!&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t know
+as I could have sat it out, if she &rsquo;adn&rsquo;t
+&rsquo;a&rsquo; give me peppermints.&nbsp; She ain&rsquo;t a bad
+one at bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit, and she do
+worry, but, law bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain&rsquo;t nothink
+really&mdash;she don&rsquo;t <i>mean</i> it.&nbsp; W&rsquo;y, she
+was down on me like a &rsquo;undredweight of bricks this
+morning.&nbsp; You see, last night she &rsquo;ad me in to supper,
+and, I beg your pardon, sir, but I took the freedom of playing
+her a chune or two.&nbsp; She didn&rsquo;t mind a bit; so this
+morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced in, and flew
+up, and carried on no end about Sunday!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You see, Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;they&rsquo;re
+all mad up here, and you have to humour them.&nbsp; See and
+don&rsquo;t quarrel with Mrs. McRankine; and, above all,
+don&rsquo;t argue with her, or you&rsquo;ll get the worst of
+it.&nbsp; Whatever she says, touch your forelock and say,
+&ldquo;If you please!&rdquo; or &ldquo;I beg pardon,
+ma&rsquo;am.&rdquo;&nbsp; And let me tell you one thing: I am
+sorry, but you have to go to church with her again this
+afternoon.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s duty, my boy!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs.
+McRankine presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang
+up with readiness and offered her my arm.&nbsp; Rowley followed
+behind.&nbsp; I was beginning to grow accustomed to the risks of
+my stay in Edinburgh, and it even amused me to confront a new
+churchful.&nbsp; I confess the amusement did not last until the
+end; for if Dr. Gray were long, Mr. McCraw was not only longer,
+but more incoherent, and the matter of his sermon (which was a
+direct attack, apparently, on all the Churches of the world, my
+own among the number), where it had not the tonic quality of
+personal insult, rather inclined me to slumber.&nbsp; But I
+braced myself for my life, kept up Rowley with the end of a pin,
+and came through it awake, but no more.</p>
+<p>Bethiah was quite conquered by this &lsquo;mark of
+grace,&rsquo; though, I am afraid, she was also moved by more
+worldly considerations.&nbsp; The first is, the lady had not the
+least objection to go to church on the arm of an elegantly
+dressed young gentleman, and be followed by a spruce servant with
+a cockade in his hat.&nbsp; I could see it by the way she took
+possession of us, found us the places in the Bible, whispered to
+me the name of the minister, passed us lozenges, which I (for my
+part) handed on to Rowley, and at each fresh attention stole a
+little glance about the church to make sure she was
+observed.&nbsp; Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me if I
+also remembered that I was a favourable-looking young man.&nbsp;
+When we grow elderly, how the room brightens, and begins to look
+as it ought to look, on the entrance of youth, grace, health, and
+comeliness!&nbsp; You do not want them for yourself, perhaps not
+even for your son, but you look on smiling; and when you recall
+their images&mdash;again, it is with a smile.&nbsp; I defy you to
+see or think of them and not smile with an infinite and intimate,
+but quite impersonal, pleasure.&nbsp; Well, either I know nothing
+of women, or that was the case with Bethiah McRankine.&nbsp; She
+had been to church with a cockade behind her, on the one hand; on
+the other, her house was brightened by the presence of a pair of
+good-looking young fellows of the other sex, who were always
+pleased and deferential in her society and accepted her views as
+final.</p>
+<p>These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home
+from church&mdash;if church it could be called&mdash;I adopted a
+most insidious device to magnify her interest.&nbsp; I took her
+into the confidence, that is, of my love affair, and I had no
+sooner mentioned a young lady with whom my affections were
+engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is she bonny?&rsquo; she inquired.</p>
+<p>I gave her full assurances upon that.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To what denoamination does she beloang?&rsquo; came
+next, and was so unexpected as almost to deprive me of
+breath.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Upon my word, ma&rsquo;am, I have never
+inquired,&rsquo; cried I; &lsquo;I only know that she is a
+heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay!&rsquo; she sighed, &lsquo;if she has the root of
+the maitter!&nbsp; There&rsquo;s a remnant practically in most of
+the denoaminations.&nbsp; There&rsquo;s some in the
+McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites, and mony in the
+McMillanites, and there&rsquo;s a leeven even in the
+Estayblishment.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to
+that,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel&rsquo;!&rsquo; she
+cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, my dear madam!&nbsp; I only&mdash;&rsquo; I
+began.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,&rsquo; she
+interrupted.</p>
+<p>On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our
+idyll with avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish
+of cream; and, strange to say&mdash;and so expansive a passion is
+that of love!&mdash;that I derived a perhaps equal satisfaction
+from confiding in that breast of iron.&nbsp; It made an immediate
+bond: from that hour we seemed to be welded into a family-party;
+and I had little difficulty in persuading her to join us and to
+preside over our tea-table.&nbsp; Surely there was never so
+ill-matched a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount
+Anne!&nbsp; But I am of the Apostle&rsquo;s way, with a
+difference: all things to all women!&nbsp; When I cannot please a
+woman, hang me in my cravat!</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER&rsquo;S
+PARTY</h2>
+<p>By half-past eight o&rsquo;clock on the next morning, I was
+ringing the bell of the lawyer&rsquo;s office in Castle Street,
+where I found him ensconced at a business table, in a room
+surrounded by several tiers of green tin cases.&nbsp; He greeted
+me like an old friend.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come away, sir, come away!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Here is the dentist ready for you, and I think I can
+promise you that the operation will be practically
+painless.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; I replied,
+as I shook hands with him.&nbsp; &lsquo;But at least there shall
+be no time lost with me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of
+drovers and their cattle, to having used a false name, to having
+murdered or half-murdered a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the
+moors, and to having suffered a couple of quite innocent men to
+lie some time in prison on a charge from which I could have
+immediately freed them.&nbsp; All this I gave him first of all,
+to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took with
+gravity, but without the least appearance of surprise.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Now, sir,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I expect to have
+to pay for my unhappy frolic, but I would like very well if it
+could be managed without my personal appearance or even the
+mention of my real name.&nbsp; I had so much wisdom as to sail
+under false colours in this foolish jaunt of mine; my family
+would be extremely concerned if they had wind of it; but at the
+same time, if the case of this Faa has terminated fatally, and
+there are proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not going
+to stand by and see them vexed, far less punished; and I
+authorise you to give me up for trial if you think that
+best&mdash;or, if you think it unnecessary, in the meanwhile to
+make preparations for their defence.&nbsp; I hope, sir, that I am
+as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined to be
+just.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Very fairly spoken,&rsquo; said Mr. Robbie.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It is not much in my line, as doubtless your friend, Mr.
+Romaine, will have told you.&nbsp; I rarely mix myself up with
+anything on the criminal side, or approaching it.&nbsp; However,
+for a young gentleman like you, I may stretch a point, and I dare
+say I may be able to accomplish more than perhaps another.&nbsp;
+I will go at once to the Procurator Fiscal&rsquo;s office and
+inquire.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You forget the chapter of expenses.&nbsp; I had thought,
+for a beginning, of placing a thousand pounds in your
+hands.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my
+bill,&rsquo; said Mr. Robbie severely.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It seemed to me,&rsquo; I protested, &lsquo;that coming
+to you almost as a stranger, and placing in your hands a piece of
+business so contrary to your habits, some substantial guarantee
+of my good faith&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not the way that we do business in Scotland,
+sir,&rsquo; he interrupted, with an air of closing the
+dispute.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And yet, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I must
+ask you to allow me to proceed.&nbsp; I do not merely refer to
+the expenses of the case.&nbsp; I have my eye besides on Todd and
+Candlish.&nbsp; They are thoroughly deserving fellows; they have
+been subjected through me to a considerable term of imprisonment;
+and I suggest, sir, that you should not spare money for their
+indemnification.&nbsp; This will explain,&rsquo; I added smiling,
+&lsquo;my offer of the thousand pounds.&nbsp; It was in the
+nature of a measure by which you should judge the scale on which
+I can afford to have this business carried through.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But the sooner I am off, the better this affair is like to
+be guided.&nbsp; My clerk will show you into the waiting-room and
+give you the day&rsquo;s <i>Caledonian Mercury</i> and the last
+<i>Register</i> to amuse yourself with in the
+interval.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.&nbsp; I
+saw him descend from a cab at the door, and almost immediately
+after I was shown again into his study, where the solemnity of
+his manner led me to augur the worst.&nbsp; For some time he had
+the inhumanity to read me a lecture as to the incredible
+silliness, &lsquo;not to say immorality,&rsquo; of my
+behaviour.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have the satisfaction in telling you my
+opinion, because it appears that you are going to get off scot
+free,&rsquo; he continued, where, indeed, I thought he might have
+begun.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two
+men, Todd and Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it
+had not been for their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr.
+Ducie&mdash;or Mr. St. Ivey, as I believe I should now call
+you.&nbsp; Never a word would either of the two old fools
+volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence of such a
+person; and when they were confronted with Faa&rsquo;s version of
+the affair, they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their
+own former declarations, as well as with each other, that the
+Fiscal was quite nonplussed, and imaigined there was something
+behind it.&nbsp; You may believe I soon laughed him out of
+that!&nbsp; And I had the satisfaction of seeing your two friends
+set free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, sir,&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;you should have brought
+them here.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No instructions, Mr. Ducie!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;How did I know you wished to renew an acquaintance which
+you had just terminated so fortunately?&nbsp; And, indeed, to be
+frank with you, I should have set my face against it, if you
+had!&nbsp; Let them go!&nbsp; They are paid and contented, and
+have the highest possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey!&nbsp; When I
+gave them fifty pounds apiece&mdash;which was rather more than
+enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may think&mdash;the man Todd, who
+has the only tongue of the party, struck his staff on the
+ground.&nbsp; &ldquo;Weel,&rdquo; says he, &ldquo;I aye said he
+was a gentleman!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Man, Todd,&rdquo; said I,
+&ldquo;that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of
+yourself!&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;So it was a case of &ldquo;Compliments fly when
+gentlefolk meet.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone
+out of your life, and a good riddance!&nbsp; They are fine
+fellows in their way, but no proper associates for the like of
+yourself; and do you finally agree to be done with all
+eccentricity&mdash;take up with no more drovers, or tinkers, but
+enjoy the naitural pleesures for which your age, your wealth,
+your intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your
+appearance so completely fit you.&nbsp; And the first of
+these,&rsquo; quoth he, looking at his watch, &lsquo;will be to
+step through to my dining-room and share a bachelor&rsquo;s
+luncheon.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop
+the same theme.&nbsp; &lsquo;You&rsquo;re, no doubt, what they
+call a dancing-man?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, on
+Thursday night there is the Assembly Ball.&nbsp; You must
+certainly go there, and you must permit me besides to do the
+honours of the ceety and send you a ticket.&nbsp; I am a thorough
+believer in a young man being a young man&mdash;but no more
+drovers or rovers, if you love me!&nbsp; Talking of which puts me
+in mind that you may be short of partners at the
+Assembly&mdash;oh, I have been young myself!&mdash;and if ye care
+to come to anything so portentiously tedious as a tea-party at
+the house of a bachelor lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces
+and nephews, and his grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and his
+wards, and generally the whole clan of the descendants of his
+clients, you might drop in to-night towards seven
+o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; I think I can show you one or two that are
+worth looking at, and you can dance with them later on at the
+Assembly.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young
+ladies&rsquo; whom I might expect to meet.&nbsp; &lsquo;And then
+there&rsquo;s my parteecular friend, Miss Flora,&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I&rsquo;ll make no attempt of a
+description.&nbsp; You shall see her for yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation;
+and returned home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet
+and the good news of which I was the bearer.&nbsp; The toilette,
+I have reason to believe, was a success.&nbsp; Mr. Rowley
+dismissed me with a farewell: &lsquo;Crikey!&nbsp; Mr. Anne, but
+you do look prime!&rsquo;&nbsp; Even the stony Bethiah
+was&mdash;how shall I say?&mdash;dazzled, but scandalised, by my
+appearance; and while, of course, she deplored the vanity that
+led to it, she could not wholly prevent herself from admiring the
+result.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a
+wayfaring Christian man!&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Wi&rsquo;
+Christ despised and rejectit in all pairts of the world and the
+flag of the Covenant flung doon, you will be muckle better on
+your knees!&nbsp; However, I&rsquo;ll have to confess that it
+sets you weel.&nbsp; And if it&rsquo;s the lassie ye&rsquo;re
+gaun to see the nicht, I suppose I&rsquo;ll just have to excuse
+ye!&nbsp; Bairns maun be bairns!&rsquo; she said, with a
+sigh.&nbsp; &lsquo;I mind when Mr. McRankine came courtin&rsquo;,
+and that&rsquo;s lang by-gane&mdash;I mind I had a green gown,
+passementit, that was thocht to become me to admiration.&nbsp; I
+was nae just exactly what ye would ca&rsquo; bonny; but I was
+pale, penetratin&rsquo;, and interestin&rsquo;.&rsquo;&nbsp; And
+she leaned over the stair-rail with a candle to watch my descent
+as long as it should be possible.</p>
+<p>It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s&mdash;by
+which, I do not so much mean that there were few people, for the
+rooms were crowded, as that there was very little attempted to
+entertain them.&nbsp; In one apartment there were tables set out,
+where the elders were solemnly engaged upon whist; in the other
+and larger one, a great number of youth of both sexes entertained
+themselves languidly, the ladies sitting upon chairs to be
+courted, the gentlemen standing about in various attitudes of
+insinuation or indifference.&nbsp; Conversation appeared the sole
+resource, except in so far as it was modified by a number of
+keepsakes and annuals which lay dispersed upon the tables, and of
+which the young beaux displayed the illustrations to the
+ladies.&nbsp; Mr. Robbie himself was customarily in the
+card-room; only now and again, when he cut out, he made an
+incursion among the young folks, and rolled about jovially from
+one to another, the very picture of the general uncle.</p>
+<p>It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the
+afternoon.&nbsp; &lsquo;Now, Miss Flora,&rsquo; he had said,
+&lsquo;come early, for I have a Phoenix to show you&mdash;one Mr.
+Ducie, a new client of mine that, I vow, I have fallen in love
+with&rsquo;; and he was so good as to add a word or two on my
+appearance, from which Flora conceived a suspicion of the
+truth.&nbsp; She had come to the party, in consequence, on the
+knife-edge of anticipation and alarm; had chosen a place by the
+door, where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded by a posse of
+vapid youths; and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me in the
+most natural manner in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared
+form of words.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;How do you do, Mr. Ducie?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It is quite an age since I have seen you!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,&rsquo; I
+replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;May I sit down?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the
+judicious use of her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty
+by her side.</p>
+<p>She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths
+had the discretion to melt before us.&nbsp; As soon as I was once
+seated her fan flew out, and she whispered behind it:</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Are you mad?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madly in love,&rsquo; I replied; &lsquo;but in no other
+sense.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have no patience!&nbsp; You cannot understand what I
+am suffering!&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;What are you to say
+to Ronald, to Major Chevenix, to my aunt?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Your aunt?&rsquo; I cried, with a start.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;<i>Peccavi</i>! is she here?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;She is in the card-room at whist,&rsquo; said
+Flora.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Where she will probably stay all the evening?&rsquo; I
+suggested.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;She may,&rsquo; she admitted; &lsquo;she generally
+does!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,&rsquo; said I,
+&lsquo;which is very much what I had counted upon doing.&nbsp; I
+did not come here to play cards, but to contemplate a certain
+young lady to my heart&rsquo;s content&mdash;if it can ever be
+contented!&mdash;and to tell her some good news.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;But there are still Ronald and the Major!&rsquo; she
+persisted.&nbsp; &lsquo;They are not card-room fixtures!&nbsp;
+Ronald will be coming and going.&nbsp; And as for Mr. Chevenix,
+he&mdash;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Always sits with Miss Flora?&rsquo; I
+interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;And they talk of poor St. Ives?&nbsp; I
+had gathered as much, my dear; and Mr. Ducie has come to prevent
+it!&nbsp; But pray dismiss these fears!&nbsp; I mind no one but
+your aunt.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why my aunt?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Because your aunt is a lady, my dear, and a very clever
+lady, and, like all clever ladies, a very rash lady,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You can never count upon them, unless you are
+sure of getting them in a corner, as I have got you, and talking
+them over rationally, as I am just engaged on with
+yourself!&nbsp; It would be quite the same to your aunt to make
+the worst kind of a scandal, with an equal indifference to my
+danger and to the feelings of our good host!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;and what of Ronald,
+then?&nbsp; Do you think <i>he</i> is above making a
+scandal?&nbsp; You must know him very little!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;On the other hand, it is my pretension that I know him
+very well!&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I must speak to Ronald
+first&mdash;not Ronald to me&mdash;that is all!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then, please, go and speak to him at once!&rsquo; she
+pleaded.&nbsp; He is there&mdash;do you see?&mdash;at the upper
+end of the room, talking to that girl in pink.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And so lose this seat before I have told you my good
+news?&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Catch me!&nbsp; And,
+besides, my dear one, think a little of me and my good
+news!&nbsp; I thought the bearer of good news was always
+welcome!&nbsp; I hoped he might be a little welcome for
+himself!&nbsp; Consider!&nbsp; I have but one friend; and let me
+stay by her!&nbsp; And there is only one thing I care to hear;
+and let me hear it!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, Anne,&rsquo; she sighed, &lsquo;if I did not love
+you, why should I be so uneasy?&nbsp; I am turned into a coward,
+dear!&nbsp; Think, if it were the other way round&mdash;if you
+were quite safe and I was in, oh, such danger!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>She had no sooner said it than I was convicted of being a
+dullard.&nbsp; &lsquo;God forgive me, dear!&rsquo;&nbsp; I made
+haste to reply.&nbsp; &lsquo;I never saw before that there were
+two sides to this!&rsquo;&nbsp; And I told her my tale as briefly
+as I could, and rose to seek Ronald.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see, my
+dear, you are obeyed,&rsquo; I said.</p>
+<p>She gave me a look that was a reward in itself; and as I
+turned away from her, with a strong sense of turning away from
+the sun, I carried that look in my bosom like a caress.&nbsp; The
+girl in pink was an arch, ogling person, with a good deal of eyes
+and teeth, and a great play of shoulders and rattle of
+conversation.&nbsp; There could be no doubt, from Mr.
+Ronald&rsquo;s attitude, that he worshipped the very chair she
+sat on.&nbsp; But I was quite ruthless.&nbsp; I laid my hand on
+his shoulder, as he was stooping over her like a hen over a
+chicken.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Excuse me for one moment, Mr. Gilchrist!&rsquo; said
+I.</p>
+<p>He started and span about in answer to my touch, and exhibited
+a face of inarticulate wonder.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;&lsquo;Yes!&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;it is even
+myself!&nbsp; Pardon me for interrupting so agreeable a
+<i>t&ecirc;te-&agrave;-t&ecirc;te</i>, but you know, my good
+fellow, we owe a first duty to Mr. Robbie.&nbsp; It would never
+do to risk making a scene in the man&rsquo;s drawing-room; so the
+first thing I had to attend to was to have you warned.&nbsp; The
+name I go by is Ducie, too, in case of accidents.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&mdash;I say, you know!&rsquo; cried Ronald.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Deuce take it, what are you doing here?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Hush, hush!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not the place,
+my dear fellow&mdash;not the place.&nbsp; Come to my rooms, if
+you like, to-night after the party, or to-morrow in the morning,
+and we can talk it out over a segar.&nbsp; But here, you know, it
+really won&rsquo;t do at all.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Before he could collect his mind for an answer, I had given
+him my address in St. James Square, and had again mingled with
+the crowd.&nbsp; Alas!&nbsp; I was not fated to get back to Flora
+so easily!&nbsp; Mr. Robbie was in the path: he was insatiably
+loquacious; and as he continued to palaver I watched the insipid
+youths gather again about my idol, and cursed my fate and my
+host.&nbsp; He remembered suddenly that I was to attend the
+Assembly Ball on Thursday, and had only attended to-night by way
+of a preparative.&nbsp; This put it into his head to present me
+to another young lady; but I managed this interview with so much
+art that, while I was scrupulously polite and even cordial to the
+fair one, I contrived to keep Robbie beside me all the time and
+to leave along with him when the ordeal was over.&nbsp; We were
+just walking away arm in arm, when I spied my friend the Major
+approaching, stiff as a ramrod and, as usual, obtrusively
+clean.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh! there&rsquo;s a man I want to know,&rsquo; said I,
+taking the bull by the horns.&nbsp; &lsquo;Won&rsquo;t you
+introduce me to Major Chevenix?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;At a word, my dear fellow,&rsquo; said Robbie; and
+&lsquo;Major!&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;come here and let me
+present to you my friend Mr. Ducie, who desires the honour of
+your acquaintance.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The Major flushed visibly, but otherwise preserved his
+composure.&nbsp; He bowed very low.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m not
+very sure,&rsquo; he said: &lsquo;I have an idea we have met
+before?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Informally,&rsquo; I said, returning his bow;
+&lsquo;and I have long looked forward to the pleasure of
+regularising our acquaintance.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are very good, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Perhaps you could aid my memory a little?&nbsp; Where was
+it that I had the pleasure?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, that would be telling tales out of school,&rsquo;
+said I, with a laugh, &lsquo;and before my lawyer,
+too!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll wager,&rsquo; broke in Mr. Robbie,
+&lsquo;that, when you knew my client, Chevenix&mdash;the past of
+our friend Mr. Ducie is an obscure chapter full of horrid
+secrets&mdash;I&rsquo;ll wager, now, you knew him as St.
+Ivey,&rsquo; says he, nudging me violently.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think not, sir,&rsquo; said the Major, with pinched
+lips.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I wish he may prove all right!&rsquo; continued
+the lawyer, with certainly the worst-inspired jocularity in the
+world.&nbsp; &lsquo;I know nothing by him!&nbsp; He may be a
+swell mobsman for me with his aliases.&nbsp; You must put your
+memory on the rack, Major, and when ye&rsquo;ve remembered when
+and where ye met him, be sure ye tell me.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I will not fail, sir,&rsquo; said Chevenix.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Seek to him!&rsquo; cried Robbie, waving his hand as he
+departed.</p>
+<p>The Major, as soon as we were alone, turned upon me his
+impassive countenance.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;you have
+courage.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It is undoubted as your honour, sir,&rsquo; I returned,
+bowing.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Did you expect to meet me, may I ask?&rsquo; said
+he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You saw, at least, that I courted the
+presentation,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And you were not afraid?&rsquo; said Chevenix.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I was perfectly at ease.&nbsp; I knew I was dealing
+with a gentleman.&nbsp; Be that your epitaph.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, there are some other people looking for
+you,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;who will make no bones about the
+point of honour.&nbsp; The police, my dear sir, are simply agog
+about you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I think that that was coarse,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You have seen Miss Gilchrist?&rsquo; he inquired,
+changing the subject.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;With whom, I am led to understand, we are on a footing
+of rivalry?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, I have seen
+her.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I was just seeking her,&rsquo; he replied.</p>
+<p>I was conscious of a certain thrill of temper; so, I suppose,
+was he.&nbsp; We looked each other up and down.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The situation is original,&rsquo; he resumed.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Quite,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But let me tell you
+frankly you are blowing a cold coal.&nbsp; I owe you so much for
+your kindness to the prisoner Champdivers.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Meaning that the lady&rsquo;s affections are more
+advantageously disposed of?&rsquo; he asked, with a sneer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Thank you, I am sure.&nbsp; And, since you have given me a
+lead, just hear a word of good advice in your turn.&nbsp; Is it
+fair, is it delicate, is it like a gentleman, to compromise the
+young lady by attentions which (as you know very well) can come
+to nothing?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I was utterly unable to find words in answer.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Excuse me if I cut this interview short,&rsquo; he went
+on.&nbsp; &lsquo;It seems to me doomed to come to nothing, and
+there is more attractive metal.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; I replied, &lsquo;as you say, it cannot
+amount to much.&nbsp; You are impotent, bound hand and foot in
+honour.&nbsp; You know me to be a man falsely accused, and even
+if you did not know it, from your position as my rival you have
+only the choice to stand quite still or to be
+infamous.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I would not say that,&rsquo; he returned, with another
+change of colour.&nbsp; &lsquo;I may hear it once too
+often.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>With which he moved off straight for where Flora was sitting
+amidst her court of vapid youths, and I had no choice but to
+follow him, a bad second, and reading myself, as I went, a sharp
+lesson on the command of temper.</p>
+<p>It is a strange thing how young men in their teens go down at
+the mere wind of the coming of men of twenty-five and
+upwards!&nbsp; The vapid ones fled without thought of resistance
+before the Major and me; a few dallied awhile in the
+neighbourhood&mdash;so to speak, with their fingers in their
+mouths&mdash;but presently these also followed the rout, and we
+remained face to face before Flora.&nbsp; There was a draught in
+that corner by the door; she had thrown her pelisse over her bare
+arms and neck, and the dark fur of the trimming set them
+off.&nbsp; She shone by contrast; the light played on her smooth
+skin to admiration, and the colour changed in her excited
+face.&nbsp; For the least fraction of a second she looked from
+one to the other of her pair of rival swains, and seemed to
+hesitate.&nbsp; Then she addressed Chevenix:&mdash;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are coming to the Assembly, of course, Major
+Chevenix?&rsquo; said she.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I fear not; I fear I shall be otherwise engaged,&rsquo;
+he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Even the pleasure of dancing with you,
+Miss Flora, must give way to duty.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>For awhile the talk ran harmlessly on the weather, and then
+branched off towards the war.&nbsp; It seemed to be by no
+one&rsquo;s fault; it was in the air, and had to come.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good news from the scene of operations,&rsquo; said the
+Major.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good news while it lasts,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But will Miss Gilchrist tell us her private thought upon
+the war?&nbsp; In her admiration for the victors, does not there
+mingle some pity for the vanquished?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Indeed, sir,&rsquo; she said, with animation,
+&lsquo;only too much of it!&nbsp; War is a subject that I do not
+think should be talked of to a girl.&nbsp; I am, I have to
+be&mdash;what do you call it?&mdash;a non-combatant?&nbsp; And to
+remind me of what others have to do and suffer: no, it is not
+fair!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Miss Gilchrist has the tender female heart,&rsquo; said
+Chevenix.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do not be too sure of that!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I would love to be allowed to fight myself!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;On which side?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Can you ask?&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am a
+Scottish girl!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;She is a Scottish girl!&rsquo; repeated the Major,
+looking at me.&nbsp; &lsquo;And no one grudges you her
+pity!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I glory in every grain of it she has to
+spare,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Pity is akin to
+love.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, and let us put that question to Miss
+Gilchrist.&nbsp; It is for her to decide, and for us to bow to
+the decision.&nbsp; Is pity, Miss Flora, or is admiration,
+nearest love?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh come,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us be more
+concrete.&nbsp; Lay before the lady a complete case: describe
+your man, then I&rsquo;ll describe <i>mine</i>, and Miss Flora
+shall decide.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think I see your meaning,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;and
+I&rsquo;ll try.&nbsp; You think that pity&mdash;and the kindred
+sentiments&mdash;have the greatest power upon the heart.&nbsp; I
+think more nobly of women.&nbsp; To my view, the man they love
+will first of all command their respect; he will be
+steadfast&mdash;proud, if you please; dry, possibly&mdash;but of
+all things steadfast.&nbsp; They will look at him in doubt; at
+last they will see that stern face which he presents to all the
+rest of the world soften to them alone.&nbsp; First, trust, I
+say.&nbsp; It is so that a woman loves who is worthy of
+heroes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Your man is very ambitious, sir,&rsquo; said I,
+&lsquo;and very much of a hero!&nbsp; Mine is a humbler, and, I
+would fain think, a more human dog.&nbsp; He is one with no
+particular trust in himself, with no superior steadfastness to be
+admired for, who sees a lady&rsquo;s face, who hears her voice,
+and, without any phrase about the matter, falls in love.&nbsp;
+What does he ask for, then, but pity?&mdash;pity for his
+weakness, pity for his love, which is his life.&nbsp; You would
+make women always the inferiors, gaping up at your imaginary
+lover; he, like a marble statue, with his nose in the air!&nbsp;
+But God has been wiser than you; and the most steadfast of your
+heroes may prove human, after all.&nbsp; We appeal to the queen
+for judgment,&rsquo; I added, turning and bowing before
+Flora.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And how shall the queen judge?&rsquo; she asked.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I must give you an answer that is no answer at all.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;The wind bloweth where it listeth&rdquo;: she goes where
+her heart goes.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Her face flushed as she said it; mine also, for I read in it a
+declaration, and my heart swelled for joy.&nbsp; But Chevenix
+grew pale.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You make of life a very dreadful kind of lottery,
+ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I will not
+despair.&nbsp; Honest and unornamental is still my
+choice.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And I must say he looked extremely handsome and very amusingly
+like the marble statue with its nose in the air to which I had
+compared him.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I cannot imagine how we got upon this subject,&rsquo;
+said Flora.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Madame, it was through the war,&rsquo; replied
+Chevenix.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;All roads lead to Rome,&rsquo; I commented.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What else would you expect Mr. Chevenix and myself to talk
+of?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>About this time I was conscious of a certain bustle and
+movement in the room behind me, but did not pay to it that degree
+of attention which perhaps would have been wise.&nbsp; There came
+a certain change in Flora&rsquo;s face; she signalled repeatedly
+with her fan; her eyes appealed to me obsequiously; there could
+be no doubt that she wanted something&mdash;as well as I could
+make out, that I should go away and leave the field clear for my
+rival, which I had not the least idea of doing.&nbsp; At last she
+rose from her chair with impatience.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I think it time you were saying good-night, Mr
+Ducie!&rsquo; she said.</p>
+<p>I could not in the least see why, and said so.</p>
+<p>Whereupon she gave me this appalling answer, &lsquo;My aunt is
+coming out of the card-room.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In less time than it takes to tell, I had made my bow and my
+escape.&nbsp; Looking back from the doorway, I was privileged to
+see, for a moment, the august profile and gold eyeglasses of Miss
+Gilchrist issuing from the card-room; and the sight lent me
+wings.&nbsp; I stood not on the order of my going; and a moment
+after, I was on the pavement of Castle Street, and the lighted
+windows shone down on me, and were crossed by ironical shadows of
+those who had remained behind.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;EVENTS OF TUESDAY: THE TOILS CLOSING</h2>
+<p>This day began with a surprise.&nbsp; I found a letter on my
+breakfast-table addressed to Edward Ducie, Esquire; and at first
+I was startled beyond measure.&nbsp; &lsquo;Conscience doth make
+cowards of us all!&rsquo;&nbsp; When I had opened it, it proved
+to be only a note from the lawyer, enclosing a card for the
+Assembly Ball on Thursday evening.&nbsp; Shortly after, as I was
+composing my mind with a segar at one of the windows of the
+sitting-room, and Rowley, having finished the light share of work
+that fell to him, sat not far off tootling with great spirit and
+a marked preference for the upper octave, Ronald was suddenly
+shown in.&nbsp; I got him a segar, drew in a chair to the side of
+the fire, and installed him there&mdash;I was going to say, at
+his ease, but no expression could be farther from the
+truth.&nbsp; He was plainly on pins and needles, did not know
+whether to take or to refuse the segar, and, after he had taken
+it, did not know whether to light or to return it.&nbsp; I saw he
+had something to say; I did not think it was his own something;
+and I was ready to offer a large bet it was really something of
+Major Chevenix&rsquo;s.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, and so here you are!&rsquo; I observed, with
+pointless cordiality, for I was bound I should do nothing to help
+him out.&nbsp; If he were, indeed, here running errands for my
+rival, he might have a fair field, but certainly no favour.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The fact is,&rsquo; he began, &lsquo;I would rather see
+you alone.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Why, certainly,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Rowley,
+you can step into the bedroom.&nbsp; My dear fellow,&rsquo; I
+continued, &lsquo;this sounds serious.&nbsp; Nothing wrong, I
+trust.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll be quite honest,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I <i>am</i> a good deal bothered.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And I bet I know why!&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And I bet I can put you to rights, too!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What do you mean!&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You must be hard up,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and all I
+can say is, you&rsquo;ve come to the right place.&nbsp; If you
+have the least use for a hundred pounds, or any such trifling sum
+as that, please mention it.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s here, quite at your
+service.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I am sure it is most kind of you,&rsquo; said Ronald,
+&lsquo;and the truth is, though I can&rsquo;t think how you
+guessed it, that I really <i>am</i> a little behind board.&nbsp;
+But I haven&rsquo;t come to talk about that.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, I dare say!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not worth
+talking about!&nbsp; But remember, Ronald, you and I are on
+different sides of the business.&nbsp; Remember that you did me
+one of those services that make men friends for ever.&nbsp; And
+since I have had the fortune to come into a fair share of money,
+just oblige me, and consider so much of it as your
+own.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;I couldn&rsquo;t take it; I
+couldn&rsquo;t, really.&nbsp; Besides, the fact is, I&rsquo;ve
+come on a very different matter.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s about my
+sister, St. Ives,&rsquo; and he shook his head menacingly at
+me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You&rsquo;re quite sure?&rsquo; I persisted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s here, at your service&mdash;up to five hundred
+pounds, if you like.&nbsp; Well, all right; only remember where
+it is, when you do want it.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, please let me alone!&rsquo; cried Ronald:
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;ve come to say something unpleasant; and how on
+earth can I do it, if you don&rsquo;t give a fellow a
+chance?&nbsp; It&rsquo;s about my sister, as I said.&nbsp; You
+can see for yourself that it can&rsquo;t be allowed to go
+on.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s compromising; it don&rsquo;t lead to
+anything; and you&rsquo;re not the kind of man (you must feel it
+yourself) that I can allow my female relatives to have anything
+to do with.&nbsp; I hate saying this, St. Ives; it looks like
+hitting a man when he&rsquo;s down, you know; and I told the
+Major I very much disliked it from the first.&nbsp; However, it
+had to be said; and now it has been, and, between gentlemen, it
+shouldn&rsquo;t be necessary to refer to it again.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;It&rsquo;s compromising; it doesn&rsquo;t lead to
+anything; not the kind of man,&rsquo; I repeated
+thoughtfully.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, I believe I understand, and shall
+make haste to put myself <i>en r&egrave;gle</i>.&rsquo;&nbsp; I
+stood up, and laid my segar down.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr.
+Gilchrist,&rsquo; said I, with a bow, &lsquo;in answer to your
+very natural observations, I beg to offer myself as a suitor for
+your sister&rsquo;s hand.&nbsp; I am a man of title, of which we
+think lightly in France, but of ancient lineage, which is
+everywhere prized.&nbsp; I can display thirty-two quarterings
+without a blot.&nbsp; My expectations are certainly above the
+average: I believe my uncle&rsquo;s income averages about thirty
+thousand pounds, though I admit I was not careful to inform
+myself.&nbsp; Put it anywhere between fifteen and fifty thousand;
+it is certainly not less.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;All this is very easy to say,&rsquo; said Ronald, with
+a pitying smile.&nbsp; &lsquo;Unfortunately, these things are in
+the air.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Pardon me,&mdash;in Buckinghamshire,&rsquo; said I,
+smiling.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, what I mean is, my dear St. Ives, that you
+<i>can&rsquo;t prove</i> them,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;They might just as well not be: do you follow me?&nbsp;
+You can&rsquo;t bring us any third party to back you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, come!&rsquo; cried I, springing up and hurrying to
+the table.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must excuse me!&rsquo;&nbsp; I wrote
+Romaine&rsquo;s address.&nbsp; &lsquo;There is my reference, Mr.
+Gilchrist.&nbsp; Until you have written to him, and received his
+negative answer, I have a right to be treated, and I shall see
+that you treat me, as a gentleman.&rsquo;&nbsp; He was brought up
+with a round turn at that.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I beg your pardon, St. Ives,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Believe me, I had no wish to be offensive.&nbsp; But
+there&rsquo;s the difficulty of this affair; I can&rsquo;t make
+any of my points without offence!&nbsp; You must excuse me,
+it&rsquo;s not my fault.&nbsp; But, at any rate, you must see for
+yourself this proposal of marriage is&mdash;is merely impossible,
+my dear fellow.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s nonsense!&nbsp; Our countries
+are at war; you are a prisoner.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My ancestor of the time of the Ligue,&rsquo; I replied,
+&lsquo;married a Huguenot lady out of the Saintonge, riding two
+hundred miles through an enemy&rsquo;s country to bring off his
+bride; and it was a happy marriage.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well!&rsquo; he began; and then looked down into the
+fire, and became silent.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, there&rsquo;s this business
+of&mdash;Goguelat,&rsquo; said he, still looking at the coals in
+the grate.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What!&rsquo; I exclaimed, starting in my chair.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What&rsquo;s that you say?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;This business about Goguelat,&rsquo; he repeated.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Ronald,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;this is not your
+doing.&nbsp; These are not your own words.&nbsp; I know where
+they came from: a coward put them in your mouth.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;St. Ives!&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;why do you make it so
+hard for me? and where&rsquo;s the use of insulting other
+people?&nbsp; The plain English is, that I can&rsquo;t hear of
+any proposal of marriage from a man under a charge like
+that.&nbsp; You must see it for yourself, man!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+the most absurd thing I ever heard of!&nbsp; And you go on
+forcing me to argue with you, too!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Because I have had an affair of honour which terminated
+unhappily, you&mdash;a young soldier, or next-door to
+it&mdash;refuse my offer?&nbsp; Do I understand you
+aright?&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My dear fellow!&rsquo; he wailed, &lsquo;of course you
+can twist my words, if you like.&nbsp; You <i>say</i> it was an
+affair of honour.&nbsp; Well, I can&rsquo;t, of course, tell you
+that&mdash;I can&rsquo;t&mdash;I mean, you must see that
+that&rsquo;s just the point!&nbsp; Was it?&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t
+know.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I have the honour to inform you,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, other people say the reverse, you see!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;They lie, Ronald, and I will prove it in
+time.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The short and the long of it is, that any man who is so
+unfortunate as to have such things said about him is not the man
+to be my brother-in-law!&rsquo; he cried.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Do you know who will be my first witness at the
+court?&nbsp; Arthur Chevenix!&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t care!&rsquo; he cried, rising from his
+chair and beginning to pace outrageously about the room.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What do you mean, St. Ives?&nbsp; What is this
+about?&nbsp; It&rsquo;s like a dream, I declare!&nbsp; You made
+an offer, and I have refused it.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t like it, I
+don&rsquo;t want it; and whatever I did, or didn&rsquo;t,
+wouldn&rsquo;t matter&mdash;my aunt wouldn&rsquo;t bear of it
+anyway!&nbsp; Can&rsquo;t you take your answer, man?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You must remember, Ronald, that we are playing with
+edged tools,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;An offer of marriage is
+a delicate subject to handle.&nbsp; You have refused, and you
+have justified your refusal by several statements: first, that I
+was an impostor; second, that our countries were at war; and
+third&mdash; No, I will speak,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;you can
+answer when I have done,&mdash;and third, that I had
+dishonourably killed&mdash;or was said to have done so&mdash;the
+man Goguelat.&nbsp; Now, my dear fellow, these are very awkward
+grounds to be taking.&nbsp; From any one else&rsquo;s lips I need
+scarce tell you how I should resent them; but my hands are
+tied.&nbsp; I have so much gratitude to you, without talking of
+the love I bear your sister, that you insult me, when you do so,
+under the cover of a complete impunity.&nbsp; I must feel the
+pain&mdash;and I do feel it acutely&mdash;I can do nothing to
+protect myself.&rsquo;&nbsp; He had been anxious enough to
+interrupt me in the beginning; but now, and after I had ceased,
+he stood a long while silent.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;St. Ives,&rsquo; he said at last, &lsquo;I think I had
+better go away.&nbsp; This has been very irritating.&nbsp; I
+never at all meant to say anything of the kind, and I apologise
+to you.&nbsp; I have all the esteem for you that one gentleman
+should have for another.&nbsp; I only meant to tell you&mdash;to
+show you what had influenced my mind; and that, in short, the
+thing was impossible.&nbsp; One thing you may be quite sure of: I
+shall do nothing against you.&nbsp; Will you shake hands before I
+go away?&rsquo; he blurted out.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I agree with you&mdash;the
+interview has been irritating.&nbsp; Let bygones be
+bygones.&nbsp; Good-bye, Ronald.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good-bye, St. Ives!&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;m heartily sorry.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And with that he was gone.</p>
+<p>The windows of my own sitting-room looked towards the north;
+but the entrance passage drew its light from the direction of the
+square.&nbsp; Hence I was able to observe Ronald&rsquo;s
+departure, his very disheartened gait, and the fact that he was
+joined, about half-way, by no less a man than Major
+Chevenix.&nbsp; At this, I could scarce keep from smiling; so
+unpalatable an interview must be before the pair of them, and I
+could hear their voices, clashing like crossed swords, in that
+eternal antiphony of &lsquo;I told you,&rsquo; and &lsquo;I told
+you not.&rsquo;&nbsp; Without doubt, they had gained very little
+by their visit; but then I had gained less than nothing, and had
+been bitterly dispirited into the bargain.&nbsp; Ronald had stuck
+to his guns and refused me to the last.&nbsp; It was no news;
+but, on the other hand, it could not be contorted into good
+news.&nbsp; I was now certain that during my temporary absence in
+France, all irons would be put into the fire, and the world
+turned upside down, to make Flora disown the obtrusive Frenchman
+and accept Chevenix.&nbsp; Without doubt she would resist these
+instances: but the thought of them did not please me, and I felt
+she should be warned and prepared for the battle.</p>
+<p>It was no use to try and see her now, but I promised myself
+early that evening to return to Swanston.&nbsp; In the meantime I
+had to make all my preparations, and look the coming journey in
+the face.&nbsp; Here in Edinburgh I was within four miles of the
+sea, yet the business of approaching random fishermen with my hat
+in the one hand and a knife in the other, appeared so desperate,
+that I saw nothing for it but to retrace my steps over the
+northern counties, and knock a second time at the doors of
+Birchell Fenn.&nbsp; To do this, money would be necessary; and
+after leaving my paper in the hands of Flora I had still a
+balance of about fifteen hundred pounds.&nbsp; Or rather I may
+say I had them and I had them not; for after my luncheon with Mr.
+Robbie I had placed the amount, all but thirty pounds of change,
+in a bank in George Street, on a deposit receipt in the name of
+Mr. Rowley.&nbsp; This I had designed to be my gift to him, in
+case I must suddenly depart.&nbsp; But now, thinking better of
+the arrangement, I despatched my little man, cockade and all, to
+lift the fifteen hundred.</p>
+<p>He was not long gone, and returned with a flushed face, and
+the deposit receipt still in his hand.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No go, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; says he.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;How&rsquo;s that?&rsquo; I inquired,</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, sir, I found the place all right, and no
+mistake,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I tell you what gave me
+a blue fright!&nbsp; There was a customer standing by the door,
+and I reckonised him!&nbsp; Who do you think it was, Mr.
+Anne?&nbsp; W&rsquo;y, that same Red-Breast&mdash;him I had
+breakfast with near Aylesbury.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;You are sure you are not mistaken?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Certain sure,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not Mr.
+Lavender, I don&rsquo;t mean, sir; I mean the other party.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Wot&rsquo;s he doing here?&rsquo; says I.&nbsp; It
+don&rsquo;t look right.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not by any means,&rsquo; I agreed.</p>
+<p>I walked to and fro in the apartment reflecting.&nbsp; This
+particular Bow Street runner might be here by accident; but it
+was to imagine a singular play of coincidence that he, who had
+met Rowley and spoken with him in the &lsquo;Green Dragon,&rsquo;
+hard by Aylesbury, should be now in Scotland, where he could have
+no legitimate business, and by the doors of the bank where Rowley
+kept his account.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;he didn&rsquo;t see you,
+did he?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Never a fear,&rsquo; quoth Rowley.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;W&rsquo;y Mr. Anne, sir, if he &rsquo;ad, you
+wouldn&rsquo;t have seen <i>me</i> any more!&nbsp; I ain&rsquo;t
+a hass, sir!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, my boy, you can put that receipt in your
+pocket.&nbsp; You&rsquo;ll have no more use for it till
+you&rsquo;re quite clear of me.&nbsp; Don&rsquo;t lose it,
+though; it&rsquo;s your share of the Christmas-box: fifteen
+hundred pounds all for yourself.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne, sir, but wot for!&rsquo;
+said Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To set up a public-house upon,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you&rsquo;ll excuse me, sir, I ain&rsquo;t got any
+call to set up a public-house, sir,&rsquo; he replied
+stoutly.&nbsp; &lsquo;And I tell you wot, sir, it seems to me
+I&rsquo;m reether young for the billet.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m your body
+servant, Mr. Anne, or else I&rsquo;m nothink.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, Rowley,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you
+what it&rsquo;s for.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s for the good service you
+have done me, of which I don&rsquo;t care&mdash;and don&rsquo;t
+dare&mdash;to speak.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s for your loyalty and
+cheerfulness, my dear boy.&nbsp; I had meant it for you; but to
+tell you the truth, it&rsquo;s past mending now&mdash;it has to
+be yours.&nbsp; Since that man is waiting by the bank, the money
+can&rsquo;t be touched until I&rsquo;m gone.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Until you&rsquo;re gone, sir?&rsquo; re-echoed
+Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;You don&rsquo;t go anywheres without me, I
+can tell you that, Mr. Anne, sir!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Yes, my boy,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;we are going to part
+very soon now; probably to-morrow.&nbsp; And it&rsquo;s for my
+sake, Rowley!&nbsp; Depend upon it, if there was any reason at
+all for that Bow Street man being at the bank, he was not there
+to look out for you.&nbsp; How they could have found out about
+the account so early is more than I can fathom; some strange
+coincidence must have played me false!&nbsp; But there the fact
+is; and Rowley, I&rsquo;ll not only have to say farewell to you
+presently, I&rsquo;ll have to ask you to stay indoors until I can
+say it.&nbsp; Remember, my boy, it&rsquo;s only so that you can
+serve me now.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;W&rsquo;y, sir, you say the word, and of course
+I&rsquo;ll do it!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;&ldquo;Nothink by
+&rsquo;alves,&rdquo; is my motto!&nbsp; I&rsquo;m your man,
+through thick and thin, live or die, I am!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In the meantime there was nothing to be done till towards
+sunset.&nbsp; My only chance now was to come again as quickly as
+possible to speech of Flora, who was my only practicable banker;
+and not before evening was it worth while to think of that.&nbsp;
+I might compose myself as well as I was able over the
+<i>Caledonian Mercury</i>, with its ill news of the campaign of
+France and belated documents about the retreat from Russia; and,
+as I sat there by the fire, I was sometimes all awake with anger
+and mortification at what I was reading, and sometimes again I
+would be three parts asleep as I dozed over the barren items of
+home intelligence.&nbsp; &lsquo;Lately arrived&rsquo;&mdash;this
+is what I suddenly stumbled on&mdash;&lsquo;at Dumbreck&rsquo;s
+Hotel, the Viscount of Saint-Yves.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you please, Mr. Anne, sir,&rsquo; answered the
+obsequious, lowering his pipe.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come and look at this, my boy,&rsquo; said I, holding
+out the paper.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My crikey!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s
+&rsquo;im, sir, sure enough!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Sure enough, Rowley,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;He&rsquo;s on the trail.&nbsp; He has fairly caught up
+with us.&nbsp; He and this Bow Street man have come together, I
+would swear.&nbsp; And now here is the whole field, quarry,
+hounds and hunters, all together in this city of
+Edinburgh.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;And wot are you goin&rsquo; to do now, sir?&nbsp; Tell
+you wot, let me take it in &rsquo;and, please!&nbsp; Gimme a
+minute, and I&rsquo;ll disguise myself, and go out to this Dum---
+to this hotel, leastways, sir&mdash;and see wot he&rsquo;s up
+to.&nbsp; You put your trust in me, Mr. Anne: I&rsquo;m fly,
+don&rsquo;t you make no mistake about it.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m all
+a-growing and a-blowing, I am.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Not one foot of you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+are a prisoner, Rowley, and make up your mind to that.&nbsp; So
+am I, or next door to it.&nbsp; I showed it you for a caution; if
+you go on the streets, it spells death to me, Rowley.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; says Rowley.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Come to think of it,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;you
+must take a cold, or something.&nbsp; No good of awakening Mrs.
+McRankine&rsquo;s suspicions.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;A cold?&rsquo; he cried, recovering immediately from
+his depression.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can do it, Mr. Anne.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And he proceeded to sneeze and cough and blow his nose, till I
+could not restrain myself from smiling.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, I tell you, I know a lot of them dodges,&rsquo; he
+observed proudly.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, they come in very handy,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;d better go at once and show it to the old gal,
+&rsquo;adn&rsquo;t I?&rsquo; he asked.</p>
+<p>I told him, by all means; and he was gone upon the instant,
+gleeful as though to a game of football.</p>
+<p>I took up the paper and read carelessly on, my thoughts
+engaged with my immediate danger, till I struck on the next
+paragraph:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;In connection with the recent horrid murder
+in the Castle, we are desired to make public the following
+intelligence.&nbsp; The soldier, Champdivers, is supposed to be
+in the neighbourhood of this city.&nbsp; He is about the middle
+height or rather under, of a pleasing appearance and highly
+genteel address.&nbsp; When last heard of he wore a fashionable
+suit of pearl-grey, and boots with fawn-coloured tops.&nbsp; He
+is accompanied by a servant about sixteen years of age, speaks
+English without any accent, and passed under the <i>alias</i> of
+Ramornie.&nbsp; A reward is offered for his
+apprehension.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>In a moment I was in the next room, stripping from me the
+pearl-coloured suit!</p>
+<p>I confess I was now a good deal agitated.&nbsp; It is
+difficult to watch the toils closing slowly and surely about you,
+and to retain your composure; and I was glad that Rowley was not
+present to spy on my confusion.&nbsp; I was flushed, my breath
+came thick; I cannot remember a time when I was more put out.</p>
+<p>And yet I must wait and do nothing, and partake of my meals,
+and entertain the ever-garrulous Rowley, as though I were
+entirely my own man.&nbsp; And if I did not require to entertain
+Mrs. McRankine also, that was but another drop of bitterness in
+my cup!&nbsp; For what ailed my landlady, that she should hold
+herself so severely aloof, that she should refuse conversation,
+that her eyes should be reddened, that I should so continually
+hear the voice of her private supplications sounding through the
+house?&nbsp; I was much deceived, or she had read the insidious
+paragraph and recognised the comminated pearl-grey suit.&nbsp; I
+remember now a certain air with which she had laid the paper on
+my table, and a certain sniff, between sympathy and defiance,
+with which she had announced it: &lsquo;There&rsquo;s your
+<i>Mercury</i> for ye!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>In this direction, at least, I saw no pressing danger; her
+tragic countenance betokened agitation; it was plain she was
+wrestling with her conscience, and the battle still hung
+dubious.&nbsp; The question of what to do troubled me
+extremely.&nbsp; I could not venture to touch such an intricate
+and mysterious piece of machinery as my landlady&rsquo;s
+spiritual nature: it might go off at a word, and in any
+direction, like a badly-made firework.&nbsp; And while I praised
+myself extremely for my wisdom in the past, that I had made so
+much a friend of her, I was all abroad as to my conduct in the
+present.&nbsp; There seemed an equal danger in pressing and in
+neglecting the accustomed marks of familiarity.&nbsp; The one
+extreme looked like impudence, and might annoy, the other was a
+practical confession of guilt.&nbsp; Altogether, it was a good
+hour for me when the dusk began to fall in earnest on the streets
+of Edinburgh, and the voice of an early watchman bade me set
+forth.</p>
+<p>I reached the neighbourhood of the cottage before seven; and
+as I breasted the steep ascent which leads to the garden wall, I
+was struck with surprise to hear a dog.&nbsp; Dogs I had heard
+before, but only from the hamlet on the hillside above.&nbsp;
+Now, this dog was in the garden itself, where it roared aloud in
+paroxysms of fury, and I could hear it leaping and straining on
+the chain.&nbsp; I waited some while, until the brute&rsquo;s fit
+of passion had roared itself out.&nbsp; Then, with the utmost
+precaution, I drew near again; and finally approached the garden
+wall.&nbsp; So soon as I had clapped my head above the level,
+however, the barking broke forth again with redoubled
+energy.&nbsp; Almost at the same time, the door of the cottage
+opened, and Ronald and the Major appeared upon the threshold with
+a lantern.&nbsp; As they so stood, they were almost immediately
+below me, strongly illuminated, and within easy earshot.&nbsp;
+The Major pacified the dog, who took instead to low, uneasy
+growling intermingled with occasional yelps.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good thing I brought Towzer!&rsquo; said Chevenix.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Damn him, I wonder where he is!&rsquo; said Ronald; and
+he moved the lantern up and down, and turned the night into a
+shifting puzzle-work of gleam and shadow.&nbsp; &lsquo;I think
+I&rsquo;ll make a sally.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t think you will,&rsquo; replied
+Chevenix.&nbsp; &lsquo;When I agreed to come out here and do
+sentry-go, it was on one condition, Master Ronald: don&rsquo;t
+you forget that!&nbsp; Military discipline, my boy!&nbsp; Our
+beat is this path close about the house.&nbsp; Down, Towzer! good
+boy, good boy&mdash;gently, then!&rsquo; he went on, caressing
+his confounded monster.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;To think!&nbsp; The beggar may be hearing us this
+minute!&rsquo; cried Ronald.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Nothing more probable,&rsquo; said the Major.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You there, St. Ives?&rsquo; he added, in a distinct but
+guarded voice.&nbsp; &lsquo;I only want to tell you, you had
+better go home.&nbsp; Mr. Gilchrist and I take watch and
+watch.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>The game was up.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Beaucoup de
+plaisir</i>!&rsquo; I replied, in the same tones.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;<i>Il fait un peu froid pour veiller</i>; <i>gardez-vous
+des engelures</i>!&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I suppose it was done in a moment of ungovernable rage; but in
+spite of the excellent advice he had given to Ronald the moment
+before, Chevenix slipped the chain, and the dog sprang, straight
+as an arrow, up the bank.&nbsp; I stepped back, picked up a stone
+of about twelve pounds weight, and stood ready.&nbsp; With a
+bound the beast landed on the cope-stone of the wall; and, almost
+in the same instant, my missile caught him fair in the
+face.&nbsp; He gave a stifled cry, went tumbling back where he
+had come from, and I could hear the twelve-pounder accompany him
+in his fall.&nbsp; Chevenix, at the same moment, broke out in a
+roaring voice: &lsquo;The hell-hound!&nbsp; If he&rsquo;s killed
+my dog!&rsquo; and I judged, upon all grounds, it was as well to
+be off.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXX&mdash;EVENTS OF WEDNESDAY; THE UNIVERSITY OF
+CRAMOND</h2>
+<p>I awoke to much diffidence, even to a feeling that might be
+called the beginnings of panic, and lay for hours in my bed
+considering the situation.&nbsp; Seek where I pleased, there was
+nothing to encourage me and plenty to appal.&nbsp; They kept a
+close watch about the cottage; they had a beast of a
+watch-dog&mdash;at least, unless I had settled it; and if I had,
+I knew its bereaved master would only watch the more
+indefatigably for the loss.&nbsp; In the pardonable ostentation
+of love I had given all the money I could spare to Flora; I had
+thought it glorious that the hunted exile should come down, like
+Jupiter, in a shower of gold, and pour thousands in the lap of
+the beloved.&nbsp; Then I had in an hour of arrant folly buried
+what remained to me in a bank in George Street.&nbsp; And now I
+must get back the one or the other; and which? and how?</p>
+<p>As I tossed in my bed, I could see three possible courses, all
+extremely perilous.&nbsp; First, Rowley might have been mistaken;
+the bank might not be watched; it might still be possible for him
+to draw the money on the deposit receipt.&nbsp; Second, I might
+apply again to Robbie.&nbsp; Or, third, I might dare everything,
+go to the Assembly Ball, and speak with Flora under the eyes of
+all Edinburgh.&nbsp; This last alternative, involving as it did
+the most horrid risks, and the delay of forty-eight hours, I did
+but glance at with an averted head, and turned again to the
+consideration of the others.&nbsp; It was the likeliest thing in
+the world that Robbie had been warned to have no more to do with
+me. The whole policy of the Gilchrists was in the hands of
+Chevenix; and I thought this was a precaution so elementary that
+he was certain to have taken it.&nbsp; If he had not, of course I
+was all right: Robbie would manage to communicate with Flora; and
+by four o&rsquo;clock I might be on the south road and, I was
+going to say, a free man.&nbsp; Lastly, I must assure myself with
+my own eyes whether the bank in George Street were
+beleaguered.</p>
+<p>I called to Rowley and questioned him tightly as to the
+appearance of the Bow Street officer.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;What sort of looking man is he, Rowley?&rsquo; I asked,
+as I began to dress.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Wot sort of a looking man he is?&rsquo; repeated
+Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t very well know wot you
+would say, Mr. Anne.&nbsp; He ain&rsquo;t a beauty,
+any&rsquo;ow.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is he tall?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Tall?&nbsp; Well, no, I shouldn&rsquo;t say <i>tall</i>
+Mr. Anne.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, then, is he short?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Short?&nbsp; No, I don&rsquo;t think I would say he was
+what you would call <i>short</i>.&nbsp; No, not piticular short,
+sir.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Then, I suppose, he must be about the middle
+height?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, you might say it, sir; but not remarkable
+so.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I smothered an oath.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Is he clean-shaved?&rsquo; I tried him again.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Clean-shaved?&rsquo; he repeated, with the same air of
+anxious candour.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Good heaven, man, don&rsquo;t repeat my words like a
+parrot!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Tell me what the man was
+like: it is of the first importance that I should be able to
+recognise him.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I&rsquo;m trying to, Mr. Anne.&nbsp; But
+<i>clean-shaved</i>?&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t seem to rightly get hold
+of that p&rsquo;int.&nbsp; Sometimes it might appear to me like
+as if he was; and sometimes like as if he wasn&rsquo;t.&nbsp; No,
+it wouldn&rsquo;t surprise me now if you was to tell me he
+&rsquo;ad a bit o&rsquo; whisker.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Was the man red-faced?&rsquo; I roared, dwelling on
+each syllable.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t think you need go for to get cross about
+it, Mr. Anne!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m
+tellin&rsquo; you every blessed thing I see!&nbsp;
+Red-faced?&nbsp; Well, no, not as you would remark
+upon.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>A dreadful calm fell upon me.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Was he anywise pale?&rsquo; I asked.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, it don&rsquo;t seem to me as though he
+were.&nbsp; But I tell you truly, I didn&rsquo;t take much heed
+to that.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Did he look like a drinking man?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, no.&nbsp; If you please, sir, he looked more like
+an eating one.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, he was stout, was he?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, sir.&nbsp; I couldn&rsquo;t go so far as
+that.&nbsp; No, he wasn&rsquo;t not to say <i>stout</i>.&nbsp; If
+anything, lean rather.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I need not go on with the infuriating interview.&nbsp; It
+ended as it began, except that Rowley was in tears, and that I
+had acquired one fact.&nbsp; The man was drawn for me as being of
+any height you like to mention, and of any degree of corpulence
+or leanness; clean-shaved or not, as the case might be; the
+colour of his hair Rowley &lsquo;could not take it upon himself
+to put a name on&rsquo;; that of his eyes he thought to have been
+blue&mdash;nay, it was the one point on which he attained to a
+kind of tearful certainty.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll take my davy
+on it,&rsquo; he asseverated.&nbsp; They proved to have been as
+black as sloes, very little and very near together.&nbsp; So much
+for the evidence of the artless!&nbsp; And the fact, or rather
+the facts, acquired?&nbsp; Well, they had to do not with the
+person but with his clothing.&nbsp; The man wore knee-breeches
+and white stockings; his coat was &lsquo;some kind of a lightish
+colour&mdash;or betwixt that and dark&rsquo;; and he wore a
+&lsquo;mole-skin weskit.&rsquo;&nbsp; As if this were not enough,
+he presently haled me from my breakfast in a prodigious flutter,
+and showed me an honest and rather venerable citizen passing in
+the Square.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;That&rsquo;s <i>him</i>, sir,&rsquo; he cried,
+&lsquo;the very moral of him!&nbsp; Well, this one is better
+dressed, and p&rsquo;r&rsquo;aps a trifler taller; and in the
+face he don&rsquo;t favour him noways at all, sir.&nbsp; No, not
+when I come to look again, &rsquo;e don&rsquo;t seem to favour
+him noways.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Jackass!&rsquo; said I, and I think the greatest
+stickler for manners will admit the epithet to have been
+justified.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile the appearance of my landlady added a great load of
+anxiety to what I already suffered.&nbsp; It was plain that she
+had not slept; equally plain that she had wept copiously.&nbsp;
+She sighed, she groaned, she drew in her breath, she shook her
+head, as she waited on table.&nbsp; In short, she seemed in so
+precarious a state, like a petard three times charged with
+hysteria, that I did not dare to address her; and stole out of
+the house on tiptoe, and actually ran downstairs, in the fear
+that she might call me back.&nbsp; It was plain that this degree
+of tension could not last long.</p>
+<p>It was my first care to go to George Street, which I reached
+(by good luck) as a boy was taking down the bank shutters.&nbsp;
+A man was conversing with him; he had white stockings and a
+moleskin waistcoat, and was as ill-looking a rogue as you would
+want to see in a day&rsquo;s journey.&nbsp; This seemed to agree
+fairly well with Rowley&rsquo;s <i>signalement</i>: he had
+declared emphatically (if you remember), and had stuck to it
+besides, that the companion of the great Lavender was no
+beauty.</p>
+<p>Thence I made my way to Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s, where I rang the
+bell.&nbsp; A servant answered the summons, and told me the
+lawyer was engaged, as I had half expected.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Wha shall I say was callin&rsquo;?&rsquo; she pursued;
+and when I had told her &lsquo;Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; &lsquo;I think
+this&rsquo;ll be for you, then?&rsquo; she added, and handed me a
+letter from the hall table.&nbsp; It ran:</p>
+<blockquote><p>&lsquo;<span class="smcap">Dear Mr.
+Ducie</span>,</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My single advice to you is to leave <i>quam primum</i>
+for the South.</p>
+<p style="text-align: right">Yours, <span class="smcap">T.
+Robbie</span>.&rsquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>That was short and sweet.&nbsp; It emphatically extinguished
+hope in one direction.&nbsp; No more was to be gotten of Robbie;
+and I wondered, from my heart, how much had been told him.&nbsp;
+Not too much, I hoped, for I liked the lawyer who had thus
+deserted me, and I placed a certain reliance in the discretion of
+Chevenix.&nbsp; He would not be merciful; on the other hand, I
+did not think he would be cruel without cause.</p>
+<p>It was my next affair to go back along George Street, and
+assure myself whether the man in the moleskin vest was still on
+guard.&nbsp; There was no sign of him on the pavement.&nbsp;
+Spying the door of a common stair nearly opposite the bank, I
+took it in my head that this would be a good point of
+observation, crossed the street, entered with a businesslike air
+and fell immediately against the man in the moleskin vest.&nbsp;
+I stopped and apologised to him; he replied in an unmistakable
+English accent, thus putting the matter almost beyond
+doubt.&nbsp; After this encounter I must, of course, ascend to
+the top story, ring the bell of a suite of apartments, inquire
+for Mr. Vavasour, learn (with no great surprise) that he did not
+live there, come down again and, again politely saluting the man
+from Bow Street, make my escape at last into the street.</p>
+<p>I was now driven back upon the Assembly Ball.&nbsp; Robbie had
+failed me.&nbsp; The bank was watched; it would never do to risk
+Rowley in that neighbourhood.&nbsp; All I could do was to wait
+until the morrow evening, and present myself at the Assembly, let
+it end as it might.&nbsp; But I must say I came to this decision
+with a good deal of genuine fright; and here I came for the first
+time to one of those places where my courage stuck.&nbsp; I do
+not mean that my courage boggled and made a bit of a bother over
+it, as it did over the escape from the Castle; I mean, stuck,
+like a stopped watch or a dead man.&nbsp; Certainly I would go to
+the ball; certainly I must see this morning about my
+clothes.&nbsp; That was all decided.&nbsp; But the most of the
+shops were on the other side of the valley, in the Old Town; and
+it was now my strange discovery that I was physically unable to
+cross the North Bridge!&nbsp; It was as though a precipice had
+stood between us, or the deep sea had intervened.&nbsp; Nearer to
+the Castle my legs refused to bear me.</p>
+<p>I told myself this was mere superstition; I made wagers with
+myself&mdash;and gained them; I went down on the esplanade of
+Princes Street, walked and stood there, alone and conspicuous,
+looking across the garden at the old grey bastions of the
+fortress, where all these troubles had begun.&nbsp; I cocked my
+hat, set my hand on my hip, and swaggered on the pavement,
+confronting detection.&nbsp; And I found I could do all this with
+a sense of exhilaration that was not unpleasing, and with a
+certain <i>cr&acirc;nerie</i> of manner that raised me in my own
+esteem.&nbsp; And yet there was one thing I could not bring my
+mind to face up to, or my limbs to execute; and that was to cross
+the valley into the Old Town.&nbsp; It seemed to me I must be
+arrested immediately if I had done so; I must go straight into
+the twilight of a prison cell, and pass straight thence to the
+gross and final embraces of the nightcap and the halter.&nbsp;
+And yet it was from no reasoned fear of the consequences that I
+could not go.&nbsp; I was unable.&nbsp; My horse baulked, and
+there was an end!</p>
+<p>My nerve was gone: here was a discovery for a man in such
+imminent peril, set down to so desperate a game, which I could
+only hope to win by continual luck and unflagging
+effrontery!&nbsp; The strain had been too long continued, and my
+nerve was gone.&nbsp; I fell into what they call panic fear, as I
+have seen soldiers do on the alarm of a night attack, and turned
+out of Princes Street at random as though the devil were at my
+heels.&nbsp; In St. Andrew Square, I remember vaguely hearing
+some one call out.&nbsp; I paid no heed, but pressed on
+blindly.&nbsp; A moment after, a hand fell heavily on my
+shoulder, and I thought I had fainted.&nbsp; Certainly the world
+went black about me for some seconds; and when that spasm passed
+I found myself standing face to face with the &lsquo;cheerful
+extravagant,&rsquo; in what sort of disarray I really dare not
+imagine, dead white at least, shaking like an aspen, and mowing
+at the man with speechless lips.&nbsp; And this was the soldier
+of Napoleon, and the gentleman who intended going next night to
+an Assembly Ball!&nbsp; I am the more particular in telling of my
+breakdown, because it was my only experience of the sort; and it
+is a good tale for officers.&nbsp; I will allow no man to call me
+coward; I have made my proofs; few men more.&nbsp; And yet I
+(come of the best blood in France and inured to danger from a
+child) did, for some ten or twenty minutes, make this hideous
+exhibition of myself on the streets of the New Town of
+Edinburgh.</p>
+<p>With my first available breath I begged his pardon.&nbsp; I
+was of an extremely nervous disposition, recently increased by
+late hours; I could not bear the slightest start.</p>
+<p>He seemed much concerned.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must be in a devil
+of a state!&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;though of course it was my
+fault&mdash;damnably silly, vulgar sort of thing to do!&nbsp; A
+thousand apologies!&nbsp; But you really must be run down; you
+should consult a medico.&nbsp; My dear sir, a hair of the dog
+that bit you is clearly indicated.&nbsp; A touch of Blue Ruin,
+now?&nbsp; Or, come: it&rsquo;s early, but is man the slave of
+hours? what do you say to a chop and a bottle in Dumbreck&rsquo;s
+Hotel?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>I refused all false comfort; but when he went on to remind me
+that this was the day when the University of Cramond met; and to
+propose a five-mile walk into the country and a dinner in the
+company of young asses like himself, I began to think
+otherwise.&nbsp; I had to wait until to-morrow evening, at any
+rate; this might serve as well as anything else to bridge the
+dreary hours.&nbsp; The country was the very place for me: and
+walking is an excellent sedative for the nerves.&nbsp;
+Remembering poor Rowley, feigning a cold in our lodgings and
+immediately under the guns of the formidable and now doubtful
+Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my servant.&nbsp; &lsquo;Poor
+devil! it is dull for him,&rsquo; I explained.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The merciful man is merciful to his ass,&rsquo;
+observed my sententious friend.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bring him by all
+means!</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The harp, his sole remaining joy,<br />
+Was carried by an orphan boy;&rdquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>and I have no doubt the orphan boy can get some cold victuals
+in the kitchen, while the Senatus dines.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Accordingly, being now quite recovered from my unmanly
+condition, except that nothing could yet induce me to cross the
+North Bridge, I arranged for my ball dress at a shop in Leith
+Street, where I was not served ill, cut out Rowley from his
+seclusion, and was ready along with him at the trysting-place,
+the corner of Duke Street and York Place, by a little after
+two.&nbsp; The University was represented in force: eleven
+persons, including ourselves, Byfield the aeronaut, and the tall
+lad, Forbes, whom I had met on the Sunday morning, bedewed with
+tallow, at the &lsquo;Hunters&rsquo; Rest.&rsquo;&nbsp; I was
+introduced; and we set off by way of Newhaven and the sea beach;
+at first through pleasant country roads, and afterwards along a
+succession of bays of a fairylike prettiness, to our
+destination&mdash;Cramond on the Almond&mdash;a little hamlet on
+a little river, embowered in woods, and looking forth over a
+great flat of quicksand to where a little islet stood planted in
+the sea.&nbsp; It was miniature scenery, but charming of its
+kind.&nbsp; The air of this good February afternoon was bracing,
+but not cold.&nbsp; All the way my companions were skylarking,
+jesting and making puns, and I felt as if a load had been taken
+off my lungs and spirits, and skylarked with the best of
+them.</p>
+<p>Byfield I observed, because I had heard of him before, and
+seen his advertisements, not at all because I was disposed to
+feel interest in the man.&nbsp; He was dark and bilious and very
+silent; frigid in his manners, but burning internally with a
+great fire of excitement; and he was so good as to bestow a good
+deal of his company and conversation (such as it was) upon
+myself, who was not in the least grateful.&nbsp; If I had known
+how I was to be connected with him in the immediate future, I
+might have taken more pains.</p>
+<p>In the hamlet of Cramond there is a hostelry of no very
+promising appearance, and here a room had been prepared for us,
+and we sat down to table.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here you will find no guttling or gormandising, no
+turtle or nightingales&rsquo; tongues,&rsquo; said the
+extravagant, whose name, by the way, was Dalmahoy.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;The device, sir, of the University of Cramond is Plain
+Living and High Drinking.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic
+Latin, which I could by no means follow, only I could hear it
+rhymed, and I guessed it to be more witty than reverent.&nbsp;
+After which the <i>Senatus Academicus</i> sat down to rough
+plenty in the shape of rizzar&rsquo;d haddocks and mustard, a
+sheep&rsquo;s head, a haggis, and other delicacies of
+Scotland.&nbsp; The dinner was washed down with brown stout in
+bottle, and as soon as the cloth was removed, glasses, boiling
+water, sugar, and whisky were set out for the manufacture of
+toddy.&nbsp; I played a good knife and fork, did not shun the
+bowl, and took part, so far as I was able, in the continual fire
+of pleasantry with which the meal was seasoned.&nbsp; Greatly
+daring, I ventured, before all these Scotsmen, to tell
+Sim&rsquo;s Tale of Tweedie&rsquo;s dog; and I was held to have
+done such extraordinary justice to the dialect, &lsquo;for a
+Southron,&rsquo; that I was immediately voted into the Chair of
+Scots, and became, from that moment, a full member of the
+University of Cramond.&nbsp; A little after, I found myself
+entertaining them with a song; and a little after&mdash;perhaps a
+little in consequence&mdash;it occurred to me that I had had
+enough, and would be very well inspired to take French
+leave.&nbsp; It was not difficult to manage, for it was
+nobody&rsquo;s business to observe my movements, and conviviality
+had banished suspicion.</p>
+<p>I got easily forth of the chamber, which reverberated with the
+voices of these merry and learned gentlemen, and breathed a long
+breath.&nbsp; I had passed an agreeable afternoon and evening,
+and I had apparently escaped scot free.&nbsp; Alas! when I looked
+into the kitchen, there was my monkey, drunk as a lord, toppling
+on the edge of the dresser, and performing on the flageolet to an
+audience of the house lasses and some neighbouring ploughmen.</p>
+<p>I routed him promptly from his perch, stuck his hat on, put
+his instrument in his pocket, and set off with him for
+Edinburgh.</p>
+<p>His limbs were of paper, his mind quite in abeyance; I must
+uphold and guide him, prevent his frantic dives, and set him
+continually on his legs again.&nbsp; At first he sang wildly,
+with occasional outbursts of causeless laughter.&nbsp; Gradually
+an inarticulate melancholy succeeded; he wept gently at times;
+would stop in the middle of the road, say firmly &lsquo;No, no,
+no,&rsquo; and then fall on his back: or else address me solemnly
+as &lsquo;M&rsquo;lord&rsquo; and fall on his face by way of
+variety.&nbsp; I am afraid I was not always so gentle with the
+little pig as I might have been, but really the position was
+unbearable.&nbsp; We made no headway at all, and I suppose we
+were scarce gotten a mile away from Cramond, when the whole
+<i>Senatus Academicus</i> was heard hailing, and doubling the
+pace to overtake its.</p>
+<p>Some of them were fairly presentable; and they were all
+Christian martyrs compared to Rowley; but they were in a
+frolicsome and rollicking humour that promised danger as we
+approached the town.&nbsp; They sang songs, they ran races, they
+fenced with their walking-sticks and umbrellas; and, in spite of
+this violent exercise, the fun grew only the more extravagant
+with the miles they traversed.&nbsp; Their drunkenness was
+deep-seated and permanent, like fire in a peat; or
+rather&mdash;to be quite just to them&mdash;it was not so much to
+be called drunkenness at all, as the effect of youth and high
+spirits&mdash;a fine night, and the night young, a good road
+under foot, and the world before you!</p>
+<p>I had left them once somewhat unceremoniously; I could not
+attempt it a second time; and, burthened as I was with Mr.
+Rowley, I was really glad of assistance.&nbsp; But I saw the
+lamps of Edinburgh draw near on their hill-top with a good deal
+of uneasiness, which increased, after we had entered the lighted
+streets, to positive alarm.&nbsp; All the passers-by were
+addressed, some of them by name.&nbsp; A worthy man was stopped
+by Forbes.&nbsp; &lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;in the name
+of the Senatus of the University of Cramond, I confer upon you
+the degree of LL.D.,&rsquo; and with the words he bonneted
+him.&nbsp; Conceive the predicament of St. Ives, committed to the
+society of these outrageous youths, in a town where the police
+and his cousin were both looking for him!&nbsp; So far, we had
+pursued our way unmolested, although raising a clamour fit to
+wake the dead; but at last, in Abercromby Place, I
+believe&mdash;at least it was a crescent of highly respectable
+houses fronting on a garden&mdash;Byfield and I, having fallen
+somewhat in the rear with Rowley, came to a simultaneous
+halt.&nbsp; Our ruffians were beginning to wrench off bells and
+door-plates!</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Oh, I say!&rsquo; says Byfield, &lsquo;this is too much
+of a good thing!&nbsp; Confound it, I&rsquo;m a respectable
+man&mdash;a public character, by George!&nbsp; I can&rsquo;t
+afford to get taken up by the police.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;My own case exactly,&rsquo; said I.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Here, let&rsquo;s bilk them,&rsquo; said he.</p>
+<p>And we turned back and took our way down hill again.</p>
+<p>It was none too soon: voices and alarm bells sounded; watchmen
+here and there began to spring their rattles; it was plain the
+University of Cramond would soon be at blows with the police of
+Edinburgh!&nbsp; Byfield and I, running the semi-inanimate Rowley
+before us, made good despatch, and did not stop till we were
+several streets away, and the hubbub was already softened by
+distance.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;Well, sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;we are well out of
+that!&nbsp; Did ever any one see such a pack of young
+barbarians?&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;We are properly punished, Mr. Byfield; we had no
+business there,&rsquo; I replied.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;No, indeed, sir, you may well say that!&nbsp;
+Outrageous!&nbsp; And my ascension announced for Friday, you
+know!&rsquo; cried the aeronaut.&nbsp; &lsquo;A pretty
+scandal!&nbsp; Byfield the aeronaut at the police-court!&nbsp;
+Tut-tut!&nbsp; Will you be able to get your rascal home,
+sir?&nbsp; Allow me to offer you my card.&nbsp; I am staying at
+Walker and Poole&rsquo;s Hotel, sir, where I should be pleased to
+see you.&rsquo;</p>
+<p>&lsquo;The pleasure would be mutual, sir,&rsquo; said I, but I
+must say my heart was not in my words, and as I watched Mr.
+Byfield departing I desired nothing less than to pursue the
+acquaintance</p>
+<p>One more ordeal remained for me to pass.&nbsp; I carried my
+senseless load upstairs to our lodging, and was admitted by the
+landlady in a tall white nightcap and with an expression
+singularly grim.&nbsp; She lighted us into the sitting-room;
+where, when I had seated Rowley in a chair, she dropped me a
+cast-iron courtesy.&nbsp; I smelt gunpowder on the woman.&nbsp;
+Her voice, tottered with emotion.</p>
+<p>&lsquo;I give ye nottice, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Dacent folks&rsquo; houses . . .&rsquo;</p>
+<p>And at that apparently temper cut off her utterance, and she
+took herself off without more words.</p>
+<p>I looked about me at the room, the goggling Rowley, the
+extinguished fire; my mind reviewed the laughable incidents of
+the day and night; and I laughed out loud to myself&mdash;lonely
+and cheerless laughter!.......</p>
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center">[<i>At this point the
+Author&rsquo;s</i> MS. <i>breaks off</i>]</p>
+<h2>Footnotes</h2>
+<p><a name="footnote0"></a><a href="#citation0"
+class="footnote">[0]</a>&nbsp; This Project Gutenberg eText does
+not include the extra chapters.</p>
+<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. IVES***</p>
+<pre>
+
+
+***** This file should be named 322-h.htm or 322-h.zip******
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+</pre></body>
+</html>
diff --git a/322.txt b/322.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d1a6407
--- /dev/null
+++ b/322.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,10929 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, St. Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson, Edited
+by Sidney Colvin
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: St. Ives
+       being The Adventures of a French Prison in England
+
+
+Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+Editor: Sidney Colvin
+
+Release Date: October 30, 2010  [eBook #322]
+First Posted: September 1995
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ST. IVES***
+
+
+Transcribed 1898 William Heinemann edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@pflaf.org
+
+
+
+
+
+                                 St. Ives
+
+
+                                  Being
+
+                   The Adventures of a French Prisoner
+                                in England
+
+                                    By
+
+                          Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                             _SECOND EDITION_
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                                  London
+                            William Heinemann
+                                   1898
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+         _First Edition_, _May_ 5, 1897; _Reprinted May_ 6, 1897
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                          _All rights reserved_
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+_The following tale was taken down from Mr. Stevenson's dictation by his
+stepdaughter and amanuensis_, _Mrs. Strong_, _at intervals between
+January_ 1893 _and October_ 1894 (_see_ Vailima Letters, _pp._ 242-246,
+299, 324 _and_ 350).  _About six weeks before his death he laid the story
+aside to take up_ Weir of Hermiston.  _The thirty chapters of_ St. Ives
+_which he had written_ (_the last few of them apparently unrevised_)
+_brought the tale within sight of its conclusion_, _and the intended
+course of the remainder was known in outline to Mrs. Strong_.  _For the
+benefit of those readers who do not like a story to be left unfinished_,
+_the delicate task of supplying the missing chapters has been entrusted
+to Mr. Quiller-Couch_, _whose work begins at Chap. XXXI._ {0}
+
+                                                                 [_S. C._]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I--A TALE OF A LION RAMPANT
+
+
+It was in the month of May 1813 that I was so unlucky as to fall at last
+into the hands of the enemy.  My knowledge of the English language had
+marked me out for a certain employment.  Though I cannot conceive a
+soldier refusing to incur the risk, yet to be hanged for a spy is a
+disgusting business; and I was relieved to be held a prisoner of war.
+Into the Castle of Edinburgh, standing in the midst of that city on the
+summit of an extraordinary rock, I was cast with several hundred
+fellow-sufferers, all privates like myself, and the more part of them, by
+an accident, very ignorant, plain fellows.  My English, which had brought
+me into that scrape, now helped me very materially to bear it.  I had a
+thousand advantages.  I was often called to play the part of an
+interpreter, whether of orders or complaints, and thus brought in
+relations, sometimes of mirth, sometimes almost of friendship, with the
+officers in charge.  A young lieutenant singled me out to be his
+adversary at chess, a game in which I was extremely proficient, and would
+reward me for my gambits with excellent cigars.  The major of the
+battalion took lessons of French from me while at breakfast, and was
+sometimes so obliging as to have me join him at the meal.  Chevenix was
+his name.  He was stiff as a drum-major and selfish as an Englishman, but
+a fairly conscientious pupil and a fairly upright man.  Little did I
+suppose that his ramrod body and frozen face would, in the end, step in
+between me and all my dearest wishes; that upon this precise, regular,
+icy soldier-man my fortunes should so nearly shipwreck!  I never liked,
+but yet I trusted him; and though it may seem but a trifle, I found his
+snuff-box with the bean in it come very welcome.
+
+For it is strange how grown men and seasoned soldiers can go back in
+life; so that after but a little while in prison, which is after all the
+next thing to being in the nursery, they grow absorbed in the most
+pitiful, childish interests, and a sugar biscuit or a pinch of snuff
+become things to follow after and scheme for!
+
+We made but a poor show of prisoners.  The officers had been all offered
+their parole, and had taken it.  They lived mostly in suburbs of the
+city, lodging with modest families, and enjoyed their freedom and
+supported the almost continual evil tidings of the Emperor as best they
+might.  It chanced I was the only gentleman among the privates who
+remained.  A great part were ignorant Italians, of a regiment that had
+suffered heavily in Catalonia.  The rest were mere diggers of the soil,
+treaders of grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly and violently
+preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.  We had but the one interest
+in common: each of us who had any skill with his fingers passed the hours
+of his captivity in the making of little toys and _articles of Paris_;
+and the prison was daily visited at certain hours by a concourse of
+people of the country, come to exult over our distress, or--it is more
+tolerant to suppose--their own vicarious triumph.  Some moved among us
+with a decency of shame or sympathy.  Others were the most offensive
+personages in the world, gaped at us as if we had been baboons, sought to
+evangelise us to their rustic, northern religion, as though we had been
+savages, or tortured us with intelligence of disasters to the arms of
+France.  Good, bad, and indifferent, there was one alleviation to the
+annoyance of these visitors; for it was the practice of almost all to
+purchase some specimen of our rude handiwork.  This led, amongst the
+prisoners, to a strong spirit of competition.  Some were neat of hand,
+and (the genius of the French being always distinguished) could place
+upon sale little miracles of dexterity and taste.  Some had a more
+engaging appearance; fine features were found to do as well as fine
+merchandise, and an air of youth in particular (as it appealed to the
+sentiment of pity in our visitors) to be a source of profit.  Others
+again enjoyed some acquaintance with the language, and were able to
+recommend the more agreeably to purchasers such trifles as they had to
+sell.  To the first of these advantages I could lay no claim, for my
+fingers were all thumbs.  Some at least of the others I possessed; and
+finding much entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer my
+advantages to rust.  I have never despised the social arts, in which it
+is a national boast that every Frenchman should excel.  For the approach
+of particular sorts of visitors, I had a particular manner of address,
+and even of appearance, which I could readily assume and change on the
+occasion rising.  I never lost an opportunity to flatter either the
+person of my visitor, if it should be a lady, or, if it should be a man,
+the greatness of his country in war.  And in case my compliments should
+miss their aim, I was always ready to cover my retreat with some
+agreeable pleasantry, which would often earn me the name of an 'oddity'
+or a 'droll fellow.'  In this way, although I was so left-handed a
+toy-maker, I made out to be rather a successful merchant; and found means
+to procure many little delicacies and alleviations, such as children or
+prisoners desire.
+
+I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy man.  It is not
+indeed my character; and I had, in a comparison with my comrades, many
+reasons for content.  In the first place, I had no family: I was an
+orphan and a bachelor; neither wife nor child awaited me in France.  In
+the second, I had never wholly forgot the emotions with which I first
+found myself a prisoner; and although a military prison be not altogether
+a garden of delights, it is still preferable to a gallows.  In the third,
+I am almost ashamed to say it, but I found a certain pleasure in our
+place of residence: being an obsolete and really mediaeval fortress, high
+placed and commanding extraordinary prospects, not only over sea,
+mountain, and champaign but actually over the thoroughfares of a capital
+city, which we could see blackened by day with the moving crowd of the
+inhabitants, and at night shining with lamps.  And lastly, although I was
+not insensible to the restraints of prison or the scantiness of our
+rations, I remembered I had sometimes eaten quite as ill in Spain, and
+had to mount guard and march perhaps a dozen leagues into the bargain.
+The first of my troubles, indeed, was the costume we were obliged to
+wear.  There is a horrible practice in England to trick out in ridiculous
+uniforms, and as it were to brand in mass, not only convicts but military
+prisoners, and even the children in charity schools.  I think some
+malignant genius had found his masterpiece of irony in the dress which we
+were condemned to wear: jacket, waistcoat, and trousers of a sulphur or
+mustard yellow, and a shirt or blue-and-white striped cotton.  It was
+conspicuous, it was cheap, it pointed us out to laughter--we, who were
+old soldiers, used to arms, and some of us showing noble scars,--like a
+set of lugubrious zanies at a fair.  The old name of that rock on which
+our prison stood was (I have heard since then) the _Painted Hill_.  Well,
+now it was all painted a bright yellow with our costumes; and the dress
+of the soldiers who guarded us being of course the essential British red
+rag, we made up together the elements of a lively picture of hell.  I
+have again and again looked round upon my fellow-prisoners, and felt my
+anger rise, and choked upon tears, to behold them thus parodied.  The
+more part, as I have said, were peasants, somewhat bettered perhaps by
+the drill-sergeant, but for all that ungainly, loutish fellows, with no
+more than a mere barrack-room smartness of address: indeed, you could
+have seen our army nowhere more discreditably represented than in this
+Castle of Edinburgh.  And I used to see myself in fancy, and blush.  It
+seemed that my more elegant carriage would but point the insult of the
+travesty.  And I remembered the days when I wore the coarse but
+honourable coat of a soldier; and remembered further back how many of the
+noble, the fair, and the gracious had taken a delight to tend my
+childhood. . . .  But I must not recall these tender and sorrowful
+memories twice; their place is further on, and I am now upon another
+business.  The perfidy of the Britannic Government stood nowhere more
+openly confessed than in one particular of our discipline: that we were
+shaved twice in the week.  To a man who has loved all his life to be
+fresh shaven, can a more irritating indignity be devised?  Monday and
+Thursday were the days.  Take the Thursday, and conceive the picture I
+must present by Sunday evening!  And Saturday, which was almost as bad,
+was the great day for visitors.
+
+Those who came to our market were of all qualities, men and women, the
+lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly pretty.  Sure, if people at
+all understood the power of beauty, there would be no prayers addressed
+except to Venus; and the mere privilege of beholding a comely woman is
+worth paying for.  Our visitors, upon the whole, were not much to boast
+of; and yet, sitting in a corner and very much ashamed of myself and my
+absurd appearance, I have again and again tasted the finest, the rarest,
+and the most ethereal pleasures in a glance of an eye that I should never
+see again--and never wanted to.  The flower of the hedgerow and the star
+in heaven satisfy and delight us: how much more the look of that
+exquisite being who was created to bear and rear, to madden and rejoice,
+mankind!
+
+There was one young lady in particular, about eighteen or nineteen, tall,
+of a gallant carriage, and with a profusion of hair in which the sun
+found threads of gold.  As soon as she came in the courtyard (and she was
+a rather frequent visitor) it seemed I was aware of it.  She had an air
+of angelic candour, yet of a high spirit; she stepped like a Diana, every
+movement was noble and free.  One day there was a strong east wind; the
+banner was straining at the flagstaff; below us the smoke of the city
+chimneys blew hither and thither in a thousand crazy variations; and away
+out on the Forth we could see the ships lying down to it and scudding.  I
+was thinking what a vile day it was, when she appeared.  Her hair blew in
+the wind with changes of colour; her garments moulded her with the
+accuracy of sculpture; the ends of her shawl fluttered about her ear and
+were caught in again with an inimitable deftness.  You have seen a pool
+on a gusty day, how it suddenly sparkles and flashes like a thing alive?
+So this lady's face had become animated and coloured; and as I saw her
+standing, somewhat inclined, her lips parted, a divine trouble in her
+eyes, I could have clapped my hands in applause, and was ready to acclaim
+her a genuine daughter of the winds.  What put it in my head, I know not:
+perhaps because it was a Thursday and I was new from the razor; but I
+determined to engage her attention no later than that day.  She was
+approaching that part of the court in which I sat with my merchandise,
+when I observed her handkerchief to escape from her hands and fall to the
+ground; the next moment the wind had taken it up and carried it within my
+reach.  I was on foot at once: I had forgot my mustard-coloured clothes,
+I had forgot the private soldier and his salute.  Bowing deeply, I
+offered her the slip of cambric.
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'your handkerchief.  The wind brought it me.'
+
+I met her eyes fully.
+
+'I thank you, sir,' said she.
+
+'The wind brought it me,' I repeated.  'May I not take it for an omen?
+You have an English proverb, "It's an ill wind that blows nobody good."'
+
+'Well,' she said, with a smile, '"One good turn deserves another."  I
+will see what you have.'
+
+She followed me to where my wares were spread out under lee of a piece of
+cannon.
+
+'Alas, mademoiselle!' said I, 'I am no very perfect craftsman.  This is
+supposed to be a house, and you see the chimneys are awry.  You may call
+this a box if you are very indulgent; but see where my tool slipped!
+Yes, I am afraid you may go from one to another, and find a flaw in
+everything.  _Failures for Sale_ should be on my signboard.  I do not
+keep a shop; I keep a Humorous Museum.'  I cast a smiling glance about my
+display, and then at her, and instantly became grave.  'Strange, is it
+not,' I added, 'that a grown man and a soldier should be engaged upon
+such trash, and a sad heart produce anything so funny to look at?'
+
+An unpleasant voice summoned her at this moment by the name of Flora, and
+she made a hasty purchase and rejoined her party.
+
+A few days after she came again.  But I must first tell you how she came
+to be so frequent.  Her aunt was one of those terrible British old maids,
+of which the world has heard much; and having nothing whatever to do, and
+a word or two of French, she had taken what she called an _interest in
+the French prisoners_.  A big, bustling, bold old lady, she flounced
+about our market-place with insufferable airs of patronage and
+condescension.  She bought, indeed, with liberality, but her manner of
+studying us through a quizzing-glass, and playing cicerone to her
+followers, acquitted us of any gratitude.  She had a tail behind her of
+heavy, obsequious old gentlemen, or dull, giggling misses, to whom she
+appeared to be an oracle.  'This one can really carve prettily: is he not
+a quiz with his big whiskers?' she would say.  'And this one,' indicating
+myself with her gold eye-glass, 'is, I assure you, quite an oddity.'  The
+oddity, you may be certain, ground his teeth.  She had a way of standing
+in our midst, nodding around, and addressing us in what she imagined to
+be French: '_Bienne_, _hommes_! _ca va bienne_?'  I took the freedom to
+reply in the same lingo: _Bienne_, _femme_! _ca va couci-couci tout
+d'meme_, _la bourgeoise_!'  And at that, when we had all laughed with a
+little more heartiness than was entirely civil, 'I told you he was quite
+an oddity!' says she in triumph.  Needless to say, these passages were
+before I had remarked the niece.
+
+The aunt came on the day in question with a following rather more than
+usually large, which she manoeuvred to and fro about the market and
+lectured to at rather more than usual length, and with rather less than
+her accustomed tact.  I kept my eyes down, but they were ever fixed in
+the same direction, quite in vain.  The aunt came and went, and pulled us
+out, and showed us off, like caged monkeys; but the niece kept herself on
+the outskirts of the crowd and on the opposite side of the courtyard, and
+departed at last as she had come, without a sign.  Closely as I had
+watched her, I could not say her eyes had ever rested on me for an
+instant; and my heart was overwhelmed with bitterness and blackness.  I
+tore out her detested image; I felt I was done with her for ever; I
+laughed at myself savagely, because I had thought to please; when I lay
+down at night sleep forsook me, and I lay, and rolled, and gloated on her
+charms, and cursed her insensibility, for half the night.  How trivial I
+thought her! and how trivial her sex!  A man might be an angel or an
+Apollo, and a mustard-coloured coat would wholly blind them to his
+merits.  I was a prisoner, a slave, a contemned and despicable being, the
+butt of her sniggering countrymen.  I would take the lesson: no proud
+daughter of my foes should have the chance to mock at me again; none in
+the future should have the chance to think I had looked at her with
+admiration.  You cannot imagine any one of a more resolute and
+independent spirit, or whose bosom was more wholly mailed with patriotic
+arrogance, than I.  Before I dropped asleep, I had remembered all the
+infamies of Britain, and debited them in an overwhelming column to Flora.
+
+The next day, as I sat in my place, I became conscious there was some one
+standing near; and behold, it was herself!  I kept my seat, at first in
+the confusion of my mind, later on from policy; and she stood, and leaned
+a little over me, as in pity.  She was very still and timid; her voice
+was low.  Did I suffer in my captivity? she asked me.  Had I to complain
+of any hardship?
+
+'Mademoiselle, I have not learned to complain,' said I.  'I am a soldier
+of Napoleon.'
+
+She sighed.  'At least you must regret _La France_,' said she, and
+coloured a little as she pronounced the words, which she did with a
+pretty strangeness of accent.
+
+'What am I to say?' I replied.  'If you were carried from this country,
+for which you seem so wholly suited, where the very rains and winds seem
+to become you like ornaments, would you regret, do you think?  We must
+surely all regret! the son to his mother, the man to his country; these
+are native feelings.'
+
+'You have a mother?' she asked.
+
+'In heaven, mademoiselle,' I answered.  'She, and my father also, went by
+the same road to heaven as so many others of the fair and brave: they
+followed their queen upon the scaffold.  So, you see, I am not so much to
+be pitied in my prison,' I continued: 'there are none to wait for me; I
+am alone in the world.  'Tis a different case, for instance, with yon
+poor fellow in the cloth cap.  His bed is next to mine, and in the night
+I hear him sobbing to himself.  He has a tender character, full of tender
+and pretty sentiments; and in the dark at night, and sometimes by day
+when he can get me apart with him, he laments a mother and a sweetheart.
+Do you know what made him take me for a confidant?'
+
+She parted her lips with a look, but did not speak.  The look burned all
+through me with a sudden vital heat.
+
+'Because I had once seen, in marching by, the belfry of his village!' I
+continued.  'The circumstance is quaint enough.  It seems to bind up into
+one the whole bundle of those human instincts that make life beautiful,
+and people and places dear--and from which it would seem I am cut off!'
+
+I rested my chin on my knee and looked before me on the ground.  I had
+been talking until then to hold her; but I was now not sorry she should
+go: an impression is a thing so delicate to produce and so easy to
+overthrow!  Presently she seemed to make an effort.
+
+'I will take this toy,' she said, laid a five-and-sixpenny piece in my
+hand, and was gone ere I could thank her.
+
+I retired to a place apart near the ramparts and behind a gun.  The
+beauty, the expression of her eyes, the tear that had trembled there, the
+compassion in her voice, and a kind of wild elegance that consecrated the
+freedom of her movements, all combined to enslave my imagination and
+inflame my heart.  What had she said?  Nothing to signify; but her eyes
+had met mine, and the fire they had kindled burned inextinguishably in my
+veins.  I loved her; and I did not fear to hope.  Twice I had spoken with
+her; and in both interviews I had been well inspired, I had engaged her
+sympathies, I had found words that she must remember, that would ring in
+her ears at night upon her bed.  What mattered if I were half shaved and
+my clothes a caricature?  I was still a man, and I had drawn my image on
+her memory.  I was still a man, and, as I trembled to realise, she was
+still a woman.  Many waters cannot quench love; and love, which is the
+law of the world, was on my side.  I closed my eyes, and she sprang up on
+the background of the darkness, more beautiful than in life.  'Ah!'
+thought I, 'and you too, my dear, you too must carry away with you a
+picture, that you are still to behold again and still to embellish.  In
+the darkness of night, in the streets by day, still you are to have my
+voice and face, whispering, making love for me, encroaching on your shy
+heart.  Shy as your heart is, _it_ is lodged there--_I_ am lodged there;
+let the hours do their office--let time continue to draw me ever in more
+lively, ever in more insidious colours.'  And then I had a vision of
+myself, and burst out laughing.
+
+A likely thing, indeed, that a beggar-man, a private soldier, a prisoner
+in a yellow travesty, was to awake the interest of this fair girl!  I
+would not despair; but I saw the game must be played fine and close.  It
+must be my policy to hold myself before her, always in a pathetic or
+pleasing attitude; never to alarm or startle her; to keep my own secret
+locked in my bosom like a story of disgrace, and let hers (if she could
+be induced to have one) grow at its own rate; to move just so fast, and
+not by a hair's-breadth any faster, than the inclination of her heart.  I
+was the man, and yet I was passive, tied by the foot in prison.  I could
+not go to her; I must cast a spell upon her at each visit, so that she
+should return to me; and this was a matter of nice management.  I had
+done it the last time--it seemed impossible she should not come again
+after our interview; and for the next I had speedily ripened a fresh
+plan.  A prisoner, if he has one great disability for a lover, has yet
+one considerable advantage: there is nothing to distract him, and he can
+spend all his hours ripening his love and preparing its manifestations.
+I had been then some days upon a piece of carving,--no less than the
+emblem of Scotland, the Lion Rampant.  This I proceeded to finish with
+what skill I was possessed of; and when at last I could do no more to it
+(and, you may be sure, was already regretting I had done so much), added
+on the base the following dedication.--
+
+                               A LA BELLE FLORA
+                         LE PRISONNIER RECONNAISSANT
+                             A. D. ST.  Y. D. K.
+
+I put my heart into the carving of these letters.  What was done with so
+much ardour, it seemed scarce possible that any should behold with
+indifference; and the initials would at least suggest to her my noble
+birth.  I thought it better to suggest: I felt that mystery was my
+stock-in-trade; the contrast between my rank and manners, between my
+speech and my clothing, and the fact that she could only think of me by a
+combination of letters, must all tend to increase her interest and engage
+her heart.
+
+This done, there was nothing left for me but to wait and to hope.  And
+there is nothing further from my character: in love and in war, I am all
+for the forward movement; and these days of waiting made my purgatory.
+It is a fact that I loved her a great deal better at the end of them, for
+love comes, like bread, from a perpetual rehandling.  And besides, I was
+fallen into a panic of fear.  How, if she came no more, how was I to
+continue to endure my empty days? how was I to fall back and find my
+interest in the major's lessons, the lieutenant's chess, in a twopenny
+sale in the market, or a halfpenny addition to the prison fare?
+
+Days went by, and weeks; I had not the courage to calculate, and to-day I
+have not the courage to remember; but at last she was there.  At last I
+saw her approach me in the company of a boy about her own age, and whom I
+divined at once to be her brother.
+
+I rose and bowed in silence.
+
+'This is my brother, Mr. Ronald Gilchrist,' said she.  'I have told him
+of your sufferings.  He is so sorry for you!'
+
+'It is more than I have the right to ask,' I replied; 'but among
+gentlefolk these generous sentiments are natural.  If your brother and I
+were to meet in the field, we should meet like tigers; but when he sees
+me here disarmed and helpless, he forgets his animosity.'  (At which, as
+I had ventured to expect, this beardless champion coloured to the ears
+for pleasure.)  'Ah, my dear young lady,' I continued, 'there are many of
+your countrymen languishing in my country, even as I do here.  I can but
+hope there is found some French lady to convey to each of them the
+priceless consolation of her sympathy.  You have given me alms; and more
+than alms--hope; and while you were absent I was not forgetful.  Suffer
+me to be able to tell myself that I have at least tried to make a return;
+and for the prisoner's sake deign to accept this trifle.'
+
+So saying, I offered her my lion, which she took, looked at in some
+embarrassment, and then, catching sight of the dedication, broke out with
+a cry.
+
+'Why, how did you know my name?' she exclaimed.
+
+'When names are so appropriate, they should be easily guessed,' said I,
+bowing.  'But indeed, there was no magic in the matter.  A lady called
+you by name on the day I found your handkerchief, and I was quick to
+remark and cherish it.'
+
+'It is very, very beautiful,' said she, 'and I shall be always proud of
+the inscription.--Come, Ronald, we must be going.'  She bowed to me as a
+lady bows to her equal, and passed on (I could have sworn) with a
+heightened colour.
+
+I was overjoyed: my innocent ruse had succeeded; she had taken my gift
+without a hint of payment, and she would scarce sleep in peace till she
+had made it up to me.  No greenhorn in matters of the heart, I was
+besides aware that I had now a resident ambassador at the court of my
+lady.  The lion might be ill chiselled; it was mine.  My hands had made
+and held it; my knife--or, to speak more by the mark, my rusty nail--had
+traced those letters; and simple as the words were, they would keep
+repeating to her that I was grateful and that I found her fair.  The boy
+had looked like a gawky, and blushed at a compliment; I could see besides
+that he regarded me with considerable suspicion; yet he made so manly a
+figure of a lad, that I could not withhold from him my sympathy.  And as
+for the impulse that had made her bring and introduce him, I could not
+sufficiently admire it.  It seemed to me finer than wit, and more tender
+than a caress.  It said (plain as language), 'I do not and I cannot know
+you.  Here is my brother--you can know him; this is the way to me--follow
+it.'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--A TALE OF A PAIR OF SCISSORS
+
+
+I was still plunged in these thoughts when the bell was rung that
+discharged our visitors into the street.  Our little market was no sooner
+closed than we were summoned to the distribution, and received our
+rations, which we were then allowed to eat according to fancy in any part
+of our quarters.
+
+I have said the conduct of some of our visitors was unbearably offensive;
+it was possibly more so than they dreamed--as the sight-seers at a
+menagerie may offend in a thousand ways, and quite without meaning it,
+the noble and unfortunate animals behind the bars; and there is no doubt
+but some of my compatriots were susceptible beyond reason.  Some of these
+old whiskerandos, originally peasants, trained since boyhood in
+victorious armies, and accustomed to move among subject and trembling
+populations, could ill brook their change of circumstance.  There was one
+man of the name of Goguelat, a brute of the first water, who had enjoyed
+no touch of civilisation beyond the military discipline, and had risen by
+an extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which he was otherwise
+unfitted--that of _marechal des logis_ in the 22nd of the line.  In so
+far as a brute can be a good soldier, he was a good soldier; the Cross
+was on his breast, and gallantly earned; but in all things outside his
+line of duty the man was no other than a brawling, bruising ignorant
+pillar of low pothouses.  As a gentleman by birth, and a scholar by taste
+and education, I was the type of all that he least understood and most
+detested; and the mere view of our visitors would leave him daily in a
+transport of annoyance, which he would make haste to wreak on the nearest
+victim, and too often on myself.
+
+It was so now.  Our rations were scarce served out, and I had just
+withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived him drawing near.
+He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of young fools, among whom he
+passed for a wit, followed him with looks of expectation; and I saw I was
+about to be the object of some of his insufferable pleasantries.  He took
+a place beside me, spread out his rations, drank to me derisively from
+his measure of prison beer, and began.  What he said it would be
+impossible to print; but his admirers, who believed their wit to have
+surpassed himself, actually rolled among the gravel.  For my part, I
+thought at first I should have died.  I had not dreamed the wretch was so
+observant; but hate sharpens the ears, and he had counted our interviews
+and actually knew Flora by her name.  Gradually my coolness returned to
+me, accompanied by a volume of living anger that surprised myself.
+
+'Are you nearly done?' I asked.  'Because if you are, I am about to say a
+word or two myself.'
+
+'Oh, fair play!' said he.  'Turn about!  The Marquis of Carabas to the
+tribune.'
+
+'Very well,' said I.  'I have to inform you that I am a gentleman.  You
+do not know what that means, hey?  Well, I will tell you.  It is a
+comical sort of animal; springs from another strange set of creatures
+they call ancestors; and, in common with toads and other vermin, has a
+thing that he calls feelings.  The lion is a gentleman; he will not touch
+carrion.  I am a gentleman, and I cannot bear to soil my fingers with
+such a lump of dirt.  Sit still, Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not
+say a word, or I shall know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are
+upon us.  Here is your health!' said I, and pledged him in the prison
+beer.  'You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a young child,' I
+continued, 'who might be your daughter, and who was giving alms to me and
+some others of us mendicants.  If the Emperor'--saluting--'if my Emperor
+could hear you, he would pluck off the Cross from your gross body.  I
+cannot do that; I cannot take away what His Majesty has given; but one
+thing I promise you--I promise you, Goguelat, you shall be dead
+to-night.'
+
+I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought there was
+no end to my forbearance, and he was at first amazed.  But I have the
+pleasure to think that some of my expressions had pierced through his
+thick hide; and besides, the brute was truly a hero of valour, and loved
+fighting for itself.  Whatever the cause, at least, he had soon pulled
+himself together, and took the thing (to do him justice) handsomely.
+
+'And I promise you, by the devil's horns, that you shall have the
+chance!' said he, and pledged me again; and again I did him scrupulous
+honour.
+
+The news of this defiance spread from prisoner to prisoner with the speed
+of wings; every face was seen to be illuminated like those of the
+spectators at a horse-race; and indeed you must first have tasted the
+active life of a soldier, and then mouldered for a while in the tedium of
+a jail, in order to understand, perhaps even to excuse, the delight of
+our companions.  Goguelat and I slept in the same squad, which greatly
+simplified the business; and a committee of honour was accordingly formed
+of our shed-mates.  They chose for president a sergeant-major in the 4th
+Dragoons, a greybeard of the army, an excellent military subject, and a
+good man.  He took the most serious view of his functions, visited us
+both, and reported our replies to the committee.  Mine was of a decent
+firmness.  I told him the young lady of whom Goguelat had spoken had on
+several occasions given me alms.  I reminded him that, if we were now
+reduced to hold out our hands and sell pill-boxes for charity, it was
+something very new for soldiers of the Empire.  We had all seen bandits
+standing at a corner of a wood truckling for copper halfpence, and after
+their benefactors were gone spitting out injuries and curses.  'But,'
+said I, 'I trust that none of us will fall so low.  As a Frenchman and a
+soldier, I owe that young child gratitude, and am bound to protect her
+character, and to support that of the army.  You are my elder and my
+superior: tell me if I am not right.'
+
+He was a quiet-mannered old fellow, and patted me with three fingers on
+the back.  '_C'est bien_, _mon enfant_,' says he, and returned to his
+committee.
+
+Goguelat was no more accommodating than myself.  'I do not like apologies
+nor those that make them,' was his only answer.  And there remained
+nothing but to arrange the details of the meeting.  So far as regards
+place and time we had no choice; we must settle the dispute at night, in
+the dark, after a round had passed by, and in the open middle of the shed
+under which we slept.  The question of arms was more obscure.  We had a
+good many tools, indeed, which we employed in the manufacture of our
+toys; but they were none of them suited for a single combat between
+civilised men, and, being nondescript, it was found extremely hard to
+equalise the chances of the combatants.  At length a pair of scissors was
+unscrewed; and a couple of tough wands being found in a corner of the
+courtyard, one blade of the scissors was lashed solidly to each with
+resined twine--the twine coming I know not whence, but the resin from the
+green pillars of the shed, which still sweated from the axe.  It was a
+strange thing to feel in one's hand this weapon, which was no heavier
+than a riding-rod, and which it was difficult to suppose would prove more
+dangerous.  A general oath was administered and taken, that no one should
+interfere in the duel nor (suppose it to result seriously) betray the
+name of the survivor.  And with that, all being then ready, we composed
+ourselves to await the moment.
+
+The evening fell cloudy; not a star was to be seen when the first round
+of the night passed through our shed and wound off along the ramparts;
+and as we took our places, we could still hear, over the murmurs of the
+surrounding city, the sentries challenging its further passage.  Leclos,
+the sergeant-major, set us in our stations, engaged our wands, and left
+us.  To avoid blood-stained clothing, my adversary and I had stripped to
+the shoes; and the chill of the night enveloped our bodies like a wet
+sheet.  The man was better at fencing than myself; he was vastly taller
+than I, being of a stature almost gigantic, and proportionately strong.
+In the inky blackness of the shed, it was impossible to see his eyes; and
+from the suppleness of the wands, I did not like to trust to a parade.  I
+made up my mind accordingly to profit, if I might, by my defect; and as
+soon as the signal should be given, to throw myself down and lunge at the
+same moment.  It was to play my life upon one card: should I not mortally
+wound him, no defence would be left me; what was yet more appalling, I
+thus ran the risk of bringing my own face against his scissor with the
+double force of our assaults, and my face and eyes are not that part of
+me that I would the most readily expose.
+
+'_Allez_!' said the sergeant-major.
+
+Both lunged in the same moment with an equal fury, and but for my
+manoeuvre both had certainly been spitted.  As it was, he did no more
+than strike my shoulder, while my scissor plunged below the girdle into a
+mortal part; and that great bulk of a man, falling from his whole height,
+knocked me immediately senseless.
+
+When I came to myself I was laid in my own sleeping-place, and could make
+out in the darkness the outline of perhaps a dozen heads crowded around
+me.  I sat up.  'What is it?' I exclaimed.
+
+'Hush!' said the sergeant-major.  'Blessed be God, all is well.'  I felt
+him clasp my hand, and there were tears in his voice.  ''Tis but a
+scratch, my child; here is papa, who is taking good care of you.  Your
+shoulder is bound up; we have dressed you in your clothes again, and it
+will all be well.'
+
+At this I began to remember.  'And Goguelat?' I gasped.
+
+'He cannot bear to be moved; he has his bellyful; 'tis a bad business,'
+said the sergeant-major.
+
+The idea of having killed a man with such an instrument as half a pair of
+scissors seemed to turn my stomach.  I am sure I might have killed a
+dozen with a firelock, a sabre, a bayonet, or any accepted weapon, and
+been visited by no such sickness of remorse.  And to this feeling every
+unusual circumstance of our rencounter, the darkness in which we had
+fought, our nakedness, even the resin on the twine, appeared to
+contribute.  I ran to my fallen adversary, kneeled by him, and could only
+sob his name.
+
+He bade me compose myself.  'You have given me the key of the fields,
+comrade,' said he.  '_Sans rancune_!'
+
+At this my horror redoubled.  Here had we two expatriated Frenchmen
+engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of beasts.  Here was
+he, who had been all his life so great a ruffian, dying in a foreign land
+of this ignoble injury, and meeting death with something of the spirit of
+a Bayard.  I insisted that the guards should be summoned and a doctor
+brought.  'It may still be possible to save him,' I cried.
+
+The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement.  'If you had been
+wounded,' said he, 'you must have lain there till the patrol came by and
+found you.  It happens to be Goguelat--and so must he!  Come, child, time
+to go to by-by.'  And as I still resisted, 'Champdivers!' he said, 'this
+is weakness.  You pain me.'
+
+'Ay, off to your beds with you!' said Goguelat, and named us in a company
+with one of his jovial gross epithets.
+
+Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what they
+certainly were far from experiencing, sleep.  It was not yet late.  The
+city, from far below, and all around us, sent up a sound of wheels and
+feet and lively voices.  Yet awhile, and the curtain of the cloud was
+rent across, and in the space of sky between the eaves of the shed and
+the irregular outline of the ramparts a multitude of stars appeared.
+Meantime, in the midst of us lay Goguelat, and could not always withhold
+himself from groaning.
+
+We heard the round far off; heard it draw slowly nearer.  Last of all, it
+turned the corner and moved into our field of vision: two file of men and
+a corporal with a lantern, which he swung to and fro, so as to cast its
+light in the recesses of the yards and sheds.
+
+'Hullo!' cried the corporal, pausing as he came by Goguelat.
+
+He stooped with his lantern.  All our hearts were flying.
+
+'What devil's work is this?' he cried, and with a startling voice
+summoned the guard.
+
+We were all afoot upon the instant; more lanterns and soldiers crowded in
+front of the shed; an officer elbowed his way in.  In the midst was the
+big naked body, soiled with blood.  Some one had covered him with his
+blanket; but as he lay there in agony, he had partly thrown it off.
+
+'This is murder!' cried the officer.  'You wild beasts, you will hear of
+this to-morrow.'
+
+As Goguelat was raised and laid upon a stretcher, he cried to us a
+cheerful and blasphemous farewell.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--MAJOR CHEVENIX COMES INTO THE STORY, AND GOGUELAT GOES OUT
+
+
+There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost in getting
+the man's deposition.  He gave but the one account of it: that he had
+committed suicide because he was sick of seeing so many Englishmen.  The
+doctor vowed it was impossible, the nature and direction of the wound
+forbidding it.  Goguelat replied that he was more ingenious than the
+other thought for, and had propped up the weapon in the ground and fallen
+on the point--'just like Nebuchadnezzar,' he added, winking to the
+assistants.  The doctor, who was a little, spruce, ruddy man of an
+impatient temper, pished and pshawed and swore over his patient.
+'Nothing to be made of him!' he cried.  'A perfect heathen.  If we could
+only find the weapon!'  But the weapon had ceased to exist.  A little
+resined twine was perhaps blowing about in the castle gutters; some bits
+of broken stick may have trailed in corners; and behold, in the pleasant
+air of the morning, a dandy prisoner trimming his nails with a pair of
+scissors!
+
+Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the authorities did not
+leave the rest of us in peace.  No stone was left unturned.  We were had
+in again and again to be examined, now singly, now in twos and threes.
+We were threatened with all sorts of impossible severities and tempted
+with all manner of improbable rewards.  I suppose I was five times
+interrogated, and came off from each with flying colours.  I am like old
+Souvaroff, I cannot understand a soldier being taken aback by any
+question; he should answer, as he marches on the fire, with an instant
+briskness and gaiety.  I may have been short of bread, gold or grace; I
+was never yet found wanting in an answer.  My comrades, if they were not
+all so ready, were none of them less staunch; and I may say here at once
+that the inquiry came to nothing at the time, and the death of Goguelat
+remained a mystery of the prison.  Such were the veterans of France!  And
+yet I should be disingenuous if I did not own this was a case apart; in
+ordinary circumstances, some one might have stumbled or been intimidated
+into an admission; and what bound us together with a closeness beyond
+that of mere comrades was a secret to which we were all committed and a
+design in which all were equally engaged.  No need to inquire as to its
+nature: there is only one desire, and only one kind of design, that
+blooms in prisons.  And the fact that our tunnel was near done supported
+and inspired us.
+
+I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the sittings
+of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no one listens to; and
+yet I was unmasked--I, whom my very adversary defended, as good as
+confessed, as good as told the nature of the quarrel, and by so doing
+prepared for myself in the future a most anxious, disagreeable adventure.
+It was the third morning after the duel, and Goguelat was still in life,
+when the time came round for me to give Major Chevenix a lesson.  I was
+fond of this occupation; not that he paid me much--no more, indeed, than
+eighteenpence a month, the customary figure, being a miser in the grain;
+but because I liked his breakfasts and (to some extent) himself.  At
+least, he was a man of education; and of the others with whom I had any
+opportunity of speech, those that would not have held a book upsidedown
+would have torn the pages out for pipe-lights.  For I must repeat again
+that our body of prisoners was exceptional: there was in Edinburgh Castle
+none of that educational busyness that distinguished some of the other
+prisons, so that men entered them unable to read, and left them fit for
+high employments.  Chevenix was handsome, and surprisingly young to be a
+major: six feet in his stockings, well set up, with regular features and
+very clear grey eyes.  It was impossible to pick a fault in him, and yet
+the sum-total was displeasing.  Perhaps he was too clean; he seemed to
+bear about with him the smell of soap.  Cleanliness is good, but I cannot
+bear a man's nails to seem japanned.  And certainly he was too
+self-possessed and cold.  There was none of the fire of youth, none of
+the swiftness of the soldier, in this young officer.  His kindness was
+cold, and cruel cold; his deliberation exasperating.  And perhaps it was
+from this character, which is very much the opposite of my own, that even
+in these days, when he was of service to me, I approached him with
+suspicion and reserve.
+
+I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six faults.
+
+'H'm.  Six,' says he, looking at the paper.  'Very annoying!  I can never
+get it right.'
+
+'Oh, but you make excellent progress!' I said.  I would not discourage
+him, you understand, but he was congenitally unable to learn French.
+Some fire, I think, is needful, and he had quenched his fire in soapsuds.
+
+He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and looked at me
+with clear, severe eyes.
+
+'I think we must have a little talk,' said he.
+
+'I am entirely at your disposition,' I replied; but I quaked, for I knew
+what subject to expect.
+
+'You have been some time giving me these lessons,' he went on, 'and I am
+tempted to think rather well of you.  I believe you are a gentleman.'
+
+'I have that honour, sir,' said I.
+
+'You have seen me for the same period.  I do not know how I strike you;
+but perhaps you will be prepared to believe that I also am a man of
+honour,' said he.
+
+'I require no assurances; the thing is manifest,' and I bowed.
+
+'Very well, then,' said he.  'What about this Goguelat?'
+
+'You heard me yesterday before the court,' I began.  'I was awakened
+only--'
+
+'Oh yes; I "heard you yesterday before the court," no doubt,' he
+interrupted, 'and I remember perfectly that you were "awakened only."  I
+could repeat the most of it by rote, indeed.  But do you suppose that I
+believed you for a moment?'
+
+'Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it here,' said I.
+
+'I may be wrong--we shall soon see,' says he; 'but my impression is that
+you will not "repeat it here."  My impression is that you have come into
+this room, and that you will tell me something before you go out.'
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+'Let me explain,' he continued.  'Your evidence, of course, is nonsense.
+I put it by, and the court put it by.'
+
+'My compliments and thanks!' said I.
+
+'You _must_ know--that's the short and the long,' he proceeded.  'All of
+you in shed B are bound to know.  And I want to ask you where is the
+common-sense of keeping up this farce, and maintaining this cock-and-bull
+story between friends.  Come, come, my good fellow, own yourself beaten,
+and laugh at it yourself.'
+
+'Well, I hear you, go ahead,' said I.  'You put your heart in it.'
+
+He crossed his legs slowly.  'I can very well understand,' he began,
+'that precautions have had to be taken.  I dare say an oath was
+administered.  I can comprehend that perfectly.'  (He was watching me all
+the time with his cold, bright eyes.)  'And I can comprehend that, about
+an affair of honour, you would be very particular to keep it.'
+
+'About an affair of honour?' I repeated, like a man quite puzzled.
+
+'It was not an affair of honour, then?' he asked.
+
+'What was not?  I do not follow,' said I.
+
+He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat awhile silent, and began again
+in the same placid and good-natured voice: 'The court and I were at one
+in setting aside your evidence.  It could not deceive a child.  But there
+was a difference between myself and the other officers, because _I knew
+my man_ and they did not.  They saw in you a common soldier, and I knew
+you for a gentleman.  To them your evidence was a leash of lies, which
+they yawned to hear you telling.  Now, I was asking myself, how far will
+a gentleman go?  Not surely so far as to help hush a murder up?  So
+that--when I heard you tell how you knew nothing of the matter, and were
+only awakened by the corporal, and all the rest of it--I translated your
+statements into something else.  Now, Champdivers,' he cried, springing
+up lively and coming towards me with animation, 'I am going to tell you
+what that was, and you are going to help me to see justice done: how, I
+don't know, for of course you are under oath--but somehow.  Mark what I'm
+going to say.'
+
+At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder; and whether
+he said anything more or came to a full stop at once, I am sure I could
+not tell you to this day.  For, as the devil would have it, the shoulder
+he laid hold of was the one Goguelat had pinked.  The wound was but a
+scratch; it was healing with the first intention; but in the clutch of
+Major Chevenix it gave me agony.  My head swam; the sweat poured off my
+face; I must have grown deadly pale.
+
+He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.  'What is wrong
+with you?' said he.
+
+'It is nothing,' said I.  'A qualm.  It has gone by.'
+
+'Are you sure?' said he.  'You are as white as a sheet.'
+
+'Oh no, I assure you!  Nothing whatever.  I am my own man again,' I said,
+though I could scarce command my tongue.
+
+'Well, shall I go on again?' says he.  'Can you follow me?'
+
+'Oh, by all means!' said I, and mopped my streaming face upon my sleeve,
+for you may be sure in those days I had no handkerchief.
+
+'If you are sure you can follow me.  That was a very sudden and sharp
+seizure,' he said doubtfully.  'But if you are sure, all right, and here
+goes.  An affair of honour among you fellows would, naturally, be a
+little difficult to carry out, perhaps it would be impossible to have it
+wholly regular.  And yet a duel might be very irregular in form, and,
+under the peculiar circumstances of the case, loyal enough in effect.  Do
+you take me?  Now, as a gentleman and a soldier.'
+
+His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me.  I could bear no
+more, and winced away from him.  'No,' I cried,  'not that.  Do not put
+your hand upon my shoulder.  I cannot bear it.  It is rheumatism,' I made
+haste to add.  'My shoulder is inflamed and very painful.'
+
+He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.
+
+'I am sorry about your shoulder,' he said at last.  'Let me send for the
+doctor.'
+
+'Not in the least,' said I.  'It is a trifle.  I am quite used to it.  It
+does not trouble me in the smallest.  At any rate, I don't believe in
+doctors.'
+
+'All right,' said he, and sat and smoked a good while in a silence which
+I would have given anything to break.  'Well,' he began presently, 'I
+believe there is nothing left for me to learn.  I presume I may say that
+I know all.'
+
+'About what?' said I boldly.
+
+'About Goguelat,' said he.
+
+'I beg your pardon.  I cannot conceive,' said I.
+
+'Oh,' says the major, 'the man fell in a duel, and by your hand!  I am
+not an infant.'
+
+'By no means,' said I.  'But you seem to me to be a good deal of a
+theorist.'
+
+'Shall we test it?' he asked.  'The doctor is close by.  If there is not
+an open wound on your shoulder, I am wrong.  If there is--'  He waved his
+hand.  'But I advise you to think twice.  There is a deuce of a nasty
+drawback to the experiment--that what might have remained private between
+us two becomes public property.'
+
+'Oh, well!' said I, with a laugh, 'anything rather than a doctor!  I
+cannot bear the breed.'
+
+His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still far from
+comfortable.
+
+Major Chevenix smoked awhile, looking now at his cigar ash, now at me.
+'I'm a soldier myself,' he says presently, 'and I've been out in my time
+and hit my man.  I don't want to run any one into a corner for an affair
+that was at all necessary or correct.  At the same time, I want to know
+that much, and I'll take your word of honour for it.  Otherwise, I shall
+be very sorry, but the doctor must be called in.'
+
+'I neither admit anything nor deny anything,' I returned.  'But if this
+form of words will suffice you, here is what I say: I give you my parole,
+as a gentleman and a soldier, there has nothing taken place amongst us
+prisoners that was not honourable as the day.'
+
+'All right,' says he.  'That was all I wanted.  You can go now,
+Champdivers.'
+
+And as I was going out he added, with a laugh: 'By the bye, I ought to
+apologise: I had no idea I was applying the torture!'
+
+The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a piece of
+paper in his hand.  He seemed hot and angry, and had certainly no mind to
+be polite.
+
+'Here!' he cried.  'Which of you fellows knows any English?  Oh!'--spying
+me--'there you are, what's your name!  _You'll_ do.  Tell these fellows
+that the other fellow's dying.  He's booked; no use talking; I expect
+he'll go by evening.  And tell them I don't envy the feelings of the
+fellow who spiked him.  Tell them that first.'
+
+I did so.
+
+'Then you can tell 'em,' he resumed, 'that the fellow, Goggle--what's his
+name?--wants to see some of them before he gets his marching orders.  If
+I got it right, he wants to kiss or embrace you, or some sickening stuff.
+Got that?  Then here's a list he's had written, and you'd better read it
+out to them--I can't make head or tail of your beastly names--and they
+can answer _present_, and fall in against that wall.'
+
+It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I read the
+first name on the list.  I had no wish to look again on my own handiwork;
+my flesh recoiled from the idea; and how could I be sure what reception
+he designed to give me?  The cure was in my own hand; I could pass that
+first name over--the doctor would not know--and I might stay away.  But
+to the subsequent great gladness of my heart, I did not dwell for an
+instant on the thought, walked over to the designated wall, faced about,
+read out the name 'Champdivers,' and answered myself with the word
+'Present.'
+
+There were some half dozen on the list, all told; and as soon as we were
+mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and we followed after,
+like a fatigue party, in single file.  At the door he paused, told us
+'the fellow' would see each of us alone, and, as soon as I had explained
+that, sent me by myself into the ward.  It was a small room, whitewashed;
+a south window stood open on a vast depth of air and a spacious and
+distant prospect; and from deep below, in the Grassmarket the voices of
+hawkers came up clear and far away.  Hard by, on a little bed, lay
+Goguelat.  The sunburn had not yet faded from his face, and the stamp of
+death was already there.  There was something wild and unmannish in his
+smile, that took me by the throat; only death and love know or have ever
+seen it.  And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.
+
+He held out his arms as if to embrace me.  I drew near with incredible
+shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with overwhelming disgust.
+But he only drew my ear down to his lips.
+
+'Trust me,' he whispered.  '_Je suis bon bougre_, _moi_.  I'll take it to
+hell with me, and tell the devil.'
+
+Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities?  All that
+he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could not clothe it
+otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce.  Presently he bade me
+call the doctor; and when that officer had come in, raised a little up in
+his bed, pointed first to himself and then to me, who stood weeping by
+his side, and several times repeated the expression, 'Frinds--frinds--dam
+frinds.'
+
+To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much affected.  He nodded
+his little bob-wigged head at us, and said repeatedly, 'All right,
+Johnny--me comprong.'
+
+Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I went out of
+the room sobbing like an infant.
+
+How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable fellows make the
+happiest exits!  It is a fate we may well envy them.  Goguelat was
+detested in life; in the last three days, by his admirable staunchness
+and consideration, he won every heart; and when word went about the
+prison the same evening that he was no more, the voice of conversation
+became hushed as in a house of mourning.
+
+For myself I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what ailed me:
+when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it; but that night I
+was filled with a gloomy fury of the nerves.  I had killed him; he had
+done his utmost to protect me; I had seen him with that awful smile.  And
+so illogical and useless is this sentiment of remorse, that I was ready,
+at a word or a look, to quarrel with somebody else.  I presume the
+disposition of my mind was imprinted on my face; and when, a little
+after, I overtook, saluted and addressed the doctor, he looked on me with
+commiseration and surprise.
+
+I had asked him if it was true.
+
+'Yes,' he said, 'the fellow's gone.'
+
+'Did he suffer much?' I asked.
+
+'Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb,' said he.  He looked on me a
+little, and I saw his hand go to his fob.  'Here, take that! no sense in
+fretting,' he said, and, putting a silver two-penny-bit in my hand, he
+left me.
+
+I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall, for it was
+the man's one act of charity in all my knowledge of him.  Instead of
+that, I stood looking at it in my hand and laughed out bitterly, as I
+realised his mistake; then went to the ramparts, and flung it far into
+the air like blood money.  The night was falling; through an embrasure
+and across the gardened valley I saw the lamplighters hasting along
+Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and looked on moodily.  As I was so
+standing a hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I turned about.  It was
+Major Chevenix, dressed for the evening, and his neckcloth really
+admirably folded.  I never denied the man could dress.
+
+'Ah!' said he, 'I thought it was you, Champdivers.  So he's gone?'
+
+I nodded.
+
+'Come, come,' said he, 'you must cheer up.  Of course it's very
+distressing, very painful and all that.  But do you know, it ain't such a
+bad thing either for you or me?  What with his death and your visit to
+him I am entirely reassured.'
+
+So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.
+
+'I had rather not discuss it,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said he, 'one word more, and I'll agree to bury the subject.
+What did you fight about?'
+
+'Oh, what do men ever fight about?' I cried.
+
+'A lady?' said he.
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+'Deuce you did!' said he.  'I should scarce have thought it of him.'
+
+And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words.  'He!' I cried.  'He
+never dared to address her--only to look at her and vomit his vile
+insults!  She may have given him sixpence: if she did, it may take him to
+heaven yet!'
+
+At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a considering look,
+and brought up sharply.
+
+'Well, well,' said he.  'Good night to you, Champdivers.  Come to me at
+breakfast-time to-morrow, and we'll talk of other subjects.'
+
+I fully admit the man's conduct was not bad: in writing it down so long
+after the events I can even see that it was good.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV--ST. IVES GETS A BUNDLE OF BANK NOTES
+
+
+I was surprised one morning, shortly after, to find myself the object of
+marked consideration by a civilian and a stranger.  This was a man of the
+middle age; he had a face of a mulberry colour, round black eyes, comical
+tufted eyebrows, and a protuberant forehead; and was dressed in clothes
+of a Quakerish cut.  In spite of his plainness, he had that inscrutable
+air of a man well-to-do in his affairs.  I conceived he had been some
+while observing me from a distance, for a sparrow sat betwixt us quite
+unalarmed on the breech of a piece of cannon.  So soon as our eyes met,
+he drew near and addressed me in the French language, which he spoke with
+a good fluency but an abominable accent.
+
+'I have the pleasure of addressing Monsieur le Vicomte Anne de Keroual de
+Saint-Yves?' said he.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I do not call myself all that; but I have a right to, if
+I chose.  In the meanwhile I call myself plain Champdivers, at your
+disposal.  It was my mother's name, and good to go soldiering with.'
+
+'I think not quite,' said he; 'for if I remember rightly, your mother
+also had the particle.  Her name was Florimonde de Champdivers.'
+
+'Right again!' said I, 'and I am extremely pleased to meet a gentleman so
+well informed in my quarterings.  Is monsieur Born himself?'  This I said
+with a great air of assumption, partly to conceal the degree of curiosity
+with which my visitor had inspired me, and in part because it struck me
+as highly incongruous and comical in my prison garb and on the lips of a
+private soldier.
+
+He seemed to think so too, for he laughed.
+
+'No, sir,' he returned, speaking this time in English; 'I am not
+"_born_," as you call it, and must content myself with _dying_, of which
+I am equally susceptible with the best of you.  My name is Mr.
+Romaine--Daniel Romaine--a solicitor of London City, at your service;
+and, what will perhaps interest you more, I am here at the request of
+your great-uncle, the Count.'
+
+'What!' I cried, 'does M. de Keroual de St.-Yves remember the existence
+of such a person as myself, and will he deign to count kinship with a
+soldier of Napoleon?'
+
+'You speak English well,' observed my visitor.
+
+'It has been a second language to me from a child,' said I.  'I had an
+English nurse; my father spoke English with me; and I was finished by a
+countryman of yours and a dear friend of mine, a Mr. Vicary.'
+
+A strong expression of interest came into the lawyer's face.
+
+'What!' he cried, 'you knew poor Vicary?'
+
+'For more than a year,' said I; 'and shared his hiding-place for many
+months.'
+
+'And I was his clerk, and have succeeded him in business,' said he.
+'Excellent man!  It was on the affairs of M. de Keroual that he went to
+that accursed country, from which he was never destined to return.  Do
+you chance to know his end, sir?'
+
+'I am sorry,' said I, 'I do.  He perished miserably at the hands of a
+gang of banditti, such as we call _chauffeurs_.  In a word, he was
+tortured, and died of it.  See,' I added, kicking off one shoe, for I had
+no stockings; 'I was no more than a child, and see how they had begun to
+treat myself.'
+
+He looked at the mark of my old burn with a certain shrinking.  'Beastly
+people!' I heard him mutter to himself.
+
+'The English may say so with a good grace,' I observed politely.
+
+Such speeches were the coin in which I paid my way among this credulous
+race.  Ninety per cent. of our visitors would have accepted the remark as
+natural in itself and creditable to my powers of judgment, but it
+appeared my lawyer was more acute.
+
+'You are not entirely a fool, I perceive,' said he.
+
+'No,' said I; 'not wholly.'
+
+'And yet it is well to beware of the ironical mood,' he continued.  'It
+is a dangerous instrument.  Your great-uncle has, I believe, practised it
+very much, until it is now become a problem what he means.'
+
+'And that brings me back to what you will admit is a most natural
+inquiry,' said I.  'To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit? how did
+you recognise me? and how did you know I was here?'
+
+Carefull separating his coat skirts, the lawyer took a seat beside me on
+the edge of the flags.
+
+'It is rather an odd story,' says he, 'and, with your leave, I'll answer
+the second question first.  It was from a certain resemblance you bear to
+your cousin, M. le Vicomte.'
+
+'I trust, sir, that I resemble him advantageously?' said I.
+
+'I hasten to reassure you,' was the reply: 'you do.  To my eyes, M. Alain
+de St.-Yves has scarce a pleasing exterior.  And yet, when I knew you
+were here, and was actually looking for you--why, the likeness helped.
+As for how I came to know your whereabouts, by an odd enough chance, it
+is again M. Alain we have to thank.  I should tell you, he has for some
+time made it his business to keep M. de Keroual informed of your career;
+with what purpose I leave you to judge.  When he first brought the news
+of your--that you were serving Buonaparte, it seemed it might be the
+death of the old gentleman, so hot was his resentment.  But from one
+thing to another, matters have a little changed.  Or I should rather say,
+not a little.  We learned you were under orders for the Peninsula, to
+fight the English; then that you had been commissioned for a piece of
+bravery, and were again reduced to the ranks.  And from one thing to
+another (as I say), M. de Keroual became used to the idea that you were
+his kinsman and yet served with Buonaparte, and filled instead with
+wonder that he should have another kinsman who was so remarkably well
+informed of events in France.  And it now became a very disagreeable
+question, whether the young gentleman was not a spy?  In short, sir, in
+seeking to disserve you, he had accumulated against himself a load of
+suspicions.'
+
+My visitor now paused, took snuff, and looked at me with an air of
+benevolence.
+
+'Good God, sir!' says I, 'this is a curious story.'
+
+'You will say so before I have done,' said he.  'For there have two
+events followed.  The first of these was an encounter of M. de Keroual
+and M. de Mauseant.'
+
+'I know the man to my cost,' said I: 'it was through him I lost my
+commission.'
+
+'Do you tell me so?' he cried.  'Why, here is news!'
+
+'Oh, I cannot complain!' said I.  'I was in the wrong.  I did it with my
+eyes open.  If a man gets a prisoner to guard and lets him go, the least
+he can expect is to be degraded.'
+
+'You will be paid for it,' said he.  'You did well for yourself and
+better for your king.'
+
+'If I had thought I was injuring my emperor,' said I, 'I would have let
+M. de Mauseant burn in hell ere I had helped him, and be sure of that!  I
+saw in him only a private person in a difficulty: I let him go in private
+charity; not even to profit myself will I suffer it to be misunderstood.'
+
+'Well, well,' said the lawyer, 'no matter now.  This is a foolish
+warmth--a very misplaced enthusiasm, believe me!  The point of the story
+is that M. de Mauseant spoke of you with gratitude, and drew your
+character in such a manner as greatly to affect your uncle's views.  Hard
+upon the back of which, in came your humble servant, and laid before him
+the direct proof of what we had been so long suspecting.  There was no
+dubiety permitted.  M. Alain's expensive way of life, his clothes and
+mistresses, his dicing and racehorses, were all explained: he was in the
+pay of Buonaparte, a hired spy, and a man that held the strings of what I
+can only call a convolution of extremely fishy enterprises.  To do M. de
+Keroual justice, he took it in the best way imaginable, destroyed the
+evidences of the one great-nephew's disgrace--and transferred his
+interest wholly to the other.'
+
+'What am I to understand by that?' said I.
+
+'I will tell you,' says he.  'There is a remarkable inconsistency in
+human nature which gentlemen of my cloth have a great deal of occasion to
+observe.  Selfish persons can live without chick or child, they can live
+without all mankind except perhaps the barber and the apothecary; but
+when it comes to dying, they seem physically unable to die without an
+heir.  You can apply this principle for yourself.  Viscount Alain, though
+he scarce guesses it, is no longer in the field.  Remains, Viscount
+Anne.'
+
+'I see,' said I, 'you give a very unfavourable impression of my uncle,
+the Count.'
+
+'I had not meant it,' said he.  'He has led a loose life--sadly
+loose--but he is a man it is impossible to know and not to admire; his
+courtesy is exquisite.'
+
+'And so you think there is actually a chance for me?' I asked.
+
+'Understand,' said he: 'in saying as much as I have done, I travel quite
+beyond my brief.  I have been clothed with no capacity to talk of wills,
+or heritages, or your cousin.  I was sent here to make but the one
+communication: that M. de Keroual desires to meet his great-nephew.'
+
+'Well,' said I, looking about me on the battlements by which we sat
+surrounded, 'this is a case in which Mahomet must certainly come to the
+mountain.'
+
+'Pardon me,' said Mr. Romaine; 'you know already your uncle is an aged
+man; but I have not yet told you that he is quite broken up, and his
+death shortly looked for.  No, no, there is no doubt about it--it is the
+mountain that must come to Mahomet.'
+
+'From an Englishman, the remark is certainly significant,' said I; 'but
+you are of course, and by trade, a keeper of men's secrets, and I see you
+keep that of Cousin Alain, which is not the mark of a truculent
+patriotism, to say the least.'
+
+'I am first of all the lawyer of your family!' says he.
+
+'That being so,' said I, 'I can perhaps stretch a point myself.  This
+rock is very high, and it is very steep; a man might come by a devil of a
+fall from almost any part of it, and yet I believe I have a pair of wings
+that might carry me just so far as to the bottom.  Once at the bottom I
+am helpless.'
+
+'And perhaps it is just then that I could step in,' returned the lawyer.
+'Suppose by some contingency, at which I make no guess, and on which I
+offer no opinion--'
+
+But here I interrupted him.  'One word ere you go further.  I am under no
+parole,' said I.
+
+'I understood so much,' he replied, 'although some of you French gentry
+find their word sit lightly on them.'
+
+'Sir, I am not one of those,' said I.
+
+'To do you plain justice, I do not think you one,' said he.  'Suppose
+yourself, then, set free and at the bottom of the rock,' he continued,
+'although I may not be able to do much, I believe I can do something to
+help you on your road.  In the first place I would carry this, whether in
+an inside pocket or my shoe.'  And he passed me a bundle of bank notes.
+
+'No harm in that,' said I, at once concealing them.
+
+'In the second place,' he resumed, 'it is a great way from here to where
+your uncle lives--Amersham Place, not far from Dunstable; you have a
+great part of Britain to get through; and for the first stages, I must
+leave you to your own luck and ingenuity.  I have no acquaintance here in
+Scotland, or at least' (with a grimace) 'no dishonest ones.  But further
+to the south, about Wakefield, I am told there is a gentleman called
+Burchell Fenn, who is not so particular as some others, and might be
+willing to give you a cast forward.  In fact, sir, I believe it's the
+man's trade: a piece of knowledge that burns my mouth.  But that is what
+you get by meddling with rogues; and perhaps the biggest rogue now
+extant, M. de Saint-Yves, is your cousin, M. Alain.'
+
+'If this be a man of my cousin's,' I observed, 'I am perhaps better to
+keep clear of him?'
+
+'It was through some paper of your cousin's that we came across his
+trail,' replied the lawyer.  'But I am inclined to think, so far as
+anything is safe in such a nasty business, you might apply to the man
+Fenn.  You might even, I think, use the Viscount's name; and the little
+trick of family resemblance might come in.  How, for instance, if you
+were to call yourself his brother?'
+
+'It might be done,' said I.  'But look here a moment?  You propose to me
+a very difficult game: I have apparently a devil of an opponent in my
+cousin; and, being a prisoner of war, I can scarcely be said to hold good
+cards.  For what stakes, then, am I playing?'
+
+'They are very large,' said he.  'Your great-uncle is immensely
+rich--immensely rich.  He was wise in time; he smelt the revolution long
+before; sold all that he could, and had all that was movable transported
+to England through my firm.  There are considerable estates in England;
+Amersham Place itself is very fine; and he has much money, wisely
+invested.  He lives, indeed, like a prince.  And of what use is it to
+him?  He has lost all that was worth living for--his family, his country;
+he has seen his king and queen murdered; he has seen all these miseries
+and infamies,' pursued the lawyer, with a rising inflection and a
+heightening colour; and then broke suddenly off,--'In short, sir, he has
+seen all the advantages of that government for which his nephew carries
+arms, and he has the misfortune not to like them.'
+
+'You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must excuse,' said I; 'yet
+which of us has the more reason to be bitter?  This man, my uncle, M. de
+Keroual, fled.  My parents, who were less wise perhaps, remained.  In the
+beginning, they were even republicans; to the end they could not be
+persuaded to despair of the people.  It was a glorious folly, for which,
+as a son, I reverence them.  First one and then the other perished.  If I
+have any mark of a gentleman, all who taught me died upon the scaffold,
+and my last school of manners was the prison of the Abbaye.  Do you think
+you can teach bitterness to a man with a history like mine?'
+
+'I have no wish to try,' said he.  'And yet there is one point I cannot
+understand: I cannot understand that one of your blood and experience
+should serve the Corsican.  I cannot understand it: it seems as though
+everything generous in you must rise against that--domination.'
+
+'And perhaps,' I retorted, 'had your childhood passed among wolves, you
+would have been overjoyed yourself to see the Corsican Shepherd.'
+
+'Well, well,' replied Mr. Romaine, 'it may be.  There are things that do
+not bear discussion.'
+
+And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a flight of
+steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V--ST. IVES IS SHOWN A HOUSE
+
+
+The lawyer was scarce gone before I remembered many omissions; and chief
+among these, that I had neglected to get Mr. Burchell Fenn's address.
+Here was an essential point neglected; and I ran to the head of the
+stairs to find myself already too late.  The lawyer was beyond my view;
+in the archway that led downward to the castle gate, only the red coat
+and the bright arms of a sentry glittered in the shadow; and I could but
+return to my place upon the ramparts.
+
+I am not very sure that I was properly entitled to this corner.  But I
+was a high favourite; not an officer, and scarce a private, in the castle
+would have turned me back, except upon a thing of moment; and whenever I
+desired to be solitary, I was suffered to sit here behind my piece of
+cannon unmolested.  The cliff went down before me almost sheer, but
+mantled with a thicket of climbing trees; from farther down, an outwork
+raised its turret; and across the valley I had a view of that long
+terrace of Princes Street which serves as a promenade to the fashionable
+inhabitants of Edinburgh.  A singularity in a military prison, that it
+should command a view on the chief thoroughfare!
+
+It is not necessary that I should trouble you with the train of my
+reflections, which turned upon the interview I had just concluded and the
+hopes that were now opening before me.  What is more essential, my eye
+(even while I thought) kept following the movement of the passengers on
+Princes Street, as they passed briskly to and fro--met, greeted, and
+bowed to each other--or entered and left the shops, which are in that
+quarter, and, for a town of the Britannic provinces, particularly fine.
+My mind being busy upon other things, the course of my eye was the more
+random; and it chanced that I followed, for some time, the advance of a
+young gentleman with a red head and a white great-coat, for whom I cared
+nothing at the moment, and of whom it is probable I shall be gathered to
+my fathers without learning more.  He seemed to have a large
+acquaintance: his hat was for ever in his hand; and I daresay I had
+already observed him exchanging compliments with half a dozen, when he
+drew up at last before a young man and a young lady whose tall persons
+and gallant carriage I thought I recognised.
+
+It was impossible at such a distance that I could be sure, but the
+thought was sufficient, and I craned out of the embrasure to follow them
+as long as possible.  To think that such emotions, that such a concussion
+of the blood, may have been inspired by a chance resemblance, and that I
+may have stood and thrilled there for a total stranger!  This distant
+view, at least, whether of Flora or of some one else, changed in a moment
+the course of my reflections.  It was all very well, and it was highly
+needful, I should see my uncle; but an uncle, a great-uncle at that, and
+one whom I had never seen, leaves the imagination cold; and if I were to
+leave the castle, I might never again have the opportunity of finding
+Flora.  The little impression I had made, even supposing I had made any,
+how soon it would die out! how soon I should sink to be a phantom memory,
+with which (in after days) she might amuse a husband and children!  No,
+the impression must be clenched, the wax impressed with the seal, ere I
+left Edinburgh.  And at this the two interests that were now contending
+in my bosom came together and became one.  I wished to see Flora again;
+and I wanted some one to further me in my flight and to get me new
+clothes.  The conclusion was apparent.  Except for persons in the
+garrison itself, with whom it was a point of honour and military duty to
+retain me captive, I knew, in the whole country of Scotland, these two
+alone.  If it were to be done at all, they must be my helpers.  To tell
+them of my designed escape while I was still in bonds, would be to lay
+before them a most difficult choice.  What they might do in such a case,
+I could not in the least be sure of, for (the same case arising) I was
+far from sure what I should do myself.  It was plain I must escape first.
+When the harm was done, when I was no more than a poor wayside fugitive,
+I might apply to them with less offence and more security.  To this end
+it became necessary that I should find out where they lived and how to
+reach it; and feeling a strong confidence that they would soon return to
+visit me, I prepared a series of baits with which to angle for my
+information.  It will be seen the first was good enough.
+
+Perhaps two days after, Master Ronald put in an appearance by himself.  I
+had no hold upon the boy, and pretermitted my design till I should have
+laid court to him and engaged his interest.  He was prodigiously
+embarrassed, not having previously addressed me otherwise than by a bow
+and blushes; and he advanced to me with an air of one stubbornly
+performing a duty, like a raw soldier under fire.  I laid down my
+carving; greeted him with a good deal of formality, such as I thought he
+would enjoy; and finding him to remain silent, branched off into
+narratives of my campaigns such as Goguelat himself might have scrupled
+to endorse.  He visibly thawed and brightened; drew more near to where I
+sat; forgot his timidity so far as to put many questions; and at last,
+with another blush, informed me he was himself expecting a commission.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'they are fine troops, your British troops in the
+Peninsula.  A young gentleman of spirit may well be proud to be engaged
+at the head of such soldiers.'
+
+'I know that,' he said; 'I think of nothing else.  I think shame to be
+dangling here at home and going through with this foolery of education,
+while others, no older than myself, are in the field.'
+
+'I cannot blame you,' said I.  'I have felt the same myself.'
+
+'There are--there are no troops, are there, quite so good as ours?' he
+asked.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'there is a point about them: they have a defect,--they
+are not to be trusted in a retreat.  I have seen them behave very ill in
+a retreat.'
+
+'I believe that is our national character,' he said--God forgive
+him!--with an air of pride.
+
+'I have seen your national character running away at least, and had the
+honour to run after it!' rose to my lips, but I was not so ill advised as
+to give it utterance.  Every one should be flattered, but boys and women
+without stint; and I put in the rest of the afternoon narrating to him
+tales of British heroism, for which I should not like to engage that they
+were all true.
+
+'I am quite surprised,' he said at last.  'People tell you the French are
+insincere.  Now, I think your sincerity is beautiful.  I think you have a
+noble character.  I admire you very much.  I am very grateful for your
+kindness to--to one so young,' and he offered me his hand.
+
+'I shall see you again soon?' said I.
+
+'Oh, now!  Yes, very soon,' said he.  'I--I wish to tell you.  I would
+not let Flora--Miss Gilchrist, I mean--come to-day.  I wished to see more
+of you myself.  I trust you are not offended: you know, one should be
+careful about strangers.'
+
+I approved his caution, and he took himself away: leaving me in a mixture
+of contrarious feelings, part ashamed to have played on one so gullible,
+part raging that I should have burned so much incense before the vanity
+of England; yet, in the bottom of my soul, delighted to think I had made
+a friend--or, at least, begun to make a friend--of Flora's brother.
+
+As I had half expected, both made their appearance the next day.  I
+struck so fine a shade betwixt the pride that is allowed to soldiers and
+the sorrowful humility that befits a captive, that I declare, as I went
+to meet them, I might have afforded a subject for a painter.  So much was
+high comedy, I must confess; but so soon as my eyes lighted full on her
+dark face and eloquent eyes, the blood leaped into my cheeks--and that
+was nature!  I thanked them, but not the least with exultation; it was my
+cue to be mournful, and to take the pair of them as one.
+
+'I have been thinking,' I said, 'you have been so good to me, both of
+you, stranger and prisoner as I am, that I have been thinking how I could
+testify to my gratitude.  It may seem a strange subject for a confidence,
+but there is actually no one here, even of my comrades, that knows me by
+my name and title.  By these I am called plain Champdivers, a name to
+which I have a right, but not the name which I should bear, and which
+(but a little while ago) I must hide like a crime.  Miss Flora, suffer me
+to present to you the Vicomte Anne de Keroual de Saint-Yves, a private
+soldier.'
+
+'I knew it!' cried the boy; 'I knew he was a noble!'
+
+And I thought the eyes of Miss Flora said the same, but more
+persuasively.  All through this interview she kept them on the ground, or
+only gave them to me for a moment at a time, and with a serious
+sweetness.
+
+'You may conceive, my friends, that this is rather a painful confession,'
+I continued.  'To stand here before you, vanquished, a prisoner in a
+fortress, and take my own name upon my lips, is painful to the proud.
+And yet I wished that you should know me.  Long after this, we may yet
+hear of one another--perhaps Mr. Gilchrist and myself in the field and
+from opposing camps--and it would be a pity if we heard and did not
+recognise.'
+
+They were both moved; and began at once to press upon me offers of
+service, such as to lend me books, get me tobacco if I used it, and the
+like.  This would have been all mighty welcome, before the tunnel was
+ready.  Now it signified no more to me than to offer the transition I
+required.
+
+'My dear friends,' I said--'for you must allow me to call you that, who
+have no others within so many hundred leagues--perhaps you will think me
+fanciful and sentimental; and perhaps indeed I am; but there is one
+service that I would beg of you before all others.  You see me set here
+on the top of this rock in the midst of your city.  Even with what
+liberty I have, I have the opportunity to see a myriad roofs, and I dare
+to say, thirty leagues of sea and land.  All this hostile!  Under all
+these roofs my enemies dwell; wherever I see the smoke of a house rising,
+I must tell myself that some one sits before the chimney and reads with
+joy of our reverses.  Pardon me, dear friends, I know that you must do
+the same, and I do not grudge at it!  With you, it is all different.
+Show me your house then, were it only the chimney, or, if that be not
+visible, the quarter of the town in which it lies!  So, when I look all
+about me, I shall be able to say: "_There is one house in which I am not
+quite unkindly thought of_."'
+
+Flora stood a moment.
+
+'It is a pretty thought,' said she, 'and, as far as regards Ronald and
+myself, a true one.  Come, I believe I can show you the very smoke out of
+our chimney.'
+
+So saying, she carried me round the battlements towards the opposite or
+southern side of the fortress, and indeed to a bastion almost immediately
+overlooking the place of our projected flight.  Thence we had a view of
+some foreshortened suburbs at our feet, and beyond of a green, open, and
+irregular country rising towards the Pentland Hills.  The face of one of
+these summits (say two leagues from where we stood) is marked with a
+procession of white scars.  And to this she directed my attention.
+
+'You see these marks?' she said.  'We call them the Seven Sisters.
+Follow a little lower with your eye, and you will see a fold of the hill,
+the tops of some trees, and a tail of smoke out of the midst of them.
+That is Swanston Cottage, where my brother and I are living with my aunt.
+If it gives you pleasure to see it, I am glad.  We, too, can see the
+castle from a corner in the garden, and we go there in the morning
+often--do we not, Ronald?--and we think of you, M. de Saint-Yves; but I
+am afraid it does not altogether make us glad.'
+
+'Mademoiselle!' said I, and indeed my voice was scarce under command, 'if
+you knew how your generous words--how even the sight of you--relieved the
+horrors of this place, I believe, I hope, I know, you would be glad.  I
+will come here daily and look at that dear chimney and these green hills,
+and bless you from the heart, and dedicate to you the prayers of this
+poor sinner.  Ah!  I do not say they can avail!'
+
+'Who can say that, M. de Saint-Yves?' she said softly.  'But I think it
+is time we should be going.'
+
+'High time,' said Ronald, whom (to say the truth) I had a little
+forgotten.
+
+On the way back, as I was laying myself out to recover lost ground with
+the youth, and to obliterate, if possible, the memory of my last and
+somewhat too fervent speech, who should come past us but the major?  I
+had to stand aside and salute as he went by, but his eyes appeared
+entirely occupied with Flora.
+
+'Who is that man?' she asked.
+
+'He is a friend of mine,' said I.  'I give him lessons in French, and he
+has been very kind to me.'
+
+'He stared,' she said,--'I do not say, rudely; but why should he stare?'
+
+'If you do not wish to be stared at, mademoiselle, suffer me to recommend
+a veil,' said I.
+
+She looked at me with what seemed anger.  'I tell you the man stared,'
+she said.
+
+And Ronald added.  'Oh, I don't think he meant any harm.  I suppose he
+was just surprised to see us walking about with a pr--- with M.
+Saint-Yves.'
+
+But the next morning, when I went to Chevenix's rooms, and after I had
+dutifully corrected his exercise--'I compliment you on your taste,' said
+he to me.
+
+'I beg your pardon?' said I.
+
+'Oh no, I beg yours,' said he.  'You understand me perfectly, just as I
+do you.'
+
+I murmured something about enigmas.
+
+'Well, shall I give you the key to the enigma?' said he, leaning back.
+'That was the young lady whom Goguelat insulted and whom you avenged.  I
+do not blame you.  She is a heavenly creature.'
+
+'With all my heart, to the last of it!' said I.  'And to the first also,
+if it amuses you!  You are become so very acute of late that I suppose
+you must have your own way.'
+
+'What is her name?' he asked.
+
+'Now, really!' said I.  'Do you think it likely she has told me?'
+
+'I think it certain,' said he.
+
+I could not restrain my laughter.  'Well, then, do you think it likely I
+would tell you?' I cried.
+
+'Not a bit.' said he.  'But come, to our lesson!'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI--THE ESCAPE
+
+
+The time for our escape drew near, and the nearer it came the less we
+seemed to enjoy the prospect.  There is but one side on which this castle
+can be left either with dignity or safety; but as there is the main gate
+and guard, and the chief street of the upper city, it is not to be
+thought of by escaping prisoners.  In all other directions an abominable
+precipice surrounds it, down the face of which (if anywhere at all) we
+must regain our liberty.  By our concurrent labours in many a dark night,
+working with the most anxious precautions against noise, we had made out
+to pierce below the curtain about the south-west corner, in a place they
+call the _Devil's Elbow_.  I have never met that celebrity; nor (if the
+rest of him at all comes up to what they called his elbow) have I the
+least desire of his acquaintance.  From the heel of the masonry, the
+rascally, breakneck precipice descended sheer among waste lands,
+scattered suburbs of the city, and houses in the building.  I had never
+the heart to look for any length of time--the thought that I must make
+the descent in person some dark night robbing me of breath; and, indeed,
+on anybody not a seaman or a steeple-jack, the mere sight of the _Devil's
+Elbow_ wrought like an emetic.
+
+I don't know where the rope was got, and doubt if I much cared.  It was
+not that which gravelled me, but whether, now that we had it, it would
+serve our turn.  Its length, indeed, we made a shift to fathom out; but
+who was to tell us how that length compared with the way we had to go?
+Day after day, there would be always some of us stolen out to the
+_Devil's Elbow_ and making estimates of the descent, whether by a bare
+guess or the dropping of stones.  A private of pioneers remembered the
+formula for that--or else remembered part of it and obligingly invented
+the remainder.  I had never any real confidence in that formula; and even
+had we got it from a book, there were difficulties in the way of the
+application that might have daunted Archimedes.  We durst not drop any
+considerable pebble lest the sentinels should hear, and those that we
+dropped we could not hear ourselves.  We had never a watch--or none that
+had a second-hand; and though every one of us could guess a second to a
+nicety, all somehow guessed it differently.  In short, if any two set
+forth upon this enterprise, they invariably returned with two opinions,
+and often with a black eye in the bargain.  I looked on upon these
+proceedings, although not without laughter, yet with impatience and
+disgust.  I am one that cannot bear to see things botched or gone upon
+with ignorance; and the thought that some poor devil was to hazard his
+bones upon such premises, revolted me.  Had I guessed the name of that
+unhappy first adventurer, my sentiments might have been livelier still.
+
+The designation of this personage was indeed all that remained for us to
+do; and even in that we had advanced so far that the lot had fallen on
+Shed B.  It had been determined to mingle the bitter and the sweet; and
+whoever went down first, the whole of his shed-mates were to follow next
+in order.  This caused a good deal of joy in Shed B, and would have
+caused more if it had not still remained to choose our pioneer.  In view
+of the ambiguity in which we lay as to the length of the rope and the
+height of the precipice--and that this gentleman was to climb down from
+fifty to seventy fathoms on a pitchy night, on a rope entirely free, and
+with not so much as an infant child to steady it at the bottom, a little
+backwardness was perhaps excusable.  But it was, in our case, more than a
+little.  The truth is, we were all womanish fellows about a height; and I
+have myself been put, more than once, _hors de combat_ by a less affair
+than the rock of Edinburgh Castle.
+
+We discussed it in the dark and between the passage of the rounds; and it
+was impossible for any body of men to show a less adventurous spirit.  I
+am sure some of us, and myself first among the number, regretted
+Goguelat.  Some were persuaded it was safe, and could prove the same by
+argument; but if they had good reasons why some one else should make the
+trial, they had better still why it should not be themselves.  Others,
+again, condemned the whole idea as insane; among these, as ill-luck would
+have it, a seaman of the fleet; who was the most dispiriting of all.  The
+height, he reminded us, was greater than the tallest ship's mast, the
+rope entirely free; and he as good as defied the boldest and strongest to
+succeed.  We were relieved from this dead-lock by our sergeant-major of
+dragoons.
+
+'Comrades,' said he, 'I believe I rank you all; and for that reason, if
+you really wish it, I will be the first myself.  At the same time, you
+are to consider what the chances are that I may prove to be the last, as
+well.  I am no longer young--I was sixty near a month ago.  Since I have
+been a prisoner, I have made for myself a little _bedaine_.  My arms are
+all gone to fat.  And you must promise not to blame me, if I fall and
+play the devil with the whole thing.'
+
+'We cannot hear of such a thing!' said I.  'M. Laclas is the oldest man
+here; and, as such, he should be the very last to offer.  It is plain, we
+must draw lots.'
+
+'No,' said M. Laclas; 'you put something else in my head!  There is one
+here who owes a pretty candle to the others, for they have kept his
+secret.  Besides, the rest of us are only rabble; and he is another
+affair altogether.  Let Champdivers--let the noble go the first.'
+
+I confess there was a notable pause before the noble in question got his
+voice.  But there was no room for choice.  I had been so ill-advised,
+when I first joined the regiment, as to take ground on my nobility.  I
+had been often rallied on the matter in the ranks, and had passed under
+the by-names of _Monseigneur_ and _the Marquis_.  It was now needful I
+should justify myself and take a fair revenge.
+
+Any little hesitation I may have felt passed entirely unnoticed, from the
+lucky incident of a round happening at that moment to go by.  And during
+the interval of silence there occurred something that sent my blood to
+the boil.  There was a private in our shed called Clausel, a man of a
+very ugly disposition.  He had made one of the followers of Goguelat;
+but, whereas Goguelat had always a kind of monstrous gaiety about him,
+Clausel was no less morose than he was evil-minded.  He was sometimes
+called _the General_, and sometimes by a name too ill-mannered for
+repetition.  As we all sat listening, this man's hand was laid on my
+shoulder, and his voice whispered in my ear: 'If you don't go, I'll have
+you hanged, Marquis!'
+
+As soon as the round was past--'Certainly, gentlemen!' said I.  'I will
+give you a lead, with all the pleasure in the world.  But, first of all,
+there is a hound here to be punished.  M. Clausel has just insulted me,
+and dishonoured the French army; and I demand that he run the gauntlet of
+this shed.'
+
+There was but one voice asking what he had done, and, as soon as I had
+told them, but one voice agreeing to the punishment.  The General was, in
+consequence, extremely roughly handled, and the next day was
+congratulated by all who saw him on his _new decorations_.  It was lucky
+for us that he was one of the prime movers and believers in our project
+of escape, or he had certainly revenged himself by a denunciation.  As
+for his feelings towards myself, they appeared, by his looks, to surpass
+humanity; and I made up my mind to give him a wide berth in the future.
+
+Had I been to go down that instant, I believe I could have carried it
+well.  But it was already too late--the day was at hand.  The rest had
+still to be summoned.  Nor was this the extent of my misfortune; for the
+next night, and the night after, were adorned with a perfect galaxy of
+stars, and showed every cat that stirred in a quarter of a mile.  During
+this interval, I have to direct your sympathies on the Vicomte de
+Saint-Yves!  All addressed me softly, like folk round a sickbed.  Our
+Italian corporal, who had got a dozen of oysters from a fishwife, laid
+them at my feet, as though I were a Pagan idol; and I have never since
+been wholly at my ease in the society of shellfish.  He who was the best
+of our carvers brought me a snuff-box, which he had just completed, and
+which, while it was yet in hand, he had often declared he would not part
+with under fifteen dollars.  I believe the piece was worth the money too!
+And yet the voice stuck in my throat with which I must thank him.  I
+found myself, in a word, to be fed up like a prisoner in a camp of
+anthropophagi, and honoured like the sacrificial bull.  And what with
+these annoyances, and the risky venture immediately ahead, I found my
+part a trying one to play.
+
+It was a good deal of a relief when the third evening closed about the
+castle with volumes of sea-fog.  The lights of Princes Street sometimes
+disappeared, sometimes blinked across at us no brighter than the eyes of
+cats; and five steps from one of the lanterns on the ramparts it was
+already groping dark.  We made haste to lie down.  Had our jailers been
+upon the watch, they must have observed our conversation to die out
+unusually soon.  Yet I doubt if any of us slept.  Each lay in his place,
+tortured at once with the hope of liberty and the fear of a hateful
+death.  The guard call sounded; the hum of the town declined by little
+and little.  On all sides of us, in their different quarters, we could
+hear the watchman cry the hours along the street.  Often enough, during
+my stay in England, have I listened to these gruff or broken voices; or
+perhaps gone to my window when I lay sleepless, and watched the old
+gentleman hobble by upon the causeway with his cape and his cap, his
+hanger and his rattle.  It was ever a thought with me how differently
+that cry would re-echo in the chamber of lovers, beside the bed of death,
+or in the condemned cell.  I might be said to hear it that night myself
+in the condemned cell!  At length a fellow with a voice like a bull's
+began to roar out in the opposite thoroughfare:
+
+'Past yin o'cloak, and a dark, haary moarnin'.'
+
+At which we were all silently afoot.
+
+As I stole about the battlements towards the--gallows, I was about to
+write--the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of my resolution, kept close
+by me, and occasionally proffered the most indigestible reassurances in
+my ear.  At last I could bear them no longer.
+
+'Be so obliging as to let me be!' said I.  'I am neither a coward nor a
+fool.  What do _you_ know of whether the rope be long enough?  But I
+shall know it in ten minutes!'
+
+The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted me.
+
+It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper before a friend
+alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had to go handsomely.  It
+was then my time to come on the stage; and I hope I took it handsomely.
+
+'Now, gentlemen,' said I, 'if the rope is ready, here is the criminal!'
+
+The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope extended.  As I moved
+forward to the place, many of my comrades caught me by the hand and wrung
+it, an attention I could well have done without.
+
+'Keep an eye on Clausel!' I whispered to Laclas; and with that, got down
+on my elbows and knees took the rope in both hands, and worked myself,
+feet foremost, through the tunnel.  When the earth failed under my feet,
+I thought my heart would have stopped; and a moment after I was demeaning
+myself in mid-air like a drunken jumping-jack.  I have never been a model
+of piety, but at this juncture prayers and a cold sweat burst from me
+simultaneously.
+
+The line was knotted at intervals of eighteen inches; and to the inexpert
+it may seem as if it should have been even easy to descend.  The trouble
+was, this devil of a piece of rope appeared to be inspired, not with life
+alone, but with a personal malignity against myself.  It turned to the
+one side, paused for a moment, and then spun me like a toasting-jack to
+the other; slipped like an eel from the clasp of my feet; kept me all the
+time in the most outrageous fury of exertion; and dashed me at intervals
+against the face of the rock.  I had no eyes to see with; and I doubt if
+there was anything to see but darkness.  I must occasionally have caught
+a gasp of breath, but it was quite unconscious.  And the whole forces of
+my mind were so consumed with losing hold and getting it again, that I
+could scarce have told whether I was going up or coming down.
+
+Of a sudden I knocked against the cliff with such a thump as almost
+bereft me of my sense; and, as reason twinkled back, I was amazed to find
+that I was in a state of rest, that the face of the precipice here
+inclined outwards at an angle which relieved me almost wholly of the
+burthen of my own weight, and that one of my feet was safely planted on a
+ledge.  I drew one of the sweetest breaths in my experience, hugged
+myself against the rope, and closed my eyes in a kind of ecstasy of
+relief.  It occurred to me next to see how far I was advanced on my
+unlucky journey, a point on which I had not a shadow of a guess.  I
+looked up: there was nothing above me but the blackness of the night and
+the fog.  I craned timidly forward and looked down.  There, upon a floor
+of darkness, I beheld a certain pattern of hazy lights, some of them
+aligned as in thoroughfares, others standing apart as in solitary houses;
+and before I could well realise it, or had in the least estimated my
+distance, a wave of nausea and vertigo warned me to lie back and close my
+eyes.  In this situation I had really but the one wish, and that was:
+something else to think of!  Strange to say, I got it: a veil was torn
+from my mind, and I saw what a fool I was--what fools we had all
+been--and that I had no business to be thus dangling between earth and
+heaven by my arms.  The only thing to have done was to have attached me
+to a rope and lowered me, and I had never the wit to see it till that
+moment!
+
+I filled my lungs, got a good hold on my rope, and once more launched
+myself on the descent.  As it chanced, the worst of the danger was at an
+end, and I was so fortunate as to be never again exposed to any violent
+concussion.  Soon after I must have passed within a little distance of a
+bush of wallflower, for the scent of it came over me with that impression
+of reality which characterises scents in darkness.  This made me a second
+landmark, the ledge being my first.  I began accordingly to compute
+intervals of time: so much to the ledge, so much again to the wallflower,
+so much more below.  If I were not at the bottom of the rock, I
+calculated I must be near indeed to the end of the rope, and there was no
+doubt that I was not far from the end of my own resources.  I began to be
+light-headed and to be tempted to let go,--now arguing that I was
+certainly arrived within a few feet of the level and could safely risk a
+fall, anon persuaded I was still close at the top and it was idle to
+continue longer on the rock.  In the midst of which I came to a bearing
+on plain ground, and had nearly wept aloud.  My hands were as good as
+flayed, my courage entirely exhausted, and, what with the long strain and
+the sudden relief, my limbs shook under me with more than the violence of
+ague, and I was glad to cling to the rope.
+
+But this was no time to give way.  I had (by God's single mercy) got
+myself alive out of that fortress; and now I had to try to get the
+others, my comrades.  There was about a fathom of rope to spare; I got it
+by the end, and searched the whole ground thoroughly for anything to make
+it fast to.  In vain: the ground was broken and stony, but there grew not
+there so much as a bush of furze.
+
+'Now then,' thought I to myself, 'here begins a new lesson, and I believe
+it will prove richer than the first.  I am not strong enough to keep this
+rope extended.  If I do not keep it extended the next man will be dashed
+against the precipice.  There is no reason why he should have my
+extravagant good luck.  I see no reason why he should not fall--nor any
+place for him to fall on but my head.'
+
+From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible, as the fog
+lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which gave me a measure
+of the height he had to fall and the horrid force that he must strike me
+with.  What was yet worse, we had agreed to do without signals: every so
+many minutes by Laclas' watch another man was to be started from the
+battlements.  Now, I had seemed to myself to be about half an hour in my
+descent, and it seemed near as long again that I waited, straining on the
+rope for my next comrade to begin.  I began to be afraid that our
+conspiracy was out, that my friends were all secured, and that I should
+pass the remainder of the night, and be discovered in the morning, vainly
+clinging to the rope's end like a hooked fish upon an angle.  I could not
+refrain, at this ridiculous image, from a chuckle of laughter.  And the
+next moment I knew, by the jerking of the rope, that my friend had
+crawled out of the tunnel and was fairly launched on his descent.  It
+appears it was the sailor who had insisted on succeeding me: as soon as
+my continued silence had assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier,
+for that was his name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself
+so extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.  It was like the fellow,
+who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive selfishness.  But he was
+like to have paid pretty dearly for the privilege.  Do as I would, I
+could not keep the rope as I could have wished it; and he ended at last
+by falling on me from a height of several yards, so that we both rolled
+together on the ground.  As soon as he could breathe he cursed me beyond
+belief, wept over his finger, which he had broken, and cursed me again.
+I bade him be still and think shame of himself to be so great a cry-baby.
+Did he not hear the round going by above? I asked; and who could tell but
+what the noise of his fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the
+very moment leaning upon the battlements to listen?
+
+The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the third man
+came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of course, child's play;
+and before there were ten of us collected, it seemed to me that, without
+the least injustice to my comrades, I might proceed to take care of
+myself.
+
+I knew their plan: they had a map and an almanack, and designed for
+Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.  Suppose them to do so, I
+had no idea they were qualified to manage it after it was stolen.  Their
+whole escape, indeed, was the most haphazard thing imaginable; only the
+impatience of captives and the ignorance of private soldiers would have
+entertained so misbegotten a device; and though I played the good comrade
+and worked with them upon the tunnel, but for the lawyer's message I
+should have let them go without me.  Well, now they were beyond my help,
+as they had always been beyond my counselling; and, without word said or
+leave taken, I stole out of the little crowd.  It is true I would rather
+have waited to shake hands with Laclas, but in the last man who had
+descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and since the scene in the shed
+my distrust of Clausel was perfect.  I believed the man to be capable of
+any infamy, and events have since shown that I was right.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII--SWANSTON COTTAGE
+
+
+I had two views.  The first was, naturally, to get clear of Edinburgh
+Castle and the town, to say nothing of my fellow-prisoners; the second to
+work to the southward so long as it was night, and be near Swanston
+Cottage by morning.  What I should do there and then, I had no guess, and
+did not greatly care, being a devotee of a couple of divinities called
+Chance and Circumstance.  Prepare, if possible; where it is impossible,
+work straight forward, and keep your eyes open and your tongue oiled.
+Wit and a good exterior--there is all life in a nutshell.
+
+I had at first a rather chequered journey: got involved in gardens,
+butted into houses, and had even once the misfortune to awake a sleeping
+family, the father of which, as I suppose, menaced me from the window
+with a blunderbuss.  Altogether, though I had been some time gone from my
+companions, I was still at no great distance, when a miserable accident
+put a period to the escape.  Of a sudden the night was divided by a
+scream.  This was followed by the sound of something falling, and that
+again by the report of a musket from the Castle battlements.  It was
+strange to hear the alarm spread through the city.  In the fortress drums
+were beat and a bell rung backward.  On all hands the watchmen sprang
+their rattles.  Even in that limbo or no-man's-land where I was
+wandering, lights were made in the houses; sashes were flung up; I could
+hear neighbouring families converse from window to window, and at length
+I was challenged myself.
+
+'Wha's that?' cried a big voice.
+
+I could see it proceeded from a big man in a big nightcap, leaning from a
+one-pair window; and as I was not yet abreast of his house, I judged it
+was more wise to answer.  This was not the first time I had had to stake
+my fortunes on the goodness of my accent in a foreign tongue; and I have
+always found the moment inspiriting, as a gambler should.  Pulling around
+me a sort of great-coat I had made of my blanket, to cover my
+sulphur-coloured livery,--'A friend!' said I.
+
+'What like's all this collieshangie?' said he.
+
+I had never heard of a collieshangie in my days, but with the racket all
+about us in the city, I could have no doubt as to the man's meaning.
+
+'I do not know, sir, really,' said I; 'but I suppose some of the
+prisoners will have escaped.'
+
+'Bedamned!' says he.
+
+'Oh, sir, they will be soon taken,' I replied: 'it has been found in
+time.  Good morning, sir!'
+
+'Ye walk late, sir?' he added.
+
+'Oh, surely not,' said I, with a laugh.  'Earlyish, if you like!' which
+brought me finally beyond him, highly pleased with my success.
+
+I was now come forth on a good thoroughfare, which led (as well as I
+could judge) in my direction.  It brought me almost immediately through a
+piece of street, whence I could hear close by the springing of a
+watchman's rattle, and where I suppose a sixth part of the windows would
+be open, and the people, in all sorts of night gear, talking with a kind
+of tragic gusto from one to another.  Here, again, I must run the
+gauntlet of a half-dozen questions, the rattle all the while sounding
+nearer; but as I was not walking inordinately quick, as I spoke like a
+gentleman, and the lamps were too dim to show my dress, I carried it off
+once more.  One person, indeed, inquired where I was off to at that hour.
+
+I replied vaguely and cheerfully, and as I escaped at one end of this
+dangerous pass I could see the watchman's lantern entering by the other.
+I was now safe on a dark country highway, out of sight of lights and out
+of the fear of watchmen.  And yet I had not gone above a hundred yards
+before a fellow made an ugly rush at me from the roadside.  I avoided him
+with a leap, and stood on guard, cursing my empty hands, wondering
+whether I had to do with an officer or a mere footpad, and scarce knowing
+which to wish.  My assailant stood a little; in the thick darkness I
+could see him bob and sidle as though he were feinting at me for an
+advantageous onfall.  Then he spoke.
+
+'My goo' frien',' says he, and at the first word I pricked my ears, 'my
+goo' frien', will you oblishe me with lil neshary infamation?  Whish roa'
+t' Cramond?'
+
+I laughed out clear and loud, stepped up to the convivialist, took him by
+the shoulders and faced him about.  'My good friend,' said I, 'I believe
+I know what is best for you much better than yourself, and may God
+forgive you the fright you have given me!  There, get you gone to
+Edinburgh!'  And I gave a shove, which he obeyed with the passive agility
+of a ball, and disappeared incontinently in the darkness down the road by
+which I had myself come.
+
+Once clear of this foolish fellow, I went on again up a gradual hill,
+descended on the other side through the houses of a country village, and
+came at last to the bottom of the main ascent leading to the Pentlands
+and my destination.  I was some way up when the fog began to lighten; a
+little farther, and I stepped by degrees into a clear starry night, and
+saw in front of me, and quite distinct, the summits of the Pentlands, and
+behind, the valley of the Forth and the city of my late captivity buried
+under a lake of vapour.  I had but one encounter--that of a farm-cart,
+which I heard, from a great way ahead of me, creaking nearer in the
+night, and which passed me about the point of dawn like a thing seen in a
+dream, with two silent figures in the inside nodding to the horse's
+steps.  I presume they were asleep; by the shawl about her head and
+shoulders, one of them should be a woman.  Soon, by concurrent steps, the
+day began to break and the fog to subside and roll away.  The east grew
+luminous and was barred with chilly colours, and the Castle on its rock,
+and the spires and chimneys of the upper town, took gradual shape, and
+arose, like islands, out of the receding cloud.  All about me was still
+and sylvan; the road mounting and winding, with nowhere a sign of any
+passenger, the birds chirping, I suppose for warmth, the boughs of the
+trees knocking together, and the red leaves falling in the wind.
+
+It was broad day, but still bitter cold and the sun not up, when I came
+in view of my destination.  A single gable and chimney of the cottage
+peeped over the shoulder of the hill; not far off, and a trifle higher on
+the mountain, a tall old white-washed farmhouse stood among the trees,
+beside a falling brook; beyond were rough hills of pasture.  I bethought
+me that shepherd folk were early risers, and if I were once seen skulking
+in that neighbourhood it might prove the ruin of my prospects; took
+advantage of a line of hedge, and worked myself up in its shadow till I
+was come under the garden wall of my friends' house.  The cottage was a
+little quaint place of many rough-cast gables and grey roofs.  It had
+something the air of a rambling infinitesimal cathedral, the body of it
+rising in the midst two storeys high, with a steep-pitched roof, and
+sending out upon all hands (as it were chapter-houses, chapels, and
+transepts) one-storeyed and dwarfish projections.  To add to this
+appearance, it was grotesquely decorated with crockets and gargoyles,
+ravished from some medieval church.  The place seemed hidden away, being
+not only concealed in the trees of the garden, but, on the side on which
+I approached it, buried as high as the eaves by the rising of the ground.
+About the walls of the garden there went a line of well-grown elms and
+beeches, the first entirely bare, the last still pretty well covered with
+red leaves, and the centre was occupied with a thicket of laurel and
+holly, in which I could see arches cut and paths winding.
+
+I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the better.  The house
+appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to wake any one, I had no guarantee
+it might not prove either the aunt with the gold eyeglasses (whom I could
+only remember with trembling), or some ass of a servant-maid who should
+burst out screaming at sight of me.  Higher up I could hear and see a
+shepherd shouting to his dogs and striding on the rough sides of the
+mountain, and it was clear I must get to cover without loss of time.  No
+doubt the holly thickets would have proved a very suitable retreat, but
+there was mounted on the wall a sort of signboard not uncommon in the
+country of Great Britain, and very damping to the adventurous: SPRING
+GUNS AND MAN-TRAPS was the legend that it bore.  I have learned since
+that these advertisements, three times out of four, were in the nature of
+Quaker guns on a disarmed battery, but I had not learned it then, and
+even so, the odds would not have been good enough.  For a choice, I would
+a hundred times sooner be returned to Edinburgh Castle and my corner in
+the bastion, than to leave my foot in a steel trap or have to digest the
+contents of an automatic blunderbuss.  There was but one chance
+left--that Ronald or Flora might be the first to come abroad; and in
+order to profit by this chance if it occurred, I got me on the cope of
+the wall in a place where it was screened by the thick branches of a
+beech, and sat there waiting.
+
+As the day wore on, the sun came very pleasantly out.  I had been awake
+all night, I had undergone the most violent agitations of mind and body,
+and it is not so much to be wondered at, as it was exceedingly unwise and
+foolhardy, that I should have dropped into a doze.  From this I awakened
+to the characteristic sound of digging, looked down, and saw immediately
+below me the back view of a gardener in a stable waistcoat.  Now he would
+appear steadily immersed in his business; anon, to my more immediate
+terror, he would straighten his back, stretch his arms, gaze about the
+otherwise deserted garden, and relish a deep pinch of snuff.  It was my
+first thought to drop from the wall upon the other side.  A glance
+sufficed to show me that even the way by which I had come was now cut
+off, and the field behind me already occupied by a couple of shepherds'
+assistants and a score or two of sheep.  I have named the talismans on
+which I habitually depend, but here was a conjuncture in which both were
+wholly useless.  The copestone of a wall arrayed with broken bottles is
+no favourable rostrum; and I might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as
+fascinating as Richelieu, and neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads
+would care a halfpenny.  In short, there was no escape possible from my
+absurd position: there I must continue to sit until one or other of my
+neighbours should raise his eyes and give the signal for my capture.
+
+The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could be scarce
+less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of the beech which
+made a fashion of sheltering me were already partly fallen; and I was
+thus not only perilously exposed myself, but enabled to command some part
+of the garden walks and (under an evergreen arch) the front lawn and
+windows of the cottage.  For long nothing stirred except my friend with
+the spade; then I heard the opening of a sash; and presently after saw
+Miss Flora appear in a morning wrapper and come strolling hitherward
+between the borders, pausing and visiting her flowers--herself as fair.
+_There_ was a friend; _here_, immediately beneath me, an unknown
+quantity--the gardener: how to communicate with the one and not attract
+the notice of the other?  To make a noise was out of the question; I
+dared scarce to breathe.  I held myself ready to make a gesture as soon
+as she should look, and she looked in every possible direction but the
+one.  She was interested in the vilest tuft of chickweed, she gazed at
+the summit of the mountain, she came even immediately below me and
+conversed on the most fastidious topics with the gardener; but to the top
+of that wall she would not dedicate a glance!  At last she began to
+retrace her steps in the direction of the cottage; whereupon, becoming
+quite desperate, I broke off a piece of plaster, took a happy aim, and
+hit her with it in the nape of the neck.  She clapped her hand to the
+place, turned about, looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying
+me (as indeed I was parting the branches to make it the more easy), half
+uttered and half swallowed down again a cry of surprise.
+
+The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.  'What's your wull,
+miss?' said he.
+
+Her readiness amazed me.  She had already turned and was gazing in the
+opposite direction.  'There's a child among the artichokes,' she said.
+
+'The Plagues of Egyp'!  _I'll_ see to them!' cried the gardener
+truculently, and with a hurried waddle disappeared among the evergreens.
+
+That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms stretched
+out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with heavenly blushes, the
+next pale as death.  'Monsieur de. Saint-Yves!' she said.
+
+'My dear young lady,' I said, 'this is the damnedest liberty--I know it!
+But what else was I to do?'
+
+'You have escaped?' said she.
+
+'If you call this escape,' I replied.
+
+'But you cannot possibly stop there!' she cried.
+
+'I know it,' said I.  'And where am I to go?'
+
+She struck her hands together.  'I have it!' she exclaimed.  'Come down
+by the beech trunk--you must leave no footprint in the border--quickly,
+before Robie can get back!  I am the hen-wife here: I keep the key; you
+must go into the hen-house--for the moment.'
+
+I was by her side at once.  Both cast a hasty glance at the blank windows
+of the cottage and so much as was visible of the garden alleys; it seemed
+there was none to observe us.  She caught me by the sleeve and ran.  It
+was no time for compliments; hurry breathed upon our necks; and I ran
+along with her to the next corner of the garden, where a wired court and
+a board hovel standing in a grove of trees advertised my place of refuge.
+She thrust me in without a word; the bulk of the fowls were at the same
+time emitted; and I found myself the next moment locked in alone with
+half a dozen sitting hens.  In the twilight of the place all fixed their
+eyes on me severely, and seemed to upbraid me with some crying
+impropriety.  Doubtless the hen has always a puritanic appearance,
+although (in its own behaviour) I could never observe it to be more
+particular than its neighbours.  But conceive a British hen!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII--THE HEN-HOUSE
+
+
+I was half an hour at least in the society of these distressing bipeds,
+and alone with my own reflections and necessities.  I was in great pain
+of my flayed hands, and had nothing to treat them with; I was hungry and
+thirsty, and had nothing to eat or to drink; I was thoroughly tired, and
+there was no place for me to sit.  To be sure there was the floor, but
+nothing could be imagined less inviting.
+
+At the sound of approaching footsteps, my good-humour was restored.  The
+key rattled in the lock, and Master Ronald entered, closed the door
+behind him, and leaned his back to it.
+
+'I say, you know!' he said, and shook a sullen young head.
+
+'I know it's a liberty,' said I.
+
+'It's infernally awkward: my position is infernally embarrassing,' said
+he.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'and what do you think of mine?'
+
+This seemed to pose him entirely, and he remained gazing upon me with a
+convincing air of youth and innocence.  I could have laughed, but I was
+not so inhumane.
+
+'I am in your hands,' said I, with a little gesture.  'You must do with
+me what you think right.'
+
+'Ah, yes!' he cried: 'if I knew!'
+
+'You see,' said I, 'it would be different if you had received your
+commission.  Properly speaking, you are not yet a combatant; I have
+ceased to be one; and I think it arguable that we are just in the
+position of one ordinary gentleman to another, where friendship usually
+comes before the law.  Observe, I only say _arguable_.  For God's sake,
+don't think I wish to dictate an opinion.  These are the sort of nasty
+little businesses, inseparable from war, which every gentleman must
+decide for himself.  If I were in your place--'
+
+'Ay, what would you do, then?' says he.
+
+'Upon my word, I do not know,' said I.  'Hesitate, as you are doing, I
+believe.'
+
+'I will tell you,' he said.  'I have a kinsman, and it is what _he_ would
+think, that I am thinking.  It is General Graham of Lynedoch--Sir Thomas
+Graham.  I scarcely know him, but I believe I admire him more than I do
+God.'
+
+'I admire him a good deal myself,' said I, 'and have good reason to.  I
+have fought with him, been beaten, and run away.  _Veni_, _victus sum_,
+_evasi_.'
+
+'What!' he cried.  'You were at Barossa?'
+
+'There and back, which many could not say,' said I.  'It was a pretty
+affair and a hot one, and the Spaniards behaved abominably, as they
+usually did in a pitched field; the Marshal Duke of Belluno made a fool
+of himself, and not for the first time; and your friend Sir Thomas had
+the best of it, so far as there was any best.  He is a brave and ready
+officer.'
+
+'Now, then, you will understand!' said the boy.  'I wish to please Sir
+Thomas: what would he do?'
+
+'Well, I can tell you a story,' said I, 'a true one too, and about this
+very combat of Chiclana, or Barossa as you call it.  I was in the Eighth
+of the Line; we lost the eagle of the First Battalion, more betoken, but
+it cost you dear.  Well, we had repulsed more charges than I care to
+count, when your 87th Regiment came on at a foot's pace, very slow but
+very steady; in front of them a mounted officer, his hat in his hand,
+white-haired, and talking very quietly to the battalions.  Our Major,
+Vigo-Roussillon, set spurs to his horse and galloped out to sabre him,
+but seeing him an old man, very handsome, and as composed as if he were
+in a coffee-house, lost heart and galloped back again.  Only, you see,
+they had been very close together for the moment, and looked each other
+in the eyes.  Soon after the Major was wounded, taken prisoner, and
+carried into Cadiz.  One fine day they announced to him the visit of the
+General, Sir Thomas Graham.  "Well, sir," said the General, taking him by
+the hand, "I think we were face to face upon the field."  It was the
+white-haired officer!'
+
+'Ah!' cried the boy,--his eyes were burning.
+
+'Well, and here is the point,' I continued.  'Sir Thomas fed the Major
+from his own table from that day, and served him with six covers.'
+
+'Yes, it is a beautiful--a beautiful story,' said Ronald.  'And yet
+somehow it is not the same--is it?'
+
+'I admit it freely,' said I.
+
+The boy stood awhile brooding.  'Well, I take my risk of it,' he cried.
+'I believe it's treason to my sovereign--I believe there is an infamous
+punishment for such a crime--and yet I'm hanged if I can give you up.'
+
+I was as much moved as he.  'I could almost beg you to do otherwise,' I
+said.  'I was a brute to come to you, a brute and a coward.  You are a
+noble enemy; you will make a noble soldier.'  And with rather a happy
+idea of a compliment for this warlike youth, I stood up straight and gave
+him the salute.
+
+He was for a moment confused; his face flushed.  'Well, well, I must be
+getting you something to eat, but it will not be for six,' he added, with
+a smile: 'only what we can get smuggled out.  There is my aunt in the
+road, you see,' and he locked me in again with the indignant hens.
+
+I always smile when I recall that young fellow; and yet, if the reader
+were to smile also, I should feel ashamed.  If my son shall be only like
+him when he comes to that age, it will be a brave day for me and not a
+bad one for his country.
+
+At the same time I cannot pretend that I was sorry when his sister
+succeeded in his place.  She brought me a few crusts of bread and a jug
+of milk, which she had handsomely laced with whisky after the Scottish
+manner.
+
+'I am so sorry,' she said: 'I dared not bring on anything more.  We are
+so small a family, and my aunt keeps such an eye upon the servants.  I
+have put some whisky in the milk--it is more wholesome so--and with eggs
+you will be able to make something of a meal.  How many eggs will you be
+wanting to that milk? for I must be taking the others to my aunt--that is
+my excuse for being here.  I should think three or four.  Do you know how
+to beat them? or shall I do it?'
+
+Willing to detain her a while longer in the hen-house, I displayed my
+bleeding palms; at which she cried aloud.
+
+'My dear Miss Flora, you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs,'
+said I; 'and it is no bagatelle to escape from Edinburgh Castle.  One of
+us, I think, was even killed.'
+
+'And you are as white as a rag, too,' she exclaimed, 'and can hardly
+stand!  Here is my shawl, sit down upon it here in the corner, and I will
+beat your eggs.  See, I have brought a fork too; I should have been a
+good person to take care of Jacobites or Covenanters in old days!  You
+shall have more to eat this evening; Ronald is to bring it you from town.
+We have money enough, although no food that we can call our own.  Ah, if
+Ronald and I kept house, you should not be lying in this shed!  He
+admires you so much.'
+
+'My dear friend,' said I, 'for God's sake do not embarrass me with more
+alms.  I loved to receive them from that hand, so long as they were
+needed; but they are so no more, and whatever else I may lack--and I lack
+everything--it is not money.'  I pulled out my sheaf of notes and
+detached the top one: it was written for ten pounds, and signed by that
+very famous individual, Abraham Newlands.  'Oblige me, as you would like
+me to oblige your brother if the parts were reversed, and take this note
+for the expenses.  I shall need not only food, but clothes.'
+
+'Lay it on the ground,' said she.  'I must not stop my beating.'
+
+'You are not offended?' I exclaimed.
+
+She answered me by a look that was a reward in itself, and seemed to
+imply the most heavenly offers for the future.  There was in it a shadow
+of reproach, and such warmth of communicative cordiality as left me
+speechless.  I watched her instead till her hens' milk was ready.
+
+'Now,' said she, 'taste that.'
+
+I did so, and swore it was nectar.  She collected her eggs and crouched
+in front of me to watch me eat.  There was about this tall young lady at
+the moment an air of motherliness delicious to behold.  I am like the
+English general, and to this day I still wonder at my moderation.
+
+'What sort of clothes will you be wanting?' said she.
+
+'The clothes of a gentleman,' said I.  'Right or wrong, I think it is the
+part I am best qualified to play.  Mr. St. Ives (for that's to be my name
+upon the journey) I conceive as rather a theatrical figure, and his
+make-up should be to match.'
+
+'And yet there is a difficulty,' said she.  'If you got coarse clothes
+the fit would hardly matter.  But the clothes of a fine gentleman--O, it
+is absolutely necessary that these should fit!  And above all, with
+your'--she paused a moment--'to our ideas somewhat noticeable manners.'
+
+'Alas for my poor manners!' said I.  'But my dear friend Flora, these
+little noticeabilities are just what mankind has to suffer under.
+Yourself, you see, you're very noticeable even when you come in a crowd
+to visit poor prisoners in the Castle.'
+
+I was afraid I should frighten my good angel visitant away, and without
+the smallest breath of pause went on to add a few directions as to stuffs
+and colours.
+
+She opened big eyes upon me.  'O, Mr. St. Ives!' she cried--'if that is
+to be your name--I do not say they would not be becoming; but for a
+journey, do you think they would be wise?  I am afraid'--she gave a
+pretty break of laughter--'I am afraid they would be daft-like!'
+
+'Well, and am I not daft?' I asked her.
+
+'I do begin to think you are,' said she.
+
+'There it is, then!' said I.  'I have been long enough a figure of fun.
+Can you not feel with me that perhaps the bitterest thing in this
+captivity has been the clothes?  Make me a captive--bind me with chains
+if you like--but let me be still myself.  You do not know what it is to
+be a walking travesty--among foes,' I added bitterly.
+
+'O, but you are too unjust!' she cried.  'You speak as though any one
+ever dreamed of laughing at you.  But no one did.  We were all pained to
+the heart.  Even my aunt--though sometimes I do think she was not quite
+in good taste--you should have seen her and heard her at home!  She took
+so much interest.  Every patch in your clothes made us sorry; it should
+have been a sister's work.'
+
+'That is what I never had--a sister,' said I.  'But since you say that I
+did not make you laugh--'
+
+'O, Mr. St. Ives! never!' she exclaimed.  'Not for one moment.  It was
+all too sad.  To see a gentleman--'
+
+'In the clothes of a harlequin, and begging?' I suggested.
+
+'To see a gentleman in distress, and nobly supporting it,' she said.
+
+'And do you not understand, my fair foe,' said I, 'that even if all were
+as you say--even if you had thought my travesty were becoming--I should
+be only the more anxious, for my sake, for my country's sake, and for the
+sake of your kindness, that you should see him whom you have helped as
+God meant him to be seen? that you should have something to remember him
+by at least more characteristic than a misfitting sulphur-yellow suit,
+and half a week's beard?'
+
+'You think a great deal too much of clothes,' she said.  'I am not that
+kind of girl.'
+
+'And I am afraid I am that kind of man,' said I.  'But do not think of me
+too harshly for that.  I talked just now of something to remember by.  I
+have many of them myself, of these beautiful reminders, of these
+keepsakes, that I cannot be parted from until I lose memory and life.
+Many of them are great things, many of them are high virtues--charity,
+mercy, faith.  But some of them are trivial enough.  Miss Flora, do you
+remember the day that I first saw you, the day of the strong east wind?
+Miss Flora, shall I tell you what you wore?'
+
+We had both risen to our feet, and she had her hand already on the door
+to go.  Perhaps this attitude emboldened me to profit by the last seconds
+of our interview; and it certainly rendered her escape the more easy.
+
+'O, you are too romantic!' she said, laughing; and with that my sun was
+blown out, my enchantress had fled away, and I was again left alone in
+the twilight with the lady hens.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX--THREE IS COMPANY, AND FOUR NONE
+
+
+The rest of the day I slept in the corner of the hen-house upon Flora's
+shawl.  Nor did I awake until a light shone suddenly in my eyes, and
+starting up with a gasp (for, indeed, at the moment I dreamed I was still
+swinging from the Castle battlements) I found Ronald bending over me with
+a lantern.  It appeared it was past midnight, that I had slept about
+sixteen hours, and that Flora had returned her poultry to the shed and I
+had heard her not.  I could not but wonder if she had stooped to look at
+me as I slept.  The puritan hens now slept irremediably; and being
+cheered with the promise of supper I wished them an ironical good-night,
+and was lighted across the garden and noiselessly admitted to a bedroom
+on the ground floor of the cottage.  There I found soap, water,
+razors--offered me diffidently by my beardless host--and an outfit of new
+clothes.  To be shaved again without depending on the barber of the gaol
+was a source of a delicious, if a childish joy.  My hair was sadly too
+long, but I was none so unwise as to make an attempt on it myself.  And,
+indeed, I thought it did not wholly misbecome me as it was, being by
+nature curly.  The clothes were about as good as I expected.  The
+waistcoat was of toilenet, a pretty piece, the trousers of fine
+kerseymere, and the coat sat extraordinarily well.  Altogether, when I
+beheld this changeling in the glass, I kissed my hand to him.
+
+'My dear fellow,' said I, 'have you no scent?'
+
+'Good God, no!' cried Ronald.  'What do you want with scent?'
+
+'Capital thing on a campaign,' said I.  'But I can do without.'
+
+I was now led, with the same precautions against noise, into the little
+bow-windowed dining-room of the cottage.  The shutters were up, the lamp
+guiltily turned low; the beautiful Flora greeted me in a whisper; and
+when I was set down to table, the pair proceeded to help me with
+precautions that might have seemed excessive in the Ear of Dionysius.
+
+'She sleeps up there,' observed the boy, pointing to the ceiling; and the
+knowledge that I was so imminently near to the resting-place of that gold
+eyeglass touched even myself with some uneasiness.
+
+Our excellent youth had imported from the city a meat pie, and I was glad
+to find it flanked with a decanter of really admirable wine of Oporto.
+While I ate, Ronald entertained me with the news of the city, which had
+naturally rung all day with our escape: troops and mounted messengers had
+followed each other forth at all hours and in all directions; but
+according to the last intelligence no recapture had been made.  Opinion
+in town was very favourable to us: our courage was applauded, and many
+professed regret that our ultimate chance of escape should be so small.
+The man who had fallen was one Sombref, a peasant; he was one who slept
+in a different part of the Castle; and I was thus assured that the whole
+of my former companions had attained their liberty, and Shed A was
+untenanted.
+
+From this we wandered insensibly into other topics.  It is impossible to
+exaggerate the pleasure I took to be thus sitting at the same table with
+Flora, in the clothes of a gentleman, at liberty and in the full
+possession of my spirits and resources; of all of which I had need,
+because it was necessary that I should support at the same time two
+opposite characters, and at once play the cavalier and lively soldier for
+the eyes of Ronald, and to the ears of Flora maintain the same profound
+and sentimental note that I had already sounded.  Certainly there are
+days when all goes well with a man; when his wit, his digestion, his
+mistress are in a conspiracy to spoil him, and even the weather smiles
+upon his wishes.  I will only say of myself upon that evening that I
+surpassed my expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.
+Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution; until at
+last we were brought back to earth by a catastrophe that might very
+easily have been foreseen, but was not the less astonishing to us when it
+occurred.
+
+I had filled all the glasses.  'I have a toast to propose,' I whispered,
+'or rather three, but all so inextricably interwoven that they will not
+bear dividing.  I wish first to drink to the health of a brave and
+therefore a generous enemy.  He found me disarmed, a fugitive and
+helpless.  Like the lion, he disdained so poor a triumph; and when he
+might have vindicated an easy valour, he preferred to make a friend.  I
+wish that we should next drink to a fairer and a more tender foe.  She
+found me in prison; she cheered me with a priceless sympathy; what she
+has done since, I know she has done in mercy, and I only pray--I dare
+scarce hope--her mercy may prove to have been merciful.  And I wish to
+conjoin with these, for the first, and perhaps the last time, the
+health--and I fear I may already say the memory--of one who has fought,
+not always without success, against the soldiers of your nation; but who
+came here, vanquished already, only to be vanquished again by the loyal
+hand of the one, by the unforgettable eyes of the other.'
+
+It is to be feared I may have lent at times a certain resonancy to my
+voice; it is to be feared that Ronald, who was none the better for his
+own hospitality, may have set down his glass with something of a clang.
+Whatever may have been the cause, at least, I had scarce finished my
+compliment before we were aware of a thump upon the ceiling overhead.  It
+was to be thought some very solid body had descended to the floor from
+the level (possibly) of a bed.  I have never seen consternation painted
+in more lively colours than on the faces of my hosts.  It was proposed to
+smuggle me forth into the garden, or to conceal my form under a horsehair
+sofa which stood against the wall.  For the first expedient, as was now
+plain by the approaching footsteps, there was no longer time; from the
+second I recoiled with indignation.
+
+'My dear creatures,' said I, 'let us die, but do not let us be
+ridiculous.'
+
+The words were still upon my lips when the door opened and my friend of
+the gold eyeglass appeared, a memorable figure, on the threshold.  In one
+hand she bore a bedroom candlestick; in the other, with the steadiness of
+a dragoon, a horse-pistol.  She was wound about in shawls which did not
+wholly conceal the candid fabric of her nightdress, and surmounted by a
+nightcap of portentous architecture.  Thus accoutred, she made her
+entrance; laid down the candle and pistol, as no longer called for;
+looked about the room with a silence more eloquent than oaths; and then,
+in a thrilling voice--'To whom have I the pleasure?' she said, addressing
+me with a ghost of a bow.
+
+'Madam, I am charmed, I am sure,' said I.  'The story is a little long;
+and our meeting, however welcome, was for the moment entirely unexpected
+by myself.  I am sure--' but here I found I was quite sure of nothing,
+and tried again.  'I have the honour,' I began, and found I had the
+honour to be only exceedingly confused.  With that, I threw myself
+outright upon her mercy.  'Madam, I must be more frank with you,' I
+resumed.  'You have already proved your charity and compassion for the
+French prisoners, I am one of these; and if my appearance be not too much
+changed, you may even yet recognise in me that _Oddity_ who had the good
+fortune more than once to make you smile.'
+
+Still gazing upon me through her glass, she uttered an uncompromising
+grunt; and then, turning to her niece--'Flora,' said she, 'how comes he
+here?'
+
+The culprits poured out for a while an antiphony of explanations, which
+died out at last in a miserable silence.
+
+'I think at least you might have told your aunt,' she snorted.
+
+'Madam,' I interposed, 'they were about to do so.  It is my fault if it
+be not done already.  But I made it my prayer that your slumbers might be
+respected, and this necessary formula of my presentation should be
+delayed until to-morrow in the morning.'
+
+The old lady regarded me with undissembled incredulity, to which I was
+able to find no better repartee than a profound and I trust graceful
+reverence.
+
+'French prisoners are very well in their place,' she said, 'but I cannot
+see that their place is in my private dining-room.'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'I hope it may be said without offence, but (except the
+Castle of Edinburgh) I cannot think upon the spot from which I would so
+readily be absent.'
+
+At this, to my relief, I thought I could perceive a vestige of a smile to
+steal upon that iron countenance and to be bitten immediately in.
+
+'And if it is a fair question, what do they call ye?' she asked.
+
+'At your service, the Vicomte Anne de St.-Yves,' said I.
+
+'Mosha the Viscount,' said she, 'I am afraid you do us plain people a
+great deal too much honour.'
+
+'My dear lady,' said I, 'let us be serious for a moment.  What was I to
+do?  Where was I to go?  And how can you be angry with these benevolent
+children who took pity on one so unfortunate as myself?  Your humble
+servant is no such terrific adventurer that you should come out against
+him with horse-pistol and'--smiling--'bedroom candlesticks.  It is but a
+young gentleman in extreme distress, hunted upon every side, and asking
+no more than to escape from his pursuers.  I know your character, I read
+it in your face'--the heart trembled in my body as I said these daring
+words.  'There are unhappy English prisoners in France at this day,
+perhaps at this hour.  Perhaps at this hour they kneel as I do; they take
+the hand of her who might conceal and assist them; they press it to their
+lips as I do--'
+
+'Here, here!' cried the old lady, breaking from my solicitations.
+'Behave yourself before folk!  Saw ever anyone the match of that?  And on
+earth, my dears, what are we to do with him?'
+
+'Pack him off, my dear lady,' said I: 'pack off the impudent fellow
+double-quick!  And if it may be, and if your good heart allows it, help
+him a little on the way he has to go.'
+
+'What's this pie?' she cried stridently.  'Where is this pie from,
+Flora?'
+
+No answer was vouchsafed by my unfortunate and (I may say) extinct
+accomplices.
+
+'Is that my port?' she pursued.  'Hough!  Will somebody give me a glass
+of my port wine?'
+
+I made haste to serve her.
+
+She looked at me over the rim with an extraordinary expression.  'I hope
+ye liked it?' said she.
+
+'It is even a magnificent wine,' said I.
+
+'Aweel, it was my father laid it down,' said she.  'There were few knew
+more about port wine than my father, God rest him!'  She settled herself
+in a chair with an alarming air of resolution.  'And so there is some
+particular direction that you wish to go in?' said she.
+
+'O,' said I, following her example, 'I am by no means such a vagrant as
+you suppose.  I have good friends, if I could get to them, for which all
+I want is to be once clear of Scotland; and I have money for the road.'
+And I produced my bundle.
+
+'English bank-notes?' she said.  'That's not very handy for Scotland.
+It's been some fool of an Englishman that's given you these, I'm
+thinking.  How much is it?'
+
+'I declare to heaven I never thought to count!' I exclaimed.  'But that
+is soon remedied.'
+
+And I counted out ten notes of ten pound each, all in the name of Abraham
+Newlands, and five bills of country bankers for as many guineas.
+
+'One hundred and twenty six pound five,' cried the old lady.  'And you
+carry such a sum about you, and have not so much as counted it!  If you
+are not a thief, you must allow you are very thief-like.'
+
+'And yet, madam, the money is legitimately mine,' said I.
+
+She took one of the bills and held it up.  'Is there any probability,
+now, that this could be traced?' she asked.
+
+'None, I should suppose; and if it were, it would be no matter,' said I.
+'With your usual penetration, you guessed right.  An Englishman brought
+it me.  It reached me, through the hands of his English solicitor, from
+my great-uncle, the Comte de Keroual de Saint-Yves, I believe the richest
+_emigre_ in London.'
+
+'I can do no more than take your word for it,' said she.
+
+'And I trust, madam, not less,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said she, 'at this rate the matter may be feasible.  I will cash
+one of these five-guinea bills, less the exchange, and give you silver
+and Scots notes to bear you as far as the border.  Beyond that, Mosha the
+Viscount, you will have to depend upon yourself.'
+
+I could not but express a civil hesitation as to whether the amount would
+suffice, in my case, for so long a journey.
+
+'Ay,' said she, 'but you havenae heard me out.  For if you are not too
+fine a gentleman to travel with a pair of drovers, I believe I have found
+the very thing, and the Lord forgive me for a treasonable old wife!
+There are a couple stopping up by with the shepherd-man at the farm;
+to-morrow they will take the road for England, probably by skriegh of
+day--and in my opinion you had best be travelling with the stots,' said
+she.
+
+'For Heaven's sake do not suppose me to be so effeminate a character!' I
+cried.  'An old soldier of Napoleon is certainly beyond suspicion.  But,
+dear lady, to what end? and how is the society of these excellent
+gentlemen supposed to help me?'
+
+'My dear sir,' said she, 'you do not at all understand your own
+predicament, and must just leave your matters in the hands of those who
+do.  I dare say you have never even heard tell of the drove-roads or the
+drovers; and I am certainly not going to sit up all night to explain it
+to you.  Suffice it, that it is me who is arranging this affair--the more
+shame to me!--and that is the way ye have to go.  Ronald,' she continued,
+'away up-by to the shepherds; rowst them out of their beds, and make it
+perfectly distinct that Sim is not to leave till he has seen me.'
+
+Ronald was nothing loath to escape from his aunt's neighbourhood, and
+left the room and the cottage with a silent expedition that was more like
+flight than mere obedience.  Meanwhile the old lady turned to her niece.
+
+'And I would like to know what we are to do with him the night!' she
+cried.
+
+'Ronald and I meant to put him in the hen-house,' said the encrimsoned
+Flora.
+
+'And I can tell you he is to go to no such a place,' replied the aunt.
+'Hen-house, indeed!  If a guest he is to be, he shall sleep in no mortal
+hen-house.  Your room is the most fit, I think, if he will consent to
+occupy it on so great a suddenty.  And as for you, Flora, you shall sleep
+with me.'
+
+I could not help admiring the prudence and tact of this old dowager, and
+of course it was not for me to make objections.  Ere I well knew how, I
+was alone with a flat candlestick, which is not the most sympathetic of
+companions, and stood studying the snuff in a frame of mind between
+triumph and chagrin.  All had gone well with my flight: the masterful
+lady who had arrogated to herself the arrangement of the details gave me
+every confidence; and I saw myself already arriving at my uncle's door.
+But, alas! it was another story with my love affair.  I had seen and
+spoken with her alone; I had ventured boldly; I had been not ill
+received; I had seen her change colour, had enjoyed the undissembled
+kindness of her eyes; and now, in a moment, down comes upon the scene
+that apocalyptic figure with the nightcap and the horse-pistol, and with
+the very wind of her coming behold me separated from my love!  Gratitude
+and admiration contended in my breast with the extreme of natural
+rancour.  My appearance in her house at past midnight had an air (I could
+not disguise it from myself) that was insolent and underhand, and could
+not but minister to the worst suspicions.  And the old lady had taken it
+well.  Her generosity was no more to be called in question than her
+courage, and I was afraid that her intelligence would be found to match.
+Certainly, Miss Flora had to support some shrewd looks, and certainly she
+had been troubled.  I could see but the one way before me: to profit by
+an excellent bed, to try to sleep soon, to be stirring early, and to hope
+for some renewed occasion in the morning.  To have said so much and yet
+to say no more, to go out into the world upon so half-hearted a parting,
+was more than I could accept.
+
+It is my belief that the benevolent fiend sat up all night to baulk me.
+She was at my bedside with a candle long ere day, roused me, laid out for
+me a damnable misfit of clothes, and bade me pack my own (which were
+wholly unsuited to the journey) in a bundle.  Sore grudging, I arrayed
+myself in a suit of some country fabric, as delicate as sackcloth and
+about as becoming as a shroud; and, on coming forth, found the dragon had
+prepared for me a hearty breakfast.  She took the head of the table,
+poured out the tea, and entertained me as I ate with a great deal of good
+sense and a conspicuous lack of charm.  How often did I not regret the
+change!--how often compare her, and condemn her in the comparison, with
+her charming niece!  But if my entertainer was not beautiful, she had
+certainly been busy in my interest.  Already she was in communication
+with my destined fellow-travellers; and the device on which she had
+struck appeared entirely suitable.  I was a young Englishman who had
+outrun the constable; warrants were out against me in Scotland, and it
+had become needful I should pass the border without loss of time, and
+privately.
+
+'I have given a very good account of you,' said she, 'which I hope you
+may justify.  I told them there was nothing against you beyond the fact
+that you were put to the haw (if that is the right word) for debt.'
+
+'I pray God you have the expression incorrectly, ma'am,' said I.  'I do
+not give myself out for a person easily alarmed; but you must admit there
+is something barbarous and mediaeval in the sound well qualified to
+startle a poor foreigner.'
+
+'It is the name of a process in Scots Law, and need alarm no honest man,'
+said she.  'But you are a very idle-minded young gentleman; you must
+still have your joke, I see: I only hope you will have no cause to regret
+it.'
+
+'I pray you not to suppose, because I speak lightly, that I do not feel
+deeply,' said I.  'Your kindness has quite conquered me; I lay myself at
+your disposition, I beg you to believe, with real tenderness; I pray you
+to consider me from henceforth as the most devoted of your friends.'
+
+'Well, well,' she said, 'here comes your devoted friend the drover.  I'm
+thinking he will be eager for the road; and I will not be easy myself
+till I see you well off the premises, and the dishes washed, before my
+servant-woman wakes.  Praise God, we have gotten one that is a treasure
+at the sleeping!'
+
+The morning was already beginning to be blue in the trees of the garden,
+and to put to shame the candle by which I had breakfasted.  The lady rose
+from table, and I had no choice but to follow her example.  All the time
+I was beating my brains for any means by which I should be able to get a
+word apart with Flora, or find the time to write her a billet.  The
+windows had been open while I breakfasted, I suppose to ventilate the
+room from any traces of my passage there; and, Master Ronald appearing on
+the front lawn, my ogre leaned forth to address him.
+
+'Ronald,' she said, 'wasn't that Sim that went by the wall?'
+
+I snatched my advantage.  Right at her back there was pen, ink, and paper
+laid out.  I wrote: 'I love you'; and before I had time to write more, or
+so much as to blot what I had written, I was again under the guns of the
+gold eyeglasses.
+
+'It's time,' she began; and then, as she observed my occupation, 'Umph!'
+she broke off.  'Ye have something to write?' she demanded.
+
+'Some notes, madam,' said I, bowing with alacrity.
+
+'Notes,' she said; 'or a note?'
+
+'There is doubtless some _finesse_ of the English language that I do not
+comprehend,' said I.
+
+'I'll contrive, however, to make my meaning very plain to ye, Mosha le
+Viscount,' she continued.  'I suppose you desire to be considered a
+gentleman?'
+
+'Can you doubt it, madam?' said I.
+
+'I doubt very much, at least, whether you go to the right way about it,'
+she said.  'You have come here to me, I cannot very well say how; I think
+you will admit you owe me some thanks, if it was only for the breakfast I
+made ye.  But what are you to me?  A waif young man, not so far to seek
+for looks and manners, with some English notes in your pocket and a price
+upon your head.  I am a lady; I have been your hostess, with however
+little will; and I desire that this random acquaintance of yours with my
+family will cease and determine.'
+
+I believe I must have coloured.  'Madam,' said I, 'the notes are of no
+importance; and your least pleasure ought certainly to be my law.  You
+have felt, and you have been pleased to express, a doubt of me.  I tear
+them up.'  Which you may be sure I did thoroughly.
+
+'There's a good lad!' said the dragon, and immediately led the way to the
+front lawn.
+
+The brother and sister were both waiting us here, and, as well as I could
+make out in the imperfect light, bore every appearance of having passed
+through a rather cruel experience.  Ronald seemed ashamed to so much as
+catch my eye in the presence of his aunt, and was the picture of
+embarrassment.  As for Flora, she had scarce the time to cast me one look
+before the dragon took her by the arm, and began to march across the
+garden in the extreme first glimmer of the dawn without exchanging
+speech.  Ronald and I followed in equal silence.
+
+There was a door in that same high wall on the top of which I had sat
+perched no longer gone than yesterday morning.  This the old lady set
+open with a key; and on the other side we were aware of a rough-looking,
+thick-set man, leaning with his arms (through which was passed a
+formidable staff) on a dry-stone dyke.  Him the old lady immediately
+addressed.
+
+'Sim,' said she, 'this is the young gentleman.'
+
+Sim replied with an inarticulate grumble of sound, and a movement of one
+arm and his head, which did duty for a salutation.
+
+'Now, Mr. St. Ives,' said the old lady, 'it's high time for you to be
+taking the road.  But first of all let me give the change of your
+five-guinea bill.  Here are four pounds of it in British Linen notes, and
+the balance in small silver, less sixpence.  Some charge a shilling, I
+believe, but I have given you the benefit of the doubt.  See and guide it
+with all the sense that you possess.'
+
+'And here, Mr. St. Ives,' said Flora, speaking for the first time, 'is a
+plaid which you will find quite necessary on so rough a journey.  I hope
+you will take it from the hands of a Scotch friend,' she added, and her
+voice trembled.
+
+'Genuine holly: I cut it myself,' said Ronald, and gave me as good a
+cudgel as a man could wish for in a row.
+
+The formality of these gifts, and the waiting figure of the driver, told
+me loudly that I must be gone.  I dropped on one knee and bade farewell
+to the aunt, kissing her hand.  I did the like--but with how different a
+passion!--to her niece; as for the boy, I took him to my arms and
+embraced him with a cordiality that seemed to strike him speechless.
+'Farewell!' and 'Farewell!' I said.  'I shall never forget my friends.
+Keep me sometimes in memory.  Farewell!' With that I turned my back and
+began to walk away; and had scarce done so, when I heard the door in the
+high wall close behind me.  Of course this was the aunt's doing; and of
+course, if I know anything of human character, she would not let me go
+without some tart expressions.  I declare, even if I had heard them, I
+should not have minded in the least, for I was quite persuaded that,
+whatever admirers I might be leaving behind me in Swanston Cottage, the
+aunt was not the least sincere.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X--THE DROVERS
+
+
+It took me a little effort to come abreast of my new companion; for
+though he walked with an ugly roll and no great appearance of speed, he
+could cover the around at a good rate when he wanted to.  Each looked at
+the other: I with natural curiosity, he with a great appearance of
+distaste.  I have heard since that his heart was entirely set against me;
+he had seen me kneel to the ladies, and diagnosed me for a 'gesterin'
+eediot.'
+
+'So, ye're for England, are ye?' said he.
+
+I told him yes.
+
+'Weel, there's waur places, I believe,' was his reply; and he relapsed
+into a silence which was not broken during a quarter of an hour of steady
+walking.
+
+This interval brought us to the foot of a bare green valley, which wound
+upwards and backwards among the hills.  A little stream came down the
+midst and made a succession of clear pools; near by the lowest of which I
+was aware of a drove of shaggy cattle, and a man who seemed the very
+counterpart of Mr. Sim making a breakfast upon bread and cheese.  This
+second drover (whose name proved to be Candlish) rose on our approach.
+
+'Here's a mannie that's to gang through with us,' said Sim.  'It was the
+auld wife, Gilchrist, wanted it.'
+
+'Aweel, aweel,' said the other; and presently, remembering his manners,
+and looking on me with a solemn grin, 'A fine day!' says he.
+
+I agreed with him, and asked him how he did.
+
+'Brawly,' was the reply; and without further civilities, the pair
+proceeded to get the cattle under way.  This, as well as almost all the
+herding, was the work of a pair of comely and intelligent dogs, directed
+by Sim or Candlish in little more than monosyllables.  Presently we were
+ascending the side of the mountain by a rude green track, whose presence
+I had not hitherto observed.  A continual sound of munching and the
+crying of a great quantity of moor birds accompanied our progress, which
+the deliberate pace and perennial appetite of the cattle rendered
+wearisomely slow.  In the midst my two conductors marched in a contented
+silence that I could not but admire.  The more I looked at them, the more
+I was impressed by their absurd resemblance to each other.  They were
+dressed in the same coarse homespun, carried similar sticks, were equally
+begrimed about the nose with snuff, and each wound in an identical plaid
+of what is called the shepherd's tartan.  In a back view they might be
+described as indistinguishable; and even from the front they were much
+alike.  An incredible coincidence of humours augmented the impression.
+Thrice and four times I attempted to pave the way for some exchange of
+thought, sentiment, or--at the least of it--human words.  An _Ay_ or an
+_Nhm_ was the sole return, and the topic died on the hill-side without
+echo.  I can never deny that I was chagrined; and when, after a little
+more walking, Sim turned towards me and offered me a ram's horn of snuff,
+with the question 'Do ye use it?' I answered, with some animation,
+'Faith, sir, I would use pepper to introduce a little cordiality.'  But
+even this sally failed to reach, or at least failed to soften, my
+companions.
+
+At this rate we came to the summit of a ridge, and saw the track descend
+in front of us abruptly into a desert vale, about a league in length, and
+closed at the farther end by no less barren hilltops.  Upon this point of
+vantage Sim came to a halt, took off his hat, and mopped his brow.
+
+'Weel,' he said, 'here we're at the top o' Howden.'
+
+'The top o' Howden, sure eneuch,' said Candlish.
+
+'Mr. St. Ivey, are ye dry?' said the first.
+
+'Now, really,' said I, 'is not this Satan reproving sin?'
+
+'What ails ye, man?' said he.  'I'm offerin' ye a dram.'
+
+'Oh, if it be anything to drink,' said I, 'I am as dry as my neighbours.'
+
+Whereupon Sim produced from the corner of his plaid a black bottle, and
+we all drank and pledged each other.  I found these gentlemen followed
+upon such occasions an invariable etiquette, which you may be certain I
+made haste to imitate.  Each wiped his mouth with the back of his left
+hand, held up the bottle in his right, remarked with emphasis, 'Here's to
+ye!' and swallowed as much of the spirit as his fancy prompted.  This
+little ceremony, which was the nearest thing to manners I could perceive
+in either of my companions, was repeated at becoming intervals, generally
+after an ascent.  Occasionally we shared a mouthful of ewe-milk cheese
+and an inglorious form of bread, which I understood (but am far from
+engaging my honour on the point) to be called 'shearer's bannock.'  And
+that may be said to have concluded our whole active intercourse for the
+first day.
+
+I had the more occasion to remark the extraordinarily desolate nature of
+that country, through which the drove road continued, hour after hour and
+even day after day, to wind.  A continual succession of insignificant
+shaggy hills, divided by the course of ten thousand brooks, through which
+we had to wade, or by the side of which we encamped at night; infinite
+perspectives of heather, infinite quantities of moorfowl; here and there,
+by a stream side, small and pretty clumps of willows or the silver birch;
+here and there, the ruins of ancient and inconsiderable fortresses--made
+the unchanging characters of the scene.  Occasionally, but only in the
+distance, we could perceive the smoke of a small town or of an isolated
+farmhouse or cottage on the moors; more often, a flock of sheep and its
+attendant shepherd, or a rude field of agriculture perhaps not yet
+harvested.  With these alleviations, we might almost be said to pass
+through an unbroken desert--sure, one of the most impoverished in Europe;
+and when I recalled to mind that we were yet but a few leagues from the
+chief city (where the law courts sat every day with a press of business,
+soldiers garrisoned the castle, and men of admitted parts were carrying
+on the practice of letters and the investigations of science), it gave me
+a singular view of that poor, barren, and yet illustrious country through
+which I travelled.  Still more, perhaps, did it commend the wisdom of
+Miss Gilchrist in sending me with these uncouth companions and by this
+unfrequented path.
+
+My itinerary is by no means clear to me; the names and distances I never
+clearly knew, and have now wholly forgotten; and this is the more to be
+regretted as there is no doubt that, in the course of those days, I must
+have passed and camped among sites which have been rendered illustrious
+by the pen of Walter Scott.  Nay, more, I am of opinion that I was still
+more favoured by fortune, and have actually met and spoken with that
+inimitable author.  Our encounter was of a tall, stoutish, elderly
+gentleman, a little grizzled, and of a rugged but cheerful and engaging
+countenance.  He sat on a hill pony, wrapped in a plaid over his green
+coat, and was accompanied by a horse-woman, his daughter, a young lady of
+the most charming appearance.  They overtook us on a stretch of heath,
+reined up as they came alongside, and accompanied us for perhaps a
+quarter of an hour before they galloped off again across the hillsides to
+our left.  Great was my amazement to find the unconquerable Mr. Sim thaw
+immediately on the accost of this strange gentleman, who hailed him with
+a ready familiarity, proceeded at once to discuss with him the trade of
+droving and the prices of cattle, and did not disdain to take a pinch
+from the inevitable ram's horn.  Presently I was aware that the
+stranger's eye was directed on myself; and there ensued a conversation,
+some of which I could not help overhearing at the time, and the rest have
+pieced together more or less plausibly from the report of Sim.
+
+'Surely that must be an _amateur drover_ ye have gotten there?' the
+gentleman seems to have asked.
+
+Sim replied, I was a young gentleman that had a reason of his own to
+travel privately.
+
+'Well, well, ye must tell me nothing of that.  I am in the law, you know,
+and _tace_ is the Latin for a candle,' answered the gentleman.  'But I
+hope it's nothing bad.'
+
+Sim told him it was no more than debt.
+
+'Oh, Lord, if that be all!' cried the gentleman; and turning to myself,
+'Well, sir,' he added, 'I understand you are taking a tramp through our
+forest here for the pleasure of the thing?'
+
+'Why, yes, sir,' said I; 'and I must say I am very well entertained.'
+
+'I envy you,' said he.  'I have jogged many miles of it myself when I was
+younger.  My youth lies buried about here under every heather-bush, like
+the soul of the licentiate Lucius.  But you should have a guide.  The
+pleasure of this country is much in the legends, which grow as plentiful
+as blackberries.'  And directing my attention to a little fragment of a
+broken wall no greater than a tombstone, he told me for an example a
+story of its earlier inhabitants.  Years after it chanced that I was one
+day diverting myself with a Waverley Novel, when what should I come upon
+but the identical narrative of my green-coated gentleman upon the moors!
+In a moment the scene, the tones of his voice, his northern accent, and
+the very aspect of the earth and sky and temperature of the weather,
+flashed back into my mind with the reality of dreams.  The unknown in the
+green-coat had been the Great Unknown!  I had met Scott; I had heard a
+story from his lips; I should have been able to write, to claim
+acquaintance, to tell him that his legend still tingled in my ears.  But
+the discovery came too late, and the great man had already succumbed
+under the load of his honours and misfortunes.
+
+Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us farewell and
+disappeared with his daughter over the hills.  And when I applied to Sim
+for information, his answer of 'The Shirra, man!  A'body kens the
+Shirra!' told me, unfortunately, nothing.
+
+A more considerable adventure falls to be related.  We were now near the
+border.  We had travelled for long upon the track beaten and browsed by a
+million herds, our predecessors, and had seen no vestige of that traffic
+which had created it.  It was early in the morning when we at last
+perceived, drawing near to the drove road, but still at a distance of
+about half a league, a second caravan, similar to but larger than our
+own.  The liveliest excitement was at once exhibited by both my comrades.
+They climbed hillocks, they studied the approaching drove from under
+their hand, they consulted each other with an appearance of alarm that
+seemed to me extraordinary.  I had learned by this time that their
+stand-off manners implied, at least, no active enmity; and I made bold to
+ask them what was wrong.
+
+'Bad yins,' was Sim's emphatic answer.
+
+All day the dogs were kept unsparingly on the alert, and the drove pushed
+forward at a very unusual and seemingly unwelcome speed.  All day Sim and
+Candlish, with a more than ordinary expenditure both of snuff and of
+words, continued to debate the position.  It seems that they had
+recognised two of our neighbours on the road--one Faa, and another by the
+name of Gillies.  Whether there was an old feud between them still
+unsettled I could never learn; but Sim and Candlish were prepared for
+every degree of fraud or violence at their hands.  Candlish repeatedly
+congratulated himself on having left 'the watch at home with the
+mistress'; and Sim perpetually brandished his cudgel, and cursed his
+ill-fortune that it should be sprung.
+
+'I willna care a damn to gie the daashed scoon'rel a fair clout wi' it,'
+he said.  'The daashed thing micht come sindry in ma hand.'
+
+'Well, gentlemen,' said I, 'suppose they do come on, I think we can give
+a very good account of them.'  And I made my piece of holly, Ronald's
+gift, the value of which I now appreciated, sing about my head.
+
+'Ay, man?  Are ye stench?' inquired Sim, with a gleam of approval in his
+wooden countenance.
+
+The same evening, somewhat wearied with our day-long expedition, we
+encamped on a little verdant mound, from the midst of which there welled
+a spring of clear water scarce great enough to wash the hands in.  We had
+made our meal and lain down, but were not yet asleep, when a growl from
+one of the collies set us on the alert.  All three sat up, and on a
+second impulse all lay down again, but now with our cudgels ready.  A man
+must be an alien and an outlaw, an old soldier and a young man in the
+bargain, to take adventure easily.  With no idea as to the rights of the
+quarrel or the probable consequences of the encounter, I was as ready to
+take part with my two drovers, as ever to fall in line on the morning of
+a battle.  Presently there leaped three men out of the heather; we had
+scarce time to get to our feet before we were assailed; and in a moment
+each one of us was engaged with an adversary whom the deepening twilight
+scarce permitted him to see.  How the battle sped in other quarters I am
+in no position to describe.  The rogue that fell to my share was
+exceedingly agile and expert with his weapon; had and held me at a
+disadvantage from the first assault; forced me to give ground
+continually, and at last, in mere self-defence, to let him have the
+point.  It struck him in the throat, and he went down like a ninepin and
+moved no more.
+
+It seemed this was the signal for the engagement to be discontinued.  The
+other combatants separated at once; our foes were suffered, without
+molestation, to lift up and bear away their fallen comrade; so that I
+perceived this sort of war to be not wholly without laws of chivalry, and
+perhaps rather to partake of the character of a tournament than of a
+battle _a outrance_.  There was no doubt, at least, that I was supposed
+to have pushed the affair too seriously.  Our friends the enemy removed
+their wounded companion with undisguised consternation; and they were no
+sooner over the top of the brae, than Sim and Candlish roused up their
+wearied drove and set forth on a night march.
+
+'I'm thinking Faa's unco bad,' said the one.
+
+'Ay,' said the other, 'he lookit dooms gash.'
+
+'He did that,' said the first.
+
+And their weary silence fell upon them again.
+
+Presently Sim turned to me.  'Ye're unco ready with the stick,' said he.
+
+'Too ready, I'm afraid,' said I.  'I am afraid Mr. Faa (if that be his
+name) has got his gruel.'
+
+'Weel, I wouldnae wonder,' replied Sim.
+
+'And what is likely to happen?' I inquired.
+
+'Aweel,' said Sim, snuffing profoundly, 'if I were to offer an opeenion,
+it would not be conscientious.  For the plain fac' is, Mr. St. Ivy, that
+I div not ken.  We have had crackit heids--and rowth of them--ere now;
+and we have had a broken leg or maybe twa; and the like of that we drover
+bodies make a kind of a practice like to keep among oursel's.  But a corp
+we have none of us ever had to deal with, and I could set nae leemit to
+what Gillies micht consider proper in the affair.  Forbye that, he would
+be in raither a hobble himsel', if he was to gang hame wantin' Faa.  Folk
+are awfu' throng with their questions, and parteecularly when they're no
+wantit.'
+
+'That's a fac',' said Candlish.
+
+I considered this prospect ruefully; and then making the best of it,
+'Upon all which accounts,' said I, 'the best will be to get across the
+border and there separate.  If you are troubled, you can very truly put
+the blame upon your late companion; and if I am pursued, I must just try
+to keep out of the way.'
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' said Sim, with something resembling enthusiasm, 'no' a
+word mair!  I have met in wi' mony kinds o' gentry ere now; I hae seen o'
+them that was the tae thing, and I hae seen o' them that was the tither;
+but the wale of a gentleman like you I have no sae very frequently seen
+the bate of.'
+
+Our night march was accordingly pursued with unremitting diligence.  The
+stars paled, the east whitened, and we were still, both dogs and men,
+toiling after the wearied cattle.  Again and again Sim and Candlish
+lamented the necessity: it was 'fair ruin on the bestial,' they declared;
+but the thought of a judge and a scaffold hunted them ever forward.  I
+myself was not so much to be pitied.  All that night, and during the
+whole of the little that remained before us of our conjunct journey, I
+enjoyed a new pleasure, the reward of my prowess, in the now loosened
+tongue of Mr. Sim.  Candlish was still obdurately taciturn: it was the
+man's nature; but Sim, having finally appraised and approved me,
+displayed without reticence a rather garrulous habit of mind and a pretty
+talent for narration.  The pair were old and close companions,
+co-existing in these endless moors in a brotherhood of silence such as I
+have heard attributed to the trappers of the west.  It seems absurd to
+mention love in connection with so ugly and snuffy a couple; at least,
+their trust was absolute; and they entertained a surprising admiration
+for each other's qualities; Candlish exclaiming that Sim was 'grand
+company!' and Sim frequently assuring me in an aside that for 'a rale,
+auld, stench bitch, there was nae the bate of Candlish in braid
+Scotland.'  The two dogs appeared to be entirely included in this family
+compact, and I remarked that their exploits and traits of character were
+constantly and minutely observed by the two masters.  Dog stories
+particularly abounded with them; and not only the dogs of the present but
+those of the past contributed their quota.  'But that was naething,' Sim
+would begin: 'there was a herd in Manar, they ca'd him Tweedie--ye'll
+mind Tweedie, Can'lish?'  'Fine, that!' said Candlish.  'Aweel, Tweedie
+had a dog--'  The story I have forgotten; I dare say it was dull, and I
+suspect it was not true; but indeed, my travels with the drove rendered
+me indulgent, and perhaps even credulous, in the matter of dog stories.
+Beautiful, indefatigable beings! as I saw them at the end of a long day's
+journey frisking, barking, bounding, striking attitudes, slanting a bushy
+tail, manifestly playing to the spectator's eye, manifestly rejoicing in
+their grace and beauty--and turned to observe Sim and Candlish
+unornamentally plodding in the rear with the plaids about their bowed
+shoulders and the drop at their snuffy nose--I thought I would rather
+claim kinship with the dogs than with the men!  My sympathy was
+unreturned; in their eyes I was a creature light as air; and they would
+scarce spare me the time for a perfunctory caress or perhaps a hasty lap
+of the wet tongue, ere they were back again in sedulous attendance on
+those dingy deities, their masters--and their masters, as like as not,
+damning their stupidity.
+
+Altogether the last hours of our tramp were infinitely the most agreeable
+to me, and I believe to all of us; and by the time we came to separate,
+there had grown up a certain familiarity and mutual esteem that made the
+parting harder.  It took place about four of the afternoon on a bare
+hillside from which I could see the ribbon of the great north road,
+henceforth to be my conductor.  I asked what was to pay.
+
+'Naething,' replied Sim.
+
+'What in the name of folly is this?' I exclaimed.  'You have led me, you
+have fed me, you have filled me full of whisky, and now you will take
+nothing!'
+
+'Ye see we indentit for that,' replied Sim.
+
+ 'Indented?' I repeated; 'what does the man mean?'
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' said Sim, 'this is a maitter entirely between Candlish and
+me and the auld wife, Gilchrist.  You had naething to say to it; weel, ye
+can have naething to do with it, then.'
+
+'My good man,' said I, 'I can allow myself to be placed in no such
+ridiculous position.  Mrs. Gilchrist is nothing to me, and I refuse to be
+her debtor.'
+
+'I dinna exac'ly see what way ye're gaun to help it,' observed my drover.
+
+'By paying you here and now,' said I.
+
+'There's aye twa to a bargain, Mr. St. Ives,' said he.
+
+'You mean that you will not take it?' said I.
+
+'There or thereabout,' said he.  'Forbye, that it would set ye a heap
+better to keep your siller for them you awe it to.  Ye're young, Mr. St.
+Ivy, and thoughtless; but it's my belief that, wi' care and
+circumspection, ye may yet do credit to yoursel'.  But just you bear this
+in mind: that him that _awes_ siller should never _gie_ siller.'
+
+Well, what was there to say?  I accepted his rebuke, and bidding the pair
+farewell, set off alone upon my southward way.
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' was the last word of Sim, 'I was never muckle ta'en up in
+Englishry; but I think that I really ought to say that ye seem to me to
+have the makings of quite a decent lad.'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI--THE GREAT NORTH ROAD
+
+
+It chanced that as I went down the hill these last words of my friend the
+drover echoed not unfruitfully in my head.  I had never told these men
+the least particulars as to my race or fortune, as it was a part, and the
+best part, of their civility to ask no questions: yet they had dubbed me
+without hesitation English.  Some strangeness in the accent they had
+doubtless thus explained.  And it occurred to me, that if I could pass in
+Scotland for an Englishman, I might be able to reverse the process and
+pass in England for a Scot.  I thought, if I was pushed to it, I could
+make a struggle to imitate the brogue; after my experience with Candlish
+and Sim, I had a rich provision of outlandish words at my command; and I
+felt I could tell the tale of Tweedie's dog so as to deceive a native.
+At the same time, I was afraid my name of St. Ives was scarcely suitable;
+till I remembered there was a town so called in the province of Cornwall,
+thought I might yet be glad to claim it for my place of origin, and
+decided for a Cornish family and a Scots education.  For a trade, as I
+was equally ignorant of all, and as the most innocent might at any moment
+be the means of my exposure, it was best to pretend to none.  And I
+dubbed myself a young gentleman of a sufficient fortune and an idle,
+curious habit of mind, rambling the country at my own charges, in quest
+of health, information, and merry adventures.
+
+At Newcastle, which was the first town I reached, I completed my
+preparations for the part, before going to the inn, by the purchase of a
+knapsack and a pair of leathern gaiters.  My plaid I continued to wear
+from sentiment.  It was warm, useful to sleep in if I were again
+benighted, and I had discovered it to be not unbecoming for a man of
+gallant carriage.  Thus equipped, I supported my character of the
+light-hearted pedestrian not amiss.  Surprise was indeed expressed that I
+should have selected such a season of the year; but I pleaded some delays
+of business, and smilingly claimed to be an eccentric.  The devil was in
+it, I would say, if any season of the year was not good enough for me; I
+was not made of sugar, I was no mollycoddle to be afraid of an ill-aired
+bed or a sprinkle of snow; and I would knock upon the table with my fist
+and call for t'other bottle, like the noisy and free-hearted young
+gentleman I was.  It was my policy (if I may so express myself) to talk
+much and say little.  At the inn tables, the country, the state of the
+roads, the business interest of those who sat down with me, and the
+course of public events, afforded me a considerable field in which I
+might discourse at large and still communicate no information about
+myself.  There was no one with less air of reticence; I plunged into my
+company up to the neck; and I had a long cock-and-bull story of an aunt
+of mine which must have convinced the most suspicious of my innocence.
+'What!' they would have said, 'that young ass to be concealing anything!
+Why, he has deafened me with an aunt of his until my head aches.  He only
+wants you should give him a line, and he would tell you his whole descent
+from Adam downward, and his whole private fortune to the last shilling.'
+A responsible solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my
+inexperience as to give me a word or two of good advice: that I was but a
+young man after all--I had at this time a deceptive air of youth that
+made me easily pass for one-and-twenty, and was, in the circumstances,
+worth a fortune--that the company at inns was very mingled, that I should
+do well to be more careful, and the like; to all which I made answer that
+I meant no harm myself and expected none from others, or the devil was in
+it.  'You are one of those d---d prudent fellows that I could never abide
+with,' said I.  'You are the kind of man that has a long head.  That's
+all the world, my dear sir: the long-heads and the short-horns!  Now, I
+am a short-horn.'  'I doubt,' says he, 'that you will not go very far
+without getting sheared.'  I offered to bet with him on that, and he made
+off, shaking his head.
+
+But my particular delight was to enlarge on politics and the war.  None
+damned the French like me; none was more bitter against the Americans.
+And when the north-bound mail arrived, crowned with holly, and the
+coachman and guard hoarse with shouting victory, I went even so far as to
+entertain the company to a bowl of punch, which I compounded myself with
+no illiberal hand, and doled out to such sentiments as the following:--
+
+'Our glorious victory on the Nivelle'!  'Lord Wellington, God bless him!
+and may victory ever attend upon his arms!' and, 'Soult, poor devil! and
+may he catch it again to the same tune!'
+
+Never was oratory more applauded to the echo--never any one was more of
+the popular man than I.  I promise you, we made a night of it.  Some of
+the company supported each other, with the assistance of boots, to their
+respective bedchambers, while the rest slept on the field of glory where
+we had left them; and at the breakfast table the next morning there was
+an extraordinary assemblage of red eyes and shaking fists.  I observed
+patriotism to burn much lower by daylight.  Let no one blame me for
+insensibility to the reverses of France!  God knows how my heart raged.
+How I longed to fall on that herd of swine and knock their heads together
+in the moment of their revelry!  But you are to consider my own situation
+and its necessities; also a certain lightheartedness, eminently Gallic,
+which forms a leading trait in my character, and leads me to throw myself
+into new circumstances with the spirit of a schoolboy.  It is possible
+that I sometimes allowed this impish humour to carry me further than good
+taste approves: and I was certainly punished for it once.
+
+This was in the episcopal city of Durham.  We sat down, a considerable
+company, to dinner, most of us fine old vatted English tories of that
+class which is often so enthusiastic as to be inarticulate.  I took and
+held the lead from the beginning; and, the talk having turned on the
+French in the Peninsula, I gave them authentic details (on the authority
+of a cousin of mine, an ensign) of certain cannibal orgies in Galicia, in
+which no less a person than General Caffarelli had taken a part.  I
+always disliked that commander, who once ordered me under arrest for
+insubordination; and it is possible that a spice of vengeance added to
+the rigour of my picture.  I have forgotten the details; no doubt they
+were high-coloured.  No doubt I rejoiced to fool these jolter-heads; and
+no doubt the sense of security that I drank from their dull, gasping
+faces encouraged me to proceed extremely far.  And for my sins, there was
+one silent little man at table who took my story at the true value.  It
+was from no sense of humour, to which he was quite dead.  It was from no
+particular intelligence, for he had not any.  The bond of sympathy, of
+all things in the world, had rendered him clairvoyant.
+
+Dinner was no sooner done than I strolled forth into the streets with
+some design of viewing the cathedral; and the little man was silently at
+my heels.  A few doors from the inn, in a dark place of the street, I was
+aware of a touch on my arm, turned suddenly, and found him looking up at
+me with eyes pathetically bright.
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir; but that story of yours was particularly rich.
+He--he!  Particularly racy,' said he.  'I tell you, sir, I took you
+wholly!  I _smoked_ you!  I believe you and I, sir, if we had a chance to
+talk, would find we had a good many opinions in common.  Here is the
+"Blue Bell," a very comfortable place.  They draw good ale, sir.  Would
+you be so condescending as to share a pot with me?'
+
+There was something so ambiguous and secret in the little man's perpetual
+signalling, that I confess my curiosity was much aroused.  Blaming
+myself, even as I did so, for the indiscretion, I embraced his proposal,
+and we were soon face to face over a tankard of mulled ale.  He lowered
+his voice to the least attenuation of a whisper.
+
+'Here, sir,' said he, 'is to the Great Man.  I think you take me?  No?'
+He leaned forward till our noses touched.  'Here is to the Emperor!' said
+he.
+
+I was extremely embarrassed, and, in spite of the creature's innocent
+appearance, more than half alarmed.  I thought him too ingenious, and,
+indeed, too daring for a spy.  Yet if he were honest he must be a man of
+extraordinary indiscretion, and therefore very unfit to be encouraged by
+an escaped prisoner.  I took a half course, accordingly--accepted his
+toast in silence, and drank it without enthusiasm.
+
+He proceeded to abound in the praises of Napoleon, such as I had never
+heard in France, or at least only on the lips of officials paid to offer
+them.
+
+'And this Caffarelli, now,' he pursued: 'he is a splendid fellow, too, is
+he not?  I have not heard vastly much of him myself.  No details, sir--no
+details!  We labour under huge difficulties here as to unbiassed
+information.'
+
+'I believe I have heard the same complaint in other countries,' I could
+not help remarking.  'But as to Caffarelli, he is neither lame nor blind,
+he has two legs and a nose in the middle of his face.  And I care as much
+about him as you care for the dead body of Mr. Perceval!'
+
+He studied me with glowing eyes.
+
+'You cannot deceive me!' he cried.  'You have served under him.  You are
+a Frenchman!  I hold by the hand, at last, one of that noble race, the
+pioneers of the glorious principles of liberty and brotherhood.  Hush!
+No, it is all right.  I thought there had been somebody at the door.  In
+this wretched, enslaved country we dare not even call our souls our own.
+The spy and the hangman, sir--the spy and the hangman!  And yet there is
+a candle burning, too.  The good leaven is working, sir--working
+underneath.  Even in this town there are a few brave spirits, who meet
+every Wednesday.  You must stay over a day or so, and join us.  We do not
+use this house.  Another, and a quieter.  They draw fine ale,
+however--fair, mild ale.  You will find yourself among friends, among
+brothers.  You will hear some very daring sentiments expressed!' he
+cried, expanding his small chest.  'Monarchy, Christianity--all the
+trappings of a bloated past--the Free Confraternity of Durham and
+Tyneside deride.'
+
+Here was a devil of a prospect for a gentleman whose whole design was to
+avoid observation!  The Free Confraternity had no charms for me; daring
+sentiments were no part of my baggage; and I tried, instead, a little
+cold water.
+
+'You seem to forget, sir, that my Emperor has re-established
+Christianity,' I observed.
+
+'Ah, sir, but that was policy!' he exclaimed.  'You do not understand
+Napoleon.  I have followed his whole career.  I can explain his policy
+from first to last.  Now for instance in the Peninsula, on which you were
+so very amusing, if you will come to a friend's house who has a map of
+Spain, I can make the whole course of the war quite clear to you, I
+venture to say, in half an hour.'
+
+This was intolerable.  Of the two extremes, I found I preferred the
+British tory; and, making an appointment for the morrow, I pleaded sudden
+headache, escaped to the inn, packed my knapsack, and fled, about nine at
+night, from this accursed neighbourhood.  It was cold, starry, and clear,
+and the road dry, with a touch of frost.  For all that, I had not the
+smallest intention to make a long stage of it; and about ten o'clock,
+spying on the right-hand side of the way the lighted windows of an
+alehouse, I determined to bait there for the night.
+
+It was against my principle, which was to frequent only the dearest inns;
+and the misadventure that befell me was sufficient to make me more
+particular in the future.  A large company was assembled in the parlour,
+which was heavy with clouds of tobacco smoke, and brightly lighted up by
+a roaring fire of coal.  Hard by the chimney stood a vacant chair in what
+I thought an enviable situation, whether for warmth or the pleasure of
+society; and I was about to take it, when the nearest of the company
+stopped me with his hand.
+
+'Beg thy pardon, sir,' said he; 'but that there chair belongs to a
+British soldier.'
+
+A chorus of voices enforced and explained.  It was one of Lord
+Wellington's heroes.  He had been wounded under Rowland Hill.  He was
+Colbourne's right-hand man.  In short, this favoured individual appeared
+to have served with every separate corps, and under every individual
+general in the Peninsula.  Of course I apologised.  I had not known.  The
+devil was in it if a soldier had not a right to the best in England.  And
+with that sentiment, which was loudly applauded, I found a corner of a
+bench, and awaited, with some hopes of entertainment, the return of the
+hero.  He proved, of course, to be a private soldier.  I say of course,
+because no officer could possibly enjoy such heights of popularity.  He
+had been wounded before San Sebastian, and still wore his arm in a sling.
+What was a great deal worse for him, every member of the company had been
+plying him with drink.  His honest yokel's countenance blazed as if with
+fever, his eyes were glazed and looked the two ways, and his feet
+stumbled as, amidst a murmur of applause, he returned to the midst of his
+admirers.
+
+Two minutes afterwards I was again posting in the dark along the highway;
+to explain which sudden movement of retreat I must trouble the reader
+with a reminiscence of my services.
+
+I lay one night with the out-pickets in Castile.  We were in close touch
+with the enemy; the usual orders had been issued against smoking, fires,
+and talk, and both armies lay as quiet as mice, when I saw the English
+sentinel opposite making a signal by holding up his musket.  I repeated
+it, and we both crept together in the dry bed of a stream, which made the
+demarcation of the armies.  It was wine he wanted, of which we had a good
+provision, and the English had quite run out.  He gave me the money, and
+I, as was the custom, left him my firelock in pledge, and set off for the
+canteen.  When I returned with a skin of wine, behold, it had pleased
+some uneasy devil of an English officer to withdraw the outposts!  Here
+was a situation with a vengeance, and I looked for nothing but ridicule
+in the present and punishment in the future.  Doubtless our officers
+winked pretty hard at this interchange of courtesies, but doubtless it
+would be impossible to wink at so gross a fault, or rather so pitiable a
+misadventure as mine; and you are to conceive me wandering in the plains
+of Castile, benighted, charged with a wine-skin for which I had no use,
+and with no knowledge whatever of the whereabouts of my musket, beyond
+that it was somewhere in my Lord Wellington's army.  But my Englishman
+was either a very honest fellow, or else extremely thirsty, and at last
+contrived to advertise me of his new position.  Now, the English sentry
+in Castile, and the wounded hero in the Durham public-house, were one and
+the same person; and if he had been a little less drunk, or myself less
+lively in getting away, the travels of M. St. Ives might have come to an
+untimely end.
+
+I suppose this woke me up; it stirred in me besides a spirit of
+opposition, and in spite of cold, darkness, the highwaymen and the
+footpads, I determined to walk right on till breakfast-time: a happy
+resolution, which enabled me to observe one of those traits of manners
+which at once depict a country and condemn it.  It was near midnight when
+I saw, a great way ahead of me, the light of many torches; presently
+after, the sound of wheels reached me, and the slow tread of feet, and
+soon I had joined myself to the rear of a sordid, silent, and lugubrious
+procession, such as we see in dreams.  Close on a hundred persons marched
+by torchlight in unbroken silence; in their midst a cart, and in the
+cart, on an inclined platform, the dead body of a man--the centre-piece
+of this solemnity, the hero whose obsequies we were come forth at this
+unusual hour to celebrate.  It was but a plain, dingy old fellow of fifty
+or sixty, his throat cut, his shirt turned over as though to show the
+wound.  Blue trousers and brown socks completed his attire, if we can
+talk so of the dead.  He had a horrid look of a waxwork.  In the tossing
+of the lights he seemed to make faces and mouths at us, to frown, and to
+be at times upon the point of speech.  The cart, with this shabby and
+tragic freight, and surrounded by its silent escort and bright torches,
+continued for some distance to creak along the high-road, and I to follow
+it in amazement, which was soon exchanged for horror.  At the corner of a
+lane the procession stopped, and, as the torches ranged themselves along
+the hedgerow-side, I became aware of a grave dug in the midst of the
+thoroughfare, and a provision of quicklime piled in the ditch.  The cart
+was backed to the margin, the body slung off the platform and dumped into
+the grave with an irreverent roughness.  A sharpened stake had hitherto
+served it for a pillow.  It was now withdrawn, held in its place by
+several volunteers, and a fellow with a heavy mallet (the sound of which
+still haunts me at night) drove it home through the bosom of the corpse.
+The hole was filled with quicklime, and the bystanders, as if relieved of
+some oppression, broke at once into a sound of whispered speech.
+
+My shirt stuck to me, my heart had almost ceased beating, and I found my
+tongue with difficulty.
+
+'I beg your pardon,' I gasped to a neighbour, 'what is this? what has he
+done? is it allowed?'
+
+'Why, where do you come from?' replied the man.
+
+'I am a traveller, sir,' said I, 'and a total stranger in this part of
+the country.  I had lost my way when I saw your torches, and came by
+chance on this--this incredible scene.  Who was the man?'
+
+'A suicide,' said he.  'Ay, he was a bad one, was Johnnie Green.'
+
+It appeared this was a wretch who had committed many barbarous murders,
+and being at last upon the point of discovery fell of his own hand.  And
+the nightmare at the crossroads was the regular punishment, according to
+the laws of England, for an act which the Romans honoured as a virtue!
+Whenever an Englishman begins to prate of civilisation (as, indeed, it's
+a defect they are rather prone to), I hear the measured blows of a
+mallet, see the bystanders crowd with torches about the grave, smile a
+little to myself in conscious superiority--and take a thimbleful of
+brandy for the stomach's sake.
+
+I believe it must have been at my next stage, for I remember going to bed
+extremely early, that I came to the model of a good old-fashioned English
+inn, and was attended on by the picture of a pretty chambermaid.  We had
+a good many pleasant passages as she waited table or warmed my bed for me
+with a devil of a brass warming pan, fully larger than herself; and as
+she was no less pert than she was pretty, she may be said to have given
+rather better than she took.  I cannot tell why (unless it were for the
+sake of her saucy eyes), but I made her my confidante, told her I was
+attached to a young lady in Scotland, and received the encouragement of
+her sympathy, mingled and connected with a fair amount of rustic wit.
+While I slept the down-mail stopped for supper; it chanced that one of
+the passengers left behind a copy of the _Edinburgh Courant_, and the
+next morning my pretty chambermaid set the paper before me at breakfast,
+with the remark that there was some news from my lady-love.  I took it
+eagerly, hoping to find some further word of our escape, in which I was
+disappointed; and I was about to lay it down, when my eye fell on a
+paragraph immediately concerning me.  Faa was in hospital, grievously
+sick, and warrants were out for the arrest of Sim and Candlish.  These
+two men had shown themselves very loyal to me.  This trouble emerging,
+the least I could do was to be guided by a similar loyalty to them.
+Suppose my visit to my uncle crowned with some success, and my finances
+re-established, I determined I should immediately return to Edinburgh,
+put their case in the hands of a good lawyer, and await events.  So my
+mind was very lightly made up to what proved a mighty serious matter.
+Candlish and Sim were all very well in their way, and I do sincerely
+trust I should have been at some pains to help them, had there been
+nothing else.  But in truth my heart and my eyes were set on quite
+another matter, and I received the news of their tribulation almost with
+joy.  That is never a bad wind that blows where we want to go, and you
+may be sure there was nothing unwelcome in a circumstance that carried me
+back to Edinburgh and Flora.  From that hour I began to indulge myself
+with the making of imaginary scenes and interviews, in which I confounded
+the aunt, flattered Ronald, and now in the witty, now in the sentimental
+manner, declared my love and received the assurance of its return.  By
+means of this exercise my resolution daily grew stronger, until at last I
+had piled together such a mass of obstinacy as it would have taken a
+cataclysm of nature to subvert.
+
+'Yes,' said I to the chambermaid, 'here is news of my lady-love indeed,
+and very good news too.'
+
+All that day, in the teeth of a keen winter wind, I hugged myself in my
+plaid, and it was as though her arms were flung around me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII--I FOLLOW A COVERED CART NEARLY TO MY DESTINATION
+
+
+At last I began to draw near, by reasonable stages, to the neighbourhood
+of Wakefield; and the name of Mr. Burchell Fenn came to the top in my
+memory.  This was the gentleman (the reader may remember) who made a
+trade of forwarding the escape of French prisoners.  How he did so:
+whether he had a sign-board, _Escapes forwarded_, _apply within_; what he
+charged for his services, or whether they were gratuitous and charitable,
+were all matters of which I was at once ignorant and extremely curious.
+Thanks to my proficiency in English, and Mr. Romaine's bank-notes, I was
+getting on swimmingly without him; but the trouble was that I could not
+be easy till I had come to the bottom of these mysteries, and it was my
+difficulty that I knew nothing of him beyond the name.  I knew not his
+trade beyond that of Forwarder of Escapes--whether he lived in town or
+country, whether he were rich or poor, nor by what kind of address I was
+to gain his confidence.  It would have a very bad appearance to go along
+the highwayside asking after a man of whom I could give so scanty an
+account; and I should look like a fool, indeed, if I were to present
+myself at his door and find the police in occupation!  The interest of
+the conundrum, however, tempted me, and I turned aside from my direct
+road to pass by Wakefield; kept my ears pricked, as I went, for any
+mention of his name, and relied for the rest on my good fortune.  If Luck
+(who must certainly be feminine) favoured me as far as to throw me in the
+man's way, I should owe the lady a candle; if not, I could very readily
+console myself.  In this experimental humour, and with so little to help
+me, it was a miracle that I should have brought my enterprise to a good
+end; and there are several saints in the calendar who might be happy to
+exchange with St. Ives!
+
+I had slept that night in a good inn at Wakefield, made my breakfast by
+candle-light with the passengers of an up-coach, and set off in a very
+ill temper with myself and my surroundings.  It was still early; the air
+raw and cold; the sun low, and soon to disappear under a vast canopy of
+rain-clouds that had begun to assemble in the north-west, and from that
+quarter invaded the whole width of the heaven.  Already the rain fell in
+crystal rods; already the whole face of the country sounded with the
+discharge of drains and ditches; and I looked forward to a day of
+downpour and the hell of wet clothes, in which particular I am as dainty
+as a cat.  At a corner of the road, and by the last glint of the drowning
+sun, I spied a covered cart, of a kind that I thought I had never seen
+before, preceding me at the foot's pace of jaded horses.  Anything is
+interesting to a pedestrian that can help him to forget the miseries of a
+day of rain; and I bettered my pace and gradually overtook the vehicle.
+
+The nearer I came, the more it puzzled me.  It was much such a cart as I
+am told the calico printers use, mounted on two wheels, and furnished
+with a seat in front for the driver.  The interior closed with a door,
+and was of a bigness to contain a good load of calico, or (at a pinch and
+if it were necessary) four or five persons.  But, indeed, if human beings
+were meant to travel there, they had my pity!  They must travel in the
+dark, for there was no sign of a window; and they would be shaken all the
+way like a phial of doctor's stuff, for the cart was not only ungainly to
+look at--it was besides very imperfectly balanced on the one pair of
+wheels, and pitched unconscionably.  Altogether, if I had any glancing
+idea that the cart was really a carriage, I had soon dismissed it; but I
+was still inquisitive as to what it should contain, and where it had come
+from.  Wheels and horses were splashed with many different colours of
+mud, as though they had come far and across a considerable diversity of
+country.  The driver continually and vainly plied his whip.  It seemed to
+follow they had made a long, perhaps an all-night, stage; and that the
+driver, at that early hour of a little after eight in the morning,
+already felt himself belated.  I looked for the name of the proprietor on
+the shaft, and started outright.  Fortune had favoured the careless: it
+was Burchell Fenn!
+
+'A wet morning, my man,' said I.
+
+The driver, a loutish fellow, shock-headed and turnip-faced, returned not
+a word to my salutation, but savagely flogged his horses.  The tired
+animals, who could scarce put the one foot before the other, paid no
+attention to his cruelty; and I continued without effort to maintain my
+position alongside, smiling to myself at the futility of his attempts,
+and at the same time pricked with curiosity as to why he made them.  I
+made no such formidable a figure as that a man should flee when I
+accosted him; and my conscience not being entirely clear, I was more
+accustomed to be uneasy myself than to see others timid.  Presently he
+desisted, and put back his whip in the holster with the air of a man
+vanquished.
+
+'So you would run away from me?' said I.  'Come, come, that's not
+English.'
+
+'Beg pardon, master: no offence meant,' he said, touching his hat.
+
+'And none taken!' cried I.  'All I desire is a little gaiety by the way.'
+
+I understood him to say he didn't 'take with gaiety.'
+
+'Then I will try you with something else,' said I.  'Oh, I can be all
+things to all men, like the apostle!  I dare to say I have travelled with
+heavier fellows than you in my time, and done famously well with them.
+Are you going home?'
+
+'Yes, I'm a goin' home, I am,' he said.
+
+'A very fortunate circumstance for me!' said I.  'At this rate we shall
+see a good deal of each other, going the same way; and, now I come to
+think of it, why should you not give me a cast?  There is room beside you
+on the bench.'
+
+With a sudden snatch, he carried the cart two yards into the roadway.
+The horses plunged and came to a stop.  'No, you don't!' he said,
+menacing me with the whip.  'None o' that with me.'
+
+'None of what?' said I.  'I asked you for a lift, but I have no idea of
+taking one by force.'
+
+'Well, I've got to take care of the cart and 'orses, I have,' says he.
+'I don't take up with no runagate vagabones, you see, else.'
+
+'I ought to thank you for your touching confidence,' said I, approaching
+carelessly nearer as I spoke.  'But I admit the road is solitary
+hereabouts, and no doubt an accident soon happens.  Little fear of
+anything of the kind with you!  I like you for it, like your prudence,
+like that pastoral shyness of disposition.  But why not put it out of my
+power to hurt?  Why not open the door and bestow me here in the box, or
+whatever you please to call it?' And I laid my hand demonstratively on
+the body of the cart.
+
+He had been timorous before; but at this, he seemed to lose the power of
+speech a moment, and stared at me in a perfect enthusiasm of fear.
+
+'Why not?' I continued.  'The idea is good.  I should be safe in there if
+I were the monster Williams himself.  The great thing is to have me under
+lock and key.  For it does lock; it is locked now,' said I, trying the
+door.  '_A propos_, what have you for a cargo?  It must be precious.'
+
+He found not a word to answer.
+
+Rat-tat-tat, I went upon the door like a well-drilled footman.
+
+'Any one at home?' I said, and stooped to listen.
+
+There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of an
+uncontrollable paroxysm; another followed immediately on the heels of it;
+and then the driver turned with an oath, laid the lash upon the horses
+with so much energy that they found their heels again, and the whole
+equipage fled down the road at a gallop.
+
+At the first sound of the sneeze, I had started back like a man shot.
+The next moment, a great light broke on my mind, and I understood.  Here
+was the secret of Fenn's trade: this was how he forwarded the escape of
+prisoners, hawking them by night about the country in his covered cart.
+There had been Frenchmen close to me; he who had just sneezed was my
+countryman, my comrade, perhaps already my friend!  I took to my heels in
+pursuit.  'Hold hard!' I shouted.  'Stop!  It's all right!  Stop!'  But
+the driver only turned a white face on me for a moment, and redoubled his
+efforts, bending forward, plying his whip and crying to his horses; these
+lay themselves down to the gallop and beat the highway with flying hoofs;
+and the cart bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a halo of rain
+and spattering mud.  But a minute since, and it had been trundling along
+like a lame cow; and now it was off as though drawn by Apollo's coursers.
+There is no telling what a man can do, until you frighten him!
+
+It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly, to maintain
+my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so near) was become a
+chief point with me.  A hundred yards farther on the cart whipped out of
+the high-road into a lane embowered with leafless trees, and became lost
+to view.  When I saw it next, the driver had increased his advantage
+considerably, but all danger was at an end, and the horses had again
+declined into a hobbling walk.  Persuaded that they could not escape me,
+I took my time, and recovered my breath as I followed them.
+
+Presently the lane twisted at right angles, and showed me a gate and the
+beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as I continued to
+advance, a red brick house about seventy years old, in a fine style of
+architecture, and presenting a front of many windows to a lawn and
+garden.  Behind, I could see outhouses and the peaked roofs of stacks;
+and I judged that a manor-house had in some way declined to be the
+residence of a tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and
+substantial comfort.  The marks of neglect were visible on every side, in
+flower-bushes straggling beyond the borders, in the ill-kept turf, and in
+the broken windows that were incongruously patched with paper or stuffed
+with rags.  A thicket of trees, mostly evergreen, fenced the place round
+and secluded it from the eyes of prying neighbours.  As I came in view of
+it, on that melancholy winter's morning, in the deluge of the falling
+rain, and with the wind that now rose in occasional gusts and hooted over
+the old chimneys, the cart had already drawn up at the front-door steps,
+and the driver was already in earnest discourse with Mr. Burchell Fenn.
+He was standing with his hands behind his back--a man of a gross,
+misbegotten face and body, dewlapped like a bull and red as a harvest
+moon; and in his jockey cap, blue coat and top boots, he had much the air
+of a good, solid tenant-farmer.
+
+The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but received me at
+last in a sort of goggling silence.  I had my hat in my hand.
+
+'I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Burchell Fenn?' said I.
+
+'The same, sir,' replied Mr. Fenn, taking off his jockey cap in answer to
+my civility, but with the distant look and the tardy movements of one who
+continues to think of something else.  'And who may you be?' he asked.
+
+'I shall tell you afterwards,' said I.  'Suffice it, in the meantime,
+that I come on business.'
+
+He seemed to digest my answer laboriously, his mouth gaping, his little
+eyes never straying from my face.
+
+'Suffer me to point out to you, sir,' I resumed, 'that this is a devil of
+a wet morning; and that the chimney corner, and possibly a glass of
+something hot, are clearly indicated.'
+
+Indeed, the rain was now grown to be a deluge; the gutters of the house
+roared; the air was filled with the continuous, strident crash.  The
+stolidity of his face, on which the rain streamed, was far from
+reassuring me.  On the contrary, I was aware of a distinct qualm of
+apprehension, which was not at all lessened by a view of the driver,
+craning from his perch to observe us with the expression of a fascinated
+bird.  So we stood silent, when the prisoner again began to sneeze from
+the body of the cart; and at the sound, prompt as a transformation, the
+driver had whipped up his horses and was shambling off round the corner
+of the house, and Mr. Fenn, recovering his wits with a gulp, had turned
+to the door behind him.
+
+'Come in, come in, sir,' he said.  'I beg your pardon, sir; the lock goes
+a trifle hard.'
+
+Indeed, it took him a surprising time to open the door, which was not
+only locked on the outside, but the lock seemed rebellious from disuse;
+and when at last he stood back and motioned me to enter before him, I was
+greeted on the threshold by that peculiar and convincing sound of the
+rain echoing over empty chambers.  The entrance-hall, in which I now
+found myself, was of a good size and good proportions; potted plants
+occupied the corners; the paved floor was soiled with muddy footprints
+and encumbered with straw; on a mahogany hall-table, which was the only
+furniture, a candle had been stuck and suffered to burn down--plainly a
+long while ago, for the gutterings were green with mould.  My mind, under
+these new impressions, worked with unusual vivacity.  I was here shut off
+with Fenn and his hireling in a deserted house, a neglected garden, and a
+wood of evergreens: the most eligible theatre for a deed of darkness.
+There came to me a vision of two flagstones raised in the hall-floor, and
+the driver putting in the rainy afternoon over my grave, and the prospect
+displeased me extremely.  I felt I had carried my pleasantry as far as
+was safe; I must lose no time in declaring my true character, and I was
+even choosing the words in which I was to begin, when the hall-door was
+slammed-to behind me with a bang, and I turned, dropping my stick as I
+did so, in time--and not any more than time--to save my life.
+
+The surprise of the onslaught and the huge weight of my assailant gave
+him the advantage.  He had a pistol in his right hand of a portentous
+size, which it took me all my strength to keep deflected.  With his left
+arm he strained me to his bosom, so that I thought I must be crushed or
+stifled.  His mouth was open, his face crimson, and he panted aloud with
+hard animal sounds.  The affair was as brief as it was hot and sudden.
+The potations which had swelled and bloated his carcase had already
+weakened the springs of energy.  One more huge effort, that came near to
+overpower me, and in which the pistol happily exploded, and I felt his
+grasp slacken and weakness come on his joints; his legs succumbed under
+his weight, and he grovelled on his knees on the stone floor.  'Spare
+me!' he gasped.
+
+I had not only been abominably frightened; I was shocked besides: my
+delicacy was in arms, like a lady to whom violence should have been
+offered by a similar monster.  I plucked myself from his horrid contact,
+I snatched the pistol--even discharged, it was a formidable weapon--and
+menaced him with the butt.  'Spare you!' I cried, 'you beast!'
+
+His voice died in his fat inwards, but his lips still vehemently framed
+the same words of supplication.  My anger began to pass off, but not all
+my repugnance; the picture he made revolted me, and I was impatient to be
+spared the further view of it.
+
+'Here,' said I, 'stop this performance: it sickens me.  I am not going to
+kill you, do you hear?  I have need of you.'
+
+A look of relief, that I could almost have called beautiful, dawned on
+his countenance.  'Anything--anything you wish,' said he.
+
+Anything is a big word, and his use of it brought me for a moment to a
+stand.  'Why, what do you mean?' I asked.  'Do you mean that you will
+blow the gaff on the whole business?'
+
+He answered me Yes with eager asseverations.
+
+'I know Monsieur de Saint-Yves is in it; it was through his papers we
+traced you,' I said.  'Do you consent to make a clean breast of the
+others?'
+
+'I do--I will!' he cried.  'The 'ole crew of 'em; there's good names
+among 'em.  I'll be king's evidence.'
+
+'So that all shall hang except yourself?  You damned villain!' I broke
+out.  'Understand at once that I am no spy or thief-taker.  I am a
+kinsman of Monsieur de St. Yves--here in his interest.  Upon my word, you
+have put your foot in it prettily, Mr. Burchell Fenn!  Come, stand up;
+don't grovel there.  Stand up, you lump of iniquity!'
+
+He scrambled to his feet.  He was utterly unmanned, or it might have gone
+hard with me yet; and I considered him hesitating, as, indeed, there was
+cause.  The man was a double-dyed traitor: he had tried to murder me, and
+I had first baffled his endeavours and then exposed and insulted him.
+Was it wise to place myself any longer at his mercy?  With his help I
+should doubtless travel more quickly; doubtless also far less agreeably;
+and there was everything to show that it would be at a greater risk.  In
+short, I should have washed my hands of him on the spot, but for the
+temptation of the French officers, whom I knew to be so near, and for
+whose society I felt so great and natural an impatience.  If I was to see
+anything of my countrymen, it was clear I had first of all to make my
+peace with Mr. Fenn; and that was no easy matter.  To make friends with
+any one implies concessions on both sides; and what could I concede?
+What could I say of him, but that he had proved himself a villain and a
+fool, and the worse man?
+
+'Well,' said I, 'here has been rather a poor piece of business, which I
+dare say you can have no pleasure in calling to mind; and, to say truth,
+I would as readily forget it myself.  Suppose we try.  Take back your
+pistol, which smells very ill; put it in your pocket or wherever you had
+it concealed.  There!  Now let us meet for the first time.--Give you good
+morning, Mr. Fenn!  I hope you do very well.  I come on the
+recommendation of my kinsman, the Vicomte de St. Yves.'
+
+'Do you mean it?' he cried.  'Do you mean you will pass over our little
+scrimmage?'
+
+'Why, certainly!' said I.  'It shows you are a bold fellow, who may be
+trusted to forget the business when it comes to the point.  There is
+nothing against you in the little scrimmage, unless that your courage is
+greater than your strength.  You are not so young as you once were, that
+is all.'
+
+'And I beg of you, sir, don't betray me to the Vis-count,' he pleaded.
+'I'll not deny but what my 'eart failed me a trifle; but it was only a
+word, sir, what anybody might have said in the 'eat of the moment, and
+over with it.'
+
+'Certainly,' said I.  'That is quite my own opinion.'
+
+'The way I came to be anxious about the Vis-count,' he continued, 'is
+that I believe he might be induced to form an 'asty judgment.  And the
+business, in a pecuniary point of view, is all that I could ask; only
+trying, sir--very trying.  It's making an old man of me before my time.
+You might have observed yourself, sir, that I 'aven't got the knees I
+once 'ad.  The knees and the breathing, there's where it takes me.  But
+I'm very sure, sir, I address a gentleman as would be the last to make
+trouble between friends.'
+
+'I am sure you do me no more than justice,' said I; 'and I shall think it
+quite unnecessary to dwell on any of these passing circumstances in my
+report to the Vicomte.'
+
+'Which you do favour him (if you'll excuse me being so bold as to mention
+it) exac'ly!' said he.  'I should have known you anywheres.  May I offer
+you a pot of 'ome-brewed ale, sir?  By your leave!  This way, if you
+please.  I am 'eartily grateful--'eartily pleased to be of any service to
+a gentleman like you, sir, which is related to the Vis-count, and really
+a fambly of which you might well be proud!  Take care of the step, sir.
+You have good news of 'is 'ealth, I trust? as well as that of Monseer the
+Count?'
+
+God forgive me! the horrible fellow was still puffing and panting with
+the fury of his assault, and already he had fallen into an obsequious,
+wheedling familiarity like that of an old servant,--already he was
+flattering me on my family connections!
+
+I followed him through the house into the stable-yard, where I observed
+the driver washing the cart in a shed.  He must have heard the explosion
+of the pistol.  He could not choose but hear it: the thing was shaped
+like a little blunderbuss, charged to the mouth, and made a report like a
+piece of field artillery.  He had heard, he had paid no attention; and
+now, as we came forth by the back-door, he raised for a moment a pale and
+tell-tale face that was as direct as a confession.  The rascal had
+expected to see Fenn come forth alone; he was waiting to be called on for
+that part of sexton, which I had already allotted to him in fancy.
+
+I need not detain the reader very long with any description of my visit
+to the back-kitchen; of how we mulled our ale there, and mulled it very
+well; nor of how we sat talking, Fenn like an old, faithful, affectionate
+dependant, and I--well!  I myself fallen into a mere admiration of so
+much impudence, that transcended words, and had very soon conquered
+animosity.  I took a fancy to the man, he was so vast a humbug.  I began
+to see a kind of beauty in him, his _aplomb_ was so majestic.  I never
+knew a rogue to cut so fat; his villainy was ample, like his belly, and I
+could scarce find it in my heart to hold him responsible for either.  He
+was good enough to drop into the autobiographical; telling me how the
+farm, in spite of the war and the high prices, had proved a
+disappointment; how there was 'a sight of cold, wet land as you come
+along the 'igh-road'; how the winds and rains and the seasons had been
+misdirected, it seemed 'o' purpose'; how Mrs. Fenn had died--'I lost her
+coming two year agone; a remarkable fine woman, my old girl, sir! if
+you'll excuse me,' he added, with a burst of humility.  In short, he gave
+me an opportunity of studying John Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked--his
+greed, his usuriousness, his hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs,
+all swelled to the superlative--such as was well worth the little
+disarray and fluster of our passage in the hall.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII--I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN
+
+
+As soon as I judged it safe, and that was not before Burchell Fenn had
+talked himself back into his breath and a complete good humour, I
+proposed he should introduce me to the French officers, henceforth to
+become my fellow-passengers.  There were two of them, it appeared, and my
+heart beat as I approached the door.  The specimen of Perfidious Albion
+whom I had just been studying gave me the stronger zest for my
+fellow-countrymen.  I could have embraced them; I could have wept on
+their necks.  And all the time I was going to a disappointment.
+
+It was in a spacious and low room, with an outlook on the court, that I
+found them bestowed.  In the good days of that house the apartment had
+probably served as a library, for there were traces of shelves along the
+wainscot.  Four or five mattresses lay on the floor in a corner, with a
+frowsy heap of bedding; near by was a basin and a cube of soap; a rude
+kitchen-table and some deal chairs stood together at the far end; and the
+room was illuminated by no less than four windows, and warmed by a
+little, crazy, sidelong grate, propped up with bricks in the vent of a
+hospitable chimney, in which a pile of coals smoked prodigiously and gave
+out a few starveling flames.  An old, frail, white-haired officer sat in
+one of the chairs, which he had drawn close to this apology for a fire.
+He was wrapped in a camlet cloak, of which the collar was turned up, his
+knees touched the bars, his hands were spread in the very smoke, and yet
+he shivered for cold.  The second--a big, florid, fine animal of a man,
+whose every gesture labelled him the cock of the walk and the admiration
+of the ladies--had apparently despaired of the fire, and now strode up
+and down, sneezing hard, bitterly blowing his nose, and proffering a
+continual stream of bluster, complaint, and barrack-room oaths.
+
+Fenn showed me in with the brief form of introduction: 'Gentlemen all,
+this here's another fare!' and was gone again at once.  The old man gave
+me but the one glance out of lack-lustre eyes; and even as he looked a
+shiver took him as sharp as a hiccough.  But the other, who represented
+to admiration the picture of a Beau in a Catarrh, stared at me
+arrogantly.
+
+'And who are you, sir?' he asked.
+
+I made the military salute to my superiors.
+
+'Champdivers, private, Eighth of the Line,' said I.
+
+'Pretty business!' said he.  'And you are going on with us?  Three in a
+cart, and a great trolloping private at that!  And who is to pay for you,
+my fine fellow?' he inquired.
+
+'If monsieur comes to that,' I answered civilly, 'who paid for him?'
+
+'Oh, if you choose to play the wit!' said he,--and began to rail at large
+upon his destiny, the weather, the cold, the danger and the expense of
+the escape, and, above all, the cooking of the accursed English.  It
+seemed to annoy him particularly that I should have joined their party.
+'If you knew what you were doing, thirty thousand millions of pigs! you
+would keep yourself to yourself!  The horses can't drag the cart; the
+roads are all ruts and swamps.  No longer ago than last night the Colonel
+and I had to march half the way--thunder of God!--half the way to the
+knees in mud--and I with this infernal cold--and the danger of detection!
+Happily we met no one: a desert--a real desert--like the whole abominable
+country!  Nothing to eat--no, sir, there is nothing to eat but raw cow
+and greens boiled in water--nor to drink but Worcestershire sauce!  Now
+I, with my catarrh, I have no appetite; is it not so?  Well, if I were in
+France, I should have a good soup with a crust in it, an omelette, a fowl
+in rice, a partridge in cabbages--things to tempt me, thunder of God!
+But here--day of God!--what a country!  And cold, too!  They talk about
+Russia--this is all the cold I want!  And the people--look at them!  What
+a race!  Never any handsome men; never any fine officers!'--and he looked
+down complacently for a moment at his waist--'And the women--what
+faggots!  No, that is one point clear, I cannot stomach the English!'
+
+There was something in this man so antipathetic to me, as sent the
+mustard into my nose.  I can never bear your bucks and dandies, even when
+they are decent-looking and well dressed; and the Major--for that was his
+rank--was the image of a flunkey in good luck.  Even to be in agreement
+with him, or to seem to be so, was more than I could make out to endure.
+
+'You could scarce be expected to stomach them,' said I civilly, 'after
+having just digested your parole.'
+
+He whipped round on his heel and turned on me a countenance which I dare
+say he imagined to be awful; but another fit of sneezing cut him off ere
+he could come the length of speech.
+
+'I have not tried the dish myself,' I took the opportunity to add.  'It
+is said to be unpalatable.  Did monsieur find it so?'
+
+With surprising vivacity the Colonel woke from his lethargy.  He was
+between us ere another word could pass.
+
+'Shame, gentlemen!' he said.  'Is this a time for Frenchmen and
+fellow-soldiers to fall out?  We are in the midst of our enemies; a
+quarrel, a loud word, may suffice to plunge us back into irretrievable
+distress.  _Monsieur le Commandant_, you have been gravely offended.  I
+make it my request, I make it my prayer--if need be, I give you my
+orders--that the matter shall stand by until we come safe to France.
+Then, if you please, I will serve you in any capacity.  And for you,
+young man, you have shown all the cruelty and carelessness of youth.
+This gentleman is your superior; he is no longer young'--at which word
+you are to conceive the Major's face.  'It is admitted he has broken his
+parole.  I know not his reason, and no more do you.  It might be
+patriotism in this hour of our country's adversity, it might be humanity,
+necessity; you know not what in the least, and you permit yourself to
+reflect on his honour.  To break parole may be a subject for pity and not
+derision.  I have broken mine--I, a colonel of the Empire.  And why?  I
+have been years negotiating my exchange, and it cannot be managed; those
+who have influence at the Ministry of War continually rush in before me,
+and I have to wait, and my daughter at home is in a decline.  I am going
+to see my daughter at last, and it is my only concern lest I should have
+delayed too long.  She is ill, and very ill,--at death's door.  Nothing
+is left me but my daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my
+honour, blame me for it who dare!'
+
+At this my heart smote me.
+
+'For God's sake,' I cried, 'think no more of what I have said!  A parole?
+what is a parole against life and death and love?  I ask your pardon;
+this gentleman's also.  As long as I shall be with you, you shall not
+have cause to complain of me again.  I pray God you will find your
+daughter alive and restored.'
+
+'That is past praying for,' said the Colonel; and immediately the brief
+fire died out of him, and, returning to the hearth, he relapsed into his
+former abstraction.
+
+But I was not so easy to compose.  The knowledge of the poor gentleman's
+trouble, and the sight of his face, had filled me with the bitterness of
+remorse; and I insisted upon shaking hands with the Major (which he did
+with a very ill grace), and abounded in palinodes and apologies.
+
+'After all,' said I, 'who am I to talk?  I am in the luck to be a private
+soldier; I have no parole to give or to keep; once I am over the rampart,
+I am as free as air.  I beg you to believe that I regret from my soul the
+use of these ungenerous expressions.  Allow me . . . Is there no way in
+this damned house to attract attention?  Where is this fellow, Fenn?'
+
+I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.  Fenn, who was at the
+moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms like one in despair,
+called to me to keep back, plunged into the house, and appeared next
+moment in the doorway of the chamber.
+
+'Oh, sir!' says he, 'keep away from those there windows.  A body might
+see you from the back lane.'
+
+'It is registered,' said I.  'Henceforward I will be a mouse for
+precaution and a ghost for invisibility.  But in the meantime, for God's
+sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy!  Your room is as damp as the bottom of
+a well, and these gentlemen are perishing of cold.'
+
+So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be paid in
+advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether because I threw
+greater energy into the business, or because the coals were now warmed
+and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze that made the chimney roar
+again.  The shine of it, in that dark, rainy day, seemed to reanimate the
+Colonel like a blink of sun.  With the outburst of the flames, besides, a
+draught was established, which immediately delivered us from the plague
+of smoke; and by the time Fenn returned, carrying a bottle under his arm
+and a single tumbler in his hand, there was already an air of gaiety in
+the room that did the heart good.
+
+I poured out some of the brandy.
+
+'Colonel,' said I, 'I am a young man and a private soldier.  I have not
+been long in this room, and already I have shown the petulance that
+belongs to the one character and the ill manners that you may look for in
+the other.  Have the humanity to pass these slips over, and honour me so
+far as to accept this glass.'
+
+'My lad,' says he, waking up and blinking at me with an air of suspicion,
+'are you sure you can afford it?'
+
+I assured him I could.
+
+'I thank you, then: I am very cold.'  He took the glass out, and a little
+colour came in his face.  'I thank you again,' said he.  'It goes to the
+heart.'
+
+The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a good deal
+of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the morning, now with
+some sort of apology, now with none at all; and the bottle began to look
+foolish before dinner was served.  It was such a meal as he had himself
+predicted: beef, greens, potatoes, mustard in a teacup, and beer in a
+brown jug that was all over hounds, horses, and hunters, with a fox at
+the fat end and a gigantic John Bull--for all the world like
+Fenn--sitting in the midst in a bob-wig and smoking tobacco.  The beer
+was a good brew, but not good enough for the Major; he laced it with
+brandy--for his cold, he said; and in this curative design the remainder
+of the bottle ebbed away.  He called my attention repeatedly to the
+circumstance; helped me pointedly to the dregs, threw the bottle in the
+air and played tricks with it; and at last, having exhausted his
+ingenuity, and seeing me remain quite blind to every hint, he ordered and
+paid for another himself.
+
+As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and only awoke
+occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he was supposed to be
+doing.  On each of these occasions he showed a gratitude and kind
+courtesy that endeared him to me beyond expression.  'Champdivers, my
+lad, your health!' he would say.  'The Major and I had a very arduous
+march last night, and I positively thought I should have eaten nothing,
+but your fortunate idea of the brandy has made quite a new man of
+me--quite a new man.'  And he would fall to with a great air of
+heartiness, cut himself a mouthful, and, before he had swallowed it,
+would have forgotten his dinner, his company, the place where he then
+was, and the escape he was engaged on, and become absorbed in the vision
+of a sick-room and a dying girl in France.  The pathos of this continual
+preoccupation, in a man so old, sick, and over-weary, and whom I looked
+upon as a mere bundle of dying bones and death-pains, put me wholly from
+my victuals: it seemed there was an element of sin, a kind of rude
+bravado of youth, in the mere relishing of food at the same table with
+this tragic father; and though I was well enough used to the coarse,
+plain diet of the English, I ate scarce more than himself.  Dinner was
+hardly over before he succumbed to a lethargic sleep; lying on one of the
+mattresses with his limbs relaxed, and his breath seemingly
+suspended--the very image of dissolution.
+
+This left the Major and myself alone at the table.  You must not suppose
+our _tete-a-tete_ was long, but it was a lively period while it lasted.
+He drank like a fish or an Englishman; shouted, beat the table, roared
+out songs, quarrelled, made it up again, and at last tried to throw the
+dinner-plates through the window, a feat of which he was at that time
+quite incapable.  For a party of fugitives, condemned to the most
+rigorous discretion, there was never seen so noisy a carnival; and
+through it all the Colonel continued to sleep like a child.  Seeing the
+Major so well advanced, and no retreat possible, I made a fair wind of a
+foul one, keeping his glass full, pushing him with toasts; and sooner
+than I could have dared to hope, he became drowsy and incoherent.  With
+the wrong-headedness of all such sots, he would not be persuaded to lie
+down upon one of the mattresses until I had stretched myself upon
+another.  But the comedy was soon over; soon he slept the sleep of the
+just, and snored like a military music; and I might get up again and face
+(as best I could) the excessive tedium of the afternoon.
+
+I had passed the night before in a good bed; I was denied the resource of
+slumber; and there was nothing open for me but to pace the apartment,
+maintain the fire, and brood on my position.  I compared yesterday and
+to-day--the safety, comfort, jollity, open-air exercise and pleasant
+roadside inns of the one, with the tedium, anxiety, and discomfort of the
+other.  I remembered that I was in the hands of Fenn, who could not be
+more false--though he might be more vindictive--than I fancied him.  I
+looked forward to nights of pitching in the covered cart, and days of
+monotony in I knew not what hiding-places; and my heart failed me, and I
+was in two minds whether to slink off ere it was too late, and return to
+my former solitary way of travel.  But the Colonel stood in the path.  I
+had not seen much of him; but already I judged him a man of a childlike
+nature--with that sort of innocence and courtesy that, I think, is only
+to be found in old soldiers or old priests--and broken with years and
+sorrow.  I could not turn my back on his distress; could not leave him
+alone with the selfish trooper who snored on the next mattress.
+'Champdivers, my lad, your health!' said a voice in my ear, and stopped
+me--and there are few things I am more glad of in the retrospect than
+that it did.
+
+It must have been about four in the afternoon--at least the rain had
+taken off, and the sun was setting with some wintry pomp--when the
+current of my reflections was effectually changed by the arrival of two
+visitors in a gig.  They were farmers of the neighbourhood, I
+suppose--big, burly fellows in great-coats and top-boots, mightily
+flushed with liquor when they arrived, and, before they left, inimitably
+drunk.  They stayed long in the kitchen with Burchell, drinking,
+shouting, singing, and keeping it up; and the sound of their merry
+minstrelsy kept me a kind of company.  The night fell, and the shine of
+the fire brightened and blinked on the panelled wall.  Our illuminated
+windows must have been visible not only from the back lane of which Fenn
+had spoken, but from the court where the farmers' gig awaited them.  In
+the far end of the firelit room lay my companions, the one silent, the
+other clamorously noisy, the images of death and drunkenness.  Little
+wonder if I were tempted to join in the choruses below, and sometimes
+could hardly refrain from laughter, and sometimes, I believe, from
+tears--so unmitigated was the tedium, so cruel the suspense, of this
+period.
+
+At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy minstrels appeared
+in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern, and knocking together as
+they came.  The visitors clambered noisily into the gig, one of them
+shook the reins, and they were snatched out of sight and hearing with a
+suddenness that partook of the nature of prodigy.  I am well aware there
+is a Providence for drunken men, that holds the reins for them and
+presides over their troubles; doubtless he had his work cut out for him
+with this particular gigful!  Fenn rescued his toes with an ejaculation
+from under the departing wheels, and turned at once with uncertain steps
+and devious lantern to the far end of the court.  There, through the open
+doors of a coach-house, the shock-headed lad was already to be seen
+drawing forth the covered cart.  If I wished any private talk with our
+host, it must be now or never.
+
+Accordingly I groped my way downstairs, and came to him as he looked on
+at and lighted the harnessing of the horses.
+
+'The hour approaches when we have to part,' said I; 'and I shall be
+obliged if you will tell your servant to drop me at the nearest point for
+Dunstable.  I am determined to go so far with our friends, Colonel X and
+Major Y, but my business is peremptory, and it takes me to the
+neighbourhood of Dunstable.'
+
+Orders were given to my satisfaction, with an obsequiousness that seemed
+only inflamed by his potations.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV--TRAVELS OF THE COVERED CART
+
+
+My companions were aroused with difficulty: the Colonel, poor old
+gentleman, to a sort of permanent dream, in which you could say of him
+only that he was very deaf and anxiously polite; the Major still maudlin
+drunk.  We had a dish of tea by the fireside, and then issued like
+criminals into the scathing cold of the night.  For the weather had in
+the meantime changed.  Upon the cessation of the rain, a strict frost had
+succeeded.  The moon, being young, was already near the zenith when we
+started, glittered everywhere on sheets of ice, and sparkled in ten
+thousand icicles.  A more unpromising night for a journey it was hard to
+conceive.  But in the course of the afternoon the horses had been well
+roughed; and King (for such was the name of the shock-headed lad) was
+very positive that he could drive us without misadventure.  He was as
+good as his word; indeed, despite a gawky air, he was simply invaluable
+in his present employment, showing marked sagacity in all that concerned
+the care of horses, and guiding us by one short cut after another for
+days, and without a fault.
+
+The interior of that engine of torture, the covered cart, was fitted with
+a bench, on which we took our places; the door was shut; in a moment, the
+night closed upon us solid and stifling; and we felt that we were being
+driven carefully out of the courtyard.  Careful was the word all night,
+and it was an alleviation of our miseries that we did not often enjoy.
+In general, as we were driven the better part of the night and day, often
+at a pretty quick pace and always through a labyrinth of the most
+infamous country lanes and by-roads, we were so bruised upon the bench,
+so dashed against the top and sides of the cart, that we reached the end
+of a stage in truly pitiable case, sometimes flung ourselves down without
+the formality of eating, made but one sleep of it until the hour of
+departure returned, and were only properly awakened by the first jolt of
+the renewed journey.  There were interruptions, at times, that we hailed
+as alleviations.  At times the cart was bogged, once it was upset, and we
+must alight and lend the driver the assistance of our arms; at times, too
+(as on the occasion when I had first encountered it), the horses gave
+out, and we had to trail alongside in mud or frost until the first peep
+of daylight, or the approach to a hamlet or a high road, bade us
+disappear like ghosts into our prison.
+
+The main roads of England are incomparable for excellence, of a beautiful
+smoothness, very ingeniously laid down, and so well kept that in most
+weathers you could take your dinner off any part of them without
+distaste.  On them, to the note of the bugle, the mail did its sixty
+miles a day; innumerable chaises whisked after the bobbing postboys; or
+some young blood would flit by in a curricle and tandem, to the vast
+delight and danger of the lieges.  On them, the slow-pacing waggons made
+a music of bells, and all day long the travellers on horse-back and the
+travellers on foot (like happy Mr. St. Ives so little a while before!)
+kept coming and going, and baiting and gaping at each other, as though a
+fair were due, and they were gathering to it from all England.  No,
+nowhere in the world is travel so great a pleasure as in that country.
+But unhappily our one need was to be secret; and all this rapid and
+animated picture of the road swept quite apart from us, as we lumbered up
+hill and down dale, under hedge and over stone, among circuitous byways.
+Only twice did I receive, as it were, a whiff of the highway.  The first
+reached my ears alone.  I might have been anywhere.  I only knew I was
+walking in the dark night and among ruts, when I heard very far off, over
+the silent country that surrounded us, the guard's horn wailing its
+signal to the next post-house for a change of horses.  It was like the
+voice of the day heard in darkness, a voice of the world heard in prison,
+the note of a cock crowing in the mid-seas--in short, I cannot tell you
+what it was like, you will have to fancy for yourself--but I could have
+wept to hear it.  Once we were belated: the cattle could hardly crawl,
+the day was at hand, it was a nipping, rigorous morning, King was lashing
+his horses, I was giving an arm to the old Colonel, and the Major was
+coughing in our rear.  I must suppose that King was a thought careless,
+being nearly in desperation about his team, and, in spite of the cold
+morning, breathing hot with his exertions.  We came, at last, a little
+before sunrise to the summit of a hill, and saw the high-road passing at
+right angles through an open country of meadows and hedgerow pollards;
+and not only the York mail, speeding smoothly at the gallop of the four
+horses, but a post-chaise besides, with the post-boy titupping briskly,
+and the traveller himself putting his head out of the window, but whether
+to breathe the dawn, or the better to observe the passage of the mail, I
+do not know.  So that we enjoyed for an instant a picture of free life on
+the road, in its most luxurious forms of despatch and comfort.  And
+thereafter, with a poignant feeling of contrast in our hearts, we must
+mount again into our wheeled dungeon.
+
+We came to our stages at all sorts of odd hours, and they were in all
+kinds of odd places.  I may say at once that my first experience was my
+best.  Nowhere again were we so well entertained as at Burchell Fenn's.
+And this, I suppose, was natural, and indeed inevitable, in so long and
+secret a journey.  The first stop, we lay six hours in a barn standing by
+itself in a poor, marshy orchard, and packed with hay; to make it more
+attractive, we were told it had been the scene of an abominable murder,
+and was now haunted.  But the day was beginning to break, and our fatigue
+was too extreme for visionary terrors.  The second or third, we alighted
+on a barren heath about midnight, built a fire to warm us under the
+shelter of some thorns, supped like beggars on bread and a piece of cold
+bacon, and slept like gipsies with our feet to the fire.  In the
+meanwhile, King was gone with the cart, I know not where, to get a change
+of horses, and it was late in the dark morning when he returned and we
+were able to resume our journey.  In the middle of another night, we came
+to a stop by an ancient, whitewashed cottage of two stories; a privet
+hedge surrounded it; the frosty moon shone blankly on the upper windows;
+but through those of the kitchen the firelight was seen glinting on the
+roof and reflected from the dishes on the wall.  Here, after much
+hammering on the door, King managed to arouse an old crone from the
+chimney-corner chair, where she had been dozing in the watch; and we were
+had in, and entertained with a dish of hot tea.  This old lady was an
+aunt of Burchell Fenn's--and an unwilling partner in his dangerous trade.
+Though the house stood solitary, and the hour was an unlikely one for any
+passenger upon the road, King and she conversed in whispers only.  There
+was something dismal, something of the sick-room, in this perpetual,
+guarded sibilation.  The apprehensions of our hostess insensibly
+communicated themselves to every one present.  We ate like mice in a
+cat's ear; if one of us jingled a teaspoon, all would start; and when the
+hour came to take the road again, we drew a long breath of relief, and
+climbed to our places in the covered cart with a positive sense of
+escape.  The most of our meals, however, were taken boldly at hedgerow
+alehouses, usually at untimely hours of the day, when the clients were in
+the field or the farmyard at labour.  I shall have to tell presently of
+our last experience of the sort, and how unfortunately it miscarried; but
+as that was the signal for my separation from my fellow-travellers, I
+must first finish with them.
+
+I had never any occasion to waver in my first judgment of the Colonel.
+The old gentleman seemed to me, and still seems in the retrospect, the
+salt of the earth.  I had occasion to see him in the extremes of
+hardship, hunger and cold; he was dying, and he looked it; and yet I
+cannot remember any hasty, harsh, or impatient word to have fallen from
+his lips.  On the contrary, he ever showed himself careful to please; and
+even if he rambled in his talk, rambled always gently--like a humane,
+half-witted old hero, true to his colours to the last.  I would not dare
+to say how often he awoke suddenly from a lethargy, and told us again, as
+though we had never heard it, the story of how he had earned the cross,
+how it had been given him by the hand of the Emperor, and of the
+innocent--and, indeed, foolish--sayings of his daughter when he returned
+with it on his bosom.  He had another anecdote which he was very apt to
+give, by way of a rebuke, when the Major wearied us beyond endurance with
+dispraises of the English.  This was an account of the _braves gens_ with
+whom he had been boarding.  True enough, he was a man so simple and
+grateful by nature, that the most common civilities were able to touch
+him to the heart, and would remain written in his memory; but from a
+thousand inconsiderable but conclusive indications, I gathered that this
+family had really loved him, and loaded him with kindness.  They made a
+fire in his bedroom, which the sons and daughters tended with their own
+hands; letters from France were looked for with scarce more eagerness by
+himself than by these alien sympathisers; when they came, he would read
+them aloud in the parlour to the assembled family, translating as he
+went.  The Colonel's English was elementary; his daughter not in the
+least likely to be an amusing correspondent; and, as I conceived these
+scenes in the parlour, I felt sure the interest centred in the Colonel
+himself, and I thought I could feel in my own heart that mixture of the
+ridiculous and the pathetic, the contest of tears and laughter, which
+must have shaken the bosoms of the family.  Their kindness had continued
+till the end.  It appears they were privy to his flight, the camlet cloak
+had been lined expressly for him, and he was the bearer of a letter from
+the daughter of the house to his own daughter in Paris.  The last
+evening, when the time came to say good-night, it was tacitly known to
+all that they were to look upon his face no more.  He rose, pleading
+fatigue, and turned to the daughter, who had been his chief ally: 'You
+will permit me, my dear--to an old and very unhappy soldier--and may God
+bless you for your goodness!'  The girl threw her arms about his neck and
+sobbed upon his bosom; the lady of the house burst into tears; '_et je
+vous le jure_, _le pere se mouchait_!' quoth the Colonel, twisting his
+moustaches with a cavalry air, and at the same time blinking the water
+from his eyes at the mere recollection.
+
+It was a good thought to me that he had found these friends in captivity;
+that he had started on this fatal journey from so cordial a farewell.  He
+had broken his parole for his daughter: that he should ever live to reach
+her sick-bed, that he could continue to endure to an end the hardships,
+the crushing fatigue, the savage cold, of our pilgrimage, I had early
+ceased to hope.  I did for him what I was able,--nursed him, kept him
+covered, watched over his slumbers, sometimes held him in my arms at the
+rough places of the road.  'Champdivers,' he once said, 'you are like a
+son to me--like a son.'  It is good to remember, though at the time it
+put me on the rack.  All was to no purpose.  Fast as we were travelling
+towards France, he was travelling faster still to another destination.
+Daily he grew weaker and more indifferent.  An old rustic accent of Lower
+Normandy reappeared in his speech, from which it had long been banished,
+and grew stronger; old words of the _patois_, too: _Ouistreham_,
+_matrasse_, and others, the sense of which we were sometimes unable to
+guess.  On the very last day he began again his eternal story of the
+cross and the Emperor.  The Major, who was particularly ill, or at least
+particularly cross, uttered some angry words of protest.
+'_Pardonnez-moi_, _monsieur le commandant_, _mais c'est pour monsieur_,'
+said the Colonel: 'Monsieur has not yet heard the circumstance, and is
+good enough to feel an interest.'  Presently after, however, he began to
+lose the thread of his narrative; and at last: '_Que que j'ai_?  _Je
+m'embrouille_!' says he, '_Suffit_: _s'm'a la donne_, _et Berthe en etait
+bien contente_.'  It struck me as the falling of the curtain or the
+closing of the sepulchre doors.
+
+Sure enough, in but a little while after, he fell into a sleep as gentle
+as an infant's, which insensibly changed into the sleep of death.  I had
+my arm about his body at the time and remarked nothing, unless it were
+that he once stretched himself a little, so kindly the end came to that
+disastrous life.  It was only at our evening halt that the Major and I
+discovered we were travelling alone with the poor clay.  That night we
+stole a spade from a field--I think near Market Bosworth--and a little
+farther on, in a wood of young oak trees and by the light of King's
+lantern, we buried the old soldier of the Empire with both prayers and
+tears.
+
+We had needs invent Heaven if it had not been revealed to us; there are
+some things that fall so bitterly ill on this side Time!  As for the
+Major, I have long since forgiven him.  He broke the news to the poor
+Colonel's daughter; I am told he did it kindly; and sure, nobody could
+have done it without tears!  His share of purgatory will be brief; and in
+this world, as I could not very well praise him, I have suppressed his
+name.  The Colonel's also, for the sake of his parole.  _Requiescat_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV--THE ADVENTURE OF THE ATTORNEY'S CLERK
+
+
+I have mentioned our usual course, which was to eat in inconsiderable
+wayside hostelries, known to King.  It was a dangerous business; we went
+daily under fire to satisfy our appetite, and put our head in the loin's
+mouth for a piece of bread.  Sometimes, to minimise the risk, we would
+all dismount before we came in view of the house, straggle in severally,
+and give what orders we pleased, like disconnected strangers.  In like
+manner we departed, to find the cart at an appointed place, some half a
+mile beyond.  The Colonel and the Major had each a word or two of
+English--God help their pronunciation!  But they did well enough to order
+a rasher and a pot or call a reckoning; and, to say truth, these country
+folks did not give themselves the pains, and had scarce the knowledge, to
+be critical.
+
+About nine or ten at night the pains of hunger and cold drove us to an
+alehouse in the flats of Bedfordshire, not far from Bedford itself.  In
+the inn kitchen was a long, lean, characteristic-looking fellow of
+perhaps forty, dressed in black.  He sat on a settle by the fireside,
+smoking a long pipe, such as they call a yard of clay.  His hat and wig
+were hanged upon the knob behind him, his head as bald as a bladder of
+lard, and his expression very shrewd, cantankerous, and inquisitive.  He
+seemed to value himself above his company, to give himself the airs of a
+man of the world among that rustic herd; which was often no more than his
+due; being, as I afterwards discovered, an attorney's clerk.  I took upon
+myself the more ungrateful part of arriving last; and by the time I
+entered on the scene the Major was already served at a side table.  Some
+general conversation must have passed, and I smelled danger in the air.
+The Major looked flustered, the attorney's clerk triumphant, and three or
+four peasants in smock-frocks (who sat about the fire to play chorus) had
+let their pipes go out.
+
+'Give you good evening, sir!' said the attorney's clerk to me.
+
+'The same to you, sir,' said I.
+
+'I think this one will do,' quoth the clerk to the yokels with a wink;
+and then, as soon as I had given my order, 'Pray, sir, whither are you
+bound?' he added.
+
+'Sir,' said I, 'I am not one of those who speak either of their business
+or their destination in houses of public entertainment.'
+
+'A good answer,' said he, 'and an excellent principle.  Sir, do you speak
+French?'
+
+'Why, no, sir,' said I.  'A little Spanish at your service.'
+
+'But you know the French accent, perhaps?' said the clerk.
+
+'Well do I do that!' said I.  'The French accent?  Why, I believe I can
+tell a Frenchman in ten words.'
+
+'Here is a puzzle for you, then!' he said.  'I have no material doubt
+myself, but some of these gentlemen are more backward.  The lack of
+education, you know.  I make bold to say that a man cannot walk, cannot
+hear, and cannot see, without the blessings of education.'
+
+He turned to the Major, whose food plainly stuck in his throat.
+
+'Now, sir,' pursued the clerk, 'let me have the pleasure to hear your
+voice again.  Where are you going, did you say?'
+
+'Sare, I am go-ing to Lon-don,' said the Major.
+
+I could have flung my plate at him to be such an ass, and to have so
+little a gift of languages where that was the essential.
+
+'What think ye of that?' said the clerk.  'Is that French enough?'
+
+'Good God!' cried I, leaping up like one who should suddenly perceive an
+acquaintance, 'is this you, Mr. Dubois?  Why, who would have dreamed of
+encountering you so far from home?'  As I spoke, I shook hands with the
+Major heartily; and turning to our tormentor, 'Oh, sir, you may be
+perfectly reassured!  This is a very honest fellow, a late neighbour of
+mine in the city of Carlisle.'
+
+I thought the attorney looked put out; I little knew the man!
+
+'But he is French,' said he, 'for all that?'
+
+'Ay, to be sure!' said I.  'A Frenchman of the emigration!  None of your
+Buonaparte lot.  I will warrant his views of politics to be as sound as
+your own.'
+
+'What is a little strange,' said the clerk quietly, 'is that Mr. Dubois
+should deny it.'
+
+I got it fair in the face, and took it smiling; but the shock was rude,
+and in the course of the next words I contrived to do what I have rarely
+done, and make a slip in my English.  I kept my liberty and life by my
+proficiency all these months, and for once that I failed, it is not to be
+supposed that I would make a public exhibition of the details.  Enough,
+that it was a very little error, and one that might have passed
+ninety-nine times in a hundred.  But my limb of the law was as swift to
+pick it up as though he had been by trade a master of languages.
+
+'Aha!' cries he; 'and you are French, too!  Your tongue bewrays you.  Two
+Frenchmen coming into an alehouse, severally and accidentally, not
+knowing each other, at ten of the clock at night, in the middle of
+Bedfordshire?  No, sir, that shall not pass!  You are all prisoners
+escaping, if you are nothing worse.  Consider yourselves under arrest.  I
+have to trouble you for your papers.'
+
+'Where is your warrant, if you come to that?' said I.  'My papers!  A
+likely thing that I would show my papers on the _ipse dixit_ of an
+unknown fellow in a hedge alehouse!'
+
+'Would you resist the law?' says he.
+
+'Not the law, sir!' said I.  'I hope I am too good a subject for that.
+But for a nameless fellow with a bald head and a pair of gingham
+small-clothes, why certainly!  'Tis my birthright as an Englishman.
+Where's _Magna Charta_, else?'
+
+'We will see about that,' says he; and then, addressing the assistants,
+'where does the constable live?'
+
+'Lord love you, sir!' cried the landlord, 'what are you thinking of?  The
+constable at past ten at night!  Why, he's abed and asleep, and good and
+drunk two hours agone!'
+
+'Ah that a' be!' came in chorus from the yokels.
+
+The attorney's clerk was put to a stand.  He could not think of force;
+there was little sign of martial ardour about the landlord, and the
+peasants were indifferent--they only listened, and gaped, and now
+scratched a head, and now would get a light to their pipes from the
+embers on the hearth.  On the other hand, the Major and I put a bold
+front on the business and defied him, not without some ground of law.  In
+this state of matters he proposed I should go along with him to one
+Squire Merton, a great man of the neighbourhood, who was in the
+commission of the peace, the end of his avenue but three lanes away.  I
+told him I would not stir a foot for him if it were to save his soul.
+Next he proposed I should stay all night where I was, and the constable
+could see to my affair in the morning, when he was sober.  I replied I
+should go when and where I pleased; that we were lawful travellers in the
+fear of God and the king, and I for one would suffer myself to be stayed
+by nobody.  At the same time, I was thinking the matter had lasted
+altogether too long, and I determined to bring it to an end at once.
+
+'See here,' said I, getting up, for till now I had remained carelessly
+seated, 'there's only one way to decide a thing like this--only one way
+that's right _English_--and that's man to man.  Take off your coat, sir,
+and these gentlemen shall see fair play.'  At this there came a look in
+his eye that I could not mistake.  His education had been neglected in
+one essential and eminently British particular: he could not box.  No
+more could I, you may say; but then I had the more impudence--and I had
+made the proposal.
+
+'He says I'm no Englishman, but the proof of the pudding is the eating of
+it,' I continued.  And here I stripped my coat and fell into the proper
+attitude, which was just about all I knew of this barbarian art.  'Why,
+sir, you seem to me to hang back a little,' said I.  'Come, I'll meet
+you; I'll give you an appetiser--though hang me if I can understand the
+man that wants any enticement to hold up his hands.'  I drew a bank-note
+out of my fob and tossed it to the landlord.  'There are the stakes,'
+said I.  'I'll fight you for first blood, since you seem to make so much
+work about it.  If you tap my claret first, there are five guineas for
+you, and I'll go with you to any squire you choose to mention.  If I tap
+yours, you'll perhaps let on that I'm the better man, and allow me to go
+about my lawful business at my own time and convenience, by God; is that
+fair, my lads?' says I, appealing to the company.
+
+'Ay, ay,' said the chorus of chawbacons; 'he can't say no fairer nor
+that, he can't.  Take off thy coat master!'
+
+The limb of the law was now on the wrong side of public opinion, and,
+what heartened me to go on, the position was rapidly changing in our
+favour.  Already the Major was paying his shot to the very indifferent
+landlord, and I could see the white face of King at the back-door, making
+signals of haste.
+
+'Oho!' quoth my enemy, 'you are as full of doubles as a fox, are you not?
+But I see through you; I see through and through you.  You would change
+the venue, would you?'
+
+'I may be transparent, sir,' says I, 'but if you'll do me the favour to
+stand up, you'll find I can hit dam hard.'
+
+'Which is a point, if you will observe, that I had never called in
+question,' said he.  'Why, you ignorant clowns,' he proceeded, addressing
+the company, 'can't you see the fellow's gulling you before your eyes?
+Can't you see that he has changed the point upon me?  I say he's a French
+prisoner, and he answers that he can box!  What has that to do with it?
+I would not wonder but what he can dance, too--they're all dancing
+masters over there.  I say, and I stick to it, that he's a Frenchy.  He
+says he isn't.  Well then, let him out with his papers, if he has them!
+If he had, would he not show them?  If he had, would he not jump at the
+idea of going to Squire Merton, a man you all know?  Now, you are all
+plain, straightforward Bedfordshire men, and I wouldn't ask a better lot
+to appeal to.  You're not the kind to be talked over with any French
+gammon, and he's plenty of that.  But let me tell him, he can take his
+pigs to another market; they'll never do here; they'll never go down in
+Bedfordshire.  Why! look at the man!  Look at his feet!  Has anybody got
+a foot in the room like that?  See how he stands! do any of you fellows
+stand like that?  Does the landlord, there?  Why, he has Frenchman wrote
+all over him, as big as a sign-post!'
+
+This was all very well; and in a different scene I might even have been
+gratified by his remarks; but I saw clearly, if I were to allow him to
+talk, he might turn the tables on me altogether.  He might not be much of
+a hand at boxing; but I was much mistaken, or he had studied forensic
+eloquence in a good school.  In this predicament I could think of nothing
+more ingenious than to burst out of the house, under the pretext of an
+ungovernable rage.  It was certainly not very ingenious--it was
+elementary, but I had no choice.
+
+'You white-livered dog!' I broke out.  'Do you dare to tell me you're an
+Englishman, and won't fight?  But I'll stand no more of this!  I leave
+this place, where I've been insulted!  Here! what's to pay?  Pay
+yourself!' I went on, offering the landlord a handful of silver, 'and
+give me back my bank-note!'
+
+The landlord, following his usual policy of obliging everybody, offered
+no opposition to my design.  The position of my adversary was now
+thoroughly bad.  He had lost my two companions.  He was on the point of
+losing me also.  There was plainly no hope of arousing the company to
+help; and watching him with a corner of my eye, I saw him hesitate for a
+moment.  The next, he had taken down his hat and his wig, which was of
+black horsehair; and I saw him draw from behind the settle a vast hooded
+great-coat and a small valise.  'The devil!' thought I: 'is the rascal
+going to follow me?'
+
+I was scarce clear of the inn before the limb of the law was at my heels.
+I saw his face plain in the moonlight; and the most resolute purpose
+showed in it, along with an unmoved composure.  A chill went over me.
+'This is no common adventure,' thinks I to myself.  'You have got hold of
+a man of character, St. Ives!  A bite-hard, a bull-dog, a weasel is on
+your trail; and how are you to throw him off?'  Who was he?  By some of
+his expressions I judged he was a hanger-on of courts.  But in what
+character had he followed the assizes?  As a simple spectator, as a
+lawyer's clerk, as a criminal himself, or--last and worst supposition--as
+a Bow-street 'runner'?
+
+The cart would wait for me, perhaps, half a mile down our onward road,
+which I was already following.  And I told myself that in a few minutes'
+walking, Bow-street runner or not, I should have him at my mercy.  And
+then reflection came to me in time.  Of all things, one was out of the
+question.  Upon no account must this obtrusive fellow see the cart.
+Until I had killed or shook him off, I was quite divorced from my
+companions--alone, in the midst of England, on a frosty by-way leading
+whither I knew not, with a sleuth-hound at my heels, and never a friend
+but the holly-stick!
+
+We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes.  The branch to the left
+was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and dark.  Not a ray of moonlight
+penetrated its recesses; and I took it at a venture.  The wretch followed
+my example in silence; and for some time we crunched together over frozen
+pools without a word.  Then he found his voice, with a chuckle.
+
+'This is not the way to Mr. Merton's,' said he.
+
+'No?' said I. 'It is mine, however.'
+
+'And therefore mine,' said he.
+
+Again we fell silent; and we may thus have covered half a mile before the
+lane, taking a sudden turn, brought us forth again into the moonshine.
+With his hooded great-coat on his back, his valise in his hand, his black
+wig adjusted, and footing it on the ice with a sort of sober doggedness
+of manner, my enemy was changed almost beyond recognition: changed in
+everything but a certain dry, polemical, pedantic air, that spoke of a
+sedentary occupation and high stools.  I observed, too, that his valise
+was heavy; and, putting this and that together, hit upon a plan.
+
+'A seasonable night, sir,' said I.  'What do you say to a bit of running?
+The frost has me by the toes.'
+
+'With all the pleasure in life,' says he.
+
+His voice seemed well assured, which pleased me little.  However, there
+was nothing else to try, except violence, for which it would always be
+too soon.  I took to my heels accordingly, he after me; and for some time
+the slapping of our feet on the hard road might have been heard a mile
+away.  He had started a pace behind me, and he finished in the same
+position.  For all his extra years and the weight of his valise, he had
+not lost a hair's breadth.  The devil might race him for me--I had enough
+of it!
+
+And, besides, to run so fast was contrary to my interests.  We could not
+run long without arriving somewhere.  At any moment we might turn a
+corner and find ourselves at the lodge-gate of some Squire Merton, in the
+midst of a village whose constable was sober, or in the hands of a
+patrol.  There was no help for it--I must finish with him on the spot, as
+long as it was possible.  I looked about me, and the place seemed
+suitable; never a light, never a house--nothing but stubble-fields,
+fallows, and a few stunted trees.  I stopped and eyed him in the
+moonlight with an angry stare.
+
+'Enough of this foolery!' said I.
+
+He had tamed, and now faced me full, very pale, but with no sign of
+shrinking.
+
+'I am quite of your opinion,' said he.  'You have tried me at the
+running; you can try me next at the high jump.  It will be all the same.
+It must end the one way.'
+
+I made my holly whistle about my head.
+
+'I believe you know what way!' said I.  'We are alone, it is night, and I
+am wholly resolved.  Are you not frightened?'
+
+'No,' he said, 'not in the smallest.  I do not box, sir; but I am not a
+coward, as you may have supposed.  Perhaps it will simplify our relations
+if I tell you at the outset that I walk armed.'
+
+Quick as lightning I made a feint at his head; as quickly he gave ground,
+and at the same time I saw a pistol glitter in his hand.
+
+'No more of that, Mr. French-Prisoner!' he said.  'It will do me no good
+to have your death at my door.'
+
+'Faith, nor me either!' said I; and I lowered my stick and considered the
+man, not without a twinkle of admiration.  'You see,' I said, 'there is
+one consideration that you appear to overlook: there are a great many
+chances that your pistol may miss fire.'
+
+'I have a pair,' he returned.  'Never travel without a brace of barkers.'
+
+'I make you my compliment,' said I.  'You are able to take care of
+yourself, and that is a good trait.  But, my good man! let us look at
+this matter dispassionately.  You are not a coward, and no more am I; we
+are both men of excellent sense; I have good reason, whatever it may be,
+to keep my concerns to myself and to walk alone.  Now I put it to you
+pointedly, am I likely to stand it?  Am I likely to put up with your
+continued and--excuse me--highly impudent _ingerence_ into my private
+affairs?'
+
+'Another French word,' says he composedly.
+
+'Oh! damn your French words!' cried I.  'You seem to be a Frenchman
+yourself!'
+
+'I have had many opportunities by which I have profited,' he explained.
+'Few men are better acquainted with the similarities and differences,
+whether of idiom or accent, of the two languages.'
+
+'You are a pompous fellow, too!' said I.
+
+'Oh, I can make distinctions, sir,' says he.  'I can talk with
+Bedfordshire peasants; and I can express myself becomingly, I hope, in
+the company of a gentleman of education like yourself.'
+
+'If you set up to be a gentleman--' I began.
+
+'Pardon me,' he interrupted: 'I make no such claim.  I only see the
+nobility and gentry in the way of business.  I am quite a plain person.'
+
+'For the Lord's sake,' I exclaimed, 'set my mind at rest upon one point.
+In the name of mystery, who and what are you?'
+
+'I have no cause to be ashamed of my name, sir,' said he, 'nor yet my
+trade.  I am Thomas Dudgeon, at your service, clerk to Mr. Daniel
+Romaine, solicitor of London; High Holborn is our address, sir.'
+
+It was only by the ecstasy of the relief that I knew how horribly I had
+been frightened.  I flung my stick on the road.
+
+'Romaine?' I cried.  'Daniel Romaine?  An old hunks with a red face and a
+big head, and got up like a Quaker?  My dear friend, to my arms!'
+
+'Keep back, I say!' said Dudgeon weakly.
+
+I would not listen to him.  With the end of my own alarm, I felt as if I
+must infallibly be at the end of all dangers likewise; as if the pistol
+that he held in one hand were no more to be feared than the valise that
+he carried with the other, and now put up like a barrier against my
+advance.
+
+'Keep back, or I declare I will fire,' he was crying.  'Have a care, for
+God's sake!  My pistol--'
+
+He might scream as be pleased.  Willy nilly, I folded him to my breast, I
+pressed him there, I kissed his ugly mug as it had never been kissed
+before and would never be kissed again; and in the doing so knocked his
+wig awry and his hat off.  He bleated in my embrace; so bleats the sheep
+in the arms of the butcher.  The whole thing, on looking back, appears
+incomparably reckless and absurd; I no better than a madman for offering
+to advance on Dudgeon, and he no better than a fool for not shooting me
+while I was about it.  But all's well that ends well; or, as the people
+in these days kept singing and whistling on the streets:--
+
+    'There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft
+    And looks out for the life of poor Jack.'
+
+'There!' said I, releasing him a little, but still keeping my hands on
+his shoulders, '_je vous ai bel et bien embrasse_--and, as you would say,
+there is another French word.'  With his wig over one eye, he looked
+incredibly rueful and put out.  'Cheer up, Dudgeon; the ordeal is over,
+you shall be embraced no more.  But do, first of all, for God's-sake, put
+away your pistol; you handle it as if you were a cockatrice; some time or
+other, depend upon it, it will certainly go off.  Here is your hat.  No,
+let me put it on square, and the wig before it.  Never suffer any stress
+of circumstances to come between you and the duty you owe to yourself.
+If you have nobody else to dress for, dress for God!
+
+    'Put your wig straight
+    On your bald pate,
+    Keep your chin scraped,
+    And your figure draped.
+
+Can you match me that?  The whole duty of man in a quatrain!  And remark,
+I do not set up to be a professional bard; these are the outpourings of a
+_dilettante_.'
+
+'But, my dear sir!' he exclaimed.
+
+'But, my dear sir!' I echoed, 'I will allow no man to interrupt the flow
+of my ideas.  Give me your opinion on my quatrain, or I vow we shall have
+a quarrel of it.'
+
+'Certainly you are quite an original,' he said.
+
+'Quite,' said I; 'and I believe I have my counterpart before me.'
+
+'Well, for a choice,' says he, smiling, 'and whether for sense or poetry,
+give me
+
+    '"Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow:
+    The rest is all but leather and prunello."'
+
+'Oh, but that's not fair--that's Pope!  It's not original, Dudgeon.
+Understand me,' said I, wringing his breast-button, 'the first duty of
+all poetry is to be mine, sir--mine.  Inspiration now swells in my bosom,
+because--to tell you the plain truth, and descend a little in style--I am
+devilish relieved at the turn things have taken.  So, I dare say, are you
+yourself, Dudgeon, if you would only allow it.  And _a propos_, let me
+ask you a home question.  Between friends, have you ever fired that
+pistol?'
+
+'Why, yes, sir,' he replied.  'Twice--at hedgesparrows.'
+
+'And you would have fired at me, you bloody-minded man?' I cried.
+
+'If you go to that, you seemed mighty reckless with your stick,' said
+Dudgeon.
+
+'Did I indeed?  Well, well, 'tis all past history; ancient as King
+Pharamond--which is another French word, if you cared to accumulate more
+evidence,' says I.  'But happily we are now the best of friends, and have
+all our interests in common.'
+
+'You go a little too fast, if you'll excuse me, Mr. ---: I do not know
+your name, that I am aware,' said Dudgeon.
+
+'No, to be sure!' said I.  'Never heard of it!'
+
+'A word of explanation--' he began.
+
+'No, Dudgeon!' I interrupted.  'Be practical; I know what you want, and
+the name of it is supper.  _Rien ne creuse comme l'emotion_.  I am hungry
+myself, and yet I am more accustomed to warlike palpitations than you,
+who are but a hunter of hedgesparrows.  Let me look at your face
+critically: your bill of fare is three slices of cold rare roast beef, a
+Welsh rabbit, a pot of stout, and a glass or two of sound tawny port, old
+in bottle--the right milk of Englishmen.'  Methought there seemed a
+brightening in his eye and a melting about his mouth at this enumeration.
+
+'The night is young,' I continued; 'not much past eleven, for a wager.
+Where can we find a good inn?  And remark that I say _good_, for the port
+must be up to the occasion--not a headache in a pipe of it.'
+
+'Really, sir,' he said, smiling a little, 'you have a way of carrying
+things--'
+
+'Will nothing make you stick to the subject?' I cried; 'you have the most
+irrelevant mind!  How do you expect to rise in your profession?  The
+inn?'
+
+'Well, I will say you are a facetious gentleman!' said he.  'You must
+have your way, I see.  We are not three miles from Bedford by this very
+road.'
+
+'Done!' cried I.  'Bedford be it!'
+
+I tucked his arm under mine, possessed myself of the valise, and walked
+him off unresisting.  Presently we came to an open piece of country lying
+a thought downhill.  The road was smooth and free of ice, the moonshine
+thin and bright over the meadows and the leafless trees.  I was now
+honestly done with the purgatory of the covered cart; I was close to my
+great-uncle's; I had no more fear of Mr. Dudgeon; which were all grounds
+enough for jollity.  And I was aware, besides, of us two as of a pair of
+tiny and solitary dolls under the vast frosty cupola of the midnight; the
+rooms decked, the moon burnished, the least of the stars lighted, the
+floor swept and waxed, and nothing wanting but for the band to strike up
+and the dancing to begin.  In the exhilaration of my heart I took the
+music on myself--
+
+    'Merrily danced the Quaker's wife,
+    And merrily danced the Quaker.'
+
+I broke into that animated and appropriate air, clapped my arm about
+Dudgeon's waist, and away down the hill at a dancing step!  He hung back
+a little at the start, but the impulse of the tune, the night, and my
+example, were not to be resisted.  A man made of putty must have danced,
+and even Dudgeon showed himself to be a human being.  Higher and higher
+were the capers that we cut; the moon repeated in shadow our antic
+footsteps and gestures; and it came over my mind of a sudden--really like
+balm--what appearance of man I was dancing with, what a long bilious
+countenance he had shown under his shaven pate, and what a world of
+trouble the rascal had given me in the immediate past.
+
+Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.  My Puritanic companion
+stopped and disengaged himself.
+
+'This is a trifle _infra dig._, sir, is it not?' said he.  'A party might
+suppose we had been drinking.'
+
+'And so you shall be, Dudgeon,' said I.  'You shall not only be drinking,
+you old hypocrite, but you shall be drunk--dead drunk, sir--and the boots
+shall put you to bed!  We'll warn him when we go in.  Never neglect a
+precaution; never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day!'
+
+But he had no more frivolity to complain of.  We finished our stage and
+came to the inn-door with decorum, to find the house still alight and in
+a bustle with many late arrivals; to give our orders with a prompt
+severity which ensured obedience, and to be served soon after at a
+side-table, close to the fire and in a blaze of candle-light, with such a
+meal as I had been dreaming of for days past.  For days, you are to
+remember, I had been skulking in the covered cart, a prey to cold,
+hunger, and an accumulation of discomforts that might have daunted the
+most brave; and the white table napery, the bright crystal, the
+reverberation of the fire, the red curtains, the Turkey carpet, the
+portraits on the coffee-room wall, the placid faces of the two or three
+late guests who were silently prolonging the pleasures of digestion, and
+(last, but not by any means least) a glass of an excellent light dry
+port, put me in a humour only to be described as heavenly.  The thought
+of the Colonel, of how he would have enjoyed this snug room and roaring
+fire, and of his cold grave in the wood by Market Bosworth, lingered on
+my palate, _amari aliquid_, like an after-taste, but was not able--I say
+it with shame--entirely to dispel my self-complacency.  After all, in
+this world every dog hangs by its own tail.  I was a free adventurer, who
+had just brought to a successful end--or, at least, within view of it--an
+adventure very difficult and alarming; and I looked across at Mr.
+Dudgeon, as the port rose to his cheeks, and a smile, that was
+semi-confidential and a trifle foolish, began to play upon his leathery
+features, not only with composure, but with a suspicion of kindness.  The
+rascal had been brave, a quality for which I would value the devil; and
+if he had been pertinacious in the beginning, he had more than made up
+for it before the end.
+
+'And now, Dudgeon, to explain,' I began.  'I know your master, he knows
+me, and he knows and approves of my errand.  So much I may tell you, that
+I am on my way to Amersham Place.'
+
+'Oho!' quoth Dudgeon, 'I begin to see.'
+
+'I am heartily glad of it,' said I, passing the bottle, 'because that is
+about all I can tell you.  You must take my word for the remainder.
+Either believe me or don't.  If you don't, let's take a chaise; you can
+carry me to-morrow to High Holborn, and confront me with Mr. Romaine; the
+result of which will be to set your mind at rest--and to make the holiest
+disorder in your master's plans.  If I judge you aright (for I find you a
+shrewd fellow), this will not be at all to your mind.  You know what a
+subordinate gets by officiousness; if I can trust my memory, old Romaine
+has not at all the face that I should care to see in anger; and I venture
+to predict surprising results upon your weekly salary--if you are paid by
+the week, that is.  In short, let me go free, and 'tis an end of the
+matter; take me to London, and 'tis only a beginning--and, by my opinion,
+a beginning of troubles.  You can take your choice.'
+
+'And that is soon taken,' said he.  'Go to Amersham tomorrow, or go to
+the devil if you prefer--I wash my hands of you and the whole
+transaction.  No, you don't find me putting my head in between Romaine
+and a client!  A good man of business, sir, but hard as millstone grit.
+I might get the sack, and I shouldn't wonder!  But, it's a pity, too,' he
+added, and sighed, shook his head, and took his glass off sadly.
+
+'That reminds me,' said I.  'I have a great curiosity, and you can
+satisfy it.  Why were you so forward to meddle with poor Mr. Dubois?  Why
+did you transfer your attentions to me?  And generally, what induced you
+to make yourself such a nuisance?'
+
+He blushed deeply.
+
+'Why, sir,' says he, 'there is such a thing as patriotism, I hope.'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI--THE HOME-COMING OF MR. ROWLEY'S VISCOUNT
+
+
+By eight the next morning Dudgeon and I had made our parting.  By that
+time we had grown to be extremely familiar; and I would very willingly
+have kept him by me, and even carried him to Amersham Place.  But it
+appeared he was due at the public-house where we had met, on some affairs
+of my great-uncle the Count, who had an outlying estate in that part of
+the shire.  If Dudgeon had had his way the night before, I should have
+been arrested on my uncle's land and by my uncle's agent, a culmination
+of ill-luck.
+
+A little after noon I started, in a hired chaise, by way of Dunstable.
+The mere mention of the name Amersham Place made every one supple and
+smiling.  It was plainly a great house, and my uncle lived there in
+style.  The fame of it rose as we approached, like a chain of mountains;
+at Bedford they touched their caps, but in Dunstable they crawled upon
+their bellies.  I thought the landlady would have kissed me; such a
+flutter of cordiality, such smiles, such affectionate attentions were
+called forth, and the good lady bustled on my service in such a pother of
+ringlets and with such a jingling of keys.  'You're probably expected,
+sir, at the Place?  I do trust you may 'ave better accounts of his
+lordship's 'elth, sir.  We understood that his lordship, Mosha de
+Carwell, was main bad.  Ha, sir, we shall all feel his loss, poor, dear,
+noble gentleman; and I'm sure nobody more polite!  They do say, sir, his
+wealth is enormous, and before the Revolution, quite a prince in his own
+country!  But I beg your pardon, sir; 'ow I do run on, to be sure; and
+doubtless all beknown to you already!  For you do resemble the family,
+sir.  I should have known you anywheres by the likeness to the dear
+viscount.  Ha, poor gentleman, he must 'ave a 'eavy 'eart these days.'
+
+In the same place I saw out of the inn-windows a man-servant passing in
+the livery of my house, which you are to think I had never before seen
+worn, or not that I could remember.  I had often enough, indeed, pictured
+myself advanced to be a Marshal, a Duke of the Empire, a Grand Cross of
+the Legion of Honour, and some other kickshaws of the kind, with a
+perfect rout of flunkeys correctly dressed in my own colours.  But it is
+one thing to imagine, and another to see; it would be one thing to have
+these liveries in a house of my own in Paris--it was quite another to
+find them flaunting in the heart of hostile England; and I fear I should
+have made a fool of myself, if the man had not been on the other side of
+the street, and I at a one-pane window.  There was something illusory in
+this transplantation of the wealth and honours of a family, a thing by
+its nature so deeply rooted in the soil; something ghostly in this sense
+of home-coming so far from home.
+
+From Dunstable I rolled away into a crescendo of similar impressions.
+There are certainly few things to be compared with these castles, or
+rather country seats, of the English nobility and gentry; nor anything at
+all to equal the servility of the population that dwells in their
+neighbourhood.  Though I was but driving in a hired chaise, word of my
+destination seemed to have gone abroad, and the women curtseyed and the
+men louted to me by the wayside.  As I came near, I began to appreciate
+the roots of this widespread respect.  The look of my uncle's park wall,
+even from the outside, had something of a princely character; and when I
+came in view of the house itself, a sort of madness of vicarious
+vain-glory struck me dumb and kept me staring.  It was about the size of
+the Tuileries.  It faced due north; and the last rays of the sun, that
+was setting like a red-hot shot amidst a tumultuous gathering of snow
+clouds, were reflected on the endless rows of windows.  A portico of
+Doric columns adorned the front, and would have done honour to a temple.
+The servant who received me at the door was civil to a fault--I had
+almost said, to offence; and the hall to which he admitted me through a
+pair of glass doors was warmed and already partly lighted by a liberal
+chimney heaped with the roots of beeches.
+
+'Vicomte Anne de St. Yves,' said I, in answer to the man's question;
+whereupon he bowed before me lower still, and stepping upon one side
+introduced me to the truly awful presence of the major-domo.  I have seen
+many dignitaries in my time, but none who quite equalled this eminent
+being; who was good enough to answer to the unassuming name of Dawson.
+From him I learned that my uncle was extremely low, a doctor in close
+attendance, Mr. Romaine expected at any moment, and that my cousin, the
+Vicomte de St. Yves, had been sent for the same morning.
+
+'It was a sudden seizure, then?' I asked.
+
+Well, he would scarcely go as far as that.  It was a decline, a fading
+away, sir; but he was certainly took bad the day before, had sent for Mr.
+Romaine, and the major-domo had taken it on himself a little later to
+send word to the Viscount.  'It seemed to me, my lord,' said he, 'as if
+this was a time when all the fambly should be called together.'
+
+I approved him with my lips, but not in my heart.  Dawson was plainly in
+the interests of my cousin.
+
+'And when can I expect to see my great-uncle, the Count?' said I.
+
+In the evening, I was told; in the meantime he would show me to my room,
+which had been long prepared for me, and I should be expected to dine in
+about an hour with the doctor, if my lordship had no objections.
+
+My lordship had not the faintest.
+
+'At the same time,' I said, 'I have had an accident: I have unhappily
+lost my baggage, and am here in what I stand in.  I don't know if the
+doctor be a formalist, but it is quite impossible I should appear at
+table as I ought.'
+
+He begged me to be under no anxiety.  'We have been long expecting you,'
+said he.  'All is ready.'
+
+Such I found to be the truth.  A great room had been prepared for me;
+through the mullioned windows the last flicker of the winter sunset
+interchanged with the reverberation of a royal fire; the bed was open, a
+suit of evening clothes was airing before the blaze, and from the far
+corner a boy came forward with deprecatory smiles.  The dream in which I
+had been moving seemed to have reached its pitch.  I might have quitted
+this house and room only the night before; it was my own place that I had
+come to; and for the first time in my life I understood the force of the
+words home and welcome.
+
+'This will be all as you would want, sir?' said Mr. Dawson.  'This 'ere
+boy, Rowley, we place entirely at your disposition.  'E's not exactly a
+trained vallet, but Mossho Powl, the Viscount's gentleman, 'ave give him
+the benefick of a few lessons, and it is 'oped that he may give
+sitisfection.  Hanythink that you may require, if you will be so good as
+to mention the same to Rowley, I will make it my business myself, sir, to
+see you sitisfied.'
+
+So saying, the eminent and already detested Mr. Dawson took his
+departure, and I was left alone with Rowley.  A man who may be said to
+have wakened to consciousness in the prison of the Abbaye, among those
+ever graceful and ever tragic figures of the brave and fair, awaiting the
+hour of the guillotine and denuded of every comfort, I had never known
+the luxuries or the amenities of my rank in life.  To be attended on by
+servants I had only been accustomed to in inns.  My toilet had long been
+military, to a moment, at the note of a bugle, too often at a ditch-side.
+And it need not be wondered at if I looked on my new valet with a certain
+diffidence.  But I remembered that if he was my first experience of a
+valet, I was his first trial as a master.  Cheered by which
+consideration, I demanded my bath in a style of good assurance.  There
+was a bathroom contiguous; in an incredibly short space of time the hot
+water was ready; and soon after, arrayed in a shawl dressing-gown, and in
+a luxury of contentment and comfort, I was reclined in an easy-chair
+before the mirror, while Rowley, with a mixture of pride and anxiety
+which I could well understand, laid out his razors.
+
+'Hey, Rowley?' I asked, not quite resigned to go under fire with such an
+inexperienced commander.  'It's all right, is it?  You feel pretty sure
+of your weapons?'
+
+'Yes, my lord,' he replied.  'It's all right, I assure your lordship.'
+
+'I beg your pardon, Mr. Rowley, 'but for the sake of shortness, would you
+mind not belording me in private?' said I.  'It will do very well if you
+call me Mr. Anne.  It is the way of my country, as I dare say you know.'
+
+Mr. Rowley looked blank.
+
+'But you're just as much a Viscount as Mr. Powl's, are you not?' he said.
+
+'As Mr. Powl's Viscount?' said I, laughing.  'Oh, keep your mind easy,
+Mr. Rowley's is every bit as good.  Only, you see, as I am of the younger
+line, I bear my Christian name along with the title.  Alain is the
+_Viscount_; I am the _Viscount Anne_.  And in giving me the name of Mr.
+Anne, I assure you you will be quite regular.'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said the docile youth.  'But about the shaving, sir, you
+need be under no alarm.  Mr. Powl says I 'ave excellent dispositions.'
+
+'Mr. Powl?' said I.  'That doesn't seem to me very like a French name.'
+
+'No, sir, indeed, my lord,' said he, with a burst of confidence.  'No,
+indeed, Mr. Anne, and it do not surely.  I should say now, it was more
+like Mr. Pole.'
+
+'And Mr. Powl is the Viscount's man?'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said he.  'He 'ave a hard billet, he do.  The Viscount
+is a very particular gentleman.  I don't think as you'll be, Mr. Anne?'
+he added, with a confidential smile in the mirror.
+
+He was about sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry, freckled face,
+and a pair of dancing eyes.  There was an air at once deprecatory and
+insinuating about the rascal that I thought I recognised.  There came to
+me from my own boyhood memories of certain passionate admirations long
+passed away, and the objects of them long ago discredited or dead.  I
+remembered how anxious I had been to serve those fleeting heroes, how
+readily I told myself I would have died for _them_, how much greater and
+handsomer than life they had appeared.  And looking in the mirror, it
+seemed to me that I read the face of Rowley, like an echo or a ghost, by
+the light of my own youth.  I have always contended (somewhat against the
+opinion of my friends) that I am first of all an economist; and the last
+thing that I would care to throw away is that very valuable piece of
+property--a boy's hero-worship.
+
+'Why,' said I, 'you shave like an angel, Mr. Rowley!'
+
+'Thank you, my lord,' says he.  'Mr. Powl had no fear of me. You may be
+sure, sir, I should never 'ave had this berth if I 'adn't 'ave been up to
+Dick.  We been expecting of you this month back.  My eye!  I never see
+such preparations.  Every day the fires has been kep' up, the bed made,
+and all!  As soon as it was known you were coming, sir, I got the
+appointment; and I've been up and down since then like a Jack-in-the-box.
+A wheel couldn't sound in the avenue but what I was at the window!  I've
+had a many disappointments; but to-night, as soon as you stepped out of
+the shay, I knew it was my--it was you.  Oh, you had been expected!  Why,
+when I go down to supper, I'll be the 'ero of the servants' 'all: the
+'ole of the staff is that curious!'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I hope you may be able to give a fair account of
+me--sober, steady, industrious, good-tempered, and with a first-rate
+character from my last place?'
+
+He laughed an embarrassed laugh.  'Your hair curls beautiful,' he said,
+by way of changing the subject.  'The Viscount's the boy for curls,
+though; and the richness of it is, Mr. Powl tells me his don't curl no
+more than that much twine--by nature.  Gettin' old, the Viscount is.  He
+'_ave_ gone the pace, 'aven't 'e, sir?'
+
+'The fact is,' said I, 'that I know very little about him.  Our family
+has been much divided, and I have been a soldier from a child.'
+
+'A soldier, Mr. Anne, sir?' cried Rowley, with a sudden feverish
+animation.  'Was you ever wounded?'
+
+It is contrary to my principles to discourage admiration for myself; and,
+slipping back the shoulder of the dressing-gown, I silently exhibited the
+scar which I had received in Edinburgh Castle.  He looked at it with awe.
+
+'Ah, well!' he continued, 'there's where the difference comes in!  It's
+in the training.  The other Viscount have been horse-racing, and dicing,
+and carrying on all his life.  All right enough, no doubt; but what I do
+say is, that it don't lead to nothink.  Whereas--'
+
+'Whereas Mr. Rowley's?' I put in.
+
+'My Viscount?' said he.  'Well, sir, I _did_ say it; and now that I've
+seen you, I say it again!'
+
+I could not refrain from smiling at this outburst, and the rascal caught
+me in the mirror and smiled to me again.
+
+'I'd say it again, Mr. Hanne,' he said.  'I know which side my bread's
+buttered.  I know when a gen'leman's a gen'leman.  Mr. Powl can go to
+Putney with his one!  Beg your pardon, Mr. Anne, for being so familiar,'
+said he, blushing suddenly scarlet.  'I was especially warned against it
+by Mr. Powl.'
+
+'Discipline before all,' said I.  'Follow your front-rank man.
+
+With that, we began to turn our attention to the clothes.  I was amazed
+to find them fit so well: not _a la diable_, in the haphazard manner of a
+soldier's uniform or a ready-made suit; but with nicety, as a trained
+artist might rejoice to make them for a favourite subject.
+
+''Tis extraordinary,' cried I: 'these things fit me perfectly.'
+
+'Indeed, Mr. Anne, you two be very much of a shape,' said Rowley.
+
+'Who?  What two?' said I.
+
+'The Viscount,' he said.
+
+'Damnation!  Have I the man's clothes on me, too?' cried I.
+
+But Rowley hastened to reassure me.  On the first word of my coming, the
+Count had put the matter of my wardrobe in the hands of his own and my
+cousin's tailors; and on the rumour of our resemblance, my clothes had
+been made to Alain's measure.
+
+'But they were all made for you express, Mr. Anne.  You may be certain
+the Count would never do nothing by 'alf: fires kep' burning; the finest
+of clothes ordered, I'm sure, and a body-servant being trained
+a-purpose.'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'it's a good fire, and a good set-out of clothes; and
+what a valet, Mr. Rowley!  And there's one thing to be said for my
+cousin--I mean for Mr. Powl's Viscount--he has a very fair figure.'
+
+'Oh, don't you be took in, Mr. Anne,' quoth the faithless Rowley: 'he has
+to be hyked into a pair of stays to get them things on!'
+
+'Come, come, Mr. Rowley,' said I, 'this is telling tales out of school!
+Do not you be deceived.  The greatest men of antiquity, including Caesar
+and Hannibal and Pope Joan, may have been very glad, at my time of life
+or Alain's, to follow his example.  'Tis a misfortune common to all; and
+really,' said I, bowing to myself before the mirror like one who should
+dance the minuet, 'when the result is so successful as this, who would do
+anything but applaud?'
+
+My toilet concluded, I marched on to fresh surprises.  My chamber, my new
+valet and my new clothes had been beyond hope: the dinner, the soup, the
+whole bill of fare was a revelation of the powers there are in man.  I
+had not supposed it lay in the genius of any cook to create, out of
+common beef and mutton, things so different and dainty.  The wine was of
+a piece, the doctor a most agreeable companion; nor could I help
+reflecting on the prospect that all this wealth, comfort and handsome
+profusion might still very possibly become mine.  Here were a change
+indeed, from the common soldier and the camp kettle, the prisoner and his
+prison rations, the fugitive and the horrors of the covered cart!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII--THE DESPATCH-BOX
+
+
+The doctor had scarce finished his meal before he hastened with an
+apology to attend upon his patient; and almost immediately after I was
+myself summoned and ushered up the great staircase and along interminable
+corridors to the bedside of my great-uncle the Count.  You are to think
+that up to the present moment I had not set eyes on this formidable
+personage, only on the evidences of his wealth and kindness.  You are to
+think besides that I had heard him miscalled and abused from my earliest
+childhood up.  The first of the _emigres_ could never expect a good word
+in the society in which my father moved.  Even yet the reports I received
+were of a doubtful nature; even Romaine had drawn of him no very amiable
+portrait; and as I was ushered into the room, it was a critical eye that
+I cast on my great-uncle.  He lay propped on pillows in a little cot no
+greater than a camp-bed, not visibly breathing.  He was about eighty
+years of age, and looked it; not that his face was much lined, but all
+the blood and colour seemed to have faded from his body, and even his
+eyes, which last he kept usually closed as though the light distressed
+him.  There was an unspeakable degree of slyness in his expression, which
+kept me ill at ease; he seemed to lie there with his arms folded, like a
+spider waiting for prey.  His speech was very deliberate and courteous,
+but scarce louder than a sigh.
+
+'I bid you welcome, _Monsieur le Vicomte Anne_,' said he, looking at me
+hard with his pale eyes, but not moving on his pillows.  'I have sent for
+you, and I thank you for the obliging expedition you have shown.  It is
+my misfortune that I cannot rise to receive you.  I trust you have been
+reasonably well entertained?'
+
+'_Monsieur mon oncle_,' I said, bowing very low, 'I am come at the
+summons of the head of my family.'
+
+'It is well,' he said.  'Be seated.  I should be glad to hear some
+news--if that can be called news that is already twenty years old--of how
+I have the pleasure to see you here.'
+
+By the coldness of his address, not more than by the nature of the times
+that he bade me recall, I was plunged in melancholy.  I felt myself
+surrounded as with deserts of friendlessness, and the delight of my
+welcome was turned to ashes in my mouth.
+
+'That is soon told, _monseigneur_,' said I.  'I understand that I need
+tell you nothing of the end of my unhappy parents?  It is only the story
+of the lost dog.'
+
+'You are right.  I am sufficiently informed of that deplorable affair; it
+is painful to me.  My nephew, your father, was a man who would not be
+advised,' said he.  'Tell me, if you please, simply of yourself.'
+
+'I am afraid I must run the risk of harrowing your sensibility in the
+beginning,' said I, with a bitter smile, 'because my story begins at the
+foot of the guillotine.  When the list came out that night, and her name
+was there, I was already old enough, not in years but in sad experience,
+to understand the extent of my misfortune.  She--'  I paused.  'Enough
+that she arranged with a friend, Madame de Chasserades, that she should
+take charge of me, and by the favour of our jailers I was suffered to
+remain in the shelter of the _Abbaye_.  That was my only refuge; there
+was no corner of France that I could rest the sole of my foot upon except
+the prison.  Monsieur le Comte, you are as well aware as I can be what
+kind of a life that was, and how swiftly death smote in that society.  I
+did not wait long before the name of Madame de Chasserades succeeded to
+that of my mother on the list.  She passed me on to Madame de Noytot;
+she, in her turn, to Mademoiselle de Braye; and there were others.  I was
+the one thing permanent; they were all transient as clouds; a day or two
+of their care, and then came the last farewell and--somewhere far off in
+that roaring Paris that surrounded us--the bloody scene.  I was the
+cherished one, the last comfort, of these dying women.  I have been in
+pitched fights, my lord, and I never knew such courage.  It was all done
+smiling, in the tone of good society; _belle maman_ was the name I was
+taught to give to each; and for a day or two the new "pretty mamma" would
+make much of me, show me off, teach me the minuet, and to say my prayers;
+and then, with a tender embrace, would go the way of her predecessors,
+smiling.  There were some that wept too.  There was a childhood!  All the
+time Monsieur de Culemberg kept his eye on me, and would have had me out
+of the _Abbaye_ and in his own protection, but my "pretty mammas" one
+after another resisted the idea.  Where could I be safer? they argued;
+and what was to become of them without the darling of the prison?  Well,
+it was soon shown how safe I was!  The dreadful day of the massacre came;
+the prison was overrun; none paid attention to me, not even the last of
+my "pretty mammas," for she had met another fate.  I was wandering
+distracted, when I was found by some one in the interests of Monsieur de
+Culemberg.  I understand he was sent on purpose; I believe, in order to
+reach the interior of the prison, he had set his hand to nameless
+barbarities: such was the price paid for my worthless, whimpering little
+life!  He gave me his hand; it was wet, and mine was reddened; he led me
+unresisting.  I remember but the one circumstance of my flight--it was my
+last view of my last pretty mamma.  Shall I describe it to you?' I asked
+the Count, with a sudden fierceness.
+
+'Avoid unpleasant details,' observed my great-uncle gently.
+
+At these words a sudden peace fell upon me.  I had been angry with the
+man before; I had not sought to spare him; and now, in a moment, I saw
+that there was nothing to spare.  Whether from natural heartlessness or
+extreme old age, the soul was not at home; and my benefactor, who had
+kept the fire lit in my room for a month past--my only relative except
+Alain, whom I knew already to be a hired spy--had trodden out the last
+sparks of hope and interest.
+
+'Certainly,' said I; 'and, indeed, the day for them is nearly over.  I
+was taken to Monsieur de Culemberg's,--I presume, sir, that you know the
+Abbe de Culemberg?'
+
+He indicated assent without opening his eyes.
+
+'He was a very brave and a very learned man--'
+
+'And a very holy one,' said my uncle civilly.
+
+'And a very holy one, as you observe,' I continued.  'He did an infinity
+of good, and through all the Terror kept himself from the guillotine.  He
+brought me up, and gave me such education as I have.  It was in his house
+in the country at Dammarie, near Melun, that I made the acquaintance of
+your agent, Mr. Vicary, who lay there in hiding, only to fall a victim at
+the last to a gang of _chauffeurs_.'
+
+'That poor Mr. Vicary!' observed my uncle.  'He had been many times in my
+interests to France, and this was his first failure.  _Quel charmant
+homme_, _n'est-ce pas_?'
+
+'Infinitely so,' said I.  'But I would not willingly detain you any
+further with a story, the details of which it must naturally be more or
+less unpleasant for you to hear.  Suffice it that, by M. de Culemberg's
+own advice, I said farewell at eighteen to that kind preceptor and his
+books, and entered the service of France; and have since then carried
+arms in such a manner as not to disgrace my family.'
+
+'You narrate well; _vous aves la voix chaude_,' said my uncle, turning on
+his pillows as if to study me.  'I have a very good account of you by
+Monsieur de Mauseant, whom you helped in Spain.  And you had some
+education from the Abbe de Culemberg, a man of a good house?  Yes, you
+will do very well.  You have a good manner and a handsome person, which
+hurts nothing.  We are all handsome in the family; even I myself, I have
+had my successes, the memories of which still charm me.  It is my
+intention, my nephew, to make of you my heir.  I am not very well content
+with my other nephew, Monsieur le Vicomte: he has not been respectful,
+which is the flattery due to age.  And there are other matters.'
+
+I was half tempted to throw back in his face that inheritance so coldly
+offered.  At the same time I had to consider that he was an old man, and,
+after all, my relation; and that I was a poor one, in considerable
+straits, with a hope at heart which that inheritance might yet enable me
+to realise.  Nor could I forget that, however icy his manners, he had
+behaved to me from the first with the extreme of liberality and--I was
+about to write, kindness, but the word, in that connection, would not
+come.  I really owed the man some measure of gratitude, which it would be
+an ill manner to repay if I were to insult him on his deathbed.
+
+'Your will, monsieur, must ever be my rule,' said I, bowing.
+
+'You have wit, _monsieur mon neveu_,' said he, 'the best wit--the wit of
+silence.  Many might have deafened me with their gratitude.  Gratitude!'
+he repeated, with a peculiar intonation, and lay and smiled to himself.
+'But to approach what is more important.  As a prisoner of war, will it
+be possible for you to be served heir to English estates?  I have no
+idea: long as I have dwelt in England, I have never studied what they
+call their laws.  On the other hand, how if Romaine should come too late?
+I have two pieces of business to be transacted--to die, and to make my
+will; and, however desirous I may be to serve you, I cannot postpone the
+first in favour of the second beyond a very few hours.'
+
+'Well, sir, I must then contrive to be doing as I did before,' said I.
+
+'Not so,' said the Count.  'I have an alternative.  I have just drawn my
+balance at my banker's, a considerable sum, and I am now to place it in
+your hands.  It will be so much for you and so much less--' he paused,
+and smiled with an air of malignity that surprised me.  'But it is
+necessary it should be done before witnesses.  _Monsieur le Vicomte_ is
+of a particular disposition, and an unwitnessed donation may very easily
+be twisted into a theft.'
+
+He touched a bell, which was answered by a man having the appearance of a
+confidential valet.  To him he gave a key.
+
+'Bring me the despatch-box that came yesterday, La Ferriere,' said he.
+'You will at the same time present my compliments to Dr. Hunter and M.
+l'Abbe, and request them to step for a few moments to my room.'
+
+The despatch-box proved to be rather a bulky piece of baggage, covered
+with Russia leather.  Before the doctor and an excellent old smiling
+priest it was passed over into my hands with a very clear statement of
+the disposer's wishes; immediately after which, though the witnesses
+remained behind to draw up and sign a joint note of the transaction,
+Monsieur de Keroual dismissed me to my own room, La Ferriere following
+with the invaluable box.
+
+At my chamber door I took it from him with thanks, and entered alone.
+Everything had been already disposed for the night, the curtains drawn
+and the fire trimmed; and Rowley was still busy with my bedclothes.  He
+turned round as I entered with a look of welcome that did my heart good.
+Indeed, I had never a much greater need of human sympathy, however
+trivial, than at that moment when I held a fortune in my arms.  In my
+uncle's room I had breathed the very atmosphere of disenchantment.  He
+had gorged my pockets; he had starved every dignified or affectionate
+sentiment of a man.  I had received so chilling an impression of age and
+experience that the mere look of youth drew me to confide in Rowley: he
+was only a boy, his heart must beat yet, he must still retain some
+innocence and natural feelings, he could blurt out follies with his
+mouth, he was not a machine to utter perfect speech!  At the same time, I
+was beginning to outgrow the painful impressions of my interview; my
+spirits were beginning to revive; and at the jolly, empty looks of Mr.
+Rowley, as he ran forward to relieve me of the box, St. Ives became
+himself again.
+
+'Now, Rowley, don't be in a hurry,' said I.  'This is a momentous
+juncture.  Man and boy, you have been in my service about three hours.
+You must already have observed that I am a gentleman of a somewhat morose
+disposition, and there is nothing that I more dislike than the smallest
+appearance of familiarity.  Mr. Pole or Mr. Powl, probably in the spirit
+of prophecy, warned you against this danger.'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said Rowley blankly.
+
+'Now there has just arisen one of those rare cases, in which I am willing
+to depart from my principles.  My uncle has given me a box--what you
+would call a Christmas box.  I don't know what's in it, and no more do
+you: perhaps I am an April fool, or perhaps I am already enormously
+wealthy; there might be five hundred pounds in this apparently harmless
+receptacle!'
+
+'Lord, Mr. Anne!' cried Rowley.
+
+'Now, Rowley, hold up your right hand and repeat the words of the oath
+after me,' said I, laying the despatch-box on the table.  'Strike me blue
+if I ever disclose to Mr. Powl, or Mr. Powl's Viscount, or anything that
+is Mr. Powl's, not to mention Mr. Dawson and the doctor, the treasures of
+the following despatch-box; and strike me sky-blue scarlet if I do not
+continually maintain, uphold, love, honour and obey, serve, and follow to
+the four corners of the earth and the waters that are under the earth,
+the hereinafter before-mentioned (only that I find I have neglected to
+mention him) Viscount Anne de Keroual de St.-Yves, commonly known as Mr.
+Rowley's Viscount.  So be it.  Amen.'
+
+He took the oath with the same exaggerated seriousness as I gave it to
+him.
+
+'Now,' said I.  'Here is the key for you; I will hold the lid with both
+hands in the meanwhile.'  He turned the key.  'Bring up all the candles
+in the room, and range them along-side.  What is it to be?  A live
+gorgon, a Jack-in-the-box, or a spring that fires a pistol?  On your
+knees, sir, before the prodigy!'
+
+So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the table.  At
+sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay in front of us, between
+the candles, or rolled upon the floor alongside, I stood astonished.
+
+'O Lord!' cried Mr. Rowley; 'oh Lordy, Lordy, Lord!' and he scrambled
+after the fallen guineas.  'O my, Mr. Anne! what a sight o' money!  Why,
+it's like a blessed story-book.  It's like the Forty Thieves.'
+
+'Now Rowley, let's be cool, let's be businesslike,' said I.  'Riches are
+deceitful, particularly when you haven't counted them; and the first
+thing we have to do is to arrive at the amount of my--let me say, modest
+competency.  If I'm not mistaken, I have enough here to keep you in gold
+buttons all the rest of your life.  You collect the gold, and I'll take
+the paper.'
+
+Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for some time
+there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the jingling of guineas,
+broken occasionally by the exulting exclamations of Rowley.  The
+arithmetical operation on which we were embarked took long, and it might
+have been tedious to others; not to me nor to my helper.
+
+'Ten thousand pounds!' I announced at last.
+
+'Ten thousand!' echoed Mr. Rowley.
+
+And we gazed upon each other.
+
+The greatness of this fortune took my breath away.  With that sum in my
+hands, I need fear no enemies.  People are arrested, in nine cases out of
+ten, not because the police are astute, but because they themselves run
+short of money; and I had here before me in the despatch-box a succession
+of devices and disguises that insured my liberty.  Not only so; but, as I
+felt with a sudden and overpowering thrill, with ten thousand pounds in
+my hands I was become an eligible suitor.  What advances I had made in
+the past, as a private soldier in a military prison, or a fugitive by the
+wayside, could only be qualified or, indeed, excused as acts of
+desperation.  And now, I might come in by the front door; I might
+approach the dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and rich settlements to
+offer.  The poor French prisoner, Champdivers, might be in a perpetual
+danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman, St.-Ives, in his
+post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side, could smile at fate and
+laugh at locksmiths.  I repeated the proverb, exulting, _Love laughs at
+locksmiths_!  In a moment, by the mere coming of this money, my love had
+become possible--it had come near, it was under my hand--and it may be by
+one of the curiosities of human nature, but it burned that instant
+brighter.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'your Viscount is a made man.'
+
+'Why, we both are, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+'Yes, both,' said I; 'and you shall dance at the wedding;' and I flung at
+his head a bundle of bank notes, and had just followed it up with a
+handful of guineas, when the door opened, and Mr. Romaine appeared upon
+the threshold.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII--MR. ROMAINE CALLS ME NAMES
+
+
+Feeling very much of a fool to be thus taken by surprise, I scrambled to
+my feet and hastened to make my visitor welcome.  He did not refuse me
+his hand; but he gave it with a coldness and distance for which I was
+quite unprepared, and his countenance, as he looked on me, was marked in
+a strong degree with concern and severity.
+
+'So, sir, I find you here?' said he, in tones of little encouragement.
+'Is that you, George?  You can run away; I have business with your
+master.'
+
+He showed Rowley out, and locked the door behind him.  Then he sat down
+in an armchair on one side of the fire, and looked at me with
+uncompromising sternness.
+
+'I am hesitating how to begin,' said he.  'In this singular labyrinth of
+blunders and difficulties that you have prepared for us, I am positively
+hesitating where to begin.  It will perhaps be best that you should read,
+first of all, this paragraph.'  And he handed over to me a newspaper.
+
+The paragraph in question was brief.  It announced the recapture of one
+of the prisoners recently escaped from Edinburgh Castle; gave his name,
+Clausel, and added that he had entered into the particulars of the recent
+revolting murder in the Castle, and denounced the murderer:--
+
+    'It is a common soldier called Champdivers, who had himself escaped,
+    and is in all probability involved in the common fate of his
+    comrades.  In spite of the activity along all the Forth and the East
+    Coast, nothing has yet been seen of the sloop which these desperadoes
+    seized at Grangemouth, and it is now almost certain that they have
+    found a watery grave.'
+
+At the reading of this paragraph, my heart turned over.  In a moment I
+saw my castle in the air ruined; myself changed from a mere military
+fugitive into a hunted murderer, fleeing from the gallows; my love, which
+had a moment since appeared so near to me, blotted from the field of
+possibility.  Despair, which was my first sentiment, did not, however,
+endure for more than a moment.  I saw that my companions had indeed
+succeeded in their unlikely design; and that I was supposed to have
+accompanied and perished along with them by shipwreck--a most probable
+ending to their enterprise.  If they thought me at the bottom of the
+North Sea, I need not fear much vigilance on the streets of Edinburgh.
+Champdivers was wanted: what was to connect him with St. Ives?  Major
+Chevenix would recognise me if he met me; that was beyond bargaining: he
+had seen me so often, his interest had been kindled to so high a point,
+that I could hope to deceive him by no stratagem of disguise.  Well, even
+so; he would have a competition of testimony before him: he knew Clausel,
+he knew me, and I was sure he would decide for honour.  At the same time
+the image of Flora shot up in my mind's eye with such a radiancy as
+fairly overwhelmed all other considerations; the blood sprang to every
+corner of my body, and I vowed I would see and win her, if it cost my
+neck.
+
+'Very annoying, no doubt,' said I, as I returned the paper to Mr.
+Romaine.
+
+'Is annoying your word for it?' said he.
+
+'Exasperating, if you like,' I admitted.
+
+'And true?' he inquired.
+
+'Well, true in a sense,' said I.  'But perhaps I had better answer that
+question by putting you in possession of the facts?'
+
+'I think so, indeed,' said he.
+
+I narrated to him as much as seemed necessary of the quarrel, the duel,
+the death of Goguelat, and the character of Clausel.  He heard me through
+in a forbidding silence, nor did he at all betray the nature of his
+sentiments, except that, at the episode of the scissors, I could observe
+his mulberry face to turn three shades paler.
+
+'I suppose I may believe you?' said he, when I had done.
+
+'Or else conclude this interview,' said I.
+
+'Can you not understand that we are here discussing matters of the
+gravest import?  Can you not understand that I feel myself weighed with a
+load of responsibility on your account--that you should take this
+occasion to air your fire-eating manners against your own attorney?
+There are serious hours in life, Mr. Anne,' he said severely.  'A capital
+charge, and that of a very brutal character and with singularly
+unpleasant details; the presence of the man Clausel, who (according to
+your account of it) is actuated by sentiments of real malignity, and
+prepared to swear black white; all the other witnesses scattered and
+perhaps drowned at sea; the natural prejudice against a Frenchman and a
+runaway prisoner: this makes a serious total for your lawyer to consider,
+and is by no means lessened by the incurable folly and levity of your own
+disposition.'
+
+'I beg your pardon!' said I.
+
+'Oh, my expressions have been selected with scrupulous accuracy,' he
+replied.  'How did I find you, sir, when I came to announce this
+catastrophe?  You were sitting on the hearthrug playing, like a silly
+baby, with a servant, were you not, and the floor all scattered with gold
+and bank paper?  There was a tableau for you!  It was I who came, and you
+were lucky in that.  It might have been any one--your cousin as well as
+another.'
+
+'You have me there, sir,' I admitted.  'I had neglected all precautions,
+and you do right to be angry.  _Apropos_, Mr. Romaine, how did you come
+yourself, and how long have you been in the house?' I added, surprised,
+on the retrospect, not to have heard him arrive.
+
+'I drove up in a chaise and pair,' he returned.  'Any one might have
+heard me.  But you were not listening, I suppose? being so extremely at
+your ease in the very house of your enemy, and under a capital charge!
+And I have been long enough here to do your business for you.  Ah, yes, I
+did it, God forgive me!--did it before I so much as asked you the
+explanation of the paragraph.  For some time back the will has been
+prepared; now it is signed; and your uncle has heard nothing of your
+recent piece of activity.  Why?  Well, I had no fancy to bother him on
+his death-bed: you might be innocent; and at bottom I preferred the
+murderer to the spy.'
+
+No doubt of it but the man played a friendly part; no doubt also that, in
+his ill-temper and anxiety, he expressed himself unpalatably.
+
+'You will perhaps find me over delicate,' said I.  'There is a word you
+employed--'
+
+'I employ the words of my brief, sir,' he cried, striking with his hand
+on the newspaper.  'It is there in six letters.  And do not be so
+certain--you have not stood your trial yet.  It is an ugly affair, a
+fishy business.  It is highly disagreeable.  I would give my hand off--I
+mean I would give a hundred pound down, to have nothing to do with it.
+And, situated as we are, we must at once take action.  There is here no
+choice.  You must at once quit this country, and get to France, or
+Holland, or, indeed, to Madagascar.'
+
+'There may be two words to that,' said I.
+
+'Not so much as one syllable!' he retorted.  'Here is no room for
+argument.  The case is nakedly plain.  In the disgusting position in
+which you have found means to place yourself, all that is to be hoped for
+is delay.  A time may come when we shall be able to do better.  It cannot
+be now: now it would be the gibbet.'
+
+'You labour under a false impression, Mr. Romaine,' said I.  'I have no
+impatience to figure in the dock.  I am even as anxious as yourself to
+postpone my first appearance there.  On the other hand, I have not the
+slightest intention of leaving this country, where I please myself
+extremely.  I have a good address, a ready tongue, an English accent that
+passes, and, thanks to the generosity of my uncle, as much money as I
+want.  It would be hard indeed if, with all these advantages, Mr. St.
+Ives should not be able to live quietly in a private lodging, while the
+authorities amuse themselves by looking for Champdivers.  You forget,
+there is no connection between these two personages.'
+
+'And you forget your cousin,' retorted Romaine.  'There is the link.
+There is the tongue of the buckle.  He knows you are Champdivers.'  He
+put up his hand as if to listen.  'And, for a wager, here he is himself!'
+he exclaimed.
+
+As when a tailor takes a piece of goods upon his counter, and rends it
+across, there came to our ears from the avenue the long tearing sound of
+a chaise and four approaching at the top speed of the horses.  And,
+looking out between the curtains, we beheld the lamps skimming on the
+smooth ascent.
+
+'Ay,' said Romaine, wiping the window-pane that he might see more
+clearly.  'Ay, that is he by the driving!  So he squanders money along
+the king's highway, the triple idiot! gorging every man he meets with
+gold for the pleasure of arriving--where?  Ah, yes, where but a debtor's
+jail, if not a criminal prison!'
+
+'Is he that kind of a man?' I said, staring on these lamps as though I
+could decipher in them the secret of my cousin's character.
+
+'You will find him a dangerous kind,' answered the lawyer.  'For you,
+these are the lights on a lee shore!  I find I fall in a muse when I
+consider of him; what a formidable being he once was, and what a
+personable! and how near he draws to the moment that must break him
+utterly! we none of us like him here; we hate him, rather; and yet I have
+a sense--I don't think at my time of life it can be pity--but a
+reluctance rather, to break anything so big and figurative, as though he
+were a big porcelain pot or a big picture of high price.  Ay, there is
+what I was waiting for!' he cried, as the lights of a second chaise swam
+in sight.  'It is he beyond a doubt.  The first was the signature and the
+next the flourish.  Two chaises, the second following with the baggage,
+which is always copious and ponderous, and one of his valets: he cannot
+go a step without a valet.'
+
+'I hear you repeat the word big,' said I.  'But it cannot be that he is
+anything out of the way in stature.'
+
+'No,' said the attorney.  'About your height, as I guessed for the
+tailors, and I see nothing wrong with the result.  But, somehow, he
+commands an atmosphere; he has a spacious manner; and he has kept up, all
+through life, such a volume of racket about his personality, with his
+chaises and his racers and his dicings, and I know not what--that somehow
+he imposes!  It seems, when the farce is done, and he locked in Fleet
+prison--and nobody left but Buonaparte and Lord Wellington and the Hetman
+Platoff to make a work about--the world will be in a comparison quite
+tranquil.  But this is beside the mark,' he added, with an effort,
+turning again from the window.  'We are now under fire, Mr. Anne, as you
+soldiers would say, and it is high time we should prepare to go into
+action.  He must not see you; that would be fatal.  All that he knows at
+present is that you resemble him, and that is much more than enough.  If
+it were possible, it would be well he should not know you were in the
+house.'
+
+'Quite impossible, depend upon it,' said I.  'Some of the servants are
+directly in his interests, perhaps in his pay: Dawson, for an example.'
+
+'My own idea!' cried Romaine.  'And at least,' he added, as the first of
+the chaises drew up with a dash in front of the portico, 'it is now too
+late.  Here he is.'
+
+We stood listening, with a strange anxiety, to the various noises that
+awoke in the silent house: the sound of doors opening and closing, the
+sound of feet near at hand and farther off.  It was plain the arrival of
+my cousin was a matter of moment, almost of parade, to the household.
+And suddenly, out of this confused and distant bustle, a rapid and light
+tread became distinguishable.  We heard it come upstairs, draw near along
+the corridor, pause at the door, and a stealthy and hasty rapping
+succeeded.
+
+'Mr. Anne--Mr. Anne, sir!  Let me in!' said the voice of Rowley.
+
+We admitted the lad, and locked the door again behind him.
+
+'It's _him_, sir,' he panted.  'He've come.'
+
+'You mean the Viscount?' said I.  'So we supposed.  But come, Rowley--out
+with the rest of it!  You have more to tell us, or your face belies you!'
+
+'Mr. Anne, I do,' he said.  'Mr. Romaine, sir, you're a friend of his,
+ain't you?'
+
+'Yes, George, I am a friend of his,' said Romaine, and, to my great
+surprise, laid his hand upon my shoulder.
+
+'Well, it's this way,' said Rowley--'Mr. Powl have been at me!  It's to
+play the spy!  I thought he was at it from the first!  From the first I
+see what he was after--coming round and round, and hinting things!  But
+to-night he outs with it plump!  I'm to let him hear all what you're to
+do beforehand, he says; and he gave me this for an arnest'--holding up
+half a guinea; 'and I took it, so I did!  Strike me sky-blue scarlet?'
+says he, adducing the words of the mock oath; and he looked askance at me
+as he did so.
+
+I saw that he had forgotten himself, and that he knew it.  The expression
+of his eye changed almost in the passing of the glance from the
+significant to the appealing--from the look of an accomplice to that of a
+culprit; and from that moment he became the model of a well-drilled
+valet.
+
+'Sky-blue scarlet?' repeated the lawyer.  'Is the fool delirious?'
+
+'No,' said I; 'he is only reminding me of something.'
+
+'Well--and I believe the fellow will be faithful,' said Romaine.  'So you
+are a friend of Mr. Anne's' too?' he added to Rowley.
+
+'If you please, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+''Tis something sudden,' observed Romaine; 'but it may be genuine enough.
+I believe him to be honest.  He comes of honest people.  Well, George
+Rowley, you might embrace some early opportunity to earn that
+half-guinea, by telling Mr. Powl that your master will not leave here
+till noon to-morrow, if he go even then.  Tell him there are a hundred
+things to be done here, and a hundred more that can only be done properly
+at my office in Holborn.  Come to think of it--we had better see to that
+first of all,' he went on, unlocking the door.  'Get hold of Powl, and
+see.  And be quick back, and clear me up this mess.'
+
+Mr. Rowley was no sooner gone than the lawyer took a pinch of snuff, and
+regarded me with somewhat of a more genial expression.
+
+'Sir,' said he, 'it is very fortunate for you that your face is so strong
+a letter of recommendation.  Here am I, a tough old practitioner, mixing
+myself up with your very distressing business; and here is this farmer's
+lad, who has the wit to take a bribe and the loyalty to come and tell you
+of it--all, I take it, on the strength of your appearance.  I wish I
+could imagine how it would impress a jury!' says he.
+
+'And how it would affect the hangman, sir?' I asked
+
+'_Absit omen_!' said Mr. Romaine devoutly.
+
+We were just so far in our talk, when I heard a sound that brought my
+heart into my mouth: the sound of some one slyly trying the handle of the
+door.  It had been preceded by no audible footstep.  Since the departure
+of Rowley our wing of the house had been entirely silent.  And we had
+every right to suppose ourselves alone, and to conclude that the
+new-comer, whoever he might be, was come on a clandestine, if not a
+hostile, errand.
+
+'Who is there?' asked Romaine.
+
+'It's only me, sir,' said the soft voice of Dawson.  'It's the Viscount,
+sir.  He is very desirous to speak with you on business.'
+
+'Tell him I shall come shortly, Dawson,' said the lawyer.  'I am at
+present engaged.'
+
+'Thank you, sir!' said Dawson.
+
+And we heard his feet draw off slowly along the corridor.
+
+'Yes,' said Mr. Romaine, speaking low, and maintaining the attitude of
+one intently listening, 'there is another foot.  I cannot be deceived!'
+
+'I think there was indeed!' said I.  'And what troubles me--I am not sure
+that the other has gone entirely away.  By the time it got the length of
+the head of the stair the tread was plainly single.'
+
+'Ahem--blockaded?' asked the lawyer.
+
+'A siege _en regle_!' I exclaimed.
+
+'Let us come farther from the door,' said Romaine, 'and reconsider this
+damnable position.  Without doubt, Alain was this moment at the door.  He
+hoped to enter and get a view of you, as if by accident.  Baffled in
+this, has he stayed himself, or has he planted Dawson here by way of
+sentinel?'
+
+'Himself, beyond a doubt,' said I.  'And yet to what end?  He cannot
+think to pass the night there!'
+
+'If it were only possible to pay no heed!' said Mr. Romaine.  'But this
+is the accursed drawback of your position.  We can do nothing openly.  I
+must smuggle you out of this room and out of this house like seizable
+goods; and how am I to set about it with a sentinel planted at your very
+door?'
+
+'There is no good in being agitated,' said I.
+
+'None at all,' he acquiesced.  'And, come to think of it, it is droll
+enough that I should have been that very moment commenting on your
+personal appearance, when your cousin came upon this mission.  I was
+saying, if you remember, that your face was as good or better than a
+letter of recommendation.  I wonder if M. Alain would be like the rest of
+us--I wonder what he would think of it?'
+
+Mr. Romaine was sitting in a chair by the fire with his back to the
+windows, and I was myself kneeling on the hearthrug and beginning
+mechanically to pick up the scattered bills, when a honeyed voice joined
+suddenly in our conversation.
+
+'He thinks well of it, Mr. Romaine.  He begs to join himself to that
+circle of admirers which you indicate to exist already.'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX--THE DEVIL AND ALL AT AMERSHAM PLACE
+
+
+Never did two human creatures get to their feet with more alacrity than
+the lawyer and myself.  We had locked and barred the main gates of the
+citadel; but unhappily we had left open the bath-room sally-port; and
+here we found the voice of the hostile trumpets sounding from within, and
+all our defences taken in reverse.  I took but the time to whisper Mr.
+Romaine in the ear: 'Here is another tableau for you!' at which he looked
+at me a moment with a kind of pathos, as who should say, 'Don't hit a man
+when he's down.'  Then I transferred my eyes to my enemy.
+
+He had his hat on, a little on one side: it was a very tall hat, raked
+extremely, and had a narrow curling brim.  His hair was all curled out in
+masses like an Italian mountebank--a most unpardonable fashion.  He
+sported a huge tippeted overcoat of frieze, such as watchmen wear, only
+the inside was lined with costly furs, and he kept it half open to
+display the exquisite linen, the many-coloured waistcoat, and the profuse
+jewellery of watch-chains and brooches underneath.  The leg and the ankle
+were turned to a miracle.  It is out of the question that I should deny
+the resemblance altogether, since it has been remarked by so many
+different persons whom I cannot reasonably accuse of a conspiracy.  As a
+matter of fact, I saw little of it and confessed to nothing.  Certainly
+he was what some might call handsome, of a pictorial, exuberant style of
+beauty, all attitude, profile, and impudence: a man whom I could see in
+fancy parade on the grand stand at a race-meeting or swagger in
+Piccadilly, staring down the women, and stared at himself with admiration
+by the coal-porters.  Of his frame of mind at that moment his face
+offered a lively if an unconscious picture.  He was lividly pale, and his
+lip was caught up in a smile that could almost be called a snarl, of a
+sheer, arid malignity that appalled me and yet put me on my mettle for
+the encounter.  He looked me up and down, then bowed and took off his hat
+to me.
+
+'My cousin, I presume?' he said.
+
+'I understand I have that honour,' I replied.
+
+'The honour is mine,' said he, and his voice shook as he said it.
+
+'I should make you welcome, I believe,' said I.
+
+'Why?' he inquired.  'This poor house has been my home for longer than I
+care to claim.  That you should already take upon yourself the duties of
+host here is to be at unnecessary pains.  Believe me, that part would be
+more becomingly mine.  And, by the way, I must not fail to offer you my
+little compliment.  It is a gratifying surprise to meet you in the dress
+of a gentleman, and to see'--with a circular look upon the scattered
+bills--'that your necessities have already been so liberally relieved.'
+
+I bowed with a smile that was perhaps no less hateful than his own.
+
+'There are so many necessities in this world,' said I.  'Charity has to
+choose.  One gets relieved, and some other, no less indigent, perhaps
+indebted, must go wanting.'
+
+'Malice is an engaging trait,' said he.
+
+'And envy, I think?' was my reply.
+
+He must have felt that he was not getting wholly the better of this
+passage at arms; perhaps even feared that he should lose command of his
+temper, which he reined in throughout the interview as with a red-hot
+curb, for he flung away from me at the word, and addressed the lawyer
+with insulting arrogance.
+
+'Mr. Romaine,' he said, 'since when have you presumed to give orders in
+this house?'
+
+'I am not prepared to admit that I have given any,' replied Romaine;
+'certainly none that did not fall in the sphere of my responsibilities.'
+
+'By whose orders, then, am I denied entrance to my uncle's room?' said my
+cousin.
+
+'By the doctor's, sir,' replied Romaine; 'and I think even you will admit
+his faculty to give them.'
+
+'Have a care, sir,' cried Alain.  'Do not be puffed up with your
+position.  It is none so secure, Master Attorney.  I should not wonder in
+the least if you were struck off the rolls for this night's work, and the
+next I should see of you were when I flung you alms at a pothouse door to
+mend your ragged elbows.  The doctor's orders?  But I believe I am not
+mistaken!  You have to-night transacted business with the Count; and this
+needy young gentleman has enjoyed the privilege of still another
+interview, in which (as I am pleased to see) his dignity has not
+prevented his doing very well for himself.  I wonder that you should care
+to prevaricate with me so idly.'
+
+'I will confess so much,' said Mr. Romaine, 'if you call it
+prevarication.  The order in question emanated from the Count himself.
+He does not wish to see you.'
+
+'For which I must take the word of Mr. Daniel Romaine?' asked Alain.
+
+'In default of any better,' said Romaine.
+
+There was an instantaneous convulsion in my cousin's face, and I
+distinctly heard him gnash his teeth at this reply; but, to my surprise,
+he resumed in tones of almost good humour:
+
+'Come, Mr. Romaine, do not let us be petty!'  He drew in a chair and sat
+down.  'Understand you have stolen a march upon me.  You have introduced
+your soldier of Napoleon, and (how, I cannot conceive) he has been
+apparently accepted with favour.  I ask no better proof than the funds
+with which I find him literally surrounded--I presume in consequence of
+some extravagance of joy at the first sight of so much money.  The odds
+are so far in your favour, but the match is not yet won.  Questions will
+arise of undue influence, of sequestration, and the like: I have my
+witnesses ready.  I tell it you cynically, for you cannot profit by the
+knowledge; and, if the worst come to the worst, I have good hopes of
+recovering my own and of ruining you.'
+
+'You do what you please,' answered Romaine; 'but I give it you for a
+piece of good advice, you had best do nothing in the matter.  You will
+only make yourself ridiculous; you will only squander money, of which you
+have none too much, and reap public mortification.'
+
+'Ah, but there you make the common mistake, Mr. Romaine!' returned Alain.
+'You despise your adversary.  Consider, if you please, how very
+disagreeable I could make myself, if I chose.  Consider the position of
+your _protege_--an escaped prisoner!  But I play a great game.  I condemn
+such petty opportunities.'
+
+At this Romaine and I exchanged a glance of triumph.  It seemed manifest
+that Alain had as yet received no word of Clausel's recapture and
+denunciation.  At the same moment the lawyer, thus relieved of the
+instancy of his fear, changed his tactics.  With a great air of
+unconcern, he secured the newspaper, which still lay open before him on
+the table.
+
+'I think, Monsieur Alain, that you labour under some illusion,' said he.
+'Believe me, this is all beside the mark.  You seem to be pointing to
+some compromise.  Nothing is further from my views.  You suspect me of an
+inclination to trifle with you, to conceal how things are going.  I
+cannot, on the other hand, be too early or too explicit in giving you
+information which concerns you (I must say) capitally.  Your great-uncle
+has to-night cancelled his will, and made a new one in favour of your
+cousin Anne.  Nay, and you shall hear it from his own lips, if you
+choose!  I will take so much upon me,' said the lawyer, rising.  'Follow
+me, if you please, gentlemen.'
+
+Mr. Romaine led the way out of the room so briskly, and was so briskly
+followed by Alain, that I had hard ado to get the remainder of the money
+replaced and the despatch-box locked, and to overtake them, even by
+running ere they should be lost in that maze of corridors, my uncle's
+house.  As it was, I went with a heart divided; and the thought of my
+treasure thus left unprotected, save by a paltry lid and lock that any
+one might break or pick open, put me in a perspiration whenever I had the
+time to remember it.  The lawyer brought us to a room, begged us to be
+seated while he should hold a consultation with the doctor, and, slipping
+out of another door, left Alain and myself closeted together.
+
+Truly he had done nothing to ingratiate himself; his every word had been
+steeped in unfriendliness, envy, and that contempt which (as it is born
+of anger) it is possible to support without humiliation.  On my part, I
+had been little more conciliating; and yet I began to be sorry for this
+man, hired spy as I knew him to be.  It seemed to me less than decent
+that he should have been brought up in the expectation of this great
+inheritance, and now, at the eleventh hour, be tumbled forth out of the
+house door and left to himself, his poverty and his debts--those debts of
+which I had so ungallantly reminded him so short a time before.  And we
+were scarce left alone ere I made haste to hang out a flag of truce.
+
+'My cousin,' said I, 'trust me, you will not find me inclined to be your
+enemy.'
+
+He paused in front of me--for he had not accepted the lawyer's invitation
+to be seated, but walked to and fro in the apartment--took a pinch of
+snuff, and looked at me while he was taking it with an air of much
+curiosity.
+
+'Is it even so?' said he.  'Am I so far favoured by fortune as to have
+your pity?  Infinitely obliged, my cousin Anne!  But these sentiments are
+not always reciprocal, and I warn you that the day when I set my foot on
+your neck, the spine shall break.  Are you acquainted with the properties
+of the spine?' he asked with an insolence beyond qualification.
+
+It was too much.  'I am acquainted also with the properties of a pair of
+pistols,' said I, toising him.
+
+'No, no, no!' says he, holding up his finger.  'I will take my revenge
+how and when I please.  We are enough of the same family to understand
+each other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had you arrested on
+your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in the first clump of
+evergreens, to await and prevent your coming--I, who knew all, before
+whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has been conspiring in broad daylight to
+supplant me--is simply this: that I had not made up my mind how I was to
+take my revenge.'
+
+At that moment he was interrupted by the tolling of a bell.  As we stood
+surprised and listening, it was succeeded by the sound of many feet
+trooping up the stairs and shuffling by the door of our room.  Both, I
+believe, had a great curiosity to set it open, which each, owing to the
+presence of the other, resisted; and we waited instead in silence, and
+without moving, until Romaine returned and bade us to my uncle's
+presence.
+
+He led the way by a little crooked passage, which brought us out in the
+sick-room, and behind the bed.  I believe I have forgotten to remark that
+the Count's chamber was of considerable dimensions.  We beheld it now
+crowded with the servants and dependants of the house, from the doctor
+and the priest to Mr. Dawson and the housekeeper, from Dawson down to
+Rowley and the last footman in white calves, the last plump chambermaid
+in her clean gown and cap, and the last ostler in a stable waiscoat.
+This large congregation of persons (and I was surprised to see how large
+it was) had the appearance, for the most part, of being ill at ease and
+heartily bewildered, standing on one foot, gaping like zanies, and those
+who were in the corners nudging each other and grinning aside.  My uncle,
+on the other hand, who was raised higher than I had yet seen him on his
+pillows, wore an air of really imposing gravity.  No sooner had we
+appeared behind him, than he lifted his voice to a good loudness, and
+addressed the assemblage.
+
+'I take you all to witness--can you hear me?--I take you all to witness
+that I recognise as my heir and representative this gentleman, whom most
+of you see for the first time, the Viscount Anne de St.-Yves, my nephew
+of the younger line.  And I take you to witness at the same time that,
+for very good reasons known to myself, I have discarded and disinherited
+this other gentleman whom you all know, the Viscount de St.-Yves.  I have
+also to explain the unusual trouble to which I have put you all--and,
+since your supper was not over, I fear I may even say annoyance.  It has
+pleased M. Alain to make some threats of disputing my will, and to
+pretend that there are among your number certain estimable persons who
+may be trusted to swear as he shall direct them.  It pleases me thus to
+put it out of his power and to stop the mouths of his false witnesses.  I
+am infinitely obliged by your politeness, and I have the honour to wish
+you all a very good evening.'
+
+As the servants, still greatly mystified, crowded out of the sickroom
+door, curtseying, pulling the forelock, scraping with the foot, and so
+on, according to their degree, I turned and stole a look at my cousin.
+He had borne this crushing public rebuke without change of countenance.
+He stood, now, very upright, with folded arms, and looking inscrutably at
+the roof of the apartment.  I could not refuse him at that moment the
+tribute of my admiration.  Still more so when, the last of the domestics
+having filed through the doorway and left us alone with my great-uncle
+and the lawyer, he took one step forward towards the bed, made a
+dignified reverence, and addressed the man who had just condemned him to
+ruin.
+
+'My lord,' said he, 'you are pleased to treat me in a manner which my
+gratitude, and your state, equally forbid me to call in question.  It
+will be only necessary for me to call your attention to the length of
+time in which I have been taught to regard myself as your heir.  In that
+position, I judged it only loyal to permit myself a certain scale of
+expenditure.  If I am now to be cut off with a shilling as the reward of
+twenty years of service, I shall be left not only a beggar, but a
+bankrupt.'
+
+Whether from the fatigue of his recent exertion, or by a well-inspired
+ingenuity of hate, my uncle had once more closed his eyes; nor did he
+open them now.  'Not with a shilling,' he contented himself with
+replying; and there stole, as he said it, a sort of smile over his face,
+that flickered there conspicuously for the least moment of time, and then
+faded and left behind the old impenetrable mask of years, cunning, and
+fatigue.  There could be no mistake: my uncle enjoyed the situation as he
+had enjoyed few things in the last quarter of a century.  The fires of
+life scarce survived in that frail body; but hatred, like some immortal
+quality, was still erect and unabated.
+
+Nevertheless my cousin persevered.
+
+'I speak at a disadvantage,' he resumed.  'My supplanter, with perhaps
+more wisdom than delicacy, remains in the room,' and he cast a glance at
+me that might have withered an oak tree.
+
+I was only too willing to withdraw, and Romaine showed as much alacrity
+to make way for my departure.  But my uncle was not to be moved.  In the
+same breath of a voice, and still without opening his eyes, he bade me
+remain.
+
+'It is well,' said Alain.  'I cannot then go on to remind you of the
+twenty years that have passed over our heads in England, and the services
+I may have rendered you in that time.  It would be a position too odious.
+Your lordship knows me too well to suppose I could stoop to such
+ignominy.  I must leave out all my defence--your lordship wills it so!  I
+do not know what are my faults; I know only my punishment, and it is
+greater than I have the courage to face.  My uncle, I implore your pity:
+pardon me so far; do not send me for life into a debtors' jail--a pauper
+debtor.'
+
+'_Chat et vieux_, _pardonnez_?' said my uncle, quoting from La Fontaine;
+and then, opening a pale-blue eye full on Alain, he delivered with some
+emphasis:
+
+    'La jeunesse se flatte et croit tout obtenir;
+    La vieillesse est impitoyable.'
+
+The blood leaped darkly into Alain's face.  He turned to Romaine and me,
+and his eyes flashed.
+
+'It is your turn now,' he said.  'At least it shall be prison for prison
+with the two viscounts.'
+
+'Not so, Mr. Alain, by your leave,' said Romaine.  'There are a few
+formalities to be considered first.'
+
+But Alain was already striding towards the door.
+
+'Stop a moment, stop a moment!' cried Romaine.  'Remember your own
+counsel not to despise an adversary.'
+
+Alain turned.
+
+'If I do not despise I hate you!' he cried, giving a loose to his
+passion.  'Be warned of that, both of you.'
+
+'I understand you to threaten Monsieur le Vicomte Anne,' said the lawyer.
+'Do you know, I would not do that.  I am afraid, I am very much afraid,
+if you were to do as you propose, you might drive me into extremes.'
+
+'You have made me a beggar and a bankrupt,' said Alain.  What extreme is
+left?'
+
+'I scarce like to put a name upon it in this company,' replied Romaine.
+'But there are worse things than even bankruptcy, and worse places than a
+debtors' jail.'
+
+The words were so significantly said that there went a visible thrill
+through Alain; sudden as a sword-stroke, he fell pale again.
+
+'I do not understand you,' said he.
+
+'O yes, you do,' returned Romaine.  'I believe you understand me very
+well.  You must not suppose that all this time, while you were so very
+busy, others were entirely idle.  You must not fancy, because I am an
+Englishman, that I have not the intelligence to pursue an inquiry.  Great
+as is my regard for the honour of your house, M. Alain de St.-Yves, if I
+hear of you moving directly or indirectly in this matter, I shall do my
+duty, let it cost what it will: that is, I shall communicate the real
+name of the Buonapartist spy who signs his letters _Rue Gregoire de
+Tours_.'
+
+I confess my heart was already almost altogether on the side of my
+insulted and unhappy cousin; and if it had not been before, it must have
+been so now, so horrid was the shock with which he heard his infamy
+exposed.  Speech was denied him; he carried his hand to his neckcloth; he
+staggered; I thought he must have fallen.  I ran to help him, and at that
+he revived, recoiled before me, and stood there with arms stretched forth
+as if to preserve himself from the outrage of my touch.
+
+'Hands off!' he somehow managed to articulate.
+
+'You will now, I hope,' pursued the lawyer, without any change of voice,
+'understand the position in which you are placed, and how delicately it
+behoves you to conduct yourself.  Your arrest hangs, if I may so express
+myself, by a hair; and as you will be under the perpetual vigilance of
+myself and my agents, you must look to it narrowly that you walk
+straight.  Upon the least dubiety, I will take action.'  He snuffed,
+looking critically at the tortured man.  'And now let me remind you that
+your chaise is at the door.  This interview is agitating to his
+lordship--it cannot be agreeable for you--and I suggest that it need not
+be further drawn out.  It does not enter into the views of your uncle,
+the Count, that you should again sleep under this roof.'
+
+As Alain turned and passed without a word or a sign from the apartment, I
+instantly followed.  I suppose I must be at bottom possessed of some
+humanity; at least, this accumulated torture, this slow butchery of a man
+as by quarters of rock, had wholly changed my sympathies.  At that moment
+I loathed both my uncle and the lawyer for their coldblooded cruelty.
+
+Leaning over the banisters, I was but in time to hear his hasty footsteps
+in that hall that had been crowded with servants to honour his coming,
+and was now left empty against his friendless departure.  A moment later,
+and the echoes rang, and the air whistled in my ears, as he slammed the
+door on his departing footsteps.  The fury of the concussion gave me (had
+one been still wanted) a measure of the turmoil of his passions.  In a
+sense, I felt with him; I felt how he would have gloried to slam that
+door on my uncle, the lawyer, myself, and the whole crowd of those who
+had been witnesses to his humiliation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX--AFTER THE STORM
+
+
+No sooner was the house clear of my cousin than I began to reckon up,
+ruefully enough, the probable results of what had passed.  Here were a
+number of pots broken, and it looked to me as if I should have to pay for
+all!  Here had been this proud, mad beast goaded and baited both publicly
+and privately, till he could neither hear nor see nor reason; whereupon
+the gate had been set open, and he had been left free to go and contrive
+whatever vengeance he might find possible.  I could not help thinking it
+was a pity that, whenever I myself was inclined to be upon my good
+behaviour, some friends of mine should always determine to play a piece
+of heroics and cast me for the hero--or the victim--which is very much
+the same.  The first duty of heroics is to be of your own choosing.  When
+they are not that, they are nothing.  And I assure you, as I walked back
+to my own room, I was in no very complaisant humour: thought my uncle and
+Mr. Romaine to have played knuckle-bones with my life and prospects;
+cursed them for it roundly; had no wish more urgent than to avoid the
+pair of them; and was quite knocked out of time, as they say in the ring,
+to find myself confronted with the lawyer.
+
+He stood on my hearthrug, leaning on the chimney-piece, with a gloomy,
+thoughtful brow, as I was pleased to see, and not in the least as though
+he were vain of the late proceedings.
+
+'Well?' said I.  'You have done it now!'
+
+'Is he gone?' he asked.
+
+'He is gone,' said I.  'We shall have the devil to pay with him when he
+comes back.'
+
+'You are right,' said the lawyer, 'and very little to pay him with but
+flams and fabrications, like to-night's.'
+
+'To-night's?' I repeated.
+
+'Ay, to-night's!' said he.
+
+'To-night's _what_?' I cried.
+
+'To-night's flams and fabrications.'
+
+'God be good to me, sir,' said I, 'have I something more to admire in
+your conduct than ever _I_ had suspected?  You cannot think how you
+interest me!  That it was severe, I knew; I had already chuckled over
+that.  But that it should be false also!  In what sense, dear sir?'
+
+I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but the lawyer
+paid no heed.
+
+'False in all senses of the word,' he replied seriously.  'False in the
+sense that they were not true, and false in the sense that they were not
+real; false in the sense that I boasted, and in the sense that I lied.
+How can I arrest him?  Your uncle burned the papers!  I told you so--but
+doubtless you have forgotten--the day I first saw you in Edinburgh
+Castle.  It was an act of generosity; I have seen many of these acts, and
+always regretted--always regretted!  "That shall be his inheritance," he
+said, as the papers burned; he did not mean that it should have proved so
+rich a one.  How rich, time will tell.'
+
+'I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times, my dear sir, but it strikes
+me you have the impudence--in the circumstances, I may call it the
+indecency--to appear cast down?'
+
+'It is true,' said he: 'I am.  I am cast down.  I am literally cast down.
+I feel myself quite helpless against your cousin.'
+
+'Now, really!' I asked.  'Is this serious?  And is it perhaps the reason
+why you have gorged the poor devil with every species of insult? and why
+you took such surprising pains to supply me with what I had so little
+need of--another enemy?  That you were helpless against them?  "Here is
+my last missile," say you; "my ammunition is quite exhausted: just wait
+till I get the last in--it will irritate, it cannot hurt him.  There--you
+see!--he is furious now, and I am quite helpless.  One more prod, another
+kick: now he is a mere lunatic!  Stand behind me; I am quite helpless!"
+Mr. Romaine, I am asking myself as to the background or motive of this
+singular jest, and whether the name of it should not be called
+treachery?'
+
+'I can scarce wonder,' said he.  'In truth it has been a singular
+business, and we are very fortunate to be out of it so well.  Yet it was
+not treachery: no, no, Mr. Anne, it was not treachery; and if you will do
+me the favour to listen to me for the inside of a minute, I shall
+demonstrate the same to you beyond cavil.'  He seemed to wake up to his
+ordinary briskness.  'You see the point?' he began.  'He had not yet read
+the newspaper, but who could tell when he might?  He might have had that
+damned journal in his pocket, and how should we know?  We were--I may
+say, we are--at the mercy of the merest twopenny accident.'
+
+'Why, true,' said I: 'I had not thought of that.'
+
+'I warrant you,' cried Romaine, 'you had supposed it was nothing to be
+the hero of an interesting notice in the journals!  You had supposed, as
+like as not, it was a form of secrecy!  But not so in the least.  A part
+of England is already buzzing with the name of Champdivers; a day or two
+more and the mail will have carried it everywhere: so wonderful a machine
+is this of ours for disseminating intelligence!  Think of it!  When my
+father was born--but that is another story.  To return: we had here the
+elements of such a combustion as I dread to think of--your cousin and the
+journal.  Let him but glance an eye upon that column of print, and where
+were we?  It is easy to ask; not so easy to answer, my young friend.  And
+let me tell you, this sheet is the Viscount's usual reading.  It is my
+conviction he had it in his pocket.'
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir,' said I.  'I have been unjust.  I did not
+appreciate my danger.'
+
+'I think you never do,' said he.
+
+'But yet surely that public scene--' I began.
+
+'It was madness.  I quite agree with you,' Mr. Romaine interrupted.  'But
+it was your uncle's orders, Mr. Anne, and what could I do?  Tell him you
+were the murderer of Goguelat?  I think not.'
+
+'No, sure!' said I.  'That would but have been to make the trouble
+thicker.  We were certainly in a very ill posture.'
+
+'You do not yet appreciate how grave it was,' he replied.  'It was
+necessary for you that your cousin should go, and go at once.  You
+yourself had to leave to-night under cover of darkness, and how could you
+have done that with the Viscount in the next room?  He must go, then; he
+must leave without delay.  And that was the difficulty.'
+
+'Pardon me, Mr. Romaine, but could not my uncle have bidden him go?' I
+asked.
+
+'Why, I see I must tell you that this is not so simple as it sounds,' he
+replied.  'You say this is your uncle's house, and so it is.  But to all
+effects and purposes it is your cousin's also.  He has rooms here; has
+had them coming on for thirty years now, and they are filled with a
+prodigious accumulation of trash--stays, I dare say, and powder-puffs,
+and such effeminate idiocy--to which none could dispute his title, even
+suppose any one wanted to.  We had a perfect right to bid him go, and he
+had a perfect right to reply, "Yes, I will go, but not without my stays
+and cravats.  I must first get together the nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine
+chestsfull of insufferable rubbish, that I have spent the last thirty
+years collecting--and may very well spend the next thirty hours a-packing
+of."  And what should we have said to that?'
+
+'By way of repartee?' I asked.  'Two tall footmen and a pair of crabtree
+cudgels, I suggest.'
+
+'The Lord deliver me from the wisdom of laymen!' cried Romaine.  'Put
+myself in the wrong at the beginning of a lawsuit?  No, indeed!  There
+was but one thing to do, and I did it, and burned my last cartridge in
+the doing of it.  I stunned him.  And it gave us three hours, by which we
+should make haste to profit; for if there is one thing sure, it is that
+he will be up to time again to-morrow in the morning.'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I own myself an idiot.  Well do they say, _an old
+soldier_, _an old innocent_!  For I guessed nothing of all this.'
+
+'And, guessing it, have you the same objections to leave England?' he
+inquired.
+
+'The same,' said I.
+
+'It is indispensable,' he objected.
+
+'And it cannot be,' I replied.  'Reason has nothing to say in the matter;
+and I must not let you squander any of yours.  It will be enough to tell
+you this is an affair of the heart.'
+
+'Is it even so?' quoth Romaine, nodding his head.  'And I might have been
+sure of it.  Place them in a hospital, put them in a jail in yellow
+overalls, do what you will, young Jessamy finds young Jenny.  O, have it
+your own way; I am too old a hand to argue with young gentlemen who
+choose to fancy themselves in love; I have too much experience, thank
+you.  Only, be sure that you appreciate what you risk: the prison, the
+dock, the gallows, and the halter--terribly vulgar circumstances, my
+young friend; grim, sordid, earnest; no poetry in that!'
+
+'And there I am warned,' I returned gaily.  'No man could be warned more
+finely or with a greater eloquence.  And I am of the same opinion still.
+Until I have again seen that lady, nothing shall induce me to quit Great
+Britain.  I have besides--'
+
+And here I came to a full stop.  It was upon my tongue to have told him
+the story of the drovers, but at the first word of it my voice died in my
+throat.  There might be a limit to the lawyer's toleration, I reflected.
+I had not been so long in Britain altogether; for the most part of that
+time I had been by the heels in limbo in Edinburgh Castle; and already I
+had confessed to killing one man with a pair of scissors; and now I was
+to go on and plead guilty to having settled another with a holly stick!
+A wave of discretion went over me as cold and as deep as the sea.
+
+'In short, sir, this is a matter of feeling,' I concluded, 'and nothing
+will prevent my going to Edinburgh.'
+
+If I had fired a pistol in his ear he could not have been more startled.
+
+'To Edinburgh?' he repeated.  'Edinburgh? where the very paving-stones
+know you!'
+
+'Then is the murder out!' said I.  'But, Mr. Romaine, is there not
+sometimes safety in boldness?  Is it not a common-place of strategy to
+get where the enemy least expects you?  And where would he expect me
+less?'
+
+'Faith, there is something in that, too!' cried the lawyer.  'Ay,
+certainly, a great deal in that.  All the witnesses drowned but one, and
+he safe in prison; you yourself changed beyond recognition--let us
+hope--and walking the streets of the very town you have illustrated by
+your--well, your eccentricity!  It is not badly combined, indeed!'
+
+'You approve it, then?' said I.
+
+'O, approve!' said he; 'there is no question of approval.  There is only
+one course which I could approve, and that were to escape to France
+instanter.'
+
+'You do not wholly disapprove, at least?' I substituted.
+
+'Not wholly; and it would not matter if I did,' he replied.  'Go your own
+way; you are beyond argument.  And I am not sure that you will run more
+danger by that course than by any other.  Give the servants time to get
+to bed and fall asleep, then take a country cross-road and walk, as the
+rhyme has it, like blazes all night.  In the morning take a chaise or
+take the mail at pleasure, and continue your journey with all the decorum
+and reserve of which you shall be found capable.'
+
+'I am taking the picture in,' I said.  'Give me time.  'Tis the _tout
+ensemble_ I must see: the whole as opposed to the details.'
+
+'Mountebank!' he murmured.
+
+'Yes, I have it now; and I see myself with a servant, and that servant is
+Rowley,' said I.
+
+'So as to have one more link with your uncle?' suggested the lawyer.
+'Very judicious!'
+
+'And, pardon me, but that is what it is,' I exclaimed.  'Judicious is the
+word.  I am not making a deception fit to last for thirty years; I do not
+found a palace in the living granite for the night.  This is a shelter
+tent--a flying picture--seen, admired, and gone again in the wink of an
+eye.  What is wanted, in short, is a _trompe-l'oeil_ that shall be good
+enough for twelve hours at an inn: is it not so?'
+
+'It is, and the objection holds.  Rowley is but another danger,' said
+Romaine.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'will pass as a servant from a distance--as a creature
+seen poised on the dicky of a bowling chaise.  He will pass at hand as a
+smart, civil fellow one meets in the inn corridor, and looks back at, and
+asks, and is told, "Gentleman's servant in Number 4."  He will pass, in
+fact, all round, except with his personal friends!  My dear sir, pray
+what do you expect?  Of course if we meet my cousin, or if we meet
+anybody who took part in the judicious exhibition of this evening, we are
+lost; and who's denying it?  To every disguise, however good and safe,
+there is always the weak point; you must always take (let us say--and to
+take a simile from your own waistcoat pocket) a snuff box-full of risk.
+You'll get it just as small with Rowley as with anybody else.  And the
+long and short of it is, the lad's honest, he likes me, I trust him; he
+is my servant, or nobody.'
+
+'He might not accept,' said Romaine.
+
+'I bet you a thousand pounds he does!' cried I.  'But no matter; all you
+have to do is to send him out to-night on this cross-country business,
+and leave the thing to me.  I tell you, he will be my servant, and I tell
+you, he will do well.'
+
+I had crossed the room, and was already overhauling my wardrobe as I
+spoke.
+
+'Well,' concluded the lawyer, with a shrug, 'one risk with another: _a la
+guerre comme a la guerre_, as you would say.  Let the brat come and be
+useful, at least.'  And he was about to ring the bell, when his eye was
+caught by my researches in the wardrobe.  'Do not fall in love with these
+coats, waistcoats, cravats, and other panoply and accoutrements by which
+you are now surrounded.  You must not run the post as a dandy.  It is not
+the fashion, even.'
+
+'You are pleased to be facetious, sir,' said I; 'and not according to
+knowledge.  These clothes are my life, they are my disguise; and since I
+can take but few of them, I were a fool indeed if I selected hastily!
+Will you understand, once and for all, what I am seeking?  To be
+invisible, is the first point; the second, to be invisible in a
+post-chaise and with a servant.  Can you not perceive the delicacy of the
+quest?  Nothing must be too coarse, nothing too fine; _rien de voyant_,
+_rien qui detonne_; so that I may leave everywhere the inconspicuous
+image of a handsome young man of a good fortune travelling in proper
+style, whom the landlord will forget in twelve hours--and the chambermaid
+perhaps remember, God bless her! with a sigh.  This is the very fine art
+of dress.'
+
+'I have practised it with success for fifty years,' said Romaine, with a
+chuckle.  'A black suit and a clean shirt is my infallible recipe.'
+
+'You surprise me; I did not think you would be shallow!' said I,
+lingering between two coats.  'Pray, Mr. Romaine, have I your head? or
+did you travel post and with a smartish servant?'
+
+'Neither, I admit,' said he.
+
+'Which change the whole problem,' I continued.  'I have to dress for a
+smartish servant and a Russia leather despatch-box.'  That brought me to
+a stand.  I came over and looked at the box with a moment's hesitation.
+'Yes,' I resumed.  'Yes, and for the despatch-box!  It looks moneyed and
+landed; it means I have a lawyer.  It is an invaluable property.  But I
+could have wished it to hold less money.  The responsibility is crushing.
+Should I not do more wisely to take five hundred pounds, and intrust the
+remainder with you, Mr. Romaine?'
+
+'If you are sure you will not want it,' answered Romaine.
+
+'I am far from sure of that,' cried I.  'In the first place, as a
+philosopher.  This is the first time I have been at the head of a large
+sum, and it is conceivable--who knows himself?--that I may make it fly.
+In the second place, as a fugitive.  Who knows what I may need?  The
+whole of it may be inadequate.  But I can always write for more.'
+
+'You do not understand,' he replied.  'I break off all communication with
+you here and now.  You must give me a power of attorney ere you start
+to-night, and then be done with me trenchantly until better days.'
+
+I believe I offered some objection.
+
+'Think a little for once of me!' said Romaine.  'I must not have seen you
+before to-night.  To-night we are to have had our only interview, and you
+are to have given me the power; and to-night I am to have lost sight of
+you again--I know not whither, you were upon business, it was none of my
+affairs to question you!  And this, you are to remark, in the interests
+of your own safety much more than mine.'
+
+'I am not even to write to you?' I said, a little bewildered.
+
+'I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects you with common
+sense,' he replied.  'But that is the plain English of it.  You are not
+even to write; and if you did, I would not answer.'
+
+'A letter, however--' I began.
+
+'Listen to me,' interrupted Romaine.  'So soon as your cousin reads the
+paragraph, what will he do?  Put the police upon looking into my
+correspondence!  So soon as you write to me, in short, you write to Bow
+Street; and if you will take my advice, you will date that letter from
+France.'
+
+'The devil!' said I, for I began suddenly to see that this might put me
+out of the way of my business.
+
+'What is it now?' says he.
+
+'There will be more to be done, then, before we can part,' I answered.
+
+'I give you the whole night,' said he.  'So long as you are off ere
+daybreak, I am content.'
+
+'In short, Mr. Romaine,' said I, 'I have had so much benefit of your
+advice and services that I am loth to sever the connection, and would
+even ask a substitute.  I would be obliged for a letter of introduction
+to one of your own cloth in Edinburgh--an old man for choice, very
+experienced, very respectable, and very secret.  Could you favour me with
+such a letter?'
+
+'Why, no,' said he.  'Certainly not.  I will do no such thing, indeed.'
+
+'It would be a great favour, sir,' I pleaded.
+
+'It would be an unpardonable blunder,' he replied.  'What?  Give you a
+letter of introduction? and when the police come, I suppose, I must
+forget the circumstance?  No, indeed.  Talk of it no more.'
+
+'You seem to be always in the right,' said I.  'The letter would be out
+of the question, I quite see that.  But the lawyer's name might very well
+have dropped from you in the way of conversation; having heard him
+mentioned, I might profit by the circumstance to introduce myself; and in
+this way my business would be the better done, and you not in the least
+compromised.'
+
+'What is this business?' said Romaine.
+
+'I have not said that I had any,' I replied.  'It might arise.  This is
+only a possibility that I must keep in view.'
+
+'Well,' said he, with a gesture of the hands, 'I mention Mr. Robbie; and
+let that be an end of it!--Or wait!' he added, 'I have it.  Here is
+something that will serve you for an introduction, and cannot compromise
+me.'  And he wrote his name and the Edinburgh lawyer's address on a piece
+of card and tossed it to me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI--I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED CHAISE
+
+
+What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an excellent cold
+supper in the lawyer's room, it was past two in the morning before we
+were ready for the road.  Romaine himself let us out of a window in a
+part of the house known to Rowley: it appears it served as a kind of
+postern to the servants' hall, by which (when they were in the mind for a
+clandestine evening) they would come regularly in and out; and I remember
+very well the vinegar aspect of the lawyer on the receipt of this piece
+of information--how he pursed his lips, jutted his eyebrows, and kept
+repeating, 'This must be seen to, indeed! this shall be barred to-morrow
+in the morning!'  In this preoccupation, I believe he took leave of me
+without observing it; our things were handed out; we heard the window
+shut behind us; and became instantly lost in a horrid intricacy of
+blackness and the shadow of woods.
+
+A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling again; it
+seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually leaving off; and the
+darkness was intense.  Time and again we walked into trees; time and
+again found ourselves adrift among garden borders or stuck like a ram in
+the thicket.  Rowley had possessed himself of the matches, and he was
+neither to be terrified nor softened.  'No, I will not, Mr. Anne, sir,'
+he would reply.  'You know he tell me to wait till we were over the 'ill.
+It's only a little way now.  Why, and I thought you was a soldier, too!'
+I was at least a very glad soldier when my valet consented at last to
+kindle a thieves' match.  From this, we easily lit the lantern; and
+thenceforward, through a labyrinth of woodland paths, were conducted by
+its uneasy glimmer.  Both booted and great-coated, with tall hats much of
+a shape, and laden with booty in the form of a despatch-box, a case of
+pistols, and two plump valises, I thought we had very much the look of a
+pair of brothers returning from the sack of Amersham Place.
+
+We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk abreast and
+without precaution.  It was nine miles to Aylesbury, our immediate
+destination; by a watch, which formed part of my new outfit, it should be
+about half-past three in the morning; and as we did not choose to arrive
+before daylight, time could not be said to press.  I gave the order to
+march at ease.
+
+'Now, Rowley,' said I, 'so far so good.  You have come, in the most
+obliging manner in the world, to carry these valises.  The question is,
+what next?  What are we to do at Aylesbury? or, more particularly, what
+are you?  Thence, I go on a journey.  Are you to accompany me?'
+
+He gave a little chuckle.  'That's all settled already, Mr. Anne, sir,'
+he replied.  'Why, I've got my things here in the valise--a half a dozen
+shirts and what not; I'm all ready, sir: just you lead on: _you'll_ see.'
+
+'The devil you have!' said I.  'You made pretty sure of your welcome.'
+
+'If you please, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish shyness
+and triumph that awoke my conscience.  I could never let this innocent
+involve himself in the perils and difficulties that beset my course,
+without some hint of warning, which it was a matter of extreme delicacy
+to make plain enough and not too plain.
+
+'No, no,' said I; 'you may think you have made a choice, but it was
+blindfold, and you must make it over again.  The Count's service is a
+good one; what are you leaving it for?  Are you not throwing away the
+substance for the shadow?  No, do not answer me yet.  You imagine that I
+am a prosperous nobleman, just declared my uncle's heir, on the threshold
+of the best of good fortune, and, from the point of view of a judicious
+servant, a jewel of a master to serve and stick to?  Well, my boy, I am
+nothing of the kind, nothing of the kind.'
+
+As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the lantern to his
+face.  He stood before me, brilliantly illuminated on the background of
+impenetrable night and falling snow, stricken to stone between his double
+burden like an ass between two panniers, and gaping at me like a
+blunderbuss.  I had never seen a face so predestined to be astonished, or
+so susceptible of rendering the emotion of surprise; and it tempted me as
+an open piano tempts the musician.
+
+'Nothing of the sort, Rowley,' I continued, in a churchyard voice.
+'These are appearances, petty appearances.  I am in peril, homeless,
+hunted.  I count scarce any one in England who is not my enemy.  From
+this hour I drop my name, my title; I become nameless; my name is
+proscribed.  My liberty, my life, hang by a hair.  The destiny which you
+will accept, if you go forth with me, is to be tracked by spies, to hide
+yourself under a false name, to follow the desperate pretences and
+perhaps share the fate of a murderer with a price upon his head.'
+
+His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from one depth to
+another of tragic astonishment, and really worth paying to see; but at
+this it suddenly cleared.  'Oh, I ain't afraid!' he said; and then,
+choking into laughter, 'why, I see it from the first!'
+
+I could have beaten him.  But I had so grossly overshot the mark that I
+suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour of elocution
+to persuade him I had been in earnest.  In the course of which I became
+so interested in demonstrating my present danger that I forgot all about
+my future safety, and not only told him the story of Goguelat, but threw
+in the business of the drovers as well, and ended by blurting out that I
+was a soldier of Napoleon's and a prisoner of war.
+
+This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common complaint of
+me that I have a long tongue.  I believe it is a fault beloved by
+fortune.  Which of you considerate fellows would have done a thing at
+once so foolhardy and so wise as to make a confidant of a boy in his
+teens, and positively smelling of the nursery?  And when had I cause to
+repent it?  There is none so apt as a boy to be the adviser of any man in
+difficulties such as mine.  To the beginnings of virile common sense he
+adds the last lights of the child's imagination; and he can fling himself
+into business with that superior earnestness that properly belongs to
+play.  And Rowley was a boy made to my hand.  He had a high sense of
+romance, and a secret cultus for all soldiers and criminals.  His
+travelling library consisted of a chap-book life of Wallace and some
+sixpenny parts of the 'Old Bailey Sessions Papers' by Gurney the
+shorthand writer; and the choice depicts his character to a hair.  You
+can imagine how his new prospects brightened on a boy of this
+disposition.  To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a soldier,
+and a murderer, rolled in one--to live by stratagems, disguises, and
+false names, in an atmosphere of midnight and mystery so thick that you
+could cut it with a knife--was really, I believe, more dear to him than
+his meals, though he was a great trencherman, and something of a glutton
+besides.  For myself, as the peg by which all this romantic business
+hung, I was simply idolised from that moment; and he would rather have
+sacrificed his hand than surrendered the privilege of serving me.
+
+We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in the snow,
+which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall to purpose.  I
+chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from its likeness to Romaine;
+Rowley, from an irresistible conversion of ideas, I dubbed Gammon.  His
+distress was laughable to witness: his own choice of an unassuming
+nickname had been Claude Duval!  We settled our procedure at the various
+inns where we should alight, rehearsed our little manners like a piece of
+drill until it seemed impossible we should ever be taken unprepared; and
+in all these dispositions, you maybe sure the despatch-box was not
+forgotten.  Who was to pick it up, who was to set it down, who was to
+remain beside it, who was to sleep with it--there was no contingency
+omitted, all was gone into with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant on
+the one hand and a child with a new plaything on the other.
+
+'I say, wouldn't it look queer if you and me was to come to the
+post-house with all this luggage?' said Rowley.
+
+'I dare say,' I replied.  'But what else is to be done?'
+
+'Well, now, sir--you hear me,' says Rowley.  'I think it would look more
+natural-like if you was to come to the post-house alone, and with nothing
+in your 'ands--more like a gentleman, you know.  And you might say that
+your servant and baggage was a-waiting for you up the road.  I think I
+could manage, somehow, to make a shift with all them dratted
+things--leastways if you was to give me a 'and up with them at the
+start.'
+
+'And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to try, Mr. Rowley!'
+I cried.  'Why, you would be quite defenceless!  A footpad that was an
+infant child could rob you.  And I should probably come driving by to
+find you in a ditch with your throat cut.  But there is something in your
+idea, for all that; and I propose we put it in execution no farther
+forward than the next corner of a lane.'
+
+Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we headed by
+cross-roads for some point to the northward of it, whither I might assist
+Rowley with the baggage, and where I might leave him to await my return
+in the post-chaise.
+
+It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and ourselves walking
+snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the morning showed us an inn upon
+the highwayside.  Some distance off, under the shelter of a corner of the
+road and a clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with the whole of our
+possessions, and watched him till he staggered in safety into the doors
+of the _Green Dragon_, which was the sign of the house.  Thence I walked
+briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in my freedom and the causeless good
+spirits that belong to a snowy morning; though, to be sure, long before I
+had arrived the snow had again ceased to fall, and the eaves of Aylesbury
+were smoking in the level sun.  There was an accumulation of gigs and
+chaises in the yard, and a great bustle going forward in the coffee-room
+and about the doors of the inn.  At these evidences of so much travel on
+the road I was seized with a misgiving lest it should be impossible to
+get horses, and I should be detained in the precarious neighbourhood of
+my cousin.  Hungry as I was, I made my way first of all to the
+postmaster, where he stood--a big, athletic, horsey-looking man, blowing
+into a key in the corner of the yard.
+
+On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference into what
+seemed passion.
+
+'A po'-shay and 'osses!' he cried.  'Do I look as if I 'ad a po'-shay and
+'osses?  Damn me, if I 'ave such a thing on the premises.  I don't _make_
+'osses and chaises--I '_ire_ 'em.  You might be God Almighty!' said he;
+and instantly, as if he had observed me for the first time, he broke off,
+and lowered his voice into the confidential.  'Why, now that I see you
+are a gentleman,' said he, 'I'll tell you what!  If you like to _buy_, I
+have the article to fit you.  Second-'and shay by Lycett, of London.
+Latest style; good as new.  Superior fittin's, net on the roof, baggage
+platform, pistol 'olsters--the most com-plete and the most gen-teel
+turn-out I ever see!  The 'ole for seventy-five pound!  It's as good as
+givin' her away!'
+
+'Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a hawker's barrow?' said
+I.  'Why, my good man, if I had to stop here, anyway, I should prefer to
+buy a house and garden!'
+
+'Come and look at her!' he cried; and, with the word, links his arm in
+mine and carries me to the outhouse where the chaise was on view.
+
+It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my purpose:
+eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though I thought the
+postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree with him so far.  The
+body was painted a dark claret, and the wheels an invisible green.  The
+lamp and glasses were bright as silver; and the whole equipage had an air
+of privacy and reserve that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm suspicion.
+With a servant like Rowley, and a chaise like this, I felt that I could
+go from the Land's End to John o' Groat's House amid a population of
+bowing ostlers.  And I suppose I betrayed in my manner the degree in
+which the bargain tempted me.
+
+'Come,' cried the postmaster--'I'll make it seventy, to oblige a friend!'
+
+'The point is: the horses,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said he, consulting his watch, 'it's now gone the 'alf after
+eight.  What time do you want her at the door?'
+
+'Horses and all?' said I.
+
+''Osses and all!' says he.  'One good turn deserves another.  You give me
+seventy pound for the shay, and I'll 'oss it for you.  I told you I
+didn't _make_ 'osses; but I _can_ make 'em, to oblige a friend.'
+
+What would you have?  It was not the wisest thing in the world to buy a
+chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle's house; but in this way I got my
+horses for the next stage.  And by any other it appeared that I should
+have to wait.  Accordingly I paid the money down--perhaps twenty pounds
+too much, though it was certainly a well-made and well-appointed
+vehicle--ordered it round in half an hour, and proceeded to refresh
+myself with breakfast.
+
+The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a bay-window, and
+commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I continued to be amused
+by the successive departures of travellers--the fussy and the offhand,
+the niggardly and the lavish--all exhibiting their different characters
+in that diagnostic moment of the farewell: some escorted to the stirrup
+or the chaise door by the chamberlain, the chambermaids and the waiters
+almost in a body, others moving off under a cloud, without human
+countenance.  In the course of this I became interested in one for whom
+this ovation began to assume the proportions of a triumph; not only the
+under-servants, but the barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the
+postmaster himself, crowding about the steps to speed his departure.  I
+was aware, at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though the
+traveller were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to air it in
+that society.  I leaned forward with a lively curiosity; and the next
+moment I had blotted myself behind the teapot.  The popular traveller had
+turned to wave a farewell; and behold! he was no other than my cousin
+Alain.  It was a change of the sharpest from the angry, pallid man I had
+seen at Amersham Place.  Ruddy to a fault, illuminated with vintages,
+crowned with his curls like Bacchus, he now stood before me for an
+instant, the perfect master of himself, smiling with airs of conscious
+popularity and insufferable condescension.  He reminded me at once of a
+royal duke, or an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman
+who should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman.  A moment after
+he was gliding noiselessly on the road to London.
+
+I breathed again.  I recognised, with heartfelt gratitude, how lucky I
+had been to go in by the stable-yard instead of the hostelry door, and
+what a fine occasion of meeting my cousin I had lost by the purchase of
+the claret-coloured chaise!  The next moment I remembered that there was
+a waiter present.  No doubt but he must have observed me when I crouched
+behind the breakfast equipage; no doubt but he must have commented on
+this unusual and undignified behaviour; and it was essential that I
+should do something to remove the impression.
+
+'Waiter!' said I, 'that was the nephew of Count Carwell that just drove
+off, wasn't it?'
+
+'Yes, sir: Viscount Carwell we calls him,' he replied.
+
+'Ah, I thought as much,' said I.  'Well, well, damn all these Frenchmen,
+say I!'
+
+'You may say so indeed, sir,' said the waiter.  'They ain't not to say in
+the same field with our 'ome-raised gentry.'
+
+'Nasty tempers?' I suggested.
+
+'Beas'ly temper, sir, the Viscount 'ave,' said the waiter with feeling.
+'Why, no longer agone than this morning, he was sitting breakfasting and
+reading in his paper.  I suppose, sir, he come on some pilitical
+information, or it might be about 'orses, but he raps his 'and upon the
+table sudden and calls for curacoa.  It gave me quite a turn, it did; he
+did it that sudden and 'ard.  Now, sir, that may be manners in France,
+but hall I can say is, that I'm not used to it.'
+
+'Reading the paper, was he?' said I.  'What paper, eh?'
+
+'Here it is, sir,' exclaimed the waiter.  'Seems like as if he'd dropped
+it.'
+
+And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.
+
+I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what to expect;
+but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped beating.  There it was:
+the fulfilment of Romaine's apprehension was before me; the paper was
+laid open at the capture of Clausel.  I felt as if I could take a little
+curacoa myself, but on second thoughts called for brandy.  It was badly
+wanted; and suddenly I observed the waiter's eye to sparkle, as it were,
+with some recognition; made certain he had remarked the resemblance
+between me and Alain; and became aware--as by a revelation--of the fool's
+part I had been playing.  For I had now managed to put my identification
+beyond a doubt, if Alain should choose to make his inquiries at
+Aylesbury; and, as if that were not enough, I had added, at an expense of
+seventy pounds, a clue by which he might follow me through the length and
+breadth of England, in the shape of the claret-coloured chaise!  That
+elegant equipage (which I began to regard as little better than a
+claret-coloured ante-room to the hangman's cart) coming presently to the
+door, I left my breakfast in the middle and departed; posting to the
+north as diligently as my cousin Alain was posting to the south, and
+putting my trust (such as it was) in an opposite direction and equal
+speed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII--CHARACTER AND ACQUIREMENTS OF MR.  ROWLEY
+
+
+I am not certain that I had ever really appreciated before that hour the
+extreme peril of the adventure on which I was embarked.  The sight of my
+cousin, the look of his face--so handsome, so jovial at the first sight,
+and branded with so much malignity as you saw it on the second--with his
+hyperbolical curls in order, with his neckcloth tied as if for the
+conquests of love, setting forth (as I had no doubt in the world he was
+doing) to clap the Bow Street runners on my trail, and cover England with
+handbills, each dangerous as a loaded musket, convinced me for the first
+time that the affair was no less serious than death.  I believe it came
+to a near touch whether I should not turn the horses' heads at the next
+stage and make directly for the coast.  But I was now in the position of
+a man who should have thrown his gage into the den of lions; or, better
+still, like one who should have quarrelled overnight under the influence
+of wine, and now, at daylight, in a cold winter's morning, and humbly
+sober, must make good his words.  It is not that I thought any the less,
+or any the less warmly, of Flora.  But, as I smoked a grim segar that
+morning in a corner of the chaise, no doubt I considered, in the first
+place, that the letter-post had been invented, and admitted privately to
+myself, in the second, that it would have been highly possible to write
+her on a piece of paper, seal it, and send it skimming by the mail,
+instead of going personally into these egregious dangers, and through a
+country that I beheld crowded with gibbets and Bow Street officers.  As
+for Sim and Candlish, I doubt if they crossed my mind.
+
+At the Green Dragon Rowley was waiting on the doorsteps with the luggage,
+and really was bursting with unpalatable conversation.
+
+'Who do you think we've 'ad 'ere, sir?' he began breathlessly, as the
+chaise drove off.  'Red Breasts'; and he nodded his head portentously.
+
+'Red Breasts?' I repeated, for I stupidly did not understand at the
+moment an expression I had often heard.
+
+'Ah!' said he.  'Red weskits.  Runners.  Bow Street runners.  Two on' em,
+and one was Lavender himself!  I hear the other say quite plain, "Now,
+Mr. Lavender, _if_ you're ready."  They was breakfasting as nigh me as I
+am to that postboy.  They're all right; they ain't after us.  It's a
+forger; and I didn't send them off on a false scent--O no!  I thought
+there was no use in having them over our way; so I give them "very
+valuable information," Mr. Lavender said, and tipped me a tizzy for
+myself; and they're off to Luton.  They showed me the 'andcuffs, too--the
+other one did--and he clicked the dratted things on my wrist; and I tell
+you, I believe I nearly went off in a swound!  There's something so
+beastly in the feel of them!  Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne,' he added,
+with one of his delicious changes from the character of the confidential
+schoolboy into that of the trained, respectful servant.
+
+Well, I must not be proud!  I cannot say I found the subject of handcuffs
+to my fancy; and it was with more asperity than was needful that I
+reproved him for the slip about the name.
+
+'Yes, Mr. Ramornie,' says he, touching his hat.  'Begging your pardon,
+Mr. Ramornie.  But I've been very piticular, sir, up to now; and you may
+trust me to be very piticular in the future.  It were only a slip, sir.'
+
+'My good boy,' said I, with the most imposing severity, 'there must be no
+slips.  Be so good as to remember that my life is at stake.'
+
+I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had made myself.
+It is my principle that an officer must never be wrong.  I have seen two
+divisions beating their brains out for a fortnight against a worthless
+and quite impregnable castle in a pass: I knew we were only doing it for
+discipline, because the General had said so at first, and had not yet
+found any way out of his own words; and I highly admired his force of
+character, and throughout these operations thought my life exposed in a
+very good cause.  With fools and children, which included Rowley, the
+necessity was even greater.  I proposed to myself to be infallible; and
+even when he expressed some wonder at the purchase of the claret-coloured
+chaise, I put him promptly in his place.  In our situation, I told him,
+everything had to be sacrificed to appearances; doubtless, in a hired
+chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look at the dignity!  I was
+so positive, that I had sometimes almost convinced myself.  Not for long,
+you may be certain!  This detestable conveyance always appeared to me to
+be laden with Bow Street officers, and to have a placard upon the back of
+it publishing my name and crimes.  If I had paid seventy pounds to get
+the thing, I should not have stuck at seven hundred to be safely rid of
+it.
+
+And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the despatch-box and
+its golden cargo!  I had never had a care but to draw my pay and spend
+it; I had lived happily in the regiment, as in my father's house, fed by
+the great Emperor's commissariat as by ubiquitous doves of Elijah--or, my
+faith! if anything went wrong with the commissariat, helping myself with
+the best grace in the world from the next peasant!  And now I began to
+feel at the same time the burthen of riches and the fear of destitution.
+There were ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box, but I reckoned in
+French money, and had two hundred and fifty thousand agonies; I kept it
+under my hand all day, I dreamed of it at night.  In the inns, I was
+afraid to go to dinner and afraid to go to sleep.  When I walked up a
+hill I durst not leave the doors of the claret-coloured chaise.
+Sometimes I would change the disposition of the funds: there were days
+when I carried as much as five or six thousand pounds on my own person,
+and only the residue continued to voyage in the treasure-chest--days when
+I bulked all over like my cousin, crackled to a touch with bank paper,
+and had my pockets weighed to bursting-point with sovereigns.  And there
+were other days when I wearied of the thing--or grew ashamed of it--and
+put all the money back where it had come from: there let it take its
+chance, like better people!  In short, I set Rowley a poor example of
+consistency, and in philosophy, none at all.
+
+Little he cared!  All was one to him so long as he was amused, and I
+never knew any one amused more easily.  He was thrillingly interested in
+life, travel, and his own melodramatic position.  All day he would be
+looking from the chaise windows with ebullitions of gratified curiosity,
+that were sometimes justified and sometimes not, and that (taken
+altogether) it occasionally wearied me to be obliged to share.  I can
+look at horses, and I can look at trees too, although not fond of it.
+But why should I look at a lame horse, or a tree that was like the letter
+Y?  What exhilaration could I feel in viewing a cottage that was the same
+colour as 'the second from the miller's' in some place where I had never
+been, and of which I had not previously heard?  I am ashamed to complain,
+but there were moments when my juvenile and confidential friend weighed
+heavy on my hands.  His cackle was indeed almost continuous, but it was
+never unamiable.  He showed an amiable curiosity when he was asking
+questions; an amiable guilelessness when he was conferring information.
+And both he did largely.  I am in a position to write the biographies of
+Mr. Rowley, Mr. Rowley's father and mother, his Aunt Eliza, and the
+miller's dog; and nothing but pity for the reader, and some misgivings as
+to the law of copyright, prevail on me to withhold them.
+
+A general design to mould himself upon my example became early apparent,
+and I had not the heart to check it.  He began to mimic my carriage; he
+acquired, with servile accuracy, a little manner I had of shrugging the
+shoulders; and I may say it was by observing it in him that I first
+discovered it in myself.  One day it came out by chance that I was of the
+Catholic religion.  He became plunged in thought, at which I was gently
+glad.  Then suddenly--
+
+'Odd-rabbit it!  I'll be Catholic too!' he broke out.  'You must teach me
+it, Mr. Anne--I mean, Ramornie.'
+
+I dissuaded him: alleging that he would find me very imperfectly informed
+as to the grounds and doctrines of the Church, and that, after all, in
+the matter of religions, it was a very poor idea to change.  'Of course,
+my Church is the best,' said I; 'but that is not the reason why I belong
+to it: I belong to it because it was the faith of my house.  I wish to
+take my chances with my own people, and so should you.  If it is a
+question of going to hell, go to hell like a gentleman with your
+ancestors.'
+
+'Well, it wasn't that,' he admitted.  'I don't know that I was exactly
+thinking of hell.  Then there's the inquisition, too.  That's rather a
+cawker, you know.'
+
+'And I don't believe you were thinking of anything in the world,' said
+I--which put a period to his respectable conversion.
+
+He consoled himself by playing for awhile on a cheap flageolet, which was
+one of his diversions, and to which I owed many intervals of peace.  When
+he first produced it, in the joints, from his pocket, he had the
+duplicity to ask me if I played upon it.  I answered, no; and he put the
+instrument away with a sigh and the remark that he had thought I might.
+For some while he resisted the unspeakable temptation, his fingers
+visibly itching and twittering about his pocket, even his interest in the
+landscape and in sporadic anecdote entirely lost.  Presently the pipe was
+in his hands again; he fitted, unfitted, refitted, and played upon it in
+dumb show for some time.
+
+'I play it myself a little,' says he.
+
+'Do you?' said I, and yawned.
+
+And then he broke down.
+
+'Mr. Ramornie, if you please, would it disturb you, sir, if I was to play
+a chune?' he pleaded.  And from that hour, the tootling of the flageolet
+cheered our way.
+
+He was particularly keen on the details of battles, single combats,
+incidents of scouting parties, and the like.  These he would make haste
+to cap with some of the exploits of Wallace, the only hero with whom he
+had the least acquaintance.  His enthusiasm was genuine and pretty.  When
+he learned we were going to Scotland, 'Well, then,' he broke out, 'I'll
+see where Wallace lived!'  And presently after, he fell to moralising.
+'It's a strange thing, sir,' he began, 'that I seem somehow to have
+always the wrong sow by the ear.  I'm English after all, and I glory in
+it.  My eye! don't I, though!  Let some of your Frenchies come over here
+to invade, and you'll see whether or not!  Oh, yes, I'm English to the
+backbone, I am.  And yet look at me!  I got hold of this 'ere William
+Wallace and took to him right off; I never heard of such a man before!
+And then you came along, and I took to you.  And both the two of you were
+my born enemies!  I--I beg your pardon, Mr. Ramornie, but would you mind
+it very much if you didn't go for to do anything against England'--he
+brought the word out suddenly, like something hot--'when I was along of
+you?'
+
+I was more affected than I can tell.
+
+'Rowley,' I said, 'you need have no fear.  By how much I love my own
+honour, by so much I will take care to protect yours.  We are but
+fraternising at the outposts, as soldiers do.  When the bugle calls, my
+boy, we must face each other, one for England, one for France, and may
+God defend the right!'
+
+So I spoke at the moment; but for all my brave airs, the boy had wounded
+me in a vital quarter.  His words continued to ring in my hearing.  There
+was no remission all day of my remorseful thoughts; and that night (which
+we lay at Lichfield, I believe) there was no sleep for me in my bed.  I
+put out the candle and lay down with a good resolution; and in a moment
+all was light about me like a theatre, and I saw myself upon the stage of
+it playing ignoble parts.  I remembered France and my Emperor, now
+depending on the arbitrament of war, bent down, fighting on their knees
+and with their teeth against so many and such various assailants.  And I
+burned with shame to be here in England, cherishing an English fortune,
+pursuing an English mistress, and not there, to handle a musket in my
+native fields, and to manure them with my body if I fell.  I remembered
+that I belonged to France.  All my fathers had fought for her, and some
+had died; the voice in my throat, the sight of my eyes, the tears that
+now sprang there, the whole man of me, was fashioned of French earth and
+born of a French mother; I had been tended and caressed by a succession
+of the daughters of France, the fairest, the most ill-starred; and I had
+fought and conquered shoulder to shoulder with her sons.  A soldier, a
+noble, of the proudest and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to
+the prattle of a hobbledehoy lackey in an English chaise to recall me to
+the consciousness of duty.
+
+When I saw how it was I did not lose time in indecision.  The old
+classical conflict of love and honour being once fairly before me, it did
+not cost me a thought.  I was a Saint-Yves de Keroual; and I decided to
+strike off on the morrow for Wakefield and Burchell Fenn, and embark, as
+soon as it should be morally possible, for the succour of my downtrodden
+fatherland and my beleaguered Emperor.  Pursuant on this resolve, I
+leaped from bed, made a light, and as the watchman was crying half-past
+two in the dark streets of Lichfield, sat down to pen a letter of
+farewell to Flora.  And then--whether it was the sudden chill of the
+night, whether it came by association of ideas from the remembrance of
+Swanston Cottage I know not, but there appeared before me--to the barking
+of sheep-dogs--a couple of snuffy and shambling figures, each wrapped in
+a plaid, each armed with a rude staff; and I was immediately bowed down
+to have forgotten them so long, and of late to have thought of them so
+cavalierly.
+
+Sure enough there was my errand!  As a private person I was neither
+French nor English; I was something else first: a loyal gentleman, an
+honest man.  Sim and Candlish must not be left to pay the penalty of my
+unfortunate blow.  They held my honour tacitly pledged to succour them;
+and it is a sort of stoical refinement entirely foreign to my nature to
+set the political obligation above the personal and private.  If France
+fell in the interval for the lack of Anne de St.-Yves, fall she must!
+But I was both surprised and humiliated to have had so plain a duty bound
+upon me for so long--and for so long to have neglected and forgotten it.
+I think any brave man will understand me when I say that I went to bed
+and to sleep with a conscience very much relieved, and woke again in the
+morning with a light heart.  The very danger of the enterprise reassured
+me: to save Sim and Candlish (suppose the worst to come to the worst) it
+would be necessary for me to declare myself in a court of justice, with
+consequences which I did not dare to dwell upon; it could never be said
+that I had chosen the cheap and the easy--only that in a very perplexing
+competition of duties I had risked my life for the most immediate.
+
+We resumed the journey with more diligence: thenceforward posted day and
+night; did not halt beyond what was necessary for meals; and the
+postillions were excited by gratuities, after the habit of my cousin
+Alain.  For twopence I could have gone farther and taken four horses; so
+extreme was my haste, running as I was before the terrors of an awakened
+conscience.  But I feared to be conspicuous.  Even as it was, we
+attracted only too much attention, with our pair and that white elephant,
+the seventy-pounds-worth of claret-coloured chaise.
+
+Meanwhile I was ashamed to look Rowley in the face.  The young shaver had
+contrived to put me wholly in the wrong; he had cost me a night's rest
+and a severe and healthful humiliation; and I was grateful and
+embarrassed in his society.  This would never do; it was contrary to all
+my ideas of discipline; if the officer has to blush before the private,
+or the master before the servant, nothing is left to hope for but
+discharge or death.  I hit upon the idea of teaching him French; and
+accordingly, from Lichfield, I became the distracted master, and he the
+scholar--how shall I say? indefatigable, but uninspired.  His interest
+never flagged.  He would hear the same word twenty times with profound
+refreshment, mispronounce it in several different ways, and forget it
+again with magical celerity.  Say it happened to be _stirrup_.  'No, I
+don't seem to remember that word, Mr. Anne,' he would say: 'it don't seem
+to stick to me, that word don't.'  And then, when I had told it him
+again, '_Etrier_!' he would cry.  'To be sure!  I had it on the tip of my
+tongue.  _Eterier_!' (going wrong already, as if by a fatal instinct).
+'What will I remember it by, now?  Why, _interior_, to be sure!  I'll
+remember it by its being something that ain't in the interior of a
+horse.'  And when next I had occasion to ask him the French for stirrup,
+it was a toss-up whether he had forgotten all about it, or gave me
+_exterior_ for an answer.  He was never a hair discouraged.  He seemed to
+consider that he was covering the ground at a normal rate.  He came up
+smiling day after day.  'Now, sir, shall we do our French?' he would say;
+and I would put questions, and elicit copious commentary and explanation,
+but never the shadow of an answer.  My hands fell to my sides; I could
+have wept to hear him.  When I reflected that he had as yet learned
+nothing, and what a vast deal more there was for him to learn, the period
+of these lessons seemed to unroll before me vast as eternity, and I saw
+myself a teacher of a hundred, and Rowley a pupil of ninety, still
+hammering on the rudiments!  The wretched boy, I should say, was quite
+unspoiled by the inevitable familiarities of the journey.  He turned out
+at each stage the pink of serving-lads, deft, civil, prompt, attentive,
+touching his hat like an automaton, raising the status of Mr. Ramornie in
+the eyes of all the inn by his smiling service, and seeming capable of
+anything in the world but the one thing I had chosen--learning French!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII--THE ADVENTURE OF THE RUNAWAY COUPLE
+
+
+The country had for some time back been changing in character.  By a
+thousand indications I could judge that I was again drawing near to
+Scotland.  I saw it written in the face of the hills, in the growth of
+the trees, and in the glint of the waterbrooks that kept the high-road
+company.  It might have occurred to me, also, that I was, at the same
+time, approaching a place of some fame in Britain--Gretna Green.  Over
+these same leagues of road--which Rowley and I now traversed in the
+claret-coloured chaise, to the note of the flageolet and the French
+lesson--how many pairs of lovers had gone bowling northwards to the music
+of sixteen scampering horseshoes; and how many irate persons, parents,
+uncles, guardians, evicted rivals, had come tearing after, clapping the
+frequent red face to the chaise-window, lavishly shedding their gold
+about the post-houses, sedulously loading and re-loading, as they went,
+their avenging pistols!  But I doubt if I had thought of it at all,
+before a wayside hazard swept me into the thick of an adventure of this
+nature; and I found myself playing providence with other people's lives,
+to my own admiration at the moment--and subsequently to my own brief but
+passionate regret.
+
+At rather an ugly corner of an uphill reach I came on the wreck of a
+chaise lying on one side in the ditch, a man and a woman in animated
+discourse in the middle of the road, and the two postillions, each with
+his pair of horses, looking on and laughing from the saddle.
+
+'Morning breezes! here's a smash!' cried Rowley, pocketing his flageolet
+in the middle of the _Tight Little Island_.
+
+I was perhaps more conscious of the moral smash than the physical--more
+alive to broken hearts than to broken chaises; for, as plain as the sun
+at morning, there was a screw loose in this runaway match.  It is always
+a bad sign when the lower classes laugh: their taste in humour is both
+poor and sinister; and for a man, running the posts with four horses,
+presumably with open pockets, and in the company of the most entrancing
+little creature conceivable, to have come down so far as to be laughed at
+by his own postillions, was only to be explained on the double
+hypothesis, that he was a fool and no gentleman.
+
+I have said they were man and woman.  I should have said man and child.
+She was certainly not more than seventeen, pretty as an angel, just plump
+enough to damn a saint, and dressed in various shades of blue, from her
+stockings to her saucy cap, in a kind of taking gamut, the top note of
+which she flung me in a beam from her too appreciative eye.  There was no
+doubt about the case: I saw it all.  From a boarding-school, a
+black-board, a piano, and Clementi's _Sonatinas_, the child had made a
+rash adventure upon life in the company of a half-bred hawbuck; and she
+was already not only regretting it, but expressing her regret with point
+and pungency.
+
+As I alighted they both paused with that unmistakable air of being
+interrupted in a scene.  I uncovered to the lady and placed my services
+at their disposal.
+
+It was the man who answered.  'There's no use in shamming, sir,' said he.
+'This lady and I have run away, and her father's after us: road to
+Gretna, sir.  And here have these nincompoops spilt us in the ditch and
+smashed the chaise!'
+
+'Very provoking,' said I.
+
+'I don't know when I've been so provoked!' cried he, with a glance down
+the road, of mortal terror.
+
+'The father is no doubt very much incensed?' I pursued civilly.
+
+'O God!' cried the hawbuck.  'In short, you see, we must get out of this.
+And I'll tell you what--it may seem cool, but necessity has no law--if
+you would lend us your chaise to the next post-house, it would be the
+very thing, sir.'
+
+'I confess it seems cool,' I replied.
+
+'What's that you say, sir?' he snapped.
+
+'I was agreeing with you,' said I.  'Yes, it does seem cool; and what is
+more to the point, it seems unnecessary.  This thing can be arranged in a
+more satisfactory manner otherwise, I think.  You can doubtless ride?'
+
+This opened a door on the matter of their previous dispute, and the
+fellow appeared life-sized in his true colours.  'That's what I've been
+telling her: that, damn her! she must ride!' he broke out.  'And if the
+gentleman's of the same mind, why, damme, you shall!'
+
+As he said so, he made a snatch at her wrist, which she evaded with
+horror.
+
+I stepped between them.
+
+'No, sir,' said I; 'the lady shall not.'
+
+He turned on me raging.  'And who are you to interfere?' he roared.
+
+'There is here no question of who I am,' I replied.  'I may be the devil
+or the Archbishop of Canterbury for what you know, or need know.  The
+point is that I can help you--it appears that nobody else can; and I will
+tell you how I propose to do it.  I will give the lady a seat in my
+chaise, if you will return the compliment by allowing my servant to ride
+one of your horses.'
+
+I thought he would have sprung at my throat.
+
+'You have always the alternative before you: to wait here for the arrival
+of papa,' I added.
+
+And that settled him.  He cast another haggard look down the road, and
+capitulated.
+
+'I am sure, sir, the lady is very much obliged to you,' he said, with an
+ill grace.
+
+I gave her my hand; she mounted like a bird into the chaise; Rowley,
+grinning from ear to ear, closed the door behind us; the two impudent
+rascals of post-boys cheered and laughed aloud as we drove off; and my
+own postillion urged his horses at once into a rattling trot.  It was
+plain I was supposed by all to have done a very dashing act, and ravished
+the bride from the ravisher.
+
+In the meantime I stole a look at the little lady.  She was in a state of
+pitiable discomposure, and her arms shook on her lap in her black lace
+mittens.
+
+'Madam--' I began.
+
+And she, in the same moment, finding her voice: 'O, what you must think
+of me!'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'what must any gentleman think when he sees youth,
+beauty and innocence in distress?  I wish I could tell you that I was old
+enough to be your father; I think we must give that up,' I continued,
+with a smile.  'But I will tell you something about myself which ought to
+do as well, and to set that little heart at rest in my society.  I am a
+lover.  May I say it of myself--for I am not quite used to all the
+niceties of English--that I am a true lover?  There is one whom I admire,
+adore, obey; she is no less good than she is beautiful; if she were here,
+she would take you to her arms: conceive that she has sent me--that she
+has said to me, "Go, be her knight!"'
+
+'O, I know she must be sweet, I know she must be worthy of you!' cried
+the little lady.  'She would never forget female decorum--nor make the
+terrible _erratum_ I've done!'
+
+And at this she lifted up her voice and wept.
+
+This did not forward matters: it was in vain that I begged her to be more
+composed and to tell me a plain, consecutive tale of her misadventures;
+but she continued instead to pour forth the most extraordinary mixture of
+the correct school miss and the poor untutored little piece of womanhood
+in a false position--of engrafted pedantry and incoherent nature.
+
+'I am certain it must have been judicial blindness,' she sobbed.  'I
+can't think how I didn't see it, but I didn't; and he isn't, is he?  And
+then a curtain rose . . . O, what a moment was that!  But I knew at once
+that _you were_; you had but to appear from your carriage, and I knew it,
+O, she must be a fortunate young lady!  And I have no fear with you,
+none--a perfect confidence.'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'a gentleman.'
+
+'That's what I mean--a gentleman,' she exclaimed.  'And he--and
+that--_he_ isn't.  O, how shall I dare meet father!'  And disclosing to
+me her tear-stained face, and opening her arms with a tragic gesture:
+'And I am quite disgraced before all the young ladies, my
+school-companions!' she added.
+
+'O, not so bad as that!' I cried.  'Come, come, you exaggerate, my dear
+Miss--?  Excuse me if I am too familiar: I have not yet heard your name.'
+
+'My name is Dorothy Greensleeves, sir: why should I conceal it?  I fear
+it will only serve to point an adage to future generations, and I had
+meant so differently!  There was no young female in the county more
+emulous to be thought well of than I.  And what a fall was there!  O,
+dear me, what a wicked, piggish donkey of a girl I have made of myself,
+to be sure!  And there is no hope! O, Mr.--'
+
+And at that she paused and asked my name.
+
+I am not writing my eulogium for the Academy; I will admit it was
+unpardonably imbecile, but I told it her.  If you had been there--and
+seen her, ravishingly pretty and little, a baby in years and mind--and
+heard her talking like a book, with so much of schoolroom propriety in
+her manner, with such an innocent despair in the matter--you would
+probably have told her yours.  She repeated it after me.
+
+'I shall pray for you all my life,' she said.  'Every night, when I
+retire to rest, the last thing I shall do is to remember you by name.'
+
+Presently I succeeded in winning from her her tale, which was much what I
+had anticipated: a tale of a schoolhouse, a walled garden, a fruit-tree
+that concealed a bench, an impudent raff posturing in church, an exchange
+of flowers and vows over the garden wall, a silly schoolmate for a
+confidante, a chaise and four, and the most immediate and perfect
+disenchantment on the part of the little lady.  'And there is nothing to
+be done!' she wailed in conclusion.  'My error is irretrievable, I am
+quite forced to that conclusion.  O, Monsieur de Saint-Yves! who would
+have thought that I could have been such a blind, wicked donkey!'
+
+I should have said before--only that I really do not know when it came
+in--that we had been overtaken by the two post-boys, Rowley and Mr.
+Bellamy, which was the hawbuck's name, bestriding the four post-horses;
+and that these formed a sort of cavalry escort, riding now before, now
+behind the chaise, and Bellamy occasionally posturing at the window and
+obliging us with some of his conversation.  He was so ill-received that I
+declare I was tempted to pity him, remembering from what a height he had
+fallen, and how few hours ago it was since the lady had herself fled to
+his arms, all blushes and ardour.  Well, these great strokes of fortune
+usually befall the unworthy, and Bellamy was now the legitimate object of
+my commiseration and the ridicule of his own post-boys!
+
+'Miss Dorothy,' said I, 'you wish to be delivered from this man?'
+
+'O, if it were possible!' she cried.  'But not by violence.'
+
+'Not in the least, ma'am,' I replied.  'The simplest thing in life.  We
+are in a civilised country; the man's a malefactor--'
+
+'O, never!' she cried.  'Do not even dream it!  With all his faults, I
+know he is not _that_.'
+
+'Anyway, he's in the wrong in this affair--on the wrong side of the law,
+call it what you please,' said I; and with that, our four horsemen having
+for the moment headed us by a considerable interval, I hailed my post-boy
+and inquired who was the nearest magistrate and where he lived.
+Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a prodigious dignitary, and one who
+lived but a lane or two back, and at the distance of only a mile or two
+out of the direct road.  I showed him the king's medallion.
+
+'Take the lady there, and at full gallop,' I cried.
+
+'Right, sir!  Mind yourself,' says the postillion.
+
+And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the carriage
+to the rightabout and we were galloping south.
+
+Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre, and came
+flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate shouting; so that the
+fine, sober picture of a carriage and escort, that we had presented but a
+moment back, was transformed in the twinkling of an eye into the image of
+a noisy fox-chase.  The two postillions and my own saucy rogue were, of
+course, disinterested actors in the comedy; they rode for the mere sport,
+keeping in a body, their mouths full of laughter, waving their hats as
+they came on, and crying (as the fancy struck them) Tally-ho!'  'Stop,
+thief!'  'A highwayman!  A highwayman!'  It was otherguess work with
+Bellamy.  That gentleman no sooner observed our change of direction than
+he turned his horse with so much violence that the poor animal was almost
+cast upon its side, and launched her in immediate and desperate pursuit.
+As he approached I saw that his face was deadly white and that he carried
+a drawn pistol in his hand.  I turned at once to the poor little bride
+that was to have been, and now was not to be; she, upon her side,
+deserting the other window, turned as if to meet me.
+
+'O, O, don't let him kill me!' she screamed.
+
+'Never fear,' I replied.
+
+Her face was distorted with terror.  Her hands took hold upon me with the
+instinctive clutch of an infant.  The chaise gave a flying lurch, which
+took the feet from under me and tumbled us anyhow upon the seat.  And
+almost in the same moment the head of Bellamy appeared in the window
+which Missy had left free for him.
+
+Conceive the situation!  The little lady and I were falling--or had just
+fallen--backward on the seat, and offered to the eye a somewhat ambiguous
+picture.  The chaise was speeding at a furious pace, and with the most
+violent leaps and lurches, along the highway.  Into this bounding
+receptacle Bellamy interjected his head, his pistol arm, and his pistol;
+and since his own horse was travelling still faster than the chaise, he
+must withdraw all of them again in the inside of the fraction of a
+minute.  He did so, but he left the charge of the pistol behind
+him--whether by design or accident I shall never know, and I dare say he
+has forgotten!  Probably he had only meant to threaten, in hopes of
+causing us to arrest our flight.  In the same moment came the explosion
+and a pitiful cry from Missy; and my gentleman, making certain he had
+struck her, went down the road pursued by the furies, turned at the first
+corner, took a flying leap over the thorn hedge, and disappeared across
+country in the least possible time.
+
+Rowley was ready and eager to pursue; but I withheld him, thinking we
+were excellently quit of Mr. Bellamy, at no more cost than a scratch on
+the forearm and a bullet-hole in the left-hand claret-coloured panel.
+And accordingly, but now at a more decent pace, we proceeded on our way
+to Archdeacon Clitheroe's, Missy's gratitude and admiration were aroused
+to a high pitch by this dramatic scene, and what she was pleased to call
+my wound.  She must dress it for me with her handkerchief, a service
+which she rendered me even with tears.  I could well have spared them,
+not loving on the whole to be made ridiculous, and the injury being in
+the nature of a cat's scratch.  Indeed, I would have suggested for her
+kind care rather the cure of my coat-sleeve, which had suffered worse in
+the encounter; but I was too wise to risk the anti-climax.  That she had
+been rescued by a hero, that the hero should have been wounded in the
+affray, and his wound bandaged with her handkerchief (which it could not
+even bloody), ministered incredibly to the recovery of her self-respect;
+and I could hear her relate the incident to 'the young ladies, my
+school-companions,' in the most approved manner of Mrs. Radcliffe!  To
+have insisted on the torn coat-sleeve would have been unmannerly, if not
+inhuman.
+
+Presently the residence of the archdeacon began to heave in sight.  A
+chaise and four smoking horses stood by the steps, and made way for us on
+our approach; and even as we alighted there appeared from the interior of
+the house a tall ecclesiastic, and beside him a little, headstrong, ruddy
+man, in a towering passion, and brandishing over his head a roll of
+paper.  At sight of him Miss Dorothy flung herself on her knees with the
+most moving adjurations, calling him father, assuring him she was wholly
+cured and entirely repentant of her disobedience, and entreating
+forgiveness; and I soon saw that she need fear no great severity from Mr.
+Greensleeves, who showed himself extraordinarily fond, loud, greedy of
+caresses and prodigal of tears.
+
+To give myself a countenance, as well as to have all ready for the road
+when I should find occasion, I turned to quit scores with Bellamy's two
+postillions.  They had not the least claim on me, but one of which they
+were quite ignorant--that I was a fugitive.  It is the worst feature of
+that false position that every gratuity becomes a case of conscience.
+You must not leave behind you any one discontented nor any one grateful.
+But the whole business had been such a 'hurrah-boys' from the beginning,
+and had gone off in the fifth act so like a melodrama, in explosions,
+reconciliations, and the rape of a post-horse, that it was plainly
+impossible to keep it covered.  It was plain it would have to be talked
+over in all the inn-kitchens for thirty miles about, and likely for six
+months to come.  It only remained for me, therefore, to settle on that
+gratuity which should be least conspicuous--so large that nobody could
+grumble, so small that nobody would be tempted to boast.  My decision was
+hastily and nor wisely taken.  The one fellow spat on his tip (so he
+called it) for luck; the other developing a sudden streak of piety,
+prayed God bless me with fervour.  It seemed a demonstration was brewing,
+and I determined to be off at once.  Bidding my own post-boy and Rowley
+be in readiness for an immediate start, I reascended the terrace and
+presented myself, hat in hand, before Mr. Greensleeves and the
+archdeacon.
+
+'You will excuse me, I trust,' said I.  'I think shame to interrupt this
+agreeable scene of family effusion, which I have been privileged in some
+small degree to bring about.'
+
+And at these words the storm broke.
+
+'Small degree! small degree, sir!' cries the father; 'that shall not
+pass, Mr. St. Eaves!  If I've got my darling back, and none the worse for
+that vagabone rascal, I know whom I have to thank.  Shake hands with
+me--up to the elbows, sir!  A Frenchman you may be, but you're one of the
+right breed, by God!  And, by God, sir, you may have anything you care to
+ask of me, down to Dolly's hand, by God!'
+
+All this he roared out in a voice surprisingly powerful from so small a
+person.  Every word was thus audible to the servants, who had followed
+them out of the house and now congregated about us on the terrace, as
+well as to Rowley and the five postillions on the gravel sweep below.
+The sentiments expressed were popular; some ass, whom the devil moved to
+be my enemy, proposed three cheers, and they were given with a will.  To
+hear my own name resounding amid acclamations in the hills of Westmorland
+was flattering, perhaps; but it was inconvenient at a moment when (as I
+was morally persuaded) police handbills were already speeding after me at
+the rate of a hundred miles a day.
+
+Nor was that the end of it.  The archdeacon must present his compliments,
+and pressed upon me some of his West India sherry, and I was carried into
+a vastly fine library, where I was presented to his lady wife.  While we
+were at sherry in the library, ale was handed round upon the terrace.
+Speeches were made, hands were shaken, Missy (at her father's request)
+kissed me farewell, and the whole party reaccompanied me to the terrace,
+where they stood waving hats and handkerchiefs, and crying farewells to
+all the echoes of the mountains until the chaise had disappeared.
+
+The echoes of the mountains were engaged in saying to me privately: 'You
+fool, you have done it now!'
+
+'They do seem to have got 'old of your name, Mr. Anne,' said Rowley.  'It
+weren't my fault this time.'
+
+'It was one of those accidents that can never be foreseen,' said I,
+affecting a dignity that I was far from feeling.  'Some one recognised
+me.'
+
+'Which on 'em, Mr. Anne?' said the rascal.
+
+'That is a senseless question; it can make no difference who it was,' I
+returned.
+
+'No, nor that it can't!' cried Rowley.  'I say, Mr. Anne, sir, it's what
+you would call a jolly mess, ain't it? looks like "clean bowled-out in
+the middle stump," don't it?'
+
+'I fail to understand you, Rowley.'
+
+'Well, what I mean is, what are we to do about this one?' pointing to the
+postillion in front of us, as he alternately hid and revealed his patched
+breeches to the trot of his horse.  'He see you get in this morning under
+_Mr. Ramornie_--I was very piticular to _Mr. Ramornie_ you, if you
+remember, sir--and he see you get in again under Mr. Saint Eaves, and
+whatever's he going to see you get out under? that's what worries me,
+sir.  It don't seem to me like as if the position was what you call
+_stratetegic_!'
+
+'_Parrrbleu_! will you let me be!' I cried.  'I have to think; you cannot
+imagine how your constant idiotic prattle annoys me.'
+
+'Beg pardon, Mr. Anne,' said he; and the next moment, 'You wouldn't like
+for us to do our French now, would you, Mr. Anne?'
+
+'Certainly not,' said I.  'Play upon your flageolet.'
+
+The which he did with what seemed to me to be irony.
+
+Conscience doth make cowards of us all!  I was so downcast by my pitiful
+mismanagement of the morning's business that I shrank from the eye of my
+own hired infant, and read offensive meanings into his idle tootling.
+
+I took off my coat, and set to mending it, soldier-fashion, with a needle
+and thread.  There is nothing more conducive to thought, above all in
+arduous circumstances; and as I sewed, I gradually gained a clearness
+upon my affairs.  I must be done with the claret-coloured chaise at once.
+It should be sold at the next stage for what it would bring.  Rowley and
+I must take back to the road on our four feet, and after a decent
+interval of trudging, get places on some coach for Edinburgh again under
+new names!  So much trouble and toil, so much extra risk and expense and
+loss of time, and all for a slip of the tongue to a little lady in blue!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV--THE INN-KEEPER OF KIRKBY-LONSDALE
+
+
+I had hitherto conceived and partly carried out an ideal that was dear to
+my heart.  Rowley and I descended from our claret-coloured chaise, a
+couple of correctly dressed, brisk, bright-eyed young fellows, like a
+pair of aristocratic mice; attending singly to our own affairs,
+communicating solely with each other, and that with the niceties and
+civilities of drill.  We would pass through the little crowd before the
+door with high-bred preoccupation, inoffensively haughty, after the best
+English pattern; and disappear within, followed by the envy and
+admiration of the bystanders, a model master and servant, point-device in
+every part.  It was a heavy thought to me, as we drew up before the inn
+at Kirkby-Lonsdale, that this scene was now to be enacted for the last
+time.  Alas! and had I known it, it was to go of with so inferior a
+grace!
+
+I had been injudiciously liberal to the post-boys of the chaise and four.
+My own post-boy, he of the patched breeches, now stood before me, his
+eyes glittering with greed, his hand advanced.  It was plain he
+anticipated something extraordinary by way of a _pourboire_; and
+considering the marches and counter-marches by which I had extended the
+stage, the military character of our affairs with Mr. Bellamy, and the
+bad example I had set before him at the archdeacon's, something
+exceptional was certainly to be done.  But these are always nice
+questions, to a foreigner above all: a shade too little will suggest
+niggardliness, a shilling too much smells of hush-money.  Fresh from the
+scene at the archdeacon's, and flushed by the idea that I was now nearly
+done with the responsibilities of the claret-coloured chaise, I put into
+his hands five guineas; and the amount served only to waken his cupidity.
+
+'O, come, sir, you ain't going to fob me of with this?  Why, I seen fire
+at your side!' he cried.
+
+It would never do to give him more; I felt I should become the fable of
+Kirkby-Lonsdale if I did; and I looked him in the face, sternly but still
+smiling, and addressed him with a voice of uncompromising firmness.
+
+'If you do not like it, give it back,' said I.
+
+He pocketed the guineas with the quickness of a conjurer, and, like a
+base-born cockney as he was, fell instantly to casting dirt.
+
+''Ave your own way of it, Mr. Ramornie--leastways Mr. St. Eaves, or
+whatever your blessed name may be.  Look 'ere'--turning for sympathy to
+the stable-boys--'this is a blessed business.  Blessed 'ard, I calls it.
+'Ere I takes up a blessed son of a pop-gun what calls hisself anything
+you care to mention, and turns out to be a blessed _mounseer_ at the end
+of it!  'Ere 'ave I been drivin' of him up and down all day, a-carrying
+off of gals, a-shootin' of pistyils, and a-drinkin' of sherry and hale;
+and wot does he up and give me but a blank, blank, blanketing blank!'
+
+The fellow's language had become too powerful for reproduction, and I
+passed it by.
+
+Meanwhile I observed Rowley fretting visibly at the bit; another moment,
+and he would have added a last touch of the ridiculous to our arrival by
+coming to his hands with the postillion.
+
+'Rowley!' cried I reprovingly.
+
+Strictly it should have been Gammon; but in the hurry of the moment, my
+fault (I can only hope) passed unperceived.  At the same time I caught
+the eye of the postmaster.  He was long and lean, and brown and bilious;
+he had the drooping nose of the humourist, and the quick attention of a
+man of parts.  He read my embarrassment in a glance, stepped instantly
+forward, sent the post-boy to the rightabout with half a word, and was
+back next moment at my side.
+
+'Dinner in a private room, sir?  Very well.  John, No. 4!  What wine
+would you care to mention?  Very well, sir.  Will you please to order
+fresh horses?  Not, sir?  Very well.'
+
+Each of these expressions was accompanied by something in the nature of a
+bow, and all were prefaced by something in the nature of a smile, which I
+could very well have done without.  The man's politeness was from the
+teeth outwards; behind and within, I was conscious of a perpetual
+scrutiny: the scene at his doorstep, the random confidences of the
+post-boy, had not been thrown away on this observer; and it was under a
+strong fear of coming trouble that I was shown at last into my private
+room.  I was in half a mind to have put off the whole business.  But the
+truth is, now my name had got abroad, my fear of the mail that was
+coming, and the handbills it should contain, had waxed inordinately, and
+I felt I could never eat a meal in peace till I had severed my connection
+with the claret-coloured chaise.
+
+Accordingly, as soon as I had done with dinner, I sent my compliments to
+the landlord and requested he should take a glass of wine with me.  He
+came; we exchanged the necessary civilities, and presently I approached
+my business.
+
+'By the bye,' said I, 'we had a brush down the road to-day.  I dare say
+you may have heard of it?'
+
+He nodded.
+
+'And I was so unlucky as to get a pistol ball in the panel of my chaise,'
+I continued, 'which makes it simply useless to me.  Do you know any one
+likely to buy?'
+
+'I can well understand that,' said the landlord, 'I was looking at it
+just now; it's as good as ruined, is that chaise.  General rule, people
+don't like chaises with bullet-holes.'
+
+'Too much _Romance of the Forest_?' I suggested, recalling my little
+friend of the morning, and what I was sure had been her favourite
+reading--Mrs. Radcliffe's novels.
+
+'Just so,' said he.  'They may be right, they may be wrong; I'm not the
+judge.  But I suppose it's natural, after all, for respectable people to
+like things respectable about them; not bullet-holes, nor puddles of
+blood, nor men with aliases.'
+
+I took a glass of wine and held it up to the light to show that my hand
+was steady.
+
+'Yes,' said I, 'I suppose so.'
+
+'You have papers, of course, showing you are the proper owner?' he
+inquired.
+
+'There is the bill, stamped and receipted,' said I, tossing it across to
+him.
+
+He looked at it.
+
+'This all you have?' he asked.
+
+'It is enough, at least,' said I.  'It shows you where I bought and what
+I paid for it.'
+
+'Well, I don't know,' he said.  'You want some paper of identification.'
+
+'To identify the chaise?' I inquired.
+
+'Not at all: to identify _you_,' said he.
+
+'My good sir, remember yourself!' said I.  'The title-deeds of my estate
+are in that despatch-box; but you do not seriously suppose that I should
+allow you to examine them?'
+
+'Well, you see, this paper proves that some Mr. Ramornie paid seventy
+guineas for a chaise,' said the fellow.  'That's all well and good; but
+who's to prove to me that you are Mr. Ramornie?'
+
+'Fellow!' cried I.
+
+'O, fellow as much as you please!' said he.  'Fellow, with all my heart!
+That changes nothing.  I am fellow, of course--obtrusive fellow, impudent
+fellow, if you like--but who are you?  I hear of you with two names; I
+hear of you running away with young ladies, and getting cheered for a
+Frenchman, which seems odd; and one thing I will go bail for, that you
+were in a blue fright when the post-boy began to tell tales at my door.
+In short, sir, you may be a very good gentleman; but I don't know enough
+about you, and I'll trouble you for your papers, or to go before a
+magistrate.  Take your choice; if I'm not fine enough, I hope the
+magistrates are.'
+
+'My good man,' I stammered, for though I had found my voice, I could
+scarce be said to have recovered my wits, 'this is most unusual, most
+rude.  Is it the custom in Westmorland that gentlemen should be
+insulted?'
+
+'That depends,' said he.  'When it's suspected that gentlemen are spies
+it _is_ the custom; and a good custom, too.  No no,' he broke out,
+perceiving me to make a movement.  'Both hands upon the table, my
+gentleman!  I want no pistol balls in my chaise panels.'
+
+'Surely, sir, you do me strange injustice!' said I, now the master of
+myself.  'You see me sitting here, a monument of tranquillity: pray may I
+help myself to wine without umbraging you?'
+
+I took this attitude in sheer despair.  I had no plan, no hope.  The best
+I could imagine was to spin the business out some minutes longer, then
+capitulate.  At least, I would not capituatle one moment too soon.
+
+'Am I to take that for _no_?' he asked.
+
+'Referring to your former obliging proposal?' said I.  'My good sir, you
+are to take it, as you say, for "No."  Certainly I will not show you my
+deeds; certainly I will not rise from table and trundle out to see your
+magistrates.  I have too much respect for my digestion, and too little
+curiosity in justices of the peace.'
+
+He leaned forward, looked me nearly in the face, and reached out one hand
+to the bell-rope.  'See here, my fine fellow!' said he.  'Do you see that
+bell-rope?  Let me tell you, there's a boy waiting below: one jingle, and
+he goes to fetch the constable.'
+
+'Do you tell me so?' said I.  'Well, there's no accounting for tastes!  I
+have a prejudice against the society of constables, but if it is your
+fancy to have one in for the dessert--'  I shrugged my shoulders lightly.
+'Really, you know,' I added, 'this is vastly entertaining.  I assure you,
+I am looking on, with all the interest of a man of the world, at the
+development of your highly original character.'
+
+He continued to study my face without speech, his hand still on the
+button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the decisive heat.
+My face seemed to myself to dislimn under his gaze, my expression to
+change, the smile (with which I had began) to degenerate into the grin of
+the man upon the rack.  I was besides harassed with doubts.  An innocent
+man, I argued, would have resented the fellow's impudence an hour ago;
+and by my continued endurance of the ordeal, I was simply signing and
+sealing my confession; in short, I had reached the end of my powers.
+
+'Have you any objection to my putting my hands in my breeches pockets?' I
+inquired.  'Excuse me mentioning it, but you showed yourself so extremely
+nervous a moment back.'  My voice was not all I could have wished, but it
+sufficed.  I could hear it tremble, but the landlord apparently could
+not.  He turned away and drew a long breath, and you may be sure I was
+quick to follow his example.
+
+'You're a cool hand at least, and that's the sort I like,' said he.  'Be
+you what you please, I'll deal square.  I'll take the chaise for a
+hundred pound down, and throw the dinner in.'
+
+'I beg your pardon,' I cried, wholly mystified by this form of words.
+
+'You pay me a hundred down,' he repeated, 'and I'll take the chaise.
+It's very little more than it cost,' he added, with a grin, 'and you know
+you must get it off your hands somehow.'
+
+I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this impudent
+proposal.  It was broadly funny, and I suppose the least tempting offer
+in the world.  For all that, it came very welcome, for it gave me the
+occasion to laugh.  This I did with the most complete abandonment, till
+the tears ran down my cheeks; and ever and again, as the fit abated, I
+would get another view of the landlord's face, and go off into another
+paroxysm.
+
+'You droll creature, you will be the death of me yet!' I cried, drying my
+eyes.
+
+My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to look, nor yet
+what to say; and began for the first time to conceive it possible he was
+mistaken.
+
+'You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir,' said he.
+
+'O, yes!  I am quite an original,' I replied, and laughed again.
+
+Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for the
+chaise; I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the offer: indeed, I
+was glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it was not in the desire of
+gain, but with the view at any price of securing a safe retreat.  For
+although hostilities were suspended, he was yet far from satisfied; and I
+could read his continued suspicions in the cloudy eye that still hovered
+about my face.  At last they took shape in words.
+
+'This is all very well,' says he: 'you carry it off well; but for all
+that, I must do my duty.'
+
+I had my strong effect in reserve; it was to burn my ships with a
+vengeance!  I rose.  'Leave the room,' said I.  'This is insuperable.  Is
+the man mad?'  And then, as if already half-ashamed of my passion: 'I can
+take a joke as well as any one,' I added; 'but this passes measure.  Send
+my servant and the bill.'
+
+When he had left me alone, I considered my own valour with amazement.  I
+had insulted him; I had sent him away alone; now, if ever, he would take
+what was the only sensible resource, and fetch the constable.  But there
+was something instinctively treacherous about the man which shrank from
+plain courses.  And, with all his cleverness, he missed the occasion of
+fame.  Rowley and I were suffered to walk out of his door, with all our
+baggage, on foot, with no destination named, except in the vague
+statement that we were come 'to view the lakes'; and my friend only
+watched our departure with his chin in his hand, still moodily
+irresolute.
+
+I think this one of my great successes.  I was exposed, unmasked,
+summoned to do a perfectly natural act, which must prove my doom and
+which I had not the slightest pretext for refusing.  I kept my head,
+stuck to my guns, and, against all likelihood, here I was once more at
+liberty and in the king's highway.  This was a strong lesson never to
+despair; and, at the same time, how many hints to be cautious! and what a
+perplexed and dubious business the whole question of my escape now
+appeared!  That I should have risked perishing upon a trumpery question
+of a _pourboire_, depicted in lively colours the perils that perpetually
+surrounded us.  Though, to be sure, the initial mistake had been
+committed before that; and if I had not suffered myself to be drawn a
+little deep in confidences to the innocent Dolly, there need have been no
+tumble at the inn of Kirkby-Lonsdale.  I took the lesson to heart, and
+promised myself in the future to be more reserved.  It was none of my
+business to attend to broken chaises or shipwrecked travellers.  I had my
+hands full of my own affairs; and my best defence would be a little more
+natural selfishness and a trifle less imbecile good-nature.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV--I MEET A CHEERFUL EXTRAVAGANT
+
+
+I pass over the next fifty or sixty leagues of our journey without
+comment.  The reader must be growing weary of scenes of travel; and for
+my own part I have no cause to recall these particular miles with any
+pleasure.  We were mainly occupied with attempts to obliterate our trail,
+which (as the result showed) were far from successful; for, on my cousin
+following, he was able to run me home with the least possible loss of
+time, following the claret-coloured chaise to Kirkby-Lonsdale, where I
+think the landlord must have wept to learn what he had missed, and
+tracing us thereafter to the doors of the coach-office in Edinburgh
+without a single check.  Fortune did not favour me, and why should I
+recapitulate the details of futile precautions which deceived nobody, and
+wearisome arts which proved to be artless?
+
+The day was drawing to an end when Mr. Rowley and I bowled into Edinburgh
+to the stirring sound of the guard's bugle and the clattering team.  I
+was here upon my field of battle; on the scene of my former captivity,
+escape and exploits; and in the same city with my love.  My heart
+expanded; I have rarely felt more of a hero.  All down the Bridges I sat
+by the driver with my arms folded and my face set, unflinchingly meeting
+every eye, and prepared every moment for a cry of recognition.  Hundreds
+of the population were in the habit of visiting the Castle, where it was
+my practice (before the days of Flora) to make myself conspicuous among
+the prisoners; and I think it an extraordinary thing that I should have
+encountered so few to recognise me.  But doubtless a clean chin is a
+disguise in itself; and the change is great from a suit of sulphur-yellow
+to fine linen, a well-fitting mouse-coloured great-coat furred in black,
+a pair of tight trousers of fashionable cut, and a hat of inimitable
+curl.  After all, it was more likely that I should have recognised our
+visitors, than that they should have identified the modish gentleman with
+the miserable prisoner in the Castle.
+
+I was glad to set foot on the flagstones, and to escape from the crowd
+that had assembled to receive the mail.  Here we were, with but little
+daylight before us, and that on Saturday afternoon, the eve of the famous
+Scottish Sabbath, adrift in the New Town of Edinburgh, and overladen with
+baggage.  We carried it ourselves.  I would not take a cab, nor so much
+as hire a porter, who might afterwards serve as a link between my
+lodgings and the mail, and connect me again with the claret-coloured
+chaise and Aylesbury.  For I was resolved to break the chain of evidence
+for good, and to begin life afresh (so far as regards caution) with a new
+character.  The first step was to find lodgings, and to find them
+quickly.  This was the more needful as Mr. Rowley and I, in our smart
+clothes and with our cumbrous burthen, made a noticeable appearance in
+the streets at that time of the day and in that quarter of the town,
+which was largely given up to fine folk, bucks and dandies and young
+ladies, or respectable professional men on their way home to dinner.
+
+On the north side of St. James' Square I was so happy as to spy a bill in
+a third-floor window.  I was equally indifferent to cost and convenience
+in my choice of a lodging--'any port in a storm' was the principle on
+which I was prepared to act; and Rowley and I made at once for the common
+entrance and sealed the stair.
+
+We were admitted by a very sour-looking female in bombazine.  I gathered
+she had all her life been depressed by a series of bereavements, the last
+of which might very well have befallen her the day before; and I
+instinctively lowered my voice when I addressed her.  She admitted she
+had rooms to let--even showed them to us--a sitting-room and bedroom in a
+_suite_, commanding a fine prospect to the Firth and Fifeshire, and in
+themselves well proportioned and comfortably furnished, with pictures on
+the wall, shells on the mantelpiece, and several books upon the table
+which I found afterwards to be all of a devotional character, and all
+presentation copies, 'to my Christian friend,' or 'to my devout
+acquaintance in the Lord, Bethiah McRankine.'  Beyond this my 'Christian
+friend' could not be made to advance: no, not even to do that which
+seemed the most natural and pleasing thing in the world--I mean to name
+her price--but stood before us shaking her head, and at times mourning
+like the dove, the picture of depression and defence.  She had a voice
+the most querulous I have ever heard, and with this she produced a whole
+regiment of difficulties and criticisms.
+
+She could not promise an attendance.
+
+'Well, madam,' said I, 'and what is my servant for?'
+
+'Him?' she asked.  'Be gude to us!  Is _he_ your servant?'
+
+'I am sorry, ma'am, he meets with your disapproval.'
+
+'Na, I never said that.  But he's young.  He'll be a great breaker, I'm
+thinkin'.  Ay! he'll be a great responsibeelity to ye, like.  Does he
+attend to his releegion?'
+
+'Yes, m'm,' returned Rowley, with admirable promptitude, and, immediately
+closing his eyes, as if from habit, repeated the following distich with
+more celerity than fervour:--
+
+    'Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
+    Bless the bed that I lie on!'
+
+'Nhm!' said the lady, and maintained an awful silence.
+
+'Well, ma'am,' said I, 'it seems we are never to hear the beginning of
+your terms, let alone the end of them.  Come--a good movement! and let us
+be either off or on.'
+
+She opened her lips slowly.  'Ony raferences?' she inquired, in a voice
+like a bell.
+
+I opened my pocket-book and showed her a handful of bank bills.  'I
+think, madam, that these are unexceptionable,' said I.
+
+'Ye'll be wantin' breakfast late?' was her reply.
+
+'Madam, we want breakfast at whatever hour it suits you to give it, from
+four in the morning till four in the afternoon!' I cried.  'Only tell us
+your figure, if your mouth be large enough to let it out!'
+
+'I couldnae give ye supper the nicht,' came the echo.
+
+'We shall go out to supper, you incorrigible female!' I vowed, between
+laughter and tears.  'Here--this is going to end!  I want you for a
+landlady--let me tell you that!--and I am going to have my way.  You
+won't tell me what you charge?  Very well; I will do without!  I can
+trust you!  You don't seem to know when you have a good lodger; but I
+know perfectly when I have an honest landlady!  Rowley, unstrap the
+valises!'
+
+Will it be credited?  The monomaniac fell to rating me for my
+indiscretion!  But the battle was over; these were her last guns, and
+more in the nature of a salute than of renewed hostilities.  And
+presently she condescended on very moderate terms, and Rowley and I were
+able to escape in quest of supper.  Much time had, however, been lost;
+the sun was long down, the lamps glimmered along the streets, and the
+voice of a watchman already resounded in the neighbouring Leith Road.  On
+our first arrival I had observed a place of entertainment not far off, in
+a street behind the Register House.  Thither we found our way, and sat
+down to a late dinner alone.  But we had scarce given our orders before
+the door opened, and a tall young fellow entered with something of a
+lurch, looked about him, and approached the same table.
+
+'Give you good evening, most grave and reverend seniors!' said he.  'Will
+you permit a wanderer, a pilgrim--the pilgrim of love, in short--to come
+to temporary anchor under your lee?  I care not who knows it, but I have
+a passionate aversion from the bestial practice of solitary feeding!'
+
+'You are welcome, sir,' said I, 'if I may take upon me so far to play the
+host in a public place.'
+
+He looked startled, and fixed a hazy eye on me, as he sat down.
+
+'Sir,' said he, 'you are a man not without some tincture of letters, I
+perceive!  What shall we drink, sir?'
+
+I mentioned I had already called for a pot of porter.
+
+'A modest pot--the seasonable quencher?' said he.  'Well, I do not know
+but what I could look at a modest pot myself!  I am, for the moment, in
+precarious health.  Much study hath heated my brain, much walking wearied
+my--well, it seems to be more my eyes!'
+
+'You have walked far, I dare say?' I suggested.
+
+'Not so much far as often,' he replied.  'There is in this city--to
+which, I think, you are a stranger?  Sir, to your very good health and
+our better acquaintance!--there is, in this city of Dunedin, a certain
+implication of streets which reflects the utmost credit on the designer
+and the publicans--at every hundred yards is seated the Judicious Tavern,
+so that persons of contemplative mind are secure, at moderate distances,
+of refreshment.  I have been doing a trot in that favoured quarter,
+favoured by art and nature.  A few chosen comrades--enemies of publicity
+and friends to wit and wine--obliged me with their society.  "Along the
+cool, sequestered vale of Register Street we kept the uneven tenor of our
+way," sir.'
+
+'It struck me, as you came in--' I began.
+
+'O, don't make any bones about it!' he interrupted.  'Of course it struck
+you! and let me tell you I was devilish lucky not to strike myself.  When
+I entered this apartment I shone "with all the pomp and prodigality of
+brandy and water," as the poet Gray has in another place expressed it.
+Powerful bard, Gray! but a niminy-piminy creature, afraid of a petticoat
+and a bottle--not a man, sir, not a man!  Excuse me for being so
+troublesome, but what the devil have I done with my fork?  Thank you, I
+am sure.  _Temulentia_, _quoad me ipsum_, _brevis colligo est_.  I sit
+and eat, sir, in a London fog.  I should bring a link-boy to table with
+me; and I would too, if the little brutes were only washed!  I intend to
+found a Philanthropical Society for Washing the Deserving Poor and
+Shaving Soldiers.  I am pleased to observe that, although not of an
+unmilitary bearing, you are apparently shaved.  In my calendar of the
+virtues shaving comes next to drinking.  A gentleman may be a low-minded
+ruffian without sixpence, but he will always be close shaved.  See me,
+with the eye of fancy, in the chill hours of the morning, say about a
+quarter to twelve, noon--see me awake!  First thing of all, without one
+thought of the plausible but unsatisfactory small beer, or the healthful
+though insipid soda-water, I take the deadly razor in my vacillating
+grasp; I proceed to skate upon the margin of eternity.  Stimulating
+thought!  I bleed, perhaps, but with medicable wounds.  The stubble
+reaped, I pass out of my chamber, calm but triumphant.  To employ a
+hackneyed phrase, I would not call Lord Wellington my uncle!  I, too,
+have dared, perhaps bled, before the imminent deadly shaving-table.'
+
+In this manner the bombastic fellow continued to entertain me all through
+dinner, and by a common error of drunkards, because he had been extremely
+talkative himself, leaped to the conclusion that he had chanced on very
+genial company.  He told me his name, his address; he begged we should
+meet again; finally he proposed that I should dine with him in the
+country at an early date.
+
+'The dinner is official,' he explained.  'The office-bearers and Senatus
+of the University of Cramond--an educational institution in which I have
+the honour to be Professor of Nonsense--meet to do honour to our friend
+Icarus, at the old-established _howff_, Cramond Bridge.  One place is
+vacant, fascinating stranger,--I offer it to you!'
+
+'And who is your friend Icarus?' I asked,
+
+'The aspiring son of Daedalus!' said he.  'Is it possible that you have
+never heard the name of Byfield?'
+
+'Possible and true,' said I.
+
+'And is fame so small a thing?' cried he.  'Byfield, sir, is an aeronaut.
+He apes the fame of a Lunardi, and is on the point of offering to the
+inhabitants--I beg your pardon, to the nobility and gentry of our
+neighbourhood--the spectacle of an ascension.  As one of the gentry
+concerned I may be permitted to remark that I am unmoved.  I care not a
+Tinker's Damn for his ascension.  No more--I breathe it in your ear--does
+anybody else.  The business is stale, sir, stale.  Lunardi did it, and
+overdid it.  A whimsical, fiddling, vain fellow, by all accounts--for I
+was at that time rocking in my cradle.  But once was enough.  If Lunardi
+went up and came down, there was the matter settled.  We prefer to grant
+the point.  We do not want to see the experiment repeated _ad nauseam_ by
+Byfield, and Brown, and Butler, and Brodie, and Bottomley.  Ah! if they
+would go up and _not_ come down again!  But this is by the question.  The
+University of Cramond delights to honour merit in the man, sir, rather
+than utility in the profession; and Byfield, though an ignorant dog, is a
+sound reliable drinker, and really not amiss over his cups.  Under the
+radiance of the kindly jar partiality might even credit him with wit.'
+
+It will be seen afterwards that this was more my business than I thought
+it at the time.  Indeed, I was impatient to be gone.  Even as my friend
+maundered ahead a squall burst, the jaws of the rain were opened against
+the coffee-house windows, and at that inclement signal I remembered I was
+due elsewhere.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI--THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT
+
+
+At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence of the
+squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting words.  All the way along
+Princes Street (whither my way led) the wind hunted me behind and
+screamed in my ears.  The city was flushed with bucketfuls of rain that
+tasted salt from the neighbouring ocean.  It seemed to darken and lighten
+again in the vicissitudes of the gusts.  Now you would say the lamps had
+been blown out from end to end of the long thoroughfare; now, in a lull,
+they would revive, re-multiply, shine again on the wet pavements, and
+make darkness sparingly visible.
+
+By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there was a
+distinct improvement.  For one thing, I had now my shoulder to the wind;
+for a second, I came in the lee of my old prison-house, the Castle; and,
+at any rate, the excessive fury of the blast was itself moderating.  The
+thought of what errand I was on re-awoke within me, and I seemed to
+breast the rough weather with increasing ease.  With such a destination,
+what mattered a little buffeting of wind or a sprinkle of cold water?  I
+recalled Flora's image, I took her in fancy to my arms, and my heart
+throbbed.  And the next moment I had recognised the inanity of that
+fool's paradise.  If I could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might
+count myself lucky.
+
+I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and now deep
+in mire.  So soon as I was clear of the last street lamp, darkness
+received me--a darkness only pointed by the lights of occasional rustic
+farms, where the dogs howled with uplifted heads as I went by.  The wind
+continued to decline: it had been but a squall, not a tempest.  The rain,
+on the other hand, settled into a steady deluge, which had soon drenched
+me thoroughly.  I continued to tramp forward in the night, contending
+with gloomy thoughts and accompanied by the dismal ululation of the dogs.
+What ailed them that they should have been thus wakeful, and perceived
+the small sound of my steps amid the general reverberation of the rain,
+was more than I could fancy.  I remembered tales with which I had been
+entertained in childhood.  I told myself some murderer was going by, and
+the brutes perceived upon him the faint smell of blood; and the next
+moment, with a physical shock, I had applied the words to my own case!
+
+Here was a dismal disposition for a lover.  'Was ever lady in this humour
+wooed?' I asked myself, and came near turning back.  It is never wise to
+risk a critical interview when your spirits are depressed, your clothes
+muddy, and your hands wet!  But the boisterous night was in itself
+favourable to my enterprise: now, or perhaps never, I might find some way
+to have an interview with Flora; and if I had one interview (wet clothes,
+low spirits and all), I told myself there would certainly be another.
+
+Arrived in the cottage-garden I found the circumstances mighty inclement.
+From the round holes in the shutters of the parlour, shafts of
+candle-light streamed forth; elsewhere the darkness was complete.  The
+trees, the thickets, were saturated; the lower parts of the garden turned
+into a morass.  At intervals, when the wind broke forth again, there
+passed overhead a wild coil of clashing branches; and between whiles the
+whole enclosure continuously and stridently resounded with the rain.  I
+advanced close to the window and contrived to read the face of my watch.
+It was half-past seven; they would not retire before ten, they might not
+before midnight, and the prospect was unpleasant.  In a lull of the wind
+I could hear from the inside the voice of Flora reading aloud; the words
+of course inaudible--only a flow of undecipherable speech, quiet,
+cordial, colourless, more intimate and winning, more eloquent of her
+personality, but not less beautiful than song.  And the next moment the
+clamour of a fresh squall broke out about the cottage; the voice was
+drowned in its bellowing, and I was glad to retreat from my dangerous
+post.
+
+For three egregious hours I must now suffer the elements to do their
+worst upon me, and continue to hold my ground in patience.  I recalled
+the least fortunate of my services in the field: being out-sentry of the
+pickets in weather no less vile, sometimes unsuppered and with nothing to
+look forward to by way of breakfast but musket-balls; and they seemed
+light in comparison.  So strangely are we built: so much more strong is
+the love of woman than the mere love of life.
+
+At last my patience was rewarded.  The light disappeared from the parlour
+and reappeared a moment after in the room above.  I was pretty well
+informed for the enterprise that lay before me.  I knew the lair of the
+dragon--that which was just illuminated.  I knew the bower of my
+Rosamond, and how excellently it was placed on the ground-level, round
+the flank of the cottage and out of earshot of her formidable aunt.
+Nothing was left but to apply my knowledge.  I was then at the bottom of
+the garden, whether I had gone (Heaven save the mark!) for warmth, that I
+might walk to and fro unheard and keep myself from perishing.  The night
+had fallen still, the wind ceased; the noise of the rain had much
+lightened, if it had not stopped, and was succeeded by the dripping of
+the garden trees.  In the midst of this lull, and as I was already
+drawing near to the cottage, I was startled by the sound of a window-sash
+screaming in its channels; and a step or two beyond I became aware of a
+gush of light upon the darkness.  It fell from Flora's window, which she
+had flung open on the night, and where she now sat, roseate and pensive,
+in the shine of two candles falling from behind, her tresses deeply
+embowering and shading her; the suspended comb still in one hand, the
+other idly clinging to the iron stanchions with which the window was
+barred.
+
+Keeping to the turf, and favoured by the darkness of the night and the
+patter of the rain which was now returning, though without wind, I
+approached until I could almost have touched her.  It seemed a grossness
+of which I was incapable to break up her reverie by speech.  I stood and
+drank her in with my eyes; how the light made a glory in her hair, and
+(what I have always thought the most ravishing thing in nature) how the
+planes ran into each other, and were distinguished, and how the hues
+blended and varied, and were shaded off, between the cheek and neck.  At
+first I was abashed: she wore her beauty like an immediate halo of
+refinement; she discouraged me like an angel, or what I suspect to be the
+next most discouraging, a modern lady.  But as I continued to gaze, hope
+and life returned to me; I forgot my timidity, I forgot the sickening
+pack of wet clothes with which I stood burdened, I tingled with new
+blood.
+
+Still unconscious of my presence, still gazing before her upon the
+illuminated image of the window, the straight shadows of the bars, the
+glinting of pebbles on the path, and the impenetrable night on the garden
+and the hills beyond it, she heaved a deep breath that struck upon my
+heart like an appeal.
+
+'Why does Miss Gilchrist sigh?' I whispered.  'Does she recall absent
+friends?'
+
+She turned her head swiftly in my direction; it was the only sign of
+surprise she deigned to make.  At the same time I stepped into the light
+and bowed profoundly.
+
+'You!' she said.  'Here?'
+
+'Yes, I am here,' I replied.  'I have come very far, it may be a hundred
+and fifty leagues, to see you.  I have waited all this night in your
+garden.  Will Miss Gilchrist not offer her hand--to a friend in trouble?'
+
+She extended it between the bars, and I dropped upon one knee on the wet
+path and kissed it twice.  At the second it was withdrawn suddenly,
+methought with more of a start than she had hitherto displayed.  I
+regained my former attitude, and we were both silent awhile.  My timidity
+returned on me tenfold.  I looked in her face for any signals of anger,
+and seeing her eyes to waver and fall aside from mine, augured that all
+was well.
+
+'You must have been mad to come here!' she broke out.  'Of all places
+under heaven this is no place for you to come.  And I was just thinking
+you were safe in France!'
+
+'You were thinking of me!' I cried.
+
+'Mr. St. Ives, you cannot understand your danger,' she replied.  'I am
+sure of it, and yet I cannot find it in my heart to tell you.  O, be
+persuaded, and go!'
+
+'I believe I know the worst.  But I was never one to set an undue value
+on life, the life that we share with beasts.  My university has been in
+the wars, not a famous place of education, but one where a man learns to
+carry his life in his hand as lightly as a glove, and for his lady or his
+honour to lay it as lightly down.  You appeal to my fears, and you do
+wrong.  I have come to Scotland with my eyes quite open to see you and to
+speak with you--it may be for the last time.  With my eyes quite open, I
+say; and if I did not hesitate at the beginning do you think that I would
+draw back now?'
+
+'You do not know!' she cried, with rising agitation.  'This country, even
+this garden, is death to you.  They all believe it; I am the only one
+that does not.  If they hear you now, if they heard a whisper--I dread to
+think of it.  O, go, go this instant.  It is my prayer.'
+
+'Dear lady, do not refuse me what I have come so far to seek; and
+remember that out of all the millions in England there is no other but
+yourself in whom I can dare confide.  I have all the world against me;
+you are my only ally; and as I have to speak, you have to listen.  All is
+true that they say of me, and all of it false at the same time.  I did
+kill this man Goguelat--it was that you meant?'
+
+She mutely signed to me that it was; she had become deadly pale.
+
+'But I killed him in fair fight.  Till then, I had never taken a life
+unless in battle, which is my trade.  But I was grateful, I was on fire
+with gratitude, to one who had been good to me, who had been better to me
+than I could have dreamed of an angel, who had come into the darkness of
+my prison like sunrise.  The man Goguelat insulted her.  O, he had
+insulted me often, it was his favourite pastime, and he might insult me
+as he pleased--for who was I?  But with that lady it was different.  I
+could never forgive myself if I had let it pass.  And we fought, and he
+fell, and I have no remorse.'
+
+I waited anxiously for some reply.  The worst was now out, and I knew
+that she had heard of it before; but it was impossible for me to go on
+with my narrative without some shadow of encouragement.
+
+'You blame me?'
+
+'No, not at all.  It is a point I cannot speak on--I am only a girl.  I
+am sure you were in the right: I have always said so--to Ronald.  Not, of
+course, to my aunt.  I am afraid I let her speak as she will.  You must
+not think me a disloyal friend; and even with the Major--I did not tell
+you he had become quite a friend of ours--Major Chevenix, I mean--he has
+taken such a fancy to Ronald!  It was he that brought the news to us of
+that hateful Clausel being captured, and all that he was saying.  I was
+indignant with him.  I said--I dare say I said too much--and I must say
+he was very good-natured.  He said, "You and I, who are his friends,
+_know_ that Champdivers is innocent.  But what is the use of saying it?"
+All this was in the corner of the room in what they call an aside.  And
+then he said, "Give me a chance to speak to you in private, I have much
+to tell you."  And he did.  And told me just what you did--that it was an
+affair of honour, and no blame attached to you.  O, I must say I like
+that Major Chevenix!'
+
+At this I was seized with a great pang of jealousy.  I remembered the
+first time that he had seen her, the interest that he seemed immediately
+to conceive; and I could not but admire the dog for the use he had been
+ingenious enough to make of our acquaintance in order to supplant me.
+All is fair in love and war.  For all that, I was now no less anxious to
+do the speaking myself than I had been before to hear Flora.  At least, I
+could keep clear of the hateful image of Major Chevenix.  Accordingly I
+burst at once on the narrative of my adventures.  It was the same as you
+have read, but briefer, and told with a very different purpose.  Now
+every incident had a particular bearing, every by-way branched off to
+Rome--and that was Flora.
+
+When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel withoutside the
+low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and lowered my voice to the
+most confidential whisper.  Flora herself must kneel upon the other side,
+and this brought our heads upon a level with only the bars between us.
+So placed, so separated, it seemed that our proximity, and the continuous
+and low sounds of my pleading voice, worked progressively and powerfully
+on her heart, and perhaps not less so on my own.  For these spells are
+double-edged.  The silly birds may be charmed with the pipe of the
+fowler, which is but a tube of reeds.  Not so with a bird of our own
+feather!  As I went on, and my resolve strengthened, and my voice found
+new modulations, and our faces were drawn closer to the bars and to each
+other, not only she, but I, succumbed to the fascination, and were
+kindled by the charm.  We make love, and thereby ourselves fall the
+deeper in it.  It is with the heart only that one captures a heart.
+
+'And now,' I continued, 'I will tell you what you can still do for me.  I
+run a little risk just now, and you see for yourself how unavoidable it
+is for any man of honour.  But if--but in case of the worst I do not
+choose to enrich either my enemies or the Prince Regent.  I have here the
+bulk of what my uncle gave me.  Eight thousand odd pounds.  Will you take
+care of it for me?  Do not think of it merely as money; take and keep it
+as a relic of your friend or some precious piece of him.  I may have
+bitter need of it ere long.  Do you know the old country story of the
+giant who gave his heart to his wife to keep for him, thinking it safer
+to repose on her loyalty than his own strength?  Flora, I am the giant--a
+very little one: will you be the keeper of my life?  It is my heart I
+offer you in this symbol.  In the sight of God, if you will have it, I
+give you my name, I endow you with my money.  If the worst come, if I may
+never hope to call you wife, let me at least think that you will use my
+uncle's legacy as my widow.'
+
+'No, not that,' she said.  'Never that.'
+
+'What then?' I said.  'What else, my angel?  What are words to me?  There
+is but one name that I care to know you by.  Flora, my love!'
+
+'Anne!' she said.
+
+What sound is so full of music as one's own name uttered for the first
+time in the voice of her we love!
+
+'My darling!' said I.
+
+The jealous bars, set at the top and bottom in stone and lime, obstructed
+the rapture of the moment; but I took her to myself as wholly as they
+allowed.  She did not shun my lips.  My arms were wound round her body,
+which yielded itself generously to my embrace.  As we so remained,
+entwined and yet severed, bruising our faces unconsciously on the cold
+bars, the irony of the universe--or as I prefer to say, envy of some of
+the gods--again stirred up the elements of that stormy night.  The wind
+blew again in the tree-tops; a volley of cold sea-rain deluged the
+garden, and, as the deuce would have it, a gutter which had been hitherto
+choked up began suddenly to play upon my head and shoulders with the
+vivacity of a fountain.  We parted with a shock; I sprang to my feet, and
+she to hers, as though we had been discovered.  A moment after, but now
+both standing, we had again approached the window on either side.
+
+'Flora,' I said, 'this is but a poor offer I can make you.'
+
+She took my hand in hers and clasped it to her bosom.
+
+'Rich enough for a queen!' she said, with a lift in her breathing that
+was more eloquent than words.  'Anne, my brave Anne!  I would be glad to
+be your maidservant; I could envy that boy Rowley.  But, no!' she broke
+off, 'I envy no one--I need not--I am yours.'
+
+'Mine,' said I, 'for ever!  By this and this, mine!'
+
+'All of me,' she repeated.  'Altogether and forever!'
+
+And if the god were envious, he must have seen with mortification how
+little he could do to mar the happiness of mortals.  I stood in a mere
+waterspout; she herself was wet, not from my embrace only, but from the
+splashing of the storm.  The candles had guttered out; we were in
+darkness.  I could scarce see anything but the shining of her eyes in the
+dark room.  To her I must have appeared as a silhouette, haloed by rain
+and the spouting of the ancient Gothic gutter above my head.
+
+Presently we became more calm and confidential; and when that squall,
+which proved to be the last of the storm, had blown by, fell into a talk
+of ways and means.  It seemed she knew Mr. Robbie, to whom I had been so
+slenderly accredited by Romaine--was even invited to his house for the
+evening of Monday, and gave me a sketch of the old gentleman's character
+which implied a great deal of penetration in herself, and proved of great
+use to me in the immediate sequel.  It seemed he was an enthusiastic
+antiquary, and in particular a fanatic of heraldry.  I heard it with
+delight, for I was myself, thanks to M. de Culemberg, fairly grounded in
+that science, and acquainted with the blazons of most families of note in
+Europe.  And I had made up my mind--even as she spoke, it was my fixed
+determination, though I was a hundred miles from saying it--to meet Flora
+on Monday night as a fellow-guest in Mr. Robbie's house.
+
+I gave her my money--it was, of course, only paper I had brought.  I gave
+it her, to be her marriage-portion, I declared.
+
+'Not so bad a marriage-portion for a private soldier,' I told her,
+laughing, as I passed it through the bars.
+
+'O, Anne, and where am I to keep it?' she cried.  'If my aunt should find
+it!  What would I say!'
+
+'Next your heart,' I suggested.
+
+'Then you will always be near your treasure,' she cried, 'for you are
+always there!'
+
+We were interrupted by a sudden clearness that fell upon the night.  The
+clouds dispersed; the stars shone in every part of the heavens; and,
+consulting my watch, I was startled to find it already hard on five in
+the morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII--THE SABBATH DAY
+
+
+It was indeed high time I should be gone from Swanston; but what I was to
+do in the meanwhile was another question.  Rowley had received his orders
+last night: he was to say that I had met a friend, and Mrs. McRankine was
+not to expect me before morning.  A good enough tale in itself; but the
+dreadful pickle I was in made it out of the question.  I could not go
+home till I had found harbourage, a fire to dry my clothes at, and a bed
+where I might lie till they were ready.
+
+Fortune favoured me again.  I had scarce got to the top of the first hill
+when I spied a light on my left, about a furlong away.  It might be a
+case of sickness; what else it was likely to be--in so rustic a
+neighbourhood, and at such an ungodly time of the morning--was beyond my
+fancy.  A faint sound of singing became audible, and gradually swelled as
+I drew near, until at last I could make out the words, which were
+singularly appropriate both to the hour and to the condition of the
+singers.  'The cock may craw, the day may daw,' they sang; and sang it
+with such laxity both in time and tune, and such sentimental complaisance
+in the expression, as assured me they had got far into the third bottle
+at least.
+
+I found a plain rustic cottage by the wayside, of the sort called double,
+with a signboard over the door; and, the lights within streaming forth
+and somewhat mitigating the darkness of the morning, I was enabled to
+decipher the inscription: 'The Hunters' Tryst, by Alexander Hendry.
+Porter Ales, and British Spirits.  Beds.'
+
+My first knock put a period to the music, and a voice challenged tipsily
+from within.
+
+'Who goes there?' it said; and I replied, 'A lawful traveller.'
+
+Immediately after, the door was unbarred by a company of the tallest lads
+my eyes had ever rested on, all astonishingly drunk and very decently
+dressed, and one (who was perhaps the drunkest of the lot) carrying a
+tallow candle, from which he impartially bedewed the clothes of the whole
+company.  As soon as I saw them I could not help smiling to myself to
+remember the anxiety with which I had approached.  They received me and
+my hastily-concocted story, that I had been walking from Peebles and had
+lost my way, with incoherent benignity; jostled me among them into the
+room where they had been sitting, a plain hedgerow alehouse parlour, with
+a roaring fire in the chimney and a prodigious number of empty bottles on
+the floor; and informed me that I was made, by this reception, a
+temporary member of the _Six-Feet-High Club_, an athletic society of
+young men in a good station, who made of the Hunters' Tryst a frequent
+resort.  They told me I had intruded on an 'all-night sitting,' following
+upon an 'all-day Saturday tramp' of forty miles; and that the members
+would all be up and 'as right as ninepence' for the noonday service at
+some neighbouring church--Collingwood, if memory serves me right.  At
+this I could have laughed, but the moment seemed ill-chosen.  For, though
+six feet was their standard, they all exceeded that measurement
+considerably; and I tasted again some of the sensations of childhood, as
+I looked up to all these lads from a lower plane, and wondered what they
+would do next.  But the Six-Footers, if they were very drunk, proved no
+less kind.  The landlord and servants of the Hunters' Tryst were in bed
+and asleep long ago.  Whether by natural gift or acquired habit they
+could suffer pandemonium to reign all over the house, and yet lie ranked
+in the kitchen like Egyptian mummies, only that the sound of their
+snoring rose and fell ceaselessly like the drone of a bagpipe.  Here the
+Six-Footers invaded them--in their citadel, so to speak; counted the
+bunks and the sleepers; proposed to put me in bed to one of the lasses,
+proposed to have one of the lasses out to make room for me, fell over
+chairs, and made noise enough to waken the dead: the whole illuminated by
+the same young torch-bearer, but now with two candles, and rapidly
+beginning to look like a man in a snowstorm.  At last a bed was found for
+me, my clothes were hung out to dry before the parlour fire, and I was
+mercifully left to my repose.
+
+I awoke about nine with the sun shining in my eyes.  The landlord came at
+my summons, brought me my clothes dried and decently brushed, and gave me
+the good news that the Six-Feet-High Club were all abed and sleeping off
+their excesses.  Where they were bestowed was a puzzle to me until (as I
+was strolling about the garden patch waiting for breakfast) I came on a
+barn door, and, looking in, saw all the red face mixed in the straw like
+plums in a cake.  Quoth the stalwart maid who brought me my porridge and
+bade me 'eat them while they were hot,' 'Ay, they were a' on the ran-dan
+last nicht!  Hout! they're fine lads, and they'll be nane the waur of it.
+Forby Farbes's coat.  I dinna see wha's to get the creish off that!' she
+added, with a sigh; in which, identifying Forbes as the torch-bearer, I
+mentally joined.
+
+It was a brave morning when I took the road; the sun shone, spring seemed
+in the air, it smelt like April or May, and some over-venturous birds
+sang in the coppices as I went by.  I had plenty to think of, plenty to
+be grateful for, that gallant morning; and yet I had a twitter at my
+heart.  To enter the city by daylight might be compared to marching on a
+battery; every face that I confronted would threaten me like the muzzle
+of a gun; and it came into my head suddenly with how much better a
+countenance I should be able to do it if I could but improvise a
+companion.  Hard by Merchiston I was so fortunate as to observe a bulky
+gentleman in broadcloth and gaiters, stooping with his head almost
+between his knees, before a stone wall.  Seizing occasion by the
+forelock, I drew up as I came alongside and inquired what he had found to
+interest him.
+
+He turned upon me a countenance not much less broad than his back.
+
+'Why, sir,' he replied, 'I was even marvelling at my own indefeasible
+stupeedity: that I should walk this way every week of my life, weather
+permitting, and should never before have _notticed_ that stone,' touching
+it at the same time with a goodly oak staff.
+
+I followed the indication.  The stone, which had been built sideways into
+the wall, offered traces of heraldic sculpture.  At once there came a
+wild idea into my mind: his appearance tallied with Flora's description
+of Mr. Robbie; a knowledge of heraldry would go far to clinch the proof;
+and what could be more desirable than to scrape an informal acquaintance
+with the man whom I must approach next day with my tale of the drovers,
+and whom I yet wished to please?  I stooped in turn.
+
+'A chevron,' I said; 'on a chief three mullets?  Looks like Douglas, does
+it not?'
+
+'Yes, sir, it does; you are right,' said he: 'it _does_ look like
+Douglas; though, without the tinctures, and the whole thing being so
+battered and broken up, who shall venture an opinion?  But allow me to be
+more personal, sir.  In these degenerate days I am astonished you should
+display so much proficiency.'
+
+'O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman, a friend of my
+family, and I may say my guardian,' said I; 'but I have forgotten it
+since.  God forbid I should delude you into thinking me a herald, sir!  I
+am only an ungrammatical amateur.'
+
+'And a little modesty does no harm even in a herald,' says my new
+acquaintance graciously.
+
+In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained very
+amicable discourse along what remained of the country road, past the
+suburbs, and on into the streets of the New Town, which was as deserted
+and silent as a city of the dead.  The shops were closed, no vehicle ran,
+cats sported in the midst of the sunny causeway; and our steps and voices
+re-echoed from the quiet houses.  It was the high-water, full and
+strange, of that weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is
+subjected: the apotheosis of the _Sawbath_; and I confess the spectacle
+wanted not grandeur, however much it may have lacked cheerfulness.  There
+are few religious ceremonies more imposing.  As we thus walked and talked
+in a public seclusion the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds
+of the city, and the streets began immediately to be thronged with decent
+church-goers.
+
+'Ah!' said my companion, 'there are the bells!  Now, sir, as you are a
+stranger I must offer you the hospitality of my pew.  I do not know
+whether you are at all used with our Scottish form; but in case you are
+not I will find your places for you; and Dr. Henry Gray, of St. Mary's
+(under whom I sit), is as good a preacher as we have to show you.'
+
+This put me in a quandary.  It was a degree of risk I was scarce prepared
+for.  Dozens of people, who might pass me by in the street with no more
+than a second look, would go on from the second to the third, and from
+that to a final recognition, if I were set before them, immobilised in a
+pew, during the whole time of service.  An unlucky turn of the head would
+suffice to arrest their attention.  'Who is that?' they would think:
+'surely I should know him!' and, a church being the place in all the
+world where one has least to think of, it was ten to one they would end
+by remembering me before the benediction.  However, my mind was made up:
+I thanked my obliging friend, and placed myself at his disposal.
+
+Our way now led us into the north-east quarter of the town, among
+pleasant new faubourgs, to a decent new church of a good size, where I
+was soon seated by the side of my good Samaritan, and looked upon by a
+whole congregation of menacing faces.  At first the possibility of danger
+kept me awake; but by the time I had assured myself there was none to be
+apprehended, and the service was not in the least likely to be enlivened
+by the arrest of a French spy, I had to resign myself to the task of
+listening to Dr. Henry Gray.
+
+As we moved out, after this ordeal was over, my friend was at once
+surrounded and claimed by his acquaintances of the congregation; and I
+was rejoiced to hear him addressed by the expected name of Robbie.
+
+So soon as we were clear of the crowd--'Mr. Robbie?' said I, bowing.
+
+'The very same, sir,' said he.
+
+'If I mistake not, a lawyer?'
+
+'A writer to His Majesty's Signet, at your service.'
+
+'It seems we were predestined to be acquaintances!' I exclaimed.  'I have
+here a card in my pocket intended for you.  It is from my family lawyer.
+It was his last word, as I was leaving, to ask to be remembered kindly,
+and to trust you would pass over so informal an introduction.'
+
+And I offered him the card.
+
+'Ay, ay, my old friend Daniel!' says he, looking on the card.  'And how
+does my old friend Daniel?'
+
+I gave a favourable view of Mr. Romaine's health.
+
+'Well, this is certainly a whimsical incident,' he continued.  'And since
+we are thus met already--and so much to my advantage!--the simplest thing
+will be to prosecute the acquaintance instantly.  Let me propose a snack
+between sermons, a bottle of my particular green seal--and when nobody is
+looking we can talk blazons, Mr. Ducie!'--which was the name I then used
+and had already incidentally mentioned, in the vain hope of provoking a
+return in kind.
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir: do I understand you to invite me to your house?'
+said I.
+
+'That was the idea I was trying to convey,' said he.  'We have the name
+of hospitable people up here, and I would like you to try mine.'
+
+'Mr. Robbie, I shall hope to try it some day, but not yet,' I replied.
+'I hope you will not misunderstand me.  My business, which brings me to
+your city, is of a peculiar kind.  Till you shall have heard it, and,
+indeed, till its issue is known, I should feel as if I had stolen your
+invitation.'
+
+'Well, well,' said he, a little sobered, 'it must be as you wish, though
+you would hardly speak otherwise if you had committed homicide!  Mine is
+the loss.  I must eat alone; a very pernicious thing for a person of my
+habit of body, content myself with a pint of skinking claret, and
+meditate the discourse.  But about this business of yours: if it is so
+particular as all that, it will doubtless admit of no delay.'
+
+'I must confess, sir, it presses,' I acknowledged.
+
+'Then, let us say to-morrow at half-past eight in the morning,' said he;
+'and I hope, when your mind is at rest (and it does you much honour to
+take it as you do), that you will sit down with me to the postponed meal,
+not forgetting the bottle.  You have my address?' he added, and gave it
+me--which was the only thing I wanted.
+
+At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual civilities,
+and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of people returning
+from church, to my lodgings in St. James' Square.
+
+Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my landlady in a
+dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in her wake: no less
+than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a smart pair of tops to his
+boots!  When I said he was in the lady's wake I spoke but in metaphor.
+As a matter of fact he was squiring her, with the utmost dignity, on his
+arm; and I followed them up the stairs, smiling to myself.
+
+Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and Mrs.
+McRankine inquired where I had been.  I told her boastfully, giving her
+the name of the church and the divine, and ignorantly supposing I should
+have gained caste.  But she soon opened my eyes.  In the roots of the
+Scottish character there are knots and contortions that not only no
+stranger can understand, but no stranger can follow; he walks among
+explosives; and his best course is to throw himself upon their
+mercy--'Just as I am, without one plea,' a citation from one of the
+lady's favourite hymns.
+
+The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was impossible
+to be written down; and I at once executed the manoeuvre I have
+recommended.
+
+'You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your city,' said I.  'If I
+have done wrong, it was in mere ignorance, my dear lady; and this
+afternoon, if you will be so good as to take me, I shall accompany
+_you_.'
+
+But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to her own
+quarters murmuring.
+
+'Well, Rowley,' said I; 'and have you been to church?'
+
+'If you please, sir,' he said.
+
+'Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I have,' I returned.  'And
+how did you get on with the Scottish form?'
+
+'Well, sir, it was pretty 'ard, the form was, and reether narrow,' he
+replied.  'I don't know w'y it is, but it seems to me like as if things
+were a good bit changed since William Wallace!  That was a main queer
+church she took me to, Mr. Anne!  I don't know as I could have sat it
+out, if she 'adn't 'a' give me peppermints.  She ain't a bad one at
+bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit, and she do worry, but, law
+bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain't nothink really--she don't _mean_ it.  W'y,
+she was down on me like a 'undredweight of bricks this morning.  You see,
+last night she 'ad me in to supper, and, I beg your pardon, sir, but I
+took the freedom of playing her a chune or two.  She didn't mind a bit;
+so this morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced in, and flew
+up, and carried on no end about Sunday!'
+
+'You see, Rowley,' said I, 'they're all mad up here, and you have to
+humour them.  See and don't quarrel with Mrs. McRankine; and, above all,
+don't argue with her, or you'll get the worst of it.  Whatever she says,
+touch your forelock and say, "If you please!" or "I beg pardon, ma'am."
+And let me tell you one thing: I am sorry, but you have to go to church
+with her again this afternoon.  That's duty, my boy!'
+
+As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs. McRankine
+presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang up with readiness
+and offered her my arm.  Rowley followed behind.  I was beginning to grow
+accustomed to the risks of my stay in Edinburgh, and it even amused me to
+confront a new churchful.  I confess the amusement did not last until the
+end; for if Dr. Gray were long, Mr. McCraw was not only longer, but more
+incoherent, and the matter of his sermon (which was a direct attack,
+apparently, on all the Churches of the world, my own among the number),
+where it had not the tonic quality of personal insult, rather inclined me
+to slumber.  But I braced myself for my life, kept up Rowley with the end
+of a pin, and came through it awake, but no more.
+
+Bethiah was quite conquered by this 'mark of grace,' though, I am afraid,
+she was also moved by more worldly considerations.  The first is, the
+lady had not the least objection to go to church on the arm of an
+elegantly dressed young gentleman, and be followed by a spruce servant
+with a cockade in his hat.  I could see it by the way she took possession
+of us, found us the places in the Bible, whispered to me the name of the
+minister, passed us lozenges, which I (for my part) handed on to Rowley,
+and at each fresh attention stole a little glance about the church to
+make sure she was observed.  Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me
+if I also remembered that I was a favourable-looking young man.  When we
+grow elderly, how the room brightens, and begins to look as it ought to
+look, on the entrance of youth, grace, health, and comeliness!  You do
+not want them for yourself, perhaps not even for your son, but you look
+on smiling; and when you recall their images--again, it is with a smile.
+I defy you to see or think of them and not smile with an infinite and
+intimate, but quite impersonal, pleasure.  Well, either I know nothing of
+women, or that was the case with Bethiah McRankine.  She had been to
+church with a cockade behind her, on the one hand; on the other, her
+house was brightened by the presence of a pair of good-looking young
+fellows of the other sex, who were always pleased and deferential in her
+society and accepted her views as final.
+
+These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from
+church--if church it could be called--I adopted a most insidious device
+to magnify her interest.  I took her into the confidence, that is, of my
+love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young lady with whom my
+affections were engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.
+
+'Is she bonny?' she inquired.
+
+I gave her full assurances upon that.
+
+'To what denoamination does she beloang?' came next, and was so
+unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.
+
+'Upon my word, ma'am, I have never inquired,' cried I; 'I only know that
+she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.'
+
+'Ay!' she sighed, 'if she has the root of the maitter!  There's a remnant
+practically in most of the denoaminations.  There's some in the
+McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites, and mony in the McMillanites,
+and there's a leeven even in the Estayblishment.'
+
+'I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,' said I.
+
+'Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel'!' she cried.
+
+'Why, my dear madam!  I only--' I began.
+
+'You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,' she interrupted.
+
+On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our idyll with
+avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of cream; and,
+strange to say--and so expansive a passion is that of love!--that I
+derived a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding in that breast of
+iron.  It made an immediate bond: from that hour we seemed to be welded
+into a family-party; and I had little difficulty in persuading her to
+join us and to preside over our tea-table.  Surely there was never so
+ill-matched a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount Anne!  But
+I am of the Apostle's way, with a difference: all things to all women!
+When I cannot please a woman, hang me in my cravat!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII--EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER'S PARTY
+
+
+By half-past eight o'clock on the next morning, I was ringing the bell of
+the lawyer's office in Castle Street, where I found him ensconced at a
+business table, in a room surrounded by several tiers of green tin cases.
+He greeted me like an old friend.
+
+'Come away, sir, come away!' said he.  'Here is the dentist ready for
+you, and I think I can promise you that the operation will be practically
+painless.'
+
+'I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,' I replied, as I shook hands with
+him.  'But at least there shall be no time lost with me.'
+
+I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and their
+cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or half-murdered
+a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to having suffered a
+couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in prison on a charge from
+which I could have immediately freed them.  All this I gave him first of
+all, to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took with gravity,
+but without the least appearance of surprise.
+
+'Now, sir,' I continued, 'I expect to have to pay for my unhappy frolic,
+but I would like very well if it could be managed without my personal
+appearance or even the mention of my real name.  I had so much wisdom as
+to sail under false colours in this foolish jaunt of mine; my family
+would be extremely concerned if they had wind of it; but at the same
+time, if the case of this Faa has terminated fatally, and there are
+proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not going to stand by and see
+them vexed, far less punished; and I authorise you to give me up for
+trial if you think that best--or, if you think it unnecessary, in the
+meanwhile to make preparations for their defence.  I hope, sir, that I am
+as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined to be just.'
+
+'Very fairly spoken,' said Mr. Robbie.  'It is not much in my line, as
+doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have told you.  I rarely mix
+myself up with anything on the criminal side, or approaching it.
+However, for a young gentleman like you, I may stretch a point, and I
+dare say I may be able to accomplish more than perhaps another.  I will
+go at once to the Procurator Fiscal's office and inquire.'
+
+'Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,' said I.  'You forget the chapter of
+expenses.  I had thought, for a beginning, of placing a thousand pounds
+in your hands.'
+
+'My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,' said Mr.
+Robbie severely.'
+
+'It seemed to me,' I protested, 'that coming to you almost as a stranger,
+and placing in your hands a piece of business so contrary to your habits,
+some substantial guarantee of my good faith--'
+
+'Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,' he interrupted, with
+an air of closing the dispute.
+
+'And yet, Mr. Robbie,' I continued, 'I must ask you to allow me to
+proceed.  I do not merely refer to the expenses of the case.  I have my
+eye besides on Todd and Candlish.  They are thoroughly deserving fellows;
+they have been subjected through me to a considerable term of
+imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that you should not spare money for
+their indemnification.  This will explain,' I added smiling, 'my offer of
+the thousand pounds.  It was in the nature of a measure by which you
+should judge the scale on which I can afford to have this business
+carried through.'
+
+'I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,' said he.  'But the sooner I am off,
+the better this affair is like to be guided.  My clerk will show you into
+the waiting-room and give you the day's _Caledonian Mercury_ and the last
+_Register_ to amuse yourself with in the interval.'
+
+I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.  I saw him descend
+from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was shown again
+into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led me to augur the
+worst.  For some time he had the inhumanity to read me a lecture as to
+the incredible silliness, 'not to say immorality,' of my behaviour.  'I
+have the satisfaction in telling you my opinion, because it appears that
+you are going to get off scot free,' he continued, where, indeed, I
+thought he might have begun.
+
+'The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd and
+Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been for
+their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie--or Mr. St. Ivey, as I
+believe I should now call you.  Never a word would either of the two old
+fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence of such a
+person; and when they were confronted with Faa's version of the affair,
+they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their own former
+declarations, as well as with each other, that the Fiscal was quite
+nonplussed, and imaigined there was something behind it.  You may believe
+I soon laughed him out of that!  And I had the satisfaction of seeing
+your two friends set free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.'
+
+'Oh, sir,' I cried, 'you should have brought them here.'
+
+'No instructions, Mr. Ducie!' said he.  'How did I know you wished to
+renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated so fortunately?  And,
+indeed, to be frank with you, I should have set my face against it, if
+you had!  Let them go!  They are paid and contented, and have the highest
+possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey!  When I gave them fifty pounds
+apiece--which was rather more than enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may
+think--the man Todd, who has the only tongue of the party, struck his
+staff on the ground.  "Weel," says he, "I aye said he was a gentleman!"
+"Man, Todd," said I, "that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of yourself!"'
+
+'So it was a case of "Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet."'
+
+'No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of your life,
+and a good riddance!  They are fine fellows in their way, but no proper
+associates for the like of yourself; and do you finally agree to be done
+with all eccentricity--take up with no more drovers, or tinkers, but
+enjoy the naitural pleesures for which your age, your wealth, your
+intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your appearance so
+completely fit you.  And the first of these,' quoth he, looking at his
+watch, 'will be to step through to my dining-room and share a bachelor's
+luncheon.'
+
+Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the same
+theme.  'You're, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?' said he.
+'Well, on Thursday night there is the Assembly Ball.  You must certainly
+go there, and you must permit me besides to do the honours of the ceety
+and send you a ticket.  I am a thorough believer in a young man being a
+young man--but no more drovers or rovers, if you love me!  Talking of
+which puts me in mind that you may be short of partners at the
+Assembly--oh, I have been young myself!--and if ye care to come to
+anything so portentiously tedious as a tea-party at the house of a
+bachelor lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces and nephews, and his
+grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and his wards, and generally the whole
+clan of the descendants of his clients, you might drop in to-night
+towards seven o'clock.  I think I can show you one or two that are worth
+looking at, and you can dance with them later on at the Assembly.'
+
+He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young ladies'
+whom I might expect to meet.  'And then there's my parteecular friend,
+Miss Flora,' said he.  'But I'll make no attempt of a description.  You
+shall see her for yourself.'
+
+It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation; and returned
+home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet and the good news of
+which I was the bearer.  The toilette, I have reason to believe, was a
+success.  Mr. Rowley dismissed me with a farewell: 'Crikey!  Mr. Anne,
+but you do look prime!'  Even the stony Bethiah was--how shall I
+say?--dazzled, but scandalised, by my appearance; and while, of course,
+she deplored the vanity that led to it, she could not wholly prevent
+herself from admiring the result.
+
+'Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a wayfaring Christian man!'
+she said.  'Wi' Christ despised and rejectit in all pairts of the world
+and the flag of the Covenant flung doon, you will be muckle better on
+your knees!  However, I'll have to confess that it sets you weel.  And if
+it's the lassie ye're gaun to see the nicht, I suppose I'll just have to
+excuse ye!  Bairns maun be bairns!' she said, with a sigh.  'I mind when
+Mr. McRankine came courtin', and that's lang by-gane--I mind I had a
+green gown, passementit, that was thocht to become me to admiration.  I
+was nae just exactly what ye would ca' bonny; but I was pale,
+penetratin', and interestin'.'  And she leaned over the stair-rail with a
+candle to watch my descent as long as it should be possible.
+
+It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie's--by which, I do not so much
+mean that there were few people, for the rooms were crowded, as that
+there was very little attempted to entertain them.  In one apartment
+there were tables set out, where the elders were solemnly engaged upon
+whist; in the other and larger one, a great number of youth of both sexes
+entertained themselves languidly, the ladies sitting upon chairs to be
+courted, the gentlemen standing about in various attitudes of insinuation
+or indifference.  Conversation appeared the sole resource, except in so
+far as it was modified by a number of keepsakes and annuals which lay
+dispersed upon the tables, and of which the young beaux displayed the
+illustrations to the ladies.  Mr. Robbie himself was customarily in the
+card-room; only now and again, when he cut out, he made an incursion
+among the young folks, and rolled about jovially from one to another, the
+very picture of the general uncle.
+
+It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the afternoon.
+'Now, Miss Flora,' he had said, 'come early, for I have a Phoenix to show
+you--one Mr. Ducie, a new client of mine that, I vow, I have fallen in
+love with'; and he was so good as to add a word or two on my appearance,
+from which Flora conceived a suspicion of the truth.  She had come to the
+party, in consequence, on the knife-edge of anticipation and alarm; had
+chosen a place by the door, where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded
+by a posse of vapid youths; and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me
+in the most natural manner in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared
+form of words.
+
+'How do you do, Mr. Ducie?' she said.  'It is quite an age since I have
+seen you!'
+
+'I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,' I replied.  'May I sit down?'
+
+For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the judicious use of
+her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty by her side.
+
+She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths had the
+discretion to melt before us.  As soon as I was once seated her fan flew
+out, and she whispered behind it:
+
+'Are you mad?'
+
+'Madly in love,' I replied; 'but in no other sense.'
+
+'I have no patience!  You cannot understand what I am suffering!' she
+said.  'What are you to say to Ronald, to Major Chevenix, to my aunt?'
+
+Your aunt?' I cried, with a start.  '_Peccavi_! is she here?'
+
+'She is in the card-room at whist,' said Flora.
+
+'Where she will probably stay all the evening?' I suggested.
+
+'She may,' she admitted; 'she generally does!'
+
+'Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,' said I, 'which is very much
+what I had counted upon doing.  I did not come here to play cards, but to
+contemplate a certain young lady to my heart's content--if it can ever be
+contented!--and to tell her some good news.'
+
+'But there are still Ronald and the Major!' she persisted.  'They are not
+card-room fixtures!  Ronald will be coming and going.  And as for Mr.
+Chevenix, he--'
+
+'Always sits with Miss Flora?' I interrupted.  'And they talk of poor St.
+Ives?  I had gathered as much, my dear; and Mr. Ducie has come to prevent
+it!  But pray dismiss these fears!  I mind no one but your aunt.'
+
+'Why my aunt?'
+
+'Because your aunt is a lady, my dear, and a very clever lady, and, like
+all clever ladies, a very rash lady,' said I.  'You can never count upon
+them, unless you are sure of getting them in a corner, as I have got you,
+and talking them over rationally, as I am just engaged on with yourself!
+It would be quite the same to your aunt to make the worst kind of a
+scandal, with an equal indifference to my danger and to the feelings of
+our good host!'
+
+'Well,' she said, 'and what of Ronald, then?  Do you think _he_ is above
+making a scandal?  You must know him very little!'
+
+'On the other hand, it is my pretension that I know him very well!' I
+replied.  'I must speak to Ronald first--not Ronald to me--that is all!'
+
+'Then, please, go and speak to him at once!' she pleaded.  He is
+there--do you see?--at the upper end of the room, talking to that girl in
+pink.'
+
+'And so lose this seat before I have told you my good news?' I exclaimed.
+'Catch me!  And, besides, my dear one, think a little of me and my good
+news!  I thought the bearer of good news was always welcome!  I hoped he
+might be a little welcome for himself!  Consider!  I have but one friend;
+and let me stay by her!  And there is only one thing I care to hear; and
+let me hear it!'
+
+'Oh, Anne,' she sighed, 'if I did not love you, why should I be so
+uneasy?  I am turned into a coward, dear!  Think, if it were the other
+way round--if you were quite safe and I was in, oh, such danger!'
+
+She had no sooner said it than I was convicted of being a dullard.  'God
+forgive me, dear!'  I made haste to reply.  'I never saw before that
+there were two sides to this!'  And I told her my tale as briefly as I
+could, and rose to seek Ronald.  'You see, my dear, you are obeyed,' I
+said.
+
+She gave me a look that was a reward in itself; and as I turned away from
+her, with a strong sense of turning away from the sun, I carried that
+look in my bosom like a caress.  The girl in pink was an arch, ogling
+person, with a good deal of eyes and teeth, and a great play of shoulders
+and rattle of conversation.  There could be no doubt, from Mr. Ronald's
+attitude, that he worshipped the very chair she sat on.  But I was quite
+ruthless.  I laid my hand on his shoulder, as he was stooping over her
+like a hen over a chicken.
+
+'Excuse me for one moment, Mr. Gilchrist!' said I.
+
+He started and span about in answer to my touch, and exhibited a face of
+inarticulate wonder.
+
+ 'Yes!' I continued, 'it is even myself!  Pardon me for interrupting so
+agreeable a _tete-a-tete_, but you know, my good fellow, we owe a first
+duty to Mr. Robbie.  It would never do to risk making a scene in the
+man's drawing-room; so the first thing I had to attend to was to have you
+warned.  The name I go by is Ducie, too, in case of accidents.'
+
+'I--I say, you know!' cried Ronald.  'Deuce take it, what are you doing
+here?'
+
+'Hush, hush!' said I.  'Not the place, my dear fellow--not the place.
+Come to my rooms, if you like, to-night after the party, or to-morrow in
+the morning, and we can talk it out over a segar.  But here, you know, it
+really won't do at all.'
+
+Before he could collect his mind for an answer, I had given him my
+address in St. James Square, and had again mingled with the crowd.  Alas!
+I was not fated to get back to Flora so easily!  Mr. Robbie was in the
+path: he was insatiably loquacious; and as he continued to palaver I
+watched the insipid youths gather again about my idol, and cursed my fate
+and my host.  He remembered suddenly that I was to attend the Assembly
+Ball on Thursday, and had only attended to-night by way of a preparative.
+This put it into his head to present me to another young lady; but I
+managed this interview with so much art that, while I was scrupulously
+polite and even cordial to the fair one, I contrived to keep Robbie
+beside me all the time and to leave along with him when the ordeal was
+over.  We were just walking away arm in arm, when I spied my friend the
+Major approaching, stiff as a ramrod and, as usual, obtrusively clean.
+
+'Oh! there's a man I want to know,' said I, taking the bull by the horns.
+'Won't you introduce me to Major Chevenix?'
+
+'At a word, my dear fellow,' said Robbie; and 'Major!' he cried, 'come
+here and let me present to you my friend Mr. Ducie, who desires the
+honour of your acquaintance.'
+
+The Major flushed visibly, but otherwise preserved his composure.  He
+bowed very low.  'I'm not very sure,' he said: 'I have an idea we have
+met before?'
+
+'Informally,' I said, returning his bow; 'and I have long looked forward
+to the pleasure of regularising our acquaintance.'
+
+'You are very good, Mr. Ducie,' he returned.  'Perhaps you could aid my
+memory a little?  Where was it that I had the pleasure?'
+
+'Oh, that would be telling tales out of school,' said I, with a laugh,
+'and before my lawyer, too!'
+
+'I'll wager,' broke in Mr. Robbie, 'that, when you knew my client,
+Chevenix--the past of our friend Mr. Ducie is an obscure chapter full of
+horrid secrets--I'll wager, now, you knew him as St. Ivey,' says he,
+nudging me violently.
+
+'I think not, sir,' said the Major, with pinched lips.
+
+'Well, I wish he may prove all right!' continued the lawyer, with
+certainly the worst-inspired jocularity in the world.  'I know nothing by
+him!  He may be a swell mobsman for me with his aliases.  You must put
+your memory on the rack, Major, and when ye've remembered when and where
+ye met him, be sure ye tell me.'
+
+'I will not fail, sir,' said Chevenix.
+
+'Seek to him!' cried Robbie, waving his hand as he departed.
+
+The Major, as soon as we were alone, turned upon me his impassive
+countenance.
+
+'Well,' he said, 'you have courage.'
+
+'It is undoubted as your honour, sir,' I returned, bowing.
+
+'Did you expect to meet me, may I ask?' said he.
+
+'You saw, at least, that I courted the presentation,' said I.
+
+'And you were not afraid?' said Chevenix.
+
+'I was perfectly at ease.  I knew I was dealing with a gentleman.  Be
+that your epitaph.'
+
+'Well, there are some other people looking for you,' he said, 'who will
+make no bones about the point of honour.  The police, my dear sir, are
+simply agog about you.'
+
+'And I think that that was coarse,' said I.
+
+'You have seen Miss Gilchrist?' he inquired, changing the subject.
+
+'With whom, I am led to understand, we are on a footing of rivalry?' I
+asked.  'Yes, I have seen her.'
+
+'And I was just seeking her,' he replied.
+
+I was conscious of a certain thrill of temper; so, I suppose, was he.  We
+looked each other up and down.
+
+'The situation is original,' he resumed.
+
+'Quite,' said I.  'But let me tell you frankly you are blowing a cold
+coal.  I owe you so much for your kindness to the prisoner Champdivers.'
+
+'Meaning that the lady's affections are more advantageously disposed of?'
+he asked, with a sneer.  'Thank you, I am sure.  And, since you have
+given me a lead, just hear a word of good advice in your turn.  Is it
+fair, is it delicate, is it like a gentleman, to compromise the young
+lady by attentions which (as you know very well) can come to nothing?'
+
+I was utterly unable to find words in answer.
+
+'Excuse me if I cut this interview short,' he went on.  'It seems to me
+doomed to come to nothing, and there is more attractive metal.'
+
+'Yes,' I replied, 'as you say, it cannot amount to much.  You are
+impotent, bound hand and foot in honour.  You know me to be a man falsely
+accused, and even if you did not know it, from your position as my rival
+you have only the choice to stand quite still or to be infamous.'
+
+'I would not say that,' he returned, with another change of colour.  'I
+may hear it once too often.'
+
+With which he moved off straight for where Flora was sitting amidst her
+court of vapid youths, and I had no choice but to follow him, a bad
+second, and reading myself, as I went, a sharp lesson on the command of
+temper.
+
+It is a strange thing how young men in their teens go down at the mere
+wind of the coming of men of twenty-five and upwards!  The vapid ones
+fled without thought of resistance before the Major and me; a few dallied
+awhile in the neighbourhood--so to speak, with their fingers in their
+mouths--but presently these also followed the rout, and we remained face
+to face before Flora.  There was a draught in that corner by the door;
+she had thrown her pelisse over her bare arms and neck, and the dark fur
+of the trimming set them off.  She shone by contrast; the light played on
+her smooth skin to admiration, and the colour changed in her excited
+face.  For the least fraction of a second she looked from one to the
+other of her pair of rival swains, and seemed to hesitate.  Then she
+addressed Chevenix:--
+
+'You are coming to the Assembly, of course, Major Chevenix?' said she.
+
+'I fear not; I fear I shall be otherwise engaged,' he replied.  'Even the
+pleasure of dancing with you, Miss Flora, must give way to duty.'
+
+For awhile the talk ran harmlessly on the weather, and then branched off
+towards the war.  It seemed to be by no one's fault; it was in the air,
+and had to come.
+
+'Good news from the scene of operations,' said the Major.
+
+'Good news while it lasts,' I said.  'But will Miss Gilchrist tell us her
+private thought upon the war?  In her admiration for the victors, does
+not there mingle some pity for the vanquished?'
+
+'Indeed, sir,' she said, with animation, 'only too much of it!  War is a
+subject that I do not think should be talked of to a girl.  I am, I have
+to be--what do you call it?--a non-combatant?  And to remind me of what
+others have to do and suffer: no, it is not fair!'
+
+'Miss Gilchrist has the tender female heart,' said Chevenix.
+
+'Do not be too sure of that!' she cried.  'I would love to be allowed to
+fight myself!'
+
+'On which side?' I asked.
+
+'Can you ask?' she exclaimed.  'I am a Scottish girl!'
+
+'She is a Scottish girl!' repeated the Major, looking at me.  'And no one
+grudges you her pity!'
+
+'And I glory in every grain of it she has to spare,' said I.  'Pity is
+akin to love.'
+
+'Well, and let us put that question to Miss Gilchrist.  It is for her to
+decide, and for us to bow to the decision.  Is pity, Miss Flora, or is
+admiration, nearest love?'
+
+'Oh come,' said I, 'let us be more concrete.  Lay before the lady a
+complete case: describe your man, then I'll describe _mine_, and Miss
+Flora shall decide.'
+
+'I think I see your meaning,' said he, 'and I'll try.  You think that
+pity--and the kindred sentiments--have the greatest power upon the heart.
+I think more nobly of women.  To my view, the man they love will first of
+all command their respect; he will be steadfast--proud, if you please;
+dry, possibly--but of all things steadfast.  They will look at him in
+doubt; at last they will see that stern face which he presents to all the
+rest of the world soften to them alone.  First, trust, I say.  It is so
+that a woman loves who is worthy of heroes.'
+
+'Your man is very ambitious, sir,' said I, 'and very much of a hero!
+Mine is a humbler, and, I would fain think, a more human dog.  He is one
+with no particular trust in himself, with no superior steadfastness to be
+admired for, who sees a lady's face, who hears her voice, and, without
+any phrase about the matter, falls in love.  What does he ask for, then,
+but pity?--pity for his weakness, pity for his love, which is his life.
+You would make women always the inferiors, gaping up at your imaginary
+lover; he, like a marble statue, with his nose in the air!  But God has
+been wiser than you; and the most steadfast of your heroes may prove
+human, after all.  We appeal to the queen for judgment,' I added, turning
+and bowing before Flora.
+
+'And how shall the queen judge?' she asked.  'I must give you an answer
+that is no answer at all.  "The wind bloweth where it listeth": she goes
+where her heart goes.'
+
+Her face flushed as she said it; mine also, for I read in it a
+declaration, and my heart swelled for joy.  But Chevenix grew pale.
+
+'You make of life a very dreadful kind of lottery, ma'am,' said he.  'But
+I will not despair.  Honest and unornamental is still my choice.'
+
+And I must say he looked extremely handsome and very amusingly like the
+marble statue with its nose in the air to which I had compared him.
+
+'I cannot imagine how we got upon this subject,' said Flora.
+
+'Madame, it was through the war,' replied Chevenix.
+
+'All roads lead to Rome,' I commented.  'What else would you expect Mr.
+Chevenix and myself to talk of?'
+
+About this time I was conscious of a certain bustle and movement in the
+room behind me, but did not pay to it that degree of attention which
+perhaps would have been wise.  There came a certain change in Flora's
+face; she signalled repeatedly with her fan; her eyes appealed to me
+obsequiously; there could be no doubt that she wanted something--as well
+as I could make out, that I should go away and leave the field clear for
+my rival, which I had not the least idea of doing.  At last she rose from
+her chair with impatience.
+
+'I think it time you were saying good-night, Mr Ducie!' she said.
+
+I could not in the least see why, and said so.
+
+Whereupon she gave me this appalling answer, 'My aunt is coming out of
+the card-room.'
+
+In less time than it takes to tell, I had made my bow and my escape.
+Looking back from the doorway, I was privileged to see, for a moment, the
+august profile and gold eyeglasses of Miss Gilchrist issuing from the
+card-room; and the sight lent me wings.  I stood not on the order of my
+going; and a moment after, I was on the pavement of Castle Street, and
+the lighted windows shone down on me, and were crossed by ironical
+shadows of those who had remained behind.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX--EVENTS OF TUESDAY: THE TOILS CLOSING
+
+
+This day began with a surprise.  I found a letter on my breakfast-table
+addressed to Edward Ducie, Esquire; and at first I was startled beyond
+measure.  'Conscience doth make cowards of us all!'  When I had opened
+it, it proved to be only a note from the lawyer, enclosing a card for the
+Assembly Ball on Thursday evening.  Shortly after, as I was composing my
+mind with a segar at one of the windows of the sitting-room, and Rowley,
+having finished the light share of work that fell to him, sat not far off
+tootling with great spirit and a marked preference for the upper octave,
+Ronald was suddenly shown in.  I got him a segar, drew in a chair to the
+side of the fire, and installed him there--I was going to say, at his
+ease, but no expression could be farther from the truth.  He was plainly
+on pins and needles, did not know whether to take or to refuse the segar,
+and, after he had taken it, did not know whether to light or to return
+it.  I saw he had something to say; I did not think it was his own
+something; and I was ready to offer a large bet it was really something
+of Major Chevenix's.
+
+'Well, and so here you are!' I observed, with pointless cordiality, for I
+was bound I should do nothing to help him out.  If he were, indeed, here
+running errands for my rival, he might have a fair field, but certainly
+no favour.
+
+'The fact is,' he began, 'I would rather see you alone.'
+
+'Why, certainly,' I replied.  'Rowley, you can step into the bedroom.  My
+dear fellow,' I continued, 'this sounds serious.  Nothing wrong, I
+trust.'
+
+'Well, I'll be quite honest,' said he.  'I _am_ a good deal bothered.'
+
+'And I bet I know why!' I exclaimed.  'And I bet I can put you to rights,
+too!'
+
+'What do you mean!' he asked.
+
+'You must be hard up,' said I, 'and all I can say is, you've come to the
+right place.  If you have the least use for a hundred pounds, or any such
+trifling sum as that, please mention it.  It's here, quite at your
+service.'
+
+'I am sure it is most kind of you,' said Ronald, 'and the truth is,
+though I can't think how you guessed it, that I really _am_ a little
+behind board.  But I haven't come to talk about that.'
+
+'No, I dare say!' cried I.  'Not worth talking about!  But remember,
+Ronald, you and I are on different sides of the business.  Remember that
+you did me one of those services that make men friends for ever.  And
+since I have had the fortune to come into a fair share of money, just
+oblige me, and consider so much of it as your own.'
+
+'No,' he said, 'I couldn't take it; I couldn't, really.  Besides, the
+fact is, I've come on a very different matter.  It's about my sister, St.
+Ives,' and he shook his head menacingly at me.
+
+'You're quite sure?' I persisted.  'It's here, at your service--up to
+five hundred pounds, if you like.  Well, all right; only remember where
+it is, when you do want it.'
+
+'Oh, please let me alone!' cried Ronald: 'I've come to say something
+unpleasant; and how on earth can I do it, if you don't give a fellow a
+chance?  It's about my sister, as I said.  You can see for yourself that
+it can't be allowed to go on.  It's compromising; it don't lead to
+anything; and you're not the kind of man (you must feel it yourself) that
+I can allow my female relatives to have anything to do with.  I hate
+saying this, St. Ives; it looks like hitting a man when he's down, you
+know; and I told the Major I very much disliked it from the first.
+However, it had to be said; and now it has been, and, between gentlemen,
+it shouldn't be necessary to refer to it again.'
+
+'It's compromising; it doesn't lead to anything; not the kind of man,' I
+repeated thoughtfully.  'Yes, I believe I understand, and shall make
+haste to put myself _en regle_.'  I stood up, and laid my segar down.
+'Mr. Gilchrist,' said I, with a bow, 'in answer to your very natural
+observations, I beg to offer myself as a suitor for your sister's hand.
+I am a man of title, of which we think lightly in France, but of ancient
+lineage, which is everywhere prized.  I can display thirty-two
+quarterings without a blot.  My expectations are certainly above the
+average: I believe my uncle's income averages about thirty thousand
+pounds, though I admit I was not careful to inform myself.  Put it
+anywhere between fifteen and fifty thousand; it is certainly not less.'
+
+'All this is very easy to say,' said Ronald, with a pitying smile.
+'Unfortunately, these things are in the air.'
+
+'Pardon me,--in Buckinghamshire,' said I, smiling.
+
+'Well, what I mean is, my dear St. Ives, that you _can't prove_ them,' he
+continued.  'They might just as well not be: do you follow me?  You can't
+bring us any third party to back you.'
+
+'Oh, come!' cried I, springing up and hurrying to the table.  'You must
+excuse me!'  I wrote Romaine's address.  'There is my reference, Mr.
+Gilchrist.  Until you have written to him, and received his negative
+answer, I have a right to be treated, and I shall see that you treat me,
+as a gentleman.'  He was brought up with a round turn at that.
+
+'I beg your pardon, St. Ives,' said he.  'Believe me, I had no wish to be
+offensive.  But there's the difficulty of this affair; I can't make any
+of my points without offence!  You must excuse me, it's not my fault.
+But, at any rate, you must see for yourself this proposal of marriage
+is--is merely impossible, my dear fellow.  It's nonsense!  Our countries
+are at war; you are a prisoner.'
+
+'My ancestor of the time of the Ligue,' I replied, 'married a Huguenot
+lady out of the Saintonge, riding two hundred miles through an enemy's
+country to bring off his bride; and it was a happy marriage.'
+
+'Well!' he began; and then looked down into the fire, and became silent.
+
+'Well?' I asked.
+
+'Well, there's this business of--Goguelat,' said he, still looking at the
+coals in the grate.
+
+'What!' I exclaimed, starting in my chair.  'What's that you say?'
+
+'This business about Goguelat,' he repeated.
+
+'Ronald,' said I, 'this is not your doing.  These are not your own words.
+I know where they came from: a coward put them in your mouth.'
+
+'St. Ives!' he cried, 'why do you make it so hard for me? and where's the
+use of insulting other people?  The plain English is, that I can't hear
+of any proposal of marriage from a man under a charge like that.  You
+must see it for yourself, man!  It's the most absurd thing I ever heard
+of!  And you go on forcing me to argue with you, too!'
+
+'Because I have had an affair of honour which terminated unhappily,
+you--a young soldier, or next-door to it--refuse my offer?  Do I
+understand you aright?' said I.
+
+'My dear fellow!' he wailed, 'of course you can twist my words, if you
+like.  You _say_ it was an affair of honour.  Well, I can't, of course,
+tell you that--I can't--I mean, you must see that that's just the point!
+Was it?  I don't know.'
+
+'I have the honour to inform you,' said I.
+
+'Well, other people say the reverse, you see!'
+
+'They lie, Ronald, and I will prove it in time.'
+
+'The short and the long of it is, that any man who is so unfortunate as
+to have such things said about him is not the man to be my
+brother-in-law!' he cried.
+
+'Do you know who will be my first witness at the court?  Arthur
+Chevenix!' said I.
+
+'I don't care!' he cried, rising from his chair and beginning to pace
+outrageously about the room.  'What do you mean, St. Ives?  What is this
+about?  It's like a dream, I declare!  You made an offer, and I have
+refused it.  I don't like it, I don't want it; and whatever I did, or
+didn't, wouldn't matter--my aunt wouldn't bear of it anyway!  Can't you
+take your answer, man?'
+
+'You must remember, Ronald, that we are playing with edged tools,' said
+I.  'An offer of marriage is a delicate subject to handle.  You have
+refused, and you have justified your refusal by several statements:
+first, that I was an impostor; second, that our countries were at war;
+and third-- No, I will speak,' said I; 'you can answer when I have
+done,--and third, that I had dishonourably killed--or was said to have
+done so--the man Goguelat.  Now, my dear fellow, these are very awkward
+grounds to be taking.  From any one else's lips I need scarce tell you
+how I should resent them; but my hands are tied.  I have so much
+gratitude to you, without talking of the love I bear your sister, that
+you insult me, when you do so, under the cover of a complete impunity.  I
+must feel the pain--and I do feel it acutely--I can do nothing to protect
+myself.'  He had been anxious enough to interrupt me in the beginning;
+but now, and after I had ceased, he stood a long while silent.
+
+'St. Ives,' he said at last, 'I think I had better go away.  This has
+been very irritating.  I never at all meant to say anything of the kind,
+and I apologise to you.  I have all the esteem for you that one gentleman
+should have for another.  I only meant to tell you--to show you what had
+influenced my mind; and that, in short, the thing was impossible.  One
+thing you may be quite sure of: I shall do nothing against you.  Will you
+shake hands before I go away?' he blurted out.
+
+'Yes,' said I, 'I agree with you--the interview has been irritating.  Let
+bygones be bygones.  Good-bye, Ronald.'
+
+'Good-bye, St. Ives!' he returned.  'I'm heartily sorry.'
+
+And with that he was gone.
+
+The windows of my own sitting-room looked towards the north; but the
+entrance passage drew its light from the direction of the square.  Hence
+I was able to observe Ronald's departure, his very disheartened gait, and
+the fact that he was joined, about half-way, by no less a man than Major
+Chevenix.  At this, I could scarce keep from smiling; so unpalatable an
+interview must be before the pair of them, and I could hear their voices,
+clashing like crossed swords, in that eternal antiphony of 'I told you,'
+and 'I told you not.'  Without doubt, they had gained very little by
+their visit; but then I had gained less than nothing, and had been
+bitterly dispirited into the bargain.  Ronald had stuck to his guns and
+refused me to the last.  It was no news; but, on the other hand, it could
+not be contorted into good news.  I was now certain that during my
+temporary absence in France, all irons would be put into the fire, and
+the world turned upside down, to make Flora disown the obtrusive
+Frenchman and accept Chevenix.  Without doubt she would resist these
+instances: but the thought of them did not please me, and I felt she
+should be warned and prepared for the battle.
+
+It was no use to try and see her now, but I promised myself early that
+evening to return to Swanston.  In the meantime I had to make all my
+preparations, and look the coming journey in the face.  Here in Edinburgh
+I was within four miles of the sea, yet the business of approaching
+random fishermen with my hat in the one hand and a knife in the other,
+appeared so desperate, that I saw nothing for it but to retrace my steps
+over the northern counties, and knock a second time at the doors of
+Birchell Fenn.  To do this, money would be necessary; and after leaving
+my paper in the hands of Flora I had still a balance of about fifteen
+hundred pounds.  Or rather I may say I had them and I had them not; for
+after my luncheon with Mr. Robbie I had placed the amount, all but thirty
+pounds of change, in a bank in George Street, on a deposit receipt in the
+name of Mr. Rowley.  This I had designed to be my gift to him, in case I
+must suddenly depart.  But now, thinking better of the arrangement, I
+despatched my little man, cockade and all, to lift the fifteen hundred.
+
+He was not long gone, and returned with a flushed face, and the deposit
+receipt still in his hand.
+
+'No go, Mr. Anne,' says he.
+
+'How's that?' I inquired,
+
+'Well, sir, I found the place all right, and no mistake,' said he.  'But
+I tell you what gave me a blue fright!  There was a customer standing by
+the door, and I reckonised him!  Who do you think it was, Mr. Anne?  W'y,
+that same Red-Breast--him I had breakfast with near Aylesbury.'
+
+'You are sure you are not mistaken?' I asked.
+
+'Certain sure,' he replied.  'Not Mr. Lavender, I don't mean, sir; I mean
+the other party.  "Wot's he doing here?' says I.  It don't look right."'
+
+'Not by any means,' I agreed.
+
+I walked to and fro in the apartment reflecting.  This particular Bow
+Street runner might be here by accident; but it was to imagine a singular
+play of coincidence that he, who had met Rowley and spoken with him in
+the 'Green Dragon,' hard by Aylesbury, should be now in Scotland, where
+he could have no legitimate business, and by the doors of the bank where
+Rowley kept his account.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'he didn't see you, did he?'
+
+'Never a fear,' quoth Rowley.  'W'y Mr. Anne, sir, if he 'ad, you
+wouldn't have seen _me_ any more!  I ain't a hass, sir!'
+
+'Well, my boy, you can put that receipt in your pocket.  You'll have no
+more use for it till you're quite clear of me.  Don't lose it, though;
+it's your share of the Christmas-box: fifteen hundred pounds all for
+yourself.'
+
+'Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne, sir, but wot for!' said Rowley.
+
+'To set up a public-house upon,' said I.
+
+'If you'll excuse me, sir, I ain't got any call to set up a public-house,
+sir,' he replied stoutly.  'And I tell you wot, sir, it seems to me I'm
+reether young for the billet.  I'm your body servant, Mr. Anne, or else
+I'm nothink.'
+
+'Well, Rowley,' I said, 'I'll tell you what it's for.  It's for the good
+service you have done me, of which I don't care--and don't dare--to
+speak.  It's for your loyalty and cheerfulness, my dear boy.  I had meant
+it for you; but to tell you the truth, it's past mending now--it has to
+be yours.  Since that man is waiting by the bank, the money can't be
+touched until I'm gone.'
+
+'Until you're gone, sir?' re-echoed Rowley.  'You don't go anywheres
+without me, I can tell you that, Mr. Anne, sir!'
+
+'Yes, my boy,' said I, 'we are going to part very soon now; probably
+to-morrow.  And it's for my sake, Rowley!  Depend upon it, if there was
+any reason at all for that Bow Street man being at the bank, he was not
+there to look out for you.  How they could have found out about the
+account so early is more than I can fathom; some strange coincidence must
+have played me false!  But there the fact is; and Rowley, I'll not only
+have to say farewell to you presently, I'll have to ask you to stay
+indoors until I can say it.  Remember, my boy, it's only so that you can
+serve me now.'
+
+'W'y, sir, you say the word, and of course I'll do it!' he cried.
+'"Nothink by 'alves," is my motto!  I'm your man, through thick and thin,
+live or die, I am!'
+
+In the meantime there was nothing to be done till towards sunset.  My
+only chance now was to come again as quickly as possible to speech of
+Flora, who was my only practicable banker; and not before evening was it
+worth while to think of that.  I might compose myself as well as I was
+able over the _Caledonian Mercury_, with its ill news of the campaign of
+France and belated documents about the retreat from Russia; and, as I sat
+there by the fire, I was sometimes all awake with anger and mortification
+at what I was reading, and sometimes again I would be three parts asleep
+as I dozed over the barren items of home intelligence.  'Lately
+arrived'--this is what I suddenly stumbled on--'at Dumbreck's Hotel, the
+Viscount of Saint-Yves.'
+
+'Rowley,' said I.
+
+'If you please, Mr. Anne, sir,' answered the obsequious, lowering his
+pipe.
+
+'Come and look at this, my boy,' said I, holding out the paper.
+
+'My crikey!' said he.  'That's 'im, sir, sure enough!'
+
+'Sure enough, Rowley,' said I.  'He's on the trail.  He has fairly caught
+up with us.  He and this Bow Street man have come together, I would
+swear.  And now here is the whole field, quarry, hounds and hunters, all
+together in this city of Edinburgh.'
+
+'And wot are you goin' to do now, sir?  Tell you wot, let me take it in
+'and, please!  Gimme a minute, and I'll disguise myself, and go out to
+this Dum--- to this hotel, leastways, sir--and see wot he's up to.  You
+put your trust in me, Mr. Anne: I'm fly, don't you make no mistake about
+it.  I'm all a-growing and a-blowing, I am.'
+
+'Not one foot of you,' said I.  'You are a prisoner, Rowley, and make up
+your mind to that.  So am I, or next door to it.  I showed it you for a
+caution; if you go on the streets, it spells death to me, Rowley.'
+
+'If you please, sir,' says Rowley.
+
+'Come to think of it,' I continued, 'you must take a cold, or something.
+No good of awakening Mrs. McRankine's suspicions.'
+
+'A cold?' he cried, recovering immediately from his depression.  'I can
+do it, Mr. Anne.'
+
+And he proceeded to sneeze and cough and blow his nose, till I could not
+restrain myself from smiling.
+
+'Oh, I tell you, I know a lot of them dodges,' he observed proudly.
+
+'Well, they come in very handy,' said I.
+
+'I'd better go at once and show it to the old gal, 'adn't I?' he asked.
+
+I told him, by all means; and he was gone upon the instant, gleeful as
+though to a game of football.
+
+I took up the paper and read carelessly on, my thoughts engaged with my
+immediate danger, till I struck on the next paragraph:--
+
+    'In connection with the recent horrid murder in the Castle, we are
+    desired to make public the following intelligence.  The soldier,
+    Champdivers, is supposed to be in the neighbourhood of this city.  He
+    is about the middle height or rather under, of a pleasing appearance
+    and highly genteel address.  When last heard of he wore a fashionable
+    suit of pearl-grey, and boots with fawn-coloured tops.  He is
+    accompanied by a servant about sixteen years of age, speaks English
+    without any accent, and passed under the _alias_ of Ramornie.  A
+    reward is offered for his apprehension.'
+
+In a moment I was in the next room, stripping from me the pearl-coloured
+suit!
+
+I confess I was now a good deal agitated.  It is difficult to watch the
+toils closing slowly and surely about you, and to retain your composure;
+and I was glad that Rowley was not present to spy on my confusion.  I was
+flushed, my breath came thick; I cannot remember a time when I was more
+put out.
+
+And yet I must wait and do nothing, and partake of my meals, and
+entertain the ever-garrulous Rowley, as though I were entirely my own
+man.  And if I did not require to entertain Mrs. McRankine also, that was
+but another drop of bitterness in my cup!  For what ailed my landlady,
+that she should hold herself so severely aloof, that she should refuse
+conversation, that her eyes should be reddened, that I should so
+continually hear the voice of her private supplications sounding through
+the house?  I was much deceived, or she had read the insidious paragraph
+and recognised the comminated pearl-grey suit.  I remember now a certain
+air with which she had laid the paper on my table, and a certain sniff,
+between sympathy and defiance, with which she had announced it: 'There's
+your _Mercury_ for ye!'
+
+In this direction, at least, I saw no pressing danger; her tragic
+countenance betokened agitation; it was plain she was wrestling with her
+conscience, and the battle still hung dubious.  The question of what to
+do troubled me extremely.  I could not venture to touch such an intricate
+and mysterious piece of machinery as my landlady's spiritual nature: it
+might go off at a word, and in any direction, like a badly-made firework.
+And while I praised myself extremely for my wisdom in the past, that I
+had made so much a friend of her, I was all abroad as to my conduct in
+the present.  There seemed an equal danger in pressing and in neglecting
+the accustomed marks of familiarity.  The one extreme looked like
+impudence, and might annoy, the other was a practical confession of
+guilt.  Altogether, it was a good hour for me when the dusk began to fall
+in earnest on the streets of Edinburgh, and the voice of an early
+watchman bade me set forth.
+
+I reached the neighbourhood of the cottage before seven; and as I
+breasted the steep ascent which leads to the garden wall, I was struck
+with surprise to hear a dog.  Dogs I had heard before, but only from the
+hamlet on the hillside above.  Now, this dog was in the garden itself,
+where it roared aloud in paroxysms of fury, and I could hear it leaping
+and straining on the chain.  I waited some while, until the brute's fit
+of passion had roared itself out.  Then, with the utmost precaution, I
+drew near again; and finally approached the garden wall.  So soon as I
+had clapped my head above the level, however, the barking broke forth
+again with redoubled energy.  Almost at the same time, the door of the
+cottage opened, and Ronald and the Major appeared upon the threshold with
+a lantern.  As they so stood, they were almost immediately below me,
+strongly illuminated, and within easy earshot.  The Major pacified the
+dog, who took instead to low, uneasy growling intermingled with
+occasional yelps.
+
+'Good thing I brought Towzer!' said Chevenix.
+
+'Damn him, I wonder where he is!' said Ronald; and he moved the lantern
+up and down, and turned the night into a shifting puzzle-work of gleam
+and shadow.  'I think I'll make a sally.'
+
+'I don't think you will,' replied Chevenix.  'When I agreed to come out
+here and do sentry-go, it was on one condition, Master Ronald: don't you
+forget that!  Military discipline, my boy!  Our beat is this path close
+about the house.  Down, Towzer! good boy, good boy--gently, then!' he
+went on, caressing his confounded monster.
+
+'To think!  The beggar may be hearing us this minute!' cried Ronald.
+
+'Nothing more probable,' said the Major.  'You there, St. Ives?' he
+added, in a distinct but guarded voice.  'I only want to tell you, you
+had better go home.  Mr. Gilchrist and I take watch and watch.'
+
+The game was up.  '_Beaucoup de plaisir_!' I replied, in the same tones.
+'_Il fait un peu froid pour veiller_; _gardez-vous des engelures_!'
+
+I suppose it was done in a moment of ungovernable rage; but in spite of
+the excellent advice he had given to Ronald the moment before, Chevenix
+slipped the chain, and the dog sprang, straight as an arrow, up the bank.
+I stepped back, picked up a stone of about twelve pounds weight, and
+stood ready.  With a bound the beast landed on the cope-stone of the
+wall; and, almost in the same instant, my missile caught him fair in the
+face.  He gave a stifled cry, went tumbling back where he had come from,
+and I could hear the twelve-pounder accompany him in his fall.  Chevenix,
+at the same moment, broke out in a roaring voice: 'The hell-hound!  If
+he's killed my dog!' and I judged, upon all grounds, it was as well to be
+off.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX--EVENTS OF WEDNESDAY; THE UNIVERSITY OF CRAMOND
+
+
+I awoke to much diffidence, even to a feeling that might be called the
+beginnings of panic, and lay for hours in my bed considering the
+situation.  Seek where I pleased, there was nothing to encourage me and
+plenty to appal.  They kept a close watch about the cottage; they had a
+beast of a watch-dog--at least, unless I had settled it; and if I had, I
+knew its bereaved master would only watch the more indefatigably for the
+loss.  In the pardonable ostentation of love I had given all the money I
+could spare to Flora; I had thought it glorious that the hunted exile
+should come down, like Jupiter, in a shower of gold, and pour thousands
+in the lap of the beloved.  Then I had in an hour of arrant folly buried
+what remained to me in a bank in George Street.  And now I must get back
+the one or the other; and which? and how?
+
+As I tossed in my bed, I could see three possible courses, all extremely
+perilous.  First, Rowley might have been mistaken; the bank might not be
+watched; it might still be possible for him to draw the money on the
+deposit receipt.  Second, I might apply again to Robbie.  Or, third, I
+might dare everything, go to the Assembly Ball, and speak with Flora
+under the eyes of all Edinburgh.  This last alternative, involving as it
+did the most horrid risks, and the delay of forty-eight hours, I did but
+glance at with an averted head, and turned again to the consideration of
+the others.  It was the likeliest thing in the world that Robbie had been
+warned to have no more to do with me. The whole policy of the Gilchrists
+was in the hands of Chevenix; and I thought this was a precaution so
+elementary that he was certain to have taken it.  If he had not, of
+course I was all right: Robbie would manage to communicate with Flora;
+and by four o'clock I might be on the south road and, I was going to say,
+a free man.  Lastly, I must assure myself with my own eyes whether the
+bank in George Street were beleaguered.
+
+I called to Rowley and questioned him tightly as to the appearance of the
+Bow Street officer.
+
+'What sort of looking man is he, Rowley?' I asked, as I began to dress.
+
+'Wot sort of a looking man he is?' repeated Rowley.  'Well, I don't very
+well know wot you would say, Mr. Anne.  He ain't a beauty, any'ow.'
+
+'Is he tall?'
+
+'Tall?  Well, no, I shouldn't say _tall_ Mr. Anne.'
+
+'Well, then, is he short?'
+
+'Short?  No, I don't think I would say he was what you would call
+_short_.  No, not piticular short, sir.'
+
+'Then, I suppose, he must be about the middle height?'
+
+'Well, you might say it, sir; but not remarkable so.'
+
+I smothered an oath.
+
+'Is he clean-shaved?' I tried him again.
+
+'Clean-shaved?' he repeated, with the same air of anxious candour.
+
+'Good heaven, man, don't repeat my words like a parrot!' I cried.  'Tell
+me what the man was like: it is of the first importance that I should be
+able to recognise him.'
+
+'I'm trying to, Mr. Anne.  But _clean-shaved_?  I don't seem to rightly
+get hold of that p'int.  Sometimes it might appear to me like as if he
+was; and sometimes like as if he wasn't.  No, it wouldn't surprise me now
+if you was to tell me he 'ad a bit o' whisker.'
+
+'Was the man red-faced?' I roared, dwelling on each syllable.
+
+'I don't think you need go for to get cross about it, Mr. Anne!' said he.
+'I'm tellin' you every blessed thing I see!  Red-faced?  Well, no, not as
+you would remark upon.'
+
+A dreadful calm fell upon me.
+
+'Was he anywise pale?' I asked.
+
+'Well, it don't seem to me as though he were.  But I tell you truly, I
+didn't take much heed to that.'
+
+'Did he look like a drinking man?'
+
+'Well, no.  If you please, sir, he looked more like an eating one.'
+
+'Oh, he was stout, was he?'
+
+'No, sir.  I couldn't go so far as that.  No, he wasn't not to say
+_stout_.  If anything, lean rather.'
+
+I need not go on with the infuriating interview.  It ended as it began,
+except that Rowley was in tears, and that I had acquired one fact.  The
+man was drawn for me as being of any height you like to mention, and of
+any degree of corpulence or leanness; clean-shaved or not, as the case
+might be; the colour of his hair Rowley 'could not take it upon himself
+to put a name on'; that of his eyes he thought to have been blue--nay, it
+was the one point on which he attained to a kind of tearful certainty.
+'I'll take my davy on it,' he asseverated.  They proved to have been as
+black as sloes, very little and very near together.  So much for the
+evidence of the artless!  And the fact, or rather the facts, acquired?
+Well, they had to do not with the person but with his clothing.  The man
+wore knee-breeches and white stockings; his coat was 'some kind of a
+lightish colour--or betwixt that and dark'; and he wore a 'mole-skin
+weskit.'  As if this were not enough, he presently haled me from my
+breakfast in a prodigious flutter, and showed me an honest and rather
+venerable citizen passing in the Square.
+
+'That's _him_, sir,' he cried, 'the very moral of him!  Well, this one is
+better dressed, and p'r'aps a trifler taller; and in the face he don't
+favour him noways at all, sir.  No, not when I come to look again, 'e
+don't seem to favour him noways.'
+
+'Jackass!' said I, and I think the greatest stickler for manners will
+admit the epithet to have been justified.
+
+Meanwhile the appearance of my landlady added a great load of anxiety to
+what I already suffered.  It was plain that she had not slept; equally
+plain that she had wept copiously.  She sighed, she groaned, she drew in
+her breath, she shook her head, as she waited on table.  In short, she
+seemed in so precarious a state, like a petard three times charged with
+hysteria, that I did not dare to address her; and stole out of the house
+on tiptoe, and actually ran downstairs, in the fear that she might call
+me back.  It was plain that this degree of tension could not last long.
+
+It was my first care to go to George Street, which I reached (by good
+luck) as a boy was taking down the bank shutters.  A man was conversing
+with him; he had white stockings and a moleskin waistcoat, and was as
+ill-looking a rogue as you would want to see in a day's journey.  This
+seemed to agree fairly well with Rowley's _signalement_: he had declared
+emphatically (if you remember), and had stuck to it besides, that the
+companion of the great Lavender was no beauty.
+
+Thence I made my way to Mr. Robbie's, where I rang the bell.  A servant
+answered the summons, and told me the lawyer was engaged, as I had half
+expected.
+
+'Wha shall I say was callin'?' she pursued; and when I had told her 'Mr.
+Ducie,' 'I think this'll be for you, then?' she added, and handed me a
+letter from the hall table.  It ran:
+
+    'DEAR MR. DUCIE,
+
+    'My single advice to you is to leave _quam primum_ for the South.
+
+                                                        Yours, T. ROBBIE.'
+
+That was short and sweet.  It emphatically extinguished hope in one
+direction.  No more was to be gotten of Robbie; and I wondered, from my
+heart, how much had been told him.  Not too much, I hoped, for I liked
+the lawyer who had thus deserted me, and I placed a certain reliance in
+the discretion of Chevenix.  He would not be merciful; on the other hand,
+I did not think he would be cruel without cause.
+
+It was my next affair to go back along George Street, and assure myself
+whether the man in the moleskin vest was still on guard.  There was no
+sign of him on the pavement.  Spying the door of a common stair nearly
+opposite the bank, I took it in my head that this would be a good point
+of observation, crossed the street, entered with a businesslike air and
+fell immediately against the man in the moleskin vest.  I stopped and
+apologised to him; he replied in an unmistakable English accent, thus
+putting the matter almost beyond doubt.  After this encounter I must, of
+course, ascend to the top story, ring the bell of a suite of apartments,
+inquire for Mr. Vavasour, learn (with no great surprise) that he did not
+live there, come down again and, again politely saluting the man from Bow
+Street, make my escape at last into the street.
+
+I was now driven back upon the Assembly Ball.  Robbie had failed me.  The
+bank was watched; it would never do to risk Rowley in that neighbourhood.
+All I could do was to wait until the morrow evening, and present myself
+at the Assembly, let it end as it might.  But I must say I came to this
+decision with a good deal of genuine fright; and here I came for the
+first time to one of those places where my courage stuck.  I do not mean
+that my courage boggled and made a bit of a bother over it, as it did
+over the escape from the Castle; I mean, stuck, like a stopped watch or a
+dead man.  Certainly I would go to the ball; certainly I must see this
+morning about my clothes.  That was all decided.  But the most of the
+shops were on the other side of the valley, in the Old Town; and it was
+now my strange discovery that I was physically unable to cross the North
+Bridge!  It was as though a precipice had stood between us, or the deep
+sea had intervened.  Nearer to the Castle my legs refused to bear me.
+
+I told myself this was mere superstition; I made wagers with myself--and
+gained them; I went down on the esplanade of Princes Street, walked and
+stood there, alone and conspicuous, looking across the garden at the old
+grey bastions of the fortress, where all these troubles had begun.  I
+cocked my hat, set my hand on my hip, and swaggered on the pavement,
+confronting detection.  And I found I could do all this with a sense of
+exhilaration that was not unpleasing, and with a certain _cranerie_ of
+manner that raised me in my own esteem.  And yet there was one thing I
+could not bring my mind to face up to, or my limbs to execute; and that
+was to cross the valley into the Old Town.  It seemed to me I must be
+arrested immediately if I had done so; I must go straight into the
+twilight of a prison cell, and pass straight thence to the gross and
+final embraces of the nightcap and the halter.  And yet it was from no
+reasoned fear of the consequences that I could not go.  I was unable.  My
+horse baulked, and there was an end!
+
+My nerve was gone: here was a discovery for a man in such imminent peril,
+set down to so desperate a game, which I could only hope to win by
+continual luck and unflagging effrontery!  The strain had been too long
+continued, and my nerve was gone.  I fell into what they call panic fear,
+as I have seen soldiers do on the alarm of a night attack, and turned out
+of Princes Street at random as though the devil were at my heels.  In St.
+Andrew Square, I remember vaguely hearing some one call out.  I paid no
+heed, but pressed on blindly.  A moment after, a hand fell heavily on my
+shoulder, and I thought I had fainted.  Certainly the world went black
+about me for some seconds; and when that spasm passed I found myself
+standing face to face with the 'cheerful extravagant,' in what sort of
+disarray I really dare not imagine, dead white at least, shaking like an
+aspen, and mowing at the man with speechless lips.  And this was the
+soldier of Napoleon, and the gentleman who intended going next night to
+an Assembly Ball!  I am the more particular in telling of my breakdown,
+because it was my only experience of the sort; and it is a good tale for
+officers.  I will allow no man to call me coward; I have made my proofs;
+few men more.  And yet I (come of the best blood in France and inured to
+danger from a child) did, for some ten or twenty minutes, make this
+hideous exhibition of myself on the streets of the New Town of Edinburgh.
+
+With my first available breath I begged his pardon.  I was of an
+extremely nervous disposition, recently increased by late hours; I could
+not bear the slightest start.
+
+He seemed much concerned.  'You must be in a devil of a state!' said he;
+'though of course it was my fault--damnably silly, vulgar sort of thing
+to do!  A thousand apologies!  But you really must be run down; you
+should consult a medico.  My dear sir, a hair of the dog that bit you is
+clearly indicated.  A touch of Blue Ruin, now?  Or, come: it's early, but
+is man the slave of hours? what do you say to a chop and a bottle in
+Dumbreck's Hotel?'
+
+I refused all false comfort; but when he went on to remind me that this
+was the day when the University of Cramond met; and to propose a
+five-mile walk into the country and a dinner in the company of young
+asses like himself, I began to think otherwise.  I had to wait until
+to-morrow evening, at any rate; this might serve as well as anything else
+to bridge the dreary hours.  The country was the very place for me: and
+walking is an excellent sedative for the nerves.  Remembering poor
+Rowley, feigning a cold in our lodgings and immediately under the guns of
+the formidable and now doubtful Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my
+servant.  'Poor devil! it is dull for him,' I explained.
+
+'The merciful man is merciful to his ass,' observed my sententious
+friend.  'Bring him by all means!
+
+    "The harp, his sole remaining joy,
+    Was carried by an orphan boy;"
+
+and I have no doubt the orphan boy can get some cold victuals in the
+kitchen, while the Senatus dines.'
+
+Accordingly, being now quite recovered from my unmanly condition, except
+that nothing could yet induce me to cross the North Bridge, I arranged
+for my ball dress at a shop in Leith Street, where I was not served ill,
+cut out Rowley from his seclusion, and was ready along with him at the
+trysting-place, the corner of Duke Street and York Place, by a little
+after two.  The University was represented in force: eleven persons,
+including ourselves, Byfield the aeronaut, and the tall lad, Forbes, whom
+I had met on the Sunday morning, bedewed with tallow, at the 'Hunters'
+Rest.'  I was introduced; and we set off by way of Newhaven and the sea
+beach; at first through pleasant country roads, and afterwards along a
+succession of bays of a fairylike prettiness, to our destination--Cramond
+on the Almond--a little hamlet on a little river, embowered in woods, and
+looking forth over a great flat of quicksand to where a little islet
+stood planted in the sea.  It was miniature scenery, but charming of its
+kind.  The air of this good February afternoon was bracing, but not cold.
+All the way my companions were skylarking, jesting and making puns, and I
+felt as if a load had been taken off my lungs and spirits, and skylarked
+with the best of them.
+
+Byfield I observed, because I had heard of him before, and seen his
+advertisements, not at all because I was disposed to feel interest in the
+man.  He was dark and bilious and very silent; frigid in his manners, but
+burning internally with a great fire of excitement; and he was so good as
+to bestow a good deal of his company and conversation (such as it was)
+upon myself, who was not in the least grateful.  If I had known how I was
+to be connected with him in the immediate future, I might have taken more
+pains.
+
+In the hamlet of Cramond there is a hostelry of no very promising
+appearance, and here a room had been prepared for us, and we sat down to
+table.
+
+'Here you will find no guttling or gormandising, no turtle or
+nightingales' tongues,' said the extravagant, whose name, by the way, was
+Dalmahoy.  'The device, sir, of the University of Cramond is Plain Living
+and High Drinking.'
+
+Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic Latin, which
+I could by no means follow, only I could hear it rhymed, and I guessed it
+to be more witty than reverent.  After which the _Senatus Academicus_ sat
+down to rough plenty in the shape of rizzar'd haddocks and mustard, a
+sheep's head, a haggis, and other delicacies of Scotland.  The dinner was
+washed down with brown stout in bottle, and as soon as the cloth was
+removed, glasses, boiling water, sugar, and whisky were set out for the
+manufacture of toddy.  I played a good knife and fork, did not shun the
+bowl, and took part, so far as I was able, in the continual fire of
+pleasantry with which the meal was seasoned.  Greatly daring, I ventured,
+before all these Scotsmen, to tell Sim's Tale of Tweedie's dog; and I was
+held to have done such extraordinary justice to the dialect, 'for a
+Southron,' that I was immediately voted into the Chair of Scots, and
+became, from that moment, a full member of the University of Cramond.  A
+little after, I found myself entertaining them with a song; and a little
+after--perhaps a little in consequence--it occurred to me that I had had
+enough, and would be very well inspired to take French leave.  It was not
+difficult to manage, for it was nobody's business to observe my
+movements, and conviviality had banished suspicion.
+
+I got easily forth of the chamber, which reverberated with the voices of
+these merry and learned gentlemen, and breathed a long breath.  I had
+passed an agreeable afternoon and evening, and I had apparently escaped
+scot free.  Alas! when I looked into the kitchen, there was my monkey,
+drunk as a lord, toppling on the edge of the dresser, and performing on
+the flageolet to an audience of the house lasses and some neighbouring
+ploughmen.
+
+I routed him promptly from his perch, stuck his hat on, put his
+instrument in his pocket, and set off with him for Edinburgh.
+
+His limbs were of paper, his mind quite in abeyance; I must uphold and
+guide him, prevent his frantic dives, and set him continually on his legs
+again.  At first he sang wildly, with occasional outbursts of causeless
+laughter.  Gradually an inarticulate melancholy succeeded; he wept gently
+at times; would stop in the middle of the road, say firmly 'No, no, no,'
+and then fall on his back: or else address me solemnly as 'M'lord' and
+fall on his face by way of variety.  I am afraid I was not always so
+gentle with the little pig as I might have been, but really the position
+was unbearable.  We made no headway at all, and I suppose we were scarce
+gotten a mile away from Cramond, when the whole _Senatus Academicus_ was
+heard hailing, and doubling the pace to overtake its.
+
+Some of them were fairly presentable; and they were all Christian martyrs
+compared to Rowley; but they were in a frolicsome and rollicking humour
+that promised danger as we approached the town.  They sang songs, they
+ran races, they fenced with their walking-sticks and umbrellas; and, in
+spite of this violent exercise, the fun grew only the more extravagant
+with the miles they traversed.  Their drunkenness was deep-seated and
+permanent, like fire in a peat; or rather--to be quite just to them--it
+was not so much to be called drunkenness at all, as the effect of youth
+and high spirits--a fine night, and the night young, a good road under
+foot, and the world before you!
+
+I had left them once somewhat unceremoniously; I could not attempt it a
+second time; and, burthened as I was with Mr. Rowley, I was really glad
+of assistance.  But I saw the lamps of Edinburgh draw near on their
+hill-top with a good deal of uneasiness, which increased, after we had
+entered the lighted streets, to positive alarm.  All the passers-by were
+addressed, some of them by name.  A worthy man was stopped by Forbes.
+'Sir,' said he, 'in the name of the Senatus of the University of Cramond,
+I confer upon you the degree of LL.D.,' and with the words he bonneted
+him.  Conceive the predicament of St. Ives, committed to the society of
+these outrageous youths, in a town where the police and his cousin were
+both looking for him!  So far, we had pursued our way unmolested,
+although raising a clamour fit to wake the dead; but at last, in
+Abercromby Place, I believe--at least it was a crescent of highly
+respectable houses fronting on a garden--Byfield and I, having fallen
+somewhat in the rear with Rowley, came to a simultaneous halt.  Our
+ruffians were beginning to wrench off bells and door-plates!
+
+'Oh, I say!' says Byfield, 'this is too much of a good thing!  Confound
+it, I'm a respectable man--a public character, by George!  I can't afford
+to get taken up by the police.'
+
+'My own case exactly,' said I.
+
+'Here, let's bilk them,' said he.
+
+And we turned back and took our way down hill again.
+
+It was none too soon: voices and alarm bells sounded; watchmen here and
+there began to spring their rattles; it was plain the University of
+Cramond would soon be at blows with the police of Edinburgh!  Byfield and
+I, running the semi-inanimate Rowley before us, made good despatch, and
+did not stop till we were several streets away, and the hubbub was
+already softened by distance.
+
+'Well, sir,' said he, 'we are well out of that!  Did ever any one see
+such a pack of young barbarians?'
+
+'We are properly punished, Mr. Byfield; we had no business there,' I
+replied.
+
+'No, indeed, sir, you may well say that!  Outrageous!  And my ascension
+announced for Friday, you know!' cried the aeronaut.  'A pretty scandal!
+Byfield the aeronaut at the police-court!  Tut-tut!  Will you be able to
+get your rascal home, sir?  Allow me to offer you my card.  I am staying
+at Walker and Poole's Hotel, sir, where I should be pleased to see you.'
+
+'The pleasure would be mutual, sir,' said I, but I must say my heart was
+not in my words, and as I watched Mr. Byfield departing I desired nothing
+less than to pursue the acquaintance
+
+One more ordeal remained for me to pass.  I carried my senseless load
+upstairs to our lodging, and was admitted by the landlady in a tall white
+nightcap and with an expression singularly grim.  She lighted us into the
+sitting-room; where, when I had seated Rowley in a chair, she dropped me
+a cast-iron courtesy.  I smelt gunpowder on the woman.  Her voice,
+tottered with emotion.
+
+'I give ye nottice, Mr. Ducie,' said she.  'Dacent folks' houses . . .'
+
+And at that apparently temper cut off her utterance, and she took herself
+off without more words.
+
+I looked about me at the room, the goggling Rowley, the extinguished
+fire; my mind reviewed the laughable incidents of the day and night; and
+I laughed out loud to myself--lonely and cheerless laughter!.......
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+             [_At this point the Author's_ MS. _breaks off_]
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes
+
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of St Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson
+(#6 in our series by Robert Louis Stevenson)
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
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+Title: St Ives
+
+Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+Release Date: September, 1995  [EBook #322]
+[This file was first posted on December 30, 1995]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, ST IVES ***
+
+
+
+
+Transcribed 1898 William Heinemann edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
+
+
+
+
+ST. IVES
+BEING
+THE ADVENTURES OF A FRENCH PRISONER IN ENGLAND
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I--A TALE OF A LION RAMPANT
+
+
+
+It was in the month of May 1813 that I was so unlucky as to fall at
+last into the hands of the enemy.  My knowledge of the English
+language had marked me out for a certain employment.  Though I
+cannot conceive a soldier refusing to incur the risk, yet to be
+hanged for a spy is a disgusting business; and I was relieved to be
+held a prisoner of war.  Into the Castle of Edinburgh, standing in
+the midst of that city on the summit of an extraordinary rock, I
+was cast with several hundred fellow-sufferers, all privates like
+myself, and the more part of them, by an accident, very ignorant,
+plain fellows.  My English, which had brought me into that scrape,
+now helped me very materially to bear it.  I had a thousand
+advantages.  I was often called to play the part of an interpreter,
+whether of orders or complaints, and thus brought in relations,
+sometimes of mirth, sometimes almost of friendship, with the
+officers in charge.  A young lieutenant singled me out to be his
+adversary at chess, a game in which I was extremely proficient, and
+would reward me for my gambits with excellent cigars.  The major of
+the battalion took lessons of French from me while at breakfast,
+and was sometimes so obliging as to have me join him at the meal.
+Chevenix was his name.  He was stiff as a drum-major and selfish as
+an Englishman, but a fairly conscientious pupil and a fairly
+upright man.  Little did I suppose that his ramrod body and frozen
+face would, in the end, step in between me and all my dearest
+wishes; that upon this precise, regular, icy soldier-man my
+fortunes should so nearly shipwreck!  I never liked, but yet I
+trusted him; and though it may seem but a trifle, I found his
+snuff-box with the bean in it come very welcome.
+
+For it is strange how grown men and seasoned soldiers can go back
+in life; so that after but a little while in prison, which is after
+all the next thing to being in the nursery, they grow absorbed in
+the most pitiful, childish interests, and a sugar biscuit or a
+pinch of snuff become things to follow after and scheme for!
+
+We made but a poor show of prisoners.  The officers had been all
+offered their parole, and had taken it.  They lived mostly in
+suburbs of the city, lodging with modest families, and enjoyed
+their freedom and supported the almost continual evil tidings of
+the Emperor as best they might.  It chanced I was the only
+gentleman among the privates who remained.  A great part were
+ignorant Italians, of a regiment that had suffered heavily in
+Catalonia.  The rest were mere diggers of the soil, treaders of
+grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly and violently
+preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.  We had but the one
+interest in common:  each of us who had any skill with his fingers
+passed the hours of his captivity in the making of little toys and
+articles of Paris; and the prison was daily visited at certain
+hours by a concourse of people of the country, come to exult over
+our distress, or--it is more tolerant to suppose--their own
+vicarious triumph.  Some moved among us with a decency of shame or
+sympathy.  Others were the most offensive personages in the world,
+gaped at us as if we had been baboons, sought to evangelise us to
+their rustic, northern religion, as though we had been savages, or
+tortured us with intelligence of disasters to the arms of France.
+Good, bad, and indifferent, there was one alleviation to the
+annoyance of these visitors; for it was the practice of almost all
+to purchase some specimen of our rude handiwork.  This led, amongst
+the prisoners, to a strong spirit of competition.  Some were neat
+of hand, and (the genius of the French being always distinguished)
+could place upon sale little miracles of dexterity and taste.  Some
+had a more engaging appearance; fine features were found to do as
+well as fine merchandise, and an air of youth in particular (as it
+appealed to the sentiment of pity in our visitors) to be a source
+of profit.  Others again enjoyed some acquaintance with the
+language, and were able to recommend the more agreeably to
+purchasers such trifles as they had to sell.  To the first of these
+advantages I could lay no claim, for my fingers were all thumbs.
+Some at least of the others I possessed; and finding much
+entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer my advantages to
+rust.  I have never despised the social arts, in which it is a
+national boast that every Frenchman should excel.  For the approach
+of particular sorts of visitors, I had a particular manner of
+address, and even of appearance, which I could readily assume and
+change on the occasion rising.  I never lost an opportunity to
+flatter either the person of my visitor, if it should be a lady,
+or, if it should be a man, the greatness of his country in war.
+And in case my compliments should miss their aim, I was always
+ready to cover my retreat with some agreeable pleasantry, which
+would often earn me the name of an 'oddity' or a 'droll fellow.'
+In this way, although I was so left-handed a toy-maker, I made out
+to be rather a successful merchant; and found means to procure many
+little delicacies and alleviations, such as children or prisoners
+desire.
+
+I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy man.  It is
+not indeed my character; and I had, in a comparison with my
+comrades, many reasons for content.  In the first place, I had no
+family:  I was an orphan and a bachelor; neither wife nor child
+awaited me in France.  In the second, I had never wholly forgot the
+emotions with which I first found myself a prisoner; and although a
+military prison be not altogether a garden of delights, it is still
+preferable to a gallows.  In the third, I am almost ashamed to say
+it, but I found a certain pleasure in our place of residence:
+being an obsolete and really mediaeval fortress, high placed and
+commanding extraordinary prospects, not only over sea, mountain,
+and champaign but actually over the thoroughfares of a capital
+city, which we could see blackened by day with the moving crowd of
+the inhabitants, and at night shining with lamps.  And lastly,
+although I was not insensible to the restraints of prison or the
+scantiness of our rations, I remembered I had sometimes eaten quite
+as ill in Spain, and had to mount guard and march perhaps a dozen
+leagues into the bargain.  The first of my troubles, indeed, was
+the costume we were obliged to wear.  There is a horrible practice
+in England to trick out in ridiculous uniforms, and as it were to
+brand in mass, not only convicts but military prisoners, and even
+the children in charity schools.  I think some malignant genius had
+found his masterpiece of irony in the dress which we were condemned
+to wear:  jacket, waistcoat, and trousers of a sulphur or mustard
+yellow, and a shirt or blue-and-white striped cotton.  It was
+conspicuous, it was cheap, it pointed us out to laughter--we, who
+were old soldiers, used to arms, and some of us showing noble
+scars,--like a set of lugubrious zanies at a fair.  The old name of
+that rock on which our prison stood was (I have heard since then)
+the Painted Hill.  Well, now it was all painted a bright yellow
+with our costumes; and the dress of the soldiers who guarded us
+being of course the essential British red rag, we made up together
+the elements of a lively picture of hell.  I have again and again
+looked round upon my fellow-prisoners, and felt my anger rise, and
+choked upon tears, to behold them thus parodied.  The more part, as
+I have said, were peasants, somewhat bettered perhaps by the drill-
+sergeant, but for all that ungainly, loutish fellows, with no more
+than a mere barrack-room smartness of address:  indeed, you could
+have seen our army nowhere more discreditably represented than in
+this Castle of Edinburgh.  And I used to see myself in fancy, and
+blush.  It seemed that my more elegant carriage would but point the
+insult of the travesty.  And I remembered the days when I wore the
+coarse but honourable coat of a soldier; and remembered further
+back how many of the noble, the fair, and the gracious had taken a
+delight to tend my childhood. . . .  But I must not recall these
+tender and sorrowful memories twice; their place is further on, and
+I am now upon another business.  The perfidy of the Britannic
+Government stood nowhere more openly confessed than in one
+particular of our discipline:  that we were shaved twice in the
+week.  To a man who has loved all his life to be fresh shaven, can
+a more irritating indignity be devised?  Monday and Thursday were
+the days.  Take the Thursday, and conceive the picture I must
+present by Sunday evening!  And Saturday, which was almost as bad,
+was the great day for visitors.
+
+Those who came to our market were of all qualities, men and women,
+the lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly pretty.  Sure, if
+people at all understood the power of beauty, there would be no
+prayers addressed except to Venus; and the mere privilege of
+beholding a comely woman is worth paying for.  Our visitors, upon
+the whole, were not much to boast of; and yet, sitting in a corner
+and very much ashamed of myself and my absurd appearance, I have
+again and again tasted the finest, the rarest, and the most
+ethereal pleasures in a glance of an eye that I should never see
+again--and never wanted to.  The flower of the hedgerow and the
+star in heaven satisfy and delight us:  how much more the look of
+that exquisite being who was created to bear and rear, to madden
+and rejoice, mankind!
+
+There was one young lady in particular, about eighteen or nineteen,
+tall, of a gallant carriage, and with a profusion of hair in which
+the sun found threads of gold.  As soon as she came in the
+courtyard (and she was a rather frequent visitor) it seemed I was
+aware of it.  She had an air of angelic candour, yet of a high
+spirit; she stepped like a Diana, every movement was noble and
+free.  One day there was a strong east wind; the banner was
+straining at the flagstaff; below us the smoke of the city chimneys
+blew hither and thither in a thousand crazy variations; and away
+out on the Forth we could see the ships lying down to it and
+scudding.  I was thinking what a vile day it was, when she
+appeared.  Her hair blew in the wind with changes of colour; her
+garments moulded her with the accuracy of sculpture; the ends of
+her shawl fluttered about her ear and were caught in again with an
+inimitable deftness.  You have seen a pool on a gusty day, how it
+suddenly sparkles and flashes like a thing alive?  So this lady's
+face had become animated and coloured; and as I saw her standing,
+somewhat inclined, her lips parted, a divine trouble in her eyes, I
+could have clapped my hands in applause, and was ready to acclaim
+her a genuine daughter of the winds.  What put it in my head, I
+know not:  perhaps because it was a Thursday and I was new from the
+razor; but I determined to engage her attention no later than that
+day.  She was approaching that part of the court in which I sat
+with my merchandise, when I observed her handkerchief to escape
+from her hands and fall to the ground; the next moment the wind had
+taken it up and carried it within my reach.  I was on foot at once:
+I had forgot my mustard-coloured clothes, I had forgot the private
+soldier and his salute.  Bowing deeply, I offered her the slip of
+cambric.
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'your handkerchief.  The wind brought it me.'
+
+I met her eyes fully.
+
+'I thank you, sir,' said she.
+
+'The wind brought it me,' I repeated.  'May I not take it for an
+omen?  You have an English proverb, "It's an ill wind that blows
+nobody good."'
+
+'Well,' she said, with a smile, '"One good turn deserves another."
+I will see what you have.'
+
+She followed me to where my wares were spread out under lee of a
+piece of cannon.
+
+'Alas, mademoiselle!' said I, 'I am no very perfect craftsman.
+This is supposed to be a house, and you see the chimneys are awry.
+You may call this a box if you are very indulgent; but see where my
+tool slipped!  Yes, I am afraid you may go from one to another, and
+find a flaw in everything.  Failures for Sale should be on my
+signboard.  I do not keep a shop; I keep a Humorous Museum.'  I
+cast a smiling glance about my display, and then at her, and
+instantly became grave.  'Strange, is it not,' I added, 'that a
+grown man and a soldier should be engaged upon such trash, and a
+sad heart produce anything so funny to look at?'
+
+An unpleasant voice summoned her at this moment by the name of
+Flora, and she made a hasty purchase and rejoined her party.
+
+A few days after she came again.  But I must first tell you how she
+came to be so frequent.  Her aunt was one of those terrible British
+old maids, of which the world has heard much; and having nothing
+whatever to do, and a word or two of French, she had taken what she
+called an INTEREST IN THE FRENCH PRISONERS.  A big, bustling, bold
+old lady, she flounced about our market-place with insufferable
+airs of patronage and condescension.  She bought, indeed, with
+liberality, but her manner of studying us through a quizzing-glass,
+and playing cicerone to her followers, acquitted us of any
+gratitude.  She had a tail behind her of heavy, obsequious old
+gentlemen, or dull, giggling misses, to whom she appeared to be an
+oracle.  'This one can really carve prettily:  is he not a quiz
+with his big whiskers?' she would say.  'And this one,' indicating
+myself with her gold eye-glass, 'is, I assure you, quite an
+oddity.'  The oddity, you may be certain, ground his teeth.  She
+had a way of standing in our midst, nodding around, and addressing
+us in what she imagined to be French:  'Bienne, hommes! ca va
+bienne?'  I took the freedom to reply in the same lingo:  Bienne,
+femme! ca va couci-couci tout d'meme, la bourgeoise!'  And at that,
+when we had all laughed with a little more heartiness than was
+entirely civil, 'I told you he was quite an oddity!' says she in
+triumph.  Needless to say, these passages were before I had
+remarked the niece.
+
+The aunt came on the day in question with a following rather more
+than usually large, which she manoeuvred to and fro about the
+market and lectured to at rather more than usual length, and with
+rather less than her accustomed tact.  I kept my eyes down, but
+they were ever fixed in the same direction, quite in vain.  The
+aunt came and went, and pulled us out, and showed us off, like
+caged monkeys; but the niece kept herself on the outskirts of the
+crowd and on the opposite side of the courtyard, and departed at
+last as she had come, without a sign.  Closely as I had watched
+her, I could not say her eyes had ever rested on me for an instant;
+and my heart was overwhelmed with bitterness and blackness.  I tore
+out her detested image; I felt I was done with her for ever; I
+laughed at myself savagely, because I had thought to please; when I
+lay down at night sleep forsook me, and I lay, and rolled, and
+gloated on her charms, and cursed her insensibility, for half the
+night.  How trivial I thought her! and how trivial her sex!  A man
+might be an angel or an Apollo, and a mustard-coloured coat would
+wholly blind them to his merits.  I was a prisoner, a slave, a
+contemned and despicable being, the butt of her sniggering
+countrymen.  I would take the lesson:  no proud daughter of my foes
+should have the chance to mock at me again; none in the future
+should have the chance to think I had looked at her with
+admiration.  You cannot imagine any one of a more resolute and
+independent spirit, or whose bosom was more wholly mailed with
+patriotic arrogance, than I.  Before I dropped asleep, I had
+remembered all the infamies of Britain, and debited them in an
+overwhelming column to Flora.
+
+The next day, as I sat in my place, I became conscious there was
+some one standing near; and behold, it was herself!  I kept my
+seat, at first in the confusion of my mind, later on from policy;
+and she stood, and leaned a little over me, as in pity.  She was
+very still and timid; her voice was low.  Did I suffer in my
+captivity? she asked me.  Had I to complain of any hardship?
+
+'Mademoiselle, I have not learned to complain,' said I.  'I am a
+soldier of Napoleon.'
+
+She sighed.  'At least you must regret La France,' said she, and
+coloured a little as she pronounced the words, which she did with a
+pretty strangeness of accent.
+
+'What am I to say?' I replied.  'If you were carried from this
+country, for which you seem so wholly suited, where the very rains
+and winds seem to become you like ornaments, would you regret, do
+you think?  We must surely all regret! the son to his mother, the
+man to his country; these are native feelings.'
+
+'You have a mother?' she asked.
+
+'In heaven, mademoiselle,' I answered.  'She, and my father also,
+went by the same road to heaven as so many others of the fair and
+brave:  they followed their queen upon the scaffold.  So, you see,
+I am not so much to be pitied in my prison,' I continued:  'there
+are none to wait for me; I am alone in the world.  'Tis a different
+case, for instance, with yon poor fellow in the cloth cap.  His bed
+is next to mine, and in the night I hear him sobbing to himself.
+He has a tender character, full of tender and pretty sentiments;
+and in the dark at night, and sometimes by day when he can get me
+apart with him, he laments a mother and a sweetheart.  Do you know
+what made him take me for a confidant?'
+
+She parted her lips with a look, but did not speak.  The look
+burned all through me with a sudden vital heat.
+
+'Because I had once seen, in marching by, the belfry of his
+village!' I continued.  'The circumstance is quaint enough.  It
+seems to bind up into one the whole bundle of those human instincts
+that make life beautiful, and people and places dear--and from
+which it would seem I am cut off!'
+
+I rested my chin on my knee and looked before me on the ground.  I
+had been talking until then to hold her; but I was now not sorry
+she should go:  an impression is a thing so delicate to produce and
+so easy to overthrow!  Presently she seemed to make an effort.
+
+'I will take this toy,' she said, laid a five-and-sixpenny piece in
+my hand, and was gone ere I could thank her.
+
+I retired to a place apart near the ramparts and behind a gun.  The
+beauty, the expression of her eyes, the tear that had trembled
+there, the compassion in her voice, and a kind of wild elegance
+that consecrated the freedom of her movements, all combined to
+enslave my imagination and inflame my heart.  What had she said?
+Nothing to signify; but her eyes had met mine, and the fire they
+had kindled burned inextinguishably in my veins.  I loved her; and
+I did not fear to hope.  Twice I had spoken with her; and in both
+interviews I had been well inspired, I had engaged her sympathies,
+I had found words that she must remember, that would ring in her
+ears at night upon her bed.  What mattered if I were half shaved
+and my clothes a caricature?  I was still a man, and I had drawn my
+image on her memory.  I was still a man, and, as I trembled to
+realise, she was still a woman.  Many waters cannot quench love;
+and love, which is the law of the world, was on my side.  I closed
+my eyes, and she sprang up on the background of the darkness, more
+beautiful than in life.  'Ah!' thought I, 'and you too, my dear,
+you too must carry away with you a picture, that you are still to
+behold again and still to embellish.  In the darkness of night, in
+the streets by day, still you are to have my voice and face,
+whispering, making love for me, encroaching on your shy heart.  Shy
+as your heart is, IT is lodged there--_I_ am lodged there; let the
+hours do their office--let time continue to draw me ever in more
+lively, ever in more insidious colours.'  And then I had a vision
+of myself, and burst out laughing.
+
+A likely thing, indeed, that a beggar-man, a private soldier, a
+prisoner in a yellow travesty, was to awake the interest of this
+fair girl!  I would not despair; but I saw the game must be played
+fine and close.  It must be my policy to hold myself before her,
+always in a pathetic or pleasing attitude; never to alarm or
+startle her; to keep my own secret locked in my bosom like a story
+of disgrace, and let hers (if she could be induced to have one)
+grow at its own rate; to move just so fast, and not by a hair's-
+breadth any faster, than the inclination of her heart.  I was the
+man, and yet I was passive, tied by the foot in prison.  I could
+not go to her; I must cast a spell upon her at each visit, so that
+she should return to me; and this was a matter of nice management.
+I had done it the last time--it seemed impossible she should not
+come again after our interview; and for the next I had speedily
+ripened a fresh plan.  A prisoner, if he has one great disability
+for a lover, has yet one considerable advantage:  there is nothing
+to distract him, and he can spend all his hours ripening his love
+and preparing its manifestations.  I had been then some days upon a
+piece of carving,--no less than the emblem of Scotland, the Lion
+Rampant.  This I proceeded to finish with what skill I was
+possessed of; and when at last I could do no more to it (and, you
+may be sure, was already regretting I had done so much), added on
+the base the following dedication. -
+
+
+A LA BELLE FLORA
+LE PRISONNIER RECONNAISSANT
+A. D. ST.  Y. D. K.
+
+
+I put my heart into the carving of these letters.  What was done
+with so much ardour, it seemed scarce possible that any should
+behold with indifference; and the initials would at least suggest
+to her my noble birth.  I thought it better to suggest:  I felt
+that mystery was my stock-in-trade; the contrast between my rank
+and manners, between my speech and my clothing, and the fact that
+she could only think of me by a combination of letters, must all
+tend to increase her interest and engage her heart.
+
+This done, there was nothing left for me but to wait and to hope.
+And there is nothing further from my character:  in love and in
+war, I am all for the forward movement; and these days of waiting
+made my purgatory.  It is a fact that I loved her a great deal
+better at the end of them, for love comes, like bread, from a
+perpetual rehandling.  And besides, I was fallen into a panic of
+fear.  How, if she came no more, how was I to continue to endure my
+empty days? how was I to fall back and find my interest in the
+major's lessons, the lieutenant's chess, in a twopenny sale in the
+market, or a halfpenny addition to the prison fare?
+
+Days went by, and weeks; I had not the courage to calculate, and
+to-day I have not the courage to remember; but at last she was
+there.  At last I saw her approach me in the company of a boy about
+her own age, and whom I divined at once to be her brother.
+
+I rose and bowed in silence.
+
+'This is my brother, Mr. Ronald Gilchrist,' said she.  'I have told
+him of your sufferings.  He is so sorry for you!'
+
+'It is more than I have the right to ask,' I replied; 'but among
+gentlefolk these generous sentiments are natural.  If your brother
+and I were to meet in the field, we should meet like tigers; but
+when he sees me here disarmed and helpless, he forgets his
+animosity.'  (At which, as I had ventured to expect, this beardless
+champion coloured to the ears for pleasure.)  'Ah, my dear young
+lady,' I continued, 'there are many of your countrymen languishing
+in my country, even as I do here.  I can but hope there is found
+some French lady to convey to each of them the priceless
+consolation of her sympathy.  You have given me alms; and more than
+alms--hope; and while you were absent I was not forgetful.  Suffer
+me to be able to tell myself that I have at least tried to make a
+return; and for the prisoner's sake deign to accept this trifle.'
+
+So saying, I offered her my lion, which she took, looked at in some
+embarrassment, and then, catching sight of the dedication, broke
+out with a cry.
+
+'Why, how did you know my name?' she exclaimed.
+
+'When names are so appropriate, they should be easily guessed,'
+said I, bowing.  'But indeed, there was no magic in the matter.  A
+lady called you by name on the day I found your handkerchief, and I
+was quick to remark and cherish it.'
+
+'It is very, very beautiful,' said she, 'and I shall be always
+proud of the inscription.--Come, Ronald, we must be going.'  She
+bowed to me as a lady bows to her equal, and passed on (I could
+have sworn) with a heightened colour.
+
+I was overjoyed:  my innocent ruse had succeeded; she had taken my
+gift without a hint of payment, and she would scarce sleep in peace
+till she had made it up to me.  No greenhorn in matters of the
+heart, I was besides aware that I had now a resident ambassador at
+the court of my lady.  The lion might be ill chiselled; it was
+mine.  My hands had made and held it; my knife--or, to speak more
+by the mark, my rusty nail--had traced those letters; and simple as
+the words were, they would keep repeating to her that I was
+grateful and that I found her fair.  The boy had looked like a
+gawky, and blushed at a compliment; I could see besides that he
+regarded me with considerable suspicion; yet he made so manly a
+figure of a lad, that I could not withhold from him my sympathy.
+And as for the impulse that had made her bring and introduce him, I
+could not sufficiently admire it.  It seemed to me finer than wit,
+and more tender than a caress.  It said (plain as language), 'I do
+not and I cannot know you.  Here is my brother--you can know him;
+this is the way to me--follow it.'
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--A TALE OF A PAIR OF SCISSORS
+
+
+
+I was still plunged in these thoughts when the bell was rung that
+discharged our visitors into the street.  Our little market was no
+sooner closed than we were summoned to the distribution, and
+received our rations, which we were then allowed to eat according
+to fancy in any part of our quarters.
+
+I have said the conduct of some of our visitors was unbearably
+offensive; it was possibly more so than they dreamed--as the sight-
+seers at a menagerie may offend in a thousand ways, and quite
+without meaning it, the noble and unfortunate animals behind the
+bars; and there is no doubt but some of my compatriots were
+susceptible beyond reason.  Some of these old whiskerandos,
+originally peasants, trained since boyhood in victorious armies,
+and accustomed to move among subject and trembling populations,
+could ill brook their change of circumstance.  There was one man of
+the name of Goguelat, a brute of the first water, who had enjoyed
+no touch of civilisation beyond the military discipline, and had
+risen by an extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which he was
+otherwise unfitted--that of marechal des logis in the 22nd of the
+line.  In so far as a brute can be a good soldier, he was a good
+soldier; the Cross was on his breast, and gallantly earned; but in
+all things outside his line of duty the man was no other than a
+brawling, bruising ignorant pillar of low pothouses.  As a
+gentleman by birth, and a scholar by taste and education, I was the
+type of all that he least understood and most detested; and the
+mere view of our visitors would leave him daily in a transport of
+annoyance, which he would make haste to wreak on the nearest
+victim, and too often on myself.
+
+It was so now.  Our rations were scarce served out, and I had just
+withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived him drawing
+near.  He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of young fools, among
+whom he passed for a wit, followed him with looks of expectation;
+and I saw I was about to be the object of some of his insufferable
+pleasantries.  He took a place beside me, spread out his rations,
+drank to me derisively from his measure of prison beer, and began.
+What he said it would be impossible to print; but his admirers, who
+believed their wit to have surpassed himself, actually rolled among
+the gravel.  For my part, I thought at first I should have died.  I
+had not dreamed the wretch was so observant; but hate sharpens the
+ears, and he had counted our interviews and actually knew Flora by
+her name.  Gradually my coolness returned to me, accompanied by a
+volume of living anger that surprised myself.
+
+'Are you nearly done?' I asked.  'Because if you are, I am about to
+say a word or two myself.'
+
+'Oh, fair play!' said he.  'Turn about!  The Marquis of Carabas to
+the tribune.'
+
+'Very well,' said I.  'I have to inform you that I am a gentleman.
+You do not know what that means, hey?  Well, I will tell you.  It
+is a comical sort of animal; springs from another strange set of
+creatures they call ancestors; and, in common with toads and other
+vermin, has a thing that he calls feelings.  The lion is a
+gentleman; he will not touch carrion.  I am a gentleman, and I
+cannot bear to soil my fingers with such a lump of dirt.  Sit
+still, Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not say a word, or I
+shall know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are upon us.
+Here is your health!' said I, and pledged him in the prison beer.
+'You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a young child,' I
+continued, 'who might be your daughter, and who was giving alms to
+me and some others of us mendicants.  If the Emperor'--saluting--
+'if my Emperor could hear you, he would pluck off the Cross from
+your gross body.  I cannot do that; I cannot take away what His
+Majesty has given; but one thing I promise you--I promise you,
+Goguelat, you shall be dead to-night.'
+
+I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought
+there was no end to my forbearance, and he was at first amazed.
+But I have the pleasure to think that some of my expressions had
+pierced through his thick hide; and besides, the brute was truly a
+hero of valour, and loved fighting for itself.  Whatever the cause,
+at least, he had soon pulled himself together, and took the thing
+(to do him justice) handsomely.
+
+'And I promise you, by the devil's horns, that you shall have the
+chance!' said he, and pledged me again; and again I did him
+scrupulous honour.
+
+The news of this defiance spread from prisoner to prisoner with the
+speed of wings; every face was seen to be illuminated like those of
+the spectators at a horse-race; and indeed you must first have
+tasted the active life of a soldier, and then mouldered for a while
+in the tedium of a jail, in order to understand, perhaps even to
+excuse, the delight of our companions.  Goguelat and I slept in the
+same squad, which greatly simplified the business; and a committee
+of honour was accordingly formed of our shed-mates.  They chose for
+president a sergeant-major in the 4th Dragoons, a greybeard of the
+army, an excellent military subject, and a good man.  He took the
+most serious view of his functions, visited us both, and reported
+our replies to the committee.  Mine was of a decent firmness.  I
+told him the young lady of whom Goguelat had spoken had on several
+occasions given me alms.  I reminded him that, if we were now
+reduced to hold out our hands and sell pill-boxes for charity, it
+was something very new for soldiers of the Empire.  We had all seen
+bandits standing at a corner of a wood truckling for copper
+halfpence, and after their benefactors were gone spitting out
+injuries and curses.  'But,' said I, 'I trust that none of us will
+fall so low.  As a Frenchman and a soldier, I owe that young child
+gratitude, and am bound to protect her character, and to support
+that of the army.  You are my elder and my superior:  tell me if I
+am not right.'
+
+He was a quiet-mannered old fellow, and patted me with three
+fingers on the back.  'C'est bien, mon enfant,' says he, and
+returned to his committee.
+
+Goguelat was no more accommodating than myself.  'I do not like
+apologies nor those that make them,' was his only answer.  And
+there remained nothing but to arrange the details of the meeting.
+So far as regards place and time we had no choice; we must settle
+the dispute at night, in the dark, after a round had passed by, and
+in the open middle of the shed under which we slept.  The question
+of arms was more obscure.  We had a good many tools, indeed, which
+we employed in the manufacture of our toys; but they were none of
+them suited for a single combat between civilised men, and, being
+nondescript, it was found extremely hard to equalise the chances of
+the combatants.  At length a pair of scissors was unscrewed; and a
+couple of tough wands being found in a corner of the courtyard, one
+blade of the scissors was lashed solidly to each with resined
+twine--the twine coming I know not whence, but the resin from the
+green pillars of the shed, which still sweated from the axe.  It
+was a strange thing to feel in one's hand this weapon, which was no
+heavier than a riding-rod, and which it was difficult to suppose
+would prove more dangerous.  A general oath was administered and
+taken, that no one should interfere in the duel nor (suppose it to
+result seriously) betray the name of the survivor.  And with that,
+all being then ready, we composed ourselves to await the moment.
+
+The evening fell cloudy; not a star was to be seen when the first
+round of the night passed through our shed and wound off along the
+ramparts; and as we took our places, we could still hear, over the
+murmurs of the surrounding city, the sentries challenging its
+further passage.  Leclos, the sergeant-major, set us in our
+stations, engaged our wands, and left us.  To avoid blood-stained
+clothing, my adversary and I had stripped to the shoes; and the
+chill of the night enveloped our bodies like a wet sheet.  The man
+was better at fencing than myself; he was vastly taller than I,
+being of a stature almost gigantic, and proportionately strong.  In
+the inky blackness of the shed, it was impossible to see his eyes;
+and from the suppleness of the wands, I did not like to trust to a
+parade.  I made up my mind accordingly to profit, if I might, by my
+defect; and as soon as the signal should be given, to throw myself
+down and lunge at the same moment.  It was to play my life upon one
+card:  should I not mortally wound him, no defence would be left
+me; what was yet more appalling, I thus ran the risk of bringing my
+own face against his scissor with the double force of our assaults,
+and my face and eyes are not that part of me that I would the most
+readily expose.
+
+'Allez!' said the sergeant-major.
+
+Both lunged in the same moment with an equal fury, and but for my
+manoeuvre both had certainly been spitted.  As it was, he did no
+more than strike my shoulder, while my scissor plunged below the
+girdle into a mortal part; and that great bulk of a man, falling
+from his whole height, knocked me immediately senseless.
+
+When I came to myself I was laid in my own sleeping-place, and
+could make out in the darkness the outline of perhaps a dozen heads
+crowded around me.  I sat up.  'What is it?' I exclaimed.
+
+'Hush!' said the sergeant-major.  'Blessed be God, all is well.'  I
+felt him clasp my hand, and there were tears in his voice.  ''Tis
+but a scratch, my child; here is papa, who is taking good care of
+you.  Your shoulder is bound up; we have dressed you in your
+clothes again, and it will all be well.'
+
+At this I began to remember.  'And Goguelat?' I gasped.
+
+'He cannot bear to be moved; he has his bellyful; 'tis a bad
+business,' said the sergeant-major.
+
+The idea of having killed a man with such an instrument as half a
+pair of scissors seemed to turn my stomach.  I am sure I might have
+killed a dozen with a firelock, a sabre, a bayonet, or any accepted
+weapon, and been visited by no such sickness of remorse.  And to
+this feeling every unusual circumstance of our rencounter, the
+darkness in which we had fought, our nakedness, even the resin on
+the twine, appeared to contribute.  I ran to my fallen adversary,
+kneeled by him, and could only sob his name.
+
+He bade me compose myself.  'You have given me the key of the
+fields, comrade,' said he.  'Sans rancune!'
+
+At this my horror redoubled.  Here had we two expatriated Frenchmen
+engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of beasts.
+Here was he, who had been all his life so great a ruffian, dying in
+a foreign land of this ignoble injury, and meeting death with
+something of the spirit of a Bayard.  I insisted that the guards
+should be summoned and a doctor brought.  'It may still be possible
+to save him,' I cried.
+
+The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement.  'If you had been
+wounded,' said he, 'you must have lain there till the patrol came
+by and found you.  It happens to be Goguelat--and so must he!
+Come, child, time to go to by-by.'  And as I still resisted,
+'Champdivers!' he said, 'this is weakness.  You pain me.'
+
+'Ay, off to your beds with you!' said Goguelat, and named us in a
+company with one of his jovial gross epithets.
+
+Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what they
+certainly were far from experiencing, sleep.  It was not yet late.
+The city, from far below, and all around us, sent up a sound of
+wheels and feet and lively voices.  Yet awhile, and the curtain of
+the cloud was rent across, and in the space of sky between the
+eaves of the shed and the irregular outline of the ramparts a
+multitude of stars appeared.  Meantime, in the midst of us lay
+Goguelat, and could not always withhold himself from groaning.
+
+We heard the round far off; heard it draw slowly nearer.  Last of
+all, it turned the corner and moved into our field of vision:  two
+file of men and a corporal with a lantern, which he swung to and
+fro, so as to cast its light in the recesses of the yards and
+sheds.
+
+'Hullo!' cried the corporal, pausing as he came by Goguelat.
+
+He stooped with his lantern.  All our hearts were flying.
+
+'What devil's work is this?' he cried, and with a startling voice
+summoned the guard.
+
+We were all afoot upon the instant; more lanterns and soldiers
+crowded in front of the shed; an officer elbowed his way in.  In
+the midst was the big naked body, soiled with blood.  Some one had
+covered him with his blanket; but as he lay there in agony, he had
+partly thrown it off.
+
+'This is murder!' cried the officer.  'You wild beasts, you will
+hear of this to-morrow.'
+
+As Goguelat was raised and laid upon a stretcher, he cried to us a
+cheerful and blasphemous farewell.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--MAJOR CHEVENIX COMES INTO THE STORY, AND GOGUELAT GOES
+OUT
+
+
+
+There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost in
+getting the man's deposition.  He gave but the one account of it:
+that he had committed suicide because he was sick of seeing so many
+Englishmen.  The doctor vowed it was impossible, the nature and
+direction of the wound forbidding it.  Goguelat replied that he was
+more ingenious than the other thought for, and had propped up the
+weapon in the ground and fallen on the point--'just like
+Nebuchadnezzar,' he added, winking to the assistants.  The doctor,
+who was a little, spruce, ruddy man of an impatient temper, pished
+and pshawed and swore over his patient.  'Nothing to be made of
+him!' he cried.  'A perfect heathen.  If we could only find the
+weapon!'  But the weapon had ceased to exist.  A little resined
+twine was perhaps blowing about in the castle gutters; some bits of
+broken stick may have trailed in corners; and behold, in the
+pleasant air of the morning, a dandy prisoner trimming his nails
+with a pair of scissors!
+
+Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the authorities
+did not leave the rest of us in peace.  No stone was left unturned.
+We were had in again and again to be examined, now singly, now in
+twos and threes.  We were threatened with all sorts of impossible
+severities and tempted with all manner of improbable rewards.  I
+suppose I was five times interrogated, and came off from each with
+flying colours.  I am like old Souvaroff, I cannot understand a
+soldier being taken aback by any question; he should answer, as he
+marches on the fire, with an instant briskness and gaiety.  I may
+have been short of bread, gold or grace; I was never yet found
+wanting in an answer.  My comrades, if they were not all so ready,
+were none of them less staunch; and I may say here at once that the
+inquiry came to nothing at the time, and the death of Goguelat
+remained a mystery of the prison.  Such were the veterans of
+France!  And yet I should be disingenuous if I did not own this was
+a case apart; in ordinary circumstances, some one might have
+stumbled or been intimidated into an admission; and what bound us
+together with a closeness beyond that of mere comrades was a secret
+to which we were all committed and a design in which all were
+equally engaged.  No need to inquire as to its nature:  there is
+only one desire, and only one kind of design, that blooms in
+prisons.  And the fact that our tunnel was near done supported and
+inspired us.
+
+I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the
+sittings of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no one
+listens to; and yet I was unmasked--I, whom my very adversary
+defended, as good as confessed, as good as told the nature of the
+quarrel, and by so doing prepared for myself in the future a most
+anxious, disagreeable adventure.  It was the third morning after
+the duel, and Goguelat was still in life, when the time came round
+for me to give Major Chevenix a lesson.  I was fond of this
+occupation; not that he paid me much--no more, indeed, than
+eighteenpence a month, the customary figure, being a miser in the
+grain; but because I liked his breakfasts and (to some extent)
+himself.  At least, he was a man of education; and of the others
+with whom I had any opportunity of speech, those that would not
+have held a book upsidedown would have torn the pages out for pipe-
+lights.  For I must repeat again that our body of prisoners was
+exceptional:  there was in Edinburgh Castle none of that
+educational busyness that distinguished some of the other prisons,
+so that men entered them unable to read, and left them fit for high
+employments.  Chevenix was handsome, and surprisingly young to be a
+major:  six feet in his stockings, well set up, with regular
+features and very clear grey eyes.  It was impossible to pick a
+fault in him, and yet the sum-total was displeasing.  Perhaps he
+was too clean; he seemed to bear about with him the smell of soap.
+Cleanliness is good, but I cannot bear a man's nails to seem
+japanned.  And certainly he was too self-possessed and cold.  There
+was none of the fire of youth, none of the swiftness of the
+soldier, in this young officer.  His kindness was cold, and cruel
+cold; his deliberation exasperating.  And perhaps it was from this
+character, which is very much the opposite of my own, that even in
+these days, when he was of service to me, I approached him with
+suspicion and reserve.
+
+I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six
+faults.
+
+'H'm.  Six,' says he, looking at the paper.  'Very annoying!  I can
+never get it right.'
+
+'Oh, but you make excellent progress!' I said.  I would not
+discourage him, you understand, but he was congenitally unable to
+learn French.  Some fire, I think, is needful, and he had quenched
+his fire in soapsuds.
+
+He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and looked
+at me with clear, severe eyes.
+
+'I think we must have a little talk,' said he.
+
+'I am entirely at your disposition,' I replied; but I quaked, for I
+knew what subject to expect.
+
+'You have been some time giving me these lessons,' he went on, 'and
+I am tempted to think rather well of you.  I believe you are a
+gentleman.'
+
+'I have that honour, sir,' said I.
+
+'You have seen me for the same period.  I do not know how I strike
+you; but perhaps you will be prepared to believe that I also am a
+man of honour,' said he.
+
+'I require no assurances; the thing is manifest,' and I bowed.
+
+'Very well, then,' said he.  'What about this Goguelat?'
+
+'You heard me yesterday before the court,' I began.  'I was
+awakened only--'
+
+'Oh yes; I "heard you yesterday before the court," no doubt,' he
+interrupted, 'and I remember perfectly that you were "awakened
+only."  I could repeat the most of it by rote, indeed.  But do you
+suppose that I believed you for a moment?'
+
+'Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it here,' said I.
+
+'I may be wrong--we shall soon see,' says he; 'but my impression is
+that you will not "repeat it here."  My impression is that you have
+come into this room, and that you will tell me something before you
+go out.'
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+'Let me explain,' he continued.  'Your evidence, of course, is
+nonsense.  I put it by, and the court put it by.'
+
+'My compliments and thanks!' said I.
+
+'You MUST know--that's the short and the long,' he proceeded.  'All
+of you in shed B are bound to know.  And I want to ask you where is
+the common-sense of keeping up this farce, and maintaining this
+cock-and-bull story between friends.  Come, come, my good fellow,
+own yourself beaten, and laugh at it yourself.'
+
+'Well, I hear you, go ahead,' said I.  'You put your heart in it.'
+
+He crossed his legs slowly.  'I can very well understand,' he
+began, 'that precautions have had to be taken.  I dare say an oath
+was administered.  I can comprehend that perfectly.'  (He was
+watching me all the time with his cold, bright eyes.)  'And I can
+comprehend that, about an affair of honour, you would be very
+particular to keep it.'
+
+'About an affair of honour?' I repeated, like a man quite puzzled.
+
+'It was not an affair of honour, then?' he asked.
+
+'What was not?  I do not follow,' said I.
+
+He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat awhile silent, and began
+again in the same placid and good-natured voice:  'The court and I
+were at one in setting aside your evidence.  It could not deceive a
+child.  But there was a difference between myself and the other
+officers, because _I_ KNEW MY MAN and they did not.  They saw in
+you a common soldier, and I knew you for a gentleman.  To them your
+evidence was a leash of lies, which they yawned to hear you
+telling.  Now, I was asking myself, how far will a gentleman go?
+Not surely so far as to help hush a murder up?  So that--when I
+heard you tell how you knew nothing of the matter, and were only
+awakened by the corporal, and all the rest of it--I translated your
+statements into something else.  Now, Champdivers,' he cried,
+springing up lively and coming towards me with animation, 'I am
+going to tell you what that was, and you are going to help me to
+see justice done:  how, I don't know, for of course you are under
+oath--but somehow.  Mark what I'm going to say.'
+
+At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder; and
+whether he said anything more or came to a full stop at once, I am
+sure I could not tell you to this day.  For, as the devil would
+have it, the shoulder he laid hold of was the one Goguelat had
+pinked.  The wound was but a scratch; it was healing with the first
+intention; but in the clutch of Major Chevenix it gave me agony.
+My head swam; the sweat poured off my face; I must have grown
+deadly pale.
+
+He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.  'What is
+wrong with you?' said he.
+
+'It is nothing,' said I.  'A qualm.  It has gone by.'
+
+'Are you sure?' said he.  'You are as white as a sheet.'
+
+'Oh no, I assure you!  Nothing whatever.  I am my own man again,' I
+said, though I could scarce command my tongue.
+
+'Well, shall I go on again?' says he.  'Can you follow me?'
+
+'Oh, by all means!' said I, and mopped my streaming face upon my
+sleeve, for you may be sure in those days I had no handkerchief.
+
+'If you are sure you can follow me.  That was a very sudden and
+sharp seizure,' he said doubtfully.  'But if you are sure, all
+right, and here goes.  An affair of honour among you fellows would,
+naturally, be a little difficult to carry out, perhaps it would be
+impossible to have it wholly regular.  And yet a duel might be very
+irregular in form, and, under the peculiar circumstances of the
+case, loyal enough in effect.  Do you take me?  Now, as a gentleman
+and a soldier.'
+
+His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me.  I could bear
+no more, and winced away from him.  'No,' I cried,  'not that.  Do
+not put your hand upon my shoulder.  I cannot bear it.  It is
+rheumatism,' I made haste to add.  'My shoulder is inflamed and
+very painful.'
+
+He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.
+
+'I am sorry about your shoulder,' he said at last.  'Let me send
+for the doctor.'
+
+'Not in the least,' said I.  'It is a trifle.  I am quite used to
+it.  It does not trouble me in the smallest.  At any rate, I don't
+believe in doctors.'
+
+'All right,' said he, and sat and smoked a good while in a silence
+which I would have given anything to break.  'Well,' he began
+presently, 'I believe there is nothing left for me to learn.  I
+presume I may say that I know all.'
+
+'About what?' said I boldly.
+
+'About Goguelat,' said he.
+
+'I beg your pardon.  I cannot conceive,' said I.
+
+'Oh,' says the major, 'the man fell in a duel, and by your hand!  I
+am not an infant.'
+
+'By no means,' said I.  'But you seem to me to be a good deal of a
+theorist.'
+
+'Shall we test it?' he asked.  'The doctor is close by.  If there
+is not an open wound on your shoulder, I am wrong.  If there is--'
+He waved his hand.  'But I advise you to think twice.  There is a
+deuce of a nasty drawback to the experiment--that what might have
+remained private between us two becomes public property.'
+
+'Oh, well!' said I, with a laugh, 'anything rather than a doctor!
+I cannot bear the breed.'
+
+His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still far
+from comfortable.
+
+Major Chevenix smoked awhile, looking now at his cigar ash, now at
+me.  'I'm a soldier myself,' he says presently, 'and I've been out
+in my time and hit my man.  I don't want to run any one into a
+corner for an affair that was at all necessary or correct.  At the
+same time, I want to know that much, and I'll take your word of
+honour for it.  Otherwise, I shall be very sorry, but the doctor
+must be called in.'
+
+'I neither admit anything nor deny anything,' I returned.  'But if
+this form of words will suffice you, here is what I say:  I give
+you my parole, as a gentleman and a soldier, there has nothing
+taken place amongst us prisoners that was not honourable as the
+day.'
+
+'All right,' says he.  'That was all I wanted.  You can go now,
+Champdivers.'
+
+And as I was going out he added, with a laugh:  'By the bye, I
+ought to apologise:  I had no idea I was applying the torture!'
+
+The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a piece
+of paper in his hand.  He seemed hot and angry, and had certainly
+no mind to be polite.
+
+'Here!' he cried.  'Which of you fellows knows any English?  Oh!'--
+spying me--'there you are, what's your name!  YOU'LL do.  Tell
+these fellows that the other fellow's dying.  He's booked; no use
+talking; I expect he'll go by evening.  And tell them I don't envy
+the feelings of the fellow who spiked him.  Tell them that first.'
+
+I did so.
+
+'Then you can tell 'em,' he resumed, 'that the fellow, Goggle--
+what's his name?--wants to see some of them before he gets his
+marching orders.  If I got it right, he wants to kiss or embrace
+you, or some sickening stuff.  Got that?  Then here's a list he's
+had written, and you'd better read it out to them--I can't make
+head or tail of your beastly names--and they can answer PRESENT,
+and fall in against that wall.'
+
+It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I read
+the first name on the list.  I had no wish to look again on my own
+handiwork; my flesh recoiled from the idea; and how could I be sure
+what reception he designed to give me?  The cure was in my own
+hand; I could pass that first name over--the doctor would not know-
+-and I might stay away.  But to the subsequent great gladness of my
+heart, I did not dwell for an instant on the thought, walked over
+to the designated wall, faced about, read out the name
+'Champdivers,' and answered myself with the word 'Present.'
+
+There were some half dozen on the list, all told; and as soon as we
+were mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and we
+followed after, like a fatigue party, in single file.  At the door
+he paused, told us 'the fellow' would see each of us alone, and, as
+soon as I had explained that, sent me by myself into the ward.  It
+was a small room, whitewashed; a south window stood open on a vast
+depth of air and a spacious and distant prospect; and from deep
+below, in the Grassmarket the voices of hawkers came up clear and
+far away.  Hard by, on a little bed, lay Goguelat.  The sunburn had
+not yet faded from his face, and the stamp of death was already
+there.  There was something wild and unmannish in his smile, that
+took me by the throat; only death and love know or have ever seen
+it.  And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.
+
+He held out his arms as if to embrace me.  I drew near with
+incredible shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with
+overwhelming disgust.  But he only drew my ear down to his lips.
+
+'Trust me,' he whispered.  'Je suis bon bougre, moi.  I'll take it
+to hell with me, and tell the devil.'
+
+Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities?
+All that he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could
+not clothe it otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce.
+Presently he bade me call the doctor; and when that officer had
+come in, raised a little up in his bed, pointed first to himself
+and then to me, who stood weeping by his side, and several times
+repeated the expression, 'Frinds--frinds--dam frinds.'
+
+To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much affected.  He
+nodded his little bob-wigged head at us, and said repeatedly, 'All
+right, Johnny--me comprong.'
+
+Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I went
+out of the room sobbing like an infant.
+
+How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable fellows
+make the happiest exits!  It is a fate we may well envy them.
+Goguelat was detested in life; in the last three days, by his
+admirable staunchness and consideration, he won every heart; and
+when word went about the prison the same evening that he was no
+more, the voice of conversation became hushed as in a house of
+mourning.
+
+For myself I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what ailed
+me:  when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it; but
+that night I was filled with a gloomy fury of the nerves.  I had
+killed him; he had done his utmost to protect me; I had seen him
+with that awful smile.  And so illogical and useless is this
+sentiment of remorse, that I was ready, at a word or a look, to
+quarrel with somebody else.  I presume the disposition of my mind
+was imprinted on my face; and when, a little after, I overtook,
+saluted and addressed the doctor, he looked on me with
+commiseration and surprise.
+
+I had asked him if it was true.
+
+'Yes,' he said, 'the fellow's gone.'
+
+'Did he suffer much?' I asked.
+
+'Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb,' said he.  He looked on me a
+little, and I saw his hand go to his fob.  'Here, take that! no
+sense in fretting,' he said, and, putting a silver two-penny-bit in
+my hand, he left me.
+
+I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall, for
+it was the man's one act of charity in all my knowledge of him.
+Instead of that, I stood looking at it in my hand and laughed out
+bitterly, as I realised his mistake; then went to the ramparts, and
+flung it far into the air like blood money.  The night was falling;
+through an embrasure and across the gardened valley I saw the
+lamplighters hasting along Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and
+looked on moodily.  As I was so standing a hand was laid upon my
+shoulder, and I turned about.  It was Major Chevenix, dressed for
+the evening, and his neckcloth really admirably folded.  I never
+denied the man could dress.
+
+'Ah!' said he, 'I thought it was you, Champdivers.  So he's gone?'
+
+I nodded.
+
+'Come, come,' said he, 'you must cheer up.  Of course it's very
+distressing, very painful and all that.  But do you know, it ain't
+such a bad thing either for you or me?  What with his death and
+your visit to him I am entirely reassured.'
+
+So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.
+
+'I had rather not discuss it,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said he, 'one word more, and I'll agree to bury the
+subject.  What did you fight about?'
+
+'Oh, what do men ever fight about?' I cried.
+
+'A lady?' said he.
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+'Deuce you did!' said he.  'I should scarce have thought it of
+him.'
+
+And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words.  'He!' I
+cried.  'He never dared to address her--only to look at her and
+vomit his vile insults!  She may have given him sixpence:  if she
+did, it may take him to heaven yet!'
+
+At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a considering
+look, and brought up sharply.
+
+'Well, well,' said he.  'Good night to you, Champdivers.  Come to
+me at breakfast-time to-morrow, and we'll talk of other subjects.'
+
+I fully admit the man's conduct was not bad:  in writing it down so
+long after the events I can even see that it was good.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV--ST. IVES GETS A BUNDLE OF BANK NOTES
+
+
+
+I was surprised one morning, shortly after, to find myself the
+object of marked consideration by a civilian and a stranger.  This
+was a man of the middle age; he had a face of a mulberry colour,
+round black eyes, comical tufted eyebrows, and a protuberant
+forehead; and was dressed in clothes of a Quakerish cut.  In spite
+of his plainness, he had that inscrutable air of a man well-to-do
+in his affairs.  I conceived he had been some while observing me
+from a distance, for a sparrow sat betwixt us quite unalarmed on
+the breech of a piece of cannon.  So soon as our eyes met, he drew
+near and addressed me in the French language, which he spoke with a
+good fluency but an abominable accent.
+
+'I have the pleasure of addressing Monsieur le Vicomte Anne de
+Keroual de Saint-Yves?' said he.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I do not call myself all that; but I have a right
+to, if I chose.  In the meanwhile I call myself plain Champdivers,
+at your disposal.  It was my mother's name, and good to go
+soldiering with.'
+
+'I think not quite,' said he; 'for if I remember rightly, your
+mother also had the particle.  Her name was Florimonde de
+Champdivers.'
+
+'Right again!' said I, 'and I am extremely pleased to meet a
+gentleman so well informed in my quarterings.  Is monsieur Born
+himself?'  This I said with a great air of assumption, partly to
+conceal the degree of curiosity with which my visitor had inspired
+me, and in part because it struck me as highly incongruous and
+comical in my prison garb and on the lips of a private soldier.
+
+He seemed to think so too, for he laughed.
+
+'No, sir,' he returned, speaking this time in English; 'I am not
+"BORN," as you call it, and must content myself with DYING, of
+which I am equally susceptible with the best of you.  My name is
+Mr. Romaine--Daniel Romaine--a solicitor of London City, at your
+service; and, what will perhaps interest you more, I am here at the
+request of your great-uncle, the Count.'
+
+'What!' I cried, 'does M. de Keroual de St.-Yves remember the
+existence of such a person as myself, and will he deign to count
+kinship with a soldier of Napoleon?'
+
+'You speak English well,' observed my visitor.
+
+'It has been a second language to me from a child,' said I.  'I had
+an English nurse; my father spoke English with me; and I was
+finished by a countryman of yours and a dear friend of mine, a Mr.
+Vicary.'
+
+A strong expression of interest came into the lawyer's face.
+
+'What!' he cried, 'you knew poor Vicary?'
+
+'For more than a year,' said I; 'and shared his hiding-place for
+many months.'
+
+'And I was his clerk, and have succeeded him in business,' said he.
+'Excellent man!  It was on the affairs of M. de Keroual that he
+went to that accursed country, from which he was never destined to
+return.  Do you chance to know his end, sir?'
+
+'I am sorry,' said I, 'I do.  He perished miserably at the hands of
+a gang of banditti, such as we call chauffeurs.  In a word, he was
+tortured, and died of it.  See,' I added, kicking off one shoe, for
+I had no stockings; 'I was no more than a child, and see how they
+had begun to treat myself.'
+
+He looked at the mark of my old burn with a certain shrinking.
+'Beastly people!' I heard him mutter to himself.
+
+'The English may say so with a good grace,' I observed politely.
+
+Such speeches were the coin in which I paid my way among this
+credulous race.  Ninety per cent. of our visitors would have
+accepted the remark as natural in itself and creditable to my
+powers of judgment, but it appeared my lawyer was more acute.
+
+'You are not entirely a fool, I perceive,' said he.
+
+'No,' said I; 'not wholly.'
+
+'And yet it is well to beware of the ironical mood,' he continued.
+'It is a dangerous instrument.  Your great-uncle has, I believe,
+practised it very much, until it is now become a problem what he
+means.'
+
+'And that brings me back to what you will admit is a most natural
+inquiry,' said I.  'To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?
+how did you recognise me? and how did you know I was here?'
+
+Carefull separating his coat skirts, the lawyer took a seat beside
+me on the edge of the flags.
+
+'It is rather an odd story,' says he, 'and, with your leave, I'll
+answer the second question first.  It was from a certain
+resemblance you bear to your cousin, M. le Vicomte.'
+
+'I trust, sir, that I resemble him advantageously?' said I.
+
+'I hasten to reassure you,' was the reply:  'you do.  To my eyes,
+M. Alain de St.-Yves has scarce a pleasing exterior.  And yet, when
+I knew you were here, and was actually looking for you--why, the
+likeness helped.  As for how I came to know your whereabouts, by an
+odd enough chance, it is again M. Alain we have to thank.  I should
+tell you, he has for some time made it his business to keep M. de
+Keroual informed of your career; with what purpose I leave you to
+judge.  When he first brought the news of your--that you were
+serving Buonaparte, it seemed it might be the death of the old
+gentleman, so hot was his resentment.  But from one thing to
+another, matters have a little changed.  Or I should rather say,
+not a little.  We learned you were under orders for the Peninsula,
+to fight the English; then that you had been commissioned for a
+piece of bravery, and were again reduced to the ranks.  And from
+one thing to another (as I say), M. de Keroual became used to the
+idea that you were his kinsman and yet served with Buonaparte, and
+filled instead with wonder that he should have another kinsman who
+was so remarkably well informed of events in France.  And it now
+became a very disagreeable question, whether the young gentleman
+was not a spy?  In short, sir, in seeking to disserve you, he had
+accumulated against himself a load of suspicions.'
+
+My visitor now paused, took snuff, and looked at me with an air of
+benevolence.
+
+'Good God, sir!' says I, 'this is a curious story.'
+
+'You will say so before I have done,' said he.  'For there have two
+events followed.  The first of these was an encounter of M. de
+Keroual and M. de Mauseant.'
+
+'I know the man to my cost,' said I:  'it was through him I lost my
+commission.'
+
+'Do you tell me so?' he cried.  'Why, here is news!'
+
+'Oh, I cannot complain!' said I.  'I was in the wrong.  I did it
+with my eyes open.  If a man gets a prisoner to guard and lets him
+go, the least he can expect is to be degraded.'
+
+'You will be paid for it,' said he.  'You did well for yourself and
+better for your king.'
+
+'If I had thought I was injuring my emperor,' said I, 'I would have
+let M. de Mauseant burn in hell ere I had helped him, and be sure
+of that!  I saw in him only a private person in a difficulty:  I
+let him go in private charity; not even to profit myself will I
+suffer it to be misunderstood.'
+
+'Well, well,' said the lawyer, 'no matter now.  This is a foolish
+warmth--a very misplaced enthusiasm, believe me!  The point of the
+story is that M. de Mauseant spoke of you with gratitude, and drew
+your character in such a manner as greatly to affect your uncle's
+views.  Hard upon the back of which, in came your humble servant,
+and laid before him the direct proof of what we had been so long
+suspecting.  There was no dubiety permitted.  M. Alain's expensive
+way of life, his clothes and mistresses, his dicing and racehorses,
+were all explained:  he was in the pay of Buonaparte, a hired spy,
+and a man that held the strings of what I can only call a
+convolution of extremely fishy enterprises.  To do M. de Keroual
+justice, he took it in the best way imaginable, destroyed the
+evidences of the one great-nephew's disgrace--and transferred his
+interest wholly to the other.'
+
+'What am I to understand by that?' said I.
+
+'I will tell you,' says he.  'There is a remarkable inconsistency
+in human nature which gentlemen of my cloth have a great deal of
+occasion to observe.  Selfish persons can live without chick or
+child, they can live without all mankind except perhaps the barber
+and the apothecary; but when it comes to dying, they seem
+physically unable to die without an heir.  You can apply this
+principle for yourself.  Viscount Alain, though he scarce guesses
+it, is no longer in the field.  Remains, Viscount Anne.'
+
+'I see,' said I, 'you give a very unfavourable impression of my
+uncle, the Count.'
+
+'I had not meant it,' said he.  'He has led a loose life--sadly
+loose--but he is a man it is impossible to know and not to admire;
+his courtesy is exquisite.'
+
+'And so you think there is actually a chance for me?' I asked.
+
+'Understand,' said he:  'in saying as much as I have done, I travel
+quite beyond my brief.  I have been clothed with no capacity to
+talk of wills, or heritages, or your cousin.  I was sent here to
+make but the one communication:  that M. de Keroual desires to meet
+his great-nephew.'
+
+'Well,' said I, looking about me on the battlements by which we sat
+surrounded, 'this is a case in which Mahomet must certainly come to
+the mountain.'
+
+'Pardon me,' said Mr. Romaine; 'you know already your uncle is an
+aged man; but I have not yet told you that he is quite broken up,
+and his death shortly looked for.  No, no, there is no doubt about
+it--it is the mountain that must come to Mahomet.'
+
+'From an Englishman, the remark is certainly significant,' said I;
+'but you are of course, and by trade, a keeper of men's secrets,
+and I see you keep that of Cousin Alain, which is not the mark of a
+truculent patriotism, to say the least.'
+
+'I am first of all the lawyer of your family!' says he.
+
+'That being so,' said I, 'I can perhaps stretch a point myself.
+This rock is very high, and it is very steep; a man might come by a
+devil of a fall from almost any part of it, and yet I believe I
+have a pair of wings that might carry me just so far as to the
+bottom.  Once at the bottom I am helpless.'
+
+'And perhaps it is just then that I could step in,' returned the
+lawyer.  'Suppose by some contingency, at which I make no guess,
+and on which I offer no opinion--'
+
+But here I interrupted him.  'One word ere you go further.  I am
+under no parole,' said I.
+
+'I understood so much,' he replied, 'although some of you French
+gentry find their word sit lightly on them.'
+
+'Sir, I am not one of those,' said I.
+
+'To do you plain justice, I do not think you one,' said he.
+'Suppose yourself, then, set free and at the bottom of the rock,'
+he continued, 'although I may not be able to do much, I believe I
+can do something to help you on your road.  In the first place I
+would carry this, whether in an inside pocket or my shoe.'  And he
+passed me a bundle of bank notes.
+
+'No harm in that,' said I, at once concealing them.
+
+'In the second place,' he resumed, 'it is a great way from here to
+where your uncle lives--Amersham Place, not far from Dunstable; you
+have a great part of Britain to get through; and for the first
+stages, I must leave you to your own luck and ingenuity.  I have no
+acquaintance here in Scotland, or at least' (with a grimace) 'no
+dishonest ones.  But further to the south, about Wakefield, I am
+told there is a gentleman called Burchell Fenn, who is not so
+particular as some others, and might be willing to give you a cast
+forward.  In fact, sir, I believe it's the man's trade:  a piece of
+knowledge that burns my mouth.  But that is what you get by
+meddling with rogues; and perhaps the biggest rogue now extant, M.
+de Saint-Yves, is your cousin, M. Alain.'
+
+'If this be a man of my cousin's,' I observed, 'I am perhaps better
+to keep clear of him?'
+
+'It was through some paper of your cousin's that we came across his
+trail,' replied the lawyer.  'But I am inclined to think, so far as
+anything is safe in such a nasty business, you might apply to the
+man Fenn.  You might even, I think, use the Viscount's name; and
+the little trick of family resemblance might come in.  How, for
+instance, if you were to call yourself his brother?'
+
+'It might be done,' said I.  'But look here a moment?  You propose
+to me a very difficult game:  I have apparently a devil of an
+opponent in my cousin; and, being a prisoner of war, I can scarcely
+be said to hold good cards.  For what stakes, then, am I playing?'
+
+'They are very large,' said he.  'Your great-uncle is immensely
+rich--immensely rich.  He was wise in time; he smelt the revolution
+long before; sold all that he could, and had all that was movable
+transported to England through my firm.  There are considerable
+estates in England; Amersham Place itself is very fine; and he has
+much money, wisely invested.  He lives, indeed, like a prince.  And
+of what use is it to him?  He has lost all that was worth living
+for--his family, his country; he has seen his king and queen
+murdered; he has seen all these miseries and infamies,' pursued the
+lawyer, with a rising inflection and a heightening colour; and then
+broke suddenly off,--'In short, sir, he has seen all the advantages
+of that government for which his nephew carries arms, and he has
+the misfortune not to like them.'
+
+'You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must excuse,' said I;
+'yet which of us has the more reason to be bitter?  This man, my
+uncle, M. de Keroual, fled.  My parents, who were less wise
+perhaps, remained.  In the beginning, they were even republicans;
+to the end they could not be persuaded to despair of the people.
+It was a glorious folly, for which, as a son, I reverence them.
+First one and then the other perished.  If I have any mark of a
+gentleman, all who taught me died upon the scaffold, and my last
+school of manners was the prison of the Abbaye.  Do you think you
+can teach bitterness to a man with a history like mine?'
+
+'I have no wish to try,' said he.  'And yet there is one point I
+cannot understand:  I cannot understand that one of your blood and
+experience should serve the Corsican.  I cannot understand it:  it
+seems as though everything generous in you must rise against that--
+domination.'
+
+'And perhaps,' I retorted, 'had your childhood passed among wolves,
+you would have been overjoyed yourself to see the Corsican
+Shepherd.'
+
+'Well, well,' replied Mr. Romaine, 'it may be.  There are things
+that do not bear discussion.'
+
+And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a flight
+of steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V--ST. IVES IS SHOWN A HOUSE
+
+
+
+The lawyer was scarce gone before I remembered many omissions; and
+chief among these, that I had neglected to get Mr. Burchell Fenn's
+address.  Here was an essential point neglected; and I ran to the
+head of the stairs to find myself already too late.  The lawyer was
+beyond my view; in the archway that led downward to the castle
+gate, only the red coat and the bright arms of a sentry glittered
+in the shadow; and I could but return to my place upon the
+ramparts.
+
+I am not very sure that I was properly entitled to this corner.
+But I was a high favourite; not an officer, and scarce a private,
+in the castle would have turned me back, except upon a thing of
+moment; and whenever I desired to be solitary, I was suffered to
+sit here behind my piece of cannon unmolested.  The cliff went down
+before me almost sheer, but mantled with a thicket of climbing
+trees; from farther down, an outwork raised its turret; and across
+the valley I had a view of that long terrace of Princes Street
+which serves as a promenade to the fashionable inhabitants of
+Edinburgh.  A singularity in a military prison, that it should
+command a view on the chief thoroughfare!
+
+It is not necessary that I should trouble you with the train of my
+reflections, which turned upon the interview I had just concluded
+and the hopes that were now opening before me.  What is more
+essential, my eye (even while I thought) kept following the
+movement of the passengers on Princes Street, as they passed
+briskly to and fro--met, greeted, and bowed to each other--or
+entered and left the shops, which are in that quarter, and, for a
+town of the Britannic provinces, particularly fine.  My mind being
+busy upon other things, the course of my eye was the more random;
+and it chanced that I followed, for some time, the advance of a
+young gentleman with a red head and a white great-coat, for whom I
+cared nothing at the moment, and of whom it is probable I shall be
+gathered to my fathers without learning more.  He seemed to have a
+large acquaintance:  his hat was for ever in his hand; and I
+daresay I had already observed him exchanging compliments with half
+a dozen, when he drew up at last before a young man and a young
+lady whose tall persons and gallant carriage I thought I
+recognised.
+
+It was impossible at such a distance that I could be sure, but the
+thought was sufficient, and I craned out of the embrasure to follow
+them as long as possible.  To think that such emotions, that such a
+concussion of the blood, may have been inspired by a chance
+resemblance, and that I may have stood and thrilled there for a
+total stranger!  This distant view, at least, whether of Flora or
+of some one else, changed in a moment the course of my reflections.
+It was all very well, and it was highly needful, I should see my
+uncle; but an uncle, a great-uncle at that, and one whom I had
+never seen, leaves the imagination cold; and if I were to leave the
+castle, I might never again have the opportunity of finding Flora.
+The little impression I had made, even supposing I had made any,
+how soon it would die out! how soon I should sink to be a phantom
+memory, with which (in after days) she might amuse a husband and
+children!  No, the impression must be clenched, the wax impressed
+with the seal, ere I left Edinburgh.  And at this the two interests
+that were now contending in my bosom came together and became one.
+I wished to see Flora again; and I wanted some one to further me in
+my flight and to get me new clothes.  The conclusion was apparent.
+Except for persons in the garrison itself, with whom it was a point
+of honour and military duty to retain me captive, I knew, in the
+whole country of Scotland, these two alone.  If it were to be done
+at all, they must be my helpers.  To tell them of my designed
+escape while I was still in bonds, would be to lay before them a
+most difficult choice.  What they might do in such a case, I could
+not in the least be sure of, for (the same case arising) I was far
+from sure what I should do myself.  It was plain I must escape
+first.  When the harm was done, when I was no more than a poor
+wayside fugitive, I might apply to them with less offence and more
+security.  To this end it became necessary that I should find out
+where they lived and how to reach it; and feeling a strong
+confidence that they would soon return to visit me, I prepared a
+series of baits with which to angle for my information.  It will be
+seen the first was good enough.
+
+Perhaps two days after, Master Ronald put in an appearance by
+himself.  I had no hold upon the boy, and pretermitted my design
+till I should have laid court to him and engaged his interest.  He
+was prodigiously embarrassed, not having previously addressed me
+otherwise than by a bow and blushes; and he advanced to me with an
+air of one stubbornly performing a duty, like a raw soldier under
+fire.  I laid down my carving; greeted him with a good deal of
+formality, such as I thought he would enjoy; and finding him to
+remain silent, branched off into narratives of my campaigns such as
+Goguelat himself might have scrupled to endorse.  He visibly thawed
+and brightened; drew more near to where I sat; forgot his timidity
+so far as to put many questions; and at last, with another blush,
+informed me he was himself expecting a commission.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'they are fine troops, your British troops in the
+Peninsula.  A young gentleman of spirit may well be proud to be
+engaged at the head of such soldiers.'
+
+'I know that,' he said; 'I think of nothing else.  I think shame to
+be dangling here at home and going through with this foolery of
+education, while others, no older than myself, are in the field.'
+
+'I cannot blame you,' said I.  'I have felt the same myself.'
+
+'There are--there are no troops, are there, quite so good as ours?'
+he asked.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'there is a point about them:  they have a defect,-
+-they are not to be trusted in a retreat.  I have seen them behave
+very ill in a retreat.'
+
+'I believe that is our national character,' he said--God forgive
+him!--with an air of pride.
+
+'I have seen your national character running away at least, and had
+the honour to run after it!' rose to my lips, but I was not so ill
+advised as to give it utterance.  Every one should be flattered,
+but boys and women without stint; and I put in the rest of the
+afternoon narrating to him tales of British heroism, for which I
+should not like to engage that they were all true.
+
+'I am quite surprised,' he said at last.  'People tell you the
+French are insincere.  Now, I think your sincerity is beautiful.  I
+think you have a noble character.  I admire you very much.  I am
+very grateful for your kindness to--to one so young,' and he
+offered me his hand.
+
+'I shall see you again soon?' said I.
+
+'Oh, now!  Yes, very soon,' said he.  'I--I wish to tell you.  I
+would not let Flora--Miss Gilchrist, I mean--come to-day.  I wished
+to see more of you myself.  I trust you are not offended:  you
+know, one should be careful about strangers.'
+
+I approved his caution, and he took himself away:  leaving me in a
+mixture of contrarious feelings, part ashamed to have played on one
+so gullible, part raging that I should have burned so much incense
+before the vanity of England; yet, in the bottom of my soul,
+delighted to think I had made a friend--or, at least, begun to make
+a friend--of Flora's brother.
+
+As I had half expected, both made their appearance the next day.  I
+struck so fine a shade betwixt the pride that is allowed to
+soldiers and the sorrowful humility that befits a captive, that I
+declare, as I went to meet them, I might have afforded a subject
+for a painter.  So much was high comedy, I must confess; but so
+soon as my eyes lighted full on her dark face and eloquent eyes,
+the blood leaped into my cheeks--and that was nature!  I thanked
+them, but not the least with exultation; it was my cue to be
+mournful, and to take the pair of them as one.
+
+'I have been thinking,' I said, 'you have been so good to me, both
+of you, stranger and prisoner as I am, that I have been thinking
+how I could testify to my gratitude.  It may seem a strange subject
+for a confidence, but there is actually no one here, even of my
+comrades, that knows me by my name and title.  By these I am called
+plain Champdivers, a name to which I have a right, but not the name
+which I should bear, and which (but a little while ago) I must hide
+like a crime.  Miss Flora, suffer me to present to you the Vicomte
+Anne de Keroual de Saint-Yves, a private soldier.'
+
+'I knew it!' cried the boy; 'I knew he was a noble!'
+
+And I thought the eyes of Miss Flora said the same, but more
+persuasively.  All through this interview she kept them on the
+ground, or only gave them to me for a moment at a time, and with a
+serious sweetness.
+
+'You may conceive, my friends, that this is rather a painful
+confession,' I continued.  'To stand here before you, vanquished, a
+prisoner in a fortress, and take my own name upon my lips, is
+painful to the proud.  And yet I wished that you should know me.
+Long after this, we may yet hear of one another--perhaps Mr.
+Gilchrist and myself in the field and from opposing camps--and it
+would be a pity if we heard and did not recognise.'
+
+They were both moved; and began at once to press upon me offers of
+service, such as to lend me books, get me tobacco if I used it, and
+the like.  This would have been all mighty welcome, before the
+tunnel was ready.  Now it signified no more to me than to offer the
+transition I required.
+
+'My dear friends,' I said--'for you must allow me to call you that,
+who have no others within so many hundred leagues--perhaps you will
+think me fanciful and sentimental; and perhaps indeed I am; but
+there is one service that I would beg of you before all others.
+You see me set here on the top of this rock in the midst of your
+city.  Even with what liberty I have, I have the opportunity to see
+a myriad roofs, and I dare to say, thirty leagues of sea and land.
+All this hostile!  Under all these roofs my enemies dwell; wherever
+I see the smoke of a house rising, I must tell myself that some one
+sits before the chimney and reads with joy of our reverses.  Pardon
+me, dear friends, I know that you must do the same, and I do not
+grudge at it!  With you, it is all different.  Show me your house
+then, were it only the chimney, or, if that be not visible, the
+quarter of the town in which it lies!  So, when I look all about
+me, I shall be able to say:  "THERE IS ONE HOUSE IN WHICH I AM NOT
+QUITE UNKINDLY THOUGHT OF."'
+
+Flora stood a moment.
+
+'It is a pretty thought,' said she, 'and, as far as regards Ronald
+and myself, a true one.  Come, I believe I can show you the very
+smoke out of our chimney.'
+
+So saying, she carried me round the battlements towards the
+opposite or southern side of the fortress, and indeed to a bastion
+almost immediately overlooking the place of our projected flight.
+Thence we had a view of some foreshortened suburbs at our feet, and
+beyond of a green, open, and irregular country rising towards the
+Pentland Hills.  The face of one of these summits (say two leagues
+from where we stood) is marked with a procession of white scars.
+And to this she directed my attention.
+
+'You see these marks?' she said.  'We call them the Seven Sisters.
+Follow a little lower with your eye, and you will see a fold of the
+hill, the tops of some trees, and a tail of smoke out of the midst
+of them.  That is Swanston Cottage, where my brother and I are
+living with my aunt.  If it gives you pleasure to see it, I am
+glad.  We, too, can see the castle from a corner in the garden, and
+we go there in the morning often--do we not, Ronald?--and we think
+of you, M. de Saint-Yves; but I am afraid it does not altogether
+make us glad.'
+
+'Mademoiselle!' said I, and indeed my voice was scarce under
+command, 'if you knew how your generous words--how even the sight
+of you--relieved the horrors of this place, I believe, I hope, I
+know, you would be glad.  I will come here daily and look at that
+dear chimney and these green hills, and bless you from the heart,
+and dedicate to you the prayers of this poor sinner.  Ah!  I do not
+say they can avail!'
+
+'Who can say that, M. de Saint-Yves?' she said softly.  'But I
+think it is time we should be going.'
+
+'High time,' said Ronald, whom (to say the truth) I had a little
+forgotten.
+
+On the way back, as I was laying myself out to recover lost ground
+with the youth, and to obliterate, if possible, the memory of my
+last and somewhat too fervent speech, who should come past us but
+the major?  I had to stand aside and salute as he went by, but his
+eyes appeared entirely occupied with Flora.
+
+'Who is that man?' she asked.
+
+'He is a friend of mine,' said I.  'I give him lessons in French,
+and he has been very kind to me.'
+
+'He stared,' she said,--'I do not say, rudely; but why should he
+stare?'
+
+'If you do not wish to be stared at, mademoiselle, suffer me to
+recommend a veil,' said I.
+
+She looked at me with what seemed anger.  'I tell you the man
+stared,' she said.
+
+And Ronald added.  'Oh, I don't think he meant any harm.  I suppose
+he was just surprised to see us walking about with a pr--with M.
+Saint-Yves.'
+
+But the next morning, when I went to Chevenix's rooms, and after I
+had dutifully corrected his exercise--'I compliment you on your
+taste,' said he to me.
+
+'I beg your pardon?' said I.
+
+'Oh no, I beg yours,' said he.  'You understand me perfectly, just
+as I do you.'
+
+I murmured something about enigmas.
+
+'Well, shall I give you the key to the enigma?' said he, leaning
+back.  'That was the young lady whom Goguelat insulted and whom you
+avenged.  I do not blame you.  She is a heavenly creature.'
+
+'With all my heart, to the last of it!' said I.  'And to the first
+also, if it amuses you!  You are become so very acute of late that
+I suppose you must have your own way.'
+
+'What is her name?' he asked.
+
+'Now, really!' said I.  'Do you think it likely she has told me?'
+
+'I think it certain,' said he.
+
+I could not restrain my laughter.  'Well, then, do you think it
+likely I would tell you?' I cried.
+
+'Not a bit.' said he.  'But come, to our lesson!'
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI--THE ESCAPE
+
+
+
+The time for our escape drew near, and the nearer it came the less
+we seemed to enjoy the prospect.  There is but one side on which
+this castle can be left either with dignity or safety; but as there
+is the main gate and guard, and the chief street of the upper city,
+it is not to be thought of by escaping prisoners.  In all other
+directions an abominable precipice surrounds it, down the face of
+which (if anywhere at all) we must regain our liberty.  By our
+concurrent labours in many a dark night, working with the most
+anxious precautions against noise, we had made out to pierce below
+the curtain about the south-west corner, in a place they call the
+Devil's Elbow.  I have never met that celebrity; nor (if the rest
+of him at all comes up to what they called his elbow) have I the
+least desire of his acquaintance.  From the heel of the masonry,
+the rascally, breakneck precipice descended sheer among waste
+lands, scattered suburbs of the city, and houses in the building.
+I had never the heart to look for any length of time--the thought
+that I must make the descent in person some dark night robbing me
+of breath; and, indeed, on anybody not a seaman or a steeple-jack,
+the mere sight of the Devil's Elbow wrought like an emetic.
+
+I don't know where the rope was got, and doubt if I much cared.  It
+was not that which gravelled me, but whether, now that we had it,
+it would serve our turn.  Its length, indeed, we made a shift to
+fathom out; but who was to tell us how that length compared with
+the way we had to go?  Day after day, there would be always some of
+us stolen out to the Devil's Elbow and making estimates of the
+descent, whether by a bare guess or the dropping of stones.  A
+private of pioneers remembered the formula for that--or else
+remembered part of it and obligingly invented the remainder.  I had
+never any real confidence in that formula; and even had we got it
+from a book, there were difficulties in the way of the application
+that might have daunted Archimedes.  We durst not drop any
+considerable pebble lest the sentinels should hear, and those that
+we dropped we could not hear ourselves.  We had never a watch--or
+none that had a second-hand; and though every one of us could guess
+a second to a nicety, all somehow guessed it differently.  In
+short, if any two set forth upon this enterprise, they invariably
+returned with two opinions, and often with a black eye in the
+bargain.  I looked on upon these proceedings, although not without
+laughter, yet with impatience and disgust.  I am one that cannot
+bear to see things botched or gone upon with ignorance; and the
+thought that some poor devil was to hazard his bones upon such
+premises, revolted me.  Had I guessed the name of that unhappy
+first adventurer, my sentiments might have been livelier still.
+
+The designation of this personage was indeed all that remained for
+us to do; and even in that we had advanced so far that the lot had
+fallen on Shed B.  It had been determined to mingle the bitter and
+the sweet; and whoever went down first, the whole of his shed-mates
+were to follow next in order.  This caused a good deal of joy in
+Shed B, and would have caused more if it had not still remained to
+choose our pioneer.  In view of the ambiguity in which we lay as to
+the length of the rope and the height of the precipice--and that
+this gentleman was to climb down from fifty to seventy fathoms on a
+pitchy night, on a rope entirely free, and with not so much as an
+infant child to steady it at the bottom, a little backwardness was
+perhaps excusable.  But it was, in our case, more than a little.
+The truth is, we were all womanish fellows about a height; and I
+have myself been put, more than once, hors de combat by a less
+affair than the rock of Edinburgh Castle.
+
+We discussed it in the dark and between the passage of the rounds;
+and it was impossible for any body of men to show a less
+adventurous spirit.  I am sure some of us, and myself first among
+the number, regretted Goguelat.  Some were persuaded it was safe,
+and could prove the same by argument; but if they had good reasons
+why some one else should make the trial, they had better still why
+it should not be themselves.  Others, again, condemned the whole
+idea as insane; among these, as ill-luck would have it, a seaman of
+the fleet; who was the most dispiriting of all.  The height, he
+reminded us, was greater than the tallest ship's mast, the rope
+entirely free; and he as good as defied the boldest and strongest
+to succeed.  We were relieved from this dead-lock by our sergeant-
+major of dragoons.
+
+'Comrades,' said he, 'I believe I rank you all; and for that
+reason, if you really wish it, I will be the first myself.  At the
+same time, you are to consider what the chances are that I may
+prove to be the last, as well.  I am no longer young--I was sixty
+near a month ago.  Since I have been a prisoner, I have made for
+myself a little bedaine.  My arms are all gone to fat.  And you
+must promise not to blame me, if I fall and play the devil with the
+whole thing.'
+
+'We cannot hear of such a thing!' said I.  'M. Laclas is the oldest
+man here; and, as such, he should be the very last to offer.  It is
+plain, we must draw lots.'
+
+'No,' said M. Laclas; 'you put something else in my head!  There is
+one here who owes a pretty candle to the others, for they have kept
+his secret.  Besides, the rest of us are only rabble; and he is
+another affair altogether.  Let Champdivers--let the noble go the
+first.'
+
+I confess there was a notable pause before the noble in question
+got his voice.  But there was no room for choice.  I had been so
+ill-advised, when I first joined the regiment, as to take ground on
+my nobility.  I had been often rallied on the matter in the ranks,
+and had passed under the by-names of Monseigneur and the Marquis.
+It was now needful I should justify myself and take a fair revenge.
+
+Any little hesitation I may have felt passed entirely unnoticed,
+from the lucky incident of a round happening at that moment to go
+by.  And during the interval of silence there occurred something
+that sent my blood to the boil.  There was a private in our shed
+called Clausel, a man of a very ugly disposition.  He had made one
+of the followers of Goguelat; but, whereas Goguelat had always a
+kind of monstrous gaiety about him, Clausel was no less morose than
+he was evil-minded.  He was sometimes called the General, and
+sometimes by a name too ill-mannered for repetition.  As we all sat
+listening, this man's hand was laid on my shoulder, and his voice
+whispered in my ear:  'If you don't go, I'll have you hanged,
+Marquis!'
+
+As soon as the round was past--'Certainly, gentlemen!' said I.  'I
+will give you a lead, with all the pleasure in the world.  But,
+first of all, there is a hound here to be punished.  M. Clausel has
+just insulted me, and dishonoured the French army; and I demand
+that he run the gauntlet of this shed.'
+
+There was but one voice asking what he had done, and, as soon as I
+had told them, but one voice agreeing to the punishment.  The
+General was, in consequence, extremely roughly handled, and the
+next day was congratulated by all who saw him on his NEW
+DECORATIONS.  It was lucky for us that he was one of the prime
+movers and believers in our project of escape, or he had certainly
+revenged himself by a denunciation.  As for his feelings towards
+myself, they appeared, by his looks, to surpass humanity; and I
+made up my mind to give him a wide berth in the future.
+
+Had I been to go down that instant, I believe I could have carried
+it well.  But it was already too late--the day was at hand.  The
+rest had still to be summoned.  Nor was this the extent of my
+misfortune; for the next night, and the night after, were adorned
+with a perfect galaxy of stars, and showed every cat that stirred
+in a quarter of a mile.  During this interval, I have to direct
+your sympathies on the Vicomte de Saint-Yves!  All addressed me
+softly, like folk round a sickbed.  Our Italian corporal, who had
+got a dozen of oysters from a fishwife, laid them at my feet, as
+though I were a Pagan idol; and I have never since been wholly at
+my ease in the society of shellfish.  He who was the best of our
+carvers brought me a snuff-box, which he had just completed, and
+which, while it was yet in hand, he had often declared he would not
+part with under fifteen dollars.  I believe the piece was worth the
+money too!  And yet the voice stuck in my throat with which I must
+thank him.  I found myself, in a word, to be fed up like a prisoner
+in a camp of anthropophagi, and honoured like the sacrificial bull.
+And what with these annoyances, and the risky venture immediately
+ahead, I found my part a trying one to play.
+
+It was a good deal of a relief when the third evening closed about
+the castle with volumes of sea-fog.  The lights of Princes Street
+sometimes disappeared, sometimes blinked across at us no brighter
+than the eyes of cats; and five steps from one of the lanterns on
+the ramparts it was already groping dark.  We made haste to lie
+down.  Had our jailers been upon the watch, they must have observed
+our conversation to die out unusually soon.  Yet I doubt if any of
+us slept.  Each lay in his place, tortured at once with the hope of
+liberty and the fear of a hateful death.  The guard call sounded;
+the hum of the town declined by little and little.  On all sides of
+us, in their different quarters, we could hear the watchman cry the
+hours along the street.  Often enough, during my stay in England,
+have I listened to these gruff or broken voices; or perhaps gone to
+my window when I lay sleepless, and watched the old gentleman
+hobble by upon the causeway with his cape and his cap, his hanger
+and his rattle.  It was ever a thought with me how differently that
+cry would re-echo in the chamber of lovers, beside the bed of
+death, or in the condemned cell.  I might be said to hear it that
+night myself in the condemned cell!  At length a fellow with a
+voice like a bull's began to roar out in the opposite thoroughfare:
+
+'Past yin o'cloak, and a dark, haary moarnin'.'
+
+At which we were all silently afoot.
+
+As I stole about the battlements towards the--gallows, I was about
+to write--the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of my resolution,
+kept close by me, and occasionally proffered the most indigestible
+reassurances in my ear.  At last I could bear them no longer.
+
+'Be so obliging as to let me be!' said I.  'I am neither a coward
+nor a fool.  What do YOU know of whether the rope be long enough?
+But I shall know it in ten minutes!'
+
+The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted me.
+
+It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper before a
+friend alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had to go
+handsomely.  It was then my time to come on the stage; and I hope I
+took it handsomely.
+
+'Now, gentlemen,' said I, 'if the rope is ready, here is the
+criminal!'
+
+The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope extended.  As I
+moved forward to the place, many of my comrades caught me by the
+hand and wrung it, an attention I could well have done without.
+
+'Keep an eye on Clausel!' I whispered to Laclas; and with that, got
+down on my elbows and knees took the rope in both hands, and worked
+myself, feet foremost, through the tunnel.  When the earth failed
+under my feet, I thought my heart would have stopped; and a moment
+after I was demeaning myself in mid-air like a drunken jumping-
+jack.  I have never been a model of piety, but at this juncture
+prayers and a cold sweat burst from me simultaneously.
+
+The line was knotted at intervals of eighteen inches; and to the
+inexpert it may seem as if it should have been even easy to
+descend.  The trouble was, this devil of a piece of rope appeared
+to be inspired, not with life alone, but with a personal malignity
+against myself.  It turned to the one side, paused for a moment,
+and then spun me like a toasting-jack to the other; slipped like an
+eel from the clasp of my feet; kept me all the time in the most
+outrageous fury of exertion; and dashed me at intervals against the
+face of the rock.  I had no eyes to see with; and I doubt if there
+was anything to see but darkness.  I must occasionally have caught
+a gasp of breath, but it was quite unconscious.  And the whole
+forces of my mind were so consumed with losing hold and getting it
+again, that I could scarce have told whether I was going up or
+coming down.
+
+Of a sudden I knocked against the cliff with such a thump as almost
+bereft me of my sense; and, as reason twinkled back, I was amazed
+to find that I was in a state of rest, that the face of the
+precipice here inclined outwards at an angle which relieved me
+almost wholly of the burthen of my own weight, and that one of my
+feet was safely planted on a ledge.  I drew one of the sweetest
+breaths in my experience, hugged myself against the rope, and
+closed my eyes in a kind of ecstasy of relief.  It occurred to me
+next to see how far I was advanced on my unlucky journey, a point
+on which I had not a shadow of a guess.  I looked up:  there was
+nothing above me but the blackness of the night and the fog.  I
+craned timidly forward and looked down.  There, upon a floor of
+darkness, I beheld a certain pattern of hazy lights, some of them
+aligned as in thoroughfares, others standing apart as in solitary
+houses; and before I could well realise it, or had in the least
+estimated my distance, a wave of nausea and vertigo warned me to
+lie back and close my eyes.  In this situation I had really but the
+one wish, and that was:  something else to think of!  Strange to
+say, I got it:  a veil was torn from my mind, and I saw what a fool
+I was--what fools we had all been--and that I had no business to be
+thus dangling between earth and heaven by my arms.  The only thing
+to have done was to have attached me to a rope and lowered me, and
+I had never the wit to see it till that moment!
+
+I filled my lungs, got a good hold on my rope, and once more
+launched myself on the descent.  As it chanced, the worst of the
+danger was at an end, and I was so fortunate as to be never again
+exposed to any violent concussion.  Soon after I must have passed
+within a little distance of a bush of wallflower, for the scent of
+it came over me with that impression of reality which characterises
+scents in darkness.  This made me a second landmark, the ledge
+being my first.  I began accordingly to compute intervals of time:
+so much to the ledge, so much again to the wallflower, so much more
+below.  If I were not at the bottom of the rock, I calculated I
+must be near indeed to the end of the rope, and there was no doubt
+that I was not far from the end of my own resources.  I began to be
+light-headed and to be tempted to let go,--now arguing that I was
+certainly arrived within a few feet of the level and could safely
+risk a fall, anon persuaded I was still close at the top and it was
+idle to continue longer on the rock.  In the midst of which I came
+to a bearing on plain ground, and had nearly wept aloud.  My hands
+were as good as flayed, my courage entirely exhausted, and, what
+with the long strain and the sudden relief, my limbs shook under me
+with more than the violence of ague, and I was glad to cling to the
+rope.
+
+But this was no time to give way.  I had (by God's single mercy)
+got myself alive out of that fortress; and now I had to try to get
+the others, my comrades.  There was about a fathom of rope to
+spare; I got it by the end, and searched the whole ground
+thoroughly for anything to make it fast to.  In vain:  the ground
+was broken and stony, but there grew not there so much as a bush of
+furze.
+
+'Now then,' thought I to myself, 'here begins a new lesson, and I
+believe it will prove richer than the first.  I am not strong
+enough to keep this rope extended.  If I do not keep it extended
+the next man will be dashed against the precipice.  There is no
+reason why he should have my extravagant good luck.  I see no
+reason why he should not fall--nor any place for him to fall on but
+my head.'
+
+From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible, as
+the fog lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which gave
+me a measure of the height he had to fall and the horrid force that
+he must strike me with.  What was yet worse, we had agreed to do
+without signals:  every so many minutes by Laclas' watch another
+man was to be started from the battlements.  Now, I had seemed to
+myself to be about half an hour in my descent, and it seemed near
+as long again that I waited, straining on the rope for my next
+comrade to begin.  I began to be afraid that our conspiracy was
+out, that my friends were all secured, and that I should pass the
+remainder of the night, and be discovered in the morning, vainly
+clinging to the rope's end like a hooked fish upon an angle.  I
+could not refrain, at this ridiculous image, from a chuckle of
+laughter.  And the next moment I knew, by the jerking of the rope,
+that my friend had crawled out of the tunnel and was fairly
+launched on his descent.  It appears it was the sailor who had
+insisted on succeeding me:  as soon as my continued silence had
+assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier, for that was his
+name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself so
+extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.  It was like the
+fellow, who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive selfishness.
+But he was like to have paid pretty dearly for the privilege.  Do
+as I would, I could not keep the rope as I could have wished it;
+and he ended at last by falling on me from a height of several
+yards, so that we both rolled together on the ground.  As soon as
+he could breathe he cursed me beyond belief, wept over his finger,
+which he had broken, and cursed me again.  I bade him be still and
+think shame of himself to be so great a cry-baby.  Did he not hear
+the round going by above? I asked; and who could tell but what the
+noise of his fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the
+very moment leaning upon the battlements to listen?
+
+The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the third
+man came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of course,
+child's play; and before there were ten of us collected, it seemed
+to me that, without the least injustice to my comrades, I might
+proceed to take care of myself.
+
+I knew their plan:  they had a map and an almanack, and designed
+for Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.  Suppose them to
+do so, I had no idea they were qualified to manage it after it was
+stolen.  Their whole escape, indeed, was the most haphazard thing
+imaginable; only the impatience of captives and the ignorance of
+private soldiers would have entertained so misbegotten a device;
+and though I played the good comrade and worked with them upon the
+tunnel, but for the lawyer's message I should have let them go
+without me.  Well, now they were beyond my help, as they had always
+been beyond my counselling; and, without word said or leave taken,
+I stole out of the little crowd.  It is true I would rather have
+waited to shake hands with Laclas, but in the last man who had
+descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and since the scene in
+the shed my distrust of Clausel was perfect.  I believed the man to
+be capable of any infamy, and events have since shown that I was
+right.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII--SWANSTON COTTAGE
+
+
+
+I had two views.  The first was, naturally, to get clear of
+Edinburgh Castle and the town, to say nothing of my fellow-
+prisoners; the second to work to the southward so long as it was
+night, and be near Swanston Cottage by morning.  What I should do
+there and then, I had no guess, and did not greatly care, being a
+devotee of a couple of divinities called Chance and Circumstance.
+Prepare, if possible; where it is impossible, work straight
+forward, and keep your eyes open and your tongue oiled.  Wit and a
+good exterior--there is all life in a nutshell.
+
+I had at first a rather chequered journey:  got involved in
+gardens, butted into houses, and had even once the misfortune to
+awake a sleeping family, the father of which, as I suppose, menaced
+me from the window with a blunderbuss.  Altogether, though I had
+been some time gone from my companions, I was still at no great
+distance, when a miserable accident put a period to the escape.  Of
+a sudden the night was divided by a scream.  This was followed by
+the sound of something falling, and that again by the report of a
+musket from the Castle battlements.  It was strange to hear the
+alarm spread through the city.  In the fortress drums were beat and
+a bell rung backward.  On all hands the watchmen sprang their
+rattles.  Even in that limbo or no-man's-land where I was
+wandering, lights were made in the houses; sashes were flung up; I
+could hear neighbouring families converse from window to window,
+and at length I was challenged myself.
+
+'Wha's that?' cried a big voice.
+
+I could see it proceeded from a big man in a big nightcap, leaning
+from a one-pair window; and as I was not yet abreast of his house,
+I judged it was more wise to answer.  This was not the first time I
+had had to stake my fortunes on the goodness of my accent in a
+foreign tongue; and I have always found the moment inspiriting, as
+a gambler should.  Pulling around me a sort of great-coat I had
+made of my blanket, to cover my sulphur-coloured livery,--'A
+friend!' said I.
+
+'What like's all this collieshangie?' said he.
+
+I had never heard of a collieshangie in my days, but with the
+racket all about us in the city, I could have no doubt as to the
+man's meaning.
+
+'I do not know, sir, really,' said I; 'but I suppose some of the
+prisoners will have escaped.'
+
+'Bedamned!' says he.
+
+'Oh, sir, they will be soon taken,' I replied:  'it has been found
+in time.  Good morning, sir!'
+
+'Ye walk late, sir?' he added.
+
+'Oh, surely not,' said I, with a laugh.  'Earlyish, if you like!'
+which brought me finally beyond him, highly pleased with my
+success.
+
+I was now come forth on a good thoroughfare, which led (as well as
+I could judge) in my direction.  It brought me almost immediately
+through a piece of street, whence I could hear close by the
+springing of a watchman's rattle, and where I suppose a sixth part
+of the windows would be open, and the people, in all sorts of night
+gear, talking with a kind of tragic gusto from one to another.
+Here, again, I must run the gauntlet of a half-dozen questions, the
+rattle all the while sounding nearer; but as I was not walking
+inordinately quick, as I spoke like a gentleman, and the lamps were
+too dim to show my dress, I carried it off once more.  One person,
+indeed, inquired where I was off to at that hour.
+
+I replied vaguely and cheerfully, and as I escaped at one end of
+this dangerous pass I could see the watchman's lantern entering by
+the other.  I was now safe on a dark country highway, out of sight
+of lights and out of the fear of watchmen.  And yet I had not gone
+above a hundred yards before a fellow made an ugly rush at me from
+the roadside.  I avoided him with a leap, and stood on guard,
+cursing my empty hands, wondering whether I had to do with an
+officer or a mere footpad, and scarce knowing which to wish.  My
+assailant stood a little; in the thick darkness I could see him bob
+and sidle as though he were feinting at me for an advantageous
+onfall.  Then he spoke.
+
+'My goo' frien',' says he, and at the first word I pricked my ears,
+'my goo' frien', will you oblishe me with lil neshary infamation?
+Whish roa' t' Cramond?'
+
+I laughed out clear and loud, stepped up to the convivialist, took
+him by the shoulders and faced him about.  'My good friend,' said
+I, 'I believe I know what is best for you much better than
+yourself, and may God forgive you the fright you have given me!
+There, get you gone to Edinburgh!'  And I gave a shove, which he
+obeyed with the passive agility of a ball, and disappeared
+incontinently in the darkness down the road by which I had myself
+come.
+
+Once clear of this foolish fellow, I went on again up a gradual
+hill, descended on the other side through the houses of a country
+village, and came at last to the bottom of the main ascent leading
+to the Pentlands and my destination.  I was some way up when the
+fog began to lighten; a little farther, and I stepped by degrees
+into a clear starry night, and saw in front of me, and quite
+distinct, the summits of the Pentlands, and behind, the valley of
+the Forth and the city of my late captivity buried under a lake of
+vapour.  I had but one encounter--that of a farm-cart, which I
+heard, from a great way ahead of me, creaking nearer in the night,
+and which passed me about the point of dawn like a thing seen in a
+dream, with two silent figures in the inside nodding to the horse's
+steps.  I presume they were asleep; by the shawl about her head and
+shoulders, one of them should be a woman.  Soon, by concurrent
+steps, the day began to break and the fog to subside and roll away.
+The east grew luminous and was barred with chilly colours, and the
+Castle on its rock, and the spires and chimneys of the upper town,
+took gradual shape, and arose, like islands, out of the receding
+cloud.  All about me was still and sylvan; the road mounting and
+winding, with nowhere a sign of any passenger, the birds chirping,
+I suppose for warmth, the boughs of the trees knocking together,
+and the red leaves falling in the wind.
+
+It was broad day, but still bitter cold and the sun not up, when I
+came in view of my destination.  A single gable and chimney of the
+cottage peeped over the shoulder of the hill; not far off, and a
+trifle higher on the mountain, a tall old white-washed farmhouse
+stood among the trees, beside a falling brook; beyond were rough
+hills of pasture.  I bethought me that shepherd folk were early
+risers, and if I were once seen skulking in that neighbourhood it
+might prove the ruin of my prospects; took advantage of a line of
+hedge, and worked myself up in its shadow till I was come under the
+garden wall of my friends' house.  The cottage was a little quaint
+place of many rough-cast gables and grey roofs.  It had something
+the air of a rambling infinitesimal cathedral, the body of it
+rising in the midst two storeys high, with a steep-pitched roof,
+and sending out upon all hands (as it were chapter-houses, chapels,
+and transepts) one-storeyed and dwarfish projections.  To add to
+this appearance, it was grotesquely decorated with crockets and
+gargoyles, ravished from some medieval church.  The place seemed
+hidden away, being not only concealed in the trees of the garden,
+but, on the side on which I approached it, buried as high as the
+eaves by the rising of the ground.  About the walls of the garden
+there went a line of well-grown elms and beeches, the first
+entirely bare, the last still pretty well covered with red leaves,
+and the centre was occupied with a thicket of laurel and holly, in
+which I could see arches cut and paths winding.
+
+I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the better.  The
+house appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to wake any one, I had no
+guarantee it might not prove either the aunt with the gold
+eyeglasses (whom I could only remember with trembling), or some ass
+of a servant-maid who should burst out screaming at sight of me.
+Higher up I could hear and see a shepherd shouting to his dogs and
+striding on the rough sides of the mountain, and it was clear I
+must get to cover without loss of time.  No doubt the holly
+thickets would have proved a very suitable retreat, but there was
+mounted on the wall a sort of signboard not uncommon in the country
+of Great Britain, and very damping to the adventurous:  SPRING GUNS
+AND MAN-TRAPS was the legend that it bore.  I have learned since
+that these advertisements, three times out of four, were in the
+nature of Quaker guns on a disarmed battery, but I had not learned
+it then, and even so, the odds would not have been good enough.
+For a choice, I would a hundred times sooner be returned to
+Edinburgh Castle and my corner in the bastion, than to leave my
+foot in a steel trap or have to digest the contents of an automatic
+blunderbuss.  There was but one chance left--that Ronald or Flora
+might be the first to come abroad; and in order to profit by this
+chance if it occurred, I got me on the cope of the wall in a place
+where it was screened by the thick branches of a beech, and sat
+there waiting.
+
+As the day wore on, the sun came very pleasantly out.  I had been
+awake all night, I had undergone the most violent agitations of
+mind and body, and it is not so much to be wondered at, as it was
+exceedingly unwise and foolhardy, that I should have dropped into a
+doze.  From this I awakened to the characteristic sound of digging,
+looked down, and saw immediately below me the back view of a
+gardener in a stable waistcoat.  Now he would appear steadily
+immersed in his business; anon, to my more immediate terror, he
+would straighten his back, stretch his arms, gaze about the
+otherwise deserted garden, and relish a deep pinch of snuff.  It
+was my first thought to drop from the wall upon the other side.  A
+glance sufficed to show me that even the way by which I had come
+was now cut off, and the field behind me already occupied by a
+couple of shepherds' assistants and a score or two of sheep.  I
+have named the talismans on which I habitually depend, but here was
+a conjuncture in which both were wholly useless.  The copestone of
+a wall arrayed with broken bottles is no favourable rostrum; and I
+might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as fascinating as Richelieu, and
+neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads would care a halfpenny.
+In short, there was no escape possible from my absurd position:
+there I must continue to sit until one or other of my neighbours
+should raise his eyes and give the signal for my capture.
+
+The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could be
+scarce less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of the
+beech which made a fashion of sheltering me were already partly
+fallen; and I was thus not only perilously exposed myself, but
+enabled to command some part of the garden walks and (under an
+evergreen arch) the front lawn and windows of the cottage.  For
+long nothing stirred except my friend with the spade; then I heard
+the opening of a sash; and presently after saw Miss Flora appear in
+a morning wrapper and come strolling hitherward between the
+borders, pausing and visiting her flowers--herself as fair.  THERE
+was a friend; HERE, immediately beneath me, an unknown quantity--
+the gardener:  how to communicate with the one and not attract the
+notice of the other?  To make a noise was out of the question; I
+dared scarce to breathe.  I held myself ready to make a gesture as
+soon as she should look, and she looked in every possible direction
+but the one.  She was interested in the vilest tuft of chickweed,
+she gazed at the summit of the mountain, she came even immediately
+below me and conversed on the most fastidious topics with the
+gardener; but to the top of that wall she would not dedicate a
+glance!  At last she began to retrace her steps in the direction of
+the cottage; whereupon, becoming quite desperate, I broke off a
+piece of plaster, took a happy aim, and hit her with it in the nape
+of the neck.  She clapped her hand to the place, turned about,
+looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying me (as indeed I
+was parting the branches to make it the more easy), half uttered
+and half swallowed down again a cry of surprise.
+
+The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.  'What's your
+wull, miss?' said he.
+
+Her readiness amazed me.  She had already turned and was gazing in
+the opposite direction.  'There's a child among the artichokes,'
+she said.
+
+'The Plagues of Egyp'!  I'LL see to them!' cried the gardener
+truculently, and with a hurried waddle disappeared among the
+evergreens.
+
+That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms
+stretched out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with
+heavenly blushes, the next pale as death.  'Monsieur de. Saint-
+Yves!' she said.
+
+'My dear young lady,' I said, 'this is the damnedest liberty--I
+know it!  But what else was I to do?'
+
+'You have escaped?' said she.
+
+'If you call this escape,' I replied.
+
+'But you cannot possibly stop there!' she cried.
+
+'I know it,' said I.  'And where am I to go?'
+
+She struck her hands together.  'I have it!' she exclaimed.  'Come
+down by the beech trunk--you must leave no footprint in the border-
+-quickly, before Robie can get back!  I am the hen-wife here:  I
+keep the key; you must go into the hen-house--for the moment.'
+
+I was by her side at once.  Both cast a hasty glance at the blank
+windows of the cottage and so much as was visible of the garden
+alleys; it seemed there was none to observe us.  She caught me by
+the sleeve and ran.  It was no time for compliments; hurry breathed
+upon our necks; and I ran along with her to the next corner of the
+garden, where a wired court and a board hovel standing in a grove
+of trees advertised my place of refuge.  She thrust me in without a
+word; the bulk of the fowls were at the same time emitted; and I
+found myself the next moment locked in alone with half a dozen
+sitting hens.  In the twilight of the place all fixed their eyes on
+me severely, and seemed to upbraid me with some crying impropriety.
+Doubtless the hen has always a puritanic appearance, although (in
+its own behaviour) I could never observe it to be more particular
+than its neighbours.  But conceive a British hen!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII--THE HEN-HOUSE
+
+
+
+I was half an hour at least in the society of these distressing
+bipeds, and alone with my own reflections and necessities.  I was
+in great pain of my flayed hands, and had nothing to treat them
+with; I was hungry and thirsty, and had nothing to eat or to drink;
+I was thoroughly tired, and there was no place for me to sit.  To
+be sure there was the floor, but nothing could be imagined less
+inviting.
+
+At the sound of approaching footsteps, my good-humour was restored.
+The key rattled in the lock, and Master Ronald entered, closed the
+door behind him, and leaned his back to it.
+
+'I say, you know!' he said, and shook a sullen young head.
+
+'I know it's a liberty,' said I.
+
+'It's infernally awkward:  my position is infernally embarrassing,'
+said he.
+
+'Well,' said I, 'and what do you think of mine?'
+
+This seemed to pose him entirely, and he remained gazing upon me
+with a convincing air of youth and innocence.  I could have
+laughed, but I was not so inhumane.
+
+'I am in your hands,' said I, with a little gesture.  'You must do
+with me what you think right.'
+
+'Ah, yes!' he cried:  'if I knew!'
+
+'You see,' said I, 'it would be different if you had received your
+commission.  Properly speaking, you are not yet a combatant; I have
+ceased to be one; and I think it arguable that we are just in the
+position of one ordinary gentleman to another, where friendship
+usually comes before the law.  Observe, I only say ARGUABLE.  For
+God's sake, don't think I wish to dictate an opinion.  These are
+the sort of nasty little businesses, inseparable from war, which
+every gentleman must decide for himself.  If I were in your place--
+'
+
+'Ay, what would you do, then?' says he.
+
+'Upon my word, I do not know,' said I.  'Hesitate, as you are
+doing, I believe.'
+
+'I will tell you,' he said.  'I have a kinsman, and it is what HE
+would think, that I am thinking.  It is General Graham of Lynedoch-
+-Sir Thomas Graham.  I scarcely know him, but I believe I admire
+him more than I do God.'
+
+'I admire him a good deal myself,' said I, 'and have good reason
+to.  I have fought with him, been beaten, and run away.  Veni,
+victus sum, evasi.'
+
+'What!' he cried.  'You were at Barossa?'
+
+'There and back, which many could not say,' said I.  'It was a
+pretty affair and a hot one, and the Spaniards behaved abominably,
+as they usually did in a pitched field; the Marshal Duke of Belluno
+made a fool of himself, and not for the first time; and your friend
+Sir Thomas had the best of it, so far as there was any best.  He is
+a brave and ready officer.'
+
+'Now, then, you will understand!' said the boy.  'I wish to please
+Sir Thomas:  what would he do?'
+
+'Well, I can tell you a story,' said I, 'a true one too, and about
+this very combat of Chiclana, or Barossa as you call it.  I was in
+the Eighth of the Line; we lost the eagle of the First Battalion,
+more betoken, but it cost you dear.  Well, we had repulsed more
+charges than I care to count, when your 87th Regiment came on at a
+foot's pace, very slow but very steady; in front of them a mounted
+officer, his hat in his hand, white-haired, and talking very
+quietly to the battalions.  Our Major, Vigo-Roussillon, set spurs
+to his horse and galloped out to sabre him, but seeing him an old
+man, very handsome, and as composed as if he were in a coffee-
+house, lost heart and galloped back again.  Only, you see, they had
+been very close together for the moment, and looked each other in
+the eyes.  Soon after the Major was wounded, taken prisoner, and
+carried into Cadiz.  One fine day they announced to him the visit
+of the General, Sir Thomas Graham.  "Well, sir," said the General,
+taking him by the hand, "I think we were face to face upon the
+field."  It was the white-haired officer!'
+
+'Ah!' cried the boy,--his eyes were burning.
+
+'Well, and here is the point,' I continued.  'Sir Thomas fed the
+Major from his own table from that day, and served him with six
+covers.'
+
+'Yes, it is a beautiful--a beautiful story,' said Ronald.  'And yet
+somehow it is not the same--is it?'
+
+'I admit it freely,' said I.
+
+The boy stood awhile brooding.  'Well, I take my risk of it,' he
+cried.  'I believe it's treason to my sovereign--I believe there is
+an infamous punishment for such a crime--and yet I'm hanged if I
+can give you up'
+
+I was as much moved as he.  'I could almost beg you to do
+otherwise,' I said.  'I was a brute to come to you, a brute and a
+coward.  You are a noble enemy; you will make a noble soldier.'
+And with rather a happy idea of a compliment for this warlike
+youth, I stood up straight and gave him the salute.
+
+He was for a moment confused; his face flushed.  'Well, well, I
+must be getting you something to eat, but it will not be for six,'
+he added, with a smile:  'only what we can get smuggled out.  There
+is my aunt in the road, you see,' and he locked me in again with
+the indignant hens.
+
+I always smile when I recall that young fellow; and yet, if the
+reader were to smile also, I should feel ashamed.  If my son shall
+be only like him when he comes to that age, it will be a brave day
+for me and not a bad one for his country.
+
+At the same time I cannot pretend that I was sorry when his sister
+succeeded in his place.  She brought me a few crusts of bread and a
+jug of milk, which she had handsomely laced with whisky after the
+Scottish manner.
+
+'I am so sorry,' she said:  'I dared not bring on anything more.
+We are so small a family, and my aunt keeps such an eye upon the
+servants.  I have put some whisky in the milk--it is more wholesome
+so--and with eggs you will be able to make something of a meal.
+How many eggs will you be wanting to that milk? for I must be
+taking the others to my aunt--that is my excuse for being here.  I
+should think three or four.  Do you know how to beat them? or shall
+I do it?'
+
+Willing to detain her a while longer in the hen-house, I displayed
+my bleeding palms; at which she cried aloud.
+
+'My dear Miss Flora, you cannot make an omelette without breaking
+eggs,' said I; 'and it is no bagatelle to escape from Edinburgh
+Castle.  One of us, I think, was even killed.'
+
+'And you are as white as a rag, too,' she exclaimed, 'and can
+hardly stand!  Here is my shawl, sit down upon it here in the
+corner, and I will beat your eggs.  See, I have brought a fork too;
+I should have been a good person to take care of Jacobites or
+Covenanters in old days!  You shall have more to eat this evening;
+Ronald is to bring it you from town.  We have money enough,
+although no food that we can call our own.  Ah, if Ronald and I
+kept house, you should not be lying in this shed!  He admires you
+so much.'
+
+'My dear friend,' said I, 'for God's sake do not embarrass me with
+more alms.  I loved to receive them from that hand, so long as they
+were needed; but they are so no more, and whatever else I may lack-
+-and I lack everything--it is not money.'  I pulled out my sheaf of
+notes and detached the top one:  it was written for ten pounds, and
+signed by that very famous individual, Abraham Newlands.  'Oblige
+me, as you would like me to oblige your brother if the parts were
+reversed, and take this note for the expenses.  I shall need not
+only food, but clothes.'
+
+'Lay it on the ground,' said she.  'I must not stop my beating.'
+
+'You are not offended?' I exclaimed.
+
+She answered me by a look that was a reward in itself, and seemed
+to imply the most heavenly offers for the future.  There was in it
+a shadow of reproach, and such warmth of communicative cordiality
+as left me speechless.  I watched her instead till her hens' milk
+was ready.
+
+'Now,' said she, 'taste that.'
+
+I did so, and swore it was nectar.  She collected her eggs and
+crouched in front of me to watch me eat.  There was about this tall
+young lady at the moment an air of motherliness delicious to
+behold.  I am like the English general, and to this day I still
+wonder at my moderation.
+
+'What sort of clothes will you be wanting?' said she.
+
+'The clothes of a gentleman,' said I.  'Right or wrong, I think it
+is the part I am best qualified to play.  Mr. St. Ives (for that's
+to be my name upon the journey) I conceive as rather a theatrical
+figure, and his make-up should be to match.'
+
+'And yet there is a difficulty,' said she.  'If you got coarse
+clothes the fit would hardly matter.  But the clothes of a fine
+gentleman--O, it is absolutely necessary that these should fit!
+And above all, with your'--she paused a moment--'to our ideas
+somewhat noticeable manners.'
+
+'Alas for my poor manners!' said I.  'But my dear friend Flora,
+these little noticeabilities are just what mankind has to suffer
+under.  Yourself, you see, you're very noticeable even when you
+come in a crowd to visit poor prisoners in the Castle.'
+
+I was afraid I should frighten my good angel visitant away, and
+without the smallest breath of pause went on to add a few
+directions as to stuffs and colours.
+
+She opened big eyes upon me.  'O, Mr. St. Ives!' she cried--'if
+that is to be your name--I do not say they would not be becoming;
+but for a journey, do you think they would be wise?  I am afraid'--
+she gave a pretty break of laughter--'I am afraid they would be
+daft-like!'
+
+'Well, and am I not daft?' I asked her.
+
+'I do begin to think you are,' said she.
+
+'There it is, then!' said I.  'I have been long enough a figure of
+fun.  Can you not feel with me that perhaps the bitterest thing in
+this captivity has been the clothes?  Make me a captive--bind me
+with chains if you like--but let me be still myself.  You do not
+know what it is to be a walking travesty--among foes,' I added
+bitterly.
+
+'O, but you are too unjust!' she cried.  'You speak as though any
+one ever dreamed of laughing at you.  But no one did.  We were all
+pained to the heart.  Even my aunt--though sometimes I do think she
+was not quite in good taste--you should have seen her and heard her
+at home!  She took so much interest.  Every patch in your clothes
+made us sorry; it should have been a sister's work.'
+
+'That is what I never had--a sister,' said I.  'But since you say
+that I did not make you laugh--'
+
+'O, Mr. St. Ives! never!' she exclaimed.  'Not for one moment.  It
+was all too sad.  To see a gentleman --'
+
+'In the clothes of a harlequin, and begging?' I suggested.
+
+'To see a gentleman in distress, and nobly supporting it,' she
+said.
+
+'And do you not understand, my fair foe,' said I, 'that even if all
+were as you say--even if you had thought my travesty were becoming-
+-I should be only the more anxious, for my sake, for my country's
+sake, and for the sake of your kindness, that you should see him
+whom you have helped as God meant him to be seen? that you should
+have something to remember him by at least more characteristic than
+a misfitting sulphur-yellow suit, and half a week's beard?'
+
+'You think a great deal too much of clothes,' she said.  'I am not
+that kind of girl.'
+
+'And I am afraid I am that kind of man,' said I.  'But do not think
+of me too harshly for that.  I talked just now of something to
+remember by.  I have many of them myself, of these beautiful
+reminders, of these keepsakes, that I cannot be parted from until I
+lose memory and life.  Many of them are great things, many of them
+are high virtues--charity, mercy, faith.  But some of them are
+trivial enough.  Miss Flora, do you remember the day that I first
+saw you, the day of the strong east wind?  Miss Flora, shall I tell
+you what you wore?'
+
+We had both risen to our feet, and she had her hand already on the
+door to go.  Perhaps this attitude emboldened me to profit by the
+last seconds of our interview; and it certainly rendered her escape
+the more easy.
+
+'O, you are too romantic!' she said, laughing; and with that my sun
+was blown out, my enchantress had fled away, and I was again left
+alone in the twilight with the lady hens.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX--THREE IS COMPANY, AND FOUR NONE
+
+
+
+The rest of the day I slept in the corner of the hen-house upon
+Flora's shawl.  Nor did I awake until a light shone suddenly in my
+eyes, and starting up with a gasp (for, indeed, at the moment I
+dreamed I was still swinging from the Castle battlements) I found
+Ronald bending over me with a lantern.  It appeared it was past
+midnight, that I had slept about sixteen hours, and that Flora had
+returned her poultry to the shed and I had heard her not.  I could
+not but wonder if she had stooped to look at me as I slept.  The
+puritan hens now slept irremediably; and being cheered with the
+promise of supper I wished them an ironical good-night, and was
+lighted across the garden and noiselessly admitted to a bedroom on
+the ground floor of the cottage.  There I found soap, water,
+razors--offered me diffidently by my beardless host--and an outfit
+of new clothes.  To be shaved again without depending on the barber
+of the gaol was a source of a delicious, if a childish joy.  My
+hair was sadly too long, but I was none so unwise as to make an
+attempt on it myself.  And, indeed, I thought it did not wholly
+misbecome me as it was, being by nature curly.  The clothes were
+about as good as I expected.  The waistcoat was of toilenet, a
+pretty piece, the trousers of fine kerseymere, and the coat sat
+extraordinarily well.  Altogether, when I beheld this changeling in
+the glass, I kissed my hand to him.
+
+'My dear fellow,' said I, 'have you no scent?'
+
+'Good God, no!' cried Ronald.  'What do you want with scent?'
+
+'Capital thing on a campaign,' said I.  'But I can do without.'
+
+I was now led, with the same precautions against noise, into the
+little bow-windowed dining-room of the cottage.  The shutters were
+up, the lamp guiltily turned low; the beautiful Flora greeted me in
+a whisper; and when I was set down to table, the pair proceeded to
+help me with precautions that might have seemed excessive in the
+Ear of Dionysius.
+
+'She sleeps up there,' observed the boy, pointing to the ceiling;
+and the knowledge that I was so imminently near to the resting-
+place of that gold eyeglass touched even myself with some
+uneasiness.
+
+Our excellent youth had imported from the city a meat pie, and I
+was glad to find it flanked with a decanter of really admirable
+wine of Oporto.  While I ate, Ronald entertained me with the news
+of the city, which had naturally rung all day with our escape:
+troops and mounted messengers had followed each other forth at all
+hours and in all directions; but according to the last intelligence
+no recapture had been made.  Opinion in town was very favourable to
+us:  our courage was applauded, and many professed regret that our
+ultimate chance of escape should be so small.  The man who had
+fallen was one Sombref, a peasant; he was one who slept in a
+different part of the Castle; and I was thus assured that the whole
+of my former companions had attained their liberty, and Shed A was
+untenanted.
+
+From this we wandered insensibly into other topics.  It is
+impossible to exaggerate the pleasure I took to be thus sitting at
+the same table with Flora, in the clothes of a gentleman, at
+liberty and in the full possession of my spirits and resources; of
+all of which I had need, because it was necessary that I should
+support at the same time two opposite characters, and at once play
+the cavalier and lively soldier for the eyes of Ronald, and to the
+ears of Flora maintain the same profound and sentimental note that
+I had already sounded.  Certainly there are days when all goes well
+with a man; when his wit, his digestion, his mistress are in a
+conspiracy to spoil him, and even the weather smiles upon his
+wishes.  I will only say of myself upon that evening that I
+surpassed my expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.
+Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution; until
+at last we were brought back to earth by a catastrophe that might
+very easily have been foreseen, but was not the less astonishing to
+us when it occurred.
+
+I had filled all the glasses.  'I have a toast to propose,' I
+whispered, 'or rather three, but all so inextricably interwoven
+that they will not bear dividing.  I wish first to drink to the
+health of a brave and therefore a generous enemy.  He found me
+disarmed, a fugitive and helpless.  Like the lion, he disdained so
+poor a triumph; and when he might have vindicated an easy valour,
+he preferred to make a friend.  I wish that we should next drink to
+a fairer and a more tender foe.  She found me in prison; she
+cheered me with a priceless sympathy; what she has done since, I
+know she has done in mercy, and I only pray--I dare scarce hope--
+her mercy may prove to have been merciful.  And I wish to conjoin
+with these, for the first, and perhaps the last time, the health--
+and I fear I may already say the memory--of one who has fought, not
+always without success, against the soldiers of your nation; but
+who came here, vanquished already, only to be vanquished again by
+the loyal hand of the one, by the unforgettable eyes of the other.'
+
+It is to be feared I may have lent at times a certain resonancy to
+my voice; it is to be feared that Ronald, who was none the better
+for his own hospitality, may have set down his glass with something
+of a clang.  Whatever may have been the cause, at least, I had
+scarce finished my compliment before we were aware of a thump upon
+the ceiling overhead.  It was to be thought some very solid body
+had descended to the floor from the level (possibly) of a bed.  I
+have never seen consternation painted in more lively colours than
+on the faces of my hosts.  It was proposed to smuggle me forth into
+the garden, or to conceal my form under a horsehair sofa which
+stood against the wall.  For the first expedient, as was now plain
+by the approaching footsteps, there was no longer time; from the
+second I recoiled with indignation.
+
+'My dear creatures,' said I, 'let us die, but do not let us be
+ridiculous.'
+
+The words were still upon my lips when the door opened and my
+friend of the gold eyeglass appeared, a memorable figure, on the
+threshold.  In one hand she bore a bedroom candlestick; in the
+other, with the steadiness of a dragoon, a horse-pistol.  She was
+wound about in shawls which did not wholly conceal the candid
+fabric of her nightdress, and surmounted by a nightcap of
+portentous architecture.  Thus accoutred, she made her entrance;
+laid down the candle and pistol, as no longer called for; looked
+about the room with a silence more eloquent than oaths; and then,
+in a thrilling voice--'To whom have I the pleasure?' she said,
+addressing me with a ghost of a bow.
+
+'Madam, I am charmed, I am sure,' said I.  'The story is a little
+long; and our meeting, however welcome, was for the moment entirely
+unexpected by myself.  I am sure--' but here I found I was quite
+sure of nothing, and tried again.  'I have the honour,' I began,
+and found I had the honour to be only exceedingly confused.  With
+that, I threw myself outright upon her mercy.  'Madam, I must be
+more frank with you,' I resumed.  'You have already proved your
+charity and compassion for the French prisoners, I am one of these;
+and if my appearance be not too much changed, you may even yet
+recognise in me that ODDITY who had the good fortune more than once
+to make you smile.'
+
+Still gazing upon me through her glass, she uttered an
+uncompromising grunt; and then, turning to her niece--'Flora,' said
+she, 'how comes he here?'
+
+The culprits poured out for a while an antiphony of explanations,
+which died out at last in a miserable silence.
+
+'I think at least you might have told your aunt,' she snorted.
+
+'Madam,' I interposed, 'they were about to do so.  It is my fault
+if it be not done already.  But I made it my prayer that your
+slumbers might be respected, and this necessary formula of my
+presentation should be delayed until to-morrow in the morning.'
+
+The old lady regarded me with undissembled incredulity, to which I
+was able to find no better repartee than a profound and I trust
+graceful reverence.
+
+'French prisoners are very well in their place,' she said, 'but I
+cannot see that their place is in my private dining-room.'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'I hope it may be said without offence, but
+(except the Castle of Edinburgh) I cannot think upon the spot from
+which I would so readily be absent.'
+
+At this, to my relief, I thought I could perceive a vestige of a
+smile to steal upon that iron countenance and to be bitten
+immediately in.
+
+'And if it is a fair question, what do they call ye?' she asked.
+
+'At your service, the Vicomte Anne de St.-Yves,' said I.
+
+'Mosha the Viscount,' said she, 'I am afraid you do us plain people
+a great deal too much honour.'
+
+'My dear lady,' said I, 'let us be serious for a moment.  What was
+I to do?  Where was I to go?  And how can you be angry with these
+benevolent children who took pity on one so unfortunate as myself?
+Your humble servant is no such terrific adventurer that you should
+come out against him with horse-pistol and'--smiling--'bedroom
+candlesticks.  It is but a young gentleman in extreme distress,
+hunted upon every side, and asking no more than to escape from his
+pursuers.  I know your character, I read it in your face'--the
+heart trembled in my body as I said these daring words.  'There are
+unhappy English prisoners in France at this day, perhaps at this
+hour.  Perhaps at this hour they kneel as I do; they take the hand
+of her who might conceal and assist them; they press it to their
+lips as I do--'
+
+'Here, here!' cried the old lady, breaking from my solicitations.
+'Behave yourself before folk!  Saw ever anyone the match of that?
+And on earth, my dears, what are we to do with him?'
+
+'Pack him off, my dear lady,' said I:  'pack off the impudent
+fellow double-quick!  And if it may be, and if your good heart
+allows it, help him a little on the way he has to go.'
+
+'What's this pie?' she cried stridently.  'Where is this pie from,
+Flora?'
+
+No answer was vouchsafed by my unfortunate and (I may say) extinct
+accomplices.
+
+'Is that my port?' she pursued.  'Hough!  Will somebody give me a
+glass of my port wine?'
+
+I made haste to serve her.
+
+She looked at me over the rim with an extraordinary expression.  'I
+hope ye liked it?' said she.
+
+'It is even a magnificent wine,' said I.
+
+'Aweel, it was my father laid it down,' said she.  'There were few
+knew more about port wine than my father, God rest him!'  She
+settled herself in a chair with an alarming air of resolution.
+'And so there is some particular direction that you wish to go in?'
+said she.
+
+'O,' said I, following her example, 'I am by no means such a
+vagrant as you suppose.  I have good friends, if I could get to
+them, for which all I want is to be once clear of Scotland; and I
+have money for the road.'  And I produced my bundle.
+
+'English bank-notes?' she said.  'That's not very handy for
+Scotland.  It's been some fool of an Englishman that's given you
+these, I'm thinking.  How much is it?'
+
+'I declare to heaven I never thought to count!' I exclaimed.  'But
+that is soon remedied.'
+
+And I counted out ten notes of ten pound each, all in the name of
+Abraham Newlands, and five bills of country bankers for as many
+guineas.
+
+'One hundred and twenty six pound five,' cried the old lady.  'And
+you carry such a sum about you, and have not so much as counted it!
+If you are not a thief, you must allow you are very thief-like.'
+
+'And yet, madam, the money is legitimately mine,' said I.
+
+She took one of the bills and held it up.  'Is there any
+probability, now, that this could be traced?' she asked.
+
+'None, I should suppose; and if it were, it would be no matter,'
+said I.  'With your usual penetration, you guessed right.  An
+Englishman brought it me.  It reached me, through the hands of his
+English solicitor, from my great-uncle, the Comte de Keroual de
+Saint-Yves, I believe the richest emigre in London.'
+
+'I can do no more than take your word for it,' said she.
+
+'And I trust, madam, not less,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said she, 'at this rate the matter may be feasible.  I will
+cash one of these five-guinea bills, less the exchange, and give
+you silver and Scots notes to bear you as far as the border.
+Beyond that, Mosha the Viscount, you will have to depend upon
+yourself.'
+
+I could not but express a civil hesitation as to whether the amount
+would suffice, in my case, for so long a journey.
+
+'Ay,' said she, 'but you havenae heard me out.  For if you are not
+too fine a gentleman to travel with a pair of drovers, I believe I
+have found the very thing, and the Lord forgive me for a
+treasonable old wife!  There are a couple stopping up by with the
+shepherd-man at the farm; to-morrow they will take the road for
+England, probably by skriegh of day--and in my opinion you had best
+be travelling with the stots,' said she.
+
+'For Heaven's sake do not suppose me to be so effeminate a
+character!' I cried.  'An old soldier of Napoleon is certainly
+beyond suspicion.  But, dear lady, to what end? and how is the
+society of these excellent gentlemen supposed to help me?'
+
+'My dear sir,' said she, 'you do not at all understand your own
+predicament, and must just leave your matters in the hands of those
+who do.  I dare say you have never even heard tell of the drove-
+roads or the drovers; and I am certainly not going to sit up all
+night to explain it to you.  Suffice it, that it is me who is
+arranging this affair--the more shame to me!--and that is the way
+ye have to go.  Ronald,' she continued, 'away up-by to the
+shepherds; rowst them out of their beds, and make it perfectly
+distinct that Sim is not to leave till he has seen me.'
+
+Ronald was nothing loath to escape from his aunt's neighbourhood,
+and left the room and the cottage with a silent expedition that was
+more like flight than mere obedience.  Meanwhile the old lady
+turned to her niece.
+
+'And I would like to know what we are to do with him the night!'
+she cried.
+
+'Ronald and I meant to put him in the hen-house,' said the
+encrimsoned Flora.
+
+'And I can tell you he is to go to no such a place,' replied the
+aunt.  'Hen-house, indeed!  If a guest he is to be, he shall sleep
+in no mortal hen-house.  Your room is the most fit, I think, if he
+will consent to occupy it on so great a suddenty.  And as for you,
+Flora, you shall sleep with me.'
+
+I could not help admiring the prudence and tact of this old
+dowager, and of course it was not for me to make objections.  Ere I
+well knew how, I was alone with a flat candlestick, which is not
+the most sympathetic of companions, and stood studying the snuff in
+a frame of mind between triumph and chagrin.  All had gone well
+with my flight:  the masterful lady who had arrogated to herself
+the arrangement of the details gave me every confidence; and I saw
+myself already arriving at my uncle's door.  But, alas! it was
+another story with my love affair.  I had seen and spoken with her
+alone; I had ventured boldly; I had been not ill received; I had
+seen her change colour, had enjoyed the undissembled kindness of
+her eyes; and now, in a moment, down comes upon the scene that
+apocalyptic figure with the nightcap and the horse-pistol, and with
+the very wind of her coming behold me separated from my love!
+Gratitude and admiration contended in my breast with the extreme of
+natural rancour.  My appearance in her house at past midnight had
+an air (I could not disguise it from myself) that was insolent and
+underhand, and could not but minister to the worst suspicions.  And
+the old lady had taken it well.  Her generosity was no more to be
+called in question than her courage, and I was afraid that her
+intelligence would be found to match.  Certainly, Miss Flora had to
+support some shrewd looks, and certainly she had been troubled.  I
+could see but the one way before me:  to profit by an excellent
+bed, to try to sleep soon, to be stirring early, and to hope for
+some renewed occasion in the morning.  To have said so much and yet
+to say no more, to go out into the world upon so half-hearted a
+parting, was more than I could accept.
+
+It is my belief that the benevolent fiend sat up all night to baulk
+me.  She was at my bedside with a candle long ere day, roused me,
+laid out for me a damnable misfit of clothes, and bade me pack my
+own (which were wholly unsuited to the journey) in a bundle.  Sore
+grudging, I arrayed myself in a suit of some country fabric, as
+delicate as sackcloth and about as becoming as a shroud; and, on
+coming forth, found the dragon had prepared for me a hearty
+breakfast.  She took the head of the table, poured out the tea, and
+entertained me as I ate with a great deal of good sense and a
+conspicuous lack of charm.  How often did I not regret the change!-
+-how often compare her, and condemn her in the comparison, with her
+charming niece!  But if my entertainer was not beautiful, she had
+certainly been busy in my interest.  Already she was in
+communication with my destined fellow-travellers; and the device on
+which she had struck appeared entirely suitable.  I was a young
+Englishman who had outrun the constable; warrants were out against
+me in Scotland, and it had become needful I should pass the border
+without loss of time, and privately.
+
+'I have given a very good account of you,' said she, 'which I hope
+you may justify.  I told them there was nothing against you beyond
+the fact that you were put to the haw (if that is the right word)
+for debt.'
+
+'I pray God you have the expression incorrectly, ma'am,' said I.
+'I do not give myself out for a person easily alarmed; but you must
+admit there is something barbarous and mediaeval in the sound well
+qualified to startle a poor foreigner.'
+
+'It is the name of a process in Scots Law, and need alarm no honest
+man,' said she.  'But you are a very idle-minded young gentleman;
+you must still have your joke, I see:  I only hope you will have no
+cause to regret it.'
+
+'I pray you not to suppose, because I speak lightly, that I do not
+feel deeply,' said I.  'Your kindness has quite conquered me; I lay
+myself at your disposition, I beg you to believe, with real
+tenderness; I pray you to consider me from henceforth as the most
+devoted of your friends.'
+
+'Well, well,' she said, 'here comes your devoted friend the drover.
+I'm thinking he will be eager for the road; and I will not be easy
+myself till I see you well off the premises, and the dishes washed,
+before my servant-woman wakes.  Praise God, we have gotten one that
+is a treasure at the sleeping!'
+
+The morning was already beginning to be blue in the trees of the
+garden, and to put to shame the candle by which I had breakfasted.
+The lady rose from table, and I had no choice but to follow her
+example.  All the time I was beating my brains for any means by
+which I should be able to get a word apart with Flora, or find the
+time to write her a billet.  The windows had been open while I
+breakfasted, I suppose to ventilate the room from any traces of my
+passage there; and, Master Ronald appearing on the front lawn, my
+ogre leaned forth to address him.
+
+'Ronald,' she said, 'wasn't that Sim that went by the wall?'
+
+I snatched my advantage.  Right at her back there was pen, ink, and
+paper laid out.  I wrote:  'I love you'; and before I had time to
+write more, or so much as to blot what I had written, I was again
+under the guns of the gold eyeglasses.
+
+'It's time,' she began; and then, as she observed my occupation,
+'Umph!' she broke off.  'Ye have something to write?' she demanded.
+
+'Some notes, madam,' said I, bowing with alacrity.
+
+'Notes,' she said; 'or a note?'
+
+'There is doubtless some finesse of the English language that I do
+not comprehend,' said I.
+
+'I'll contrive, however, to make my meaning very plain to ye, Mosha
+le Viscount,' she continued.  'I suppose you desire to be
+considered a gentleman?'
+
+'Can you doubt it, madam?' said I.
+
+'I doubt very much, at least, whether you go to the right way about
+it,' she said.  'You have come here to me, I cannot very well say
+how; I think you will admit you owe me some thanks, if it was only
+for the breakfast I made ye.  But what are you to me?  A waif young
+man, not so far to seek for looks and manners, with some English
+notes in your pocket and a price upon your head.  I am a lady; I
+have been your hostess, with however little will; and I desire that
+this random acquaintance of yours with my family will cease and
+determine.'
+
+I believe I must have coloured.  'Madam,' said I, 'the notes are of
+no importance; and your least pleasure ought certainly to be my
+law.  You have felt, and you have been pleased to express, a doubt
+of me.  I tear them up.'  Which you may be sure I did thoroughly.
+
+'There's a good lad!' said the dragon, and immediately led the way
+to the front lawn.
+
+The brother and sister were both waiting us here, and, as well as I
+could make out in the imperfect light, bore every appearance of
+having passed through a rather cruel experience.  Ronald seemed
+ashamed to so much as catch my eye in the presence of his aunt, and
+was the picture of embarrassment.  As for Flora, she had scarce the
+time to cast me one look before the dragon took her by the arm, and
+began to march across the garden in the extreme first glimmer of
+the dawn without exchanging speech.  Ronald and I followed in equal
+silence.
+
+There was a door in that same high wall on the top of which I had
+sat perched no longer gone than yesterday morning.  This the old
+lady set open with a key; and on the other side we were aware of a
+rough-looking, thick-set man, leaning with his arms (through which
+was passed a formidable staff) on a dry-stone dyke.  Him the old
+lady immediately addressed.
+
+'Sim,' said she, 'this is the young gentleman.'
+
+Sim replied with an inarticulate grumble of sound, and a movement
+of one arm and his head, which did duty for a salutation.
+
+'Now, Mr. St. Ives,' said the old lady, 'it's high time for you to
+be taking the road.  But first of all let me give the change of
+your five-guinea bill.  Here are four pounds of it in British Linen
+notes, and the balance in small silver, less sixpence.  Some charge
+a shilling, I believe, but I have given you the benefit of the
+doubt.  See and guide it with all the sense that you possess.'
+
+'And here, Mr. St. Ives,' said Flora, speaking for the first time,
+'is a plaid which you will find quite necessary on so rough a
+journey.  I hope you will take it from the hands of a Scotch
+friend,' she added, and her voice trembled.
+
+'Genuine holly:  I cut it myself,' said Ronald, and gave me as good
+a cudgel as a man could wish for in a row.
+
+The formality of these gifts, and the waiting figure of the driver,
+told me loudly that I must be gone.  I dropped on one knee and bade
+farewell to the aunt, kissing her hand.  I did the like--but with
+how different a passion!--to her niece; as for the boy, I took him
+to my arms and embraced him with a cordiality that seemed to strike
+him speechless.  'Farewell!' and 'Farewell!' I said.  'I shall
+never forget my friends.  Keep me sometimes in memory.  Farewell!'
+With that I turned my back and began to walk away; and had scarce
+done so, when I heard the door in the high wall close behind me.
+Of course this was the aunt's doing; and of course, if I know
+anything of human character, she would not let me go without some
+tart expressions.  I declare, even if I had heard them, I should
+not have minded in the least, for I was quite persuaded that,
+whatever admirers I might be leaving behind me in Swanston Cottage,
+the aunt was not the least sincere.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X--THE DROVERS
+
+
+
+It took me a little effort to come abreast of my new companion; for
+though he walked with an ugly roll and no great appearance of
+speed, he could cover the around at a good rate when he wanted to.
+Each looked at the other:  I with natural curiosity, he with a
+great appearance of distaste.  I have heard since that his heart
+was entirely set against me; he had seen me kneel to the ladies,
+and diagnosed me for a 'gesterin' eediot.'
+
+'So, ye're for England, are ye?' said he.
+
+I told him yes.
+
+'Weel, there's waur places, I believe,' was his reply; and he
+relapsed into a silence which was not broken during a quarter of an
+hour of steady walking.
+
+This interval brought us to the foot of a bare green valley, which
+wound upwards and backwards among the hills.  A little stream came
+down the midst and made a succession of clear pools; near by the
+lowest of which I was aware of a drove of shaggy cattle, and a man
+who seemed the very counterpart of Mr. Sim making a breakfast upon
+bread and cheese.  This second drover (whose name proved to be
+Candlish) rose on our approach.
+
+'Here's a mannie that's to gang through with us,' said Sim.  'It
+was the auld wife, Gilchrist, wanted it.'
+
+'Aweel, aweel,' said the other; and presently, remembering his
+manners, and looking on me with a solemn grin, 'A fine day!' says
+he.
+
+I agreed with him, and asked him how he did.
+
+'Brawly,' was the reply; and without further civilities, the pair
+proceeded to get the cattle under way.  This, as well as almost all
+the herding, was the work of a pair of comely and intelligent dogs,
+directed by Sim or Candlish in little more than monosyllables.
+Presently we were ascending the side of the mountain by a rude
+green track, whose presence I had not hitherto observed.  A
+continual sound of munching and the crying of a great quantity of
+moor birds accompanied our progress, which the deliberate pace and
+perennial appetite of the cattle rendered wearisomely slow.  In the
+midst my two conductors marched in a contented silence that I could
+not but admire.  The more I looked at them, the more I was
+impressed by their absurd resemblance to each other.  They were
+dressed in the same coarse homespun, carried similar sticks, were
+equally begrimed about the nose with snuff, and each wound in an
+identical plaid of what is called the shepherd's tartan.  In a back
+view they might be described as indistinguishable; and even from
+the front they were much alike.  An incredible coincidence of
+humours augmented the impression.  Thrice and four times I
+attempted to pave the way for some exchange of thought, sentiment,
+or--at the least of it--human words.  An Ay or an Nhm was the sole
+return, and the topic died on the hill-side without echo.  I can
+never deny that I was chagrined; and when, after a little more
+walking, Sim turned towards me and offered me a ram's horn of
+snuff, with the question 'Do ye use it?' I answered, with some
+animation, 'Faith, sir, I would use pepper to introduce a little
+cordiality.'  But even this sally failed to reach, or at least
+failed to soften, my companions.
+
+At this rate we came to the summit of a ridge, and saw the track
+descend in front of us abruptly into a desert vale, about a league
+in length, and closed at the farther end by no less barren
+hilltops.  Upon this point of vantage Sim came to a halt, took off
+his hat, and mopped his brow.
+
+'Weel,' he said, 'here we're at the top o' Howden.'
+
+'The top o' Howden, sure eneuch,' said Candlish.
+
+'Mr. St. Ivey, are ye dry?' said the first.
+
+'Now, really,' said I, 'is not this Satan reproving sin?'
+
+'What ails ye, man?' said he.  'I'm offerin' ye a dram.'
+
+'Oh, if it be anything to drink,' said I, 'I am as dry as my
+neighbours.'
+
+Whereupon Sim produced from the corner of his plaid a black bottle,
+and we all drank and pledged each other.  I found these gentlemen
+followed upon such occasions an invariable etiquette, which you may
+be certain I made haste to imitate.  Each wiped his mouth with the
+back of his left hand, held up the bottle in his right, remarked
+with emphasis, 'Here's to ye!' and swallowed as much of the spirit
+as his fancy prompted.  This little ceremony, which was the nearest
+thing to manners I could perceive in either of my companions, was
+repeated at becoming intervals, generally after an ascent.
+Occasionally we shared a mouthful of ewe-milk cheese and an
+inglorious form of bread, which I understood (but am far from
+engaging my honour on the point) to be called 'shearer's bannock.'
+And that may be said to have concluded our whole active intercourse
+for the first day.
+
+I had the more occasion to remark the extraordinarily desolate
+nature of that country, through which the drove road continued,
+hour after hour and even day after day, to wind.  A continual
+succession of insignificant shaggy hills, divided by the course of
+ten thousand brooks, through which we had to wade, or by the side
+of which we encamped at night; infinite perspectives of heather,
+infinite quantities of moorfowl; here and there, by a stream side,
+small and pretty clumps of willows or the silver birch; here and
+there, the ruins of ancient and inconsiderable fortresses--made the
+unchanging characters of the scene.  Occasionally, but only in the
+distance, we could perceive the smoke of a small town or of an
+isolated farmhouse or cottage on the moors; more often, a flock of
+sheep and its attendant shepherd, or a rude field of agriculture
+perhaps not yet harvested.  With these alleviations, we might
+almost be said to pass through an unbroken desert--sure, one of the
+most impoverished in Europe; and when I recalled to mind that we
+were yet but a few leagues from the chief city (where the law
+courts sat every day with a press of business, soldiers garrisoned
+the castle, and men of admitted parts were carrying on the practice
+of letters and the investigations of science), it gave me a
+singular view of that poor, barren, and yet illustrious country
+through which I travelled.  Still more, perhaps, did it commend the
+wisdom of Miss Gilchrist in sending me with these uncouth
+companions and by this unfrequented path.
+
+My itinerary is by no means clear to me; the names and distances I
+never clearly knew, and have now wholly forgotten; and this is the
+more to be regretted as there is no doubt that, in the course of
+those days, I must have passed and camped among sites which have
+been rendered illustrious by the pen of Walter Scott.  Nay, more, I
+am of opinion that I was still more favoured by fortune, and have
+actually met and spoken with that inimitable author.  Our encounter
+was of a tall, stoutish, elderly gentleman, a little grizzled, and
+of a rugged but cheerful and engaging countenance.  He sat on a
+hill pony, wrapped in a plaid over his green coat, and was
+accompanied by a horse-woman, his daughter, a young lady of the
+most charming appearance.  They overtook us on a stretch of heath,
+reined up as they came alongside, and accompanied us for perhaps a
+quarter of an hour before they galloped off again across the
+hillsides to our left.  Great was my amazement to find the
+unconquerable Mr. Sim thaw immediately on the accost of this
+strange gentleman, who hailed him with a ready familiarity,
+proceeded at once to discuss with him the trade of droving and the
+prices of cattle, and did not disdain to take a pinch from the
+inevitable ram's horn.  Presently I was aware that the stranger's
+eye was directed on myself; and there ensued a conversation, some
+of which I could not help overhearing at the time, and the rest
+have pieced together more or less plausibly from the report of Sim.
+
+'Surely that must be an AMATEUR DROVER ye have gotten there?' the
+gentleman seems to have asked.
+
+Sim replied, I was a young gentleman that had a reason of his own
+to travel privately.
+
+'Well, well, ye must tell me nothing of that.  I am in the law, you
+know, and tace is the Latin for a candle,' answered the gentleman.
+'But I hope it's nothing bad.'
+
+Sim told him it was no more than debt.
+
+'Oh, Lord, if that be all!' cried the gentleman; and turning to
+myself, 'Well, sir,' he added, 'I understand you are taking a tramp
+through our forest here for the pleasure of the thing?'
+
+'Why, yes, sir,' said I; 'and I must say I am very well
+entertained.'
+
+'I envy you,' said he.  'I have jogged many miles of it myself when
+I was younger.  My youth lies buried about here under every
+heather-bush, like the soul of the licentiate Lucius.  But you
+should have a guide.  The pleasure of this country is much in the
+legends, which grow as plentiful as blackberries.'  And directing
+my attention to a little fragment of a broken wall no greater than
+a tombstone, he told me for an example a story of its earlier
+inhabitants.  Years after it chanced that I was one day diverting
+myself with a Waverley Novel, when what should I come upon but the
+identical narrative of my green-coated gentleman upon the moors!
+In a moment the scene, the tones of his voice, his northern accent,
+and the very aspect of the earth and sky and temperature of the
+weather, flashed back into my mind with the reality of dreams.  The
+unknown in the green-coat had been the Great Unknown!  I had met
+Scott; I had heard a story from his lips; I should have been able
+to write, to claim acquaintance, to tell him that his legend still
+tingled in my ears.  But the discovery came too late, and the great
+man had already succumbed under the load of his honours and
+misfortunes.
+
+Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us farewell
+and disappeared with his daughter over the hills.  And when I
+applied to Sim for information, his answer of 'The Shirra, man!
+A'body kens the Shirra!' told me, unfortunately, nothing.
+
+A more considerable adventure falls to be related.  We were now
+near the border.  We had travelled for long upon the track beaten
+and browsed by a million herds, our predecessors, and had seen no
+vestige of that traffic which had created it.  It was early in the
+morning when we at last perceived, drawing near to the drove road,
+but still at a distance of about half a league, a second caravan,
+similar to but larger than our own.  The liveliest excitement was
+at once exhibited by both my comrades.  They climbed hillocks, they
+studied the approaching drove from under their hand, they consulted
+each other with an appearance of alarm that seemed to me
+extraordinary.  I had learned by this time that their stand-oft
+manners implied, at least, no active enmity; and I made bold to ask
+them what was wrong.
+
+'Bad yins,' was Sim's emphatic answer.
+
+All day the dogs were kept unsparingly on the alert, and the drove
+pushed forward at a very unusual and seemingly unwelcome speed.
+All day Sim and Candlish, with a more than ordinary expenditure
+both of snuff and of words, continued to debate the position.  It
+seems that they had recognised two of our neighbours on the road--
+one Faa, and another by the name of Gillies.  Whether there was an
+old feud between them still unsettled I could never learn; but Sim
+and Candlish were prepared for every degree of fraud or violence at
+their hands.  Candlish repeatedly congratulated himself on having
+left 'the watch at home with the mistress'; and Sim perpetually
+brandished his cudgel, and cursed his ill-fortune that it should be
+sprung.
+
+'I willna care a damn to gie the daashed scoon'rel a fair clout wi'
+it,' he said.  'The daashed thing micht come sindry in ma hand.'
+
+'Well, gentlemen,' said I, 'suppose they do come on, I think we can
+give a very good account of them.'  And I made my piece of holly,
+Ronald's gift, the value of which I now appreciated, sing about my
+head.
+
+'Ay, man?  Are ye stench?' inquired Sim, with a gleam of approval
+in his wooden countenance.
+
+The same evening, somewhat wearied with our day-long expedition, we
+encamped on a little verdant mound, from the midst of which there
+welled a spring of clear water scarce great enough to wash the
+hands in.  We had made our meal and lain down, but were not yet
+asleep, when a growl from one of the collies set us on the alert.
+All three sat up, and on a second impulse all lay down again, but
+now with our cudgels ready.  A man must be an alien and an outlaw,
+an old soldier and a young man in the bargain, to take adventure
+easily.  With no idea as to the rights of the quarrel or the
+probable consequences of the encounter, I was as ready to take part
+with my two drovers, as ever to fall in line on the morning of a
+battle.  Presently there leaped three men out of the heather; we
+had scarce time to get to our feet before we were assailed; and in
+a moment each one of us was engaged with an adversary whom the
+deepening twilight scarce permitted him to see.  How the battle
+sped in other quarters I am in no position to describe.  The rogue
+that fell to my share was exceedingly agile and expert with his
+weapon; had and held me at a disadvantage from the first assault;
+forced me to give ground continually, and at last, in mere self-
+defence, to let him have the point.  It struck him in the throat,
+and he went down like a ninepin and moved no more.
+
+It seemed this was the signal for the engagement to be
+discontinued.  The other combatants separated at once; our foes
+were suffered, without molestation, to lift up and bear away their
+fallen comrade; so that I perceived this sort of war to be not
+wholly without laws of chivalry, and perhaps rather to partake of
+the character of a tournament than of a battle a outrance.  There
+was no doubt, at least, that I was supposed to have pushed the
+affair too seriously.  Our friends the enemy removed their wounded
+companion with undisguised consternation; and they were no sooner
+over the top of the brae, than Sim and Candlish roused up their
+wearied drove and set forth on a night march.
+
+'I'm thinking Faa's unco bad,' said the one.
+
+'Ay,' said the other, 'he lookit dooms gash.'
+
+'He did that,' said the first.
+
+And their weary silence fell upon them again.
+
+Presently Sim turned to me.  'Ye're unco ready with the stick,'
+said he.
+
+'Too ready, I'm afraid,' said I.  'I am afraid Mr. Faa (if that be
+his name) has got his gruel.'
+
+'Weel, I wouldnae wonder,' replied Sim.
+
+'And what is likely to happen?' I inquired.
+
+'Aweel,' said Sim, snuffing profoundly, 'if I were to offer an
+opeenion, it would not be conscientious.  For the plain fac' is,
+Mr. St. Ivy, that I div not ken.  We have had crackit heids--and
+rowth of them--ere now; and we have had a broken leg or maybe twa;
+and the like of that we drover bodies make a kind of a practice
+like to keep among oursel's.  But a corp we have none of us ever
+had to deal with, and I could set nae leemit to what Gillies micht
+consider proper in the affair.  Forbye that, he would be in raither
+a hobble himsel', if he was to gang hame wantin' Faa.  Folk are
+awfu' throng with their questions, and parteecularly when they're
+no wantit.'
+
+'That's a fac',' said Candlish.
+
+I considered this prospect ruefully; and then making the best of
+it, 'Upon all which accounts,' said I, 'the best will be to get
+across the border and there separate.  If you are troubled, you can
+very truly put the blame upon your late companion; and if I am
+pursued, I must just try to keep out of the way.'
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' said Sim, with something resembling enthusiasm, 'no'
+a word mair!  I have met in wi' mony kinds o' gentry ere now; I hae
+seen o' them that was the tae thing, and I hae seen o' them that
+was the tither; but the wale of a gentleman like you I have no sae
+very frequently seen the bate of.'
+
+Our night march was accordingly pursued with unremitting diligence.
+The stars paled, the east whitened, and we were still, both dogs
+and men, toiling after the wearied cattle.  Again and again Sim and
+Candlish lamented the necessity:  it was 'fair ruin on the
+bestial,' they declared; but the thought of a judge and a scaffold
+hunted them ever forward.  I myself was not so much to be pitied.
+All that night, and during the whole of the little that remained
+before us of our conjunct journey, I enjoyed a new pleasure, the
+reward of my prowess, in the now loosened tongue of Mr. Sim.
+Candlish was still obdurately taciturn:  it was the man's nature;
+but Sim, having finally appraised and approved me, displayed
+without reticence a rather garrulous habit of mind and a pretty
+talent for narration.  The pair were old and close companions, co-
+existing in these endless moors in a brotherhood of silence such as
+I have heard attributed to the trappers of the west.  It seems
+absurd to mention love in connection with so ugly and snuffy a
+couple; at least, their trust was absolute; and they entertained a
+surprising admiration for each other's qualities; Candlish
+exclaiming that Sim was 'grand company!' and Sim frequently
+assuring me in an aside that for 'a rale, auld, stench bitch, there
+was nae the bate of Candlish in braid Scotland.'  The two dogs
+appeared to be entirely included in this family compact, and I
+remarked that their exploits and traits of character were
+constantly and minutely observed by the two masters.  Dog stories
+particularly abounded with them; and not only the dogs of the
+present but those of the past contributed their quota.  'But that
+was naething,' Sim would begin:  'there was a herd in Manar, they
+ca'd him Tweedie--ye'll mind Tweedie, Can'lish?'  'Fine, that!'
+said Candlish.  'Aweel, Tweedie had a dog--'  The story I have
+forgotten; I dare say it was dull, and I suspect it was not true;
+but indeed, my travels with the drove rendered me indulgent, and
+perhaps even credulous, in the matter of dog stories.  Beautiful,
+indefatigable beings! as I saw them at the end of a long day's
+journey frisking, barking, bounding, striking attitudes, slanting a
+bushy tail, manifestly playing to the spectator's eye, manifestly
+rejoicing in their grace and beauty--and turned to observe Sim and
+Candlish unornamentally plodding in the rear with the plaids about
+their bowed shoulders and the drop at their snuffy nose--I thought
+I would rather claim kinship with the dogs than with the men!  My
+sympathy was unreturned; in their eyes I was a creature light as
+air; and they would scarce spare me the time for a perfunctory
+caress or perhaps a hasty lap of the wet tongue, ere they were back
+again in sedulous attendance on those dingy deities, their masters-
+-and their masters, as like as not, damning their stupidity.
+
+Altogether the last hours of our tramp were infinitely the most
+agreeable to me, and I believe to all of us; and by the time we
+came to separate, there had grown up a certain familiarity and
+mutual esteem that made the parting harder.  It took place about
+four of the afternoon on a bare hillside from which I could see the
+ribbon of the great north road, henceforth to be my conductor.  I
+asked what was to pay.
+
+'Naething,' replied Sim.
+
+'What in the name of folly is this?' I exclaimed.  'You have led
+me, you have fed me, you have filled me full of whisky, and now you
+will take nothing!'
+
+'Ye see we indentit for that,' replied Sim.
+
+ 'Indented?' I repeated; 'what does the man mean?'
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' said Sim, 'this is a maitter entirely between
+Candlish and me and the auld wife, Gilchrist.  You had naething to
+say to it; weel, ye can have naething to do with it, then.'
+
+'My good man,' said I, 'I can allow myself to be placed in no such
+ridiculous position.  Mrs. Gilchrist is nothing to me, and I refuse
+to be her debtor.'
+
+'I dinna exac'ly see what way ye're gaun to help it,' observed my
+drover.
+
+'By paying you here and now,' said I.
+
+'There's aye twa to a bargain, Mr. St. Ives,' said he.
+
+'You mean that you will not take it?' said I.
+
+'There or thereabout,' said he.  'Forbye, that it would set ye a
+heap better to keep your siller for them you awe it to.  Ye're
+young, Mr. St. Ivy, and thoughtless; but it's my belief that, wi'
+care and circumspection, ye may yet do credit to yoursel'.  But
+just you bear this in mind:  that him that AWES siller should never
+GIE siller.'
+
+Well, what was there to say?  I accepted his rebuke, and bidding
+the pair farewell, set off alone upon my southward way.
+
+'Mr. St. Ivy,' was the last word of Sim, 'I was never muckle ta'en
+up in Englishry; but I think that I really ought to say that ye
+seem to me to have the makings of quite a decent lad.'
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI--THE GREAT NORTH ROAD
+
+
+
+It chanced that as I went down the hill these last words of my
+friend the drover echoed not unfruitfully in my head.  I had never
+told these men the least particulars as to my race or fortune, as
+it was a part, and the best part, of their civility to ask no
+questions:  yet they had dubbed me without hesitation English.
+Some strangeness in the accent they had doubtless thus explained.
+And it occurred to me, that if I could pass in Scotland for an
+Englishman, I might be able to reverse the process and pass in
+England for a Scot.  I thought, if I was pushed to it, I could make
+a struggle to imitate the brogue; after my experience with Candlish
+and Sim, I had a rich provision of outlandish words at my command;
+and I felt I could tell the tale of Tweedie's dog so as to deceive
+a native.  At the same time, I was afraid my name of St. Ives was
+scarcely suitable; till I remembered there was a town so called in
+the province of Cornwall, thought I might yet be glad to claim it
+for my place of origin, and decided for a Cornish family and a
+Scots education.  For a trade, as I was equally ignorant of all,
+and as the most innocent might at any moment be the means of my
+exposure, it was best to pretend to none.  And I dubbed myself a
+young gentleman of a sufficient fortune and an idle, curious habit
+of mind, rambling the country at my own charges, in quest of
+health, information, and merry adventures.
+
+At Newcastle, which was the first town I reached, I completed my
+preparations for the part, before going to the inn, by the purchase
+of a knapsack and a pair of leathern gaiters.  My plaid I continued
+to wear from sentiment.  It was warm, useful to sleep in if I were
+again benighted, and I had discovered it to be not unbecoming for a
+man of gallant carriage.  Thus equipped, I supported my character
+of the light-hearted pedestrian not amiss.  Surprise was indeed
+expressed that I should have selected such a season of the year;
+but I pleaded some delays of business, and smilingly claimed to be
+an eccentric.  The devil was in it, I would say, if any season of
+the year was not good enough for me; I was not made of sugar, I was
+no mollycoddle to be afraid of an ill-aired bed or a sprinkle of
+snow; and I would knock upon the table with my fist and call for
+t'other bottle, like the noisy and free-hearted young gentleman I
+was.  It was my policy (if I may so express myself) to talk much
+and say little.  At the inn tables, the country, the state of the
+roads, the business interest of those who sat down with me, and the
+course of public events, afforded me a considerable field in which
+I might discourse at large and still communicate no information
+about myself.  There was no one with less air of reticence; I
+plunged into my company up to the neck; and I had a long cock-and-
+bull story of an aunt of mine which must have convinced the most
+suspicious of my innocence.  'What!' they would have said, 'that
+young ass to be concealing anything!  Why, he has deafened me with
+an aunt of his until my head aches.  He only wants you should give
+him a line, and he would tell you his whole descent from Adam
+downward, and his whole private fortune to the last shilling.' A
+responsible solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my
+inexperience as to give me a word or two of good advice:  that I
+was but a young man after all--I had at this time a deceptive air
+of youth that made me easily pass for one-and-twenty, and was, in
+the circumstances, worth a fortune--that the company at inns was
+very mingled, that I should do well to be more careful, and the
+like; to all which I made answer that I meant no harm myself and
+expected none from others, or the devil was in it.  'You are one of
+those d-d prudent fellows that I could never abide with,' said I.
+'You are the kind of man that has a long head.  That's all the
+world, my dear sir:  the long-heads and the short-horns!  Now, I am
+a short-horn.'  'I doubt,' says he, 'that you will not go very far
+without getting sheared.'  I offered to bet with him on that, and
+he made off, shaking his head.
+
+But my particular delight was to enlarge on politics and the war.
+None damned the French like me; none was more bitter against the
+Americans.  And when the north-bound mail arrived, crowned with
+holly, and the coachman and guard hoarse with shouting victory, I
+went even so far as to entertain the company to a bowl of punch,
+which I compounded myself with no illiberal hand, and doled out to
+such sentiments as the following:-
+
+'Our glorious victory on the Nivelle'!  'Lord Wellington, God bless
+him! and may victory ever attend upon his arms!' and, 'Soult, poor
+devil! and may he catch it again to the same tune!'
+
+Never was oratory more applauded to the echo--never any one was
+more of the popular man than I.  I promise you, we made a night of
+it.  Some of the company supported each other, with the assistance
+of boots, to their respective bedchambers, while the rest slept on
+the field of glory where we had left them; and at the breakfast
+table the next morning there was an extraordinary assemblage of red
+eyes and shaking fists.  I observed patriotism to burn much lower
+by daylight.  Let no one blame me for insensibility to the reverses
+of France!  God knows how my heart raged.  How I longed to fall on
+that herd of swine and knock their heads together in the moment of
+their revelry!  But you are to consider my own situation and its
+necessities; also a certain lightheartedness, eminently Gallic,
+which forms a leading trait in my character, and leads me to throw
+myself into new circumstances with the spirit of a schoolboy.  It
+is possible that I sometimes allowed this impish humour to carry me
+further than good taste approves:  and I was certainly punished for
+it once.
+
+This was in the episcopal city of Durham.  We sat down, a
+considerable company, to dinner, most of us fine old vatted English
+tories of that class which is often so enthusiastic as to be
+inarticulate.  I took and held the lead from the beginning; and,
+the talk having turned on the French in the Peninsula, I gave them
+authentic details (on the authority of a cousin of mine, an ensign)
+of certain cannibal orgies in Galicia, in which no less a person
+than General Caffarelli had taken a part.  I always disliked that
+commander, who once ordered me under arrest for insubordination;
+and it is possible that a spice of vengeance added to the rigour of
+my picture.  I have forgotten the details; no doubt they were high-
+coloured.  No doubt I rejoiced to fool these jolter-heads; and no
+doubt the sense of security that I drank from their dull, gasping
+faces encouraged me to proceed extremely far.  And for my sins,
+there was one silent little man at table who took my story at the
+true value.  It was from no sense of humour, to which he was quite
+dead.  It was from no particular intelligence, for he had not any.
+The bond of sympathy, of all things in the world, had rendered him
+clairvoyant.
+
+Dinner was no sooner done than I strolled forth into the streets
+with some design of viewing the cathedral; and the little man was
+silently at my heels.  A few doors from the inn, in a dark place of
+the street, I was aware of a touch on my arm, turned suddenly, and
+found him looking up at me with eyes pathetically bright.
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir; but that story of yours was particularly
+rich.  He--he!  Particularly racy,' said he.  'I tell you, sir, I
+took you wholly!  I SMOKED you!  I believe you and I, sir, if we
+had a chance to talk, would find we had a good many opinions in
+common.  Here is the "Blue Bell," a very comfortable place.  They
+draw good ale, sir.  Would you be so condescending as to share a
+pot with me?'
+
+There was something so ambiguous and secret in the little man's
+perpetual signalling, that I confess my curiosity was much aroused.
+Blaming myself, even as I did so, for the indiscretion, I embraced
+his proposal, and we were soon face to face over a tankard of
+mulled ale.  He lowered his voice to the least attenuation of a
+whisper.
+
+'Here, sir,' said he, 'is to the Great Man.  I think you take me?
+No?'  He leaned forward till our noses touched.  'Here is to the
+Emperor!' said he.
+
+I was extremely embarrassed, and, in spite of the creature's
+innocent appearance, more than half alarmed.  I thought him too
+ingenious, and, indeed, too daring for a spy.  Yet if he were
+honest he must be a man of extraordinary indiscretion, and
+therefore very unfit to be encouraged by an escaped prisoner.  I
+took a half course, accordingly--accepted his toast in silence, and
+drank it without enthusiasm.
+
+He proceeded to abound in the praises of Napoleon, such as I had
+never heard in France, or at least only on the lips of officials
+paid to offer them.
+
+'And this Caffarelli, now,' he pursued:  'he is a splendid fellow,
+too, is he not?  I have not heard vastly much of him myself.  No
+details, sir--no details!  We labour under huge difficulties here
+as to unbiassed information.'
+
+'I believe I have heard the same complaint in other countries,' I
+could not help remarking.  'But as to Caffarelli, he is neither
+lame nor blind, he has two legs and a nose in the middle of his
+face.  And I care as much about him as you care for the dead body
+of Mr. Perceval!'
+
+He studied me with glowing eyes.
+
+'You cannot deceive me!' he cried.  'You have served under him.
+You are a Frenchman!  I hold by the hand, at last, one of that
+noble race, the pioneers of the glorious principles of liberty and
+brotherhood.  Hush!  No, it is all right.  I thought there had been
+somebody at the door.  In this wretched, enslaved country we dare
+not even call our souls our own.  The spy and the hangman, sir--the
+spy and the hangman!  And yet there is a candle burning, too.  The
+good leaven is working, sir--working underneath.  Even in this town
+there are a few brave spirits, who meet every Wednesday.  You must
+stay over a day or so, and join us.  We do not use this house.
+Another, and a quieter.  They draw fine ale, however--fair, mild
+ale.  You will find yourself among friends, among brothers.  You
+will hear some very daring sentiments expressed!' he cried,
+expanding his small chest.  'Monarchy, Christianity--all the
+trappings of a bloated past--the Free Confraternity of Durham and
+Tyneside deride.'
+
+Here was a devil of a prospect for a gentleman whose whole design
+was to avoid observation!  The Free Confraternity had no charms for
+me; daring sentiments were no part of my baggage; and I tried,
+instead, a little cold water.
+
+'You seem to forget, sir, that my Emperor has re-established
+Christianity,' I observed.
+
+'Ah, sir, but that was policy!' he exclaimed.  'You do not
+understand Napoleon.  I have followed his whole career.  I can
+explain his policy from first to last.  Now for instance in the
+Peninsula, on which you were so very amusing, if you will come to a
+friend's house who has a map of Spain, I can make the whole course
+of the war quite clear to you, I venture to say, in half an hour.'
+
+This was intolerable.  Of the two extremes, I found I preferred the
+British tory; and, making an appointment for the morrow, I pleaded
+sudden headache, escaped to the inn, packed my knapsack, and fled,
+about nine at night, from this accursed neighbourhood.  It was
+cold, starry, and clear, and the road dry, with a touch of frost.
+For all that, I had not the smallest intention to make a long stage
+of it; and about ten o'clock, spying on the right-hand side of the
+way the lighted windows of an alehouse, I determined to bait there
+for the night.
+
+It was against my principle, which was to frequent only the dearest
+inns; and the misadventure that befell me was sufficient to make me
+more particular in the future.  A large company was assembled in
+the parlour, which was heavy with clouds of tobacco smoke, and
+brightly lighted up by a roaring fire of coal.  Hard by the chimney
+stood a vacant chair in what I thought an enviable situation,
+whether for warmth or the pleasure of society; and I was about to
+take it, when the nearest of the company stopped me with his hand.
+
+'Beg thy pardon, sir,' said he; 'but that there chair belongs to a
+British soldier.'
+
+A chorus of voices enforced and explained.  It was one of Lord
+Wellington's heroes.  He had been wounded under Rowland Hill.  He
+was Colbourne's right-hand man.  In short, this favoured individual
+appeared to have served with every separate corps, and under every
+individual general in the Peninsula.  Of course I apologised.  I
+had not known.  The devil was in it if a soldier had not a right to
+the best in England.  And with that sentiment, which was loudly
+applauded, I found a corner of a bench, and awaited, with some
+hopes of entertainment, the return of the hero.  He proved, of
+course, to be a private soldier.  I say of course, because no
+officer could possibly enjoy such heights of popularity.  He had
+been wounded before San Sebastian, and still wore his arm in a
+sling.  What was a great deal worse for him, every member of the
+company had been plying him with drink.  His honest yokel's
+countenance blazed as if with fever, his eyes were glazed and
+looked the two ways, and his feet stumbled as, amidst a murmur of
+applause, he returned to the midst of his admirers.
+
+Two minutes afterwards I was again posting in the dark along the
+highway; to explain which sudden movement of retreat I must trouble
+the reader with a reminiscence of my services.
+
+I lay one night with the out-pickets in Castile.  We were in close
+touch with the enemy; the usual orders had been issued against
+smoking, fires, and talk, and both armies lay as quiet as mice,
+when I saw the English sentinel opposite making a signal by holding
+up his musket.  I repeated it, and we both crept together in the
+dry bed of a stream, which made the demarcation of the armies.  It
+was wine he wanted, of which we had a good provision, and the
+English had quite run out.  He gave me the money, and I, as was the
+custom, left him my firelock in pledge, and set off for the
+canteen.  When I returned with a skin of wine, behold, it had
+pleased some uneasy devil of an English officer to withdraw the
+outposts!  Here was a situation with a vengeance, and I looked for
+nothing but ridicule in the present and punishment in the future.
+Doubtless our officers winked pretty hard at this interchange of
+courtesies, but doubtless it would be impossible to wink at so
+gross a fault, or rather so pitiable a misadventure as mine; and
+you are to conceive me wandering in the plains of Castile,
+benighted, charged with a wine-skin for which I had no use, and
+with no knowledge whatever of the whereabouts of my musket, beyond
+that it was somewhere in my Lord Wellington's army.  But my
+Englishman was either a very honest fellow, or else extremely
+thirsty, and at last contrived to advertise me of his new position.
+Now, the English sentry in Castile, and the wounded hero in the
+Durham public-house, were one and the same person; and if he had
+been a little less drunk, or myself less lively in getting away,
+the travels of M. St. Ives might have come to an untimely end.
+
+I suppose this woke me up; it stirred in me besides a spirit of
+opposition, and in spite of cold, darkness, the highwaymen and the
+footpads, I determined to walk right on till breakfast-time:  a
+happy resolution, which enabled me to observe one of those traits
+of manners which at once depict a country and condemn it.  It was
+near midnight when I saw, a great way ahead of me, the light of
+many torches; presently after, the sound of wheels reached me, and
+the slow tread of feet, and soon I had joined myself to the rear of
+a sordid, silent, and lugubrious procession, such as we see in
+dreams.  Close on a hundred persons marched by torchlight in
+unbroken silence; in their midst a cart, and in the cart, on an
+inclined platform, the dead body of a man--the centre-piece of this
+solemnity, the hero whose obsequies we were come forth at this
+unusual hour to celebrate.  It was but a plain, dingy old fellow of
+fifty or sixty, his throat cut, his shirt turned over as though to
+show the wound.  Blue trousers and brown socks completed his
+attire, if we can talk so of the dead.  He had a horrid look of a
+waxwork.  In the tossing of the lights he seemed to make faces and
+mouths at us, to frown, and to be at times upon the point of
+speech.  The cart, with this shabby and tragic freight, and
+surrounded by its silent escort and bright torches, continued for
+some distance to creak along the high-road, and I to follow it in
+amazement, which was soon exchanged for horror.  At the corner of a
+lane the procession stopped, and, as the torches ranged themselves
+along the hedgerow-side, I became aware of a grave dug in the midst
+of the thoroughfare, and a provision of quicklime piled in the
+ditch.  The cart was backed to the margin, the body slung off the
+platform and dumped into the grave with an irreverent roughness.  A
+sharpened stake had hitherto served it for a pillow.  It was now
+withdrawn, held in its place by several volunteers, and a fellow
+with a heavy mallet (the sound of which still haunts me at night)
+drove it home through the bosom of the corpse.  The hole was filled
+with quicklime, and the bystanders, as if relieved of some
+oppression, broke at once into a sound of whispered speech.
+
+My shirt stuck to me, my heart had almost ceased beating, and I
+found my tongue with difficulty.
+
+'I beg your pardon,' I gasped to a neighbour, 'what is this? what
+has he done? is it allowed?'
+
+'Why, where do you come from?' replied the man.
+
+'I am a traveller, sir,' said I, 'and a total stranger in this part
+of the country.  I had lost my way when I saw your torches, and
+came by chance on this--this incredible scene.  Who was the man?'
+
+'A suicide,' said he.  'Ay, he was a bad one, was Johnnie Green.'
+
+It appeared this was a wretch who had committed many barbarous
+murders, and being at last upon the point of discovery fell of his
+own hand.  And the nightmare at the crossroads was the regular
+punishment, according to the laws of England, for an act which the
+Romans honoured as a virtue!  Whenever an Englishman begins to
+prate of civilisation (as, indeed, it's a defect they are rather
+prone to), I hear the measured blows of a mallet, see the
+bystanders crowd with torches about the grave, smile a little to
+myself in conscious superiority--and take a thimbleful of brandy
+for the stomach's sake.
+
+I believe it must have been at my next stage, for I remember going
+to bed extremely early, that I came to the model of a good old-
+fashioned English inn, and was attended on by the picture of a
+pretty chambermaid.  We had a good many pleasant passages as she
+waited table or warmed my bed for me with a devil of a brass
+warming pan, fully larger than herself; and as she was no less pert
+than she was pretty, she may be said to have given rather better
+than she took.  I cannot tell why (unless it were for the sake of
+her saucy eyes), but I made her my confidante, told her I was
+attached to a young lady in Scotland, and received the
+encouragement of her sympathy, mingled and connected with a fair
+amount of rustic wit.  While I slept the down-mail stopped for
+supper; it chanced that one of the passengers left behind a copy of
+the EDINBURGH COURANT, and the next morning my pretty chambermaid
+set the paper before me at breakfast, with the remark that there
+was some news from my lady-love.  I took it eagerly, hoping to find
+some further word of our escape, in which I was disappointed; and I
+was about to lay it down, when my eye fell on a paragraph
+immediately concerning me.  Faa was in hospital, grievously sick,
+and warrants were out for the arrest of Sim and Candlish.  These
+two men had shown themselves very loyal to me.  This trouble
+emerging, the least I could do was to be guided by a similar
+loyalty to them.  Suppose my visit to my uncle crowned with some
+success, and my finances re-established, I determined I should
+immediately return to Edinburgh, put their case in the hands of a
+good lawyer, and await events.  So my mind was very lightly made up
+to what proved a mighty serious matter.  Candlish and Sim were all
+very well in their way, and I do sincerely trust I should have been
+at some pains to help them, had there been nothing else.  But in
+truth my heart and my eyes were set on quite another matter, and I
+received the news of their tribulation almost with joy.  That is
+never a bad wind that blows where we want to go, and you may be
+sure there was nothing unwelcome in a circumstance that carried me
+back to Edinburgh and Flora.  From that hour I began to indulge
+myself with the making of imaginary scenes and interviews, in which
+I confounded the aunt, flattered Ronald, and now in the witty, now
+in the sentimental manner, declared my love and received the
+assurance of its return.  By means of this exercise my resolution
+daily grew stronger, until at last I had piled together such a mass
+of obstinacy as it would have taken a cataclysm of nature to
+subvert.
+
+'Yes,' said I to the chambermaid, 'here is news of my lady-love
+indeed, and very good news too.'
+
+All that day, in the teeth of a keen winter wind, I hugged myself
+in my plaid, and it was as though her arms were flung around me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII--I FOLLOW A COVERED CART NEARLY TO MY DESTINATION
+
+
+
+At last I began to draw near, by reasonable stages, to the
+neighbourhood of Wakefield; and the name of Mr. Burchell Fenn came
+to the top in my memory.  This was the gentleman (the reader may
+remember) who made a trade of forwarding the escape of French
+prisoners.  How he did so:  whether he had a sign-board, Escapes
+forwarded, apply within; what he charged for his services, or
+whether they were gratuitous and charitable, were all matters of
+which I was at once ignorant and extremely curious.  Thanks to my
+proficiency in English, and Mr. Romaine's bank-notes, I was getting
+on swimmingly without him; but the trouble was that I could not be
+easy till I had come to the bottom of these mysteries, and it was
+my difficulty that I knew nothing of him beyond the name.  I knew
+not his trade beyond that of Forwarder of Escapes--whether he lived
+in town or country, whether he were rich or poor, nor by what kind
+of address I was to gain his confidence.  It would have a very bad
+appearance to go along the highwayside asking after a man of whom I
+could give so scanty an account; and I should look like a fool,
+indeed, if I were to present myself at his door and find the police
+in occupation!  The interest of the conundrum, however, tempted me,
+and I turned aside from my direct road to pass by Wakefield; kept
+my ears pricked, as I went, for any mention of his name, and relied
+for the rest on my good fortune.  If Luck (who must certainly be
+feminine) favoured me as far as to throw me in the man's way, I
+should owe the lady a candle; if not, I could very readily console
+myself.  In this experimental humour, and with so little to help
+me, it was a miracle that I should have brought my enterprise to a
+good end; and there are several saints in the calendar who might be
+happy to exchange with St. Ives!
+
+I had slept that night in a good inn at Wakefield, made my
+breakfast by candle-light with the passengers of an up-coach, and
+set off in a very ill temper with myself and my surroundings.  It
+was still early; the air raw and cold; the sun low, and soon to
+disappear under a vast canopy of rain-clouds that had begun to
+assemble in the north-west, and from that quarter invaded the whole
+width of the heaven.  Already the rain fell in crystal rods;
+already the whole face of the country sounded with the discharge of
+drains and ditches; and I looked forward to a day of downpour and
+the hell of wet clothes, in which particular I am as dainty as a
+cat.  At a corner of the road, and by the last glint of the
+drowning sun, I spied a covered cart, of a kind that I thought I
+had never seen before, preceding me at the foot's pace of jaded
+horses.  Anything is interesting to a pedestrian that can help him
+to forget the miseries of a day of rain; and I bettered my pace and
+gradually overtook the vehicle.
+
+The nearer I came, the more it puzzled me.  It was much such a cart
+as I am told the calico printers use, mounted on two wheels, and
+furnished with a seat in front for the driver.  The interior closed
+with a door, and was of a bigness to contain a good load of calico,
+or (at a pinch and if it were necessary) four or five persons.
+But, indeed, if human beings were meant to travel there, they had
+my pity!  They must travel in the dark, for there was no sign of a
+window; and they would be shaken all the way like a phial of
+doctor's stuff, for the cart was not only ungainly to look at--it
+was besides very imperfectly balanced on the one pair of wheels,
+and pitched unconscionably.  Altogether, if I had any glancing idea
+that the cart was really a carriage, I had soon dismissed it; but I
+was still inquisitive as to what it should contain, and where it
+had come from.  Wheels and horses were splashed with many different
+colours of mud, as though they had come far and across a
+considerable diversity of country.  The driver continually and
+vainly plied his whip.  It seemed to follow they had made a long,
+perhaps an all-night, stage; and that the driver, at that early
+hour of a little after eight in the morning, already felt himself
+belated.  I looked for the name of the proprietor on the shaft, and
+started outright.  Fortune had favoured the careless:  it was
+Burchell Fenn!
+
+'A wet morning, my man,' said I.
+
+The driver, a loutish fellow, shock-headed and turnip-faced,
+returned not a word to my salutation, but savagely flogged his
+horses.  The tired animals, who could scarce put the one foot
+before the other, paid no attention to his cruelty; and I continued
+without effort to maintain my position alongside, smiling to myself
+at the futility of his attempts, and at the same time pricked with
+curiosity as to why he made them.  I made no such formidable a
+figure as that a man should flee when I accosted him; and my
+conscience not being entirely clear, I was more accustomed to be
+uneasy myself than to see others timid.  Presently he desisted, and
+put back his whip in the holster with the air of a man vanquished.
+
+'So you would run away from me?' said I.  'Come, come, that's not
+English.'
+
+'Beg pardon, master:  no offence meant,' he said, touching his hat.
+
+'And none taken!' cried I.  'All I desire is a little gaiety by the
+way.'
+
+I understood him to say he didn't 'take with gaiety.'
+
+'Then I will try you with something else,' said I.  'Oh, I can be
+all things to all men, like the apostle!  I dare to say I have
+travelled with heavier fellows than you in my time, and done
+famously well with them.  Are you going home?'
+
+'Yes, I'm a goin' home, I am,' he said.
+
+'A very fortunate circumstance for me!' said I.  'At this rate we
+shall see a good deal of each other, going the same way; and, now I
+come to think of it, why should you not give me a cast?  There is
+room beside you on the bench.'
+
+With a sudden snatch, he carried the cart two yards into the
+roadway.  The horses plunged and came to a stop.  'No, you don't!'
+he said, menacing me with the whip.  'None o' that with me.'
+
+'None of what?' said I.  'I asked you for a lift, but I have no
+idea of taking one by force.'
+
+'Well, I've got to take care of the cart and 'orses, I have,' says
+he.  'I don't take up with no runagate vagabones, you see, else.'
+
+'I ought to thank you for your touching confidence,' said I,
+approaching carelessly nearer as I spoke.  'But I admit the road is
+solitary hereabouts, and no doubt an accident soon happens.  Little
+fear of anything of the kind with you!  I like you for it, like
+your prudence, like that pastoral shyness of disposition.  But why
+not put it out of my power to hurt?  Why not open the door and
+bestow me here in the box, or whatever you please to call it?' And
+I laid my hand demonstratively on the body of the cart.
+
+He had been timorous before; but at this, he seemed to lose the
+power of speech a moment, and stared at me in a perfect enthusiasm
+of fear.
+
+'Why not?' I continued.  'The idea is good.  I should be safe in
+there if I were the monster Williams himself.  The great thing is
+to have me under lock and key.  For it does lock; it is locked
+now,' said I, trying the door.  'A propos, what have you for a
+cargo?  It must be precious.'
+
+He found not a word to answer.
+
+Rat-tat-tat, I went upon the door like a well-drilled footman.
+
+'Any one at home?' I said, and stooped to listen.
+
+There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of an
+uncontrollable paroxysm; another followed immediately on the heels
+of it; and then the driver turned with an oath, laid the lash upon
+the horses with so much energy that they found their heels again,
+and the whole equipage fled down the road at a gallop.
+
+At the first sound of the sneeze, I had started back like a man
+shot.  The next moment, a great light broke on my mind, and I
+understood.  Here was the secret of Fenn's trade:  this was how he
+forwarded the escape of prisoners, hawking them by night about the
+country in his covered cart.  There had been Frenchmen close to me;
+he who had just sneezed was my countryman, my comrade, perhaps
+already my friend!  I took to my heels in pursuit.  'Hold hard!' I
+shouted.  'Stop!  It's all right!  Stop!'  But the driver only
+turned a white face on me for a moment, and redoubled his efforts,
+bending forward, plying his whip and crying to his horses; these
+lay themselves down to the gallop and beat the highway with flying
+hoofs; and the cart bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a
+halo of rain and spattering mud.  But a minute since, and it had
+been trundling along like a lame cow; and now it was off as though
+drawn by Apollo's coursers.  There is no telling what a man can do,
+until you frighten him!
+
+It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly, to
+maintain my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so near)
+was become a chief point with me.  A hundred yards farther on the
+cart whipped out of the high-road into a lane embowered with
+leafless trees, and became lost to view.  When I saw it next, the
+driver had increased his advantage considerably, but all danger was
+at an end, and the horses had again declined into a hobbling walk.
+Persuaded that they could not escape me, I took my time, and
+recovered my breath as I followed them.
+
+Presently the lane twisted at right angles, and showed me a gate
+and the beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as I
+continued to advance, a red brick house about seventy years old, in
+a fine style of architecture, and presenting a front of many
+windows to a lawn and garden.  Behind, I could see outhouses and
+the peaked roofs of stacks; and I judged that a manor-house had in
+some way declined to be the residence of a tenant-farmer, careless
+alike of appearances and substantial comfort.  The marks of neglect
+were visible on every side, in flower-bushes straggling beyond the
+borders, in the ill-kept turf, and in the broken windows that were
+incongruously patched with paper or stuffed with rags.  A thicket
+of trees, mostly evergreen, fenced the place round and secluded it
+from the eyes of prying neighbours.  As I came in view of it, on
+that melancholy winter's morning, in the deluge of the falling
+rain, and with the wind that now rose in occasional gusts and
+hooted over the old chimneys, the cart had already drawn up at the
+front-door steps, and the driver was already in earnest discourse
+with Mr. Burchell Fenn.  He was standing with his hands behind his
+back--a man of a gross, misbegotten face and body, dewlapped like a
+bull and red as a harvest moon; and in his jockey cap, blue coat
+and top boots, he had much the air of a good, solid tenant-farmer.
+
+The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but received
+me at last in a sort of goggling silence.  I had my hat in my hand.
+
+'I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Burchell Fenn?' said I.
+
+'The same, sir,' replied Mr. Fenn, taking off his jockey cap in
+answer to my civility, but with the distant look and the tardy
+movements of one who continues to think of something else.  'And
+who may you be?' he asked.
+
+'I shall tell you afterwards,' said I.  'Suffice it, in the
+meantime, that I come on business.'
+
+He seemed to digest my answer laboriously, his mouth gaping, his
+little eyes never straying from my face.
+
+'Suffer me to point out to you, sir,' I resumed, 'that this is a
+devil of a wet morning; and that the chimney corner, and possibly a
+glass of something hot, are clearly indicated.'
+
+Indeed, the rain was now grown to be a deluge; the gutters of the
+house roared; the air was filled with the continuous, strident
+crash.  The stolidity of his face, on which the rain streamed, was
+far from reassuring me.  On the contrary, I was aware of a distinct
+qualm of apprehension, which was not at all lessened by a view of
+the driver, craning from his perch to observe us with the
+expression of a fascinated bird.  So we stood silent, when the
+prisoner again began to sneeze from the body of the cart; and at
+the sound, prompt as a transformation, the driver had whipped up
+his horses and was shambling off round the corner of the house, and
+Mr. Fenn, recovering his wits with a gulp, had turned to the door
+behind him.
+
+'Come in, come in, sir,' he said.  'I beg your pardon, sir; the
+lock goes a trifle hard.'
+
+Indeed, it took him a surprising time to open the door, which was
+not only locked on the outside, but the lock seemed rebellious from
+disuse; and when at last he stood back and motioned me to enter
+before him, I was greeted on the threshold by that peculiar and
+convincing sound of the rain echoing over empty chambers.  The
+entrance-hall, in which I now found myself, was of a good size and
+good proportions; potted plants occupied the corners; the paved
+floor was soiled with muddy footprints and encumbered with straw;
+on a mahogany hall-table, which was the only furniture, a candle
+had been stuck and suffered to burn down--plainly a long while ago,
+for the gutterings were green with mould.  My mind, under these new
+impressions, worked with unusual vivacity.  I was here shut off
+with Fenn and his hireling in a deserted house, a neglected garden,
+and a wood of evergreens:  the most eligible theatre for a deed of
+darkness.  There came to me a vision of two flagstones raised in
+the hall-floor, and the driver putting in the rainy afternoon over
+my grave, and the prospect displeased me extremely.  I felt I had
+carried my pleasantry as far as was safe; I must lose no time in
+declaring my true character, and I was even choosing the words in
+which I was to begin, when the hall-door was slammed-to behind me
+with a bang, and I turned, dropping my stick as I did so, in time--
+and not any more than time--to save my life.
+
+The surprise of the onslaught and the huge weight of my assailant
+gave him the advantage.  He had a pistol in his right hand of a
+portentous size, which it took me all my strength to keep
+deflected.  With his left arm he strained me to his bosom, so that
+I thought I must be crushed or stifled.  His mouth was open, his
+face crimson, and he panted aloud with hard animal sounds.  The
+affair was as brief as it was hot and sudden.  The potations which
+had swelled and bloated his carcase had already weakened the
+springs of energy.  One more huge effort, that came near to
+overpower me, and in which the pistol happily exploded, and I felt
+his grasp slacken and weakness come on his joints; his legs
+succumbed under his weight, and he grovelled on his knees on the
+stone floor.  'Spare me!' he gasped.
+
+I had not only been abominably frightened; I was shocked besides:
+my delicacy was in arms, like a lady to whom violence should have
+been offered by a similar monster.  I plucked myself from his
+horrid contact, I snatched the pistol--even discharged, it was a
+formidable weapon--and menaced him with the butt.  'Spare you!' I
+cried, 'you beast!'
+
+His voice died in his fat inwards, but his lips still vehemently
+framed the same words of supplication.  My anger began to pass off,
+but not all my repugnance; the picture he made revolted me, and I
+was impatient to be spared the further view of it.
+
+'Here,' said I, 'stop this performance:  it sickens me.  I am not
+going to kill you, do you hear?  I have need of you.'
+
+A look of relief, that I could almost have called beautiful, dawned
+on his countenance.  'Anything--anything you wish,' said he.
+
+Anything is a big word, and his use of it brought me for a moment
+to a stand.  'Why, what do you mean?' I asked.  'Do you mean that
+you will blow the gaff on the whole business?'
+
+He answered me Yes with eager asseverations.
+
+'I know Monsieur de Saint-Yves is in it; it was through his papers
+we traced you,' I said.  'Do you consent to make a clean breast of
+the others?'
+
+'I do--I will!' he cried.  'The 'ole crew of 'em; there's good
+names among 'em.  I'll be king's evidence.'
+
+'So that all shall hang except yourself?  You damned villain!' I
+broke out.  'Understand at once that I am no spy or thief-taker.  I
+am a kinsman of Monsieur de St. Yves--here in his interest.  Upon
+my word, you have put your foot in it prettily, Mr. Burchell Fenn!
+Come, stand up; don't grovel there.  Stand up, you lump of
+iniquity!'
+
+He scrambled to his feet.  He was utterly unmanned, or it might
+have gone hard with me yet; and I considered him hesitating, as,
+indeed, there was cause.  The man was a double-dyed traitor:  he
+had tried to murder me, and I had first baffled his endeavours and
+then exposed and insulted him.  Was it wise to place myself any
+longer at his mercy?  With his help I should doubtless travel more
+quickly; doubtless also far less agreeably; and there was
+everything to show that it would be at a greater risk.  In short, I
+should have washed my hands of him on the spot, but for the
+temptation of the French officers, whom I knew to be so near, and
+for whose society I felt so great and natural an impatience.  If I
+was to see anything of my countrymen, it was clear I had first of
+all to make my peace with Mr. Fenn; and that was no easy matter.
+To make friends with any one implies concessions on both sides; and
+what could I concede?  What could I say of him, but that he had
+proved himself a villain and a fool, and the worse man?
+
+'Well,' said I, 'here has been rather a poor piece of business,
+which I dare say you can have no pleasure in calling to mind; and,
+to say truth, I would as readily forget it myself.  Suppose we try.
+Take back your pistol, which smells very ill; put it in your pocket
+or wherever you had it concealed.  There!  Now let us meet for the
+first time.--Give you good morning, Mr. Fenn!  I hope you do very
+well.  I come on the recommendation of my kinsman, the Vicomte de
+St. Yves.'
+
+'Do you mean it?' he cried.  'Do you mean you will pass over our
+little scrimmage?'
+
+'Why, certainly!' said I.  'It shows you are a bold fellow, who may
+be trusted to forget the business when it comes to the point.
+There is nothing against you in the little scrimmage, unless that
+your courage is greater than your strength.  You are not so young
+as you once were, that is all.'
+
+'And I beg of you, sir, don't betray me to the Vis-count,' he
+pleaded.  'I'll not deny but what my 'eart failed me a trifle; but
+it was only a word, sir, what anybody might have said in the 'eat
+of the moment, and over with it.'
+
+'Certainly,' said I.  'That is quite my own opinion.'
+
+'The way I came to be anxious about the Vis-count,' he continued,
+'is that I believe he might be induced to form an 'asty judgment.
+And the business, in a pecuniary point of view, is all that I could
+ask; only trying, sir--very trying.  It's making an old man of me
+before my time.  You might have observed yourself, sir, that I
+'aven't got the knees I once 'ad.  The knees and the breathing,
+there's where it takes me.  But I'm very sure, sir, I address a
+gentleman as would be the last to make trouble between friends.'
+
+'I am sure you do me no more than justice,' said I; 'and I shall
+think it quite unnecessary to dwell on any of these passing
+circumstances in my report to the Vicomte.'
+
+'Which you do favour him (if you'll excuse me being so bold as to
+mention it) exac'ly!' said he.  'I should have known you anywheres.
+May I offer you a pot of 'ome-brewed ale, sir?  By your leave!
+This way, if you please.  I am 'eartily grateful--'eartily pleased
+to be of any service to a gentleman like you, sir, which is related
+to the Vis-count, and really a fambly of which you might well be
+proud!  Take care of the step, sir.  You have good news of 'is
+'ealth, I trust? as well as that of Monseer the Count?'
+
+God forgive me! the horrible fellow was still puffing and panting
+with the fury of his assault, and already he had fallen into an
+obsequious, wheedling familiarity like that of an old servant,--
+already he was flattering me on my family connections!
+
+I followed him through the house into the stable-yard, where I
+observed the driver washing the cart in a shed.  He must have heard
+the explosion of the pistol.  He could not choose but hear it:  the
+thing was shaped like a little blunderbuss, charged to the mouth,
+and made a report like a piece of field artillery.  He had heard,
+he had paid no attention; and now, as we came forth by the back-
+door, he raised for a moment a pale and tell-tale face that was as
+direct as a confession.  The rascal had expected to see Fenn come
+forth alone; he was waiting to be called on for that part of
+sexton, which I had already allotted to him in fancy.
+
+I need not detain the reader very long with any description of my
+visit to the back-kitchen; of how we mulled our ale there, and
+mulled it very well; nor of how we sat talking, Fenn like an old,
+faithful, affectionate dependant, and I--well!  I myself fallen
+into a mere admiration of so much impudence, that transcended
+words, and had very soon conquered animosity.  I took a fancy to
+the man, he was so vast a humbug.  I began to see a kind of beauty
+in him, his aplomb was so majestic.  I never knew a rogue to cut so
+fat; his villainy was ample, like his belly, and I could scarce
+find it in my heart to hold him responsible for either.  He was
+good enough to drop into the autobiographical; telling me how the
+farm, in spite of the war and the high prices, had proved a
+disappointment; how there was 'a sight of cold, wet land as you
+come along the 'igh-road'; how the winds and rains and the seasons
+had been misdirected, it seemed 'o' purpose'; how Mrs. Fenn had
+died--'I lost her coming two year agone; a remarkable fine woman,
+my old girl, sir! if you'll excuse me,' he added, with a burst of
+humility.  In short, he gave me an opportunity of studying John
+Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked--his greed, his usuriousness, his
+hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled to the
+superlative--such as was well worth the little disarray and fluster
+of our passage in the hall.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII--I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN
+
+
+
+As soon as I judged it safe, and that was not before Burchell Fenn
+had talked himself back into his breath and a complete good humour,
+I proposed he should introduce me to the French officers,
+henceforth to become my fellow-passengers.  There were two of them,
+it appeared, and my heart beat as I approached the door.  The
+specimen of Perfidious Albion whom I had just been studying gave me
+the stronger zest for my fellow-countrymen.  I could have embraced
+them; I could have wept on their necks.  And all the time I was
+going to a disappointment.
+
+It was in a spacious and low room, with an outlook on the court,
+that I found them bestowed.  In the good days of that house the
+apartment had probably served as a library, for there were traces
+of shelves along the wainscot.  Four or five mattresses lay on the
+floor in a corner, with a frowsy heap of bedding; near by was a
+basin and a cube of soap; a rude kitchen-table and some deal chairs
+stood together at the far end; and the room was illuminated by no
+less than four windows, and warmed by a little, crazy, sidelong
+grate, propped up with bricks in the vent of a hospitable chimney,
+in which a pile of coals smoked prodigiously and gave out a few
+starveling flames.  An old, frail, white-haired officer sat in one
+of the chairs, which he had drawn close to this apology for a fire.
+He was wrapped in a camlet cloak, of which the collar was turned
+up, his knees touched the bars, his hands were spread in the very
+smoke, and yet he shivered for cold.  The second--a big, florid,
+fine animal of a man, whose every gesture labelled him the cock of
+the walk and the admiration of the ladies--had apparently despaired
+of the fire, and now strode up and down, sneezing hard, bitterly
+blowing his nose, and proffering a continual stream of bluster,
+complaint, and barrack-room oaths.
+
+Fenn showed me in with the brief form of introduction:  'Gentlemen
+all, this here's another fare!' and was gone again at once.  The
+old man gave me but the one glance out of lack-lustre eyes; and
+even as he looked a shiver took him as sharp as a hiccough.  But
+the other, who represented to admiration the picture of a Beau in a
+Catarrh, stared at me arrogantly.
+
+'And who are you, sir?' he asked.
+
+I made the military salute to my superiors.
+
+'Champdivers, private, Eighth of the Line,' said I.
+
+'Pretty business!' said he.  'And you are going on with us?  Three
+in a cart, and a great trolloping private at that!  And who is to
+pay for you, my fine fellow?' he inquired.
+
+'If monsieur comes to that,' I answered civilly, 'who paid for
+him?'
+
+'Oh, if you choose to play the wit!' said he,--and began to rail at
+large upon his destiny, the weather, the cold, the danger and the
+expense of the escape, and, above all, the cooking of the accursed
+English.  It seemed to annoy him particularly that I should have
+joined their party.  'If you knew what you were doing, thirty
+thousand millions of pigs! you would keep yourself to yourself!
+The horses can't drag the cart; the roads are all ruts and swamps.
+No longer ago than last night the Colonel and I had to march half
+the way--thunder of God!--half the way to the knees in mud--and I
+with this infernal cold--and the danger of detection!  Happily we
+met no one:  a desert--a real desert--like the whole abominable
+country!  Nothing to eat--no, sir, there is nothing to eat but raw
+cow and greens boiled in water--nor to drink but Worcestershire
+sauce!  Now I, with my catarrh, I have no appetite; is it not so?
+Well, if I were in France, I should have a good soup with a crust
+in it, an omelette, a fowl in rice, a partridge in cabbages--things
+to tempt me, thunder of God!  But here--day of God!--what a
+country!  And cold, too!  They talk about Russia--this is all the
+cold I want!  And the people--look at them!  What a race!  Never
+any handsome men; never any fine officers!'--and he looked down
+complacently for a moment at his waist--'And the women--what
+faggots!  No, that is one point clear, I cannot stomach the
+English!'
+
+There was something in this man so antipathetic to me, as sent the
+mustard into my nose.  I can never bear your bucks and dandies,
+even when they are decent-looking and well dressed; and the Major--
+for that was his rank--was the image of a flunkey in good luck.
+Even to be in agreement with him, or to seem to be so, was more
+than I could make out to endure.
+
+'You could scarce be expected to stomach them,' said I civilly,
+'after having just digested your parole.'
+
+He whipped round on his heel and turned on me a countenance which I
+dare say he imagined to be awful; but another fit of sneezing cut
+him off ere he could come the length of speech.
+
+'I have not tried the dish myself,' I took the opportunity to add.
+'It is said to be unpalatable.  Did monsieur find it so?'
+
+With surprising vivacity the Colonel woke from his lethargy.  He
+was between us ere another word could pass.
+
+'Shame, gentlemen!' he said.  'Is this a time for Frenchmen and
+fellow-soldiers to fall out?  We are in the midst of our enemies; a
+quarrel, a loud word, may suffice to plunge us back into
+irretrievable distress.  Monsieur le Commandant, you have been
+gravely offended.  I make it my request, I make it my prayer--if
+need be, I give you my orders--that the matter shall stand by until
+we come safe to France.  Then, if you please, I will serve you in
+any capacity.  And for you, young man, you have shown all the
+cruelty and carelessness of youth.  This gentleman is your
+superior; he is no longer young'--at which word you are to conceive
+the Major's face.  'It is admitted he has broken his parole.  I
+know not his reason, and no more do you.  It might be patriotism in
+this hour of our country's adversity, it might be humanity,
+necessity; you know not what in the least, and you permit yourself
+to reflect on his honour.  To break parole may be a subject for
+pity and not derision.  I have broken mine--I, a colonel of the
+Empire.  And why?  I have been years negotiating my exchange, and
+it cannot be managed; those who have influence at the Ministry of
+War continually rush in before me, and I have to wait, and my
+daughter at home is in a decline.  I am going to see my daughter at
+last, and it is my only concern lest I should have delayed too
+long.  She is ill, and very ill,--at death's door.  Nothing is left
+me but my daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my
+honour, blame me for it who dare!'
+
+At this my heart smote me.
+
+'For God's sake,' I cried, 'think no more of what I have said!  A
+parole? what is a parole against life and death and love?  I ask
+your pardon; this gentleman's also.  As long as I shall be with
+you, you shall not have cause to complain of me again.  I pray God
+you will find your daughter alive and restored.'
+
+'That is past praying for,' said the Colonel; and immediately the
+brief fire died out of him, and, returning to the hearth, he
+relapsed into his former abstraction.
+
+But I was not so easy to compose.  The knowledge of the poor
+gentleman's trouble, and the sight of his face, had filled me with
+the bitterness of remorse; and I insisted upon shaking hands with
+the Major (which he did with a very ill grace), and abounded in
+palinodes and apologies.
+
+'After all,' said I, 'who am I to talk?  I am in the luck to be a
+private soldier; I have no parole to give or to keep; once I am
+over the rampart, I am as free as air.  I beg you to believe that I
+regret from my soul the use of these ungenerous expressions.  Allow
+me . . . Is there no way in this damned house to attract attention?
+Where is this fellow, Fenn?'
+
+I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.  Fenn, who was at
+the moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms like one in
+despair, called to me to keep back, plunged into the house, and
+appeared next moment in the doorway of the chamber.
+
+'Oh, sir!' says he, 'keep away from those there windows.  A body
+might see you from the back lane.'
+
+'It is registered,' said I.  'Henceforward I will be a mouse for
+precaution and a ghost for invisibility.  But in the meantime, for
+God's sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy!  Your room is as damp as
+the bottom of a well, and these gentlemen are perishing of cold.'
+
+So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be paid in
+advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether because I
+threw greater energy into the business, or because the coals were
+now warmed and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze that made the
+chimney roar again.  The shine of it, in that dark, rainy day,
+seemed to reanimate the Colonel like a blink of sun.  With the
+outburst of the flames, besides, a draught was established, which
+immediately delivered us from the plague of smoke; and by the time
+Fenn returned, carrying a bottle under his arm and a single tumbler
+in his hand, there was already an air of gaiety in the room that
+did the heart good.
+
+I poured out some of the brandy.
+
+'Colonel,' said I, 'I am a young man and a private soldier.  I have
+not been long in this room, and already I have shown the petulance
+that belongs to the one character and the ill manners that you may
+look for in the other.  Have the humanity to pass these slips over,
+and honour me so far as to accept this glass.'
+
+'My lad,' says he, waking up and blinking at me with an air of
+suspicion, 'are you sure you can afford it?'
+
+I assured him I could.
+
+'I thank you, then:  I am very cold.'  He took the glass out, and a
+little colour came in his face.  'I thank you again,' said he.  'It
+goes to the heart.'
+
+The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a good
+deal of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the morning,
+now with some sort of apology, now with none at all; and the bottle
+began to look foolish before dinner was served.  It was such a meal
+as he had himself predicted:  beef, greens, potatoes, mustard in a
+teacup, and beer in a brown jug that was all over hounds, horses,
+and hunters, with a fox at the fat end and a gigantic John Bull--
+for all the world like Fenn--sitting in the midst in a bob-wig and
+smoking tobacco.  The beer was a good brew, but not good enough for
+the Major; he laced it with brandy--for his cold, he said; and in
+this curative design the remainder of the bottle ebbed away.  He
+called my attention repeatedly to the circumstance; helped me
+pointedly to the dregs, threw the bottle in the air and played
+tricks with it; and at last, having exhausted his ingenuity, and
+seeing me remain quite blind to every hint, he ordered and paid for
+another himself.
+
+As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and only
+awoke occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he was
+supposed to be doing.  On each of these occasions he showed a
+gratitude and kind courtesy that endeared him to me beyond
+expression.  'Champdivers, my lad, your health!' he would say.
+'The Major and I had a very arduous march last night, and I
+positively thought I should have eaten nothing, but your fortunate
+idea of the brandy has made quite a new man of me--quite a new
+man.'  And he would fall to with a great air of heartiness, cut
+himself a mouthful, and, before he had swallowed it, would have
+forgotten his dinner, his company, the place where he then was, and
+the escape he was engaged on, and become absorbed in the vision of
+a sick-room and a dying girl in France.  The pathos of this
+continual preoccupation, in a man so old, sick, and over-weary, and
+whom I looked upon as a mere bundle of dying bones and death-pains,
+put me wholly from my victuals:  it seemed there was an element of
+sin, a kind of rude bravado of youth, in the mere relishing of food
+at the same table with this tragic father; and though I was well
+enough used to the coarse, plain diet of the English, I ate scarce
+more than himself.  Dinner was hardly over before he succumbed to a
+lethargic sleep; lying on one of the mattresses with his limbs
+relaxed, and his breath seemingly suspended--the very image of
+dissolution.
+
+This left the Major and myself alone at the table.  You must not
+suppose our tete-a-tete was long, but it was a lively period while
+it lasted.  He drank like a fish or an Englishman; shouted, beat
+the table, roared out songs, quarrelled, made it up again, and at
+last tried to throw the dinner-plates through the window, a feat of
+which he was at that time quite incapable.  For a party of
+fugitives, condemned to the most rigorous discretion, there was
+never seen so noisy a carnival; and through it all the Colonel
+continued to sleep like a child.  Seeing the Major so well
+advanced, and no retreat possible, I made a fair wind of a foul
+one, keeping his glass full, pushing him with toasts; and sooner
+than I could have dared to hope, he became drowsy and incoherent.
+With the wrong-headedness of all such sots, he would not be
+persuaded to lie down upon one of the mattresses until I had
+stretched myself upon another.  But the comedy was soon over; soon
+he slept the sleep of the just, and snored like a military music;
+and I might get up again and face (as best I could) the excessive
+tedium of the afternoon.
+
+I had passed the night before in a good bed; I was denied the
+resource of slumber; and there was nothing open for me but to pace
+the apartment, maintain the fire, and brood on my position.  I
+compared yesterday and to-day--the safety, comfort, jollity, open-
+air exercise and pleasant roadside inns of the one, with the
+tedium, anxiety, and discomfort of the other.  I remembered that I
+was in the hands of Fenn, who could not be more false--though he
+might be more vindictive--than I fancied him.  I looked forward to
+nights of pitching in the covered cart, and days of monotony in I
+knew not what hiding-places; and my heart failed me, and I was in
+two minds whether to slink off ere it was too late, and return to
+my former solitary way of travel.  But the Colonel stood in the
+path.  I had not seen much of him; but already I judged him a man
+of a childlike nature--with that sort of innocence and courtesy
+that, I think, is only to be found in old soldiers or old priests--
+and broken with years and sorrow.  I could not turn my back on his
+distress; could not leave him alone with the selfish trooper who
+snored on the next mattress.  'Champdivers, my lad, your health!'
+said a voice in my ear, and stopped me--and there are few things I
+am more glad of in the retrospect than that it did.
+
+It must have been about four in the afternoon--at least the rain
+had taken off, and the sun was setting with some wintry pomp--when
+the current of my reflections was effectually changed by the
+arrival of two visitors in a gig.  They were farmers of the
+neighbourhood, I suppose--big, burly fellows in great-coats and
+top-boots, mightily flushed with liquor when they arrived, and,
+before they left, inimitably drunk.  They stayed long in the
+kitchen with Burchell, drinking, shouting, singing, and keeping it
+up; and the sound of their merry minstrelsy kept me a kind of
+company.  The night fell, and the shine of the fire brightened and
+blinked on the panelled wall.  Our illuminated windows must have
+been visible not only from the back lane of which Fenn had spoken,
+but from the court where the farmers' gig awaited them.  In the far
+end of the firelit room lay my companions, the one silent, the
+other clamorously noisy, the images of death and drunkenness.
+Little wonder if I were tempted to join in the choruses below, and
+sometimes could hardly refrain from laughter, and sometimes, I
+believe, from tears--so unmitigated was the tedium, so cruel the
+suspense, of this period.
+
+At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy minstrels
+appeared in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern, and knocking
+together as they came.  The visitors clambered noisily into the
+gig, one of them shook the reins, and they were snatched out of
+sight and hearing with a suddenness that partook of the nature of
+prodigy.  I am well aware there is a Providence for drunken men,
+that holds the reins for them and presides over their troubles;
+doubtless he had his work cut out for him with this particular
+gigful!  Fenn rescued his toes with an ejaculation from under the
+departing wheels, and turned at once with uncertain steps and
+devious lantern to the far end of the court.  There, through the
+open doors of a coach-house, the shock-headed lad was already to be
+seen drawing forth the covered cart.  If I wished any private talk
+with our host, it must be now or never.
+
+Accordingly I groped my way downstairs, and came to him as he
+looked on at and lighted the harnessing of the horses.
+
+'The hour approaches when we have to part,' said I; 'and I shall be
+obliged if you will tell your servant to drop me at the nearest
+point for Dunstable.  I am determined to go so far with our
+friends, Colonel X and Major Y, but my business is peremptory, and
+it takes me to the neighbourhood of Dunstable.'
+
+Orders were given to my satisfaction, with an obsequiousness that
+seemed only inflamed by his potations.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV--TRAVELS OF THE COVERED CART
+
+
+
+My companions were aroused with difficulty:  the Colonel, poor old
+gentleman, to a sort of permanent dream, in which you could say of
+him only that he was very deaf and anxiously polite; the Major
+still maudlin drunk.  We had a dish of tea by the fireside, and
+then issued like criminals into the scathing cold of the night.
+For the weather had in the meantime changed.  Upon the cessation of
+the rain, a strict frost had succeeded.  The moon, being young, was
+already near the zenith when we started, glittered everywhere on
+sheets of ice, and sparkled in ten thousand icicles.  A more
+unpromising night for a journey it was hard to conceive.  But in
+the course of the afternoon the horses had been well roughed; and
+King (for such was the name of the shock-headed lad) was very
+positive that he could drive us without misadventure.  He was as
+good as his word; indeed, despite a gawky air, he was simply
+invaluable in his present employment, showing marked sagacity in
+all that concerned the care of horses, and guiding us by one short
+cut after another for days, and without a fault.
+
+The interior of that engine of torture, the covered cart, was
+fitted with a bench, on which we took our places; the door was
+shut; in a moment, the night closed upon us solid and stifling; and
+we felt that we were being driven carefully out of the courtyard.
+Careful was the word all night, and it was an alleviation of our
+miseries that we did not often enjoy.  In general, as we were
+driven the better part of the night and day, often at a pretty
+quick pace and always through a labyrinth of the most infamous
+country lanes and by-roads, we were so bruised upon the bench, so
+dashed against the top and sides of the cart, that we reached the
+end of a stage in truly pitiable case, sometimes flung ourselves
+down without the formality of eating, made but one sleep of it
+until the hour of departure returned, and were only properly
+awakened by the first jolt of the renewed journey.  There were
+interruptions, at times, that we hailed as alleviations.  At times
+the cart was bogged, once it was upset, and we must alight and lend
+the driver the assistance of our arms; at times, too (as on the
+occasion when I had first encountered it), the horses gave out, and
+we had to trail alongside in mud or frost until the first peep of
+daylight, or the approach to a hamlet or a high road, bade us
+disappear like ghosts into our prison.
+
+The main roads of England are incomparable for excellence, of a
+beautiful smoothness, very ingeniously laid down, and so well kept
+that in most weathers you could take your dinner off any part of
+them without distaste.  On them, to the note of the bugle, the mail
+did its sixty miles a day; innumerable chaises whisked after the
+bobbing postboys; or some young blood would flit by in a curricle
+and tandem, to the vast delight and danger of the lieges.  On them,
+the slow-pacing waggons made a music of bells, and all day long the
+travellers on horse-back and the travellers on foot (like happy Mr.
+St. Ives so little a while before!) kept coming and going, and
+baiting and gaping at each other, as though a fair were due, and
+they were gathering to it from all England.  No, nowhere in the
+world is travel so great a pleasure as in that country.  But
+unhappily our one need was to be secret; and all this rapid and
+animated picture of the road swept quite apart from us, as we
+lumbered up hill and down dale, under hedge and over stone, among
+circuitous byways.  Only twice did I receive, as it were, a whiff
+of the highway.  The first reached my ears alone.  I might have
+been anywhere.  I only knew I was walking in the dark night and
+among ruts, when I heard very far off, over the silent country that
+surrounded us, the guard's horn wailing its signal to the next
+post-house for a change of horses.  It was like the voice of the
+day heard in darkness, a voice of the world heard in prison, the
+note of a cock crowing in the mid-seas--in short, I cannot tell you
+what it was like, you will have to fancy for yourself--but I could
+have wept to hear it.  Once we were belated:  the cattle could
+hardly crawl, the day was at hand, it was a nipping, rigorous
+morning, King was lashing his horses, I was giving an arm to the
+old Colonel, and the Major was coughing in our rear.  I must
+suppose that King was a thought careless, being nearly in
+desperation about his team, and, in spite of the cold morning,
+breathing hot with his exertions.  We came, at last, a little
+before sunrise to the summit of a hill, and saw the high-road
+passing at right angles through an open country of meadows and
+hedgerow pollards; and not only the York mail, speeding smoothly at
+the gallop of the four horses, but a post-chaise besides, with the
+post-boy titupping briskly, and the traveller himself putting his
+head out of the window, but whether to breathe the dawn, or the
+better to observe the passage of the mail, I do not know.  So that
+we enjoyed for an instant a picture of free life on the road, in
+its most luxurious forms of despatch and comfort.  And thereafter,
+with a poignant feeling of contrast in our hearts, we must mount
+again into our wheeled dungeon.
+
+We came to our stages at all sorts of odd hours, and they were in
+all kinds of odd places.  I may say at once that my first
+experience was my best.  Nowhere again were we so well entertained
+as at Burchell Fenn's.  And this, I suppose, was natural, and
+indeed inevitable, in so long and secret a journey.  The first
+stop, we lay six hours in a barn standing by itself in a poor,
+marshy orchard, and packed with hay; to make it more attractive, we
+were told it had been the scene of an abominable murder, and was
+now haunted.  But the day was beginning to break, and our fatigue
+was too extreme for visionary terrors.  The second or third, we
+alighted on a barren heath about midnight, built a fire to warm us
+under the shelter of some thorns, supped like beggars on bread and
+a piece of cold bacon, and slept like gipsies with our feet to the
+fire.  In the meanwhile, King was gone with the cart, I know not
+where, to get a change of horses, and it was late in the dark
+morning when he returned and we were able to resume our journey.
+In the middle of another night, we came to a stop by an ancient,
+whitewashed cottage of two stories; a privet hedge surrounded it;
+the frosty moon shone blankly on the upper windows; but through
+those of the kitchen the firelight was seen glinting on the roof
+and reflected from the dishes on the wall.  Here, after much
+hammering on the door, King managed to arouse an old crone from the
+chimney-corner chair, where she had been dozing in the watch; and
+we were had in, and entertained with a dish of hot tea.  This old
+lady was an aunt of Burchell Fenn's--and an unwilling partner in
+his dangerous trade.  Though the house stood solitary, and the hour
+was an unlikely one for any passenger upon the road, King and she
+conversed in whispers only.  There was something dismal, something
+of the sick-room, in this perpetual, guarded sibilation.  The
+apprehensions of our hostess insensibly communicated themselves to
+every one present.  We ate like mice in a cat's ear; if one of us
+jingled a teaspoon, all would start; and when the hour came to take
+the road again, we drew a long breath of relief, and climbed to our
+places in the covered cart with a positive sense of escape.  The
+most of our meals, however, were taken boldly at hedgerow
+alehouses, usually at untimely hours of the day, when the clients
+were in the field or the farmyard at labour.  I shall have to tell
+presently of our last experience of the sort, and how unfortunately
+it miscarried; but as that was the signal for my separation from my
+fellow-travellers, I must first finish with them.
+
+I had never any occasion to waver in my first judgment of the
+Colonel.  The old gentleman seemed to me, and still seems in the
+retrospect, the salt of the earth.  I had occasion to see him in
+the extremes of hardship, hunger and cold; he was dying, and he
+looked it; and yet I cannot remember any hasty, harsh, or impatient
+word to have fallen from his lips.  On the contrary, he ever showed
+himself careful to please; and even if he rambled in his talk,
+rambled always gently--like a humane, half-witted old hero, true to
+his colours to the last.  I would not dare to say how often he
+awoke suddenly from a lethargy, and told us again, as though we had
+never heard it, the story of how he had earned the cross, how it
+had been given him by the hand of the Emperor, and of the innocent-
+-and, indeed, foolish--sayings of his daughter when he returned
+with it on his bosom.  He had another anecdote which he was very
+apt to give, by way of a rebuke, when the Major wearied us beyond
+endurance with dispraises of the English.  This was an account of
+the braves gens with whom he had been boarding.  True enough, he
+was a man so simple and grateful by nature, that the most common
+civilities were able to touch him to the heart, and would remain
+written in his memory; but from a thousand inconsiderable but
+conclusive indications, I gathered that this family had really
+loved him, and loaded him with kindness.  They made a fire in his
+bedroom, which the sons and daughters tended with their own hands;
+letters from France were looked for with scarce more eagerness by
+himself than by these alien sympathisers; when they came, he would
+read them aloud in the parlour to the assembled family, translating
+as he went.  The Colonel's English was elementary; his daughter not
+in the least likely to be an amusing correspondent; and, as I
+conceived these scenes in the parlour, I felt sure the interest
+centred in the Colonel himself, and I thought I could feel in my
+own heart that mixture of the ridiculous and the pathetic, the
+contest of tears and laughter, which must have shaken the bosoms of
+the family.  Their kindness had continued till the end.  It appears
+they were privy to his flight, the camlet cloak had been lined
+expressly for him, and he was the bearer of a letter from the
+daughter of the house to his own daughter in Paris.  The last
+evening, when the time came to say good-night, it was tacitly known
+to all that they were to look upon his face no more.  He rose,
+pleading fatigue, and turned to the daughter, who had been his
+chief ally:  'You will permit me, my dear--to an old and very
+unhappy soldier--and may God bless you for your goodness!'  The
+girl threw her arms about his neck and sobbed upon his bosom; the
+lady of the house burst into tears; 'et je vous le jure, le pere se
+mouchait!' quoth the Colonel, twisting his moustaches with a
+cavalry air, and at the same time blinking the water from his eyes
+at the mere recollection.
+
+It was a good thought to me that he had found these friends in
+captivity; that he had started on this fatal journey from so
+cordial a farewell.  He had broken his parole for his daughter:
+that he should ever live to reach her sick-bed, that he could
+continue to endure to an end the hardships, the crushing fatigue,
+the savage cold, of our pilgrimage, I had early ceased to hope.  I
+did for him what I was able,--nursed him, kept him covered, watched
+over his slumbers, sometimes held him in my arms at the rough
+places of the road.  'Champdivers,' he once said, 'you are like a
+son to me--like a son.'  It is good to remember, though at the time
+it put me on the rack.  All was to no purpose.  Fast as we were
+travelling towards France, he was travelling faster still to
+another destination.  Daily he grew weaker and more indifferent.
+An old rustic accent of Lower Normandy reappeared in his speech,
+from which it had long been banished, and grew stronger; old words
+of the patois, too:  Ouistreham, matrasse, and others, the sense of
+which we were sometimes unable to guess.  On the very last day he
+began again his eternal story of the cross and the Emperor.  The
+Major, who was particularly ill, or at least particularly cross,
+uttered some angry words of protest.  'Pardonnez-moi, monsieur le
+commandant, mais c'est pour monsieur,' said the Colonel:  'Monsieur
+has not yet heard the circumstance, and is good enough to feel an
+interest.'  Presently after, however, he began to lose the thread
+of his narrative; and at last:  'Que que j'ai?  Je m'embrouille!'
+says he, 'Suffit:  s'm'a la donne, et Berthe en etait bien
+contente.'  It struck me as the falling of the curtain or the
+closing of the sepulchre doors.
+
+Sure enough, in but a little while after, he fell into a sleep as
+gentle as an infant's, which insensibly changed into the sleep of
+death.  I had my arm about his body at the time and remarked
+nothing, unless it were that he once stretched himself a little, so
+kindly the end came to that disastrous life.  It was only at our
+evening halt that the Major and I discovered we were travelling
+alone with the poor clay.  That night we stole a spade from a
+field--I think near Market Bosworth--and a little farther on, in a
+wood of young oak trees and by the light of King's lantern, we
+buried the old soldier of the Empire with both prayers and tears.
+
+We had needs invent Heaven if it had not been revealed to us; there
+are some things that fall so bitterly ill on this side Time!  As
+for the Major, I have long since forgiven him.  He broke the news
+to the poor Colonel's daughter; I am told he did it kindly; and
+sure, nobody could have done it without tears!  His share of
+purgatory will be brief; and in this world, as I could not very
+well praise him, I have suppressed his name.  The Colonel's also,
+for the sake of his parole.  Requiescat.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV--THE ADVENTURE OF THE ATTORNEY'S CLERK
+
+
+
+I have mentioned our usual course, which was to eat in
+inconsiderable wayside hostelries, known to King.  It was a
+dangerous business; we went daily under fire to satisfy our
+appetite, and put our head in the loin's mouth for a piece of
+bread.  Sometimes, to minimise the risk, we would all dismount
+before we came in view of the house, straggle in severally, and
+give what orders we pleased, like disconnected strangers.  In like
+manner we departed, to find the cart at an appointed place, some
+half a mile beyond.  The Colonel and the Major had each a word or
+two of English--God help their pronunciation!  But they did well
+enough to order a rasher and a pot or call a reckoning; and, to say
+truth, these country folks did not give themselves the pains, and
+had scarce the knowledge, to be critical.
+
+About nine or ten at night the pains of hunger and cold drove us to
+an alehouse in the flats of Bedfordshire, not far from Bedford
+itself.  In the inn kitchen was a long, lean, characteristic-
+looking fellow of perhaps forty, dressed in black.  He sat on a
+settle by the fireside, smoking a long pipe, such as they call a
+yard of clay.  His hat and wig were hanged upon the knob behind
+him, his head as bald as a bladder of lard, and his expression very
+shrewd, cantankerous, and inquisitive.  He seemed to value himself
+above his company, to give himself the airs of a man of the world
+among that rustic herd; which was often no more than his due;
+being, as I afterwards discovered, an attorney's clerk.  I took
+upon myself the more ungrateful part of arriving last; and by the
+time I entered on the scene the Major was already served at a side
+table.  Some general conversation must have passed, and I smelled
+danger in the air.  The Major looked flustered, the attorney's
+clerk triumphant, and three or four peasants in smock-frocks (who
+sat about the fire to play chorus) had let their pipes go out.
+
+'Give you good evening, sir!' said the attorney's clerk to me.
+
+'The same to you, sir,' said I.
+
+'I think this one will do,' quoth the clerk to the yokels with a
+wink; and then, as soon as I had given my order, 'Pray, sir,
+whither are you bound?' he added.
+
+'Sir,' said I, 'I am not one of those who speak either of their
+business or their destination in houses of public entertainment.'
+
+'A good answer,' said he, 'and an excellent principle.  Sir, do you
+speak French?'
+
+'Why, no, sir,' said I.  'A little Spanish at your service.'
+
+'But you know the French accent, perhaps?' said the clerk.
+
+'Well do I do that!' said I.  'The French accent?  Why, I believe I
+can tell a Frenchman in ten words.'
+
+'Here is a puzzle for you, then!' he said.  'I have no material
+doubt myself, but some of these gentlemen are more backward.  The
+lack of education, you know.  I make bold to say that a man cannot
+walk, cannot hear, and cannot see, without the blessings of
+education.'
+
+He turned to the Major, whose food plainly stuck in his throat.
+
+'Now, sir,' pursued the clerk, 'let me have the pleasure to hear
+your voice again.  Where are you going, did you say?'
+
+'Sare, I am go-ing to Lon-don,' said the Major.
+
+I could have flung my plate at him to be such an ass, and to have
+so little a gift of languages where that was the essential.
+
+'What think ye of that?' said the clerk.  'Is that French enough?'
+
+'Good God!' cried I, leaping up like one who should suddenly
+perceive an acquaintance, 'is this you, Mr. Dubois?  Why, who would
+have dreamed of encountering you so far from home?'  As I spoke, I
+shook hands with the Major heartily; and turning to our tormentor,
+'Oh, sir, you may be perfectly reassured!  This is a very honest
+fellow, a late neighbour of mine in the city of Carlisle.'
+
+I thought the attorney looked put out; I little knew the man!
+
+'But he is French,' said he, 'for all that?'
+
+'Ay, to be sure!' said I.  'A Frenchman of the emigration!  None of
+your Buonaparte lot.  I will warrant his views of politics to be as
+sound as your own.'
+
+'What is a little strange,' said the clerk quietly, 'is that Mr.
+Dubois should deny it.'
+
+I got it fair in the face, and took it smiling; but the shock was
+rude, and in the course of the next words I contrived to do what I
+have rarely done, and make a slip in my English.  I kept my liberty
+and life by my proficiency all these months, and for once that I
+failed, it is not to be supposed that I would make a public
+exhibition of the details.  Enough, that it was a very little
+error, and one that might have passed ninety-nine times in a
+hundred.  But my limb of the law was as swift to pick it up as
+though he had been by trade a master of languages.
+
+'Aha!' cries he; 'and you are French, too!  Your tongue bewrays
+you.  Two Frenchmen coming into an alehouse, severally and
+accidentally, not knowing each other, at ten of the clock at night,
+in the middle of Bedfordshire?  No, sir, that shall not pass!  You
+are all prisoners escaping, if you are nothing worse.  Consider
+yourselves under arrest.  I have to trouble you for your papers.'
+
+'Where is your warrant, if you come to that?' said I.  'My papers!
+A likely thing that I would show my papers on the ipse dixit of an
+unknown fellow in a hedge alehouse!'
+
+'Would you resist the law?' says he.
+
+'Not the law, sir!' said I.  'I hope I am too good a subject for
+that.  But for a nameless fellow with a bald head and a pair of
+gingham small-clothes, why certainly!  'Tis my birthright as an
+Englishman.  Where's Magna Charta, else?'
+
+'We will see about that,' says he; and then, addressing the
+assistants, 'where does the constable live?'
+
+'Lord love you, sir!' cried the landlord, 'what are you thinking
+of?  The constable at past ten at night!  Why, he's abed and
+asleep, and good and drunk two hours agone!'
+
+'Ah that a' be!' came in chorus from the yokels.
+
+The attorney's clerk was put to a stand.  He could not think of
+force; there was little sign of martial ardour about the landlord,
+and the peasants were indifferent--they only listened, and gaped,
+and now scratched a head, and now would get a light to their pipes
+from the embers on the hearth.  On the other hand, the Major and I
+put a bold front on the business and defied him, not without some
+ground of law.  In this state of matters he proposed I should go
+along with him to one Squire Merton, a great man of the
+neighbourhood, who was in the commission of the peace, the end of
+his avenue but three lanes away.  I told him I would not stir a
+foot for him if it were to save his soul.  Next he proposed I
+should stay all night where I was, and the constable could see to
+my affair in the morning, when he was sober.  I replied I should go
+when and where I pleased; that we were lawful travellers in the
+fear of God and the king, and I for one would suffer myself to be
+stayed by nobody.  At the same time, I was thinking the matter had
+lasted altogether too long, and I determined to bring it to an end
+at once.
+
+'See here,' said I, getting up, for till now I had remained
+carelessly seated, 'there's only one way to decide a thing like
+this--only one way that's right ENGLISH--and that's man to man.
+Take off your coat, sir, and these gentlemen shall see fair play.'
+At this there came a look in his eye that I could not mistake.  His
+education had been neglected in one essential and eminently British
+particular:  he could not box.  No more could I, you may say; but
+then I had the more impudence--and I had made the proposal.
+
+'He says I'm no Englishman, but the proof of the pudding is the
+eating of it,' I continued.  And here I stripped my coat and fell
+into the proper attitude, which was just about all I knew of this
+barbarian art.  'Why, sir, you seem to me to hang back a little,'
+said I.  'Come, I'll meet you; I'll give you an appetiser--though
+hang me if I can understand the man that wants any enticement to
+hold up his hands.'  I drew a bank-note out of my fob and tossed it
+to the landlord.  'There are the stakes,' said I.  'I'll fight you
+for first blood, since you seem to make so much work about it.  If
+you tap my claret first, there are five guineas for you, and I'll
+go with you to any squire you choose to mention.  If I tap yours,
+you'll perhaps let on that I'm the better man, and allow me to go
+about my lawful business at my own time and convenience, by God; is
+that fair, my lads?' says I, appealing to the company.
+
+'Ay, ay,' said the chorus of chawbacons; 'he can't say no fairer
+nor that, he can't.  Take off thy coat master!'
+
+The limb of the law was now on the wrong side of public opinion,
+and, what heartened me to go on, the position was rapidly changing
+in our favour.  Already the Major was paying his shot to the very
+indifferent landlord, and I could see the white face of King at the
+back-door, making signals of haste.
+
+'Oho!' quoth my enemy, 'you are as full of doubles as a fox, are
+you not?  But I see through you; I see through and through you.
+You would change the venue, would you?'
+
+'I may be transparent, sir,' says I, 'but if you'll do me the
+favour to stand up, you'll find I can hit dam hard.'
+
+'Which is a point, if you will observe, that I had never called in
+question,' said he.  'Why, you ignorant clowns,' he proceeded,
+addressing the company, 'can't you see the fellow's gulling you
+before your eyes?  Can't you see that he has changed the point upon
+me?  I say he's a French prisoner, and he answers that he can box!
+What has that to do with it?  I would not wonder but what he can
+dance, too--they're all dancing masters over there.  I say, and I
+stick to it, that he's a Frenchy.  He says he isn't.  Well then,
+let him out with his papers, if he has them!  If he had, would he
+not show them?  If he had, would he not jump at the idea of going
+to Squire Merton, a man you all know?  Now, you are all plain,
+straightforward Bedfordshire men, and I wouldn't ask a better lot
+to appeal to.  You're not the kind to be talked over with any
+French gammon, and he's plenty of that.  But let me tell him, he
+can take his pigs to another market; they'll never do here; they'll
+never go down in Bedfordshire.  Why! look at the man!  Look at his
+feet!  Has anybody got a foot in the room like that?  See how he
+stands! do any of you fellows stand like that?  Does the landlord,
+there?  Why, he has Frenchman wrote all over him, as big as a sign-
+post!'
+
+This was all very well; and in a different scene I might even have
+been gratified by his remarks; but I saw clearly, if I were to
+allow him to talk, he might turn the tables on me altogether.  He
+might not be much of a hand at boxing; but I was much mistaken, or
+he had studied forensic eloquence in a good school.  In this
+predicament I could think of nothing more ingenious than to burst
+out of the house, under the pretext of an ungovernable rage.  It
+was certainly not very ingenious--it was elementary, but I had no
+choice.
+
+'You white-livered dog!' I broke out.  'Do you dare to tell me
+you're an Englishman, and won't fight?  But I'll stand no more of
+this!  I leave this place, where I've been insulted!  Here! what's
+to pay?  Pay yourself!' I went on, offering the landlord a handful
+of silver, 'and give me back my bank-note!'
+
+The landlord, following his usual policy of obliging everybody,
+offered no opposition to my design.  The position of my adversary
+was now thoroughly bad.  He had lost my two companions.  He was on
+the point of losing me also.  There was plainly no hope of arousing
+the company to help; and watching him with a corner of my eye, I
+saw him hesitate for a moment.  The next, he had taken down his hat
+and his wig, which was of black horsehair; and I saw him draw from
+behind the settle a vast hooded great-coat and a small valise.
+'The devil!' thought I:  'is the rascal going to follow me?'
+
+I was scarce clear of the inn before the limb of the law was at my
+heels.  I saw his face plain in the moonlight; and the most
+resolute purpose showed in it, along with an unmoved composure.  A
+chill went over me.  'This is no common adventure,' thinks I to
+myself.  'You have got hold of a man of character, St. Ives!  A
+bite-hard, a bull-dog, a weasel is on your trail; and how are you
+to throw him off?'  Who was he?  By some of his expressions I
+judged he was a hanger-on of courts.  But in what character had he
+followed the assizes?  As a simple spectator, as a lawyer's clerk,
+as a criminal himself, or--last and worst supposition--as a Bow-
+street 'runner'?
+
+The cart would wait for me, perhaps, half a mile down our onward
+road, which I was already following.  And I told myself that in a
+few minutes' walking, Bow-street runner or not, I should have him
+at my mercy.  And then reflection came to me in time.  Of all
+things, one was out of the question.  Upon no account must this
+obtrusive fellow see the cart.  Until I had killed or shook him
+off, I was quite divorced from my companions--alone, in the midst
+of England, on a frosty by-way leading whither I knew not, with a
+sleuth-hound at my heels, and never a friend but the holly-stick!
+
+We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes.  The branch to the
+left was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and dark.  Not a ray of
+moonlight penetrated its recesses; and I took it at a venture.  The
+wretch followed my example in silence; and for some time we
+crunched together over frozen pools without a word.  Then he found
+his voice, with a chuckle.
+
+'This is not the way to Mr. Merton's,' said he.
+
+'No?' said I. 'It is mine, however.'
+
+'And therefore mine,' said he.
+
+Again we fell silent; and we may thus have covered half a mile
+before the lane, taking a sudden turn, brought us forth again into
+the moonshine.  With his hooded great-coat on his back, his valise
+in his hand, his black wig adjusted, and footing it on the ice with
+a sort of sober doggedness of manner, my enemy was changed almost
+beyond recognition:  changed in everything but a certain dry,
+polemical, pedantic air, that spoke of a sedentary occupation and
+high stools.  I observed, too, that his valise was heavy; and,
+putting this and that together, hit upon a plan.
+
+'A seasonable night, sir,' said I.  'What do you say to a bit of
+running?  The frost has me by the toes.'
+
+'With all the pleasure in life,' says he.
+
+His voice seemed well assured, which pleased me little.  However,
+there was nothing else to try, except violence, for which it would
+always be too soon.  I took to my heels accordingly, he after me;
+and for some time the slapping of our feet on the hard road might
+have been heard a mile away.  He had started a pace behind me, and
+he finished in the same position.  For all his extra years and the
+weight of his valise, he had not lost a hair's breadth.  The devil
+might race him for me--I had enough of it!
+
+And, besides, to run so fast was contrary to my interests.  We
+could not run long without arriving somewhere.  At any moment we
+might turn a corner and find ourselves at the lodge-gate of some
+Squire Merton, in the midst of a village whose constable was sober,
+or in the hands of a patrol.  There was no help for it--I must
+finish with him on the spot, as long as it was possible.  I looked
+about me, and the place seemed suitable; never a light, never a
+house--nothing but stubble-fields, fallows, and a few stunted
+trees.  I stopped and eyed him in the moonlight with an angry
+stare.
+
+'Enough of this foolery!' said I.
+
+He had tamed, and now faced me full, very pale, but with no sign of
+shrinking.
+
+'I am quite of your opinion,' said he.  'You have tried me at the
+running; you can try me next at the high jump.  It will be all the
+same.  It must end the one way.'
+
+I made my holly whistle about my head.
+
+'I believe you know what way!' said I.  'We are alone, it is night,
+and I am wholly resolved.  Are you not frightened?'
+
+'No,' he said, 'not in the smallest.  I do not box, sir; but I am
+not a coward, as you may have supposed.  Perhaps it will simplify
+our relations if I tell you at the outset that I walk armed.'
+
+Quick as lightning I made a feint at his head; as quickly he gave
+ground, and at the same time I saw a pistol glitter in his hand.
+
+'No more of that, Mr. French-Prisoner!' he said.  'It will do me no
+good to have your death at my door.'
+
+'Faith, nor me either!' said I; and I lowered my stick and
+considered the man, not without a twinkle of admiration.  'You
+see,' I said, 'there is one consideration that you appear to
+overlook:  there are a great many chances that your pistol may miss
+fire.'
+
+'I have a pair,' he returned.  'Never travel without a brace of
+barkers.'
+
+'I make you my compliment,' said I.  'You are able to take care of
+yourself, and that is a good trait.  But, my good man! let us look
+at this matter dispassionately.  You are not a coward, and no more
+am I; we are both men of excellent sense; I have good reason,
+whatever it may be, to keep my concerns to myself and to walk
+alone.  Now I put it to you pointedly, am I likely to stand it?  Am
+I likely to put up with your continued and--excuse me--highly
+impudent ingerence into my private affairs?'
+
+'Another French word,' says he composedly.
+
+'Oh! damn your French words!' cried I.  'You seem to be a Frenchman
+yourself!'
+
+'I have had many opportunities by which I have profited,' he
+explained.  'Few men are better acquainted with the similarities
+and differences, whether of idiom or accent, of the two languages.'
+
+'You are a pompous fellow, too!' said I.
+
+'Oh, I can make distinctions, sir,' says he.  'I can talk with
+Bedfordshire peasants; and I can express myself becomingly, I hope,
+in the company of a gentleman of education like yourself.'
+
+'If you set up to be a gentleman--' I began.
+
+'Pardon me,' he interrupted:  'I make no such claim.  I only see
+the nobility and gentry in the way of business.  I am quite a plain
+person.'
+
+'For the Lord's sake,' I exclaimed, 'set my mind at rest upon one
+point.  In the name of mystery, who and what are you?'
+
+'I have no cause to be ashamed of my name, sir,' said he, 'nor yet
+my trade.  I am Thomas Dudgeon, at your service, clerk to Mr.
+Daniel Romaine, solicitor of London; High Holborn is our address,
+sir.'
+
+It was only by the ecstasy of the relief that I knew how horribly I
+had been frightened.  I flung my stick on the road.
+
+'Romaine?' I cried.  'Daniel Romaine?  An old hunks with a red face
+and a big head, and got up like a Quaker?  My dear friend, to my
+arms!'
+
+'Keep back, I say!' said Dudgeon weakly.
+
+I would not listen to him.  With the end of my own alarm, I felt as
+if I must infallibly be at the end of all dangers likewise; as if
+the pistol that he held in one hand were no more to be feared than
+the valise that he carried with the other, and now put up like a
+barrier against my advance.
+
+'Keep back, or I declare I will fire,' he was crying.  'Have a
+care, for God's sake!  My pistol--'
+
+He might scream as be pleased.  Willy nilly, I folded him to my
+breast, I pressed him there, I kissed his ugly mug as it had never
+been kissed before and would never be kissed again; and in the
+doing so knocked his wig awry and his hat off.  He bleated in my
+embrace; so bleats the sheep in the arms of the butcher.  The whole
+thing, on looking back, appears incomparably reckless and absurd; I
+no better than a madman for offering to advance on Dudgeon, and he
+no better than a fool for not shooting me while I was about it.
+But all's well that ends well; or, as the people in these days kept
+singing and whistling on the streets:-
+
+
+'There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft
+And looks out for the life of poor Jack.'
+
+
+'There!' said I, releasing him a little, but still keeping my hands
+on his shoulders, 'je vous ai bel et bien embrasse--and, as you
+would say, there is another French word.'  With his wig over one
+eye, he looked incredibly rueful and put out.  'Cheer up, Dudgeon;
+the ordeal is over, you shall be embraced no more.  But do, first
+of all, for God's-sake, put away your pistol; you handle it as if
+you were a cockatrice; some time or other, depend upon it, it will
+certainly go off.  Here is your hat.  No, let me put it on square,
+and the wig before it.  Never suffer any stress of circumstances to
+come between you and the duty you owe to yourself.  If you have
+nobody else to dress for, dress for God!
+
+
+'Put your wig straight
+On your bald pate,
+Keep your chin scraped,
+And your figure draped.
+
+
+Can you match me that?  The whole duty of man in a quatrain!  And
+remark, I do not set up to be a professional bard; these are the
+outpourings of a dilettante.'
+
+'But, my dear sir!' he exclaimed.
+
+'But, my dear sir!' I echoed, 'I will allow no man to interrupt the
+flow of my ideas.  Give me your opinion on my quatrain, or I vow we
+shall have a quarrel of it.'
+
+'Certainly you are quite an original,' he said.
+
+'Quite,' said I; 'and I believe I have my counterpart before me.'
+
+'Well, for a choice,' says he, smiling, 'and whether for sense or
+poetry, give me
+
+
+'"Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow:
+The rest is all but leather and prunello."'
+
+
+'Oh, but that's not fair--that's Pope!  It's not original, Dudgeon.
+Understand me,' said I, wringing his breast-button, 'the first duty
+of all poetry is to be mine, sir--mine.  Inspiration now swells in
+my bosom, because--to tell you the plain truth, and descend a
+little in style--I am devilish relieved at the turn things have
+taken.  So, I dare say, are you yourself, Dudgeon, if you would
+only allow it.  And a propos, let me ask you a home question.
+Between friends, have you ever fired that pistol?'
+
+'Why, yes, sir,' he replied.  'Twice--at hedgesparrows.'
+
+'And you would have fired at me, you bloody-minded man?' I cried.
+
+'If you go to that, you seemed mighty reckless with your stick,'
+said Dudgeon.
+
+'Did I indeed?  Well, well, 'tis all past history; ancient as King
+Pharamond--which is another French word, if you cared to accumulate
+more evidence,' says I.  'But happily we are now the best of
+friends, and have all our interests in common.'
+
+'You go a little too fast, if you'll excuse me, Mr. -:  I do not
+know your name, that I am aware,' said Dudgeon.
+
+'No, to be sure!' said I.  'Never heard of it!'
+
+'A word of explanation--' he began.
+
+'No, Dudgeon!' I interrupted.  'Be practical; I know what you want,
+and the name of it is supper.  Rien ne creuse comme l'emotion.  I
+am hungry myself, and yet I am more accustomed to warlike
+palpitations than you, who are but a hunter of hedgesparrows.  Let
+me look at your face critically:  your bill of fare is three slices
+of cold rare roast beef, a Welsh rabbit, a pot of stout, and a
+glass or two of sound tawny port, old in bottle--the right milk of
+Englishmen.'  Methought there seemed a brightening in his eye and a
+melting about his mouth at this enumeration.
+
+'The night is young,' I continued; 'not much past eleven, for a
+wager.  Where can we find a good inn?  And remark that I say GOOD,
+for the port must be up to the occasion--not a headache in a pipe
+of it.'
+
+'Really, sir,' he said, smiling a little, 'you have a way of
+carrying things--'
+
+'Will nothing make you stick to the subject?' I cried; 'you have
+the most irrelevant mind!  How do you expect to rise in your
+profession?  The inn?'
+
+'Well, I will say you are a facetious gentleman!' said he.  'You
+must have your way, I see.  We are not three miles from Bedford by
+this very road.'
+
+'Done!' cried I.  'Bedford be it!'
+
+I tucked his arm under mine, possessed myself of the valise, and
+walked him off unresisting.  Presently we came to an open piece of
+country lying a thought downhill.  The road was smooth and free of
+ice, the moonshine thin and bright over the meadows and the
+leafless trees.  I was now honestly done with the purgatory of the
+covered cart; I was close to my great-uncle's; I had no more fear
+of Mr. Dudgeon; which were all grounds enough for jollity.  And I
+was aware, besides, of us two as of a pair of tiny and solitary
+dolls under the vast frosty cupola of the midnight; the rooms
+decked, the moon burnished, the least of the stars lighted, the
+floor swept and waxed, and nothing wanting but for the band to
+strike up and the dancing to begin.  In the exhilaration of my
+heart I took the music on myself -
+
+
+'Merrily danced the Quaker's wife,
+And merrily danced the Quaker.'
+
+
+I broke into that animated and appropriate air, clapped my arm
+about Dudgeon's waist, and away down the hill at a dancing step!
+He hung back a little at the start, but the impulse of the tune,
+the night, and my example, were not to be resisted.  A man made of
+putty must have danced, and even Dudgeon showed himself to be a
+human being.  Higher and higher were the capers that we cut; the
+moon repeated in shadow our antic footsteps and gestures; and it
+came over my mind of a sudden--really like balm--what appearance of
+man I was dancing with, what a long bilious countenance he had
+shown under his shaven pate, and what a world of trouble the rascal
+had given me in the immediate past.
+
+Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.  My Puritanic
+companion stopped and disengaged himself.
+
+'This is a trifle infra dig., sir, is it not?' said he.  'A party
+might suppose we had been drinking.'
+
+'And so you shall be, Dudgeon,' said I.  'You shall not only be
+drinking, you old hypocrite, but you shall be drunk--dead drunk,
+sir--and the boots shall put you to bed!  We'll warn him when we go
+in.  Never neglect a precaution; never put off till to-morrow what
+you can do to-day!'
+
+But he had no more frivolity to complain of.  We finished our stage
+and came to the inn-door with decorum, to find the house still
+alight and in a bustle with many late arrivals; to give our orders
+with a prompt severity which ensured obedience, and to be served
+soon after at a side-table, close to the fire and in a blaze of
+candle-light, with such a meal as I had been dreaming of for days
+past.  For days, you are to remember, I had been skulking in the
+covered cart, a prey to cold, hunger, and an accumulation of
+discomforts that might have daunted the most brave; and the white
+table napery, the bright crystal, the reverberation of the fire,
+the red curtains, the Turkey carpet, the portraits on the coffee-
+room wall, the placid faces of the two or three late guests who
+were silently prolonging the pleasures of digestion, and (last, but
+not by any means least) a glass of an excellent light dry port, put
+me in a humour only to be described as heavenly.  The thought of
+the Colonel, of how he would have enjoyed this snug room and
+roaring fire, and of his cold grave in the wood by Market Bosworth,
+lingered on my palate, amari aliquid, like an after-taste, but was
+not able--I say it with shame--entirely to dispel my self-
+complacency.  After all, in this world every dog hangs by its own
+tail.  I was a free adventurer, who had just brought to a
+successful end--or, at least, within view of it--an adventure very
+difficult and alarming; and I looked across at Mr. Dudgeon, as the
+port rose to his cheeks, and a smile, that was semi-confidential
+and a trifle foolish, began to play upon his leathery features, not
+only with composure, but with a suspicion of kindness.  The rascal
+had been brave, a quality for which I would value the devil; and if
+he had been pertinacious in the beginning, he had more than made up
+for it before the end.
+
+'And now, Dudgeon, to explain,' I began.  'I know your master, he
+knows me, and he knows and approves of my errand.  So much I may
+tell you, that I am on my way to Amersham Place.'
+
+'Oho!' quoth Dudgeon, 'I begin to see.'
+
+'I am heartily glad of it,' said I, passing the bottle, 'because
+that is about all I can tell you.  You must take my word for the
+remainder.  Either believe me or don't.  If you don't, let's take a
+chaise; you can carry me to-morrow to High Holborn, and confront me
+with Mr. Romaine; the result of which will be to set your mind at
+rest--and to make the holiest disorder in your master's plans.  If
+I judge you aright (for I find you a shrewd fellow), this will not
+be at all to your mind.  You know what a subordinate gets by
+officiousness; if I can trust my memory, old Romaine has not at all
+the face that I should care to see in anger; and I venture to
+predict surprising results upon your weekly salary--if you are paid
+by the week, that is.  In short, let me go free, and 'tis an end of
+the matter; take me to London, and 'tis only a beginning--and, by
+my opinion, a beginning of troubles.  You can take your choice.'
+
+'And that is soon taken,' said he.  'Go to Amersham tomorrow, or go
+to the devil if you prefer--I wash my hands of you and the whole
+transaction.  No, you don't find me putting my head in between
+Romaine and a client!  A good man of business, sir, but hard as
+millstone grit.  I might get the sack, and I shouldn't wonder!
+But, it's a pity, too,' he added, and sighed, shook his head, and
+took his glass off sadly.
+
+'That reminds me,' said I.  'I have a great curiosity, and you can
+satisfy it.  Why were you so forward to meddle with poor Mr.
+Dubois?  Why did you transfer your attentions to me?  And
+generally, what induced you to make yourself such a nuisance?'
+
+He blushed deeply.
+
+'Why, sir,' says he, 'there is such a thing as patriotism, I hope.'
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI--THE HOME-COMING OF MR. ROWLEY'S VISCOUNT
+
+
+
+By eight the next morning Dudgeon and I had made our parting.  By
+that time we had grown to be extremely familiar; and I would very
+willingly have kept him by me, and even carried him to Amersham
+Place.  But it appeared he was due at the public-house where we had
+met, on some affairs of my great-uncle the Count, who had an
+outlying estate in that part of the shire.  If Dudgeon had had his
+way the night before, I should have been arrested on my uncle's
+land and by my uncle's agent, a culmination of ill-luck.
+
+A little after noon I started, in a hired chaise, by way of
+Dunstable.  The mere mention of the name Amersham Place made every
+one supple and smiling.  It was plainly a great house, and my uncle
+lived there in style.  The fame of it rose as we approached, like a
+chain of mountains; at Bedford they touched their caps, but in
+Dunstable they crawled upon their bellies.  I thought the landlady
+would have kissed me; such a flutter of cordiality, such smiles,
+such affectionate attentions were called forth, and the good lady
+bustled on my service in such a pother of ringlets and with such a
+jingling of keys.  'You're probably expected, sir, at the Place?  I
+do trust you may 'ave better accounts of his lordship's 'elth, sir.
+We understood that his lordship, Mosha de Carwell, was main bad.
+Ha, sir, we shall all feel his loss, poor, dear, noble gentleman;
+and I'm sure nobody more polite!  They do say, sir, his wealth is
+enormous, and before the Revolution, quite a prince in his own
+country!  But I beg your pardon, sir; 'ow I do run on, to be sure;
+and doubtless all beknown to you already!  For you do resemble the
+family, sir.  I should have known you anywheres by the likeness to
+the dear viscount.  Ha, poor gentleman, he must 'ave a 'eavy 'eart
+these days.'
+
+In the same place I saw out of the inn-windows a man-servant
+passing in the livery of my house, which you are to think I had
+never before seen worn, or not that I could remember.  I had often
+enough, indeed, pictured myself advanced to be a Marshal, a Duke of
+the Empire, a Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour, and some other
+kickshaws of the kind, with a perfect rout of flunkeys correctly
+dressed in my own colours.  But it is one thing to imagine, and
+another to see; it would be one thing to have these liveries in a
+house of my own in Paris--it was quite another to find them
+flaunting in the heart of hostile England; and I fear I should have
+made a fool of myself, if the man had not been on the other side of
+the street, and I at a one-pane window.  There was something
+illusory in this transplantation of the wealth and honours of a
+family, a thing by its nature so deeply rooted in the soil;
+something ghostly in this sense of home-coming so far from home.
+
+From Dunstable I rolled away into a crescendo of similar
+impressions.  There are certainly few things to be compared with
+these castles, or rather country seats, of the English nobility and
+gentry; nor anything at all to equal the servility of the
+population that dwells in their neighbourhood.  Though I was but
+driving in a hired chaise, word of my destination seemed to have
+gone abroad, and the women curtseyed and the men louted to me by
+the wayside.  As I came near, I began to appreciate the roots of
+this widespread respect.  The look of my uncle's park wall, even
+from the outside, had something of a princely character; and when I
+came in view of the house itself, a sort of madness of vicarious
+vain-glory struck me dumb and kept me staring.  It was about the
+size of the Tuileries.  It faced due north; and the last rays of
+the sun, that was setting like a red-hot shot amidst a tumultuous
+gathering of snow clouds, were reflected on the endless rows of
+windows.  A portico of Doric columns adorned the front, and would
+have done honour to a temple.  The servant who received me at the
+door was civil to a fault--I had almost said, to offence; and the
+hall to which he admitted me through a pair of glass doors was
+warmed and already partly lighted by a liberal chimney heaped with
+the roots of beeches.
+
+'Vicomte Anne de St. Yves,' said I, in answer to the man's
+question; whereupon he bowed before me lower still, and stepping
+upon one side introduced me to the truly awful presence of the
+major-domo.  I have seen many dignitaries in my time, but none who
+quite equalled this eminent being; who was good enough to answer to
+the unassuming name of Dawson.  From him I learned that my uncle
+was extremely low, a doctor in close attendance, Mr. Romaine
+expected at any moment, and that my cousin, the Vicomte de St.
+Yves, had been sent for the same morning.
+
+'It was a sudden seizure, then?' I asked.
+
+Well, he would scarcely go as far as that.  It was a decline, a
+fading away, sir; but he was certainly took bad the day before, had
+sent for Mr. Romaine, and the major-domo had taken it on himself a
+little later to send word to the Viscount.  'It seemed to me, my
+lord,' said he, 'as if this was a time when all the fambly should
+be called together.'
+
+I approved him with my lips, but not in my heart.  Dawson was
+plainly in the interests of my cousin.
+
+'And when can I expect to see my great-uncle, the Count?' said I.
+
+In the evening, I was told; in the meantime he would show me to my
+room, which had been long prepared for me, and I should be expected
+to dine in about an hour with the doctor, if my lordship had no
+objections.
+
+My lordship had not the faintest.
+
+'At the same time,' I said, 'I have had an accident:  I have
+unhappily lost my baggage, and am here in what I stand in.  I don't
+know if the doctor be a formalist, but it is quite impossible I
+should appear at table as I ought.'
+
+He begged me to be under no anxiety.  'We have been long expecting
+you,' said he.  'All is ready.'
+
+Such I found to be the truth.  A great room had been prepared for
+me; through the mullioned windows the last flicker of the winter
+sunset interchanged with the reverberation of a royal fire; the bed
+was open, a suit of evening clothes was airing before the blaze,
+and from the far corner a boy came forward with deprecatory smiles.
+The dream in which I had been moving seemed to have reached its
+pitch.  I might have quitted this house and room only the night
+before; it was my own place that I had come to; and for the first
+time in my life I understood the force of the words home and
+welcome.
+
+'This will be all as you would want, sir?' said Mr. Dawson.  'This
+'ere boy, Rowley, we place entirely at your disposition.  'E's not
+exactly a trained vallet, but Mossho Powl, the Viscount's
+gentleman, 'ave give him the benefick of a few lessons, and it is
+'oped that he may give sitisfection.  Hanythink that you may
+require, if you will be so good as to mention the same to Rowley, I
+will make it my business myself, sir, to see you sitisfied.'
+
+So saying, the eminent and already detested Mr. Dawson took his
+departure, and I was left alone with Rowley.  A man who may be said
+to have wakened to consciousness in the prison of the Abbaye, among
+those ever graceful and ever tragic figures of the brave and fair,
+awaiting the hour of the guillotine and denuded of every comfort, I
+had never known the luxuries or the amenities of my rank in life.
+To be attended on by servants I had only been accustomed to in
+inns.  My toilet had long been military, to a moment, at the note
+of a bugle, too often at a ditch-side.  And it need not be wondered
+at if I looked on my new valet with a certain diffidence.  But I
+remembered that if he was my first experience of a valet, I was his
+first trial as a master.  Cheered by which consideration, I
+demanded my bath in a style of good assurance.  There was a
+bathroom contiguous; in an incredibly short space of time the hot
+water was ready; and soon after, arrayed in a shawl dressing-gown,
+and in a luxury of contentment and comfort, I was reclined in an
+easy-chair before the mirror, while Rowley, with a mixture of pride
+and anxiety which I could well understand, laid out his razors.
+
+'Hey, Rowley?' I asked, not quite resigned to go under fire with
+such an inexperienced commander.  'It's all right, is it?  You feel
+pretty sure of your weapons?'
+
+'Yes, my lord,' he replied.  'It's all right, I assure your
+lordship.'
+
+'I beg your pardon, Mr. Rowley, 'but for the sake of shortness,
+would you mind not belording me in private?' said I.  'It will do
+very well if you call me Mr. Anne.  It is the way of my country, as
+I dare say you know.'
+
+Mr. Rowley looked blank.
+
+'But you're just as much a Viscount as Mr. Powl's, are you not?' he
+said.
+
+'As Mr. Powl's Viscount?' said I, laughing.  'Oh, keep your mind
+easy, Mr. Rowley's is every bit as good.  Only, you see, as I am of
+the younger line, I bear my Christian name along with the title.
+Alain is the Viscount; I am the Viscount Anne.  And in giving me
+the name of Mr. Anne, I assure you you will be quite regular.'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said the docile youth.  'But about the shaving,
+sir, you need be under no alarm.  Mr. Powl says I 'ave excellent
+dispositions.'
+
+'Mr. Powl?' said I.  'That doesn't seem to me very like a French
+name.'
+
+'No, sir, indeed, my lord,' said he, with a burst of confidence.
+'No, indeed, Mr. Anne, and it do not surely.  I should say now, it
+was more like Mr. Pole.'
+
+'And Mr. Powl is the Viscount's man?'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said he.  'He 'ave a hard billet, he do.  The
+Viscount is a very particular gentleman.  I don't think as you'll
+be, Mr. Anne?' he added, with a confidential smile in the mirror.
+
+He was about sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry, freckled
+face, and a pair of dancing eyes.  There was an air at once
+deprecatory and insinuating about the rascal that I thought I
+recognised.  There came to me from my own boyhood memories of
+certain passionate admirations long passed away, and the objects of
+them long ago discredited or dead.  I remembered how anxious I had
+been to serve those fleeting heroes, how readily I told myself I
+would have died for THEM, how much greater and handsomer than life
+they had appeared.  And looking in the mirror, it seemed to me that
+I read the face of Rowley, like an echo or a ghost, by the light of
+my own youth.  I have always contended (somewhat against the
+opinion of my friends) that I am first of all an economist; and the
+last thing that I would care to throw away is that very valuable
+piece of property--a boy's hero-worship.
+
+'Why,' said I, 'you shave like an angel, Mr. Rowley!'
+
+'Thank you, my lord,' says he.  'Mr. Powl had no fear of me. You
+may be sure, sir, I should never 'ave had this berth if I 'adn't
+'ave been up to Dick.  We been expecting of you this month back.
+My eye!  I never see such preparations.  Every day the fires has
+been kep' up, the bed made, and all!  As soon as it was known you
+were coming, sir, I got the appointment; and I've been up and down
+since then like a Jack-in-the-box.  A wheel couldn't sound in the
+avenue but what I was at the window!  I've had a many
+disappointments; but to-night, as soon as you stepped out of the
+shay, I knew it was my--it was you.  Oh, you had been expected!
+Why, when I go down to supper, I'll be the 'ero of the servants'
+'all:  the 'ole of the staff is that curious!'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I hope you may be able to give a fair account of
+me--sober, steady, industrious, good-tempered, and with a first-
+rate character from my last place?'
+
+He laughed an embarrassed laugh.  'Your hair curls beautiful,' he
+said, by way of changing the subject.  'The Viscount's the boy for
+curls, though; and the richness of it is, Mr. Powl tells me his
+don't curl no more than that much twine--by nature.  Gettin' old,
+the Viscount is.  He 'AVE gone the pace, 'aven't 'e, sir?'
+
+'The fact is,' said I, 'that I know very little about him.  Our
+family has been much divided, and I have been a soldier from a
+child.'
+
+'A soldier, Mr. Anne, sir?' cried Rowley, with a sudden feverish
+animation.  'Was you ever wounded?'
+
+It is contrary to my principles to discourage admiration for
+myself; and, slipping back the shoulder of the dressing-gown, I
+silently exhibited the scar which I had received in Edinburgh
+Castle.  He looked at it with awe.
+
+'Ah, well!' he continued, 'there's where the difference comes in!
+It's in the training.  The other Viscount have been horse-racing,
+and dicing, and carrying on all his life.  All right enough, no
+doubt; but what I do say is, that it don't lead to nothink.
+Whereas--'
+
+'Whereas Mr. Rowley's?' I put in.
+
+'My Viscount?' said he.  'Well, sir, I DID say it; and now that
+I've seen you, I say it again!'
+
+I could not refrain from smiling at this outburst, and the rascal
+caught me in the mirror and smiled to me again.
+
+'I'd say it again, Mr. Hanne,' he said.  'I know which side my
+bread's buttered.  I know when a gen'leman's a gen'leman.  Mr. Powl
+can go to Putney with his one!  Beg your pardon, Mr. Anne, for
+being so familiar,' said he, blushing suddenly scarlet.  'I was
+especially warned against it by Mr. Powl.'
+
+'Discipline before all,' said I.  'Follow your front-rank man.
+
+With that, we began to turn our attention to the clothes.  I was
+amazed to find them fit so well:  not a la diable, in the haphazard
+manner of a soldier's uniform or a ready-made suit; but with
+nicety, as a trained artist might rejoice to make them for a
+favourite subject.
+
+''Tis extraordinary,' cried I:  'these things fit me perfectly.'
+
+'Indeed, Mr. Anne, you two be very much of a shape,' said Rowley.
+
+'Who?  What two?' said I.
+
+'The Viscount,' he said.
+
+'Damnation!  Have I the man's clothes on me, too?' cried I.
+
+But Rowley hastened to reassure me.  On the first word of my
+coming, the Count had put the matter of my wardrobe in the hands of
+his own and my cousin's tailors; and on the rumour of our
+resemblance, my clothes had been made to Alain's measure.
+
+'But they were all made for you express, Mr. Anne.  You may be
+certain the Count would never do nothing by 'alf:  fires kep'
+burning; the finest of clothes ordered, I'm sure, and a body-
+servant being trained a-purpose.'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'it's a good fire, and a good set-out of clothes;
+and what a valet, Mr. Rowley!  And there's one thing to be said for
+my cousin--I mean for Mr. Powl's Viscount--he has a very fair
+figure.'
+
+'Oh, don't you be took in, Mr. Anne,' quoth the faithless Rowley:
+'he has to be hyked into a pair of stays to get them things on!'
+
+'Come, come, Mr. Rowley,' said I, 'this is telling tales out of
+school!  Do not you be deceived.  The greatest men of antiquity,
+including Caesar and Hannibal and Pope Joan, may have been very
+glad, at my time of life or Alain's, to follow his example.  'Tis a
+misfortune common to all; and really,' said I, bowing to myself
+before the mirror like one who should dance the minuet, 'when the
+result is so successful as this, who would do anything but
+applaud?'
+
+My toilet concluded, I marched on to fresh surprises.  My chamber,
+my new valet and my new clothes had been beyond hope:  the dinner,
+the soup, the whole bill of fare was a revelation of the powers
+there are in man.  I had not supposed it lay in the genius of any
+cook to create, out of common beef and mutton, things so different
+and dainty.  The wine was of a piece, the doctor a most agreeable
+companion; nor could I help reflecting on the prospect that all
+this wealth, comfort and handsome profusion might still very
+possibly become mine.  Here were a change indeed, from the common
+soldier and the camp kettle, the prisoner and his prison rations,
+the fugitive and the horrors of the covered cart!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII--THE DESPATCH-BOX
+
+
+
+The doctor had scarce finished his meal before he hastened with an
+apology to attend upon his patient; and almost immediately after I
+was myself summoned and ushered up the great staircase and along
+interminable corridors to the bedside of my great-uncle the Count.
+You are to think that up to the present moment I had not set eyes
+on this formidable personage, only on the evidences of his wealth
+and kindness.  You are to think besides that I had heard him
+miscalled and abused from my earliest childhood up.  The first of
+the emigres could never expect a good word in the society in which
+my father moved.  Even yet the reports I received were of a
+doubtful nature; even Romaine had drawn of him no very amiable
+portrait; and as I was ushered into the room, it was a critical eye
+that I cast on my great-uncle.  He lay propped on pillows in a
+little cot no greater than a camp-bed, not visibly breathing.  He
+was about eighty years of age, and looked it; not that his face was
+much lined, but all the blood and colour seemed to have faded from
+his body, and even his eyes, which last he kept usually closed as
+though the light distressed him.  There was an unspeakable degree
+of slyness in his expression, which kept me ill at ease; he seemed
+to lie there with his arms folded, like a spider waiting for prey.
+His speech was very deliberate and courteous, but scarce louder
+than a sigh.
+
+'I bid you welcome, Monsieur le Vicomte Anne,' said he, looking at
+me hard with his pale eyes, but not moving on his pillows.  'I have
+sent for you, and I thank you for the obliging expedition you have
+shown.  It is my misfortune that I cannot rise to receive you.  I
+trust you have been reasonably well entertained?'
+
+'Monsieur mon oncle,' I said, bowing very low, 'I am come at the
+summons of the head of my family.'
+
+'It is well,' he said.  'Be seated.  I should be glad to hear some
+news--if that can be called news that is already twenty years old--
+of how I have the pleasure to see you here.'
+
+By the coldness of his address, not more than by the nature of the
+times that he bade me recall, I was plunged in melancholy.  I felt
+myself surrounded as with deserts of friendlessness, and the
+delight of my welcome was turned to ashes in my mouth.
+
+'That is soon told, monseigneur,' said I.  'I understand that I
+need tell you nothing of the end of my unhappy parents?  It is only
+the story of the lost dog.'
+
+'You are right.  I am sufficiently informed of that deplorable
+affair; it is painful to me.  My nephew, your father, was a man who
+would not be advised,' said he.  'Tell me, if you please, simply of
+yourself.'
+
+'I am afraid I must run the risk of harrowing your sensibility in
+the beginning,' said I, with a bitter smile, 'because my story
+begins at the foot of the guillotine.  When the list came out that
+night, and her name was there, I was already old enough, not in
+years but in sad experience, to understand the extent of my
+misfortune.  She--'  I paused.  'Enough that she arranged with a
+friend, Madame de Chasserades, that she should take charge of me,
+and by the favour of our jailers I was suffered to remain in the
+shelter of the Abbaye.  That was my only refuge; there was no
+corner of France that I could rest the sole of my foot upon except
+the prison.  Monsieur le Comte, you are as well aware as I can be
+what kind of a life that was, and how swiftly death smote in that
+society.  I did not wait long before the name of Madame de
+Chasserades succeeded to that of my mother on the list.  She passed
+me on to Madame de Noytot; she, in her turn, to Mademoiselle de
+Braye; and there were others.  I was the one thing permanent; they
+were all transient as clouds; a day or two of their care, and then
+came the last farewell and--somewhere far off in that roaring Paris
+that surrounded us--the bloody scene.  I was the cherished one, the
+last comfort, of these dying women.  I have been in pitched fights,
+my lord, and I never knew such courage.  It was all done smiling,
+in the tone of good society; belle maman was the name I was taught
+to give to each; and for a day or two the new "pretty mamma" would
+make much of me, show me off, teach me the minuet, and to say my
+prayers; and then, with a tender embrace, would go the way of her
+predecessors, smiling.  There were some that wept too.  There was a
+childhood!  All the time Monsieur de Culemberg kept his eye on me,
+and would have had me out of the Abbaye and in his own protection,
+but my "pretty mammas" one after another resisted the idea.  Where
+could I be safer? they argued; and what was to become of them
+without the darling of the prison?  Well, it was soon shown how
+safe I was!  The dreadful day of the massacre came; the prison was
+overrun; none paid attention to me, not even the last of my "pretty
+mammas," for she had met another fate.  I was wandering distracted,
+when I was found by some one in the interests of Monsieur de
+Culemberg.  I understand he was sent on purpose; I believe, in
+order to reach the interior of the prison, he had set his hand to
+nameless barbarities:  such was the price paid for my worthless,
+whimpering little life!  He gave me his hand; it was wet, and mine
+was reddened; he led me unresisting.  I remember but the one
+circumstance of my flight--it was my last view of my last pretty
+mamma.  Shall I describe it to you?' I asked the Count, with a
+sudden fierceness.
+
+'Avoid unpleasant details,' observed my great-uncle gently.
+
+At these words a sudden peace fell upon me.  I had been angry with
+the man before; I had not sought to spare him; and now, in a
+moment, I saw that there was nothing to spare.  Whether from
+natural heartlessness or extreme old age, the soul was not at home;
+and my benefactor, who had kept the fire lit in my room for a month
+past--my only relative except Alain, whom I knew already to be a
+hired spy--had trodden out the last sparks of hope and interest.
+
+'Certainly,' said I; 'and, indeed, the day for them is nearly over.
+I was taken to Monsieur de Culemberg's,--I presume, sir, that you
+know the Abbe de Culemberg?'
+
+He indicated assent without opening his eyes.
+
+'He was a very brave and a very learned man--'
+
+'And a very holy one,' said my uncle civilly.
+
+'And a very holy one, as you observe,' I continued.  'He did an
+infinity of good, and through all the Terror kept himself from the
+guillotine.  He brought me up, and gave me such education as I
+have.  It was in his house in the country at Dammarie, near Melun,
+that I made the acquaintance of your agent, Mr. Vicary, who lay
+there in hiding, only to fall a victim at the last to a gang of
+chauffeurs.'
+
+'That poor Mr. Vicary!' observed my uncle.  'He had been many times
+in my interests to France, and this was his first failure.  Quel
+charmant homme, n'est-ce pas?'
+
+'Infinitely so,' said I.  'But I would not willingly detain you any
+further with a story, the details of which it must naturally be
+more or less unpleasant for you to hear.  Suffice it that, by M. de
+Culemberg's own advice, I said farewell at eighteen to that kind
+preceptor and his books, and entered the service of France; and
+have since then carried arms in such a manner as not to disgrace my
+family.'
+
+'You narrate well; vous aves la voix chaude,' said my uncle,
+turning on his pillows as if to study me.  'I have a very good
+account of you by Monsieur de Mauseant, whom you helped in Spain.
+And you had some education from the Abbe de Culemberg, a man of a
+good house?  Yes, you will do very well.  You have a good manner
+and a handsome person, which hurts nothing.  We are all handsome in
+the family; even I myself, I have had my successes, the memories of
+which still charm me.  It is my intention, my nephew, to make of
+you my heir.  I am not very well content with my other nephew,
+Monsieur le Vicomte:  he has not been respectful, which is the
+flattery due to age.  And there are other matters.'
+
+I was half tempted to throw back in his face that inheritance so
+coldly offered.  At the same time I had to consider that he was an
+old man, and, after all, my relation; and that I was a poor one, in
+considerable straits, with a hope at heart which that inheritance
+might yet enable me to realise.  Nor could I forget that, however
+icy his manners, he had behaved to me from the first with the
+extreme of liberality and--I was about to write, kindness, but the
+word, in that connection, would not come.  I really owed the man
+some measure of gratitude, which it would be an ill manner to repay
+if I were to insult him on his deathbed.
+
+'Your will, monsieur, must ever be my rule,' said I, bowing.
+
+'You have wit, monsieur mon neveu,' said he, 'the best wit--the wit
+of silence.  Many might have deafened me with their gratitude.
+Gratitude!' he repeated, with a peculiar intonation, and lay and
+smiled to himself.  'But to approach what is more important.  As a
+prisoner of war, will it be possible for you to be served heir to
+English estates?  I have no idea:  long as I have dwelt in England,
+I have never studied what they call their laws.  On the other hand,
+how if Romaine should come too late?  I have two pieces of business
+to be transacted--to die, and to make my will; and, however
+desirous I may be to serve you, I cannot postpone the first in
+favour of the second beyond a very few hours.'
+
+'Well, sir, I must then contrive to be doing as I did before,' said
+I.
+
+'Not so,' said the Count.  'I have an alternative.  I have just
+drawn my balance at my banker's, a considerable sum, and I am now
+to place it in your hands.  It will be so much for you and so much
+less--' he paused, and smiled with an air of malignity that
+surprised me.  'But it is necessary it should be done before
+witnesses.  Monsieur le Vicomte is of a particular disposition, and
+an unwitnessed donation may very easily be twisted into a theft.'
+
+He touched a bell, which was answered by a man having the
+appearance of a confidential valet.  To him he gave a key.
+
+'Bring me the despatch-box that came yesterday, La Ferriere,' said
+he.  'You will at the same time present my compliments to Dr.
+Hunter and M. l'Abbe, and request them to step for a few moments to
+my room.'
+
+The despatch-box proved to be rather a bulky piece of baggage,
+covered with Russia leather.  Before the doctor and an excellent
+old smiling priest it was passed over into my hands with a very
+clear statement of the disposer's wishes; immediately after which,
+though the witnesses remained behind to draw up and sign a joint
+note of the transaction, Monsieur de Keroual dismissed me to my own
+room, La Ferriere following with the invaluable box.
+
+At my chamber door I took it from him with thanks, and entered
+alone.  Everything had been already disposed for the night, the
+curtains drawn and the fire trimmed; and Rowley was still busy with
+my bedclothes.  He turned round as I entered with a look of welcome
+that did my heart good.  Indeed, I had never a much greater need of
+human sympathy, however trivial, than at that moment when I held a
+fortune in my arms.  In my uncle's room I had breathed the very
+atmosphere of disenchantment.  He had gorged my pockets; he had
+starved every dignified or affectionate sentiment of a man.  I had
+received so chilling an impression of age and experience that the
+mere look of youth drew me to confide in Rowley:  he was only a
+boy, his heart must beat yet, he must still retain some innocence
+and natural feelings, he could blurt out follies with his mouth, he
+was not a machine to utter perfect speech!  At the same time, I was
+beginning to outgrow the painful impressions of my interview; my
+spirits were beginning to revive; and at the jolly, empty looks of
+Mr. Rowley, as he ran forward to relieve me of the box, St. Ives
+became himself again.
+
+'Now, Rowley, don't be in a hurry,' said I.  'This is a momentous
+juncture.  Man and boy, you have been in my service about three
+hours.  You must already have observed that I am a gentleman of a
+somewhat morose disposition, and there is nothing that I more
+dislike than the smallest appearance of familiarity.  Mr. Pole or
+Mr. Powl, probably in the spirit of prophecy, warned you against
+this danger.'
+
+'Yes, Mr. Anne,' said Rowley blankly.
+
+'Now there has just arisen one of those rare cases, in which I am
+willing to depart from my principles.  My uncle has given me a box-
+-what you would call a Christmas box.  I don't know what's in it,
+and no more do you:  perhaps I am an April fool, or perhaps I am
+already enormously wealthy; there might be five hundred pounds in
+this apparently harmless receptacle!'
+
+'Lord, Mr. Anne!' cried Rowley.
+
+'Now, Rowley, hold up your right hand and repeat the words of the
+oath after me,' said I, laying the despatch-box on the table.
+'Strike me blue if I ever disclose to Mr. Powl, or Mr. Powl's
+Viscount, or anything that is Mr. Powl's, not to mention Mr. Dawson
+and the doctor, the treasures of the following despatch-box; and
+strike me sky-blue scarlet if I do not continually maintain,
+uphold, love, honour and obey, serve, and follow to the four
+corners of the earth and the waters that are under the earth, the
+hereinafter before-mentioned (only that I find I have neglected to
+mention him) Viscount Anne de Keroual de St.-Yves, commonly known
+as Mr. Rowley's Viscount.  So be it.  Amen.'
+
+He took the oath with the same exaggerated seriousness as I gave it
+to him.
+
+'Now,' said I.  'Here is the key for you; I will hold the lid with
+both hands in the meanwhile.'  He turned the key.  'Bring up all
+the candles in the room, and range them along-side.  What is it to
+be?  A live gorgon, a Jack-in-the-box, or a spring that fires a
+pistol?  On your knees, sir, before the prodigy!'
+
+So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the table.
+At sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay in front of
+us, between the candles, or rolled upon the floor alongside, I
+stood astonished.
+
+'O Lord!' cried Mr. Rowley; 'oh Lordy, Lordy, Lord!' and he
+scrambled after the fallen guineas.  'O my, Mr. Anne! what a sight
+o' money!  Why, it's like a blessed story-book.  It's like the
+Forty Thieves.'
+
+'Now Rowley, let's be cool, let's be businesslike,' said I.
+'Riches are deceitful, particularly when you haven't counted them;
+and the first thing we have to do is to arrive at the amount of my-
+-let me say, modest competency.  If I'm not mistaken, I have enough
+here to keep you in gold buttons all the rest of your life.  You
+collect the gold, and I'll take the paper.'
+
+Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for some
+time there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the jingling
+of guineas, broken occasionally by the exulting exclamations of
+Rowley.  The arithmetical operation on which we were embarked took
+long, and it might have been tedious to others; not to me nor to my
+helper.
+
+'Ten thousand pounds!' I announced at last.
+
+'Ten thousand!' echoed Mr. Rowley.
+
+And we gazed upon each other.
+
+The greatness of this fortune took my breath away.  With that sum
+in my hands, I need fear no enemies.  People are arrested, in nine
+cases out of ten, not because the police are astute, but because
+they themselves run short of money; and I had here before me in the
+despatch-box a succession of devices and disguises that insured my
+liberty.  Not only so; but, as I felt with a sudden and
+overpowering thrill, with ten thousand pounds in my hands I was
+become an eligible suitor.  What advances I had made in the past,
+as a private soldier in a military prison, or a fugitive by the
+wayside, could only be qualified or, indeed, excused as acts of
+desperation.  And now, I might come in by the front door; I might
+approach the dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and rich settlements
+to offer.  The poor French prisoner, Champdivers, might be in a
+perpetual danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman,
+St.-Ives, in his post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side,
+could smile at fate and laugh at locksmiths.  I repeated the
+proverb, exulting, Love laughs at locksmiths!  In a moment, by the
+mere coming of this money, my love had become possible--it had come
+near, it was under my hand--and it may be by one of the curiosities
+of human nature, but it burned that instant brighter.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'your Viscount is a made man.'
+
+'Why, we both are, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+'Yes, both,' said I; 'and you shall dance at the wedding;' and I
+flung at his head a bundle of bank notes, and had just followed it
+up with a handful of guineas, when the door opened, and Mr. Romaine
+appeared upon the threshold.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII--MR. ROMAINE CALLS ME NAMES
+
+
+
+Feeling very much of a fool to be thus taken by surprise, I
+scrambled to my feet and hastened to make my visitor welcome.  He
+did not refuse me his hand; but he gave it with a coldness and
+distance for which I was quite unprepared, and his countenance, as
+he looked on me, was marked in a strong degree with concern and
+severity.
+
+'So, sir, I find you here?' said he, in tones of little
+encouragement.  'Is that you, George?  You can run away; I have
+business with your master.'
+
+He showed Rowley out, and locked the door behind him.  Then he sat
+down in an armchair on one side of the fire, and looked at me with
+uncompromising sternness.
+
+'I am hesitating how to begin,' said he.  'In this singular
+labyrinth of blunders and difficulties that you have prepared for
+us, I am positively hesitating where to begin.  It will perhaps be
+best that you should read, first of all, this paragraph.'  And he
+handed over to me a newspaper.
+
+The paragraph in question was brief.  It announced the recapture of
+one of the prisoners recently escaped from Edinburgh Castle; gave
+his name, Clausel, and added that he had entered into the
+particulars of the recent revolting murder in the Castle, and
+denounced the murderer:-
+
+
+'It is a common soldier called Champdivers, who had himself
+escaped, and is in all probability involved in the common fate of
+his comrades.  In spite of the activity along all the Forth and the
+East Coast, nothing has yet been seen of the sloop which these
+desperadoes seized at Grangemouth, and it is now almost certain
+that they have found a watery grave.'
+
+
+At the reading of this paragraph, my heart turned over.  In a
+moment I saw my castle in the air ruined; myself changed from a
+mere military fugitive into a hunted murderer, fleeing from the
+gallows; my love, which had a moment since appeared so near to me,
+blotted from the field of possibility.  Despair, which was my first
+sentiment, did not, however, endure for more than a moment.  I saw
+that my companions had indeed succeeded in their unlikely design;
+and that I was supposed to have accompanied and perished along with
+them by shipwreck--a most probable ending to their enterprise.  If
+they thought me at the bottom of the North Sea, I need not fear
+much vigilance on the streets of Edinburgh.  Champdivers was
+wanted:  what was to connect him with St. Ives?  Major Chevenix
+would recognise me if he met me; that was beyond bargaining:  he
+had seen me so often, his interest had been kindled to so high a
+point, that I could hope to deceive him by no stratagem of
+disguise.  Well, even so; he would have a competition of testimony
+before him:  he knew Clausel, he knew me, and I was sure he would
+decide for honour.  At the same time the image of Flora shot up in
+my mind's eye with such a radiancy as fairly overwhelmed all other
+considerations; the blood sprang to every corner of my body, and I
+vowed I would see and win her, if it cost my neck.
+
+'Very annoying, no doubt,' said I, as I returned the paper to Mr.
+Romaine.
+
+'Is annoying your word for it?' said he.
+
+'Exasperating, if you like,' I admitted.
+
+'And true?' he inquired.
+
+'Well, true in a sense,' said I.  'But perhaps I had better answer
+that question by putting you in possession of the facts?'
+
+'I think so, indeed,' said he.
+
+I narrated to him as much as seemed necessary of the quarrel, the
+duel, the death of Goguelat, and the character of Clausel.  He
+heard me through in a forbidding silence, nor did he at all betray
+the nature of his sentiments, except that, at the episode of the
+scissors, I could observe his mulberry face to turn three shades
+paler.
+
+'I suppose I may believe you?' said he, when I had done.
+
+'Or else conclude this interview,' said I.
+
+'Can you not understand that we are here discussing matters of the
+gravest import?  Can you not understand that I feel myself weighed
+with a load of responsibility on your account--that you should take
+this occasion to air your fire-eating manners against your own
+attorney?  There are serious hours in life, Mr. Anne,' he said
+severely.  'A capital charge, and that of a very brutal character
+and with singularly unpleasant details; the presence of the man
+Clausel, who (according to your account of it) is actuated by
+sentiments of real malignity, and prepared to swear black white;
+all the other witnesses scattered and perhaps drowned at sea; the
+natural prejudice against a Frenchman and a runaway prisoner:  this
+makes a serious total for your lawyer to consider, and is by no
+means lessened by the incurable folly and levity of your own
+disposition.'
+
+'I beg your pardon!' said I.
+
+'Oh, my expressions have been selected with scrupulous accuracy,'
+he replied.  'How did I find you, sir, when I came to announce this
+catastrophe?  You were sitting on the hearthrug playing, like a
+silly baby, with a servant, were you not, and the floor all
+scattered with gold and bank paper?  There was a tableau for you!
+It was I who came, and you were lucky in that.  It might have been
+any one--your cousin as well as another.'
+
+'You have me there, sir,' I admitted.  'I had neglected all
+precautions, and you do right to be angry.  Apropos, Mr. Romaine,
+how did you come yourself, and how long have you been in the
+house?' I added, surprised, on the retrospect, not to have heard
+him arrive.
+
+'I drove up in a chaise and pair,' he returned.  'Any one might
+have heard me.  But you were not listening, I suppose? being so
+extremely at your ease in the very house of your enemy, and under a
+capital charge!  And I have been long enough here to do your
+business for you.  Ah, yes, I did it, God forgive me!--did it
+before I so much as asked you the explanation of the paragraph.
+For some time back the will has been prepared; now it is signed;
+and your uncle has heard nothing of your recent piece of activity.
+Why?  Well, I had no fancy to bother him on his death-bed:  you
+might be innocent; and at bottom I preferred the murderer to the
+spy.'
+
+No doubt of it but the man played a friendly part; no doubt also
+that, in his ill-temper and anxiety, he expressed himself
+unpalatably.
+
+'You will perhaps find me over delicate,' said I.  'There is a word
+you employed--'
+
+'I employ the words of my brief, sir,' he cried, striking with his
+hand on the newspaper.  'It is there in six letters.  And do not be
+so certain--you have not stood your trial yet.  It is an ugly
+affair, a fishy business.  It is highly disagreeable.  I would give
+my hand off--I mean I would give a hundred pound down, to have
+nothing to do with it.  And, situated as we are, we must at once
+take action.  There is here no choice.  You must at once quit this
+country, and get to France, or Holland, or, indeed, to Madagascar.'
+
+'There may be two words to that,' said I.
+
+'Not so much as one syllable!' he retorted.  'Here is no room for
+argument.  The case is nakedly plain.  In the disgusting position
+in which you have found means to place yourself, all that is to be
+hoped for is delay.  A time may come when we shall be able to do
+better.  It cannot be now:  now it would be the gibbet.'
+
+'You labour under a false impression, Mr. Romaine,' said I.  'I
+have no impatience to figure in the dock.  I am even as anxious as
+yourself to postpone my first appearance there.  On the other hand,
+I have not the slightest intention of leaving this country, where I
+please myself extremely.  I have a good address, a ready tongue, an
+English accent that passes, and, thanks to the generosity of my
+uncle, as much money as I want.  It would be hard indeed if, with
+all these advantages, Mr. St. Ives should not be able to live
+quietly in a private lodging, while the authorities amuse
+themselves by looking for Champdivers.  You forget, there is no
+connection between these two personages.'
+
+'And you forget your cousin,' retorted Romaine.  'There is the
+link.  There is the tongue of the buckle.  He knows you are
+Champdivers.'  He put up his hand as if to listen.  'And, for a
+wager, here he is himself!' he exclaimed.
+
+As when a tailor takes a piece of goods upon his counter, and rends
+it across, there came to our ears from the avenue the long tearing
+sound of a chaise and four approaching at the top speed of the
+horses.  And, looking out between the curtains, we beheld the lamps
+skimming on the smooth ascent.
+
+'Ay,' said Romaine, wiping the window-pane that he might see more
+clearly.  'Ay, that is he by the driving!  So he squanders money
+along the king's highway, the triple idiot! gorging every man he
+meets with gold for the pleasure of arriving--where?  Ah, yes,
+where but a debtor's jail, if not a criminal prison!'
+
+'Is he that kind of a man?' I said, staring on these lamps as
+though I could decipher in them the secret of my cousin's
+character.
+
+'You will find him a dangerous kind,' answered the lawyer.  'For
+you, these are the lights on a lee shore!  I find I fall in a muse
+when I consider of him; what a formidable being he once was, and
+what a personable! and how near he draws to the moment that must
+break him utterly! we none of us like him here; we hate him,
+rather; and yet I have a sense--I don't think at my time of life it
+can be pity--but a reluctance rather, to break anything so big and
+figurative, as though he were a big porcelain pot or a big picture
+of high price.  Ay, there is what I was waiting for!' he cried, as
+the lights of a second chaise swam in sight.  'It is he beyond a
+doubt.  The first was the signature and the next the flourish.  Two
+chaises, the second following with the baggage, which is always
+copious and ponderous, and one of his valets:  he cannot go a step
+without a valet.'
+
+'I hear you repeat the word big,' said I.  'But it cannot be that
+he is anything out of the way in stature.'
+
+'No,' said the attorney.  'About your height, as I guessed for the
+tailors, and I see nothing wrong with the result.  But, somehow, he
+commands an atmosphere; he has a spacious manner; and he has kept
+up, all through life, such a volume of racket about his
+personality, with his chaises and his racers and his dicings, and I
+know not what--that somehow he imposes!  It seems, when the farce
+is done, and he locked in Fleet prison--and nobody left but
+Buonaparte and Lord Wellington and the Hetman Platoff to make a
+work about--the world will be in a comparison quite tranquil.  But
+this is beside the mark,' he added, with an effort, turning again
+from the window.  'We are now under fire, Mr. Anne, as you soldiers
+would say, and it is high time we should prepare to go into action.
+He must not see you; that would be fatal.  All that he knows at
+present is that you resemble him, and that is much more than
+enough.  If it were possible, it would be well he should not know
+you were in the house.'
+
+'Quite impossible, depend upon it,' said I.  'Some of the servants
+are directly in his interests, perhaps in his pay:  Dawson, for an
+example.'
+
+'My own idea!' cried Romaine.  'And at least,' he added, as the
+first of the chaises drew up with a dash in front of the portico,
+'it is now too late.  Here he is.'
+
+We stood listening, with a strange anxiety, to the various noises
+that awoke in the silent house:  the sound of doors opening and
+closing, the sound of feet near at hand and farther off.  It was
+plain the arrival of my cousin was a matter of moment, almost of
+parade, to the household.  And suddenly, out of this confused and
+distant bustle, a rapid and light tread became distinguishable.  We
+heard it come upstairs, draw near along the corridor, pause at the
+door, and a stealthy and hasty rapping succeeded.
+
+'Mr. Anne--Mr. Anne, sir!  Let me in!' said the voice of Rowley.
+
+We admitted the lad, and locked the door again behind him.
+
+'It's HIM, sir,' he panted.  'He've come.'
+
+'You mean the Viscount?' said I.  'So we supposed.  But come,
+Rowley--out with the rest of it!  You have more to tell us, or your
+face belies you !'
+
+'Mr. Anne, I do,' he said.  'Mr. Romaine, sir, you're a friend of
+his, ain't you?'
+
+'Yes, George, I am a friend of his,' said Romaine, and, to my great
+surprise, laid his hand upon my shoulder.
+
+'Well, it's this way,' said Rowley--'Mr. Powl have been at me!
+It's to play the spy!  I thought he was at it from the first!  From
+the first I see what he was after--coming round and round, and
+hinting things!  But to-night he outs with it plump!  I'm to let
+him hear all what you're to do beforehand, he says; and he gave me
+this for an arnest'--holding up half a guinea; 'and I took it, so I
+did!  Strike me sky-blue scarlet?' says he, adducing the words of
+the mock oath; and he looked askance at me as he did so.
+
+I saw that he had forgotten himself, and that he knew it.  The
+expression of his eye changed almost in the passing of the glance
+from the significant to the appealing--from the look of an
+accomplice to that of a culprit; and from that moment he became the
+model of a well-drilled valet.
+
+'Sky-blue scarlet?' repeated the lawyer.  'Is the fool delirious?'
+
+'No,' said I; 'he is only reminding me of something.'
+
+'Well--and I believe the fellow will be faithful,' said Romaine.
+'So you are a friend of Mr. Anne's' too?' he added to Rowley.
+
+'If you please, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+''Tis something sudden,' observed Romaine; 'but it may be genuine
+enough.  I believe him to be honest.  He comes of honest people.
+Well, George Rowley, you might embrace some early opportunity to
+earn that half-guinea, by telling Mr. Powl that your master will
+not leave here till noon to-morrow, if he go even then.  Tell him
+there are a hundred things to be done here, and a hundred more that
+can only be done properly at my office in Holborn.  Come to think
+of it--we had better see to that first of all,' he went on,
+unlocking the door.  'Get hold of Powl, and see.  And be quick
+back, and clear me up this mess.'
+
+Mr. Rowley was no sooner gone than the lawyer took a pinch of
+snuff, and regarded me with somewhat of a more genial expression.
+
+'Sir,' said he, 'it is very fortunate for you that your face is so
+strong a letter of recommendation.  Here am I, a tough old
+practitioner, mixing myself up with your very distressing business;
+and here is this farmer's lad, who has the wit to take a bribe and
+the loyalty to come and tell you of it--all, I take it, on the
+strength of your appearance.  I wish I could imagine how it would
+impress a jury!' says he.
+
+'And how it would affect the hangman, sir?' I asked
+
+'Absit omen!' said Mr. Romaine devoutly.
+
+We were just so far in our talk, when I heard a sound that brought
+my heart into my mouth:  the sound of some one slyly trying the
+handle of the door.  It had been preceded by no audible footstep.
+Since the departure of Rowley our wing of the house had been
+entirely silent.  And we had every right to suppose ourselves
+alone, and to conclude that the new-comer, whoever he might be, was
+come on a clandestine, if not a hostile, errand.
+
+'Who is there?' asked Romaine.
+
+'It's only me, sir,' said the soft voice of Dawson.  'It's the
+Viscount, sir.  He is very desirous to speak with you on business.'
+
+'Tell him I shall come shortly, Dawson,' said the lawyer.  'I am at
+present engaged.'
+
+'Thank you, sir!' said Dawson.
+
+And we heard his feet draw off slowly along the corridor.
+
+'Yes,' said Mr. Romaine, speaking low, and maintaining the attitude
+of one intently listening, 'there is another foot.  I cannot be
+deceived!'
+
+'I think there was indeed!' said I.  'And what troubles me--I am
+not sure that the other has gone entirely away.  By the time it got
+the length of the head of the stair the tread was plainly single.'
+
+'Ahem--blockaded?' asked the lawyer.
+
+'A siege en regle!' I exclaimed.
+
+'Let us come farther from the door,' said Romaine, 'and reconsider
+this damnable position.  Without doubt, Alain was this moment at
+the door.  He hoped to enter and get a view of you, as if by
+accident.  Baffled in this, has he stayed himself, or has he
+planted Dawson here by way of sentinel?'
+
+'Himself, beyond a doubt,' said I.  'And yet to what end?  He
+cannot think to pass the night there!'
+
+'If it were only possible to pay no heed!' said Mr. Romaine.  'But
+this is the accursed drawback of your position.  We can do nothing
+openly.  I must smuggle you out of this room and out of this house
+like seizable goods; and how am I to set about it with a sentinel
+planted at your very door?'
+
+'There is no good in being agitated,' said I.
+
+'None at all,' he acquiesced.  'And, come to think of it, it is
+droll enough that I should have been that very moment commenting on
+your personal appearance, when your cousin came upon this mission.
+I was saying, if you remember, that your face was as good or better
+than a letter of recommendation.  I wonder if M. Alain would be
+like the rest of us--I wonder what he would think of it?'
+
+Mr. Romaine was sitting in a chair by the fire with his back to the
+windows, and I was myself kneeling on the hearthrug and beginning
+mechanically to pick up the scattered bills, when a honeyed voice
+joined suddenly in our conversation.
+
+'He thinks well of it, Mr. Romaine.  He begs to join himself to
+that circle of admirers which you indicate to exist already.'
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX--THE DEVIL AND ALL AT AMERSHAM PLACE
+
+
+
+Never did two human creatures get to their feet with more alacrity
+than the lawyer and myself.  We had locked and barred the main
+gates of the citadel; but unhappily we had left open the bath-room
+sally-port; and here we found the voice of the hostile trumpets
+sounding from within, and all our defences taken in reverse.  I
+took but the time to whisper Mr. Romaine in the ear:  'Here is
+another tableau for you!' at which he looked at me a moment with a
+kind of pathos, as who should say, 'Don't hit a man when he's
+down.'  Then I transferred my eyes to my enemy.
+
+He had his hat on, a little on one side:  it was a very tall hat,
+raked extremely, and had a narrow curling brim.  His hair was all
+curled out in masses like an Italian mountebank--a most
+unpardonable fashion.  He sported a huge tippeted overcoat of
+frieze, such as watchmen wear, only the inside was lined with
+costly furs, and he kept it half open to display the exquisite
+linen, the many-coloured waistcoat, and the profuse jewellery of
+watch-chains and brooches underneath.  The leg and the ankle were
+turned to a miracle.  It is out of the question that I should deny
+the resemblance altogether, since it has been remarked by so many
+different persons whom I cannot reasonably accuse of a conspiracy.
+As a matter of fact, I saw little of it and confessed to nothing.
+Certainly he was what some might call handsome, of a pictorial,
+exuberant style of beauty, all attitude, profile, and impudence:  a
+man whom I could see in fancy parade on the grand stand at a race-
+meeting or swagger in Piccadilly, staring down the women, and
+stared at himself with admiration by the coal-porters.  Of his
+frame of mind at that moment his face offered a lively if an
+unconscious picture.  He was lividly pale, and his lip was caught
+up in a smile that could almost be called a snarl, of a sheer, arid
+malignity that appalled me and yet put me on my mettle for the
+encounter.  He looked me up and down, then bowed and took off his
+hat to me.
+
+'My cousin, I presume?' he said.
+
+'I understand I have that honour,' I replied.
+
+'The honour is mine,' said he, and his voice shook as he said it.
+
+'I should make you welcome, I believe,' said I.
+
+'Why?' he inquired.  'This poor house has been my home for longer
+than I care to claim.  That you should already take upon yourself
+the duties of host here is to be at unnecessary pains.  Believe me,
+that part would be more becomingly mine.  And, by the way, I must
+not fail to offer you my little compliment.  It is a gratifying
+surprise to meet you in the dress of a gentleman, and to see'--with
+a circular look upon the scattered bills--'that your necessities
+have already been so liberally relieved.'
+
+I bowed with a smile that was perhaps no less hateful than his own.
+
+'There are so many necessities in this world,' said I.  'Charity
+has to choose.  One gets relieved, and some other, no less
+indigent, perhaps indebted, must go wanting.'
+
+'Malice is an engaging trait,' said he.
+
+'And envy, I think?' was my reply.
+
+He must have felt that he was not getting wholly the better of this
+passage at arms; perhaps even feared that he should lose command of
+his temper, which he reined in throughout the interview as with a
+red-hot curb, for he flung away from me at the word, and addressed
+the lawyer with insulting arrogance.
+
+'Mr. Romaine,' he said, 'since when have you presumed to give
+orders in this house?'
+
+'I am not prepared to admit that I have given any,' replied
+Romaine; 'certainly none that did not fall in the sphere of my
+responsibilities.'
+
+'By whose orders, then, am I denied entrance to my uncle's room?'
+said my cousin.
+
+'By the doctor's, sir,' replied Romaine; 'and I think even you will
+admit his faculty to give them.'
+
+'Have a care, sir,' cried Alain.  'Do not be puffed up with your
+position.  It is none so secure, Master Attorney.  I should not
+wonder in the least if you were struck off the rolls for this
+night's work, and the next I should see of you were when I flung
+you alms at a pothouse door to mend your ragged elbows.  The
+doctor's orders?  But I believe I am not mistaken!  You have to-
+night transacted business with the Count; and this needy young
+gentleman has enjoyed the privilege of still another interview, in
+which (as I am pleased to see) his dignity has not prevented his
+doing very well for himself.  I wonder that you should care to
+prevaricate with me so idly.'
+
+'I will confess so much,' said Mr. Romaine, 'if you call it
+prevarication.  The order in question emanated from the Count
+himself.  He does not wish to see you.'
+
+'For which I must take the word of Mr. Daniel Romaine?' asked
+Alain.
+
+'In default of any better,' said Romaine.
+
+There was an instantaneous convulsion in my cousin's face, and I
+distinctly heard him gnash his teeth at this reply; but, to my
+surprise, he resumed in tones of almost good humour:
+
+'Come, Mr. Romaine, do not let us be petty!'  He drew in a chair
+and sat down.  'Understand you have stolen a march upon me.  You
+have introduced your soldier of Napoleon, and (how, I cannot
+conceive) he has been apparently accepted with favour.  I ask no
+better proof than the funds with which I find him literally
+surrounded--I presume in consequence of some extravagance of joy at
+the first sight of so much money.  The odds are so far in your
+favour, but the match is not yet won.  Questions will arise of
+undue influence, of sequestration, and the like:  I have my
+witnesses ready.  I tell it you cynically, for you cannot profit by
+the knowledge; and, if the worst come to the worst, I have good
+hopes of recovering my own and of ruining you.'
+
+'You do what you please,' answered Romaine; 'but I give it you for
+a piece of good advice, you had best do nothing in the matter.  You
+will only make yourself ridiculous; you will only squander money,
+of which you have none too much, and reap public mortification.'
+
+'Ah, but there you make the common mistake, Mr. Romaine!' returned
+Alain.  'You despise your adversary.  Consider, if you please, how
+very disagreeable I could make myself, if I chose.  Consider the
+position of your protege--an escaped prisoner!  But I play a great
+game.  I condemn such petty opportunities.'
+
+At this Romaine and I exchanged a glance of triumph.  It seemed
+manifest that Alain had as yet received no word of Clausel's
+recapture and denunciation.  At the same moment the lawyer, thus
+relieved of the instancy of his fear, changed his tactics.  With a
+great air of unconcern, he secured the newspaper, which still lay
+open before him on the table.
+
+'I think, Monsieur Alain, that you labour under some illusion,'
+said he.  'Believe me, this is all beside the mark.  You seem to be
+pointing to some compromise.  Nothing is further from my views.
+You suspect me of an inclination to trifle with you, to conceal how
+things are going.  I cannot, on the other hand, be too early or too
+explicit in giving you information which concerns you (I must say)
+capitally.  Your great-uncle has to-night cancelled his will, and
+made a new one in favour of your cousin Anne.  Nay, and you shall
+hear it from his own lips, if you choose!  I will take so much upon
+me,' said the lawyer, rising.  'Follow me, if you please,
+gentlemen.'
+
+Mr. Romaine led the way out of the room so briskly, and was so
+briskly followed by Alain, that I had hard ado to get the remainder
+of the money replaced and the despatch-box locked, and to overtake
+them, even by running ere they should be lost in that maze of
+corridors, my uncle's house.  As it was, I went with a heart
+divided; and the thought of my treasure thus left unprotected, save
+by a paltry lid and lock that any one might break or pick open, put
+me in a perspiration whenever I had the time to remember it.  The
+lawyer brought us to a room, begged us to be seated while he should
+hold a consultation with the doctor, and, slipping out of another
+door, left Alain and myself closeted together.
+
+Truly he had done nothing to ingratiate himself; his every word had
+been steeped in unfriendliness, envy, and that contempt which (as
+it is born of anger) it is possible to support without humiliation.
+On my part, I had been little more conciliating; and yet I began to
+be sorry for this man, hired spy as I knew him to be.  It seemed to
+me less than decent that he should have been brought up in the
+expectation of this great inheritance, and now, at the eleventh
+hour, be tumbled forth out of the house door and left to himself,
+his poverty and his debts--those debts of which I had so
+ungallantly reminded him so short a time before.  And we were
+scarce left alone ere I made haste to hang out a flag of truce.
+
+'My cousin,' said I, 'trust me, you will not find me inclined to be
+your enemy.'
+
+He paused in front of me--for he had not accepted the lawyer's
+invitation to be seated, but walked to and fro in the apartment--
+took a pinch of snuff, and looked at me while he was taking it with
+an air of much curiosity.
+
+'Is it even so?' said he.  'Am I so far favoured by fortune as to
+have your pity?  Infinitely obliged, my cousin Anne!  But these
+sentiments are not always reciprocal, and I warn you that the day
+when I set my foot on your neck, the spine shall break.  Are you
+acquainted with the properties of the spine?' he asked with an
+insolence beyond qualification.
+
+It was too much.  'I am acquainted also with the properties of a
+pair of pistols,' said I, toising him.
+
+'No, no, no!' says he, holding up his finger.  'I will take my
+revenge how and when I please.  We are enough of the same family to
+understand each other, perhaps; and the reason why I have not had
+you arrested on your arrival, why I had not a picket of soldiers in
+the first clump of evergreens, to await and prevent your coming--I,
+who knew all, before whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has been
+conspiring in broad daylight to supplant me--is simply this:  that
+I had not made up my mind how I was to take my revenge.'
+
+At that moment he was interrupted by the tolling of a bell.  As we
+stood surprised and listening, it was succeeded by the sound of
+many feet trooping up the stairs and shuffling by the door of our
+room.  Both, I believe, had a great curiosity to set it open, which
+each, owing to the presence of the other, resisted; and we waited
+instead in silence, and without moving, until Romaine returned and
+bade us to my uncle's presence.
+
+He led the way by a little crooked passage, which brought us out in
+the sick-room, and behind the bed.  I believe I have forgotten to
+remark that the Count's chamber was of considerable dimensions.  We
+beheld it now crowded with the servants and dependants of the
+house, from the doctor and the priest to Mr. Dawson and the
+housekeeper, from Dawson down to Rowley and the last footman in
+white calves, the last plump chambermaid in her clean gown and cap,
+and the last ostler in a stable waiscoat.  This large congregation
+of persons (and I was surprised to see how large it was) had the
+appearance, for the most part, of being ill at ease and heartily
+bewildered, standing on one foot, gaping like zanies, and those who
+were in the corners nudging each other and grinning aside.  My
+uncle, on the other hand, who was raised higher than I had yet seen
+him on his pillows, wore an air of really imposing gravity.  No
+sooner had we appeared behind him, than he lifted his voice to a
+good loudness, and addressed the assemblage.
+
+'I take you all to witness--can you hear me?--I take you all to
+witness that I recognise as my heir and representative this
+gentleman, whom most of you see for the first time, the Viscount
+Anne de St.-Yves, my nephew of the younger line.  And I take you to
+witness at the same time that, for very good reasons known to
+myself, I have discarded and disinherited this other gentleman whom
+you all know, the Viscount de St.-Yves.  I have also to explain the
+unusual trouble to which I have put you all--and, since your supper
+was not over, I fear I may even say annoyance.  It has pleased M.
+Alain to make some threats of disputing my will, and to pretend
+that there are among your number certain estimable persons who may
+be trusted to swear as he shall direct them.  It pleases me thus to
+put it out of his power and to stop the mouths of his false
+witnesses.  I am infinitely obliged by your politeness, and I have
+the honour to wish you all a very good evening.'
+
+As the servants, still greatly mystified, crowded out of the
+sickroom door, curtseying, pulling the forelock, scraping with the
+foot, and so on, according to their degree, I turned and stole a
+look at my cousin.  He had borne this crushing public rebuke
+without change of countenance.  He stood, now, very upright, with
+folded arms, and looking inscrutably at the roof of the apartment.
+I could not refuse him at that moment the tribute of my admiration.
+Still more so when, the last of the domestics having filed through
+the doorway and left us alone with my great-uncle and the lawyer,
+he took one step forward towards the bed, made a dignified
+reverence, and addressed the man who had just condemned him to
+ruin.
+
+'My lord,' said he, 'you are pleased to treat me in a manner which
+my gratitude, and your state, equally forbid me to call in
+question.  It will be only necessary for me to call your attention
+to the length of time in which I have been taught to regard myself
+as your heir.  In that position, I judged it only loyal to permit
+myself a certain scale of expenditure.  If I am now to be cut off
+with a shilling as the reward of twenty years of service, I shall
+be left not only a beggar, but a bankrupt.'
+
+Whether from the fatigue of his recent exertion, or by a well-
+inspired ingenuity of hate, my uncle had once more closed his eyes;
+nor did he open them now.  'Not with a shilling,' he contented
+himself with replying; and there stole, as he said it, a sort of
+smile over his face, that flickered there conspicuously for the
+least moment of time, and then faded and left behind the old
+impenetrable mask of years, cunning, and fatigue.  There could be
+no mistake:  my uncle enjoyed the situation as he had enjoyed few
+things in the last quarter of a century.  The fires of life scarce
+survived in that frail body; but hatred, like some immortal
+quality, was still erect and unabated.
+
+Nevertheless my cousin persevered.
+
+'I speak at a disadvantage,' he resumed.  'My supplanter, with
+perhaps more wisdom than delicacy, remains in the room,' and he
+cast a glance at me that might have withered an oak tree.
+
+I was only too willing to withdraw, and Romaine showed as much
+alacrity to make way for my departure.  But my uncle was not to be
+moved.  In the same breath of a voice, and still without opening
+his eyes, he bade me remain.
+
+'It is well,' said Alain.  'I cannot then go on to remind you of
+the twenty years that have passed over our heads in England, and
+the services I may have rendered you in that time.  It would be a
+position too odious.  Your lordship knows me too well to suppose I
+could stoop to such ignominy.  I must leave out all my defence--
+your lordship wills it so!  I do not know what are my faults; I
+know only my punishment, and it is greater than I have the courage
+to face.  My uncle, I implore your pity:  pardon me so far; do not
+send me for life into a debtors' jail--a pauper debtor.'
+
+'Chat et vieux, pardonnez?' said my uncle, quoting from La
+Fontaine; and then, opening a pale-blue eye full on Alain, he
+delivered with some emphasis:
+
+
+'La jeunesse se flatte et croit tout obtenir;
+La vieillesse est impitoyable.'
+
+
+The blood leaped darkly into Alain's face.  He turned to Romaine
+and me, and his eyes flashed.
+
+'It is your turn now,' he said.  'At least it shall be prison for
+prison with the two viscounts.'
+
+'Not so, Mr. Alain, by your leave,' said Romaine.  'There are a few
+formalities to be considered first.'
+
+But Alain was already striding towards the door.
+
+'Stop a moment, stop a moment!' cried Romaine.  'Remember your own
+counsel not to despise an adversary.'
+
+Alain turned.
+
+'If I do not despise I hate you!' he cried, giving a loose to his
+passion.  'Be warned of that, both of you.'
+
+'I understand you to threaten Monsieur le Vicomte Anne,' said the
+lawyer.  'Do you know, I would not do that.  I am afraid, I am very
+much afraid, if you were to do as you propose, you might drive me
+into extremes.'
+
+'You have made me a beggar and a bankrupt,' said Alain.  What
+extreme is left?'
+
+'I scarce like to put a name upon it in this company,' replied
+Romaine.  'But there are worse things than even bankruptcy, and
+worse places than a debtors' jail.'
+
+The words were so significantly said that there went a visible
+thrill through Alain; sudden as a sword-stroke, he fell pale again.
+
+'I do not understand you,' said he.
+
+'O yes, you do,' returned Romaine.  'I believe you understand me
+very well.  You must not suppose that all this time, while you were
+so very busy, others were entirely idle.  You must not fancy,
+because I am an Englishman, that I have not the intelligence to
+pursue an inquiry.  Great as is my regard for the honour of your
+house, M. Alain de St.-Yves, if I hear of you moving directly or
+indirectly in this matter, I shall do my duty, let it cost what it
+will:  that is, I shall communicate the real name of the
+Buonapartist spy who signs his letters Rue Gregoire de Tours.'
+
+I confess my heart was already almost altogether on the side of my
+insulted and unhappy cousin; and if it had not been before, it must
+have been so now, so horrid was the shock with which he heard his
+infamy exposed.  Speech was denied him; he carried his hand to his
+neckcloth; he staggered; I thought he must have fallen.  I ran to
+help him, and at that he revived, recoiled before me, and stood
+there with arms stretched forth as if to preserve himself from the
+outrage of my touch.
+
+'Hands off!' he somehow managed to articulate.
+
+'You will now, I hope,' pursued the lawyer, without any change of
+voice, 'understand the position in which you are placed, and how
+delicately it behoves you to conduct yourself.  Your arrest hangs,
+if I may so express myself, by a hair; and as you will be under the
+perpetual vigilance of myself and my agents, you must look to it
+narrowly that you walk straight.  Upon the least dubiety, I will
+take action.'  He snuffed, looking critically at the tortured man.
+'And now let me remind you that your chaise is at the door.  This
+interview is agitating to his lordship--it cannot be agreeable for
+you--and I suggest that it need not be further drawn out.  It does
+not enter into the views of your uncle, the Count, that you should
+again sleep under this roof.'
+
+As Alain turned and passed without a word or a sign from the
+apartment, I instantly followed.  I suppose I must be at bottom
+possessed of some humanity; at least, this accumulated torture,
+this slow butchery of a man as by quarters of rock, had wholly
+changed my sympathies.  At that moment I loathed both my uncle and
+the lawyer for their coldblooded cruelty.
+
+Leaning over the banisters, I was but in time to hear his hasty
+footsteps in that hall that had been crowded with servants to
+honour his coming, and was now left empty against his friendless
+departure.  A moment later, and the echoes rang, and the air
+whistled in my ears, as he slammed the door on his departing
+footsteps.  The fury of the concussion gave me (had one been still
+wanted) a measure of the turmoil of his passions.  In a sense, I
+felt with him; I felt how he would have gloried to slam that door
+on my uncle, the lawyer, myself, and the whole crowd of those who
+had been witnesses to his humiliation.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX--AFTER THE STORM
+
+
+
+No sooner was the house clear of my cousin than I began to reckon
+up, ruefully enough, the probable results of what had passed.  Here
+were a number of pots broken, and it looked to me as if I should
+have to pay for all!  Here had been this proud, mad beast goaded
+and baited both publicly and privately, till he could neither hear
+nor see nor reason; whereupon the gate had been set open, and he
+had been left free to go and contrive whatever vengeance he might
+find possible.  I could not help thinking it was a pity that,
+whenever I myself was inclined to be upon my good behaviour, some
+friends of mine should always determine to play a piece of heroics
+and cast me for the hero--or the victim--which is very much the
+same.  The first duty of heroics is to be of your own choosing.
+When they are not that, they are nothing.  And I assure you, as I
+walked back to my own room, I was in no very complaisant humour:
+thought my uncle and Mr. Romaine to have played knuckle-bones with
+my life and prospects; cursed them for it roundly; had no wish more
+urgent than to avoid the pair of them; and was quite knocked out of
+time, as they say in the ring, to find myself confronted with the
+lawyer.
+
+He stood on my hearthrug, leaning on the chimney-piece, with a
+gloomy, thoughtful brow, as I was pleased to see, and not in the
+least as though he were vain of the late proceedings.
+
+'Well?' said I.  'You have done it now!'
+
+'Is he gone?' he asked.
+
+'He is gone,' said I.  'We shall have the devil to pay with him
+when he comes back.'
+
+'You are right,' said the lawyer, 'and very little to pay him with
+but flams and fabrications, like to-night's.'
+
+'To-night's?' I repeated.
+
+'Ay, to-night's!' said he.
+
+'To-night's WHAT?' I cried.
+
+'To-night's flams and fabrications.'
+
+'God be good to me, sir,' said I, 'have I something more to admire
+in your conduct than ever _I_ had suspected?  You cannot think how
+you interest me!  That it was severe, I knew; I had already
+chuckled over that.  But that it should be false also!  In what
+sense, dear sir?'
+
+I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but the
+lawyer paid no heed.
+
+'False in all senses of the word,' he replied seriously.  'False in
+the sense that they were not true, and false in the sense that they
+were not real; false in the sense that I boasted, and in the sense
+that I lied.  How can I arrest him?  Your uncle burned the papers!
+I told you so--but doubtless you have forgotten--the day I first
+saw you in Edinburgh Castle.  It was an act of generosity; I have
+seen many of these acts, and always regretted--always regretted!
+"That shall be his inheritance," he said, as the papers burned; he
+did not mean that it should have proved so rich a one.  How rich,
+time will tell.'
+
+'I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times, my dear sir, but it
+strikes me you have the impudence--in the circumstances, I may call
+it the indecency--to appear cast down?'
+
+'It is true,' said he:  'I am.  I am cast down.  I am literally
+cast down.  I feel myself quite helpless against your cousin.'
+
+'Now, really!' I asked.  'Is this serious?  And is it perhaps the
+reason why you have gorged the poor devil with every species of
+insult? and why you took such surprising pains to supply me with
+what I had so little need of--another enemy?  That you were
+helpless against them?  "Here is my last missile," say you; "my
+ammunition is quite exhausted:  just wait till I get the last in--
+it will irritate, it cannot hurt him.  There--you see!--he is
+furious now, and I am quite helpless.  One more prod, another kick:
+now he is a mere lunatic!  Stand behind me; I am quite helpless!"
+Mr. Romaine, I am asking myself as to the background or motive of
+this singular jest, and whether the name of it should not be called
+treachery?'
+
+'I can scarce wonder,' said he.  'In truth it has been a singular
+business, and we are very fortunate to be out of it so well.  Yet
+it was not treachery:  no, no, Mr. Anne, it was not treachery; and
+if you will do me the favour to listen to me for the inside of a
+minute, I shall demonstrate the same to you beyond cavil.'  He
+seemed to wake up to his ordinary briskness.  'You see the point?'
+he began.  'He had not yet read the newspaper, but who could tell
+when he might?  He might have had that damned journal in his
+pocket, and how should we know?  We were--I may say, we are--at the
+mercy of the merest twopenny accident.'
+
+'Why, true,' said I:  'I had not thought of that.'
+
+'I warrant you,' cried Romaine, 'you had supposed it was nothing to
+be the hero of an interesting notice in the journals!  You had
+supposed, as like as not, it was a form of secrecy!  But not so in
+the least.  A part of England is already buzzing with the name of
+Champdivers; a day or two more and the mail will have carried it
+everywhere:  so wonderful a machine is this of ours for
+disseminating intelligence!  Think of it!  When my father was born-
+-but that is another story.  To return:  we had here the elements
+of such a combustion as I dread to think of--your cousin and the
+journal.  Let him but glance an eye upon that column of print, and
+where were we?  It is easy to ask; not so easy to answer, my young
+friend.  And let me tell you, this sheet is the Viscount's usual
+reading.  It is my conviction he had it in his pocket.'
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir,' said I.  'I have been unjust.  I did not
+appreciate my danger.'
+
+'I think you never do,' said he.
+
+'But yet surely that public scene--' I began.
+
+'It was madness.  I quite agree with you,' Mr. Romaine interrupted.
+'But it was your uncle's orders, Mr. Anne, and what could I do?
+Tell him you were the murderer of Goguelat?  I think not.'
+
+'No, sure!' said I.  'That would but have been to make the trouble
+thicker.  We were certainly in a very ill posture.'
+
+'You do not yet appreciate how grave it was,' he replied.  'It was
+necessary for you that your cousin should go, and go at once.  You
+yourself had to leave to-night under cover of darkness, and how
+could you have done that with the Viscount in the next room?  He
+must go, then; he must leave without delay.  And that was the
+difficulty.'
+
+'Pardon me, Mr. Romaine, but could not my uncle have bidden him
+go?' I asked.
+
+'Why, I see I must tell you that this is not so simple as it
+sounds,' he replied.  'You say this is your uncle's house, and so
+it is.  But to all effects and purposes it is your cousin's also.
+He has rooms here; has had them coming on for thirty years now, and
+they are filled with a prodigious accumulation of trash--stays, I
+dare say, and powder-puffs, and such effeminate idiocy--to which
+none could dispute his title, even suppose any one wanted to.  We
+had a perfect right to bid him go, and he had a perfect right to
+reply, "Yes, I will go, but not without my stays and cravats.  I
+must first get together the nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine chestsfull
+of insufferable rubbish, that I have spent the last thirty years
+collecting--and may very well spend the next thirty hours a-packing
+of."  And what should we have said to that?'
+
+'By way of repartee?' I asked.  'Two tall footmen and a pair of
+crabtree cudgels, I suggest.'
+
+'The Lord deliver me from the wisdom of laymen!' cried Romaine.
+'Put myself in the wrong at the beginning of a lawsuit?  No,
+indeed!  There was but one thing to do, and I did it, and burned my
+last cartridge in the doing of it.  I stunned him.  And it gave us
+three hours, by which we should make haste to profit; for if there
+is one thing sure, it is that he will be up to time again to-morrow
+in the morning.'
+
+'Well,' said I, 'I own myself an idiot.  Well do they say, an old
+soldier, an old innocent!  For I guessed nothing of all this.'
+
+'And, guessing it, have you the same objections to leave England?'
+he inquired.
+
+'The same,' said I.
+
+'It is indispensable,' he objected.
+
+'And it cannot be,' I replied.  'Reason has nothing to say in the
+matter; and I must not let you squander any of yours.  It will be
+enough to tell you this is an affair of the heart.'
+
+'Is it even so?' quoth Romaine, nodding his head.  'And I might
+have been sure of it.  Place them in a hospital, put them in a jail
+in yellow overalls, do what you will, young Jessamy finds young
+Jenny.  O, have it your own way; I am too old a hand to argue with
+young gentlemen who choose to fancy themselves in love; I have too
+much experience, thank you.  Only, be sure that you appreciate what
+you risk:  the prison, the dock, the gallows, and the halter--
+terribly vulgar circumstances, my young friend; grim, sordid,
+earnest; no poetry in that!'
+
+'And there I am warned,' I returned gaily.  'No man could be warned
+more finely or with a greater eloquence.  And I am of the same
+opinion still.  Until I have again seen that lady, nothing shall
+induce me to quit Great Britain.  I have besides--'
+
+And here I came to a full stop.  It was upon my tongue to have told
+him the story of the drovers, but at the first word of it my voice
+died in my throat.  There might be a limit to the lawyer's
+toleration, I reflected.  I had not been so long in Britain
+altogether; for the most part of that time I had been by the heels
+in limbo in Edinburgh Castle; and already I had confessed to
+killing one man with a pair of scissors; and now I was to go on and
+plead guilty to having settled another with a holly stick!  A wave
+of discretion went over me as cold and as deep as the sea.
+
+'In short, sir, this is a matter of feeling,' I concluded, 'and
+nothing will prevent my going to Edinburgh.'
+
+If I had fired a pistol in his ear he could not have been more
+startled.
+
+'To Edinburgh?' he repeated.  'Edinburgh? where the very paving-
+stones know you!'
+
+'Then is the murder out!' said I.  'But, Mr. Romaine, is there not
+sometimes safety in boldness?  Is it not a common-place of strategy
+to get where the enemy least expects you?  And where would he
+expect me less?'
+
+'Faith, there is something in that, too!' cried the lawyer.  'Ay,
+certainly, a great deal in that.  All the witnesses drowned but
+one, and he safe in prison; you yourself changed beyond
+recognition--let us hope--and walking the streets of the very town
+you have illustrated by your--well, your eccentricity!  It is not
+badly combined, indeed!'
+
+'You approve it, then?' said I.
+
+'O, approve!' said he; 'there is no question of approval.  There is
+only one course which I could approve, and that were to escape to
+France instanter.'
+
+'You do not wholly disapprove, at least?' I substituted.
+
+'Not wholly; and it would not matter if I did,' he replied.  'Go
+your own way; you are beyond argument.  And I am not sure that you
+will run more danger by that course than by any other.  Give the
+servants time to get to bed and fall asleep, then take a country
+cross-road and walk, as the rhyme has it, like blazes all night.
+In the morning take a chaise or take the mail at pleasure, and
+continue your journey with all the decorum and reserve of which you
+shall be found capable.'
+
+'I am taking the picture in,' I said.  'Give me time.  'Tis the
+tout ensemble I must see:  the whole as opposed to the details.'
+
+'Mountebank!' he murmured.
+
+'Yes, I have it now; and I see myself with a servant, and that
+servant is Rowley,' said I.
+
+'So as to have one more link with your uncle?' suggested the
+lawyer.  'Very judicious!'
+
+'And, pardon me, but that is what it is,' I exclaimed.  'Judicious
+is the word.  I am not making a deception fit to last for thirty
+years; I do not found a palace in the living granite for the night.
+This is a shelter tent--a flying picture--seen, admired, and gone
+again in the wink of an eye.  What is wanted, in short, is a
+trompe-l'oeil that shall be good enough for twelve hours at an inn:
+is it not so?'
+
+'It is, and the objection holds.  Rowley is but another danger,'
+said Romaine.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'will pass as a servant from a distance--as a
+creature seen poised on the dicky of a bowling chaise.  He will
+pass at hand as a smart, civil fellow one meets in the inn
+corridor, and looks back at, and asks, and is told, "Gentleman's
+servant in Number 4."  He will pass, in fact, all round, except
+with his personal friends!  My dear sir, pray what do you expect?
+Of course if we meet my cousin, or if we meet anybody who took part
+in the judicious exhibition of this evening, we are lost; and who's
+denying it?  To every disguise, however good and safe, there is
+always the weak point; you must always take (let us say--and to
+take a simile from your own waistcoat pocket) a snuff box-full of
+risk.  You'll get it just as small with Rowley as with anybody
+else.  And the long and short of it is, the lad's honest, he likes
+me, I trust him; he is my servant, or nobody.'
+
+'He might not accept,' said Romaine.
+
+'I bet you a thousand pounds he does!' cried I.  'But no matter;
+all you have to do is to send him out to-night on this cross-
+country business, and leave the thing to me.  I tell you, he will
+be my servant, and I tell you, he will do well.'
+
+I had crossed the room, and was already overhauling my wardrobe as
+I spoke.
+
+'Well,' concluded the lawyer, with a shrug, 'one risk with another:
+a la guerre comme a la guerre, as you would say.  Let the brat come
+and be useful, at least.'  And he was about to ring the bell, when
+his eye was caught by my researches in the wardrobe.  'Do not fall
+in love with these coats, waistcoats, cravats, and other panoply
+and accoutrements by which you are now surrounded.  You must not
+run the post as a dandy.  It is not the fashion, even.'
+
+'You are pleased to be facetious, sir,' said I; 'and not according
+to knowledge.  These clothes are my life, they are my disguise; and
+since I can take but few of them, I were a fool indeed if I
+selected hastily!  Will you understand, once and for all, what I am
+seeking?  To be invisible, is the first point; the second, to be
+invisible in a post-chaise and with a servant.  Can you not
+perceive the delicacy of the quest?  Nothing must be too coarse,
+nothing too fine; rien de voyant, rien qui detonne; so that I may
+leave everywhere the inconspicuous image of a handsome young man of
+a good fortune travelling in proper style, whom the landlord will
+forget in twelve hours--and the chambermaid perhaps remember, God
+bless her! with a sigh.  This is the very fine art of dress.'
+
+'I have practised it with success for fifty years,' said Romaine,
+with a chuckle.  'A black suit and a clean shirt is my infallible
+recipe.'
+
+'You surprise me; I did not think you would be shallow!' said I,
+lingering between two coats.  'Pray, Mr. Romaine, have I your head?
+or did you travel post and with a smartish servant?'
+
+'Neither, I admit,' said he.
+
+'Which change the whole problem,' I continued.  'I have to dress
+for a smartish servant and a Russia leather despatch-box.'  That
+brought me to a stand.  I came over and looked at the box with a
+moment's hesitation.  'Yes,' I resumed.  'Yes, and for the
+despatch-box!  It looks moneyed and landed; it means I have a
+lawyer.  It is an invaluable property.  But I could have wished it
+to hold less money.  The responsibility is crushing.  Should I not
+do more wisely to take five hundred pounds, and intrust the
+remainder with you, Mr. Romaine?'
+
+'If you are sure you will not want it,' answered Romaine.
+
+'I am far from sure of that,' cried I.  'In the first place, as a
+philosopher.  This is the first time I have been at the head of a
+large sum, and it is conceivable--who knows himself?--that I may
+make it fly.  In the second place, as a fugitive.  Who knows what I
+may need?  The whole of it may be inadequate.  But I can always
+write for more.'
+
+'You do not understand,' he replied.  'I break off all
+communication with you here and now.  You must give me a power of
+attorney ere you start to-night, and then be done with me
+trenchantly until better days.'
+
+I believe I offered some objection.
+
+'Think a little for once of me!' said Romaine.  'I must not have
+seen you before to-night.  To-night we are to have had our only
+interview, and you are to have given me the power; and to-night I
+am to have lost sight of you again--I know not whither, you were
+upon business, it was none of my affairs to question you!  And
+this, you are to remark, in the interests of your own safety much
+more than mine.'
+
+'I am not even to write to you?' I said, a little bewildered.
+
+'I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects you with
+common sense,' he replied.  'But that is the plain English of it.
+You are not even to write; and if you did, I would not answer.'
+
+'A letter, however--' I began.
+
+'Listen to me,' interrupted Romaine.  'So soon as your cousin reads
+the paragraph, what will he do?  Put the police upon looking into
+my correspondence!  So soon as you write to me, in short, you write
+to Bow Street; and if you will take my advice, you will date that
+letter from France.'
+
+'The devil!' said I, for I began suddenly to see that this might
+put me out of the way of my business.
+
+'What is it now?' says he.
+
+'There will be more to be done, then, before we can part,' I
+answered.
+
+'I give you the whole night,' said he.  'So long as you are off ere
+daybreak, I am content.'
+
+'In short, Mr. Romaine,' said I, 'I have had so much benefit of
+your advice and services that I am loth to sever the connection,
+and would even ask a substitute.  I would be obliged for a letter
+of introduction to one of your own cloth in Edinburgh--an old man
+for choice, very experienced, very respectable, and very secret.
+Could you favour me with such a letter?'
+
+'Why, no,' said he.  'Certainly not.  I will do no such thing,
+indeed.'
+
+'It would be a great favour, sir,' I pleaded.
+
+'It would be an unpardonable blunder,' he replied.  'What?  Give
+you a letter of introduction? and when the police come, I suppose,
+I must forget the circumstance?  No, indeed.  Talk of it no more.'
+
+'You seem to be always in the right,' said I.  'The letter would be
+out of the question, I quite see that.  But the lawyer's name might
+very well have dropped from you in the way of conversation; having
+heard him mentioned, I might profit by the circumstance to
+introduce myself; and in this way my business would be the better
+done, and you not in the least compromised.'
+
+'What is this business?' said Romaine.
+
+'I have not said that I had any,' I replied.  'It might arise.
+This is only a possibility that I must keep in view.'
+
+'Well,' said he, with a gesture of the hands, 'I mention Mr.
+Robbie; and let that be an end of it!--Or wait!' he added, 'I have
+it.  Here is something that will serve you for an introduction, and
+cannot compromise me.'  And he wrote his name and the Edinburgh
+lawyer's address on a piece of card and tossed it to me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI--I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED CHAISE
+
+
+
+What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an excellent
+cold supper in the lawyer's room, it was past two in the morning
+before we were ready for the road.  Romaine himself let us out of a
+window in a part of the house known to Rowley:  it appears it
+served as a kind of postern to the servants' hall, by which (when
+they were in the mind for a clandestine evening) they would come
+regularly in and out; and I remember very well the vinegar aspect
+of the lawyer on the receipt of this piece of information--how he
+pursed his lips, jutted his eyebrows, and kept repeating, 'This
+must be seen to, indeed! this shall be barred to-morrow in the
+morning!'  In this preoccupation, I believe he took leave of me
+without observing it; our things were handed out; we heard the
+window shut behind us; and became instantly lost in a horrid
+intricacy of blackness and the shadow of woods.
+
+A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling
+again; it seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually
+leaving off; and the darkness was intense.  Time and again we
+walked into trees; time and again found ourselves adrift among
+garden borders or stuck like a ram in the thicket.  Rowley had
+possessed himself of the matches, and he was neither to be
+terrified nor softened.  'No, I will not, Mr. Anne, sir,' he would
+reply.  'You know he tell me to wait till we were over the 'ill.
+It's only a little way now.  Why, and I thought you was a soldier,
+too!'  I was at least a very glad soldier when my valet consented
+at last to kindle a thieves' match.  From this, we easily lit the
+lantern; and thenceforward, through a labyrinth of woodland paths,
+were conducted by its uneasy glimmer.  Both booted and great-
+coated, with tall hats much of a shape, and laden with booty in the
+form of a despatch-box, a case of pistols, and two plump valises, I
+thought we had very much the look of a pair of brothers returning
+from the sack of Amersham Place.
+
+We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk
+abreast and without precaution.  It was nine miles to Aylesbury,
+our immediate destination; by a watch, which formed part of my new
+outfit, it should be about half-past three in the morning; and as
+we did not choose to arrive before daylight, time could not be said
+to press.  I gave the order to march at ease.
+
+'Now, Rowley,' said I, 'so far so good.  You have come, in the most
+obliging manner in the world, to carry these valises.  The question
+is, what next?  What are we to do at Aylesbury? or, more
+particularly, what are you?  Thence, I go on a journey.  Are you to
+accompany me?'
+
+He gave a little chuckle.  'That's all settled already, Mr. Anne,
+sir,' he replied.  'Why, I've got my things here in the valise--a
+half a dozen shirts and what not; I'm all ready, sir:  just you
+lead on:  YOU'LL see.'
+
+'The devil you have!' said I.  'You made pretty sure of your
+welcome.'
+
+'If you please, sir,' said Rowley.
+
+He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish
+shyness and triumph that awoke my conscience.  I could never let
+this innocent involve himself in the perils and difficulties that
+beset my course, without some hint of warning, which it was a
+matter of extreme delicacy to make plain enough and not too plain.
+
+'No, no,' said I; 'you may think you have made a choice, but it was
+blindfold, and you must make it over again.  The Count's service is
+a good one; what are you leaving it for?  Are you not throwing away
+the substance for the shadow?  No, do not answer me yet.  You
+imagine that I am a prosperous nobleman, just declared my uncle's
+heir, on the threshold of the best of good fortune, and, from the
+point of view of a judicious servant, a jewel of a master to serve
+and stick to?  Well, my boy, I am nothing of the kind, nothing of
+the kind.'
+
+As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the lantern
+to his face.  He stood before me, brilliantly illuminated on the
+background of impenetrable night and falling snow, stricken to
+stone between his double burden like an ass between two panniers,
+and gaping at me like a blunderbuss.  I had never seen a face so
+predestined to be astonished, or so susceptible of rendering the
+emotion of surprise; and it tempted me as an open piano tempts the
+musician.
+
+'Nothing of the sort, Rowley,' I continued, in a churchyard voice.
+'These are appearances, petty appearances.  I am in peril,
+homeless, hunted.  I count scarce any one in England who is not my
+enemy.  From this hour I drop my name, my title; I become nameless;
+my name is proscribed.  My liberty, my life, hang by a hair.  The
+destiny which you will accept, if you go forth with me, is to be
+tracked by spies, to hide yourself under a false name, to follow
+the desperate pretences and perhaps share the fate of a murderer
+with a price upon his head.'
+
+His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from one
+depth to another of tragic astonishment, and really worth paying to
+see; but at this it suddenly cleared.  'Oh, I ain't afraid!' he
+said; and then, choking into laughter, 'why, I see it from the
+first!'
+
+I could have beaten him.  But I had so grossly overshot the mark
+that I suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour
+of elocution to persuade him I had been in earnest.  In the course
+of which I became so interested in demonstrating my present danger
+that I forgot all about my future safety, and not only told him the
+story of Goguelat, but threw in the business of the drovers as
+well, and ended by blurting out that I was a soldier of Napoleon's
+and a prisoner of war.
+
+This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common
+complaint of me that I have a long tongue.  I believe it is a fault
+beloved by fortune.  Which of you considerate fellows would have
+done a thing at once so foolhardy and so wise as to make a
+confidant of a boy in his teens, and positively smelling of the
+nursery?  And when had I cause to repent it?  There is none so apt
+as a boy to be the adviser of any man in difficulties such as mine.
+To the beginnings of virile common sense he adds the last lights of
+the child's imagination; and he can fling himself into business
+with that superior earnestness that properly belongs to play.  And
+Rowley was a boy made to my hand.  He had a high sense of romance,
+and a secret cultus for all soldiers and criminals.  His travelling
+library consisted of a chap-book life of Wallace and some sixpenny
+parts of the 'Old Bailey Sessions Papers' by Gurney the shorthand
+writer; and the choice depicts his character to a hair.  You can
+imagine how his new prospects brightened on a boy of this
+disposition.  To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a
+soldier, and a murderer, rolled in one--to live by stratagems,
+disguises, and false names, in an atmosphere of midnight and
+mystery so thick that you could cut it with a knife--was really, I
+believe, more dear to him than his meals, though he was a great
+trencherman, and something of a glutton besides.  For myself, as
+the peg by which all this romantic business hung, I was simply
+idolised from that moment; and he would rather have sacrificed his
+hand than surrendered the privilege of serving me.
+
+We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in the
+snow, which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall to
+purpose.  I chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from its likeness
+to Romaine; Rowley, from an irresistible conversion of ideas, I
+dubbed Gammon.  His distress was laughable to witness:  his own
+choice of an unassuming nickname had been Claude Duval!  We settled
+our procedure at the various inns where we should alight, rehearsed
+our little manners like a piece of drill until it seemed impossible
+we should ever be taken unprepared; and in all these dispositions,
+you maybe sure the despatch-box was not forgotten.  Who was to pick
+it up, who was to set it down, who was to remain beside it, who was
+to sleep with it--there was no contingency omitted, all was gone
+into with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant on the one hand and
+a child with a new plaything on the other.
+
+'I say, wouldn't it look queer if you and me was to come to the
+post-house with all this luggage?' said Rowley.
+
+'I dare say,' I replied.  'But what else is to be done?'
+
+'Well, now, sir--you hear me,' says Rowley.  'I think it would look
+more natural-like if you was to come to the post-house alone, and
+with nothing in your 'ands--more like a gentleman, you know.  And
+you might say that your servant and baggage was a-waiting for you
+up the road.  I think I could manage, somehow, to make a shift with
+all them dratted things--leastways if you was to give me a 'and up
+with them at the start.'
+
+'And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to try, Mr.
+Rowley!' I cried.  'Why, you would be quite defenceless!  A footpad
+that was an infant child could rob you.  And I should probably come
+driving by to find you in a ditch with your throat cut.  But there
+is something in your idea, for all that; and I propose we put it in
+execution no farther forward than the next corner of a lane.'
+
+Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we headed
+by cross-roads for some point to the northward of it, whither I
+might assist Rowley with the baggage, and where I might leave him
+to await my return in the post-chaise.
+
+It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and ourselves
+walking snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the morning showed us
+an inn upon the highwayside.  Some distance off, under the shelter
+of a corner of the road and a clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with
+the whole of our possessions, and watched him till he staggered in
+safety into the doors of the Green Dragon, which was the sign of
+the house.  Thence I walked briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in my
+freedom and the causeless good spirits that belong to a snowy
+morning; though, to be sure, long before I had arrived the snow had
+again ceased to fall, and the eaves of Aylesbury were smoking in
+the level sun.  There was an accumulation of gigs and chaises in
+the yard, and a great bustle going forward in the coffee-room and
+about the doors of the inn.  At these evidences of so much travel
+on the road I was seized with a misgiving lest it should be
+impossible to get horses, and I should be detained in the
+precarious neighbourhood of my cousin.  Hungry as I was, I made my
+way first of all to the postmaster, where he stood--a big,
+athletic, horsey-looking man, blowing into a key in the corner of
+the yard.
+
+On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference into
+what seemed passion.
+
+'A po'-shay and 'osses!' he cried.  'Do I look as if I 'ad a po'-
+shay and 'osses?  Damn me, if I 'ave such a thing on the premises.
+I don't MAKE 'osses and chaises--I 'IRE 'em.  You might be God
+Almighty!' said he; and instantly, as if he had observed me for the
+first time, he broke off, and lowered his voice into the
+confidential.  'Why, now that I see you are a gentleman,' said he,
+'I'll tell you what!  If you like to BUY, I have the article to fit
+you.  Second-'and shay by Lycett, of London.  Latest style; good as
+new.  Superior fittin's, net on the roof, baggage platform, pistol
+'olsters--the most com-plete and the most gen-teel turn-out I ever
+see!  The 'ole for seventy-five pound!  It's as good as givin' her
+away!'
+
+'Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a hawker's
+barrow?' said I.  'Why, my good man, if I had to stop here, anyway,
+I should prefer to buy a house and garden!'
+
+'Come and look at her!' he cried; and, with the word, links his arm
+in mine and carries me to the outhouse where the chaise was on
+view.
+
+It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my
+purpose:  eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though I
+thought the postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree
+with him so far.  The body was painted a dark claret, and the
+wheels an invisible green.  The lamp and glasses were bright as
+silver; and the whole equipage had an air of privacy and reserve
+that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm suspicion.  With a servant
+like Rowley, and a chaise like this, I felt that I could go from
+the Land's End to John o' Groat's House amid a population of bowing
+ostlers.  And I suppose I betrayed in my manner the degree in which
+the bargain tempted me.
+
+'Come,' cried the postmaster--'I'll make it seventy, to oblige a
+friend!'
+
+'The point is:  the horses,' said I.
+
+'Well,' said he, consulting his watch, 'it's now gone the 'alf
+after eight.  What time do you want her at the door?'
+
+'Horses and all?' said I.
+
+''Osses and all!' says he.  'One good turn deserves another.  You
+give me seventy pound for the shay, and I'll 'oss it for you.  I
+told you I didn't MAKE 'osses; but I CAN make 'em, to oblige a
+friend.'
+
+What would you have?  It was not the wisest thing in the world to
+buy a chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle's house; but in this
+way I got my horses for the next stage.  And by any other it
+appeared that I should have to wait.  Accordingly I paid the money
+down--perhaps twenty pounds too much, though it was certainly a
+well-made and well-appointed vehicle--ordered it round in half an
+hour, and proceeded to refresh myself with breakfast.
+
+The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a bay-window,
+and commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I continued to
+be amused by the successive departures of travellers--the fussy and
+the offhand, the niggardly and the lavish--all exhibiting their
+different characters in that diagnostic moment of the farewell:
+some escorted to the stirrup or the chaise door by the chamberlain,
+the chambermaids and the waiters almost in a body, others moving
+off under a cloud, without human countenance.  In the course of
+this I became interested in one for whom this ovation began to
+assume the proportions of a triumph; not only the under-servants,
+but the barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the postmaster
+himself, crowding about the steps to speed his departure.  I was
+aware, at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though the
+traveller were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to air
+it in that society.  I leaned forward with a lively curiosity; and
+the next moment I had blotted myself behind the teapot.  The
+popular traveller had turned to wave a farewell; and behold! he was
+no other than my cousin Alain.  It was a change of the sharpest
+from the angry, pallid man I had seen at Amersham Place.  Ruddy to
+a fault, illuminated with vintages, crowned with his curls like
+Bacchus, he now stood before me for an instant, the perfect master
+of himself, smiling with airs of conscious popularity and
+insufferable condescension.  He reminded me at once of a royal
+duke, or an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman
+who should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman.  A moment
+after he was gliding noiselessly on the road to London.
+
+I breathed again.  I recognised, with heartfelt gratitude, how
+lucky I had been to go in by the stable-yard instead of the
+hostelry door, and what a fine occasion of meeting my cousin I had
+lost by the purchase of the claret-coloured chaise!  The next
+moment I remembered that there was a waiter present.  No doubt but
+he must have observed me when I crouched behind the breakfast
+equipage; no doubt but he must have commented on this unusual and
+undignified behaviour; and it was essential that I should do
+something to remove the impression.
+
+'Waiter!' said I, 'that was the nephew of Count Carwell that just
+drove off, wasn't it?'
+
+'Yes, sir:  Viscount Carwell we calls him,' he replied.
+
+'Ah, I thought as much,' said I.  'Well, well, damn all these
+Frenchmen, say I!'
+
+'You may say so indeed, sir,' said the waiter.  'They ain't not to
+say in the same field with our 'ome-raised gentry.'
+
+'Nasty tempers?' I suggested.
+
+'Beas'ly temper, sir, the Viscount 'ave,' said the waiter with
+feeling.  'Why, no longer agone than this morning, he was sitting
+breakfasting and reading in his paper.  I suppose, sir, he come on
+some pilitical information, or it might be about 'orses, but he
+raps his 'and upon the table sudden and calls for curacoa.  It gave
+me quite a turn, it did; he did it that sudden and 'ard.  Now, sir,
+that may be manners in France, but hall I can say is, that I'm not
+used to it.'
+
+'Reading the paper, was he?' said I.  'What paper, eh?'
+
+'Here it is, sir,' exclaimed the waiter.  'Seems like as if he'd
+dropped it.'
+
+And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.
+
+I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what to
+expect; but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped beating.
+There it was:  the fulfilment of Romaine's apprehension was before
+me; the paper was laid open at the capture of Clausel.  I felt as
+if I could take a little curacoa myself, but on second thoughts
+called for brandy.  It was badly wanted; and suddenly I observed
+the waiter's eye to sparkle, as it were, with some recognition;
+made certain he had remarked the resemblance between me and Alain;
+and became aware--as by a revelation--of the fool's part I had been
+playing.  For I had now managed to put my identification beyond a
+doubt, if Alain should choose to make his inquiries at Aylesbury;
+and, as if that were not enough, I had added, at an expense of
+seventy pounds, a clue by which he might follow me through the
+length and breadth of England, in the shape of the claret-coloured
+chaise!  That elegant equipage (which I began to regard as little
+better than a claret-coloured ante-room to the hangman's cart)
+coming presently to the door, I left my breakfast in the middle and
+departed; posting to the north as diligently as my cousin Alain was
+posting to the south, and putting my trust (such as it was) in an
+opposite direction and equal speed.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII--CHARACTER AND ACQUIREMENTS OF MR.  ROWLEY
+
+
+
+I am not certain that I had ever really appreciated before that
+hour the extreme peril of the adventure on which I was embarked.
+The sight of my cousin, the look of his face--so handsome, so
+jovial at the first sight, and branded with so much malignity as
+you saw it on the second--with his hyperbolical curls in order,
+with his neckcloth tied as if for the conquests of love, setting
+forth (as I had no doubt in the world he was doing) to clap the Bow
+Street runners on my trail, and cover England with handbills, each
+dangerous as a loaded musket, convinced me for the first time that
+the affair was no less serious than death.  I believe it came to a
+near touch whether I should not turn the horses' heads at the next
+stage and make directly for the coast.  But I was now in the
+position of a man who should have thrown his gage into the den of
+lions; or, better still, like one who should have quarrelled
+overnight under the influence of wine, and now, at daylight, in a
+cold winter's morning, and humbly sober, must make good his words.
+It is not that I thought any the less, or any the less warmly, of
+Flora.  But, as I smoked a grim segar that morning in a corner of
+the chaise, no doubt I considered, in the first place, that the
+letter-post had been invented, and admitted privately to myself, in
+the second, that it would have been highly possible to write her on
+a piece of paper, seal it, and send it skimming by the mail,
+instead of going personally into these egregious dangers, and
+through a country that I beheld crowded with gibbets and Bow Street
+officers.  As for Sim and Candlish, I doubt if they crossed my
+mind.
+
+At the Green Dragon Rowley was waiting on the doorsteps with the
+luggage, and really was bursting with unpalatable conversation.
+
+'Who do you think we've 'ad 'ere, sir?' he began breathlessly, as
+the chaise drove off.  'Red Breasts'; and he nodded his head
+portentously.
+
+'Red Breasts?' I repeated, for I stupidly did not understand at the
+moment an expression I had often heard.
+
+'Ah!' said he.  'Red weskits.  Runners.  Bow Street runners.  Two
+on' em, and one was Lavender himself!  I hear the other say quite
+plain, "Now, Mr. Lavender, IF you're ready."  They was breakfasting
+as nigh me as I am to that postboy.  They're all right; they ain't
+after us.  It's a forger; and I didn't send them off on a false
+scent--O no!  I thought there was no use in having them over our
+way; so I give them "very valuable information," Mr. Lavender said,
+and tipped me a tizzy for myself; and they're off to Luton.  They
+showed me the 'andcuffs, too--the other one did--and he clicked the
+dratted things on my wrist; and I tell you, I believe I nearly went
+off in a swound!  There's something so beastly in the feel of them!
+Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne,' he added, with one of his delicious
+changes from the character of the confidential schoolboy into that
+of the trained, respectful servant.
+
+Well, I must not be proud!  I cannot say I found the subject of
+handcuffs to my fancy; and it was with more asperity than was
+needful that I reproved him for the slip about the name.
+
+'Yes, Mr. Ramornie,' says he, touching his hat.  'Begging your
+pardon, Mr. Ramornie.  But I've been very piticular, sir, up to
+now; and you may trust me to be very piticular in the future.  It
+were only a slip, sir.'
+
+'My good boy,' said I, with the most imposing severity, 'there must
+be no slips.  Be so good as to remember that my life is at stake.'
+
+I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had made
+myself.  It is my principle that an officer must never be wrong.  I
+have seen two divisions beating their brains out for a fortnight
+against a worthless and quite impregnable castle in a pass:  I knew
+we were only doing it for discipline, because the General had said
+so at first, and had not yet found any way out of his own words;
+and I highly admired his force of character, and throughout these
+operations thought my life exposed in a very good cause.  With
+fools and children, which included Rowley, the necessity was even
+greater.  I proposed to myself to be infallible; and even when he
+expressed some wonder at the purchase of the claret-coloured
+chaise, I put him promptly in his place.  In our situation, I told
+him, everything had to be sacrificed to appearances; doubtless, in
+a hired chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look at the
+dignity!  I was so positive, that I had sometimes almost convinced
+myself.  Not for long, you may be certain!  This detestable
+conveyance always appeared to me to be laden with Bow Street
+officers, and to have a placard upon the back of it publishing my
+name and crimes.  If I had paid seventy pounds to get the thing, I
+should not have stuck at seven hundred to be safely rid of it.
+
+And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the despatch-
+box and its golden cargo!  I had never had a care but to draw my
+pay and spend it; I had lived happily in the regiment, as in my
+father's house, fed by the great Emperor's commissariat as by
+ubiquitous doves of Elijah--or, my faith! if anything went wrong
+with the commissariat, helping myself with the best grace in the
+world from the next peasant!  And now I began to feel at the same
+time the burthen of riches and the fear of destitution.  There were
+ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box, but I reckoned in French
+money, and had two hundred and fifty thousand agonies; I kept it
+under my hand all day, I dreamed of it at night.  In the inns, I
+was afraid to go to dinner and afraid to go to sleep.  When I
+walked up a hill I durst not leave the doors of the claret-coloured
+chaise.  Sometimes I would change the disposition of the funds:
+there were days when I carried as much as five or six thousand
+pounds on my own person, and only the residue continued to voyage
+in the treasure-chest--days when I bulked all over like my cousin,
+crackled to a touch with bank paper, and had my pockets weighed to
+bursting-point with sovereigns.  And there were other days when I
+wearied of the thing--or grew ashamed of it--and put all the money
+back where it had come from:  there let it take its chance, like
+better people!  In short, I set Rowley a poor example of
+consistency, and in philosophy, none at all.
+
+Little he cared!  All was one to him so long as he was amused, and
+I never knew any one amused more easily.  He was thrillingly
+interested in life, travel, and his own melodramatic position.  All
+day he would be looking from the chaise windows with ebullitions of
+gratified curiosity, that were sometimes justified and sometimes
+not, and that (taken altogether) it occasionally wearied me to be
+obliged to share.  I can look at horses, and I can look at trees
+too, although not fond of it.  But why should I look at a lame
+horse, or a tree that was like the letter Y?  What exhilaration
+could I feel in viewing a cottage that was the same colour as 'the
+second from the miller's' in some place where I had never been, and
+of which I had not previously heard?  I am ashamed to complain, but
+there were moments when my juvenile and confidential friend weighed
+heavy on my hands.  His cackle was indeed almost continuous, but it
+was never unamiable.  He showed an amiable curiosity when he was
+asking questions; an amiable guilelessness when he was conferring
+information.  And both he did largely.  I am in a position to write
+the biographies of Mr. Rowley, Mr. Rowley's father and mother, his
+Aunt Eliza, and the miller's dog; and nothing but pity for the
+reader, and some misgivings as to the law of copyright, prevail on
+me to withhold them.
+
+A general design to mould himself upon my example became early
+apparent, and I had not the heart to check it.  He began to mimic
+my carriage; he acquired, with servile accuracy, a little manner I
+had of shrugging the shoulders; and I may say it was by observing
+it in him that I first discovered it in myself.  One day it came
+out by chance that I was of the Catholic religion.  He became
+plunged in thought, at which I was gently glad.  Then suddenly -
+
+'Odd-rabbit it!  I'll be Catholic too!' he broke out.  'You must
+teach me it, Mr. Anne--I mean, Ramornie.'
+
+I dissuaded him:  alleging that he would find me very imperfectly
+informed as to the grounds and doctrines of the Church, and that,
+after all, in the matter of religions, it was a very poor idea to
+change.  'Of course, my Church is the best,' said I; 'but that is
+not the reason why I belong to it:  I belong to it because it was
+the faith of my house.  I wish to take my chances with my own
+people, and so should you.  If it is a question of going to hell,
+go to hell like a gentleman with your ancestors.'
+
+'Well, it wasn't that,' he admitted.  'I don't know that I was
+exactly thinking of hell.  Then there's the inquisition, too.
+That's rather a cawker, you know.'
+
+'And I don't believe you were thinking of anything in the world,'
+said I--which put a period to his respectable conversion.
+
+He consoled himself by playing for awhile on a cheap flageolet,
+which was one of his diversions, and to which I owed many intervals
+of peace.  When he first produced it, in the joints, from his
+pocket, he had the duplicity to ask me if I played upon it.  I
+answered, no; and he put the instrument away with a sigh and the
+remark that he had thought I might.  For some while he resisted the
+unspeakable temptation, his fingers visibly itching and twittering
+about his pocket, even his interest in the landscape and in
+sporadic anecdote entirely lost.  Presently the pipe was in his
+hands again; he fitted, unfitted, refitted, and played upon it in
+dumb show for some time.
+
+'I play it myself a little,' says he.
+
+'Do you?' said I, and yawned.
+
+And then he broke down.
+
+'Mr. Ramornie, if you please, would it disturb you, sir, if I was
+to play a chune?' he pleaded.  And from that hour, the tootling of
+the flageolet cheered our way.
+
+He was particularly keen on the details of battles, single combats,
+incidents of scouting parties, and the like.  These he would make
+haste to cap with some of the exploits of Wallace, the only hero
+with whom he had the least acquaintance.  His enthusiasm was
+genuine and pretty.  When he learned we were going to Scotland,
+'Well, then,' he broke out, 'I'll see where Wallace lived!'  And
+presently after, he fell to moralising.  'It's a strange thing,
+sir,' he began, 'that I seem somehow to have always the wrong sow
+by the ear.  I'm English after all, and I glory in it.  My eye!
+don't I, though!  Let some of your Frenchies come over here to
+invade, and you'll see whether or not!  Oh, yes, I'm English to the
+backbone, I am.  And yet look at me!  I got hold of this 'ere
+William Wallace and took to him right off; I never heard of such a
+man before!  And then you came along, and I took to you.  And both
+the two of you were my born enemies!  I--I beg your pardon, Mr.
+Ramornie, but would you mind it very much if you didn't go for to
+do anything against England'--he brought the word out suddenly,
+like something hot--'when I was along of you?'
+
+I was more affected than I can tell.
+
+'Rowley,' I said, 'you need have no fear.  By how much I love my
+own honour, by so much I will take care to protect yours.  We are
+but fraternising at the outposts, as soldiers do.  When the bugle
+calls, my boy, we must face each other, one for England, one for
+France, and may God defend the right!'
+
+So I spoke at the moment; but for all my brave airs, the boy had
+wounded me in a vital quarter.  His words continued to ring in my
+hearing.  There was no remission all day of my remorseful thoughts;
+and that night (which we lay at Lichfield, I believe) there was no
+sleep for me in my bed.  I put out the candle and lay down with a
+good resolution; and in a moment all was light about me like a
+theatre, and I saw myself upon the stage of it playing ignoble
+parts.  I remembered France and my Emperor, now depending on the
+arbitrament of war, bent down, fighting on their knees and with
+their teeth against so many and such various assailants.  And I
+burned with shame to be here in England, cherishing an English
+fortune, pursuing an English mistress, and not there, to handle a
+musket in my native fields, and to manure them with my body if I
+fell.  I remembered that I belonged to France.  All my fathers had
+fought for her, and some had died; the voice in my throat, the
+sight of my eyes, the tears that now sprang there, the whole man of
+me, was fashioned of French earth and born of a French mother; I
+had been tended and caressed by a succession of the daughters of
+France, the fairest, the most ill-starred; and I had fought and
+conquered shoulder to shoulder with her sons.  A soldier, a noble,
+of the proudest and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to the
+prattle of a hobbledehoy lackey in an English chaise to recall me
+to the consciousness of duty.
+
+When I saw how it was I did not lose time in indecision.  The old
+classical conflict of love and honour being once fairly before me,
+it did not cost me a thought.  I was a Saint-Yves de Keroual; and I
+decided to strike off on the morrow for Wakefield and Burchell
+Fenn, and embark, as soon as it should be morally possible, for the
+succour of my downtrodden fatherland and my beleaguered Emperor.
+Pursuant on this resolve, I leaped from bed, made a light, and as
+the watchman was crying half-past two in the dark streets of
+Lichfield, sat down to pen a letter of farewell to Flora.  And
+then--whether it was the sudden chill of the night, whether it came
+by association of ideas from the remembrance of Swanston Cottage I
+know not, but there appeared before me--to the barking of sheep-
+dogs--a couple of snuffy and shambling figures, each wrapped in a
+plaid, each armed with a rude staff; and I was immediately bowed
+down to have forgotten them so long, and of late to have thought of
+them so cavalierly.
+
+Sure enough there was my errand!  As a private person I was neither
+French nor English; I was something else first:  a loyal gentleman,
+an honest man.  Sim and Candlish must not be left to pay the
+penalty of my unfortunate blow.  They held my honour tacitly
+pledged to succour them; and it is a sort of stoical refinement
+entirely foreign to my nature to set the political obligation above
+the personal and private.  If France fell in the interval for the
+lack of Anne de St.-Yves, fall she must!  But I was both surprised
+and humiliated to have had so plain a duty bound upon me for so
+long--and for so long to have neglected and forgotten it.  I think
+any brave man will understand me when I say that I went to bed and
+to sleep with a conscience very much relieved, and woke again in
+the morning with a light heart.  The very danger of the enterprise
+reassured me:  to save Sim and Candlish (suppose the worst to come
+to the worst) it would be necessary for me to declare myself in a
+court of justice, with consequences which I did not dare to dwell
+upon; it could never be said that I had chosen the cheap and the
+easy--only that in a very perplexing competition of duties I had
+risked my life for the most immediate.
+
+We resumed the journey with more diligence:  thenceforward posted
+day and night; did not halt beyond what was necessary for meals;
+and the postillions were excited by gratuities, after the habit of
+my cousin Alain.  For twopence I could have gone farther and taken
+four horses; so extreme was my haste, running as I was before the
+terrors of an awakened conscience.  But I feared to be conspicuous.
+Even as it was, we attracted only too much attention, with our pair
+and that white elephant, the seventy-pounds-worth of claret-
+coloured chaise.
+
+Meanwhile I was ashamed to look Rowley in the face.  The young
+shaver had contrived to put me wholly in the wrong; he had cost me
+a night's rest and a severe and healthful humiliation; and I was
+grateful and embarrassed in his society.  This would never do; it
+was contrary to all my ideas of discipline; if the officer has to
+blush before the private, or the master before the servant, nothing
+is left to hope for but discharge or death.  I hit upon the idea of
+teaching him French; and accordingly, from Lichfield, I became the
+distracted master, and he the scholar--how shall I say?
+indefatigable, but uninspired.  His interest never flagged.  He
+would hear the same word twenty times with profound refreshment,
+mispronounce it in several different ways, and forget it again with
+magical celerity.  Say it happened to be STIRRUP.  'No, I don't
+seem to remember that word, Mr. Anne,' he would say:  'it don't
+seem to stick to me, that word don't.'  And then, when I had told
+it him again, 'Etrier!' he would cry.  'To be sure!  I had it on
+the tip of my tongue.  Eterier!' (going wrong already, as if by a
+fatal instinct).  'What will I remember it by, now?  Why, INTERIOR,
+to be sure!  I'll remember it by its being something that ain't in
+the interior of a horse.'  And when next I had occasion to ask him
+the French for stirrup, it was a toss-up whether he had forgotten
+all about it, or gave me EXTERIOR for an answer.  He was never a
+hair discouraged.  He seemed to consider that he was covering the
+ground at a normal rate.  He came up smiling day after day.  'Now,
+sir, shall we do our French?' he would say; and I would put
+questions, and elicit copious commentary and explanation, but never
+the shadow of an answer.  My hands fell to my sides; I could have
+wept to hear him.  When I reflected that he had as yet learned
+nothing, and what a vast deal more there was for him to learn, the
+period of these lessons seemed to unroll before me vast as
+eternity, and I saw myself a teacher of a hundred, and Rowley a
+pupil of ninety, still hammering on the rudiments!  The wretched
+boy, I should say, was quite unspoiled by the inevitable
+familiarities of the journey.  He turned out at each stage the pink
+of serving-lads, deft, civil, prompt, attentive, touching his hat
+like an automaton, raising the status of Mr. Ramornie in the eyes
+of all the inn by his smiling service, and seeming capable of
+anything in the world but the one thing I had chosen--learning
+French!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII--THE ADVENTURE OF THE RUNAWAY COUPLE
+
+
+
+The country had for some time back been changing in character.  By
+a thousand indications I could judge that I was again drawing near
+to Scotland.  I saw it written in the face of the hills, in the
+growth of the trees, and in the glint of the waterbrooks that kept
+the high-road company.  It might have occurred to me, also, that I
+was, at the same time, approaching a place of some fame in Britain-
+-Gretna Green.  Over these same leagues of road--which Rowley and I
+now traversed in the claret-coloured chaise, to the note of the
+flageolet and the French lesson--how many pairs of lovers had gone
+bowling northwards to the music of sixteen scampering horseshoes;
+and how many irate persons, parents, uncles, guardians, evicted
+rivals, had come tearing after, clapping the frequent red face to
+the chaise-window, lavishly shedding their gold about the post-
+houses, sedulously loading and re-loading, as they went, their
+avenging pistols!  But I doubt if I had thought of it at all,
+before a wayside hazard swept me into the thick of an adventure of
+this nature; and I found myself playing providence with other
+people's lives, to my own admiration at the moment--and
+subsequently to my own brief but passionate regret.
+
+At rather an ugly corner of an uphill reach I came on the wreck of
+a chaise lying on one side in the ditch, a man and a woman in
+animated discourse in the middle of the road, and the two
+postillions, each with his pair of horses, looking on and laughing
+from the saddle.
+
+'Morning breezes! here's a smash!' cried Rowley, pocketing his
+flageolet in the middle of the Tight Little Island.
+
+I was perhaps more conscious of the moral smash than the physical--
+more alive to broken hearts than to broken chaises; for, as plain
+as the sun at morning, there was a screw loose in this runaway
+match.  It is always a bad sign when the lower classes laugh:
+their taste in humour is both poor and sinister; and for a man,
+running the posts with four horses, presumably with open pockets,
+and in the company of the most entrancing little creature
+conceivable, to have come down so far as to be laughed at by his
+own postillions, was only to be explained on the double hypothesis,
+that he was a fool and no gentleman.
+
+I have said they were man and woman.  I should have said man and
+child.  She was certainly not more than seventeen, pretty as an
+angel, just plump enough to damn a saint, and dressed in various
+shades of blue, from her stockings to her saucy cap, in a kind of
+taking gamut, the top note of which she flung me in a beam from her
+too appreciative eye.  There was no doubt about the case:  I saw it
+all.  From a boarding-school, a black-board, a piano, and
+Clementi's Sonatinas, the child had made a rash adventure upon life
+in the company of a half-bred hawbuck; and she was already not only
+regretting it, but expressing her regret with point and pungency.
+
+As I alighted they both paused with that unmistakable air of being
+interrupted in a scene.  I uncovered to the lady and placed my
+services at their disposal.
+
+It was the man who answered.  'There's no use in shamming, sir,'
+said he.  'This lady and I have run away, and her father's after
+us:  road to Gretna, sir.  And here have these nincompoops spilt us
+in the ditch and smashed the chaise!'
+
+'Very provoking,' said I.
+
+'I don't know when I've been so provoked!' cried he, with a glance
+down the road, of mortal terror.
+
+'The father is no doubt very much incensed?' I pursued civilly.
+
+'O God!' cried the hawbuck.  'In short, you see, we must get out of
+this.  And I'll tell you what--it may seem cool, but necessity has
+no law--if you would lend us your chaise to the next post-house, it
+would be the very thing, sir.'
+
+'I confess it seems cool,' I replied.
+
+'What's that you say, sir?' he snapped.
+
+'I was agreeing with you,' said I.  'Yes, it does seem cool; and
+what is more to the point, it seems unnecessary.  This thing can be
+arranged in a more satisfactory manner otherwise, I think.  You can
+doubtless ride?'
+
+This opened a door on the matter of their previous dispute, and the
+fellow appeared life-sized in his true colours.  'That's what I've
+been telling her:  that, damn her! she must ride!' he broke out.
+'And if the gentleman's of the same mind, why, damme, you shall!'
+
+As he said so, he made a snatch at her wrist, which she evaded with
+horror.
+
+I stepped between them.
+
+'No, sir,' said I; 'the lady shall not.'
+
+He turned on me raging.  'And who are you to interfere?' he roared.
+
+'There is here no question of who I am,' I replied.  'I may be the
+devil or the Archbishop of Canterbury for what you know, or need
+know.  The point is that I can help you--it appears that nobody
+else can; and I will tell you how I propose to do it.  I will give
+the lady a seat in my chaise, if you will return the compliment by
+allowing my servant to ride one of your horses.'
+
+I thought he would have sprung at my throat.
+
+'You have always the alternative before you:  to wait here for the
+arrival of papa,' I added.
+
+And that settled him.  He cast another haggard look down the road,
+and capitulated.
+
+'I am sure, sir, the lady is very much obliged to you,' he said,
+with an ill grace.
+
+I gave her my hand; she mounted like a bird into the chaise;
+Rowley, grinning from ear to ear, closed the door behind us; the
+two impudent rascals of post-boys cheered and laughed aloud as we
+drove off; and my own postillion urged his horses at once into a
+rattling trot.  It was plain I was supposed by all to have done a
+very dashing act, and ravished the bride from the ravisher.
+
+In the meantime I stole a look at the little lady.  She was in a
+state of pitiable discomposure, and her arms shook on her lap in
+her black lace mittens.
+
+'Madam--' I began.
+
+And she, in the same moment, finding her voice:  'O, what you must
+think of me!'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'what must any gentleman think when he sees youth,
+beauty and innocence in distress?  I wish I could tell you that I
+was old enough to be your father; I think we must give that up,' I
+continued, with a smile.  'But I will tell you something about
+myself which ought to do as well, and to set that little heart at
+rest in my society.  I am a lover.  May I say it of myself--for I
+am not quite used to all the niceties of English--that I am a true
+lover?  There is one whom I admire, adore, obey; she is no less
+good than she is beautiful; if she were here, she would take you to
+her arms:  conceive that she has sent me--that she has said to me,
+"Go, be her knight!"'
+
+'O, I know she must be sweet, I know she must be worthy of you!'
+cried the little lady.  'She would never forget female decorum--nor
+make the terrible erratum I've done!'
+
+And at this she lifted up her voice and wept.
+
+This did not forward matters:  it was in vain that I begged her to
+be more composed and to tell me a plain, consecutive tale of her
+misadventures; but she continued instead to pour forth the most
+extraordinary mixture of the correct school miss and the poor
+untutored little piece of womanhood in a false position--of
+engrafted pedantry and incoherent nature.
+
+'I am certain it must have been judicial blindness,' she sobbed.
+'I can't think how I didn't see it, but I didn't; and he isn't, is
+he?  And then a curtain rose . . . O, what a moment was that!  But
+I knew at once that YOU WERE; you had but to appear from your
+carriage, and I knew it, O, she must be a fortunate young lady!
+And I have no fear with you, none--a perfect confidence.'
+
+'Madam,' said I, 'a gentleman.'
+
+'That's what I mean--a gentleman,' she exclaimed.  'And he--and
+that--HE isn't.  O, how shall I dare meet father!'  And disclosing
+to me her tear-stained face, and opening her arms with a tragic
+gesture:  'And I am quite disgraced before all the young ladies, my
+school-companions!' she added.
+
+'O, not so bad as that!' I cried.  'Come, come, you exaggerate, my
+dear Miss--?  Excuse me if I am too familiar:  I have not yet heard
+your name.'
+
+'My name is Dorothy Greensleeves, sir:  why should I conceal it?  I
+fear it will only serve to point an adage to future generations,
+and I had meant so differently!  There was no young female in the
+county more emulous to be thought well of than I.  And what a fall
+was there!  O, dear me, what a wicked, piggish donkey of a girl I
+have made of myself, to be sure!  And there is no hope! O, Mr.--'
+
+And at that she paused and asked my name.
+
+I am not writing my eulogium for the Academy; I will admit it was
+unpardonably imbecile, but I told it her.  If you had been there--
+and seen her, ravishingly pretty and little, a baby in years and
+mind--and heard her talking like a book, with so much of schoolroom
+propriety in her manner, with such an innocent despair in the
+matter--you would probably have told her yours.  She repeated it
+after me.
+
+'I shall pray for you all my life,' she said.  'Every night, when I
+retire to rest, the last thing I shall do is to remember you by
+name.'
+
+Presently I succeeded in winning from her her tale, which was much
+what I had anticipated:  a tale of a schoolhouse, a walled garden,
+a fruit-tree that concealed a bench, an impudent raff posturing in
+church, an exchange of flowers and vows over the garden wall, a
+silly schoolmate for a confidante, a chaise and four, and the most
+immediate and perfect disenchantment on the part of the little
+lady.  'And there is nothing to be done!' she wailed in conclusion.
+'My error is irretrievable, I am quite forced to that conclusion.
+O, Monsieur de Saint-Yves! who would have thought that I could have
+been such a blind, wicked donkey!'
+
+I should have said before--only that I really do not know when it
+came in--that we had been overtaken by the two post-boys, Rowley
+and Mr. Bellamy, which was the hawbuck's name, bestriding the four
+post-horses; and that these formed a sort of cavalry escort, riding
+now before, now behind the chaise, and Bellamy occasionally
+posturing at the window and obliging us with some of his
+conversation.  He was so ill-received that I declare I was tempted
+to pity him, remembering from what a height he had fallen, and how
+few hours ago it was since the lady had herself fled to his arms,
+all blushes and ardour.  Well, these great strokes of fortune
+usually befall the unworthy, and Bellamy was now the legitimate
+object of my commiseration and the ridicule of his own post-boys!
+
+'Miss Dorothy,' said I, 'you wish to be delivered from this man?'
+
+'O, if it were possible!' she cried.  'But not by violence.'
+
+'Not in the least, ma'am,' I replied.  'The simplest thing in life.
+We are in a civilised country; the man's a malefactor--'
+
+'O, never!' she cried.  'Do not even dream it!  With all his
+faults, I know he is not THAT.'
+
+'Anyway, he's in the wrong in this affair--on the wrong side of the
+law, call it what you please,' said I; and with that, our four
+horsemen having for the moment headed us by a considerable
+interval, I hailed my post-boy and inquired who was the nearest
+magistrate and where he lived.  Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a
+prodigious dignitary, and one who lived but a lane or two back, and
+at the distance of only a mile or two out of the direct road.  I
+showed him the king's medallion.
+
+'Take the lady there, and at full gallop,' I cried.
+
+'Right, sir!  Mind yourself,' says the postillion.
+
+And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the
+carriage to the rightabout and we were galloping south.
+
+Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre, and
+came flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate shouting;
+so that the fine, sober picture of a carriage and escort, that we
+had presented but a moment back, was transformed in the twinkling
+of an eye into the image of a noisy fox-chase.  The two postillions
+and my own saucy rogue were, of course, disinterested actors in the
+comedy; they rode for the mere sport, keeping in a body, their
+mouths full of laughter, waving their hats as they came on, and
+crying (as the fancy struck them) Tally-ho!'  'Stop, thief!'  'A
+highwayman!  A highwayman!'  It was otherguess work with Bellamy.
+That gentleman no sooner observed our change of direction than he
+turned his horse with so much violence that the poor animal was
+almost cast upon its side, and launched her in immediate and
+desperate pursuit.  As he approached I saw that his face was deadly
+white and that he carried a drawn pistol in his hand.  I turned at
+once to the poor little bride that was to have been, and now was
+not to be; she, upon her side, deserting the other window, turned
+as if to meet me.
+
+'O, O, don't let him kill me!' she screamed.
+
+'Never fear,' I replied.
+
+Her face was distorted with terror.  Her hands took hold upon me
+with the instinctive clutch of an infant.  The chaise gave a flying
+lurch, which took the feet from under me and tumbled us anyhow upon
+the seat.  And almost in the same moment the head of Bellamy
+appeared in the window which Missy had left free for him.
+
+Conceive the situation!  The little lady and I were falling--or had
+just fallen--backward on the seat, and offered to the eye a
+somewhat ambiguous picture.  The chaise was speeding at a furious
+pace, and with the most violent leaps and lurches, along the
+highway.  Into this bounding receptacle Bellamy interjected his
+head, his pistol arm, and his pistol; and since his own horse was
+travelling still faster than the chaise, he must withdraw all of
+them again in the inside of the fraction of a minute.  He did so,
+but he left the charge of the pistol behind him--whether by design
+or accident I shall never know, and I dare say he has forgotten!
+Probably he had only meant to threaten, in hopes of causing us to
+arrest our flight.  In the same moment came the explosion and a
+pitiful cry from Missy; and my gentleman, making certain he had
+struck her, went down the road pursued by the furies, turned at the
+first corner, took a flying leap over the thorn hedge, and
+disappeared across country in the least possible time.
+
+Rowley was ready and eager to pursue; but I withheld him, thinking
+we were excellently quit of Mr. Bellamy, at no more cost than a
+scratch on the forearm and a bullet-hole in the left-hand claret-
+coloured panel.  And accordingly, but now at a more decent pace, we
+proceeded on our way to Archdeacon Clitheroe's, Missy's gratitude
+and admiration were aroused to a high pitch by this dramatic scene,
+and what she was pleased to call my wound.  She must dress it for
+me with her handkerchief, a service which she rendered me even with
+tears.  I could well have spared them, not loving on the whole to
+be made ridiculous, and the injury being in the nature of a cat's
+scratch.  Indeed, I would have suggested for her kind care rather
+the cure of my coat-sleeve, which had suffered worse in the
+encounter; but I was too wise to risk the anti-climax.  That she
+had been rescued by a hero, that the hero should have been wounded
+in the affray, and his wound bandaged with her handkerchief (which
+it could not even bloody), ministered incredibly to the recovery of
+her self-respect; and I could hear her relate the incident to 'the
+young ladies, my school-companions,' in the most approved manner of
+Mrs. Radcliffe!  To have insisted on the torn coat-sleeve would
+have been unmannerly, if not inhuman.
+
+Presently the residence of the archdeacon began to heave in sight.
+A chaise and four smoking horses stood by the steps, and made way
+for us on our approach; and even as we alighted there appeared from
+the interior of the house a tall ecclesiastic, and beside him a
+little, headstrong, ruddy man, in a towering passion, and
+brandishing over his head a roll of paper.  At sight of him Miss
+Dorothy flung herself on her knees with the most moving
+adjurations, calling him father, assuring him she was wholly cured
+and entirely repentant of her disobedience, and entreating
+forgiveness; and I soon saw that she need fear no great severity
+from Mr. Greensleeves, who showed himself extraordinarily fond,
+loud, greedy of caresses and prodigal of tears.
+
+To give myself a countenance, as well as to have all ready for the
+road when I should find occasion, I turned to quit scores with
+Bellamy's two postillions.  They had not the least claim on me, but
+one of which they were quite ignorant--that I was a fugitive.  It
+is the worst feature of that false position that every gratuity
+becomes a case of conscience.  You must not leave behind you any
+one discontented nor any one grateful.  But the whole business had
+been such a 'hurrah-boys' from the beginning, and had gone off in
+the fifth act so like a melodrama, in explosions, reconciliations,
+and the rape of a post-horse, that it was plainly impossible to
+keep it covered.  It was plain it would have to be talked over in
+all the inn-kitchens for thirty miles about, and likely for six
+months to come.  It only remained for me, therefore, to settle on
+that gratuity which should be least conspicuous--so large that
+nobody could grumble, so small that nobody would be tempted to
+boast.  My decision was hastily and nor wisely taken.  The one
+fellow spat on his tip (so he called it) for luck; the other
+developing a sudden streak of piety, prayed God bless me with
+fervour.  It seemed a demonstration was brewing, and I determined
+to be off at once.  Bidding my own post-boy and Rowley be in
+readiness for an immediate start, I reascended the terrace and
+presented myself, hat in hand, before Mr. Greensleeves and the
+archdeacon.
+
+'You will excuse me, I trust,' said I.  'I think shame to interrupt
+this agreeable scene of family effusion, which I have been
+privileged in some small degree to bring about.'
+
+And at these words the storm broke.
+
+'Small degree! small degree, sir!' cries the father; 'that shall
+not pass, Mr. St. Eaves!  If I've got my darling back, and none the
+worse for that vagabone rascal, I know whom I have to thank.  Shake
+hands with me--up to the elbows, sir!  A Frenchman you may be, but
+you're one of the right breed, by God!  And, by God, sir, you may
+have anything you care to ask of me, down to Dolly's hand, by God!'
+
+All this he roared out in a voice surprisingly powerful from so
+small a person.  Every word was thus audible to the servants, who
+had followed them out of the house and now congregated about us on
+the terrace, as well as to Rowley and the five postillions on the
+gravel sweep below.  The sentiments expressed were popular; some
+ass, whom the devil moved to be my enemy, proposed three cheers,
+and they were given with a will.  To hear my own name resounding
+amid acclamations in the hills of Westmorland was flattering,
+perhaps; but it was inconvenient at a moment when (as I was morally
+persuaded) police handbills were already speeding after me at the
+rate of a hundred miles a day.
+
+Nor was that the end of it.  The archdeacon must present his
+compliments, and pressed upon me some of his West India sherry, and
+I was carried into a vastly fine library, where I was presented to
+his lady wife.  While we were at sherry in the library, ale was
+handed round upon the terrace.  Speeches were made, hands were
+shaken, Missy (at her father's request) kissed me farewell, and the
+whole party reaccompanied me to the terrace, where they stood
+waving hats and handkerchiefs, and crying farewells to all the
+echoes of the mountains until the chaise had disappeared.
+
+The echoes of the mountains were engaged in saying to me privately:
+'You fool, you have done it now!'
+
+'They do seem to have got 'old of your name, Mr. Anne,' said
+Rowley.  'It weren't my fault this time.'
+
+'It was one of those accidents that can never be foreseen,' said I,
+affecting a dignity that I was far from feeling.  'Some one
+recognised me.'
+
+'Which on 'em, Mr. Anne?' said the rascal.
+
+'That is a senseless question; it can make no difference who it
+was,' I returned.
+
+'No, nor that it can't!' cried Rowley.  'I say, Mr. Anne, sir, it's
+what you would call a jolly mess, ain't it? looks like "clean
+bowled-out in the middle stump," don't it?'
+
+'I fail to understand you, Rowley.'
+
+'Well, what I mean is, what are we to do about this one?' pointing
+to the postillion in front of us, as he alternately hid and
+revealed his patched breeches to the trot of his horse.  'He see
+you get in this morning under Mr. Ramornie--I was very piticular to
+Mr. Ramornie you, if you remember, sir--and he see you get in again
+under Mr. Saint Eaves, and whatever's he going to see you get out
+under? that's what worries me, sir.  It don't seem to me like as if
+the position was what you call stratetegic!'
+
+'Parrrbleu! will you let me be!' I cried.  'I have to think; you
+cannot imagine how your constant idiotic prattle annoys me.'
+
+'Beg pardon, Mr. Anne,' said he; and the next moment, 'You wouldn't
+like for us to do our French now, would you, Mr. Anne?'
+
+'Certainly not,' said I.  'Play upon your flageolet.'
+
+The which he did with what seemed to me to be irony.
+
+Conscience doth make cowards of us all!  I was so downcast by my
+pitiful mismanagement of the morning's business that I shrank from
+the eye of my own hired infant, and read offensive meanings into
+his idle tootling.
+
+I took off my coat, and set to mending it, soldier-fashion, with a
+needle and thread.  There is nothing more conducive to thought,
+above all in arduous circumstances; and as I sewed, I gradually
+gained a clearness upon my affairs.  I must be done with the
+claret-coloured chaise at once.  It should be sold at the next
+stage for what it would bring.  Rowley and I must take back to the
+road on our four feet, and after a decent interval of trudging, get
+places on some coach for Edinburgh again under new names!  So much
+trouble and toil, so much extra risk and expense and loss of time,
+and all for a slip of the tongue to a little lady in blue!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV--THE INN-KEEPER OF KIRKBY-LONSDALE
+
+
+
+I had hitherto conceived and partly carried out an ideal that was
+dear to my heart.  Rowley and I descended from our claret-coloured
+chaise, a couple of correctly dressed, brisk, bright-eyed young
+fellows, like a pair of aristocratic mice; attending singly to our
+own affairs, communicating solely with each other, and that with
+the niceties and civilities of drill.  We would pass through the
+little crowd before the door with high-bred preoccupation,
+inoffensively haughty, after the best English pattern; and
+disappear within, followed by the envy and admiration of the
+bystanders, a model master and servant, point-device in every part.
+It was a heavy thought to me, as we drew up before the inn at
+Kirkby-Lonsdale, that this scene was now to be enacted for the last
+time.  Alas! and had I known it, it was to go of with so inferior a
+grace!
+
+I had been injudiciously liberal to the post-boys of the chaise and
+four.  My own post-boy, he of the patched breeches, now stood
+before me, his eyes glittering with greed, his hand advanced.  It
+was plain he anticipated something extraordinary by way of a
+pourboire; and considering the marches and counter-marches by which
+I had extended the stage, the military character of our affairs
+with Mr. Bellamy, and the bad example I had set before him at the
+archdeacon's, something exceptional was certainly to be done.  But
+these are always nice questions, to a foreigner above all:  a shade
+too little will suggest niggardliness, a shilling too much smells
+of hush-money.  Fresh from the scene at the archdeacon's, and
+flushed by the idea that I was now nearly done with the
+responsibilities of the claret-coloured chaise, I put into his
+hands five guineas; and the amount served only to waken his
+cupidity.
+
+'O, come, sir, you ain't going to fob me of with this?  Why, I seen
+fire at your side!' he cried.
+
+It would never do to give him more; I felt I should become the
+fable of Kirkby-Lonsdale if I did; and I looked him in the face,
+sternly but still smiling, and addressed him with a voice of
+uncompromising firmness.
+
+'If you do not like it, give it back,' said I.
+
+He pocketed the guineas with the quickness of a conjurer, and, like
+a base-born cockney as he was, fell instantly to casting dirt.
+
+''Ave your own way of it, Mr. Ramornie--leastways Mr. St. Eaves, or
+whatever your blessed name may be.  Look 'ere'--turning for
+sympathy to the stable-boys--'this is a blessed business.  Blessed
+'ard, I calls it.  'Ere I takes up a blessed son of a pop-gun what
+calls hisself anything you care to mention, and turns out to be a
+blessed mounseer at the end of it!  'Ere 'ave I been drivin' of him
+up and down all day, a-carrying off of gals, a-shootin' of
+pistyils, and a-drinkin' of sherry and hale; and wot does he up and
+give me but a blank, blank, blanketing blank!'
+
+The fellow's language had become too powerful for reproduction, and
+I passed it by.
+
+Meanwhile I observed Rowley fretting visibly at the bit; another
+moment, and he would have added a last touch of the ridiculous to
+our arrival by coming to his hands with the postillion.
+
+'Rowley!' cried I reprovingly.
+
+Strictly it should have been Gammon; but in the hurry of the
+moment, my fault (I can only hope) passed unperceived.  At the same
+time I caught the eye of the postmaster.  He was long and lean, and
+brown and bilious; he had the drooping nose of the humourist, and
+the quick attention of a man of parts.  He read my embarrassment in
+a glance, stepped instantly forward, sent the post-boy to the
+rightabout with half a word, and was back next moment at my side.
+
+'Dinner in a private room, sir?  Very well.  John, No. 4!  What
+wine would you care to mention?  Very well, sir.  Will you please
+to order fresh horses?  Not, sir?  Very well.'
+
+Each of these expressions was accompanied by something in the
+nature of a bow, and all were prefaced by something in the nature
+of a smile, which I could very well have done without.  The man's
+politeness was from the teeth outwards; behind and within, I was
+conscious of a perpetual scrutiny:  the scene at his doorstep, the
+random confidences of the post-boy, had not been thrown away on
+this observer; and it was under a strong fear of coming trouble
+that I was shown at last into my private room.  I was in half a
+mind to have put off the whole business.  But the truth is, now my
+name had got abroad, my fear of the mail that was coming, and the
+handbills it should contain, had waxed inordinately, and I felt I
+could never eat a meal in peace till I had severed my connection
+with the claret-coloured chaise.
+
+Accordingly, as soon as I had done with dinner, I sent my
+compliments to the landlord and requested he should take a glass of
+wine with me.  He came; we exchanged the necessary civilities, and
+presently I approached my business.
+
+'By the bye,' said I, 'we had a brush down the road to-day.  I dare
+say you may have heard of it?'
+
+He nodded.
+
+'And I was so unlucky as to get a pistol ball in the panel of my
+chaise,' I continued, 'which makes it simply useless to me.  Do you
+know any one likely to buy?'
+
+'I can well understand that,' said the landlord, 'I was looking at
+it just now; it's as good as ruined, is that chaise.  General rule,
+people don't like chaises with bullet-holes.'
+
+'Too much Romance of the Forest?' I suggested, recalling my little
+friend of the morning, and what I was sure had been her favourite
+reading--Mrs. Radcliffe's novels.
+
+'Just so,' said he.  'They may be right, they may be wrong; I'm not
+the judge.  But I suppose it's natural, after all, for respectable
+people to like things respectable about them; not bullet-holes, nor
+puddles of blood, nor men with aliases.'
+
+I took a glass of wine and held it up to the light to show that my
+hand was steady.
+
+'Yes,' said I, 'I suppose so.'
+
+'You have papers, of course, showing you are the proper owner?' he
+inquired.
+
+'There is the bill, stamped and receipted,' said I, tossing it
+across to him.
+
+He looked at it.
+
+'This all you have?' he asked.
+
+'It is enough, at least,' said I.  'It shows you where I bought and
+what I paid for it.'
+
+'Well, I don't know,' he said.  'You want some paper of
+identification.'
+
+'To identify the chaise?' I inquired.
+
+'Not at all:  to identify YOU,' said he.
+
+'My good sir, remember yourself!' said I.  'The title-deeds of my
+estate are in that despatch-box; but you do not seriously suppose
+that I should allow you to examine them?'
+
+'Well, you see, this paper proves that some Mr. Ramornie paid
+seventy guineas for a chaise,' said the fellow.  'That's all well
+and good; but who's to prove to me that you are Mr. Ramornie?'
+
+'Fellow!' cried I.
+
+'O, fellow as much as you please!' said he.  'Fellow, with all my
+heart!  That changes nothing.  I am fellow, of course--obtrusive
+fellow, impudent fellow, if you like--but who are you?  I hear of
+you with two names; I hear of you running away with young ladies,
+and getting cheered for a Frenchman, which seems odd; and one thing
+I will go bail for, that you were in a blue fright when the post-
+boy began to tell tales at my door.  In short, sir, you may be a
+very good gentleman; but I don't know enough about you, and I'll
+trouble you for your papers, or to go before a magistrate.  Take
+your choice; if I'm not fine enough, I hope the magistrates are.'
+
+'My good man,' I stammered, for though I had found my voice, I
+could scarce be said to have recovered my wits, 'this is most
+unusual, most rude.  Is it the custom in Westmorland that gentlemen
+should be insulted?'
+
+'That depends,' said he.  'When it's suspected that gentlemen are
+spies it IS the custom; and a good custom, too.  No no,' he broke
+out, perceiving me to make a movement.  'Both hands upon the table,
+my gentleman!  I want no pistol balls in my chaise panels.'
+
+'Surely, sir, you do me strange injustice!' said I, now the master
+of myself.  'You see me sitting here, a monument of tranquillity:
+pray may I help myself to wine without umbraging you?'
+
+I took this attitude in sheer despair.  I had no plan, no hope.
+The best I could imagine was to spin the business out some minutes
+longer, then capitulate.  At least, I would not capituatle one
+moment too soon.
+
+'Am I to take that for NO?' he asked.
+
+'Referring to your former obliging proposal?' said I.  'My good
+sir, you are to take it, as you say, for "No."  Certainly I will
+not show you my deeds; certainly I will not rise from table and
+trundle out to see your magistrates.  I have too much respect for
+my digestion, and too little curiosity in justices of the peace.'
+
+He leaned forward, looked me nearly in the face, and reached out
+one hand to the bell-rope.  'See here, my fine fellow!' said he.
+'Do you see that bell-rope?  Let me tell you, there's a boy waiting
+below:  one jingle, and he goes to fetch the constable.'
+
+'Do you tell me so?' said I.  'Well, there's no accounting for
+tastes!  I have a prejudice against the society of constables, but
+if it is your fancy to have one in for the dessert--'  I shrugged
+my shoulders lightly.  'Really, you know,' I added, 'this is vastly
+entertaining.  I assure you, I am looking on, with all the interest
+of a man of the world, at the development of your highly original
+character.'
+
+He continued to study my face without speech, his hand still on the
+button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the decisive
+heat.  My face seemed to myself to dislimn under his gaze, my
+expression to change, the smile (with which I had began) to
+degenerate into the grin of the man upon the rack.  I was besides
+harassed with doubts.  An innocent man, I argued, would have
+resented the fellow's impudence an hour ago; and by my continued
+endurance of the ordeal, I was simply signing and sealing my
+confession; in short, I had reached the end of my powers.
+
+'Have you any objection to my putting my hands in my breeches
+pockets?' I inquired.  'Excuse me mentioning it, but you showed
+yourself so extremely nervous a moment back.'  My voice was not all
+I could have wished, but it sufficed.  I could hear it tremble, but
+the landlord apparently could not.  He turned away and drew a long
+breath, and you may be sure I was quick to follow his example.
+
+'You're a cool hand at least, and that's the sort I like,' said he.
+'Be you what you please, I'll deal square.  I'll take the chaise
+for a hundred pound down, and throw the dinner in.'
+
+'I beg your pardon,' I cried, wholly mystified by this form of
+words.
+
+'You pay me a hundred down,' he repeated, 'and I'll take the
+chaise.  It's very little more than it cost,' he added, with a
+grin, 'and you know you must get it off your hands somehow.'
+
+I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this
+impudent proposal.  It was broadly funny, and I suppose the least
+tempting offer in the world.  For all that, it came very welcome,
+for it gave me the occasion to laugh.  This I did with the most
+complete abandonment, till the tears ran down my cheeks; and ever
+and again, as the fit abated, I would get another view of the
+landlord's face, and go off into another paroxysm.
+
+'You droll creature, you will be the death of me yet!' I cried,
+drying my eyes.
+
+My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to look,
+nor yet what to say; and began for the first time to conceive it
+possible he was mistaken.
+
+'You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir,' said he.
+
+'O, yes!  I am quite an original,' I replied, and laughed again.
+
+Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for the
+chaise; I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the offer:
+indeed, I was glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it was not in
+the desire of gain, but with the view at any price of securing a
+safe retreat.  For although hostilities were suspended, he was yet
+far from satisfied; and I could read his continued suspicions in
+the cloudy eye that still hovered about my face.  At last they took
+shape in words.
+
+'This is all very well,' says he:  'you carry it off well; but for
+all that, I must do my duty.'
+
+I had my strong effect in reserve; it was to burn my ships with a
+vengeance!  I rose.  'Leave the room,' said I.  'This is
+insuperable.  Is the man mad?'  And then, as if already half-
+ashamed of my passion:  'I can take a joke as well as any one,' I
+added; 'but this passes measure.  Send my servant and the bill.'
+
+When he had left me alone, I considered my own valour with
+amazement.  I had insulted him; I had sent him away alone; now, if
+ever, he would take what was the only sensible resource, and fetch
+the constable.  But there was something instinctively treacherous
+about the man which shrank from plain courses.  And, with all his
+cleverness, he missed the occasion of fame.  Rowley and I were
+suffered to walk out of his door, with all our baggage, on foot,
+with no destination named, except in the vague statement that we
+were come 'to view the lakes'; and my friend only watched our
+departure with his chin in his hand, still moodily irresolute.
+
+I think this one of my great successes.  I was exposed, unmasked,
+summoned to do a perfectly natural act, which must prove my doom
+and which I had not the slightest pretext for refusing.  I kept my
+head, stuck to my guns, and, against all likelihood, here I was
+once more at liberty and in the king's highway.  This was a strong
+lesson never to despair; and, at the same time, how many hints to
+be cautious! and what a perplexed and dubious business the whole
+question of my escape now appeared!  That I should have risked
+perishing upon a trumpery question of a pourboire, depicted in
+lively colours the perils that perpetually surrounded us.  Though,
+to be sure, the initial mistake had been committed before that; and
+if I had not suffered myself to be drawn a little deep in
+confidences to the innocent Dolly, there need have been no tumble
+at the inn of Kirkby-Lonsdale.  I took the lesson to heart, and
+promised myself in the future to be more reserved.  It was none of
+my business to attend to broken chaises or shipwrecked travellers.
+I had my hands full of my own affairs; and my best defence would be
+a little more natural selfishness and a trifle less imbecile good-
+nature.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV--I MEET A CHEERFUL EXTRAVAGANT
+
+
+
+I pass over the next fifty or sixty leagues of our journey without
+comment.  The reader must be growing weary of scenes of travel; and
+for my own part I have no cause to recall these particular miles
+with any pleasure.  We were mainly occupied with attempts to
+obliterate our trail, which (as the result showed) were far from
+successful; for, on my cousin following, he was able to run me home
+with the least possible loss of time, following the claret-coloured
+chaise to Kirkby-Lonsdale, where I think the landlord must have
+wept to learn what he had missed, and tracing us thereafter to the
+doors of the coach-office in Edinburgh without a single check.
+Fortune did not favour me, and why should I recapitulate the
+details of futile precautions which deceived nobody, and wearisome
+arts which proved to be artless?
+
+The day was drawing to an end when Mr. Rowley and I bowled into
+Edinburgh to the stirring sound of the guard's bugle and the
+clattering team.  I was here upon my field of battle; on the scene
+of my former captivity, escape and exploits; and in the same city
+with my love.  My heart expanded; I have rarely felt more of a
+hero.  All down the Bridges I sat by the driver with my arms folded
+and my face set, unflinchingly meeting every eye, and prepared
+every moment for a cry of recognition.  Hundreds of the population
+were in the habit of visiting the Castle, where it was my practice
+(before the days of Flora) to make myself conspicuous among the
+prisoners; and I think it an extraordinary thing that I should have
+encountered so few to recognise me.  But doubtless a clean chin is
+a disguise in itself; and the change is great from a suit of
+sulphur-yellow to fine linen, a well-fitting mouse-coloured great-
+coat furred in black, a pair of tight trousers of fashionable cut,
+and a hat of inimitable curl.  After all, it was more likely that I
+should have recognised our visitors, than that they should have
+identified the modish gentleman with the miserable prisoner in the
+Castle.
+
+I was glad to set foot on the flagstones, and to escape from the
+crowd that had assembled to receive the mail.  Here we were, with
+but little daylight before us, and that on Saturday afternoon, the
+eve of the famous Scottish Sabbath, adrift in the New Town of
+Edinburgh, and overladen with baggage.  We carried it ourselves.  I
+would not take a cab, nor so much as hire a porter, who might
+afterwards serve as a link between my lodgings and the mail, and
+connect me again with the claret-coloured chaise and Aylesbury.
+For I was resolved to break the chain of evidence for good, and to
+begin life afresh (so far as regards caution) with a new character.
+The first step was to find lodgings, and to find them quickly.
+This was the more needful as Mr. Rowley and I, in our smart clothes
+and with our cumbrous burthen, made a noticeable appearance in the
+streets at that time of the day and in that quarter of the town,
+which was largely given up to fine folk, bucks and dandies and
+young ladies, or respectable professional men on their way home to
+dinner.
+
+On the north side of St. James' Square I was so happy as to spy a
+bill in a third-floor window.  I was equally indifferent to cost
+and convenience in my choice of a lodging--'any port in a storm'
+was the principle on which I was prepared to act; and Rowley and I
+made at once for the common entrance and sealed the stair.
+
+We were admitted by a very sour-looking female in bombazine.  I
+gathered she had all her life been depressed by a series of
+bereavements, the last of which might very well have befallen her
+the day before; and I instinctively lowered my voice when I
+addressed her.  She admitted she had rooms to let--even showed them
+to us--a sitting-room and bedroom in a suite, commanding a fine
+prospect to the Firth and Fifeshire, and in themselves well
+proportioned and comfortably furnished, with pictures on the wall,
+shells on the mantelpiece, and several books upon the table which I
+found afterwards to be all of a devotional character, and all
+presentation copies, 'to my Christian friend,' or 'to my devout
+acquaintance in the Lord, Bethiah McRankine.'  Beyond this my
+'Christian friend' could not be made to advance:  no, not even to
+do that which seemed the most natural and pleasing thing in the
+world--I mean to name her price--but stood before us shaking her
+head, and at times mourning like the dove, the picture of
+depression and defence.  She had a voice the most querulous I have
+ever heard, and with this she produced a whole regiment of
+difficulties and criticisms.
+
+She could not promise an attendance.
+
+'Well, madam,' said I, 'and what is my servant for?'
+
+'Him?' she asked.  'Be gude to us!  Is HE your servant?'
+
+'I am sorry, ma'am, he meets with your disapproval.'
+
+'Na, I never said that.  But he's young.  He'll be a great breaker,
+I'm thinkin'.  Ay! he'll be a great responsibeelity to ye, like.
+Does he attend to his releegion?'
+
+'Yes, m'm,' returned Rowley, with admirable promptitude, and,
+immediately closing his eyes, as if from habit, repeated the
+following distich with more celerity than fervour:-
+
+
+'Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
+Bless the bed that I lie on!'
+
+
+'Nhm!' said the lady, and maintained an awful silence.
+
+'Well, ma'am,' said I, 'it seems we are never to hear the beginning
+of your terms, let alone the end of them.  Come--a good movement!
+and let us be either off or on.'
+
+She opened her lips slowly.  'Ony raferences?' she inquired, in a
+voice like a bell.
+
+I opened my pocket-book and showed her a handful of bank bills.  'I
+think, madam, that these are unexceptionable,' said I.
+
+'Ye'll be wantin' breakfast late?' was her reply.
+
+'Madam, we want breakfast at whatever hour it suits you to give it,
+from four in the morning till four in the afternoon!' I cried.
+'Only tell us your figure, if your mouth be large enough to let it
+out!'
+
+'I couldnae give ye supper the nicht,' came the echo.
+
+'We shall go out to supper, you incorrigible female!' I vowed,
+between laughter and tears.  'Here--this is going to end!  I want
+you for a landlady--let me tell you that!--and I am going to have
+my way.  You won't tell me what you charge?  Very well; I will do
+without!  I can trust you!  You don't seem to know when you have a
+good lodger; but I know perfectly when I have an honest landlady!
+Rowley, unstrap the valises!'
+
+Will it be credited?  The monomaniac fell to rating me for my
+indiscretion!  But the battle was over; these were her last guns,
+and more in the nature of a salute than of renewed hostilities.
+And presently she condescended on very moderate terms, and Rowley
+and I were able to escape in quest of supper.  Much time had,
+however, been lost; the sun was long down, the lamps glimmered
+along the streets, and the voice of a watchman already resounded in
+the neighbouring Leith Road.  On our first arrival I had observed a
+place of entertainment not far off, in a street behind the Register
+House.  Thither we found our way, and sat down to a late dinner
+alone.  But we had scarce given our orders before the door opened,
+and a tall young fellow entered with something of a lurch, looked
+about him, and approached the same table.
+
+'Give you good evening, most grave and reverend seniors!' said he.
+'Will you permit a wanderer, a pilgrim--the pilgrim of love, in
+short--to come to temporary anchor under your lee?  I care not who
+knows it, but I have a passionate aversion from the bestial
+practice of solitary feeding!'
+
+'You are welcome, sir,' said I, 'if I may take upon me so far to
+play the host in a public place.'
+
+He looked startled, and fixed a hazy eye on me, as he sat down.
+
+'Sir,' said he, 'you are a man not without some tincture of
+letters, I perceive!  What shall we drink, sir?'
+
+I mentioned I had already called for a pot of porter.
+
+'A modest pot--the seasonable quencher?' said he.  'Well, I do not
+know but what I could look at a modest pot myself!  I am, for the
+moment, in precarious health.  Much study hath heated my brain,
+much walking wearied my--well, it seems to be more my eyes!'
+
+'You have walked far, I dare say?' I suggested.
+
+'Not so much far as often,' he replied.  'There is in this city--to
+which, I think, you are a stranger?  Sir, to your very good health
+and our better acquaintance!--there is, in this city of Dunedin, a
+certain implication of streets which reflects the utmost credit on
+the designer and the publicans--at every hundred yards is seated
+the Judicious Tavern, so that persons of contemplative mind are
+secure, at moderate distances, of refreshment.  I have been doing a
+trot in that favoured quarter, favoured by art and nature.  A few
+chosen comrades--enemies of publicity and friends to wit and wine--
+obliged me with their society.  "Along the cool, sequestered vale
+of Register Street we kept the uneven tenor of our way," sir.'
+
+'It struck me, as you came in--' I began.
+
+'O, don't make any bones about it!' he interrupted.  'Of course it
+struck you! and let me tell you I was devilish lucky not to strike
+myself.  When I entered this apartment I shone "with all the pomp
+and prodigality of brandy and water," as the poet Gray has in
+another place expressed it.  Powerful bard, Gray! but a niminy-
+piminy creature, afraid of a petticoat and a bottle--not a man,
+sir, not a man!  Excuse me for being so troublesome, but what the
+devil have I done with my fork?  Thank you, I am sure.  Temulentia,
+quoad me ipsum, brevis colligo est.  I sit and eat, sir, in a
+London fog.  I should bring a link-boy to table with me; and I
+would too, if the little brutes were only washed!  I intend to
+found a Philanthropical Society for Washing the Deserving Poor and
+Shaving Soldiers.  I am pleased to observe that, although not of an
+unmilitary bearing, you are apparently shaved.  In my calendar of
+the virtues shaving comes next to drinking.  A gentleman may be a
+low-minded ruffian without sixpence, but he will always be close
+shaved.  See me, with the eye of fancy, in the chill hours of the
+morning, say about a quarter to twelve, noon--see me awake!  First
+thing of all, without one thought of the plausible but
+unsatisfactory small beer, or the healthful though insipid soda-
+water, I take the deadly razor in my vacillating grasp; I proceed
+to skate upon the margin of eternity.  Stimulating thought!  I
+bleed, perhaps, but with medicable wounds.  The stubble reaped, I
+pass out of my chamber, calm but triumphant.  To employ a hackneyed
+phrase, I would not call Lord Wellington my uncle!  I, too, have
+dared, perhaps bled, before the imminent deadly shaving-table.'
+
+In this manner the bombastic fellow continued to entertain me all
+through dinner, and by a common error of drunkards, because he had
+been extremely talkative himself, leaped to the conclusion that he
+had chanced on very genial company.  He told me his name, his
+address; he begged we should meet again; finally he proposed that I
+should dine with him in the country at an early date.
+
+'The dinner is official,' he explained.  'The office-bearers and
+Senatus of the University of Cramond--an educational institution in
+which I have the honour to be Professor of Nonsense--meet to do
+honour to our friend Icarus, at the old-established howff, Cramond
+Bridge.  One place is vacant, fascinating stranger,--I offer it to
+you!'
+
+'And who is your friend Icarus?' I asked,
+
+'The aspiring son of Daedalus!' said he.  'Is it possible that you
+have never heard the name of Byfield?'
+
+'Possible and true,' said I.
+
+'And is fame so small a thing?' cried he.  'Byfield, sir, is an
+aeronaut.  He apes the fame of a Lunardi, and is on the point of
+offering to the inhabitants--I beg your pardon, to the nobility and
+gentry of our neighbourhood--the spectacle of an ascension.  As one
+of the gentry concerned I may be permitted to remark that I am
+unmoved.  I care not a Tinker's Damn for his ascension.  No more--I
+breathe it in your ear--does anybody else.  The business is stale,
+sir, stale.  Lunardi did it, and overdid it.  A whimsical,
+fiddling, vain fellow, by all accounts--for I was at that time
+rocking in my cradle.  But once was enough.  If Lunardi went up and
+came down, there was the matter settled.  We prefer to grant the
+point.  We do not want to see the experiment repeated ad nauseam by
+Byfield, and Brown, and Butler, and Brodie, and Bottomley.  Ah! if
+they would go up and NOT come down again!  But this is by the
+question.  The University of Cramond delights to honour merit in
+the man, sir, rather than utility in the profession; and Byfield,
+though an ignorant dog, is a sound reliable drinker, and really not
+amiss over his cups.  Under the radiance of the kindly jar
+partiality might even credit him with wit.'
+
+It will be seen afterwards that this was more my business than I
+thought it at the time.  Indeed, I was impatient to be gone.  Even
+as my friend maundered ahead a squall burst, the jaws of the rain
+were opened against the coffee-house windows, and at that inclement
+signal I remembered I was due elsewhere.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI--THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT
+
+
+
+At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence of
+the squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting words.  All the
+way along Princes Street (whither my way led) the wind hunted me
+behind and screamed in my ears.  The city was flushed with
+bucketfuls of rain that tasted salt from the neighbouring ocean.
+It seemed to darken and lighten again in the vicissitudes of the
+gusts.  Now you would say the lamps had been blown out from end to
+end of the long thoroughfare; now, in a lull, they would revive,
+re-multiply, shine again on the wet pavements, and make darkness
+sparingly visible.
+
+By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there was a
+distinct improvement.  For one thing, I had now my shoulder to the
+wind; for a second, I came in the lee of my old prison-house, the
+Castle; and, at any rate, the excessive fury of the blast was
+itself moderating.  The thought of what errand I was on re-awoke
+within me, and I seemed to breast the rough weather with increasing
+ease.  With such a destination, what mattered a little buffeting of
+wind or a sprinkle of cold water?  I recalled Flora's image, I took
+her in fancy to my arms, and my heart throbbed.  And the next
+moment I had recognised the inanity of that fool's paradise.  If I
+could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might count myself lucky.
+
+I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and now
+deep in mire.  So soon as I was clear of the last street lamp,
+darkness received me--a darkness only pointed by the lights of
+occasional rustic farms, where the dogs howled with uplifted heads
+as I went by.  The wind continued to decline:  it had been but a
+squall, not a tempest.  The rain, on the other hand, settled into a
+steady deluge, which had soon drenched me thoroughly.  I continued
+to tramp forward in the night, contending with gloomy thoughts and
+accompanied by the dismal ululation of the dogs.  What ailed them
+that they should have been thus wakeful, and perceived the small
+sound of my steps amid the general reverberation of the rain, was
+more than I could fancy.  I remembered tales with which I had been
+entertained in childhood.  I told myself some murderer was going
+by, and the brutes perceived upon him the faint smell of blood; and
+the next moment, with a physical shock, I had applied the words to
+my own case!
+
+Here was a dismal disposition for a lover.  'Was ever lady in this
+humour wooed?' I asked myself, and came near turning back.  It is
+never wise to risk a critical interview when your spirits are
+depressed, your clothes muddy, and your hands wet!  But the
+boisterous night was in itself favourable to my enterprise:  now,
+or perhaps never, I might find some way to have an interview with
+Flora; and if I had one interview (wet clothes, low spirits and
+all), I told myself there would certainly be another.
+
+Arrived in the cottage-garden I found the circumstances mighty
+inclement.  From the round holes in the shutters of the parlour,
+shafts of candle-light streamed forth; elsewhere the darkness was
+complete.  The trees, the thickets, were saturated; the lower parts
+of the garden turned into a morass.  At intervals, when the wind
+broke forth again, there passed overhead a wild coil of clashing
+branches; and between whiles the whole enclosure continuously and
+stridently resounded with the rain.  I advanced close to the window
+and contrived to read the face of my watch.  It was half-past
+seven; they would not retire before ten, they might not before
+midnight, and the prospect was unpleasant.  In a lull of the wind I
+could hear from the inside the voice of Flora reading aloud; the
+words of course inaudible--only a flow of undecipherable speech,
+quiet, cordial, colourless, more intimate and winning, more
+eloquent of her personality, but not less beautiful than song.  And
+the next moment the clamour of a fresh squall broke out about the
+cottage; the voice was drowned in its bellowing, and I was glad to
+retreat from my dangerous post.
+
+For three egregious hours I must now suffer the elements to do
+their worst upon me, and continue to hold my ground in patience.  I
+recalled the least fortunate of my services in the field:  being
+out-sentry of the pickets in weather no less vile, sometimes
+unsuppered and with nothing to look forward to by way of breakfast
+but musket-balls; and they seemed light in comparison.  So
+strangely are we built:  so much more strong is the love of woman
+than the mere love of life.
+
+At last my patience was rewarded.  The light disappeared from the
+parlour and reappeared a moment after in the room above.  I was
+pretty well informed for the enterprise that lay before me.  I knew
+the lair of the dragon--that which was just illuminated.  I knew
+the bower of my Rosamond, and how excellently it was placed on the
+ground-level, round the flank of the cottage and out of earshot of
+her formidable aunt.  Nothing was left but to apply my knowledge.
+I was then at the bottom of the garden, whether I had gone (Heaven
+save the mark!) for warmth, that I might walk to and fro unheard
+and keep myself from perishing.  The night had fallen still, the
+wind ceased; the noise of the rain had much lightened, if it had
+not stopped, and was succeeded by the dripping of the garden trees.
+In the midst of this lull, and as I was already drawing near to the
+cottage, I was startled by the sound of a window-sash screaming in
+its channels; and a step or two beyond I became aware of a gush of
+light upon the darkness.  It fell from Flora's window, which she
+had flung open on the night, and where she now sat, roseate and
+pensive, in the shine of two candles falling from behind, her
+tresses deeply embowering and shading her; the suspended comb still
+in one hand, the other idly clinging to the iron stanchions with
+which the window was barred.
+
+Keeping to the turf, and favoured by the darkness of the night and
+the patter of the rain which was now returning, though without
+wind, I approached until I could almost have touched her.  It
+seemed a grossness of which I was incapable to break up her reverie
+by speech.  I stood and drank her in with my eyes; how the light
+made a glory in her hair, and (what I have always thought the most
+ravishing thing in nature) how the planes ran into each other, and
+were distinguished, and how the hues blended and varied, and were
+shaded off, between the cheek and neck.  At first I was abashed:
+she wore her beauty like an immediate halo of refinement; she
+discouraged me like an angel, or what I suspect to be the next most
+discouraging, a modern lady.  But as I continued to gaze, hope and
+life returned to me; I forgot my timidity, I forgot the sickening
+pack of wet clothes with which I stood burdened, I tingled with new
+blood.
+
+Still unconscious of my presence, still gazing before her upon the
+illuminated image of the window, the straight shadows of the bars,
+the glinting of pebbles on the path, and the impenetrable night on
+the garden and the hills beyond it, she heaved a deep breath that
+struck upon my heart like an appeal.
+
+'Why does Miss Gilchrist sigh?' I whispered.  'Does she recall
+absent friends?'
+
+She turned her head swiftly in my direction; it was the only sign
+of surprise she deigned to make.  At the same time I stepped into
+the light and bowed profoundly.
+
+'You!' she said.  'Here?'
+
+'Yes, I am here,' I replied.  'I have come very far, it may be a
+hundred and fifty leagues, to see you.  I have waited all this
+night in your garden.  Will Miss Gilchrist not offer her hand--to a
+friend in trouble?'
+
+She extended it between the bars, and I dropped upon one knee on
+the wet path and kissed it twice.  At the second it was withdrawn
+suddenly, methought with more of a start than she had hitherto
+displayed.  I regained my former attitude, and we were both silent
+awhile.  My timidity returned on me tenfold.  I looked in her face
+for any signals of anger, and seeing her eyes to waver and fall
+aside from mine, augured that all was well.
+
+'You must have been mad to come here!' she broke out.  'Of all
+places under heaven this is no place for you to come.  And I was
+just thinking you were safe in France!'
+
+'You were thinking of me!' I cried.
+
+'Mr. St. Ives, you cannot understand your danger,' she replied.  'I
+am sure of it, and yet I cannot find it in my heart to tell you.
+O, be persuaded, and go!'
+
+'I believe I know the worst.  But I was never one to set an undue
+value on life, the life that we share with beasts.  My university
+has been in the wars, not a famous place of education, but one
+where a man learns to carry his life in his hand as lightly as a
+glove, and for his lady or his honour to lay it as lightly down.
+You appeal to my fears, and you do wrong.  I have come to Scotland
+with my eyes quite open to see you and to speak with you--it may be
+for the last time.  With my eyes quite open, I say; and if I did
+not hesitate at the beginning do you think that I would draw back
+now?'
+
+'You do not know!' she cried, with rising agitation.  'This
+country, even this garden, is death to you.  They all believe it; I
+am the only one that does not.  If they hear you now, if they heard
+a whisper--I dread to think of it.  O, go, go this instant.  It is
+my prayer.'
+
+'Dear lady, do not refuse me what I have come so far to seek; and
+remember that out of all the millions in England there is no other
+but yourself in whom I can dare confide.  I have all the world
+against me; you are my only ally; and as I have to speak, you have
+to listen.  All is true that they say of me, and all of it false at
+the same time.  I did kill this man Goguelat--it was that you
+meant?'
+
+She mutely signed to me that it was; she had become deadly pale.
+
+'But I killed him in fair fight.  Till then, I had never taken a
+life unless in battle, which is my trade.  But I was grateful, I
+was on fire with gratitude, to one who had been good to me, who had
+been better to me than I could have dreamed of an angel, who had
+come into the darkness of my prison like sunrise.  The man Goguelat
+insulted her.  O, he had insulted me often, it was his favourite
+pastime, and he might insult me as he pleased--for who was I?  But
+with that lady it was different.  I could never forgive myself if I
+had let it pass.  And we fought, and he fell, and I have no
+remorse.'
+
+I waited anxiously for some reply.  The worst was now out, and I
+knew that she had heard of it before; but it was impossible for me
+to go on with my narrative without some shadow of encouragement.
+
+'You blame me?'
+
+'No, not at all.  It is a point I cannot speak on--I am only a
+girl.  I am sure you were in the right:  I have always said so--to
+Ronald.  Not, of course, to my aunt.  I am afraid I let her speak
+as she will.  You must not think me a disloyal friend; and even
+with the Major--I did not tell you he had become quite a friend of
+ours--Major Chevenix, I mean--he has taken such a fancy to Ronald!
+It was he that brought the news to us of that hateful Clausel being
+captured, and all that he was saying.  I was indignant with him.  I
+said--I dare say I said too much--and I must say he was very good-
+natured.  He said, "You and I, who are his friends, KNOW that
+Champdivers is innocent.  But what is the use of saying it?"  All
+this was in the corner of the room in what they call an aside.  And
+then he said, "Give me a chance to speak to you in private, I have
+much to tell you."  And he did.  And told me just what you did--
+that it was an affair of honour, and no blame attached to you.  O,
+I must say I like that Major Chevenix!'
+
+At this I was seized with a great pang of jealousy.  I remembered
+the first time that he had seen her, the interest that he seemed
+immediately to conceive; and I could not but admire the dog for the
+use he had been ingenious enough to make of our acquaintance in
+order to supplant me.  All is fair in love and war.  For all that,
+I was now no less anxious to do the speaking myself than I had been
+before to hear Flora.  At least, I could keep clear of the hateful
+image of Major Chevenix.  Accordingly I burst at once on the
+narrative of my adventures.  It was the same as you have read, but
+briefer, and told with a very different purpose.  Now every
+incident had a particular bearing, every by-way branched off to
+Rome--and that was Flora.
+
+When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel withoutside
+the low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and lowered my voice
+to the most confidential whisper.  Flora herself must kneel upon
+the other side, and this brought our heads upon a level with only
+the bars between us.  So placed, so separated, it seemed that our
+proximity, and the continuous and low sounds of my pleading voice,
+worked progressively and powerfully on her heart, and perhaps not
+less so on my own.  For these spells are double-edged.  The silly
+birds may be charmed with the pipe of the fowler, which is but a
+tube of reeds.  Not so with a bird of our own feather!  As I went
+on, and my resolve strengthened, and my voice found new
+modulations, and our faces were drawn closer to the bars and to
+each other, not only she, but I, succumbed to the fascination, and
+were kindled by the charm.  We make love, and thereby ourselves
+fall the deeper in it.  It is with the heart only that one captures
+a heart.
+
+'And now,' I continued, 'I will tell you what you can still do for
+me.  I run a little risk just now, and you see for yourself how
+unavoidable it is for any man of honour.  But if--but in case of
+the worst I do not choose to enrich either my enemies or the Prince
+Regent.  I have here the bulk of what my uncle gave me.  Eight
+thousand odd pounds.  Will you take care of it for me?  Do not
+think of it merely as money; take and keep it as a relic of your
+friend or some precious piece of him.  I may have bitter need of it
+ere long.  Do you know the old country story of the giant who gave
+his heart to his wife to keep for him, thinking it safer to repose
+on her loyalty than his own strength?  Flora, I am the giant--a
+very little one:  will you be the keeper of my life?  It is my
+heart I offer you in this symbol.  In the sight of God, if you will
+have it, I give you my name, I endow you with my money.  If the
+worst come, if I may never hope to call you wife, let me at least
+think that you will use my uncle's legacy as my widow.'
+
+'No, not that,' she said.  'Never that.'
+
+'What then?' I said.  'What else, my angel?  What are words to me?
+There is but one name that I care to know you by.  Flora, my love!'
+
+'Anne!' she said.
+
+What sound is so full of music as one's own name uttered for the
+first time in the voice of her we love!
+
+'My darling!' said I.
+
+The jealous bars, set at the top and bottom in stone and lime,
+obstructed the rapture of the moment; but I took her to myself as
+wholly as they allowed.  She did not shun my lips.  My arms were
+wound round her body, which yielded itself generously to my
+embrace.  As we so remained, entwined and yet severed, bruising our
+faces unconsciously on the cold bars, the irony of the universe--or
+as I prefer to say, envy of some of the gods--again stirred up the
+elements of that stormy night.  The wind blew again in the tree-
+tops; a volley of cold sea-rain deluged the garden, and, as the
+deuce would have it, a gutter which had been hitherto choked up
+began suddenly to play upon my head and shoulders with the vivacity
+of a fountain.  We parted with a shock; I sprang to my feet, and
+she to hers, as though we had been discovered.  A moment after, but
+now both standing, we had again approached the window on either
+side.
+
+'Flora,' I said, 'this is but a poor offer I can make you.'
+
+She took my hand in hers and clasped it to her bosom.
+
+'Rich enough for a queen!' she said, with a lift in her breathing
+that was more eloquent than words.  'Anne, my brave Anne!  I would
+be glad to be your maidservant; I could envy that boy Rowley.  But,
+no!' she broke off, 'I envy no one--I need not--I am yours.'
+
+'Mine,' said I, 'for ever!  By this and this, mine!'
+
+'All of me,' she repeated.  'Altogether and forever!'
+
+And if the god were envious, he must have seen with mortification
+how little he could do to mar the happiness of mortals.  I stood in
+a mere waterspout; she herself was wet, not from my embrace only,
+but from the splashing of the storm.  The candles had guttered out;
+we were in darkness.  I could scarce see anything but the shining
+of her eyes in the dark room.  To her I must have appeared as a
+silhouette, haloed by rain and the spouting of the ancient Gothic
+gutter above my head.
+
+Presently we became more calm and confidential; and when that
+squall, which proved to be the last of the storm, had blown by,
+fell into a talk of ways and means.  It seemed she knew Mr. Robbie,
+to whom I had been so slenderly accredited by Romaine--was even
+invited to his house for the evening of Monday, and gave me a
+sketch of the old gentleman's character which implied a great deal
+of penetration in herself, and proved of great use to me in the
+immediate sequel.  It seemed he was an enthusiastic antiquary, and
+in particular a fanatic of heraldry.  I heard it with delight, for
+I was myself, thanks to M. de Culemberg, fairly grounded in that
+science, and acquainted with the blazons of most families of note
+in Europe.  And I had made up my mind--even as she spoke, it was my
+fixed determination, though I was a hundred miles from saying it--
+to meet Flora on Monday night as a fellow-guest in Mr. Robbie's
+house.
+
+I gave her my money--it was, of course, only paper I had brought.
+I gave it her, to be her marriage-portion, I declared.
+
+'Not so bad a marriage-portion for a private soldier,' I told her,
+laughing, as I passed it through the bars.
+
+'O, Anne, and where am I to keep it?' she cried.  'If my aunt
+should find it!  What would I say!'
+
+'Next your heart,' I suggested.
+
+'Then you will always be near your treasure,' she cried, 'for you
+are always there!'
+
+We were interrupted by a sudden clearness that fell upon the night.
+The clouds dispersed; the stars shone in every part of the heavens;
+and, consulting my watch, I was startled to find it already hard on
+five in the morning.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII--THE SABBATH DAY
+
+
+
+It was indeed high time I should be gone from Swanston; but what I
+was to do in the meanwhile was another question.  Rowley had
+received his orders last night:  he was to say that I had met a
+friend, and Mrs. McRankine was not to expect me before morning.  A
+good enough tale in itself; but the dreadful pickle I was in made
+it out of the question.  I could not go home till I had found
+harbourage, a fire to dry my clothes at, and a bed where I might
+lie till they were ready.
+
+Fortune favoured me again.  I had scarce got to the top of the
+first hill when I spied a light on my left, about a furlong away.
+It might be a case of sickness; what else it was likely to be--in
+so rustic a neighbourhood, and at such an ungodly time of the
+morning--was beyond my fancy.  A faint sound of singing became
+audible, and gradually swelled as I drew near, until at last I
+could make out the words, which were singularly appropriate both to
+the hour and to the condition of the singers.  'The cock may craw,
+the day may daw,' they sang; and sang it with such laxity both in
+time and tune, and such sentimental complaisance in the expression,
+as assured me they had got far into the third bottle at least.
+
+I found a plain rustic cottage by the wayside, of the sort called
+double, with a signboard over the door; and, the lights within
+streaming forth and somewhat mitigating the darkness of the
+morning, I was enabled to decipher the inscription:  'The Hunters'
+Tryst, by Alexander Hendry.  Porter Ales, and British Spirits.
+Beds.'
+
+My first knock put a period to the music, and a voice challenged
+tipsily from within.
+
+'Who goes there?' it said; and I replied, 'A lawful traveller.'
+
+Immediately after, the door was unbarred by a company of the
+tallest lads my eyes had ever rested on, all astonishingly drunk
+and very decently dressed, and one (who was perhaps the drunkest of
+the lot) carrying a tallow candle, from which he impartially
+bedewed the clothes of the whole company.  As soon as I saw them I
+could not help smiling to myself to remember the anxiety with which
+I had approached.  They received me and my hastily-concocted story,
+that I had been walking from Peebles and had lost my way, with
+incoherent benignity; jostled me among them into the room where
+they had been sitting, a plain hedgerow alehouse parlour, with a
+roaring fire in the chimney and a prodigious number of empty
+bottles on the floor; and informed me that I was made, by this
+reception, a temporary member of the Six-Feet-High Club, an
+athletic society of young men in a good station, who made of the
+Hunters' Tryst a frequent resort.  They told me I had intruded on
+an 'all-night sitting,' following upon an 'all-day Saturday tramp'
+of forty miles; and that the members would all be up and 'as right
+as ninepence' for the noonday service at some neighbouring church--
+Collingwood, if memory serves me right.  At this I could have
+laughed, but the moment seemed ill-chosen.  For, though six feet
+was their standard, they all exceeded that measurement
+considerably; and I tasted again some of the sensations of
+childhood, as I looked up to all these lads from a lower plane, and
+wondered what they would do next.  But the Six-Footers, if they
+were very drunk, proved no less kind.  The landlord and servants of
+the Hunters' Tryst were in bed and asleep long ago.  Whether by
+natural gift or acquired habit they could suffer pandemonium to
+reign all over the house, and yet lie ranked in the kitchen like
+Egyptian mummies, only that the sound of their snoring rose and
+fell ceaselessly like the drone of a bagpipe.  Here the Six-Footers
+invaded them--in their citadel, so to speak; counted the bunks and
+the sleepers; proposed to put me in bed to one of the lasses,
+proposed to have one of the lasses out to make room for me, fell
+over chairs, and made noise enough to waken the dead:  the whole
+illuminated by the same young torch-bearer, but now with two
+candles, and rapidly beginning to look like a man in a snowstorm.
+At last a bed was found for me, my clothes were hung out to dry
+before the parlour fire, and I was mercifully left to my repose.
+
+I awoke about nine with the sun shining in my eyes.  The landlord
+came at my summons, brought me my clothes dried and decently
+brushed, and gave me the good news that the Six-Feet-High Club were
+all abed and sleeping off their excesses.  Where they were bestowed
+was a puzzle to me until (as I was strolling about the garden patch
+waiting for breakfast) I came on a barn door, and, looking in, saw
+all the red face mixed in the straw like plums in a cake.  Quoth
+the stalwart maid who brought me my porridge and bade me 'eat them
+while they were hot,' 'Ay, they were a' on the ran-dan last nicht!
+Hout! they're fine lads, and they'll be nane the waur of it.  Forby
+Farbes's coat.  I dinna see wha's to get the creish off that!' she
+added, with a sigh; in which, identifying Forbes as the torch-
+bearer, I mentally joined.
+
+It was a brave morning when I took the road; the sun shone, spring
+seemed in the air, it smelt like April or May, and some over-
+venturous birds sang in the coppices as I went by.  I had plenty to
+think of, plenty to be grateful for, that gallant morning; and yet
+I had a twitter at my heart.  To enter the city by daylight might
+be compared to marching on a battery; every face that I confronted
+would threaten me like the muzzle of a gun; and it came into my
+head suddenly with how much better a countenance I should be able
+to do it if I could but improvise a companion.  Hard by Merchiston
+I was so fortunate as to observe a bulky gentleman in broadcloth
+and gaiters, stooping with his head almost between his knees,
+before a stone wall.  Seizing occasion by the forelock, I drew up
+as I came alongside and inquired what he had found to interest him.
+
+He turned upon me a countenance not much less broad than his back.
+
+'Why, sir,' he replied, 'I was even marvelling at my own
+indefeasible stupeedity:  that I should walk this way every week of
+my life, weather permitting, and should never before have NOTTICED
+that stone,' touching it at the same time with a goodly oak staff.
+
+I followed the indication.  The stone, which had been built
+sideways into the wall, offered traces of heraldic sculpture.  At
+once there came a wild idea into my mind:  his appearance tallied
+with Flora's description of Mr. Robbie; a knowledge of heraldry
+would go far to clinch the proof; and what could be more desirable
+than to scrape an informal acquaintance with the man whom I must
+approach next day with my tale of the drovers, and whom I yet
+wished to please?  I stooped in turn.
+
+'A chevron,' I said; 'on a chief three mullets?  Looks like
+Douglas, does it not?'
+
+'Yes, sir, it does; you are right,' said he:  'it DOES look like
+Douglas; though, without the tinctures, and the whole thing being
+so battered and broken up, who shall venture an opinion?  But allow
+me to be more personal, sir.  In these degenerate days I am
+astonished you should display so much proficiency.'
+
+'O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman, a friend
+of my family, and I may say my guardian,' said I; 'but I have
+forgotten it since.  God forbid I should delude you into thinking
+me a herald, sir!  I am only an ungrammatical amateur.'
+
+'And a little modesty does no harm even in a herald,' says my new
+acquaintance graciously.
+
+In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained very
+amicable discourse along what remained of the country road, past
+the suburbs, and on into the streets of the New Town, which was as
+deserted and silent as a city of the dead.  The shops were closed,
+no vehicle ran, cats sported in the midst of the sunny causeway;
+and our steps and voices re-echoed from the quiet houses.  It was
+the high-water, full and strange, of that weekly trance to which
+the city of Edinburgh is subjected:  the apotheosis of the Sawbath;
+and I confess the spectacle wanted not grandeur, however much it
+may have lacked cheerfulness.  There are few religious ceremonies
+more imposing.  As we thus walked and talked in a public seclusion
+the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds of the city, and
+the streets began immediately to be thronged with decent church-
+goers.
+
+'Ah!' said my companion, 'there are the bells!  Now, sir, as you
+are a stranger I must offer you the hospitality of my pew.  I do
+not know whether you are at all used with our Scottish form; but in
+case you are not I will find your places for you; and Dr. Henry
+Gray, of St. Mary's (under whom I sit), is as good a preacher as we
+have to show you.'
+
+This put me in a quandary.  It was a degree of risk I was scarce
+prepared for.  Dozens of people, who might pass me by in the street
+with no more than a second look, would go on from the second to the
+third, and from that to a final recognition, if I were set before
+them, immobilised in a pew, during the whole time of service.  An
+unlucky turn of the head would suffice to arrest their attention.
+'Who is that?' they would think:  'surely I should know him!' and,
+a church being the place in all the world where one has least to
+think of, it was ten to one they would end by remembering me before
+the benediction.  However, my mind was made up:  I thanked my
+obliging friend, and placed myself at his disposal.
+
+Our way now led us into the north-east quarter of the town, among
+pleasant new faubourgs, to a decent new church of a good size,
+where I was soon seated by the side of my good Samaritan, and
+looked upon by a whole congregation of menacing faces.  At first
+the possibility of danger kept me awake; but by the time I had
+assured myself there was none to be apprehended, and the service
+was not in the least likely to be enlivened by the arrest of a
+French spy, I had to resign myself to the task of listening to Dr.
+Henry Gray.
+
+As we moved out, after this ordeal was over, my friend was at once
+surrounded and claimed by his acquaintances of the congregation;
+and I was rejoiced to hear him addressed by the expected name of
+Robbie.
+
+So soon as we were clear of the crowd--'Mr. Robbie?' said I,
+bowing.
+
+'The very same, sir,' said he.
+
+'If I mistake not, a lawyer?'
+
+'A writer to His Majesty's Signet, at your service.'
+
+'It seems we were predestined to be acquaintances!' I exclaimed.
+'I have here a card in my pocket intended for you.  It is from my
+family lawyer.  It was his last word, as I was leaving, to ask to
+be remembered kindly, and to trust you would pass over so informal
+an introduction.'
+
+And I offered him the card.
+
+'Ay, ay, my old friend Daniel!' says he, looking on the card.  'And
+how does my old friend Daniel?'
+
+I gave a favourable view of Mr. Romaine's health.
+
+'Well, this is certainly a whimsical incident,' he continued.  'And
+since we are thus met already--and so much to my advantage!--the
+simplest thing will be to prosecute the acquaintance instantly.
+Let me propose a snack between sermons, a bottle of my particular
+green seal--and when nobody is looking we can talk blazons, Mr.
+Ducie!'--which was the name I then used and had already
+incidentally mentioned, in the vain hope of provoking a return in
+kind.
+
+'I beg your pardon, sir:  do I understand you to invite me to your
+house?' said I.
+
+'That was the idea I was trying to convey,' said he.  'We have the
+name of hospitable people up here, and I would like you to try
+mine.'
+
+'Mr. Robbie, I shall hope to try it some day, but not yet,' I
+replied.  'I hope you will not misunderstand me.  My business,
+which brings me to your city, is of a peculiar kind.  Till you
+shall have heard it, and, indeed, till its issue is known, I should
+feel as if I had stolen your invitation.'
+
+'Well, well,' said he, a little sobered, 'it must be as you wish,
+though you would hardly speak otherwise if you had committed
+homicide!  Mine is the loss.  I must eat alone; a very pernicious
+thing for a person of my habit of body, content myself with a pint
+of skinking claret, and meditate the discourse.  But about this
+business of yours:  if it is so particular as all that, it will
+doubtless admit of no delay.'
+
+'I must confess, sir, it presses,' I acknowledged.
+
+'Then, let us say to-morrow at half-past eight in the morning,'
+said he; 'and I hope, when your mind is at rest (and it does you
+much honour to take it as you do), that you will sit down with me
+to the postponed meal, not forgetting the bottle.  You have my
+address?' he added, and gave it me--which was the only thing I
+wanted.
+
+At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual
+civilities, and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of
+people returning from church, to my lodgings in St. James' Square.
+
+Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my landlady in
+a dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in her wake:  no
+less than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a smart pair of
+tops to his boots!  When I said he was in the lady's wake I spoke
+but in metaphor.  As a matter of fact he was squiring her, with the
+utmost dignity, on his arm; and I followed them up the stairs,
+smiling to myself.
+
+Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and Mrs.
+McRankine inquired where I had been.  I told her boastfully, giving
+her the name of the church and the divine, and ignorantly supposing
+I should have gained caste.  But she soon opened my eyes.  In the
+roots of the Scottish character there are knots and contortions
+that not only no stranger can understand, but no stranger can
+follow; he walks among explosives; and his best course is to throw
+himself upon their mercy--'Just as I am, without one plea,' a
+citation from one of the lady's favourite hymns.
+
+The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was
+impossible to be written down; and I at once executed the manoeuvre
+I have recommended.
+
+'You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your city,' said I.
+'If I have done wrong, it was in mere ignorance, my dear lady; and
+this afternoon, if you will be so good as to take me, I shall
+accompany YOU.'
+
+But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to her
+own quarters murmuring.
+
+'Well, Rowley,' said I; 'and have you been to church?'
+
+'If you please, sir,' he said.
+
+'Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I have,' I returned.
+'And how did you get on with the Scottish form?'
+
+'Well, sir, it was pretty 'ard, the form was, and reether narrow,'
+he replied.  'I don't know w'y it is, but it seems to me like as if
+things were a good bit changed since William Wallace!  That was a
+main queer church she took me to, Mr. Anne!  I don't know as I
+could have sat it out, if she 'adn't 'a' give me peppermints.  She
+ain't a bad one at bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit, and
+she do worry, but, law bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain't nothink
+really--she don't MEAN it.  W'y, she was down on me like a
+'undredweight of bricks this morning.  You see, last night she 'ad
+me in to supper, and, I beg your pardon, sir, but I took the
+freedom of playing her a chune or two.  She didn't mind a bit; so
+this morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced in, and
+flew up, and carried on no end about Sunday!'
+
+'You see, Rowley,' said I, 'they're all mad up here, and you have
+to humour them.  See and don't quarrel with Mrs. McRankine; and,
+above all, don't argue with her, or you'll get the worst of it.
+Whatever she says, touch your forelock and say, "If you please!" or
+"I beg pardon, ma'am."  And let me tell you one thing:  I am sorry,
+but you have to go to church with her again this afternoon.  That's
+duty, my boy!'
+
+As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs. McRankine
+presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang up with
+readiness and offered her my arm.  Rowley followed behind.  I was
+beginning to grow accustomed to the risks of my stay in Edinburgh,
+and it even amused me to confront a new churchful.  I confess the
+amusement did not last until the end; for if Dr. Gray were long,
+Mr. McCraw was not only longer, but more incoherent, and the matter
+of his sermon (which was a direct attack, apparently, on all the
+Churches of the world, my own among the number), where it had not
+the tonic quality of personal insult, rather inclined me to
+slumber.  But I braced myself for my life, kept up Rowley with the
+end of a pin, and came through it awake, but no more.
+
+Bethiah was quite conquered by this 'mark of grace,' though, I am
+afraid, she was also moved by more worldly considerations.  The
+first is, the lady had not the least objection to go to church on
+the arm of an elegantly dressed young gentleman, and be followed by
+a spruce servant with a cockade in his hat.  I could see it by the
+way she took possession of us, found us the places in the Bible,
+whispered to me the name of the minister, passed us lozenges, which
+I (for my part) handed on to Rowley, and at each fresh attention
+stole a little glance about the church to make sure she was
+observed.  Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me if I also
+remembered that I was a favourable-looking young man.  When we grow
+elderly, how the room brightens, and begins to look as it ought to
+look, on the entrance of youth, grace, health, and comeliness!  You
+do not want them for yourself, perhaps not even for your son, but
+you look on smiling; and when you recall their images--again, it is
+with a smile.  I defy you to see or think of them and not smile
+with an infinite and intimate, but quite impersonal, pleasure.
+Well, either I know nothing of women, or that was the case with
+Bethiah McRankine.  She had been to church with a cockade behind
+her, on the one hand; on the other, her house was brightened by the
+presence of a pair of good-looking young fellows of the other sex,
+who were always pleased and deferential in her society and accepted
+her views as final.
+
+These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from
+church--if church it could be called--I adopted a most insidious
+device to magnify her interest.  I took her into the confidence,
+that is, of my love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young
+lady with whom my affections were engaged than she turned upon me a
+face of awful gravity.
+
+'Is she bonny?' she inquired.
+
+I gave her full assurances upon that.
+
+'To what denoamination does she beloang?' came next, and was so
+unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.
+
+'Upon my word, ma'am, I have never inquired,' cried I; 'I only know
+that she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.'
+
+'Ay!' she sighed, 'if she has the root of the maitter!  There's a
+remnant practically in most of the denoaminations.  There's some in
+the McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites, and mony in the
+McMillanites, and there's a leeven even in the Estayblishment.'
+
+'I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,' said
+I.
+
+'Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel'!' she cried.
+
+'Why, my dear madam!  I only--' I began.
+
+'You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,' she interrupted.
+
+On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our
+idyll with avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of
+cream; and, strange to say--and so expansive a passion is that of
+love!--that I derived a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding
+in that breast of iron.  It made an immediate bond:  from that hour
+we seemed to be welded into a family-party; and I had little
+difficulty in persuading her to join us and to preside over our
+tea-table.  Surely there was never so ill-matched a trio as Rowley,
+Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount Anne!  But I am of the Apostle's
+way, with a difference:  all things to all women!  When I cannot
+please a woman, hang me in my cravat!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII--EVENTS OF MONDAY:  THE LAWYER'S PARTY
+
+
+
+By half-past eight o'clock on the next morning, I was ringing the
+bell of the lawyer's office in Castle Street, where I found him
+ensconced at a business table, in a room surrounded by several
+tiers of green tin cases.  He greeted me like an old friend.
+
+'Come away, sir, come away!' said he.  'Here is the dentist ready
+for you, and I think I can promise you that the operation will be
+practically painless.'
+
+'I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,' I replied, as I shook hands
+with him.  'But at least there shall be no time lost with me.'
+
+I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and
+their cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or
+half-murdered a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to
+having suffered a couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in
+prison on a charge from which I could have immediately freed them.
+All this I gave him first of all, to be done with the worst of it;
+and all this he took with gravity, but without the least appearance
+of surprise.
+
+'Now, sir,' I continued, 'I expect to have to pay for my unhappy
+frolic, but I would like very well if it could be managed without
+my personal appearance or even the mention of my real name.  I had
+so much wisdom as to sail under false colours in this foolish jaunt
+of mine; my family would be extremely concerned if they had wind of
+it; but at the same time, if the case of this Faa has terminated
+fatally, and there are proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am
+not going to stand by and see them vexed, far less punished; and I
+authorise you to give me up for trial if you think that best--or,
+if you think it unnecessary, in the meanwhile to make preparations
+for their defence.  I hope, sir, that I am as little anxious to be
+Quixotic, as I am determined to be just.'
+
+'Very fairly spoken,' said Mr. Robbie.  'It is not much in my line,
+as doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have told you.  I
+rarely mix myself up with anything on the criminal side, or
+approaching it.  However, for a young gentleman like you, I may
+stretch a point, and I dare say I may be able to accomplish more
+than perhaps another.  I will go at once to the Procurator Fiscal's
+office and inquire.'
+
+'Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,' said I.  'You forget the chapter of
+expenses.  I had thought, for a beginning, of placing a thousand
+pounds in your hands.'
+
+'My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,'
+said Mr. Robbie severely.'
+
+'It seemed to me,' I protested, 'that coming to you almost as a
+stranger, and placing in your hands a piece of business so contrary
+to your habits, some substantial guarantee of my good faith--'
+
+'Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,' he interrupted,
+with an air of closing the dispute.
+
+'And yet, Mr. Robbie,' I continued, 'I must ask you to allow me to
+proceed.  I do not merely refer to the expenses of the case.  I
+have my eye besides on Todd and Candlish.  They are thoroughly
+deserving fellows; they have been subjected through me to a
+considerable term of imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that you
+should not spare money for their indemnification.  This will
+explain,' I added smiling, 'my offer of the thousand pounds.  It
+was in the nature of a measure by which you should judge the scale
+on which I can afford to have this business carried through.'
+
+'I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,' said he.  'But the sooner I am
+off, the better this affair is like to be guided.  My clerk will
+show you into the waiting-room and give you the day's Caledonian
+Mercury and the last Register to amuse yourself with in the
+interval.'
+
+I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.  I saw him
+descend from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was
+shown again into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led
+me to augur the worst.  For some time he had the inhumanity to read
+me a lecture as to the incredible silliness, 'not to say
+immorality,' of my behaviour.  'I have the satisfaction in telling
+you my opinion, because it appears that you are going to get off
+scot free,' he continued, where, indeed, I thought he might have
+begun.
+
+'The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd and
+Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been
+for their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie--or Mr. St.
+Ivey, as I believe I should now call you.  Never a word would
+either of the two old fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at
+the existence of such a person; and when they were confronted with
+Faa's version of the affair, they gave accounts so entirely
+discrepant with their own former declarations, as well as with each
+other, that the Fiscal was quite nonplussed, and imaigined there
+was something behind it.  You may believe I soon laughed him out of
+that!  And I had the satisfaction of seeing your two friends set
+free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.'
+
+'Oh, sir,' I cried, 'you should have brought them here.'
+
+'No instructions, Mr. Ducie!' said he.  'How did I know you wished
+to renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated so
+fortunately?  And, indeed, to be frank with you, I should have set
+my face against it, if you had!  Let them go!  They are paid and
+contented, and have the highest possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey!
+When I gave them fifty pounds apiece--which was rather more than
+enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may think--the man Todd, who has
+the only tongue of the party, struck his staff on the ground.
+"Weel," says he, "I aye said he was a gentleman!"  "Man, Todd,"
+said I, "that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of yourself!"'
+
+'So it was a case of "Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet."'
+
+'No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of your
+life, and a good riddance!  They are fine fellows in their way, but
+no proper associates for the like of yourself; and do you finally
+agree to be done with all eccentricity--take up with no more
+drovers, or tinkers, but enjoy the naitural pleesures for which
+your age, your wealth, your intelligence, and (if I may be allowed
+to say it) your appearance so completely fit you.  And the first of
+these,' quoth he, looking at his watch, 'will be to step through to
+my dining-room and share a bachelor's luncheon.'
+
+Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the
+same theme.  'You're, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?' said
+he.  'Well, on Thursday night there is the Assembly Ball.  You must
+certainly go there, and you must permit me besides to do the
+honours of the ceety and send you a ticket.  I am a thorough
+believer in a young man being a young man--but no more drovers or
+rovers, if you love me!  Talking of which puts me in mind that you
+may be short of partners at the Assembly--oh, I have been young
+myself!--and if ye care to come to anything so portentiously
+tedious as a tea-party at the house of a bachelor lawyer,
+consisting mainly of his nieces and nephews, and his grand-nieces
+and grand-nephews, and his wards, and generally the whole clan of
+the descendants of his clients, you might drop in to-night towards
+seven o'clock.  I think I can show you one or two that are worth
+looking at, and you can dance with them later on at the Assembly.'
+
+He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young
+ladies' whom I might expect to meet.  'And then there's my
+parteecular friend, Miss Flora,' said he.  'But I'll make no
+attempt of a description.  You shall see her for yourself.'
+
+It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation; and
+returned home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet and
+the good news of which I was the bearer.  The toilette, I have
+reason to believe, was a success.  Mr. Rowley dismissed me with a
+farewell:  'Crikey!  Mr. Anne, but you do look prime!'  Even the
+stony Bethiah was--how shall I say?--dazzled, but scandalised, by
+my appearance; and while, of course, she deplored the vanity that
+led to it, she could not wholly prevent herself from admiring the
+result.
+
+'Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a wayfaring Christian
+man!' she said.  'Wi' Christ despised and rejectit in all pairts of
+the world and the flag of the Covenant flung doon, you will be
+muckle better on your knees!  However, I'll have to confess that it
+sets you weel.  And if it's the lassie ye're gaun to see the nicht,
+I suppose I'll just have to excuse ye!  Bairns maun be bairns!' she
+said, with a sigh.  'I mind when Mr. McRankine came courtin', and
+that's lang by-gane--I mind I had a green gown, passementit, that
+was thocht to become me to admiration.  I was nae just exactly what
+ye would ca' bonny; but I was pale, penetratin', and interestin'.'
+And she leaned over the stair-rail with a candle to watch my
+descent as long as it should be possible.
+
+It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie's--by which, I do not so
+much mean that there were few people, for the rooms were crowded,
+as that there was very little attempted to entertain them.  In one
+apartment there were tables set out, where the elders were solemnly
+engaged upon whist; in the other and larger one, a great number of
+youth of both sexes entertained themselves languidly, the ladies
+sitting upon chairs to be courted, the gentlemen standing about in
+various attitudes of insinuation or indifference.  Conversation
+appeared the sole resource, except in so far as it was modified by
+a number of keepsakes and annuals which lay dispersed upon the
+tables, and of which the young beaux displayed the illustrations to
+the ladies.  Mr. Robbie himself was customarily in the card-room;
+only now and again, when he cut out, he made an incursion among the
+young folks, and rolled about jovially from one to another, the
+very picture of the general uncle.
+
+It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the
+afternoon.  'Now, Miss Flora,' he had said, 'come early, for I have
+a Phoenix to show you--one Mr. Ducie, a new client of mine that, I
+vow, I have fallen in love with'; and he was so good as to add a
+word or two on my appearance, from which Flora conceived a
+suspicion of the truth.  She had come to the party, in consequence,
+on the knife-edge of anticipation and alarm; had chosen a place by
+the door, where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded by a posse
+of vapid youths; and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me in the
+most natural manner in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared
+form of words.
+
+'How do you do, Mr. Ducie?' she said.  'It is quite an age since I
+have seen you!'
+
+'I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,' I replied.  'May I sit
+down?'
+
+For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the judicious
+use of her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty by her side.
+
+She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths had the
+discretion to melt before us.  As soon as I was once seated her fan
+flew out, and she whispered behind it:
+
+'Are you mad?'
+
+'Madly in love,' I replied; 'but in no other sense.'
+
+'I have no patience!  You cannot understand what I am suffering!'
+she said.  'What are you to say to Ronald, to Major Chevenix, to my
+aunt?'
+
+Your aunt?' I cried, with a start.  'Peccavi! is she here?'
+
+'She is in the card-room at whist,' said Flora.
+
+'Where she will probably stay all the evening?' I suggested.
+
+'She may,' she admitted; 'she generally does!'
+
+'Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,' said I, 'which is very
+much what I had counted upon doing.  I did not come here to play
+cards, but to contemplate a certain young lady to my heart's
+content--if it can ever be contented!--and to tell her some good
+news.'
+
+'But there are still Ronald and the Major!' she persisted.  'They
+are not card-room fixtures!  Ronald will be coming and going.  And
+as for Mr. Chevenix, he--'
+
+'Always sits with Miss Flora?' I interrupted.  'And they talk of
+poor St. Ives?  I had gathered as much, my dear; and Mr. Ducie has
+come to prevent it!  But pray dismiss these fears!  I mind no one
+but your aunt.'
+
+'Why my aunt?'
+
+'Because your aunt is a lady, my dear, and a very clever lady, and,
+like all clever ladies, a very rash lady,' said I.  'You can never
+count upon them, unless you are sure of getting them in a corner,
+as I have got you, and talking them over rationally, as I am just
+engaged on with yourself!  It would be quite the same to your aunt
+to make the worst kind of a scandal, with an equal indifference to
+my danger and to the feelings of our good host!'
+
+'Well,' she said, 'and what of Ronald, then?  Do you think HE is
+above making a scandal?  You must know him very little!'
+
+'On the other hand, it is my pretension that I know him very well!'
+I replied.  'I must speak to Ronald first--not Ronald to me--that
+is all!'
+
+'Then, please, go and speak to him at once!' she pleaded.  He is
+there--do you see?--at the upper end of the room, talking to that
+girl in pink.'
+
+'And so lose this seat before I have told you my good news?' I
+exclaimed.  'Catch me!  And, besides, my dear one, think a little
+of me and my good news!  I thought the bearer of good news was
+always welcome!  I hoped he might be a little welcome for himself!
+Consider!  I have but one friend; and let me stay by her!  And
+there is only one thing I care to hear; and let me hear it!'
+
+'Oh, Anne,' she sighed, 'if I did not love you, why should I be so
+uneasy?  I am turned into a coward, dear!  Think, if it were the
+other way round--if you were quite safe and I was in, oh, such
+danger!'
+
+She had no sooner said it than I was convicted of being a dullard.
+'God forgive me, dear!'  I made haste to reply.  'I never saw
+before that there were two sides to this!'  And I told her my tale
+as briefly as I could, and rose to seek Ronald.  'You see, my dear,
+you are obeyed,' I said.
+
+She gave me a look that was a reward in itself; and as I turned
+away from her, with a strong sense of turning away from the sun, I
+carried that look in my bosom like a caress.  The girl in pink was
+an arch, ogling person, with a good deal of eyes and teeth, and a
+great play of shoulders and rattle of conversation.  There could be
+no doubt, from Mr. Ronald's attitude, that he worshipped the very
+chair she sat on.  But I was quite ruthless.  I laid my hand on his
+shoulder, as he was stooping over her like a hen over a chicken.
+
+'Excuse me for one moment, Mr. Gilchrist!' said I.
+
+He started and span about in answer to my touch, and exhibited a
+face of inarticulate wonder.
+
+ 'Yes!' I continued, 'it is even myself!  Pardon me for
+interrupting so agreeable a tete-a-tete, but you know, my good
+fellow, we owe a first duty to Mr. Robbie.  It would never do to
+risk making a scene in the man's drawing-room; so the first thing I
+had to attend to was to have you warned.  The name I go by is
+Ducie, too, in case of accidents.'
+
+'I--I say, you know!' cried Ronald.  'Deuce take it, what are you
+doing here?'
+
+'Hush, hush!' said I.  'Not the place, my dear fellow--not the
+place.  Come to my rooms, if you like, to-night after the party, or
+to-morrow in the morning, and we can talk it out over a segar.  But
+here, you know, it really won't do at all.'
+
+Before he could collect his mind for an answer, I had given him my
+address in St. James Square, and had again mingled with the crowd.
+Alas!  I was not fated to get back to Flora so easily!  Mr. Robbie
+was in the path:  he was insatiably loquacious; and as he continued
+to palaver I watched the insipid youths gather again about my idol,
+and cursed my fate and my host.  He remembered suddenly that I was
+to attend the Assembly Ball on Thursday, and had only attended to-
+night by way of a preparative.  This put it into his head to
+present me to another young lady; but I managed this interview with
+so much art that, while I was scrupulously polite and even cordial
+to the fair one, I contrived to keep Robbie beside me all the time
+and to leave along with him when the ordeal was over.  We were just
+walking away arm in arm, when I spied my friend the Major
+approaching, stiff as a ramrod and, as usual, obtrusively clean.
+
+'Oh! there's a man I want to know,' said I, taking the bull by the
+horns.  'Won't you introduce me to Major Chevenix?'
+
+'At a word, my dear fellow,' said Robbie; and 'Major!' he cried,
+'come here and let me present to you my friend Mr. Ducie, who
+desires the honour of your acquaintance.'
+
+The Major flushed visibly, but otherwise preserved his composure.
+He bowed very low.  'I'm not very sure,' he said:  'I have an idea
+we have met before?'
+
+'Informally,' I said, returning his bow; 'and I have long looked
+forward to the pleasure of regularising our acquaintance.'
+
+'You are very good, Mr. Ducie,' he returned.  'Perhaps you could
+aid my memory a little?  Where was it that I had the pleasure?'
+
+'Oh, that would be telling tales out of school,' said I, with a
+laugh, 'and before my lawyer, too!'
+
+'I'll wager,' broke in Mr. Robbie, 'that, when you knew my client,
+Chevenix--the past of our friend Mr. Ducie is an obscure chapter
+full of horrid secrets--I'll wager, now, you knew him as St. Ivey,'
+says he, nudging me violently.
+
+'I think not, sir,' said the Major, with pinched lips.
+
+'Well, I wish he may prove all right!' continued the lawyer, with
+certainly the worst-inspired jocularity in the world.  'I know
+nothing by him!  He may be a swell mobsman for me with his aliases.
+You must put your memory on the rack, Major, and when ye've
+remembered when and where ye met him, be sure ye tell me.'
+
+'I will not fail, sir,' said Chevenix.
+
+'Seek to him!' cried Robbie, waving his hand as he departed.
+
+The Major, as soon as we were alone, turned upon me his impassive
+countenance.
+
+'Well,' he said, 'you have courage.'
+
+'It is undoubted as your honour, sir,' I returned, bowing.
+
+'Did you expect to meet me, may I ask?' said he.
+
+'You saw, at least, that I courted the presentation,' said I.
+
+'And you were not afraid?' said Chevenix.
+
+'I was perfectly at ease.  I knew I was dealing with a gentleman.
+Be that your epitaph.'
+
+'Well, there are some other people looking for you,' he said, 'who
+will make no bones about the point of honour.  The police, my dear
+sir, are simply agog about you.'
+
+'And I think that that was coarse,' said I.
+
+'You have seen Miss Gilchrist?' he inquired, changing the subject.
+
+'With whom, I am led to understand, we are on a footing of
+rivalry?' I asked.  'Yes, I have seen her.'
+
+'And I was just seeking her,' he replied.
+
+I was conscious of a certain thrill of temper; so, I suppose, was
+he.  We looked each other up and down.
+
+'The situation is original,' he resumed.
+
+'Quite,' said I.  'But let me tell you frankly you are blowing a
+cold coal.  I owe you so much for your kindness to the prisoner
+Champdivers.'
+
+'Meaning that the lady's affections are more advantageously
+disposed of?' he asked, with a sneer.  'Thank you, I am sure.  And,
+since you have given me a lead, just hear a word of good advice in
+your turn.  Is it fair, is it delicate, is it like a gentleman, to
+compromise the young lady by attentions which (as you know very
+well) can come to nothing?'
+
+I was utterly unable to find words in answer.
+
+'Excuse me if I cut this interview short,' he went on.  'It seems
+to me doomed to come to nothing, and there is more attractive
+metal.'
+
+'Yes,' I replied, 'as you say, it cannot amount to much.  You are
+impotent, bound hand and foot in honour.  You know me to be a man
+falsely accused, and even if you did not know it, from your
+position as my rival you have only the choice to stand quite still
+or to be infamous.'
+
+'I would not say that,' he returned, with another change of colour.
+'I may hear it once too often.'
+
+With which he moved off straight for where Flora was sitting amidst
+her court of vapid youths, and I had no choice but to follow him, a
+bad second, and reading myself, as I went, a sharp lesson on the
+command of temper.
+
+It is a strange thing how young men in their teens go down at the
+mere wind of the coming of men of twenty-five and upwards!  The
+vapid ones fled without thought of resistance before the Major and
+me; a few dallied awhile in the neighbourhood--so to speak, with
+their fingers in their mouths--but presently these also followed
+the rout, and we remained face to face before Flora.  There was a
+draught in that corner by the door; she had thrown her pelisse over
+her bare arms and neck, and the dark fur of the trimming set them
+off.  She shone by contrast; the light played on her smooth skin to
+admiration, and the colour changed in her excited face.  For the
+least fraction of a second she looked from one to the other of her
+pair of rival swains, and seemed to hesitate.  Then she addressed
+Chevenix:-
+
+'You are coming to the Assembly, of course, Major Chevenix?' said
+she.
+
+'I fear not; I fear I shall be otherwise engaged,' he replied.
+'Even the pleasure of dancing with you, Miss Flora, must give way
+to duty.'
+
+For awhile the talk ran harmlessly on the weather, and then
+branched off towards the war.  It seemed to be by no one's fault;
+it was in the air, and had to come.
+
+'Good news from the scene of operations,' said the Major.
+
+'Good news while it lasts,' I said.  'But will Miss Gilchrist tell
+us her private thought upon the war?  In her admiration for the
+victors, does not there mingle some pity for the vanquished?'
+
+'Indeed, sir,' she said, with animation, 'only too much of it!  War
+is a subject that I do not think should be talked of to a girl.  I
+am, I have to be--what do you call it?--a non-combatant?  And to
+remind me of what others have to do and suffer:  no, it is not
+fair!'
+
+'Miss Gilchrist has the tender female heart,' said Chevenix.
+
+'Do not be too sure of that!' she cried.  'I would love to be
+allowed to fight myself!'
+
+'On which side?' I asked.
+
+'Can you ask?' she exclaimed.  'I am a Scottish girl!'
+
+'She is a Scottish girl!' repeated the Major, looking at me.  'And
+no one grudges you her pity!'
+
+'And I glory in every grain of it she has to spare,' said I.  'Pity
+is akin to love.'
+
+'Well, and let us put that question to Miss Gilchrist.  It is for
+her to decide, and for us to bow to the decision.  Is pity, Miss
+Flora, or is admiration, nearest love?'
+
+'Oh come,' said I, 'let us be more concrete.  Lay before the lady a
+complete case:  describe your man, then I'll describe MINE, and
+Miss Flora shall decide.'
+
+'I think I see your meaning,' said he, 'and I'll try.  You think
+that pity--and the kindred sentiments--have the greatest power upon
+the heart.  I think more nobly of women.  To my view, the man they
+love will first of all command their respect; he will be steadfast-
+-proud, if you please; dry, possibly--but of all things steadfast.
+They will look at him in doubt; at last they will see that stern
+face which he presents to all the rest of the world soften to them
+alone.  First, trust, I say.  It is so that a woman loves who is
+worthy of heroes.'
+
+'Your man is very ambitious, sir,' said I, 'and very much of a
+hero!  Mine is a humbler, and, I would fain think, a more human
+dog.  He is one with no particular trust in himself, with no
+superior steadfastness to be admired for, who sees a lady's face,
+who hears her voice, and, without any phrase about the matter,
+falls in love.  What does he ask for, then, but pity?--pity for his
+weakness, pity for his love, which is his life.  You would make
+women always the inferiors, gaping up at your imaginary lover; he,
+like a marble statue, with his nose in the air!  But God has been
+wiser than you; and the most steadfast of your heroes may prove
+human, after all.  We appeal to the queen for judgment,' I added,
+turning and bowing before Flora.
+
+'And how shall the queen judge?' she asked.  'I must give you an
+answer that is no answer at all.  "The wind bloweth where it
+listeth":  she goes where her heart goes.'
+
+Her face flushed as she said it; mine also, for I read in it a
+declaration, and my heart swelled for joy.  But Chevenix grew pale.
+
+'You make of life a very dreadful kind of lottery, ma'am,' said he.
+'But I will not despair.  Honest and unornamental is still my
+choice.'
+
+And I must say he looked extremely handsome and very amusingly like
+the marble statue with its nose in the air to which I had compared
+him.
+
+'I cannot imagine how we got upon this subject,' said Flora.
+
+'Madame, it was through the war,' replied Chevenix.
+
+'All roads lead to Rome,' I commented.  'What else would you expect
+Mr. Chevenix and myself to talk of?'
+
+About this time I was conscious of a certain bustle and movement in
+the room behind me, but did not pay to it that degree of attention
+which perhaps would have been wise.  There came a certain change in
+Flora's face; she signalled repeatedly with her fan; her eyes
+appealed to me obsequiously; there could be no doubt that she
+wanted something--as well as I could make out, that I should go
+away and leave the field clear for my rival, which I had not the
+least idea of doing.  At last she rose from her chair with
+impatience.
+
+'I think it time you were saying good-night, Mr Ducie!' she said.
+
+I could not in the least see why, and said so.
+
+Whereupon she gave me this appalling answer, 'My aunt is coming out
+of the card-room.'
+
+In less time than it takes to tell, I had made my bow and my
+escape.  Looking back from the doorway, I was privileged to see,
+for a moment, the august profile and gold eyeglasses of Miss
+Gilchrist issuing from the card-room; and the sight lent me wings.
+I stood not on the order of my going; and a moment after, I was on
+the pavement of Castle Street, and the lighted windows shone down
+on me, and were crossed by ironical shadows of those who had
+remained behind.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX--EVENTS OF TUESDAY:  THE TOILS CLOSING
+
+
+
+This day began with a surprise.  I found a letter on my breakfast-
+table addressed to Edward Ducie, Esquire; and at first I was
+startled beyond measure.  'Conscience doth make cowards of us all!'
+When I had opened it, it proved to be only a note from the lawyer,
+enclosing a card for the Assembly Ball on Thursday evening.
+Shortly after, as I was composing my mind with a segar at one of
+the windows of the sitting-room, and Rowley, having finished the
+light share of work that fell to him, sat not far off tootling with
+great spirit and a marked preference for the upper octave, Ronald
+was suddenly shown in.  I got him a segar, drew in a chair to the
+side of the fire, and installed him there--I was going to say, at
+his ease, but no expression could be farther from the truth.  He
+was plainly on pins and needles, did not know whether to take or to
+refuse the segar, and, after he had taken it, did not know whether
+to light or to return it.  I saw he had something to say; I did not
+think it was his own something; and I was ready to offer a large
+bet it was really something of Major Chevenix's.
+
+'Well, and so here you are!' I observed, with pointless cordiality,
+for I was bound I should do nothing to help him out.  If he were,
+indeed, here running errands for my rival, he might have a fair
+field, but certainly no favour.
+
+'The fact is,' he began, 'I would rather see you alone.'
+
+'Why, certainly,' I replied.  'Rowley, you can step into the
+bedroom.  My dear fellow,' I continued, 'this sounds serious.
+Nothing wrong, I trust.'
+
+'Well, I'll be quite honest,' said he.  'I AM a good deal
+bothered.'
+
+'And I bet I know why!' I exclaimed.  'And I bet I can put you to
+rights, too!'
+
+'What do you mean!' he asked.
+
+'You must be hard up,' said I, 'and all I can say is, you've come
+to the right place.  If you have the least use for a hundred
+pounds, or any such trifling sum as that, please mention it.  It's
+here, quite at your service.'
+
+'I am sure it is most kind of you,' said Ronald, 'and the truth is,
+though I can't think how you guessed it, that I really AM a little
+behind board.  But I haven't come to talk about that.'
+
+'No, I dare say!' cried I.  'Not worth talking about!  But
+remember, Ronald, you and I are on different sides of the business.
+Remember that you did me one of those services that make men
+friends for ever.  And since I have had the fortune to come into a
+fair share of money, just oblige me, and consider so much of it as
+your own.'
+
+'No,' he said, 'I couldn't take it; I couldn't, really.  Besides,
+the fact is, I've come on a very different matter.  It's about my
+sister, St. Ives,' and he shook his head menacingly at me.
+
+'You're quite sure?' I persisted.  'It's here, at your service--up
+to five hundred pounds, if you like.  Well, all right; only
+remember where it is, when you do want it.'
+
+'Oh, please let me alone!' cried Ronald:  'I've come to say
+something unpleasant; and how on earth can I do it, if you don't
+give a fellow a chance?  It's about my sister, as I said.  You can
+see for yourself that it can't be allowed to go on.  It's
+compromising; it don't lead to anything; and you're not the kind of
+man (you must feel it yourself) that I can allow my female
+relatives to have anything to do with.  I hate saying this, St.
+Ives; it looks like hitting a man when he's down, you know; and I
+told the Major I very much disliked it from the first.  However, it
+had to be said; and now it has been, and, between gentlemen, it
+shouldn't be necessary to refer to it again.'
+
+'It's compromising; it doesn't lead to anything; not the kind of
+man,' I repeated thoughtfully.  'Yes, I believe I understand, and
+shall make haste to put myself en regle.'  I stood up, and laid my
+segar down.  'Mr. Gilchrist,' said I, with a bow, 'in answer to
+your very natural observations, I beg to offer myself as a suitor
+for your sister's hand.  I am a man of title, of which we think
+lightly in France, but of ancient lineage, which is everywhere
+prized.  I can display thirty-two quarterings without a blot.  My
+expectations are certainly above the average:  I believe my uncle's
+income averages about thirty thousand pounds, though I admit I was
+not careful to inform myself.  Put it anywhere between fifteen and
+fifty thousand; it is certainly not less.'
+
+'All this is very easy to say,' said Ronald, with a pitying smile.
+'Unfortunately, these things are in the air.'
+
+'Pardon me,--in Buckinghamshire,' said I, smiling.
+
+'Well, what I mean is, my dear St. Ives, that you CAN'T PROVE
+them,' he continued.  'They might just as well not be:  do you
+follow me?  You can't bring us any third party to back you.'
+
+'Oh, come!' cried I, springing up and hurrying to the table.  'You
+must excuse me!'  I wrote Romaine's address.  'There is my
+reference, Mr. Gilchrist.  Until you have written to him, and
+received his negative answer, I have a right to be treated, and I
+shall see that you treat me, as a gentleman.'  He was brought up
+with a round turn at that.
+
+'I beg your pardon, St. Ives,' said he.  'Believe me, I had no wish
+to be offensive.  But there's the difficulty of this affair; I
+can't make any of my points without offence!  You must excuse me,
+it's not my fault.  But, at any rate, you must see for yourself
+this proposal of marriage is--is merely impossible, my dear fellow.
+It's nonsense!  Our countries are at war; you are a prisoner.'
+
+'My ancestor of the time of the Ligue,' I replied, 'married a
+Huguenot lady out of the Saintonge, riding two hundred miles
+through an enemy's country to bring off his bride; and it was a
+happy marriage.'
+
+'Well!' he began; and then looked down into the fire, and became
+silent.
+
+'Well?' I asked.
+
+'Well, there's this business of--Goguelat,' said he, still looking
+at the coals in the grate.
+
+'What!' I exclaimed, starting in my chair.  'What's that you say?'
+
+'This business about Goguelat,' he repeated.
+
+'Ronald,' said I, 'this is not your doing.  These are not your own
+words.  I know where they came from:  a coward put them in your
+mouth.'
+
+'St. Ives!' he cried, 'why do you make it so hard for me? and
+where's the use of insulting other people?  The plain English is,
+that I can't hear of any proposal of marriage from a man under a
+charge like that.  You must see it for yourself, man!  It's the
+most absurd thing I ever heard of!  And you go on forcing me to
+argue with you, too!'
+
+'Because I have had an affair of honour which terminated unhappily,
+you--a young soldier, or next-door to it--refuse my offer?  Do I
+understand you aright?' said I.
+
+'My dear fellow!' he wailed, 'of course you can twist my words, if
+you like.  You SAY it was an affair of honour.  Well, I can't, of
+course, tell you that--I can't--I mean, you must see that that's
+just the point!  Was it?  I don't know.'
+
+'I have the honour to inform you,' said I.
+
+'Well, other people say the reverse, you see!'
+
+'They lie, Ronald, and I will prove it in time.'
+
+'The short and the long of it is, that any man who is so
+unfortunate as to have such things said about him is not the man to
+be my brother-in-law!' he cried.
+
+'Do you know who will be my first witness at the court?  Arthur
+Chevenix!' said I.
+
+'I don't care!' he cried, rising from his chair and beginning to
+pace outrageously about the room.  'What do you mean, St. Ives?
+What is this about?  It's like a dream, I declare!  You made an
+offer, and I have refused it.  I don't like it, I don't want it;
+and whatever I did, or didn't, wouldn't matter--my aunt wouldn't
+bear of it anyway!  Can't you take your answer, man?'
+
+'You must remember, Ronald, that we are playing with edged tools,'
+said I.  'An offer of marriage is a delicate subject to handle.
+You have refused, and you have justified your refusal by several
+statements:  first, that I was an impostor; second, that our
+countries were at war; and third-- No, I will speak,' said I; 'you
+can answer when I have done,--and third, that I had dishonourably
+killed--or was said to have done so--the man Goguelat.  Now, my
+dear fellow, these are very awkward grounds to be taking.  From any
+one else's lips I need scarce tell you how I should resent them;
+but my hands are tied.  I have so much gratitude to you, without
+talking of the love I bear your sister, that you insult me, when
+you do so, under the cover of a complete impunity.  I must feel the
+pain--and I do feel it acutely--I can do nothing to protect
+myself.'  He had been anxious enough to interrupt me in the
+beginning; but now, and after I had ceased, he stood a long while
+silent.
+
+'St. Ives,' he said at last, 'I think I had better go away.  This
+has been very irritating.  I never at all meant to say anything of
+the kind, and I apologise to you.  I have all the esteem for you
+that one gentleman should have for another.  I only meant to tell
+you--to show you what had influenced my mind; and that, in short,
+the thing was impossible.  One thing you may be quite sure of:  I
+shall do nothing against you.  Will you shake hands before I go
+away?' he blurted out.
+
+'Yes,' said I, 'I agree with you--the interview has been
+irritating.  Let bygones be bygones.  Good-bye, Ronald.'
+
+'Good-bye, St. Ives!' he returned.  'I'm heartily sorry.'
+
+And with that he was gone.
+
+The windows of my own sitting-room looked towards the north; but
+the entrance passage drew its light from the direction of the
+square.  Hence I was able to observe Ronald's departure, his very
+disheartened gait, and the fact that he was joined, about half-way,
+by no less a man than Major Chevenix.  At this, I could scarce keep
+from smiling; so unpalatable an interview must be before the pair
+of them, and I could hear their voices, clashing like crossed
+swords, in that eternal antiphony of 'I told you,' and 'I told you
+not.'  Without doubt, they had gained very little by their visit;
+but then I had gained less than nothing, and had been bitterly
+dispirited into the bargain.  Ronald had stuck to his guns and
+refused me to the last.  It was no news; but, on the other hand, it
+could not be contorted into good news.  I was now certain that
+during my temporary absence in France, all irons would be put into
+the fire, and the world turned upside down, to make Flora disown
+the obtrusive Frenchman and accept Chevenix.  Without doubt she
+would resist these instances:  but the thought of them did not
+please me, and I felt she should be warned and prepared for the
+battle.
+
+It was no use to try and see her now, but I promised myself early
+that evening to return to Swanston.  In the meantime I had to make
+all my preparations, and look the coming journey in the face.  Here
+in Edinburgh I was within four miles of the sea, yet the business
+of approaching random fishermen with my hat in the one hand and a
+knife in the other, appeared so desperate, that I saw nothing for
+it but to retrace my steps over the northern counties, and knock a
+second time at the doors of Birchell Fenn.  To do this, money would
+be necessary; and after leaving my paper in the hands of Flora I
+had still a balance of about fifteen hundred pounds.  Or rather I
+may say I had them and I had them not; for after my luncheon with
+Mr. Robbie I had placed the amount, all but thirty pounds of
+change, in a bank in George Street, on a deposit receipt in the
+name of Mr. Rowley.  This I had designed to be my gift to him, in
+case I must suddenly depart.  But now, thinking better of the
+arrangement, I despatched my little man, cockade and all, to lift
+the fifteen hundred.
+
+He was not long gone, and returned with a flushed face, and the
+deposit receipt still in his hand.
+
+'No go, Mr. Anne,' says he.
+
+'How's that?' I inquired,
+
+'Well, sir, I found the place all right, and no mistake,' said he.
+'But I tell you what gave me a blue fright!  There was a customer
+standing by the door, and I reckonised him!  Who do you think it
+was, Mr. Anne?  W'y, that same Red-Breast--him I had breakfast with
+near Aylesbury.'
+
+'You are sure you are not mistaken?' I asked.
+
+'Certain sure,' he replied.  'Not Mr. Lavender, I don't mean, sir;
+I mean the other party.  "Wot's he doing here?' says I.  It don't
+look right."'
+
+'Not by any means,' I agreed.
+
+I walked to and fro in the apartment reflecting.  This particular
+Bow Street runner might be here by accident; but it was to imagine
+a singular play of coincidence that he, who had met Rowley and
+spoken with him in the 'Green Dragon,' hard by Aylesbury, should be
+now in Scotland, where he could have no legitimate business, and by
+the doors of the bank where Rowley kept his account.
+
+'Rowley,' said I, 'he didn't see you, did he?'
+
+'Never a fear,' quoth Rowley.  'W'y Mr. Anne, sir, if he 'ad, you
+wouldn't have seen ME any more!  I ain't a hass, sir!'
+
+'Well, my boy, you can put that receipt in your pocket.  You'll
+have no more use for it till you're quite clear of me.  Don't lose
+it, though; it's your share of the Christmas-box:  fifteen hundred
+pounds all for yourself.'
+
+'Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne, sir, but wot for!' said Rowley.
+
+'To set up a public-house upon,' said I.
+
+'If you'll excuse me, sir, I ain't got any call to set up a public-
+house, sir,' he replied stoutly.  'And I tell you wot, sir, it
+seems to me I'm reether young for the billet.  I'm your body
+servant, Mr. Anne, or else I'm nothink.'
+
+'Well, Rowley,' I said, 'I'll tell you what it's for.  It's for the
+good service you have done me, of which I don't care--and don't
+dare--to speak.  It's for your loyalty and cheerfulness, my dear
+boy.  I had meant it for you; but to tell you the truth, it's past
+mending now--it has to be yours.  Since that man is waiting by the
+bank, the money can't be touched until I'm gone.'
+
+'Until you're gone, sir?' re-echoed Rowley.  'You don't go
+anywheres without me, I can tell you that, Mr. Anne, sir!'
+
+'Yes, my boy,' said I, 'we are going to part very soon now;
+probably to-morrow.  And it's for my sake, Rowley!  Depend upon it,
+if there was any reason at all for that Bow Street man being at the
+bank, he was not there to look out for you.  How they could have
+found out about the account so early is more than I can fathom;
+some strange coincidence must have played me false!  But there the
+fact is; and Rowley, I'll not only have to say farewell to you
+presently, I'll have to ask you to stay indoors until I can say it.
+Remember, my boy, it's only so that you can serve me now.'
+
+'W'y, sir, you say the word, and of course I'll do it!' he cried.
+'"Nothink by 'alves," is my motto!  I'm your man, through thick and
+thin, live or die, I am!'
+
+In the meantime there was nothing to be done till towards sunset.
+My only chance now was to come again as quickly as possible to
+speech of Flora, who was my only practicable banker; and not before
+evening was it worth while to think of that.  I might compose
+myself as well as I was able over the Caledonian Mercury, with its
+ill news of the campaign of France and belated documents about the
+retreat from Russia; and, as I sat there by the fire, I was
+sometimes all awake with anger and mortification at what I was
+reading, and sometimes again I would be three parts asleep as I
+dozed over the barren items of home intelligence.  'Lately
+arrived'--this is what I suddenly stumbled on--'at Dumbreck's
+Hotel, the Viscount of Saint-Yves.'
+
+'Rowley,' said I.
+
+'If you please, Mr. Anne, sir,' answered the obsequious, lowering
+his pipe.
+
+'Come and look at this, my boy,' said I, holding out the paper.
+
+'My crikey!' said he.  'That's 'im, sir, sure enough!'
+
+'Sure enough, Rowley,' said I.  'He's on the trail.  He has fairly
+caught up with us.  He and this Bow Street man have come together,
+I would swear.  And now here is the whole field, quarry, hounds and
+hunters, all together in this city of Edinburgh.'
+
+'And wot are you goin' to do now, sir?  Tell you wot, let me take
+it in 'and, please!  Gimme a minute, and I'll disguise myself, and
+go out to this Dum--to this hotel, leastways, sir--and see wot he's
+up to.  You put your trust in me, Mr. Anne:  I'm fly, don't you
+make no mistake about it.  I'm all a-growing and a-blowing, I am.'
+
+'Not one foot of you,' said I.  'You are a prisoner, Rowley, and
+make up your mind to that.  So am I, or next door to it.  I showed
+it you for a caution; if you go on the streets, it spells death to
+me, Rowley.'
+
+'If you please, sir,' says Rowley.
+
+'Come to think of it,' I continued, 'you must take a cold, or
+something.  No good of awakening Mrs. McRankine's suspicions.'
+
+'A cold?' he cried, recovering immediately from his depression.  'I
+can do it, Mr. Anne.'
+
+And he proceeded to sneeze and cough and blow his nose, till I
+could not restrain myself from smiling.
+
+'Oh, I tell you, I know a lot of them dodges,' he observed proudly.
+
+'Well, they come in very handy,' said I.
+
+'I'd better go at once and show it to the old gal, 'adn't I?' he
+asked.
+
+I told him, by all means; and he was gone upon the instant, gleeful
+as though to a game of football.
+
+I took up the paper and read carelessly on, my thoughts engaged
+with my immediate danger, till I struck on the next paragraph:-
+
+
+'In connection with the recent horrid murder in the Castle, we are
+desired to make public the following intelligence.  The soldier,
+Champdivers, is supposed to be in the neighbourhood of this city.
+He is about the middle height or rather under, of a pleasing
+appearance and highly genteel address.  When last heard of he wore
+a fashionable suit of pearl-grey, and boots with fawn-coloured
+tops.  He is accompanied by a servant about sixteen years of age,
+speaks English without any accent, and passed under the alias of
+Ramornie.  A reward is offered for his apprehension.'
+
+In a moment I was in the next room, stripping from me the pearl-
+coloured suit!
+
+I confess I was now a good deal agitated.  It is difficult to watch
+the toils closing slowly and surely about you, and to retain your
+composure; and I was glad that Rowley was not present to spy on my
+confusion.  I was flushed, my breath came thick; I cannot remember
+a time when I was more put out.
+
+And yet I must wait and do nothing, and partake of my meals, and
+entertain the ever-garrulous Rowley, as though I were entirely my
+own man.  And if I did not require to entertain Mrs. McRankine
+also, that was but another drop of bitterness in my cup!  For what
+ailed my landlady, that she should hold herself so severely aloof,
+that she should refuse conversation, that her eyes should be
+reddened, that I should so continually hear the voice of her
+private supplications sounding through the house?  I was much
+deceived, or she had read the insidious paragraph and recognised
+the comminated pearl-grey suit.  I remember now a certain air with
+which she had laid the paper on my table, and a certain sniff,
+between sympathy and defiance, with which she had announced it:
+'There's your Mercury for ye!'
+
+In this direction, at least, I saw no pressing danger; her tragic
+countenance betokened agitation; it was plain she was wrestling
+with her conscience, and the battle still hung dubious.  The
+question of what to do troubled me extremely.  I could not venture
+to touch such an intricate and mysterious piece of machinery as my
+landlady's spiritual nature:  it might go off at a word, and in any
+direction, like a badly-made firework.  And while I praised myself
+extremely for my wisdom in the past, that I had made so much a
+friend of her, I was all abroad as to my conduct in the present.
+There seemed an equal danger in pressing and in neglecting the
+accustomed marks of familiarity.  The one extreme looked like
+impudence, and might annoy, the other was a practical confession of
+guilt.  Altogether, it was a good hour for me when the dusk began
+to fall in earnest on the streets of Edinburgh, and the voice of an
+early watchman bade me set forth.
+
+I reached the neighbourhood of the cottage before seven; and as I
+breasted the steep ascent which leads to the garden wall, I was
+struck with surprise to hear a dog.  Dogs I had heard before, but
+only from the hamlet on the hillside above.  Now, this dog was in
+the garden itself, where it roared aloud in paroxysms of fury, and
+I could hear it leaping and straining on the chain.  I waited some
+while, until the brute's fit of passion had roared itself out.
+Then, with the utmost precaution, I drew near again; and finally
+approached the garden wall.  So soon as I had clapped my head above
+the level, however, the barking broke forth again with redoubled
+energy.  Almost at the same time, the door of the cottage opened,
+and Ronald and the Major appeared upon the threshold with a
+lantern.  As they so stood, they were almost immediately below me,
+strongly illuminated, and within easy earshot.  The Major pacified
+the dog, who took instead to low, uneasy growling intermingled with
+occasional yelps.
+
+'Good thing I brought Towzer!' said Chevenix.
+
+'Damn him, I wonder where he is!' said Ronald; and he moved the
+lantern up and down, and turned the night into a shifting puzzle-
+work of gleam and shadow.  'I think I'll make a sally.'
+
+'I don't think you will,' replied Chevenix.  'When I agreed to come
+out here and do sentry-go, it was on one condition, Master Ronald:
+don't you forget that!  Military discipline, my boy!  Our beat is
+this path close about the house.  Down, Towzer! good boy, good boy-
+-gently, then!' he went on, caressing his confounded monster.
+
+'To think!  The beggar may be hearing us this minute!' cried
+Ronald.
+
+'Nothing more probable,' said the Major.  'You there, St. Ives?' he
+added, in a distinct but guarded voice.  'I only want to tell you,
+you had better go home.  Mr. Gilchrist and I take watch and watch.'
+
+The game was up.  'Beaucoup de plaisir!' I replied, in the same
+tones.  'Il fait un peu froid pour veiller; gardez-vous des
+engelures!'
+
+I suppose it was done in a moment of ungovernable rage; but in
+spite of the excellent advice he had given to Ronald the moment
+before, Chevenix slipped the chain, and the dog sprang, straight as
+an arrow, up the bank.  I stepped back, picked up a stone of about
+twelve pounds weight, and stood ready.  With a bound the beast
+landed on the cope-stone of the wall; and, almost in the same
+instant, my missile caught him fair in the face.  He gave a stifled
+cry, went tumbling back where he had come from, and I could hear
+the twelve-pounder accompany him in his fall.  Chevenix, at the
+same moment, broke out in a roaring voice:  'The hell-hound!  If
+he's killed my dog!' and I judged, upon all grounds, it was as well
+to be off.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX--EVENTS OF WEDNESDAY; THE UNIVERSITY OF CRAMOND
+
+
+
+I awoke to much diffidence, even to a feeling that might be called
+the beginnings of panic, and lay for hours in my bed considering
+the situation.  Seek where I pleased, there was nothing to
+encourage me and plenty to appal.  They kept a close watch about
+the cottage; they had a beast of a watch-dog--at least, unless I
+had settled it; and if I had, I knew its bereaved master would only
+watch the more indefatigably for the loss.  In the pardonable
+ostentation of love I had given all the money I could spare to
+Flora; I had thought it glorious that the hunted exile should come
+down, like Jupiter, in a shower of gold, and pour thousands in the
+lap of the beloved.  Then I had in an hour of arrant folly buried
+what remained to me in a bank in George Street.  And now I must get
+back the one or the other; and which? and how?
+
+As I tossed in my bed, I could see three possible courses, all
+extremely perilous.  First, Rowley might have been mistaken; the
+bank might not be watched; it might still be possible for him to
+draw the money on the deposit receipt.  Second, I might apply again
+to Robbie.  Or, third, I might dare everything, go to the Assembly
+Ball, and speak with Flora under the eyes of all Edinburgh.  This
+last alternative, involving as it did the most horrid risks, and
+the delay of forty-eight hours, I did but glance at with an averted
+head, and turned again to the consideration of the others.  It was
+the likeliest thing in the world that Robbie had been warned to
+have no more to do with me. The whole policy of the Gilchrists was
+in the hands of Chevenix; and I thought this was a precaution so
+elementary that he was certain to have taken it.  If he had not, of
+course I was all right:  Robbie would manage to communicate with
+Flora; and by four o'clock I might be on the south road and, I was
+going to say, a free man.  Lastly, I must assure myself with my own
+eyes whether the bank in George Street were beleaguered.
+
+I called to Rowley and questioned him tightly as to the appearance
+of the Bow Street officer.
+
+'What sort of looking man is he, Rowley?' I asked, as I began to
+dress.
+
+'Wot sort of a looking man he is?' repeated Rowley.  'Well, I don't
+very well know wot you would say, Mr. Anne.  He ain't a beauty,
+any'ow.'
+
+'Is he tall?'
+
+'Tall?  Well, no, I shouldn't say TALL Mr. Anne.'
+
+'Well, then, is he short?'
+
+'Short?  No, I don't think I would say he was what you would call
+SHORT.  No, not piticular short, sir.'
+
+'Then, I suppose, he must be about the middle height?'
+
+'Well, you might say it, sir; but not remarkable so.'
+
+I smothered an oath.
+
+'Is he clean-shaved?' I tried him again.
+
+'Clean-shaved?' he repeated, with the same air of anxious candour.
+
+'Good heaven, man, don't repeat my words like a parrot!' I cried.
+'Tell me what the man was like:  it is of the first importance that
+I should be able to recognise him.'
+
+'I'm trying to, Mr. Anne.  But CLEAN-SHAVED?  I don't seem to
+rightly get hold of that p'int.  Sometimes it might appear to me
+like as if he was; and sometimes like as if he wasn't.  No, it
+wouldn't surprise me now if you was to tell me he 'ad a bit o'
+whisker.'
+
+'Was the man red-faced?' I roared, dwelling on each syllable.
+
+'I don't think you need go for to get cross about it, Mr. Anne!'
+said he.  'I'm tellin' you every blessed thing I see!  Red-faced?
+Well, no, not as you would remark upon.'
+
+A dreadful calm fell upon me.
+
+'Was he anywise pale?' I asked.
+
+'Well, it don't seem to me as though he were.  But I tell you
+truly, I didn't take much heed to that.'
+
+'Did he look like a drinking man?'
+
+'Well, no.  If you please, sir, he looked more like an eating one.'
+
+'Oh, he was stout, was he?'
+
+'No, sir.  I couldn't go so far as that.  No, he wasn't not to say
+STOUT.  If anything, lean rather.'
+
+I need not go on with the infuriating interview.  It ended as it
+began, except that Rowley was in tears, and that I had acquired one
+fact.  The man was drawn for me as being of any height you like to
+mention, and of any degree of corpulence or leanness; clean-shaved
+or not, as the case might be; the colour of his hair Rowley 'could
+not take it upon himself to put a name on'; that of his eyes he
+thought to have been blue--nay, it was the one point on which he
+attained to a kind of tearful certainty.  'I'll take my davy on
+it,' he asseverated.  They proved to have been as black as sloes,
+very little and very near together.  So much for the evidence of
+the artless!  And the fact, or rather the facts, acquired?  Well,
+they had to do not with the person but with his clothing.  The man
+wore knee-breeches and white stockings; his coat was 'some kind of
+a lightish colour--or betwixt that and dark'; and he wore a 'mole-
+skin weskit.'  As if this were not enough, he presently haled me
+from my breakfast in a prodigious flutter, and showed me an honest
+and rather venerable citizen passing in the Square.
+
+'That's HIM, sir,' he cried, 'the very moral of him!  Well, this
+one is better dressed, and p'r'aps a trifler taller; and in the
+face he don't favour him noways at all, sir.  No, not when I come
+to look again, 'e don't seem to favour him noways.'
+
+'Jackass!' said I, and I think the greatest stickler for manners
+will admit the epithet to have been justified.
+
+Meanwhile the appearance of my landlady added a great load of
+anxiety to what I already suffered.  It was plain that she had not
+slept; equally plain that she had wept copiously.  She sighed, she
+groaned, she drew in her breath, she shook her head, as she waited
+on table.  In short, she seemed in so precarious a state, like a
+petard three times charged with hysteria, that I did not dare to
+address her; and stole out of the house on tiptoe, and actually ran
+downstairs, in the fear that she might call me back.  It was plain
+that this degree of tension could not last long.
+
+It was my first care to go to George Street, which I reached (by
+good luck) as a boy was taking down the bank shutters.  A man was
+conversing with him; he had white stockings and a moleskin
+waistcoat, and was as ill-looking a rogue as you would want to see
+in a day's journey.  This seemed to agree fairly well with Rowley's
+signalement:  he had declared emphatically (if you remember), and
+had stuck to it besides, that the companion of the great Lavender
+was no beauty.
+
+Thence I made my way to Mr. Robbie's, where I rang the bell.  A
+servant answered the summons, and told me the lawyer was engaged,
+as I had half expected.
+
+'Wha shall I say was callin'?' she pursued; and when I had told her
+'Mr. Ducie,' 'I think this'll be for you, then?' she added, and
+handed me a letter from the hall table.  It ran:
+
+
+'DEAR MR. DUCIE,
+
+'My single advice to you is to leave quam primum for the South.
+
+Yours, T. ROBBIE.'
+
+
+That was short and sweet.  It emphatically extinguished hope in one
+direction.  No more was to be gotten of Robbie; and I wondered,
+from my heart, how much had been told him.  Not too much, I hoped,
+for I liked the lawyer who had thus deserted me, and I placed a
+certain reliance in the discretion of Chevenix.  He would not be
+merciful; on the other hand, I did not think he would be cruel
+without cause.
+
+It was my next affair to go back along George Street, and assure
+myself whether the man in the moleskin vest was still on guard.
+There was no sign of him on the pavement.  Spying the door of a
+common stair nearly opposite the bank, I took it in my head that
+this would be a good point of observation, crossed the street,
+entered with a businesslike air and fell immediately against the
+man in the moleskin vest.  I stopped and apologised to him; he
+replied in an unmistakable English accent, thus putting the matter
+almost beyond doubt.  After this encounter I must, of course,
+ascend to the top story, ring the bell of a suite of apartments,
+inquire for Mr. Vavasour, learn (with no great surprise) that he
+did not live there, come down again and, again politely saluting
+the man from Bow Street, make my escape at last into the street.
+
+I was now driven back upon the Assembly Ball.  Robbie had failed
+me.  The bank was watched; it would never do to risk Rowley in that
+neighbourhood.  All I could do was to wait until the morrow
+evening, and present myself at the Assembly, let it end as it
+might.  But I must say I came to this decision with a good deal of
+genuine fright; and here I came for the first time to one of those
+places where my courage stuck.  I do not mean that my courage
+boggled and made a bit of a bother over it, as it did over the
+escape from the Castle; I mean, stuck, like a stopped watch or a
+dead man.  Certainly I would go to the ball; certainly I must see
+this morning about my clothes.  That was all decided.  But the most
+of the shops were on the other side of the valley, in the Old Town;
+and it was now my strange discovery that I was physically unable to
+cross the North Bridge!  It was as though a precipice had stood
+between us, or the deep sea had intervened.  Nearer to the Castle
+my legs refused to bear me.
+
+I told myself this was mere superstition; I made wagers with
+myself--and gained them; I went down on the esplanade of Princes
+Street, walked and stood there, alone and conspicuous, looking
+across the garden at the old grey bastions of the fortress, where
+all these troubles had begun.  I cocked my hat, set my hand on my
+hip, and swaggered on the pavement, confronting detection.  And I
+found I could do all this with a sense of exhilaration that was not
+unpleasing, and with a certain cranerie of manner that raised me in
+my own esteem.  And yet there was one thing I could not bring my
+mind to face up to, or my limbs to execute; and that was to cross
+the valley into the Old Town.  It seemed to me I must be arrested
+immediately if I had done so; I must go straight into the twilight
+of a prison cell, and pass straight thence to the gross and final
+embraces of the nightcap and the halter.  And yet it was from no
+reasoned fear of the consequences that I could not go.  I was
+unable.  My horse baulked, and there was an end!
+
+My nerve was gone:  here was a discovery for a man in such imminent
+peril, set down to so desperate a game, which I could only hope to
+win by continual luck and unflagging effrontery!  The strain had
+been too long continued, and my nerve was gone.  I fell into what
+they call panic fear, as I have seen soldiers do on the alarm of a
+night attack, and turned out of Princes Street at random as though
+the devil were at my heels.  In St. Andrew Square, I remember
+vaguely hearing some one call out.  I paid no heed, but pressed on
+blindly.  A moment after, a hand fell heavily on my shoulder, and I
+thought I had fainted.  Certainly the world went black about me for
+some seconds; and when that spasm passed I found myself standing
+face to face with the 'cheerful extravagant,' in what sort of
+disarray I really dare not imagine, dead white at least, shaking
+like an aspen, and mowing at the man with speechless lips.  And
+this was the soldier of Napoleon, and the gentleman who intended
+going next night to an Assembly Ball!  I am the more particular in
+telling of my breakdown, because it was my only experience of the
+sort; and it is a good tale for officers.  I will allow no man to
+call me coward; I have made my proofs; few men more.  And yet I
+(come of the best blood in France and inured to danger from a
+child) did, for some ten or twenty minutes, make this hideous
+exhibition of myself on the streets of the New Town of Edinburgh.
+
+With my first available breath I begged his pardon.  I was of an
+extremely nervous disposition, recently increased by late hours; I
+could not bear the slightest start.
+
+He seemed much concerned.  'You must be in a devil of a state!'
+said he; 'though of course it was my fault--damnably silly, vulgar
+sort of thing to do!  A thousand apologies!  But you really must be
+run down; you should consult a medico.  My dear sir, a hair of the
+dog that bit you is clearly indicated.  A touch of Blue Ruin, now?
+Or, come:  it's early, but is man the slave of hours? what do you
+say to a chop and a bottle in Dumbreck's Hotel?'
+
+I refused all false comfort; but when he went on to remind me that
+this was the day when the University of Cramond met; and to propose
+a five-mile walk into the country and a dinner in the company of
+young asses like himself, I began to think otherwise.  I had to
+wait until to-morrow evening, at any rate; this might serve as well
+as anything else to bridge the dreary hours.  The country was the
+very place for me:  and walking is an excellent sedative for the
+nerves.  Remembering poor Rowley, feigning a cold in our lodgings
+and immediately under the guns of the formidable and now doubtful
+Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my servant.  'Poor devil! it is
+dull for him,' I explained.
+
+'The merciful man is merciful to his ass,' observed my sententious
+friend.  'Bring him by all means!
+
+
+"The harp, his sole remaining joy,
+Was carried by an orphan boy;"
+
+
+and I have no doubt the orphan boy can get some cold victuals in
+the kitchen, while the Senatus dines.'
+
+Accordingly, being now quite recovered from my unmanly condition,
+except that nothing could yet induce me to cross the North Bridge,
+I arranged for my ball dress at a shop in Leith Street, where I was
+not served ill, cut out Rowley from his seclusion, and was ready
+along with him at the trysting-place, the corner of Duke Street and
+York Place, by a little after two.  The University was represented
+in force:  eleven persons, including ourselves, Byfield the
+aeronaut, and the tall lad, Forbes, whom I had met on the Sunday
+morning, bedewed with tallow, at the 'Hunters' Rest.'  I was
+introduced; and we set off by way of Newhaven and the sea beach; at
+first through pleasant country roads, and afterwards along a
+succession of bays of a fairylike prettiness, to our destination--
+Cramond on the Almond--a little hamlet on a little river, embowered
+in woods, and looking forth over a great flat of quicksand to where
+a little islet stood planted in the sea.  It was miniature scenery,
+but charming of its kind.  The air of this good February afternoon
+was bracing, but not cold.  All the way my companions were
+skylarking, jesting and making puns, and I felt as if a load had
+been taken off my lungs and spirits, and skylarked with the best of
+them.
+
+Byfield I observed, because I had heard of him before, and seen his
+advertisements, not at all because I was disposed to feel interest
+in the man.  He was dark and bilious and very silent; frigid in his
+manners, but burning internally with a great fire of excitement;
+and he was so good as to bestow a good deal of his company and
+conversation (such as it was) upon myself, who was not in the least
+grateful.  If I had known how I was to be connected with him in the
+immediate future, I might have taken more pains.
+
+In the hamlet of Cramond there is a hostelry of no very promising
+appearance, and here a room had been prepared for us, and we sat
+down to table.
+
+'Here you will find no guttling or gormandising, no turtle or
+nightingales' tongues,' said the extravagant, whose name, by the
+way, was Dalmahoy.  'The device, sir, of the University of Cramond
+is Plain Living and High Drinking.'
+
+Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic Latin,
+which I could by no means follow, only I could hear it rhymed, and
+I guessed it to be more witty than reverent.  After which the
+Senatus Academicus sat down to rough plenty in the shape of
+rizzar'd haddocks and mustard, a sheep's head, a haggis, and other
+delicacies of Scotland.  The dinner was washed down with brown
+stout in bottle, and as soon as the cloth was removed, glasses,
+boiling water, sugar, and whisky were set out for the manufacture
+of toddy.  I played a good knife and fork, did not shun the bowl,
+and took part, so far as I was able, in the continual fire of
+pleasantry with which the meal was seasoned.  Greatly daring, I
+ventured, before all these Scotsmen, to tell Sim's Tale of
+Tweedie's dog; and I was held to have done such extraordinary
+justice to the dialect, 'for a Southron,' that I was immediately
+voted into the Chair of Scots, and became, from that moment, a full
+member of the University of Cramond.  A little after, I found
+myself entertaining them with a song; and a little after--perhaps a
+little in consequence--it occurred to me that I had had enough, and
+would be very well inspired to take French leave.  It was not
+difficult to manage, for it was nobody's business to observe my
+movements, and conviviality had banished suspicion.
+
+I got easily forth of the chamber, which reverberated with the
+voices of these merry and learned gentlemen, and breathed a long
+breath.  I had passed an agreeable afternoon and evening, and I had
+apparently escaped scot free.  Alas! when I looked into the
+kitchen, there was my monkey, drunk as a lord, toppling on the edge
+of the dresser, and performing on the flageolet to an audience of
+the house lasses and some neighbouring ploughmen.
+
+I routed him promptly from his perch, stuck his hat on, put his
+instrument in his pocket, and set off with him for Edinburgh.
+
+His limbs were of paper, his mind quite in abeyance; I must uphold
+and guide him, prevent his frantic dives, and set him continually
+on his legs again.  At first he sang wildly, with occasional
+outbursts of causeless laughter.  Gradually an inarticulate
+melancholy succeeded; he wept gently at times; would stop in the
+middle of the road, say firmly 'No, no, no,' and then fall on his
+back:  or else address me solemnly as 'M'lord' and fall on his face
+by way of variety.  I am afraid I was not always so gentle with the
+little pig as I might have been, but really the position was
+unbearable.  We made no headway at all, and I suppose we were
+scarce gotten a mile away from Cramond, when the whole Senatus
+Academicus was heard hailing, and doubling the pace to overtake
+its.
+
+Some of them were fairly presentable; and they were all Christian
+martyrs compared to Rowley; but they were in a frolicsome and
+rollicking humour that promised danger as we approached the town.
+They sang songs, they ran races, they fenced with their walking-
+sticks and umbrellas; and, in spite of this violent exercise, the
+fun grew only the more extravagant with the miles they traversed.
+Their drunkenness was deep-seated and permanent, like fire in a
+peat; or rather--to be quite just to them--it was not so much to be
+called drunkenness at all, as the effect of youth and high spirits-
+-a fine night, and the night young, a good road under foot, and the
+world before you!
+
+I had left them once somewhat unceremoniously; I could not attempt
+it a second time; and, burthened as I was with Mr. Rowley, I was
+really glad of assistance.  But I saw the lamps of Edinburgh draw
+near on their hill-top with a good deal of uneasiness, which
+increased, after we had entered the lighted streets, to positive
+alarm.  All the passers-by were addressed, some of them by name.  A
+worthy man was stopped by Forbes.  'Sir,' said he, 'in the name of
+the Senatus of the University of Cramond, I confer upon you the
+degree of LL.D.,' and with the words he bonneted him.  Conceive the
+predicament of St. Ives, committed to the society of these
+outrageous youths, in a town where the police and his cousin were
+both looking for him!  So far, we had pursued our way unmolested,
+although raising a clamour fit to wake the dead; but at last, in
+Abercromby Place, I believe--at least it was a crescent of highly
+respectable houses fronting on a garden--Byfield and I, having
+fallen somewhat in the rear with Rowley, came to a simultaneous
+halt.  Our ruffians were beginning to wrench off bells and door-
+plates!
+
+'Oh, I say!' says Byfield, 'this is too much of a good thing!
+Confound it, I'm a respectable man--a public character, by George!
+I can't afford to get taken up by the police.'
+
+'My own case exactly,' said I.
+
+'Here, let's bilk them,' said he.
+
+And we turned back and took our way down hill again.
+
+It was none too soon:  voices and alarm bells sounded; watchmen
+here and there began to spring their rattles; it was plain the
+University of Cramond would soon be at blows with the police of
+Edinburgh!  Byfield and I, running the semi-inanimate Rowley before
+us, made good despatch, and did not stop till we were several
+streets away, and the hubbub was already softened by distance.
+
+'Well, sir,' said he, 'we are well out of that!  Did ever any one
+see such a pack of young barbarians?'
+
+'We are properly punished, Mr. Byfield; we had no business there,'
+I replied.
+
+'No, indeed, sir, you may well say that!  Outrageous!  And my
+ascension announced for Friday, you know!' cried the aeronaut.  'A
+pretty scandal!  Byfield the aeronaut at the police-court!  Tut-
+tut!  Will you be able to get your rascal home, sir?  Allow me to
+offer you my card.  I am staying at Walker and Poole's Hotel, sir,
+where I should be pleased to see you.'
+
+'The pleasure would be mutual, sir,' said I, but I must say my
+heart was not in my words, and as I watched Mr. Byfield departing I
+desired nothing less than to pursue the acquaintance
+
+One more ordeal remained for me to pass.  I carried my senseless
+load upstairs to our lodging, and was admitted by the landlady in a
+tall white nightcap and with an expression singularly grim.  She
+lighted us into the sitting-room; where, when I had seated Rowley
+in a chair, she dropped me a cast-iron courtesy.  I smelt gunpowder
+on the woman.  Her voice, tottered with emotion.
+
+'I give ye nottice, Mr. Ducie,' said she.  'Dacent folks' houses .
+. .'
+
+And at that apparently temper cut off her utterance, and she took
+herself off without more words.
+
+I looked about me at the room, the goggling Rowley, the
+extinguished fire; my mind reviewed the laughable incidents of the
+day and night; and I laughed out loud to myself--lonely and
+cheerless laughter!.......
+
+
+[As this point the Author's manuscript breaks off]
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, ST IVES ***
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+<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN">
+<html>
+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII">
+<title>St Ives</title>
+</head>
+<body>
+<h2>
+<a href="#startoftext">St Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson</a>
+</h2>
+<pre>
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of St Ives, by Robert Louis Stevenson
+(#6 in our series by Robert Louis Stevenson)
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+Title: St Ives
+
+Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
+
+Release Date: September, 1995  [EBook #322]
+[This file was first posted on December 30, 1995]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+</pre>
+<p>
+<a name="startoftext"></a>
+Transcribed 1898 William Heinemann edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+ST. IVES<br>
+BEING<br>
+THE ADVENTURES OF A FRENCH PRISONER IN ENGLAND<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER I - A TALE OF A LION RAMPANT<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was in the month of May 1813 that I was so unlucky as to fall at
+last into the hands of the enemy.&nbsp; My knowledge of the English
+language had marked me out for a certain employment.&nbsp; Though I
+cannot conceive a soldier refusing to incur the risk, yet to be hanged
+for a spy is a disgusting business; and I was relieved to be held a
+prisoner of war.&nbsp; Into the Castle of Edinburgh, standing in the
+midst of that city on the summit of an extraordinary rock, I was cast
+with several hundred fellow-sufferers, all privates like myself, and
+the more part of them, by an accident, very ignorant, plain fellows.&nbsp;
+My English, which had brought me into that scrape, now helped me very
+materially to bear it.&nbsp; I had a thousand advantages.&nbsp; I was
+often called to play the part of an interpreter, whether of orders or
+complaints, and thus brought in relations, sometimes of mirth, sometimes
+almost of friendship, with the officers in charge.&nbsp; A young lieutenant
+singled me out to be his adversary at chess, a game in which I was extremely
+proficient, and would reward me for my gambits with excellent cigars.&nbsp;
+The major of the battalion took lessons of French from me while at breakfast,
+and was sometimes so obliging as to have me join him at the meal.&nbsp;
+Chevenix was his name.&nbsp; He was stiff as a drum-major and selfish
+as an Englishman, but a fairly conscientious pupil and a fairly upright
+man.&nbsp; Little did I suppose that his ramrod body and frozen face
+would, in the end, step in between me and all my dearest wishes; that
+upon this precise, regular, icy soldier-man my fortunes should so nearly
+shipwreck!&nbsp; I never liked, but yet I trusted him; and though it
+may seem but a trifle, I found his snuff-box with the bean in it come
+very welcome.<br>
+<br>
+For it is strange how grown men and seasoned soldiers can go back in
+life; so that after but a little while in prison, which is after all
+the next thing to being in the nursery, they grow absorbed in the most
+pitiful, childish interests, and a sugar biscuit or a pinch of snuff
+become things to follow after and scheme for!<br>
+<br>
+We made but a poor show of prisoners.&nbsp; The officers had been all
+offered their parole, and had taken it.&nbsp; They lived mostly in suburbs
+of the city, lodging with modest families, and enjoyed their freedom
+and supported the almost continual evil tidings of the Emperor as best
+they might.&nbsp; It chanced I was the only gentleman among the privates
+who remained.&nbsp; A great part were ignorant Italians, of a regiment
+that had suffered heavily in Catalonia.&nbsp; The rest were mere diggers
+of the soil, treaders of grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly
+and violently preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.&nbsp; We
+had but the one interest in common: each of us who had any skill with
+his fingers passed the hours of his captivity in the making of little
+toys and <i>articles of Paris</i>; and the prison was daily visited
+at certain hours by a concourse of people of the country, come to exult
+over our distress, or - it is more tolerant to suppose - their own vicarious
+triumph.&nbsp; Some moved among us with a decency of shame or sympathy.&nbsp;
+Others were the most offensive personages in the world, gaped at us
+as if we had been baboons, sought to evangelise us to their rustic,
+northern religion, as though we had been savages, or tortured us with
+intelligence of disasters to the arms of France.&nbsp; Good, bad, and
+indifferent, there was one alleviation to the annoyance of these visitors;
+for it was the practice of almost all to purchase some specimen of our
+rude handiwork.&nbsp; This led, amongst the prisoners, to a strong spirit
+of competition.&nbsp; Some were neat of hand, and (the genius of the
+French being always distinguished) could place upon sale little miracles
+of dexterity and taste.&nbsp; Some had a more engaging appearance; fine
+features were found to do as well as fine merchandise, and an air of
+youth in particular (as it appealed to the sentiment of pity in our
+visitors) to be a source of profit.&nbsp; Others again enjoyed some
+acquaintance with the language, and were able to recommend the more
+agreeably to purchasers such trifles as they had to sell.&nbsp; To the
+first of these advantages I could lay no claim, for my fingers were
+all thumbs.&nbsp; Some at least of the others I possessed; and finding
+much entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer my advantages to
+rust.&nbsp; I have never despised the social arts, in which it is a
+national boast that every Frenchman should excel.&nbsp; For the approach
+of particular sorts of visitors, I had a particular manner of address,
+and even of appearance, which I could readily assume and change on the
+occasion rising.&nbsp; I never lost an opportunity to flatter either
+the person of my visitor, if it should be a lady, or, if it should be
+a man, the greatness of his country in war.&nbsp; And in case my compliments
+should miss their aim, I was always ready to cover my retreat with some
+agreeable pleasantry, which would often earn me the name of an &lsquo;oddity&rsquo;
+or a &lsquo;droll fellow.&rsquo;&nbsp; In this way, although I was so
+left-handed a toy-maker, I made out to be rather a successful merchant;
+and found means to procure many little delicacies and alleviations,
+such as children or prisoners desire.<br>
+<br>
+I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy man.&nbsp; It
+is not indeed my character; and I had, in a comparison with my comrades,
+many reasons for content.&nbsp; In the first place, I had no family:
+I was an orphan and a bachelor; neither wife nor child awaited me in
+France.&nbsp; In the second, I had never wholly forgot the emotions
+with which I first found myself a prisoner; and although a military
+prison be not altogether a garden of delights, it is still preferable
+to a gallows.&nbsp; In the third, I am almost ashamed to say it, but
+I found a certain pleasure in our place of residence: being an obsolete
+and really mediaeval fortress, high placed and commanding extraordinary
+prospects, not only over sea, mountain, and champaign but actually over
+the thoroughfares of a capital city, which we could see blackened by
+day with the moving crowd of the inhabitants, and at night shining with
+lamps.&nbsp; And lastly, although I was not insensible to the restraints
+of prison or the scantiness of our rations, I remembered I had sometimes
+eaten quite as ill in Spain, and had to mount guard and march perhaps
+a dozen leagues into the bargain.&nbsp; The first of my troubles, indeed,
+was the costume we were obliged to wear.&nbsp; There is a horrible practice
+in England to trick out in ridiculous uniforms, and as it were to brand
+in mass, not only convicts but military prisoners, and even the children
+in charity schools.&nbsp; I think some malignant genius had found his
+masterpiece of irony in the dress which we were condemned to wear: jacket,
+waistcoat, and trousers of a sulphur or mustard yellow, and a shirt
+or blue-and-white striped cotton.&nbsp; It was conspicuous, it was cheap,
+it pointed us out to laughter - we, who were old soldiers, used to arms,
+and some of us showing noble scars, - like a set of lugubrious zanies
+at a fair.&nbsp; The old name of that rock on which our prison stood
+was (I have heard since then) the <i>Painted Hill</i>.&nbsp; Well, now
+it was all painted a bright yellow with our costumes; and the dress
+of the soldiers who guarded us being of course the essential British
+red rag, we made up together the elements of a lively picture of hell.&nbsp;
+I have again and again looked round upon my fellow-prisoners, and felt
+my anger rise, and choked upon tears, to behold them thus parodied.&nbsp;
+The more part, as I have said, were peasants, somewhat bettered perhaps
+by the drill-sergeant, but for all that ungainly, loutish fellows, with
+no more than a mere barrack-room smartness of address: indeed, you could
+have seen our army nowhere more discreditably represented than in this
+Castle of Edinburgh.&nbsp; And I used to see myself in fancy, and blush.&nbsp;
+It seemed that my more elegant carriage would but point the insult of
+the travesty.&nbsp; And I remembered the days when I wore the coarse
+but honourable coat of a soldier; and remembered further back how many
+of the noble, the fair, and the gracious had taken a delight to tend
+my childhood. . . .&nbsp; But I must not recall these tender and sorrowful
+memories twice; their place is further on, and I am now upon another
+business.&nbsp; The perfidy of the Britannic Government stood nowhere
+more openly confessed than in one particular of our discipline: that
+we were shaved twice in the week.&nbsp; To a man who has loved all his
+life to be fresh shaven, can a more irritating indignity be devised?&nbsp;
+Monday and Thursday were the days.&nbsp; Take the Thursday, and conceive
+the picture I must present by Sunday evening!&nbsp; And Saturday, which
+was almost as bad, was the great day for visitors.<br>
+<br>
+Those who came to our market were of all qualities, men and women, the
+lean and the stout, the plain and the fairly pretty.&nbsp; Sure, if
+people at all understood the power of beauty, there would be no prayers
+addressed except to Venus; and the mere privilege of beholding a comely
+woman is worth paying for.&nbsp; Our visitors, upon the whole, were
+not much to boast of; and yet, sitting in a corner and very much ashamed
+of myself and my absurd appearance, I have again and again tasted the
+finest, the rarest, and the most ethereal pleasures in a glance of an
+eye that I should never see again - and never wanted to.&nbsp; The flower
+of the hedgerow and the star in heaven satisfy and delight us: how much
+more the look of that exquisite being who was created to bear and rear,
+to madden and rejoice, mankind!<br>
+<br>
+There was one young lady in particular, about eighteen or nineteen,
+tall, of a gallant carriage, and with a profusion of hair in which the
+sun found threads of gold.&nbsp; As soon as she came in the courtyard
+(and she was a rather frequent visitor) it seemed I was aware of it.&nbsp;
+She had an air of angelic candour, yet of a high spirit; she stepped
+like a Diana, every movement was noble and free.&nbsp; One day there
+was a strong east wind; the banner was straining at the flagstaff; below
+us the smoke of the city chimneys blew hither and thither in a thousand
+crazy variations; and away out on the Forth we could see the ships lying
+down to it and scudding.&nbsp; I was thinking what a vile day it was,
+when she appeared.&nbsp; Her hair blew in the wind with changes of colour;
+her garments moulded her with the accuracy of sculpture; the ends of
+her shawl fluttered about her ear and were caught in again with an inimitable
+deftness.&nbsp; You have seen a pool on a gusty day, how it suddenly
+sparkles and flashes like a thing alive?&nbsp; So this lady&rsquo;s
+face had become animated and coloured; and as I saw her standing, somewhat
+inclined, her lips parted, a divine trouble in her eyes, I could have
+clapped my hands in applause, and was ready to acclaim her a genuine
+daughter of the winds.&nbsp; What put it in my head, I know not: perhaps
+because it was a Thursday and I was new from the razor; but I determined
+to engage her attention no later than that day.&nbsp; She was approaching
+that part of the court in which I sat with my merchandise, when I observed
+her handkerchief to escape from her hands and fall to the ground; the
+next moment the wind had taken it up and carried it within my reach.&nbsp;
+I was on foot at once: I had forgot my mustard-coloured clothes, I had
+forgot the private soldier and his salute.&nbsp; Bowing deeply, I offered
+her the slip of cambric.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;your handkerchief.&nbsp; The wind
+brought it me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I met her eyes fully.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I thank you, sir,&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The wind brought it me,&rsquo; I repeated.&nbsp; &lsquo;May I
+not take it for an omen?&nbsp; You have an English proverb, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s
+an ill wind that blows nobody good.&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; she said, with a smile, &lsquo;&ldquo;One good turn
+deserves another.&rdquo;&nbsp; I will see what you have.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She followed me to where my wares were spread out under lee of a piece
+of cannon.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Alas, mademoiselle!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am no very perfect
+craftsman.&nbsp; This is supposed to be a house, and you see the chimneys
+are awry.&nbsp; You may call this a box if you are very indulgent; but
+see where my tool slipped!&nbsp; Yes, I am afraid you may go from one
+to another, and find a flaw in everything.&nbsp; <i>Failures for Sale</i>
+should be on my signboard.&nbsp; I do not keep a shop; I keep a Humorous
+Museum.&rsquo;&nbsp; I cast a smiling glance about my display, and then
+at her, and instantly became grave.&nbsp; &lsquo;Strange, is it not,&rsquo;
+I added, &lsquo;that a grown man and a soldier should be engaged upon
+such trash, and a sad heart produce anything so funny to look at?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+An unpleasant voice summoned her at this moment by the name of Flora,
+and she made a hasty purchase and rejoined her party.<br>
+<br>
+A few days after she came again.&nbsp; But I must first tell you how
+she came to be so frequent.&nbsp; Her aunt was one of those terrible
+British old maids, of which the world has heard much; and having nothing
+whatever to do, and a word or two of French, she had taken what she
+called an <i>interest in the French prisoners</i>.&nbsp; A big, bustling,
+bold old lady, she flounced about our market-place with insufferable
+airs of patronage and condescension.&nbsp; She bought, indeed, with
+liberality, but her manner of studying us through a quizzing-glass,
+and playing cicerone to her followers, acquitted us of any gratitude.&nbsp;
+She had a tail behind her of heavy, obsequious old gentlemen, or dull,
+giggling misses, to whom she appeared to be an oracle.&nbsp; &lsquo;This
+one can really carve prettily: is he not a quiz with his big whiskers?&rsquo;
+she would say.&nbsp; &lsquo;And this one,&rsquo; indicating myself with
+her gold eye-glass, &lsquo;is, I assure you, quite an oddity.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+The oddity, you may be certain, ground his teeth.&nbsp; She had a way
+of standing in our midst, nodding around, and addressing us in what
+she imagined to be French: &lsquo;<i>Bienne, hommes! &ccedil;a va bienne</i>?&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I took the freedom to reply in the same lingo: <i>Bienne, femme</i>!
+<i>&ccedil;a va couci-couci tout d&rsquo;m&ecirc;me, la bourgeoise</i>!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And at that, when we had all laughed with a little more heartiness than
+was entirely civil, &lsquo;I told you he was quite an oddity!&rsquo;
+says she in triumph.&nbsp; Needless to say, these passages were before
+I had remarked the niece.<br>
+<br>
+The aunt came on the day in question with a following rather more than
+usually large, which she manoeuvred to and fro about the market and
+lectured to at rather more than usual length, and with rather less than
+her accustomed tact.&nbsp; I kept my eyes down, but they were ever fixed
+in the same direction, quite in vain.&nbsp; The aunt came and went,
+and pulled us out, and showed us off, like caged monkeys; but the niece
+kept herself on the outskirts of the crowd and on the opposite side
+of the courtyard, and departed at last as she had come, without a sign.&nbsp;
+Closely as I had watched her, I could not say her eyes had ever rested
+on me for an instant; and my heart was overwhelmed with bitterness and
+blackness.&nbsp; I tore out her detested image; I felt I was done with
+her for ever; I laughed at myself savagely, because I had thought to
+please; when I lay down at night sleep forsook me, and I lay, and rolled,
+and gloated on her charms, and cursed her insensibility, for half the
+night.&nbsp; How trivial I thought her! and how trivial her sex!&nbsp;
+A man might be an angel or an Apollo, and a mustard-coloured coat would
+wholly blind them to his merits.&nbsp; I was a prisoner, a slave, a
+contemned and despicable being, the butt of her sniggering countrymen.&nbsp;
+I would take the lesson: no proud daughter of my foes should have the
+chance to mock at me again; none in the future should have the chance
+to think I had looked at her with admiration.&nbsp; You cannot imagine
+any one of a more resolute and independent spirit, or whose bosom was
+more wholly mailed with patriotic arrogance, than I.&nbsp; Before I
+dropped asleep, I had remembered all the infamies of Britain, and debited
+them in an overwhelming column to Flora.<br>
+<br>
+The next day, as I sat in my place, I became conscious there was some
+one standing near; and behold, it was herself!&nbsp; I kept my seat,
+at first in the confusion of my mind, later on from policy; and she
+stood, and leaned a little over me, as in pity.&nbsp; She was very still
+and timid; her voice was low.&nbsp; Did I suffer in my captivity? she
+asked me.&nbsp; Had I to complain of any hardship?<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mademoiselle, I have not learned to complain,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am a soldier of Napoleon.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She sighed.&nbsp; &lsquo;At least you must regret <i>La France</i>,&rsquo;
+said she, and coloured a little as she pronounced the words, which she
+did with a pretty strangeness of accent.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What am I to say?&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;If you were
+carried from this country, for which you seem so wholly suited, where
+the very rains and winds seem to become you like ornaments, would you
+regret, do you think?&nbsp; We must surely all regret! the son to his
+mother, the man to his country; these are native feelings.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have a mother?&rsquo; she asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In heaven, mademoiselle,&rsquo; I answered.&nbsp; &lsquo;She,
+and my father also, went by the same road to heaven as so many others
+of the fair and brave: they followed their queen upon the scaffold.&nbsp;
+So, you see, I am not so much to be pitied in my prison,&rsquo; I continued:
+&lsquo;there are none to wait for me; I am alone in the world.&nbsp;
+&rsquo;Tis a different case, for instance, with yon poor fellow in the
+cloth cap.&nbsp; His bed is next to mine, and in the night I hear him
+sobbing to himself.&nbsp; He has a tender character, full of tender
+and pretty sentiments; and in the dark at night, and sometimes by day
+when he can get me apart with him, he laments a mother and a sweetheart.&nbsp;
+Do you know what made him take me for a confidant?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She parted her lips with a look, but did not speak.&nbsp; The look burned
+all through me with a sudden vital heat.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Because I had once seen, in marching by, the belfry of his village!&rsquo;
+I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;The circumstance is quaint enough.&nbsp; It
+seems to bind up into one the whole bundle of those human instincts
+that make life beautiful, and people and places dear - and from which
+it would seem I am cut off!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I rested my chin on my knee and looked before me on the ground.&nbsp;
+I had been talking until then to hold her; but I was now not sorry she
+should go: an impression is a thing so delicate to produce and so easy
+to overthrow!&nbsp; Presently she seemed to make an effort.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I will take this toy,&rsquo; she said, laid a five-and-sixpenny
+piece in my hand, and was gone ere I could thank her.<br>
+<br>
+I retired to a place apart near the ramparts and behind a gun.&nbsp;
+The beauty, the expression of her eyes, the tear that had trembled there,
+the compassion in her voice, and a kind of wild elegance that consecrated
+the freedom of her movements, all combined to enslave my imagination
+and inflame my heart.&nbsp; What had she said?&nbsp; Nothing to signify;
+but her eyes had met mine, and the fire they had kindled burned inextinguishably
+in my veins.&nbsp; I loved her; and I did not fear to hope.&nbsp; Twice
+I had spoken with her; and in both interviews I had been well inspired,
+I had engaged her sympathies, I had found words that she must remember,
+that would ring in her ears at night upon her bed.&nbsp; What mattered
+if I were half shaved and my clothes a caricature?&nbsp; I was still
+a man, and I had drawn my image on her memory.&nbsp; I was still a man,
+and, as I trembled to realise, she was still a woman.&nbsp; Many waters
+cannot quench love; and love, which is the law of the world, was on
+my side.&nbsp; I closed my eyes, and she sprang up on the background
+of the darkness, more beautiful than in life.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ah!&rsquo;
+thought I, &lsquo;and you too, my dear, you too must carry away with
+you a picture, that you are still to behold again and still to embellish.&nbsp;
+In the darkness of night, in the streets by day, still you are to have
+my voice and face, whispering, making love for me, encroaching on your
+shy heart.&nbsp; Shy as your heart is, <i>it</i> is lodged there - <i>I</i>
+am lodged there; let the hours do their office - let time continue to
+draw me ever in more lively, ever in more insidious colours.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And then I had a vision of myself, and burst out laughing.<br>
+<br>
+A likely thing, indeed, that a beggar-man, a private soldier, a prisoner
+in a yellow travesty, was to awake the interest of this fair girl!&nbsp;
+I would not despair; but I saw the game must be played fine and close.&nbsp;
+It must be my policy to hold myself before her, always in a pathetic
+or pleasing attitude; never to alarm or startle her; to keep my own
+secret locked in my bosom like a story of disgrace, and let hers (if
+she could be induced to have one) grow at its own rate; to move just
+so fast, and not by a hair&rsquo;s-breadth any faster, than the inclination
+of her heart.&nbsp; I was the man, and yet I was passive, tied by the
+foot in prison.&nbsp; I could not go to her; I must cast a spell upon
+her at each visit, so that she should return to me; and this was a matter
+of nice management.&nbsp; I had done it the last time - it seemed impossible
+she should not come again after our interview; and for the next I had
+speedily ripened a fresh plan.&nbsp; A prisoner, if he has one great
+disability for a lover, has yet one considerable advantage: there is
+nothing to distract him, and he can spend all his hours ripening his
+love and preparing its manifestations.&nbsp; I had been then some days
+upon a piece of carving, - no less than the emblem of Scotland, the
+Lion Rampant.&nbsp; This I proceeded to finish with what skill I was
+possessed of; and when at last I could do no more to it (and, you may
+be sure, was already regretting I had done so much), added on the base
+the following dedication. -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&Agrave; LA BELLE FLORA<br>
+LE PRISONNIER RECONNAISSANT<br>
+A. D. ST.&nbsp; Y. D. K.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I put my heart into the carving of these letters.&nbsp; What was done
+with so much ardour, it seemed scarce possible that any should behold
+with indifference; and the initials would at least suggest to her my
+noble birth.&nbsp; I thought it better to suggest: I felt that mystery
+was my stock-in-trade; the contrast between my rank and manners, between
+my speech and my clothing, and the fact that she could only think of
+me by a combination of letters, must all tend to increase her interest
+and engage her heart.<br>
+<br>
+This done, there was nothing left for me but to wait and to hope.&nbsp;
+And there is nothing further from my character: in love and in war,
+I am all for the forward movement; and these days of waiting made my
+purgatory.&nbsp; It is a fact that I loved her a great deal better at
+the end of them, for love comes, like bread, from a perpetual rehandling.&nbsp;
+And besides, I was fallen into a panic of fear.&nbsp; How, if she came
+no more, how was I to continue to endure my empty days? how was I to
+fall back and find my interest in the major&rsquo;s lessons, the lieutenant&rsquo;s
+chess, in a twopenny sale in the market, or a halfpenny addition to
+the prison fare?<br>
+<br>
+Days went by, and weeks; I had not the courage to calculate, and to-day
+I have not the courage to remember; but at last she was there.&nbsp;
+At last I saw her approach me in the company of a boy about her own
+age, and whom I divined at once to be her brother.<br>
+<br>
+I rose and bowed in silence.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This is my brother, Mr. Ronald Gilchrist,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I have told him of your sufferings.&nbsp; He is so sorry for
+you!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is more than I have the right to ask,&rsquo; I replied; &lsquo;but
+among gentlefolk these generous sentiments are natural.&nbsp; If your
+brother and I were to meet in the field, we should meet like tigers;
+but when he sees me here disarmed and helpless, he forgets his animosity.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+(At which, as I had ventured to expect, this beardless champion coloured
+to the ears for pleasure.)&nbsp; &lsquo;Ah, my dear young lady,&rsquo;
+I continued, &lsquo;there are many of your countrymen languishing in
+my country, even as I do here.&nbsp; I can but hope there is found some
+French lady to convey to each of them the priceless consolation of her
+sympathy.&nbsp; You have given me alms; and more than alms - hope; and
+while you were absent I was not forgetful.&nbsp; Suffer me to be able
+to tell myself that I have at least tried to make a return; and for
+the prisoner&rsquo;s sake deign to accept this trifle.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So saying, I offered her my lion, which she took, looked at in some
+embarrassment, and then, catching sight of the dedication, broke out
+with a cry.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, how did you know my name?&rsquo; she exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;When names are so appropriate, they should be easily guessed,&rsquo;
+said I, bowing.&nbsp; &lsquo;But indeed, there was no magic in the matter.&nbsp;
+A lady called you by name on the day I found your handkerchief, and
+I was quick to remark and cherish it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is very, very beautiful,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;and I shall
+be always proud of the inscription. - Come, Ronald, we must be going.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+She bowed to me as a lady bows to her equal, and passed on (I could
+have sworn) with a heightened colour.<br>
+<br>
+I was overjoyed: my innocent ruse had succeeded; she had taken my gift
+without a hint of payment, and she would scarce sleep in peace till
+she had made it up to me.&nbsp; No greenhorn in matters of the heart,
+I was besides aware that I had now a resident ambassador at the court
+of my lady.&nbsp; The lion might be ill chiselled; it was mine.&nbsp;
+My hands had made and held it; my knife - or, to speak more by the mark,
+my rusty nail - had traced those letters; and simple as the words were,
+they would keep repeating to her that I was grateful and that I found
+her fair.&nbsp; The boy had looked like a gawky, and blushed at a compliment;
+I could see besides that he regarded me with considerable suspicion;
+yet he made so manly a figure of a lad, that I could not withhold from
+him my sympathy.&nbsp; And as for the impulse that had made her bring
+and introduce him, I could not sufficiently admire it.&nbsp; It seemed
+to me finer than wit, and more tender than a caress.&nbsp; It said (plain
+as language), &lsquo;I do not and I cannot know you.&nbsp; Here is my
+brother - you can know him; this is the way to me - follow it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER II - A TALE OF A PAIR OF SCISSORS<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I was still plunged in these thoughts when the bell was rung that discharged
+our visitors into the street.&nbsp; Our little market was no sooner
+closed than we were summoned to the distribution, and received our rations,
+which we were then allowed to eat according to fancy in any part of
+our quarters.<br>
+<br>
+I have said the conduct of some of our visitors was unbearably offensive;
+it was possibly more so than they dreamed - as the sight-seers at a
+menagerie may offend in a thousand ways, and quite without meaning it,
+the noble and unfortunate animals behind the bars; and there is no doubt
+but some of my compatriots were susceptible beyond reason.&nbsp; Some
+of these old whiskerandos, originally peasants, trained since boyhood
+in victorious armies, and accustomed to move among subject and trembling
+populations, could ill brook their change of circumstance.&nbsp; There
+was one man of the name of Goguelat, a brute of the first water, who
+had enjoyed no touch of civilisation beyond the military discipline,
+and had risen by an extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which
+he was otherwise unfitted - that of <i>mar&eacute;chal des logis</i>
+in the 22nd of the line.&nbsp; In so far as a brute can be a good soldier,
+he was a good soldier; the Cross was on his breast, and gallantly earned;
+but in all things outside his line of duty the man was no other than
+a brawling, bruising ignorant pillar of low pothouses.&nbsp; As a gentleman
+by birth, and a scholar by taste and education, I was the type of all
+that he least understood and most detested; and the mere view of our
+visitors would leave him daily in a transport of annoyance, which he
+would make haste to wreak on the nearest victim, and too often on myself.<br>
+<br>
+It was so now.&nbsp; Our rations were scarce served out, and I had just
+withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived him drawing near.&nbsp;
+He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of young fools, among whom he
+passed for a wit, followed him with looks of expectation; and I saw
+I was about to be the object of some of his insufferable pleasantries.&nbsp;
+He took a place beside me, spread out his rations, drank to me derisively
+from his measure of prison beer, and began.&nbsp; What he said it would
+be impossible to print; but his admirers, who believed their wit to
+have surpassed himself, actually rolled among the gravel.&nbsp; For
+my part, I thought at first I should have died.&nbsp; I had not dreamed
+the wretch was so observant; but hate sharpens the ears, and he had
+counted our interviews and actually knew Flora by her name.&nbsp; Gradually
+my coolness returned to me, accompanied by a volume of living anger
+that surprised myself.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Are you nearly done?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Because if
+you are, I am about to say a word or two myself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, fair play!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Turn about!&nbsp;
+The Marquis of Carabas to the tribune.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Very well,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have to inform you that
+I am a gentleman.&nbsp; You do not know what that means, hey?&nbsp;
+Well, I will tell you.&nbsp; It is a comical sort of animal; springs
+from another strange set of creatures they call ancestors; and, in common
+with toads and other vermin, has a thing that he calls feelings.&nbsp;
+The lion is a gentleman; he will not touch carrion.&nbsp; I am a gentleman,
+and I cannot bear to soil my fingers with such a lump of dirt.&nbsp;
+Sit still, Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not say a word, or I
+shall know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are upon us.&nbsp;
+Here is your health!&rsquo; said I, and pledged him in the prison beer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a young child,&rsquo;
+I continued, &lsquo;who might be your daughter, and who was giving alms
+to me and some others of us mendicants.&nbsp; If the Emperor&rsquo;
+- saluting - &lsquo;if my Emperor could hear you, he would pluck off
+the Cross from your gross body.&nbsp; I cannot do that; I cannot take
+away what His Majesty has given; but one thing I promise you - I promise
+you, Goguelat, you shall be dead to-night.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought there
+was no end to my forbearance, and he was at first amazed.&nbsp; But
+I have the pleasure to think that some of my expressions had pierced
+through his thick hide; and besides, the brute was truly a hero of valour,
+and loved fighting for itself.&nbsp; Whatever the cause, at least, he
+had soon pulled himself together, and took the thing (to do him justice)
+handsomely.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I promise you, by the devil&rsquo;s horns, that you shall
+have the chance!&rsquo; said he, and pledged me again; and again I did
+him scrupulous honour.<br>
+<br>
+The news of this defiance spread from prisoner to prisoner with the
+speed of wings; every face was seen to be illuminated like those of
+the spectators at a horse-race; and indeed you must first have tasted
+the active life of a soldier, and then mouldered for a while in the
+tedium of a jail, in order to understand, perhaps even to excuse, the
+delight of our companions.&nbsp; Goguelat and I slept in the same squad,
+which greatly simplified the business; and a committee of honour was
+accordingly formed of our shed-mates.&nbsp; They chose for president
+a sergeant-major in the 4th Dragoons, a greybeard of the army, an excellent
+military subject, and a good man.&nbsp; He took the most serious view
+of his functions, visited us both, and reported our replies to the committee.&nbsp;
+Mine was of a decent firmness.&nbsp; I told him the young lady of whom
+Goguelat had spoken had on several occasions given me alms.&nbsp; I
+reminded him that, if we were now reduced to hold out our hands and
+sell pill-boxes for charity, it was something very new for soldiers
+of the Empire.&nbsp; We had all seen bandits standing at a corner of
+a wood truckling for copper halfpence, and after their benefactors were
+gone spitting out injuries and curses.&nbsp; &lsquo;But,&rsquo; said
+I, &lsquo;I trust that none of us will fall so low.&nbsp; As a Frenchman
+and a soldier, I owe that young child gratitude, and am bound to protect
+her character, and to support that of the army.&nbsp; You are my elder
+and my superior: tell me if I am not right.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He was a quiet-mannered old fellow, and patted me with three fingers
+on the back.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>C&rsquo;est bien, mon enfant</i>,&rsquo;
+says he, and returned to his committee.<br>
+<br>
+Goguelat was no more accommodating than myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;I do not
+like apologies nor those that make them,&rsquo; was his only answer.&nbsp;
+And there remained nothing but to arrange the details of the meeting.&nbsp;
+So far as regards place and time we had no choice; we must settle the
+dispute at night, in the dark, after a round had passed by, and in the
+open middle of the shed under which we slept.&nbsp; The question of
+arms was more obscure.&nbsp; We had a good many tools, indeed, which
+we employed in the manufacture of our toys; but they were none of them
+suited for a single combat between civilised men, and, being nondescript,
+it was found extremely hard to equalise the chances of the combatants.&nbsp;
+At length a pair of scissors was unscrewed; and a couple of tough wands
+being found in a corner of the courtyard, one blade of the scissors
+was lashed solidly to each with resined twine - the twine coming I know
+not whence, but the resin from the green pillars of the shed, which
+still sweated from the axe.&nbsp; It was a strange thing to feel in
+one&rsquo;s hand this weapon, which was no heavier than a riding-rod,
+and which it was difficult to suppose would prove more dangerous.&nbsp;
+A general oath was administered and taken, that no one should interfere
+in the duel nor (suppose it to result seriously) betray the name of
+the survivor.&nbsp; And with that, all being then ready, we composed
+ourselves to await the moment.<br>
+<br>
+The evening fell cloudy; not a star was to be seen when the first round
+of the night passed through our shed and wound off along the ramparts;
+and as we took our places, we could still hear, over the murmurs of
+the surrounding city, the sentries challenging its further passage.&nbsp;
+Leclos, the sergeant-major, set us in our stations, engaged our wands,
+and left us.&nbsp; To avoid blood-stained clothing, my adversary and
+I had stripped to the shoes; and the chill of the night enveloped our
+bodies like a wet sheet.&nbsp; The man was better at fencing than myself;
+he was vastly taller than I, being of a stature almost gigantic, and
+proportionately strong.&nbsp; In the inky blackness of the shed, it
+was impossible to see his eyes; and from the suppleness of the wands,
+I did not like to trust to a parade.&nbsp; I made up my mind accordingly
+to profit, if I might, by my defect; and as soon as the signal should
+be given, to throw myself down and lunge at the same moment.&nbsp; It
+was to play my life upon one card: should I not mortally wound him,
+no defence would be left me; what was yet more appalling, I thus ran
+the risk of bringing my own face against his scissor with the double
+force of our assaults, and my face and eyes are not that part of me
+that I would the most readily expose.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;<i>Allez</i>!&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.<br>
+<br>
+Both lunged in the same moment with an equal fury, and but for my manoeuvre
+both had certainly been spitted.&nbsp; As it was, he did no more than
+strike my shoulder, while my scissor plunged below the girdle into a
+mortal part; and that great bulk of a man, falling from his whole height,
+knocked me immediately senseless.<br>
+<br>
+When I came to myself I was laid in my own sleeping-place, and could
+make out in the darkness the outline of perhaps a dozen heads crowded
+around me.&nbsp; I sat up.&nbsp; &lsquo;What is it?&rsquo; I exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Hush!&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.&nbsp; &lsquo;Blessed be
+God, all is well.&rsquo;&nbsp; I felt him clasp my hand, and there were
+tears in his voice.&nbsp; &lsquo;&rsquo;Tis but a scratch, my child;
+here is papa, who is taking good care of you.&nbsp; Your shoulder is
+bound up; we have dressed you in your clothes again, and it will all
+be well.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this I began to remember.&nbsp; &lsquo;And Goguelat?&rsquo; I gasped.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He cannot bear to be moved; he has his bellyful; &rsquo;tis a
+bad business,&rsquo; said the sergeant-major.<br>
+<br>
+The idea of having killed a man with such an instrument as half a pair
+of scissors seemed to turn my stomach.&nbsp; I am sure I might have
+killed a dozen with a firelock, a sabre, a bayonet, or any accepted
+weapon, and been visited by no such sickness of remorse.&nbsp; And to
+this feeling every unusual circumstance of our rencounter, the darkness
+in which we had fought, our nakedness, even the resin on the twine,
+appeared to contribute.&nbsp; I ran to my fallen adversary, kneeled
+by him, and could only sob his name.<br>
+<br>
+He bade me compose myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have given me the key of
+the fields, comrade,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Sans rancune</i>!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this my horror redoubled.&nbsp; Here had we two expatriated Frenchmen
+engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of beasts.&nbsp;
+Here was he, who had been all his life so great a ruffian, dying in
+a foreign land of this ignoble injury, and meeting death with something
+of the spirit of a Bayard.&nbsp; I insisted that the guards should be
+summoned and a doctor brought.&nbsp; &lsquo;It may still be possible
+to save him,&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement.&nbsp; &lsquo;If you
+had been wounded,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you must have lain there till
+the patrol came by and found you.&nbsp; It happens to be Goguelat -
+and so must he!&nbsp; Come, child, time to go to by-by.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And as I still resisted, &lsquo;Champdivers!&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;this
+is weakness.&nbsp; You pain me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, off to your beds with you!&rsquo; said Goguelat, and named
+us in a company with one of his jovial gross epithets.<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what they
+certainly were far from experiencing, sleep.&nbsp; It was not yet late.&nbsp;
+The city, from far below, and all around us, sent up a sound of wheels
+and feet and lively voices.&nbsp; Yet awhile, and the curtain of the
+cloud was rent across, and in the space of sky between the eaves of
+the shed and the irregular outline of the ramparts a multitude of stars
+appeared.&nbsp; Meantime, in the midst of us lay Goguelat, and could
+not always withhold himself from groaning.<br>
+<br>
+We heard the round far off; heard it draw slowly nearer.&nbsp; Last
+of all, it turned the corner and moved into our field of vision: two
+file of men and a corporal with a lantern, which he swung to and fro,
+so as to cast its light in the recesses of the yards and sheds.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Hullo!&rsquo; cried the corporal, pausing as he came by Goguelat.<br>
+<br>
+He stooped with his lantern.&nbsp; All our hearts were flying.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What devil&rsquo;s work is this?&rsquo; he cried, and with a
+startling voice summoned the guard.<br>
+<br>
+We were all afoot upon the instant; more lanterns and soldiers crowded
+in front of the shed; an officer elbowed his way in.&nbsp; In the midst
+was the big naked body, soiled with blood.&nbsp; Some one had covered
+him with his blanket; but as he lay there in agony, he had partly thrown
+it off.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This is murder!&rsquo; cried the officer.&nbsp; &lsquo;You wild
+beasts, you will hear of this to-morrow.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As Goguelat was raised and laid upon a stretcher, he cried to us a cheerful
+and blasphemous farewell.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER III - MAJOR CHEVENIX COMES INTO THE STORY, AND GOGUELAT GOES
+OUT<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost in getting
+the man&rsquo;s deposition.&nbsp; He gave but the one account of it:
+that he had committed suicide because he was sick of seeing so many
+Englishmen.&nbsp; The doctor vowed it was impossible, the nature and
+direction of the wound forbidding it.&nbsp; Goguelat replied that he
+was more ingenious than the other thought for, and had propped up the
+weapon in the ground and fallen on the point - &lsquo;just like Nebuchadnezzar,&rsquo;
+he added, winking to the assistants.&nbsp; The doctor, who was a little,
+spruce, ruddy man of an impatient temper, pished and pshawed and swore
+over his patient.&nbsp; &lsquo;Nothing to be made of him!&rsquo; he
+cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;A perfect heathen.&nbsp; If we could only find the
+weapon!&rsquo;&nbsp; But the weapon had ceased to exist.&nbsp; A little
+resined twine was perhaps blowing about in the castle gutters; some
+bits of broken stick may have trailed in corners; and behold, in the
+pleasant air of the morning, a dandy prisoner trimming his nails with
+a pair of scissors!<br>
+<br>
+Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the authorities did
+not leave the rest of us in peace.&nbsp; No stone was left unturned.&nbsp;
+We were had in again and again to be examined, now singly, now in twos
+and threes.&nbsp; We were threatened with all sorts of impossible severities
+and tempted with all manner of improbable rewards.&nbsp; I suppose I
+was five times interrogated, and came off from each with flying colours.&nbsp;
+I am like old Souvaroff, I cannot understand a soldier being taken aback
+by any question; he should answer, as he marches on the fire, with an
+instant briskness and gaiety.&nbsp; I may have been short of bread,
+gold or grace; I was never yet found wanting in an answer.&nbsp; My
+comrades, if they were not all so ready, were none of them less staunch;
+and I may say here at once that the inquiry came to nothing at the time,
+and the death of Goguelat remained a mystery of the prison.&nbsp; Such
+were the veterans of France!&nbsp; And yet I should be disingenuous
+if I did not own this was a case apart; in ordinary circumstances, some
+one might have stumbled or been intimidated into an admission; and what
+bound us together with a closeness beyond that of mere comrades was
+a secret to which we were all committed and a design in which all were
+equally engaged.&nbsp; No need to inquire as to its nature: there is
+only one desire, and only one kind of design, that blooms in prisons.&nbsp;
+And the fact that our tunnel was near done supported and inspired us.<br>
+<br>
+I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the sittings
+of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no one listens to;
+and yet I was unmasked - I, whom my very adversary defended, as good
+as confessed, as good as told the nature of the quarrel, and by so doing
+prepared for myself in the future a most anxious, disagreeable adventure.&nbsp;
+It was the third morning after the duel, and Goguelat was still in life,
+when the time came round for me to give Major Chevenix a lesson.&nbsp;
+I was fond of this occupation; not that he paid me much - no more, indeed,
+than eighteenpence a month, the customary figure, being a miser in the
+grain; but because I liked his breakfasts and (to some extent) himself.&nbsp;
+At least, he was a man of education; and of the others with whom I had
+any opportunity of speech, those that would not have held a book upsidedown
+would have torn the pages out for pipe-lights.&nbsp; For I must repeat
+again that our body of prisoners was exceptional: there was in Edinburgh
+Castle none of that educational busyness that distinguished some of
+the other prisons, so that men entered them unable to read, and left
+them fit for high employments.&nbsp; Chevenix was handsome, and surprisingly
+young to be a major: six feet in his stockings, well set up, with regular
+features and very clear grey eyes.&nbsp; It was impossible to pick a
+fault in him, and yet the sum-total was displeasing.&nbsp; Perhaps he
+was too clean; he seemed to bear about with him the smell of soap.&nbsp;
+Cleanliness is good, but I cannot bear a man&rsquo;s nails to seem japanned.&nbsp;
+And certainly he was too self-possessed and cold.&nbsp; There was none
+of the fire of youth, none of the swiftness of the soldier, in this
+young officer.&nbsp; His kindness was cold, and cruel cold; his deliberation
+exasperating.&nbsp; And perhaps it was from this character, which is
+very much the opposite of my own, that even in these days, when he was
+of service to me, I approached him with suspicion and reserve.<br>
+<br>
+I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six faults.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;H&rsquo;m.&nbsp; Six,&rsquo; says he, looking at the paper.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Very annoying!&nbsp; I can never get it right.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, but you make excellent progress!&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; I would
+not discourage him, you understand, but he was congenitally unable to
+learn French.&nbsp; Some fire, I think, is needful, and he had quenched
+his fire in soapsuds.<br>
+<br>
+He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and looked
+at me with clear, severe eyes.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think we must have a little talk,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am entirely at your disposition,&rsquo; I replied; but I quaked,
+for I knew what subject to expect.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have been some time giving me these lessons,&rsquo; he went
+on, &lsquo;and I am tempted to think rather well of you.&nbsp; I believe
+you are a gentleman.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have that honour, sir,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have seen me for the same period.&nbsp; I do not know how
+I strike you; but perhaps you will be prepared to believe that I also
+am a man of honour,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I require no assurances; the thing is manifest,&rsquo; and I
+bowed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Very well, then,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;What about this
+Goguelat?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You heard me yesterday before the court,&rsquo; I began.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I was awakened only - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh yes; I &ldquo;heard you yesterday before the court,&rdquo;
+no doubt,&rsquo; he interrupted, &lsquo;and I remember perfectly that
+you were &ldquo;awakened only.&rdquo;&nbsp; I could repeat the most
+of it by rote, indeed.&nbsp; But do you suppose that I believed you
+for a moment?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it here,&rsquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I may be wrong - we shall soon see,&rsquo; says he; &lsquo;but
+my impression is that you will not &ldquo;repeat it here.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+My impression is that you have come into this room, and that you will
+tell me something before you go out.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I shrugged my shoulders.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Let me explain,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your evidence,
+of course, is nonsense.&nbsp; I put it by, and the court put it by.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My compliments and thanks!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You <i>must</i> know - that&rsquo;s the short and the long,&rsquo;
+he proceeded.&nbsp; &lsquo;All of you in shed B are bound to know.&nbsp;
+And I want to ask you where is the common-sense of keeping up this farce,
+and maintaining this cock-and-bull story between friends.&nbsp; Come,
+come, my good fellow, own yourself beaten, and laugh at it yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I hear you, go ahead,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You put
+your heart in it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He crossed his legs slowly.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can very well understand,&rsquo;
+he began, &lsquo;that precautions have had to be taken.&nbsp; I dare
+say an oath was administered.&nbsp; I can comprehend that perfectly.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+(He was watching me all the time with his cold, bright eyes.)&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And I can comprehend that, about an affair of honour, you would
+be very particular to keep it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;About an affair of honour?&rsquo; I repeated, like a man quite
+puzzled.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It was not an affair of honour, then?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What was not?&nbsp; I do not follow,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat awhile silent, and began again
+in the same placid and good-natured voice: &lsquo;The court and I were
+at one in setting aside your evidence.&nbsp; It could not deceive a
+child.&nbsp; But there was a difference between myself and the other
+officers, because <i>I knew my man</i> and they did not.&nbsp; They
+saw in you a common soldier, and I knew you for a gentleman.&nbsp; To
+them your evidence was a leash of lies, which they yawned to hear you
+telling.&nbsp; Now, I was asking myself, how far will a gentleman go?&nbsp;
+Not surely so far as to help hush a murder up?&nbsp; So that - when
+I heard you tell how you knew nothing of the matter, and were only awakened
+by the corporal, and all the rest of it - I translated your statements
+into something else.&nbsp; Now, Champdivers,&rsquo; he cried, springing
+up lively and coming towards me with animation, &lsquo;I am going to
+tell you what that was, and you are going to help me to see justice
+done: how, I don&rsquo;t know, for of course you are under oath - but
+somehow.&nbsp; Mark what I&rsquo;m going to say.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder; and whether
+he said anything more or came to a full stop at once, I am sure I could
+not tell you to this day.&nbsp; For, as the devil would have it, the
+shoulder he laid hold of was the one Goguelat had pinked.&nbsp; The
+wound was but a scratch; it was healing with the first intention; but
+in the clutch of Major Chevenix it gave me agony.&nbsp; My head swam;
+the sweat poured off my face; I must have grown deadly pale.<br>
+<br>
+He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+is wrong with you?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is nothing,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A qualm.&nbsp; It
+has gone by.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Are you sure?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are as white as
+a sheet.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh no, I assure you!&nbsp; Nothing whatever.&nbsp; I am my own
+man again,&rsquo; I said, though I could scarce command my tongue.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, shall I go on again?&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Can you
+follow me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, by all means!&rsquo; said I, and mopped my streaming face
+upon my sleeve, for you may be sure in those days I had no handkerchief.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you are sure you can follow me.&nbsp; That was a very sudden
+and sharp seizure,&rsquo; he said doubtfully.&nbsp; &lsquo;But if you
+are sure, all right, and here goes.&nbsp; An affair of honour among
+you fellows would, naturally, be a little difficult to carry out, perhaps
+it would be impossible to have it wholly regular.&nbsp; And yet a duel
+might be very irregular in form, and, under the peculiar circumstances
+of the case, loyal enough in effect.&nbsp; Do you take me?&nbsp; Now,
+as a gentleman and a soldier.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me.&nbsp; I could
+bear no more, and winced away from him.&nbsp; &lsquo;No,&rsquo; I cried,&nbsp;
+&lsquo;not that.&nbsp; Do not put your hand upon my shoulder.&nbsp;
+I cannot bear it.&nbsp; It is rheumatism,&rsquo; I made haste to add.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;My shoulder is inflamed and very painful.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sorry about your shoulder,&rsquo; he said at last.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Let me send for the doctor.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not in the least,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is a trifle.&nbsp;
+I am quite used to it.&nbsp; It does not trouble me in the smallest.&nbsp;
+At any rate, I don&rsquo;t believe in doctors.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;All right,&rsquo; said he, and sat and smoked a good while in
+a silence which I would have given anything to break.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well,&rsquo;
+he began presently, &lsquo;I believe there is nothing left for me to
+learn.&nbsp; I presume I may say that I know all.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;About what?&rsquo; said I boldly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;About Goguelat,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon.&nbsp; I cannot conceive,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh,&rsquo; says the major, &lsquo;the man fell in a duel, and
+by your hand!&nbsp; I am not an infant.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By no means,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But you seem to me to
+be a good deal of a theorist.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Shall we test it?&rsquo; he asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;The doctor is
+close by.&nbsp; If there is not an open wound on your shoulder, I am
+wrong.&nbsp; If there is - &rsquo;&nbsp; He waved his hand.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+I advise you to think twice.&nbsp; There is a deuce of a nasty drawback
+to the experiment - that what might have remained private between us
+two becomes public property.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, well!&rsquo; said I, with a laugh, &lsquo;anything rather
+than a doctor!&nbsp; I cannot bear the breed.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still far from
+comfortable.<br>
+<br>
+Major Chevenix smoked awhile, looking now at his cigar ash, now at me.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;m a soldier myself,&rsquo; he says presently, &lsquo;and
+I&rsquo;ve been out in my time and hit my man.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t want
+to run any one into a corner for an affair that was at all necessary
+or correct.&nbsp; At the same time, I want to know that much, and I&rsquo;ll
+take your word of honour for it.&nbsp; Otherwise, I shall be very sorry,
+but the doctor must be called in.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I neither admit anything nor deny anything,&rsquo; I returned.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But if this form of words will suffice you, here is what I say:
+I give you my parole, as a gentleman and a soldier, there has nothing
+taken place amongst us prisoners that was not honourable as the day.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;All right,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;That was all I wanted.&nbsp;
+You can go now, Champdivers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And as I was going out he added, with a laugh: &lsquo;By the bye, I
+ought to apologise: I had no idea I was applying the torture!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a piece of
+paper in his hand.&nbsp; He seemed hot and angry, and had certainly
+no mind to be polite.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Which of you fellows knows
+any English?&nbsp; Oh!&rsquo; - spying me - &lsquo;there you are, what&rsquo;s
+your name!&nbsp; <i>You&rsquo;ll</i> do.&nbsp; Tell these fellows that
+the other fellow&rsquo;s dying.&nbsp; He&rsquo;s booked; no use talking;
+I expect he&rsquo;ll go by evening.&nbsp; And tell them I don&rsquo;t
+envy the feelings of the fellow who spiked him.&nbsp; Tell them that
+first.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I did so.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then you can tell &rsquo;em,&rsquo; he resumed, &lsquo;that the
+fellow, Goggle - what&rsquo;s his name? - wants to see some of them
+before he gets his marching orders.&nbsp; If I got it right, he wants
+to kiss or embrace you, or some sickening stuff.&nbsp; Got that?&nbsp;
+Then here&rsquo;s a list he&rsquo;s had written, and you&rsquo;d better
+read it out to them - I can&rsquo;t make head or tail of your beastly
+names - and they can answer <i>present</i>, and fall in against that
+wall.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I read
+the first name on the list.&nbsp; I had no wish to look again on my
+own handiwork; my flesh recoiled from the idea; and how could I be sure
+what reception he designed to give me?&nbsp; The cure was in my own
+hand; I could pass that first name over - the doctor would not know
+- and I might stay away.&nbsp; But to the subsequent great gladness
+of my heart, I did not dwell for an instant on the thought, walked over
+to the designated wall, faced about, read out the name &lsquo;Champdivers,&rsquo;
+and answered myself with the word &lsquo;Present.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+There were some half dozen on the list, all told; and as soon as we
+were mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and we followed
+after, like a fatigue party, in single file.&nbsp; At the door he paused,
+told us &lsquo;the fellow&rsquo; would see each of us alone, and, as
+soon as I had explained that, sent me by myself into the ward.&nbsp;
+It was a small room, whitewashed; a south window stood open on a vast
+depth of air and a spacious and distant prospect; and from deep below,
+in the Grassmarket the voices of hawkers came up clear and far away.&nbsp;
+Hard by, on a little bed, lay Goguelat.&nbsp; The sunburn had not yet
+faded from his face, and the stamp of death was already there.&nbsp;
+There was something wild and unmannish in his smile, that took me by
+the throat; only death and love know or have ever seen it.&nbsp; And
+when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.<br>
+<br>
+He held out his arms as if to embrace me.&nbsp; I drew near with incredible
+shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with overwhelming disgust.&nbsp;
+But he only drew my ear down to his lips.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Trust me,&rsquo; he whispered.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Je suis bon bougre,
+moi</i>.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll take it to hell with me, and tell the devil.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities?&nbsp;
+All that he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could not
+clothe it otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce.&nbsp; Presently
+he bade me call the doctor; and when that officer had come in, raised
+a little up in his bed, pointed first to himself and then to me, who
+stood weeping by his side, and several times repeated the expression,
+&lsquo;Frinds - frinds - dam frinds.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much affected.&nbsp;
+He nodded his little bob-wigged head at us, and said repeatedly, &lsquo;All
+right, Johnny - me comprong.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I went out
+of the room sobbing like an infant.<br>
+<br>
+How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable fellows make
+the happiest exits!&nbsp; It is a fate we may well envy them.&nbsp;
+Goguelat was detested in life; in the last three days, by his admirable
+staunchness and consideration, he won every heart; and when word went
+about the prison the same evening that he was no more, the voice of
+conversation became hushed as in a house of mourning.<br>
+<br>
+For myself I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what ailed me:
+when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it; but that night
+I was filled with a gloomy fury of the nerves.&nbsp; I had killed him;
+he had done his utmost to protect me; I had seen him with that awful
+smile.&nbsp; And so illogical and useless is this sentiment of remorse,
+that I was ready, at a word or a look, to quarrel with somebody else.&nbsp;
+I presume the disposition of my mind was imprinted on my face; and when,
+a little after, I overtook, saluted and addressed the doctor, he looked
+on me with commiseration and surprise.<br>
+<br>
+I had asked him if it was true.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;the fellow&rsquo;s gone.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Did he suffer much?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; He
+looked on me a little, and I saw his hand go to his fob.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here,
+take that! no sense in fretting,&rsquo; he said, and, putting a silver
+two-penny-bit in my hand, he left me.<br>
+<br>
+I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall, for it
+was the man&rsquo;s one act of charity in all my knowledge of him.&nbsp;
+Instead of that, I stood looking at it in my hand and laughed out bitterly,
+as I realised his mistake; then went to the ramparts, and flung it far
+into the air like blood money.&nbsp; The night was falling; through
+an embrasure and across the gardened valley I saw the lamplighters hasting
+along Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and looked on moodily.&nbsp;
+As I was so standing a hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I turned
+about.&nbsp; It was Major Chevenix, dressed for the evening, and his
+neckcloth really admirably folded.&nbsp; I never denied the man could
+dress.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;I thought it was you, Champdivers.&nbsp;
+So he&rsquo;s gone?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I nodded.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come, come,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you must cheer up.&nbsp; Of
+course it&rsquo;s very distressing, very painful and all that.&nbsp;
+But do you know, it ain&rsquo;t such a bad thing either for you or me?&nbsp;
+What with his death and your visit to him I am entirely reassured.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I had rather not discuss it,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;one word more, and I&rsquo;ll agree
+to bury the subject.&nbsp; What did you fight about?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, what do men ever fight about?&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A lady?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I shrugged my shoulders.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Deuce you did!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I should scarce have
+thought it of him.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words.&nbsp; &lsquo;He!&rsquo;
+I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;He never dared to address her - only to look at
+her and vomit his vile insults!&nbsp; She may have given him sixpence:
+if she did, it may take him to heaven yet!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a considering look,
+and brought up sharply.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Good night to you, Champdivers.&nbsp;
+Come to me at breakfast-time to-morrow, and we&rsquo;ll talk of other
+subjects.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I fully admit the man&rsquo;s conduct was not bad: in writing it down
+so long after the events I can even see that it was good.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IV - ST. IVES GETS A BUNDLE OF BANK NOTES<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I was surprised one morning, shortly after, to find myself the object
+of marked consideration by a civilian and a stranger.&nbsp; This was
+a man of the middle age; he had a face of a mulberry colour, round black
+eyes, comical tufted eyebrows, and a protuberant forehead; and was dressed
+in clothes of a Quakerish cut.&nbsp; In spite of his plainness, he had
+that inscrutable air of a man well-to-do in his affairs.&nbsp; I conceived
+he had been some while observing me from a distance, for a sparrow sat
+betwixt us quite unalarmed on the breech of a piece of cannon.&nbsp;
+So soon as our eyes met, he drew near and addressed me in the French
+language, which he spoke with a good fluency but an abominable accent.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have the pleasure of addressing Monsieur le Vicomte Anne de
+K&eacute;roual de Saint-Yves?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I do not call myself all that; but
+I have a right to, if I chose.&nbsp; In the meanwhile I call myself
+plain Champdivers, at your disposal.&nbsp; It was my mother&rsquo;s
+name, and good to go soldiering with.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think not quite,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;for if I remember rightly,
+your mother also had the particle.&nbsp; Her name was Florimonde de
+Champdivers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Right again!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and I am extremely pleased
+to meet a gentleman so well informed in my quarterings.&nbsp; Is monsieur
+Born himself?&rsquo;&nbsp; This I said with a great air of assumption,
+partly to conceal the degree of curiosity with which my visitor had
+inspired me, and in part because it struck me as highly incongruous
+and comical in my prison garb and on the lips of a private soldier.<br>
+<br>
+He seemed to think so too, for he laughed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, sir,&rsquo; he returned, speaking this time in English; &lsquo;I
+am not &ldquo;<i>born</i>,&rdquo; as you call it, and must content myself
+with <i>dying</i>, of which I am equally susceptible with the best of
+you.&nbsp; My name is Mr. Romaine - Daniel Romaine - a solicitor of
+London City, at your service; and, what will perhaps interest you more,
+I am here at the request of your great-uncle, the Count.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What!&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;does M. de K&eacute;roual de St.-Yves
+remember the existence of such a person as myself, and will he deign
+to count kinship with a soldier of Napoleon?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You speak English well,&rsquo; observed my visitor.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It has been a second language to me from a child,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I had an English nurse; my father spoke English with
+me; and I was finished by a countryman of yours and a dear friend of
+mine, a Mr. Vicary.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+A strong expression of interest came into the lawyer&rsquo;s face.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What!&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;you knew poor Vicary?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;For more than a year,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and shared his hiding-place
+for many months.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I was his clerk, and have succeeded him in business,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Excellent man!&nbsp; It was on the affairs of
+M. de K&eacute;roual that he went to that accursed country, from which
+he was never destined to return.&nbsp; Do you chance to know his end,
+sir?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sorry,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I do.&nbsp; He perished miserably
+at the hands of a gang of banditti, such as we call <i>chauffeurs</i>.&nbsp;
+In a word, he was tortured, and died of it.&nbsp; See,&rsquo; I added,
+kicking off one shoe, for I had no stockings; &lsquo;I was no more than
+a child, and see how they had begun to treat myself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He looked at the mark of my old burn with a certain shrinking.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Beastly people!&rsquo; I heard him mutter to himself.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The English may say so with a good grace,&rsquo; I observed politely.<br>
+<br>
+Such speeches were the coin in which I paid my way among this credulous
+race.&nbsp; Ninety per cent. of our visitors would have accepted the
+remark as natural in itself and creditable to my powers of judgment,
+but it appeared my lawyer was more acute.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are not entirely a fool, I perceive,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;not wholly.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And yet it is well to beware of the ironical mood,&rsquo; he
+continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is a dangerous instrument.&nbsp; Your great-uncle
+has, I believe, practised it very much, until it is now become a problem
+what he means.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And that brings me back to what you will admit is a most natural
+inquiry,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;To what do I owe the pleasure of
+this visit? how did you recognise me? and how did you know I was here?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Carefull separating his coat skirts, the lawyer took a seat beside me
+on the edge of the flags.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is rather an odd story,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;and, with your
+leave, I&rsquo;ll answer the second question first.&nbsp; It was from
+a certain resemblance you bear to your cousin, M. le Vicomte.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I trust, sir, that I resemble him advantageously?&rsquo; said
+I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I hasten to reassure you,&rsquo; was the reply: &lsquo;you do.&nbsp;
+To my eyes, M. Alain de St.-Yves has scarce a pleasing exterior.&nbsp;
+And yet, when I knew you were here, and was actually looking for you
+- why, the likeness helped.&nbsp; As for how I came to know your whereabouts,
+by an odd enough chance, it is again M. Alain we have to thank.&nbsp;
+I should tell you, he has for some time made it his business to keep
+M. de K&eacute;roual informed of your career; with what purpose I leave
+you to judge.&nbsp; When he first brought the news of your - that you
+were serving Buonaparte, it seemed it might be the death of the old
+gentleman, so hot was his resentment.&nbsp; But from one thing to another,
+matters have a little changed.&nbsp; Or I should rather say, not a little.&nbsp;
+We learned you were under orders for the Peninsula, to fight the English;
+then that you had been commissioned for a piece of bravery, and were
+again reduced to the ranks.&nbsp; And from one thing to another (as
+I say), M. de K&eacute;roual became used to the idea that you were his
+kinsman and yet served with Buonaparte, and filled instead with wonder
+that he should have another kinsman who was so remarkably well informed
+of events in France.&nbsp; And it now became a very disagreeable question,
+whether the young gentleman was not a spy?&nbsp; In short, sir, in seeking
+to disserve you, he had accumulated against himself a load of suspicions.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+My visitor now paused, took snuff, and looked at me with an air of benevolence.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good God, sir!&rsquo; says I, &lsquo;this is a curious story.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will say so before I have done,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;For
+there have two events followed.&nbsp; The first of these was an encounter
+of M. de K&eacute;roual and M. de Mauseant.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I know the man to my cost,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;it was through
+him I lost my commission.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you tell me so?&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, here is
+news!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, I cannot complain!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I was in the
+wrong.&nbsp; I did it with my eyes open.&nbsp; If a man gets a prisoner
+to guard and lets him go, the least he can expect is to be degraded.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will be paid for it,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You did
+well for yourself and better for your king.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If I had thought I was injuring my emperor,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I
+would have let M. de Mauseant burn in hell ere I had helped him, and
+be sure of that!&nbsp; I saw in him only a private person in a difficulty:
+I let him go in private charity; not even to profit myself will I suffer
+it to be misunderstood.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said the lawyer, &lsquo;no matter now.&nbsp;
+This is a foolish warmth - a very misplaced enthusiasm, believe me!&nbsp;
+The point of the story is that M. de Mauseant spoke of you with gratitude,
+and drew your character in such a manner as greatly to affect your uncle&rsquo;s
+views.&nbsp; Hard upon the back of which, in came your humble servant,
+and laid before him the direct proof of what we had been so long suspecting.&nbsp;
+There was no dubiety permitted.&nbsp; M. Alain&rsquo;s expensive way
+of life, his clothes and mistresses, his dicing and racehorses, were
+all explained: he was in the pay of Buonaparte, a hired spy, and a man
+that held the strings of what I can only call a convolution of extremely
+fishy enterprises.&nbsp; To do M. de K&eacute;roual justice, he took
+it in the best way imaginable, destroyed the evidences of the one great-nephew&rsquo;s
+disgrace - and transferred his interest wholly to the other.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What am I to understand by that?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I will tell you,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;There is a remarkable
+inconsistency in human nature which gentlemen of my cloth have a great
+deal of occasion to observe.&nbsp; Selfish persons can live without
+chick or child, they can live without all mankind except perhaps the
+barber and the apothecary; but when it comes to dying, they seem physically
+unable to die without an heir.&nbsp; You can apply this principle for
+yourself.&nbsp; Viscount Alain, though he scarce guesses it, is no longer
+in the field.&nbsp; Remains, Viscount Anne.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I see,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you give a very unfavourable impression
+of my uncle, the Count.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I had not meant it,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;He has led a
+loose life - sadly loose - but he is a man it is impossible to know
+and not to admire; his courtesy is exquisite.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And so you think there is actually a chance for me?&rsquo; I
+asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Understand,&rsquo; said he: &lsquo;in saying as much as I have
+done, I travel quite beyond my brief.&nbsp; I have been clothed with
+no capacity to talk of wills, or heritages, or your cousin.&nbsp; I
+was sent here to make but the one communication: that M. de K&eacute;roual
+desires to meet his great-nephew.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, looking about me on the battlements by which
+we sat surrounded, &lsquo;this is a case in which Mahomet must certainly
+come to the mountain.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pardon me,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine; &lsquo;you know already your
+uncle is an aged man; but I have not yet told you that he is quite broken
+up, and his death shortly looked for.&nbsp; No, no, there is no doubt
+about it - it is the mountain that must come to Mahomet.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;From an Englishman, the remark is certainly significant,&rsquo;
+said I; &lsquo;but you are of course, and by trade, a keeper of men&rsquo;s
+secrets, and I see you keep that of Cousin Alain, which is not the mark
+of a truculent patriotism, to say the least.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am first of all the lawyer of your family!&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That being so,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I can perhaps stretch a
+point myself.&nbsp; This rock is very high, and it is very steep; a
+man might come by a devil of a fall from almost any part of it, and
+yet I believe I have a pair of wings that might carry me just so far
+as to the bottom.&nbsp; Once at the bottom I am helpless.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And perhaps it is just then that I could step in,&rsquo; returned
+the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Suppose by some contingency, at which I make
+no guess, and on which I offer no opinion - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+But here I interrupted him.&nbsp; &lsquo;One word ere you go further.&nbsp;
+I am under no parole,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I understood so much,&rsquo; he replied, &lsquo;although some
+of you French gentry find their word sit lightly on them.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sir, I am not one of those,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To do you plain justice, I do not think you one,&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Suppose yourself, then, set free and at the bottom
+of the rock,&rsquo; he continued, &lsquo;although I may not be able
+to do much, I believe I can do something to help you on your road.&nbsp;
+In the first place I would carry this, whether in an inside pocket or
+my shoe.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he passed me a bundle of bank notes.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No harm in that,&rsquo; said I, at once concealing them.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In the second place,&rsquo; he resumed, &lsquo;it is a great
+way from here to where your uncle lives - Amersham Place, not far from
+Dunstable; you have a great part of Britain to get through; and for
+the first stages, I must leave you to your own luck and ingenuity.&nbsp;
+I have no acquaintance here in Scotland, or at least&rsquo; (with a
+grimace) &lsquo;no dishonest ones.&nbsp; But further to the south, about
+Wakefield, I am told there is a gentleman called Burchell Fenn, who
+is not so particular as some others, and might be willing to give you
+a cast forward.&nbsp; In fact, sir, I believe it&rsquo;s the man&rsquo;s
+trade: a piece of knowledge that burns my mouth.&nbsp; But that is what
+you get by meddling with rogues; and perhaps the biggest rogue now extant,
+M. de Saint-Yves, is your cousin, M. Alain.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If this be a man of my cousin&rsquo;s,&rsquo; I observed, &lsquo;I
+am perhaps better to keep clear of him?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It was through some paper of your cousin&rsquo;s that we came
+across his trail,&rsquo; replied the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I am inclined
+to think, so far as anything is safe in such a nasty business, you might
+apply to the man Fenn.&nbsp; You might even, I think, use the Viscount&rsquo;s
+name; and the little trick of family resemblance might come in.&nbsp;
+How, for instance, if you were to call yourself his brother?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It might be done,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But look here a
+moment?&nbsp; You propose to me a very difficult game: I have apparently
+a devil of an opponent in my cousin; and, being a prisoner of war, I
+can scarcely be said to hold good cards.&nbsp; For what stakes, then,
+am I playing?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;They are very large,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your great-uncle
+is immensely rich - immensely rich.&nbsp; He was wise in time; he smelt
+the revolution long before; sold all that he could, and had all that
+was movable transported to England through my firm.&nbsp; There are
+considerable estates in England; Amersham Place itself is very fine;
+and he has much money, wisely invested.&nbsp; He lives, indeed, like
+a prince.&nbsp; And of what use is it to him?&nbsp; He has lost all
+that was worth living for - his family, his country; he has seen his
+king and queen murdered; he has seen all these miseries and infamies,&rsquo;
+pursued the lawyer, with a rising inflection and a heightening colour;
+and then broke suddenly off, - &lsquo;In short, sir, he has seen all
+the advantages of that government for which his nephew carries arms,
+and he has the misfortune not to like them.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You speak with a bitterness that I suppose I must excuse,&rsquo;
+said I; &lsquo;yet which of us has the more reason to be bitter?&nbsp;
+This man, my uncle, M. de K&eacute;roual, fled.&nbsp; My parents, who
+were less wise perhaps, remained.&nbsp; In the beginning, they were
+even republicans; to the end they could not be persuaded to despair
+of the people.&nbsp; It was a glorious folly, for which, as a son, I
+reverence them.&nbsp; First one and then the other perished.&nbsp; If
+I have any mark of a gentleman, all who taught me died upon the scaffold,
+and my last school of manners was the prison of the Abbaye.&nbsp; Do
+you think you can teach bitterness to a man with a history like mine?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have no wish to try,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;And yet there
+is one point I cannot understand: I cannot understand that one of your
+blood and experience should serve the Corsican.&nbsp; I cannot understand
+it: it seems as though everything generous in you must rise against
+that - domination.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And perhaps,&rsquo; I retorted, &lsquo;had your childhood passed
+among wolves, you would have been overjoyed yourself to see the Corsican
+Shepherd.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; replied Mr. Romaine, &lsquo;it may be.&nbsp;
+There are things that do not bear discussion.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And with a wave of his hand he disappeared abruptly down a flight of
+steps and under the shadow of a ponderous arch.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER V - ST. IVES IS SHOWN A HOUSE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The lawyer was scarce gone before I remembered many omissions; and chief
+among these, that I had neglected to get Mr. Burchell Fenn&rsquo;s address.&nbsp;
+Here was an essential point neglected; and I ran to the head of the
+stairs to find myself already too late.&nbsp; The lawyer was beyond
+my view; in the archway that led downward to the castle gate, only the
+red coat and the bright arms of a sentry glittered in the shadow; and
+I could but return to my place upon the ramparts.<br>
+<br>
+I am not very sure that I was properly entitled to this corner.&nbsp;
+But I was a high favourite; not an officer, and scarce a private, in
+the castle would have turned me back, except upon a thing of moment;
+and whenever I desired to be solitary, I was suffered to sit here behind
+my piece of cannon unmolested.&nbsp; The cliff went down before me almost
+sheer, but mantled with a thicket of climbing trees; from farther down,
+an outwork raised its turret; and across the valley I had a view of
+that long terrace of Princes Street which serves as a promenade to the
+fashionable inhabitants of Edinburgh.&nbsp; A singularity in a military
+prison, that it should command a view on the chief thoroughfare!<br>
+<br>
+It is not necessary that I should trouble you with the train of my reflections,
+which turned upon the interview I had just concluded and the hopes that
+were now opening before me.&nbsp; What is more essential, my eye (even
+while I thought) kept following the movement of the passengers on Princes
+Street, as they passed briskly to and fro - met, greeted, and bowed
+to each other - or entered and left the shops, which are in that quarter,
+and, for a town of the Britannic provinces, particularly fine.&nbsp;
+My mind being busy upon other things, the course of my eye was the more
+random; and it chanced that I followed, for some time, the advance of
+a young gentleman with a red head and a white great-coat, for whom I
+cared nothing at the moment, and of whom it is probable I shall be gathered
+to my fathers without learning more.&nbsp; He seemed to have a large
+acquaintance: his hat was for ever in his hand; and I daresay I had
+already observed him exchanging compliments with half a dozen, when
+he drew up at last before a young man and a young lady whose tall persons
+and gallant carriage I thought I recognised.<br>
+<br>
+It was impossible at such a distance that I could be sure, but the thought
+was sufficient, and I craned out of the embrasure to follow them as
+long as possible.&nbsp; To think that such emotions, that such a concussion
+of the blood, may have been inspired by a chance resemblance, and that
+I may have stood and thrilled there for a total stranger!&nbsp; This
+distant view, at least, whether of Flora or of some one else, changed
+in a moment the course of my reflections.&nbsp; It was all very well,
+and it was highly needful, I should see my uncle; but an uncle, a great-uncle
+at that, and one whom I had never seen, leaves the imagination cold;
+and if I were to leave the castle, I might never again have the opportunity
+of finding Flora.&nbsp; The little impression I had made, even supposing
+I had made any, how soon it would die out! how soon I should sink to
+be a phantom memory, with which (in after days) she might amuse a husband
+and children!&nbsp; No, the impression must be clenched, the wax impressed
+with the seal, ere I left Edinburgh.&nbsp; And at this the two interests
+that were now contending in my bosom came together and became one.&nbsp;
+I wished to see Flora again; and I wanted some one to further me in
+my flight and to get me new clothes.&nbsp; The conclusion was apparent.&nbsp;
+Except for persons in the garrison itself, with whom it was a point
+of honour and military duty to retain me captive, I knew, in the whole
+country of Scotland, these two alone.&nbsp; If it were to be done at
+all, they must be my helpers.&nbsp; To tell them of my designed escape
+while I was still in bonds, would be to lay before them a most difficult
+choice.&nbsp; What they might do in such a case, I could not in the
+least be sure of, for (the same case arising) I was far from sure what
+I should do myself.&nbsp; It was plain I must escape first.&nbsp; When
+the harm was done, when I was no more than a poor wayside fugitive,
+I might apply to them with less offence and more security.&nbsp; To
+this end it became necessary that I should find out where they lived
+and how to reach it; and feeling a strong confidence that they would
+soon return to visit me, I prepared a series of baits with which to
+angle for my information.&nbsp; It will be seen the first was good enough.<br>
+<br>
+Perhaps two days after, Master Ronald put in an appearance by himself.&nbsp;
+I had no hold upon the boy, and pretermitted my design till I should
+have laid court to him and engaged his interest.&nbsp; He was prodigiously
+embarrassed, not having previously addressed me otherwise than by a
+bow and blushes; and he advanced to me with an air of one stubbornly
+performing a duty, like a raw soldier under fire.&nbsp; I laid down
+my carving; greeted him with a good deal of formality, such as I thought
+he would enjoy; and finding him to remain silent, branched off into
+narratives of my campaigns such as Goguelat himself might have scrupled
+to endorse.&nbsp; He visibly thawed and brightened; drew more near to
+where I sat; forgot his timidity so far as to put many questions; and
+at last, with another blush, informed me he was himself expecting a
+commission.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;they are fine troops, your British
+troops in the Peninsula.&nbsp; A young gentleman of spirit may well
+be proud to be engaged at the head of such soldiers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I know that,&rsquo; he said; &lsquo;I think of nothing else.&nbsp;
+I think shame to be dangling here at home and going through with this
+foolery of education, while others, no older than myself, are in the
+field.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I cannot blame you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have felt the
+same myself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There are - there are no troops, are there, quite so good as
+ours?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;there is a point about them: they
+have a defect, - they are not to be trusted in a retreat.&nbsp; I have
+seen them behave very ill in a retreat.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I believe that is our national character,&rsquo; he said - God
+forgive him! - with an air of pride.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have seen your national character running away at least, and
+had the honour to run after it!&rsquo; rose to my lips, but I was not
+so ill advised as to give it utterance.&nbsp; Every one should be flattered,
+but boys and women without stint; and I put in the rest of the afternoon
+narrating to him tales of British heroism, for which I should not like
+to engage that they were all true.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am quite surprised,&rsquo; he said at last.&nbsp; &lsquo;People
+tell you the French are insincere.&nbsp; Now, I think your sincerity
+is beautiful.&nbsp; I think you have a noble character.&nbsp; I admire
+you very much.&nbsp; I am very grateful for your kindness to - to one
+so young,&rsquo; and he offered me his hand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I shall see you again soon?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, now!&nbsp; Yes, very soon,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+- I wish to tell you.&nbsp; I would not let Flora - Miss Gilchrist,
+I mean - come to-day.&nbsp; I wished to see more of you myself.&nbsp;
+I trust you are not offended: you know, one should be careful about
+strangers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I approved his caution, and he took himself away: leaving me in a mixture
+of contrarious feelings, part ashamed to have played on one so gullible,
+part raging that I should have burned so much incense before the vanity
+of England; yet, in the bottom of my soul, delighted to think I had
+made a friend - or, at least, begun to make a friend - of Flora&rsquo;s
+brother.<br>
+<br>
+As I had half expected, both made their appearance the next day.&nbsp;
+I struck so fine a shade betwixt the pride that is allowed to soldiers
+and the sorrowful humility that befits a captive, that I declare, as
+I went to meet them, I might have afforded a subject for a painter.&nbsp;
+So much was high comedy, I must confess; but so soon as my eyes lighted
+full on her dark face and eloquent eyes, the blood leaped into my cheeks
+- and that was nature!&nbsp; I thanked them, but not the least with
+exultation; it was my cue to be mournful, and to take the pair of them
+as one.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have been thinking,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;you have been so
+good to me, both of you, stranger and prisoner as I am, that I have
+been thinking how I could testify to my gratitude.&nbsp; It may seem
+a strange subject for a confidence, but there is actually no one here,
+even of my comrades, that knows me by my name and title.&nbsp; By these
+I am called plain Champdivers, a name to which I have a right, but not
+the name which I should bear, and which (but a little while ago) I must
+hide like a crime.&nbsp; Miss Flora, suffer me to present to you the
+Vicomte Anne de K&eacute;roual de Saint-Yves, a private soldier.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I knew it!&rsquo; cried the boy; &lsquo;I knew he was a noble!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And I thought the eyes of Miss Flora said the same, but more persuasively.&nbsp;
+All through this interview she kept them on the ground, or only gave
+them to me for a moment at a time, and with a serious sweetness.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You may conceive, my friends, that this is rather a painful confession,&rsquo;
+I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;To stand here before you, vanquished, a prisoner
+in a fortress, and take my own name upon my lips, is painful to the
+proud.&nbsp; And yet I wished that you should know me.&nbsp; Long after
+this, we may yet hear of one another - perhaps Mr. Gilchrist and myself
+in the field and from opposing camps - and it would be a pity if we
+heard and did not recognise.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+They were both moved; and began at once to press upon me offers of service,
+such as to lend me books, get me tobacco if I used it, and the like.&nbsp;
+This would have been all mighty welcome, before the tunnel was ready.&nbsp;
+Now it signified no more to me than to offer the transition I required.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear friends,&rsquo; I said - &lsquo;for you must allow me
+to call you that, who have no others within so many hundred leagues
+- perhaps you will think me fanciful and sentimental; and perhaps indeed
+I am; but there is one service that I would beg of you before all others.&nbsp;
+You see me set here on the top of this rock in the midst of your city.&nbsp;
+Even with what liberty I have, I have the opportunity to see a myriad
+roofs, and I dare to say, thirty leagues of sea and land.&nbsp; All
+this hostile!&nbsp; Under all these roofs my enemies dwell; wherever
+I see the smoke of a house rising, I must tell myself that some one
+sits before the chimney and reads with joy of our reverses.&nbsp; Pardon
+me, dear friends, I know that you must do the same, and I do not grudge
+at it!&nbsp; With you, it is all different.&nbsp; Show me your house
+then, were it only the chimney, or, if that be not visible, the quarter
+of the town in which it lies!&nbsp; So, when I look all about me, I
+shall be able to say: &ldquo;<i>There is one house in which I am not
+quite unkindly thought of</i>.&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Flora stood a moment.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is a pretty thought,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;and, as far as
+regards Ronald and myself, a true one.&nbsp; Come, I believe I can show
+you the very smoke out of our chimney.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So saying, she carried me round the battlements towards the opposite
+or southern side of the fortress, and indeed to a bastion almost immediately
+overlooking the place of our projected flight.&nbsp; Thence we had a
+view of some foreshortened suburbs at our feet, and beyond of a green,
+open, and irregular country rising towards the Pentland Hills.&nbsp;
+The face of one of these summits (say two leagues from where we stood)
+is marked with a procession of white scars.&nbsp; And to this she directed
+my attention.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You see these marks?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;We call them
+the Seven Sisters.&nbsp; Follow a little lower with your eye, and you
+will see a fold of the hill, the tops of some trees, and a tail of smoke
+out of the midst of them.&nbsp; That is Swanston Cottage, where my brother
+and I are living with my aunt.&nbsp; If it gives you pleasure to see
+it, I am glad.&nbsp; We, too, can see the castle from a corner in the
+garden, and we go there in the morning often - do we not, Ronald? -
+and we think of you, M. de Saint-Yves; but I am afraid it does not altogether
+make us glad.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mademoiselle!&rsquo; said I, and indeed my voice was scarce under
+command, &lsquo;if you knew how your generous words - how even the sight
+of you - relieved the horrors of this place, I believe, I hope, I know,
+you would be glad.&nbsp; I will come here daily and look at that dear
+chimney and these green hills, and bless you from the heart, and dedicate
+to you the prayers of this poor sinner.&nbsp; Ah!&nbsp; I do not say
+they can avail!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who can say that, M. de Saint-Yves?&rsquo; she said softly.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But I think it is time we should be going.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;High time,&rsquo; said Ronald, whom (to say the truth) I had
+a little forgotten.<br>
+<br>
+On the way back, as I was laying myself out to recover lost ground with
+the youth, and to obliterate, if possible, the memory of my last and
+somewhat too fervent speech, who should come past us but the major?&nbsp;
+I had to stand aside and salute as he went by, but his eyes appeared
+entirely occupied with Flora.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who is that man?&rsquo; she asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He is a friend of mine,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I give him
+lessons in French, and he has been very kind to me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He stared,&rsquo; she said, - &lsquo;I do not say, rudely; but
+why should he stare?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you do not wish to be stared at, mademoiselle, suffer me to
+recommend a veil,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+She looked at me with what seemed anger.&nbsp; &lsquo;I tell you the
+man stared,&rsquo; she said.<br>
+<br>
+And Ronald added.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh, I don&rsquo;t think he meant any
+harm.&nbsp; I suppose he was just surprised to see us walking about
+with a pr - with M. Saint-Yves.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+But the next morning, when I went to Chevenix&rsquo;s rooms, and after
+I had dutifully corrected his exercise - &lsquo;I compliment you on
+your taste,&rsquo; said he to me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh no, I beg yours,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You understand
+me perfectly, just as I do you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I murmured something about enigmas.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, shall I give you the key to the enigma?&rsquo; said he,
+leaning back.&nbsp; &lsquo;That was the young lady whom Goguelat insulted
+and whom you avenged.&nbsp; I do not blame you.&nbsp; She is a heavenly
+creature.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;With all my heart, to the last of it!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And
+to the first also, if it amuses you!&nbsp; You are become so very acute
+of late that I suppose you must have your own way.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What is her name?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, really!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you think it likely
+she has told me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think it certain,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I could not restrain my laughter.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, then, do you think
+it likely I would tell you?&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not a bit.&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But come, to our lesson!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VI - THE ESCAPE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The time for our escape drew near, and the nearer it came the less we
+seemed to enjoy the prospect.&nbsp; There is but one side on which this
+castle can be left either with dignity or safety; but as there is the
+main gate and guard, and the chief street of the upper city, it is not
+to be thought of by escaping prisoners.&nbsp; In all other directions
+an abominable precipice surrounds it, down the face of which (if anywhere
+at all) we must regain our liberty.&nbsp; By our concurrent labours
+in many a dark night, working with the most anxious precautions against
+noise, we had made out to pierce below the curtain about the south-west
+corner, in a place they call the <i>Devil&rsquo;s Elbow</i>.&nbsp; I
+have never met that celebrity; nor (if the rest of him at all comes
+up to what they called his elbow) have I the least desire of his acquaintance.&nbsp;
+From the heel of the masonry, the rascally, breakneck precipice descended
+sheer among waste lands, scattered suburbs of the city, and houses in
+the building.&nbsp; I had never the heart to look for any length of
+time - the thought that I must make the descent in person some dark
+night robbing me of breath; and, indeed, on anybody not a seaman or
+a steeple-jack, the mere sight of the <i>Devil&rsquo;s Elbow</i> wrought
+like an emetic.<br>
+<br>
+I don&rsquo;t know where the rope was got, and doubt if I much cared.&nbsp;
+It was not that which gravelled me, but whether, now that we had it,
+it would serve our turn.&nbsp; Its length, indeed, we made a shift to
+fathom out; but who was to tell us how that length compared with the
+way we had to go?&nbsp; Day after day, there would be always some of
+us stolen out to the <i>Devil&rsquo;s Elbow</i> and making estimates
+of the descent, whether by a bare guess or the dropping of stones.&nbsp;
+A private of pioneers remembered the formula for that - or else remembered
+part of it and obligingly invented the remainder.&nbsp; I had never
+any real confidence in that formula; and even had we got it from a book,
+there were difficulties in the way of the application that might have
+daunted Archimedes.&nbsp; We durst not drop any considerable pebble
+lest the sentinels should hear, and those that we dropped we could not
+hear ourselves.&nbsp; We had never a watch - or none that had a second-hand;
+and though every one of us could guess a second to a nicety, all somehow
+guessed it differently.&nbsp; In short, if any two set forth upon this
+enterprise, they invariably returned with two opinions, and often with
+a black eye in the bargain.&nbsp; I looked on upon these proceedings,
+although not without laughter, yet with impatience and disgust.&nbsp;
+I am one that cannot bear to see things botched or gone upon with ignorance;
+and the thought that some poor devil was to hazard his bones upon such
+premises, revolted me.&nbsp; Had I guessed the name of that unhappy
+first adventurer, my sentiments might have been livelier still.<br>
+<br>
+The designation of this personage was indeed all that remained for us
+to do; and even in that we had advanced so far that the lot had fallen
+on Shed B.&nbsp; It had been determined to mingle the bitter and the
+sweet; and whoever went down first, the whole of his shed-mates were
+to follow next in order.&nbsp; This caused a good deal of joy in Shed
+B, and would have caused more if it had not still remained to choose
+our pioneer.&nbsp; In view of the ambiguity in which we lay as to the
+length of the rope and the height of the precipice - and that this gentleman
+was to climb down from fifty to seventy fathoms on a pitchy night, on
+a rope entirely free, and with not so much as an infant child to steady
+it at the bottom, a little backwardness was perhaps excusable.&nbsp;
+But it was, in our case, more than a little.&nbsp; The truth is, we
+were all womanish fellows about a height; and I have myself been put,
+more than once, <i>hors de combat</i> by a less affair than the rock
+of Edinburgh Castle.<br>
+<br>
+We discussed it in the dark and between the passage of the rounds; and
+it was impossible for any body of men to show a less adventurous spirit.&nbsp;
+I am sure some of us, and myself first among the number, regretted Goguelat.&nbsp;
+Some were persuaded it was safe, and could prove the same by argument;
+but if they had good reasons why some one else should make the trial,
+they had better still why it should not be themselves.&nbsp; Others,
+again, condemned the whole idea as insane; among these, as ill-luck
+would have it, a seaman of the fleet; who was the most dispiriting of
+all.&nbsp; The height, he reminded us, was greater than the tallest
+ship&rsquo;s mast, the rope entirely free; and he as good as defied
+the boldest and strongest to succeed.&nbsp; We were relieved from this
+dead-lock by our sergeant-major of dragoons.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Comrades,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;I believe I rank you all; and
+for that reason, if you really wish it, I will be the first myself.&nbsp;
+At the same time, you are to consider what the chances are that I may
+prove to be the last, as well.&nbsp; I am no longer young - I was sixty
+near a month ago.&nbsp; Since I have been a prisoner, I have made for
+myself a little <i>bedaine</i>.&nbsp; My arms are all gone to fat.&nbsp;
+And you must promise not to blame me, if I fall and play the devil with
+the whole thing.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;We cannot hear of such a thing!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;M.
+Laclas is the oldest man here; and, as such, he should be the very last
+to offer.&nbsp; It is plain, we must draw lots.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said M. Laclas; &lsquo;you put something else in my
+head!&nbsp; There is one here who owes a pretty candle to the others,
+for they have kept his secret.&nbsp; Besides, the rest of us are only
+rabble; and he is another affair altogether.&nbsp; Let Champdivers -
+let the noble go the first.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I confess there was a notable pause before the noble in question got
+his voice.&nbsp; But there was no room for choice.&nbsp; I had been
+so ill-advised, when I first joined the regiment, as to take ground
+on my nobility.&nbsp; I had been often rallied on the matter in the
+ranks, and had passed under the by-names of <i>Monseigneur</i> and <i>the
+Marquis</i>.&nbsp; It was now needful I should justify myself and take
+a fair revenge.<br>
+<br>
+Any little hesitation I may have felt passed entirely unnoticed, from
+the lucky incident of a round happening at that moment to go by.&nbsp;
+And during the interval of silence there occurred something that sent
+my blood to the boil.&nbsp; There was a private in our shed called Clausel,
+a man of a very ugly disposition.&nbsp; He had made one of the followers
+of Goguelat; but, whereas Goguelat had always a kind of monstrous gaiety
+about him, Clausel was no less morose than he was evil-minded.&nbsp;
+He was sometimes called <i>the General</i>, and sometimes by a name
+too ill-mannered for repetition.&nbsp; As we all sat listening, this
+man&rsquo;s hand was laid on my shoulder, and his voice whispered in
+my ear: &lsquo;If you don&rsquo;t go, I&rsquo;ll have you hanged, Marquis!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As soon as the round was past - &lsquo;Certainly, gentlemen!&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I will give you a lead, with all the pleasure in
+the world.&nbsp; But, first of all, there is a hound here to be punished.&nbsp;
+M. Clausel has just insulted me, and dishonoured the French army; and
+I demand that he run the gauntlet of this shed.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+There was but one voice asking what he had done, and, as soon as I had
+told them, but one voice agreeing to the punishment.&nbsp; The General
+was, in consequence, extremely roughly handled, and the next day was
+congratulated by all who saw him on his <i>new decorations</i>.&nbsp;
+It was lucky for us that he was one of the prime movers and believers
+in our project of escape, or he had certainly revenged himself by a
+denunciation.&nbsp; As for his feelings towards myself, they appeared,
+by his looks, to surpass humanity; and I made up my mind to give him
+a wide berth in the future.<br>
+<br>
+Had I been to go down that instant, I believe I could have carried it
+well.&nbsp; But it was already too late - the day was at hand.&nbsp;
+The rest had still to be summoned.&nbsp; Nor was this the extent of
+my misfortune; for the next night, and the night after, were adorned
+with a perfect galaxy of stars, and showed every cat that stirred in
+a quarter of a mile.&nbsp; During this interval, I have to direct your
+sympathies on the Vicomte de Saint-Yves!&nbsp; All addressed me softly,
+like folk round a sickbed.&nbsp; Our Italian corporal, who had got a
+dozen of oysters from a fishwife, laid them at my feet, as though I
+were a Pagan idol; and I have never since been wholly at my ease in
+the society of shellfish.&nbsp; He who was the best of our carvers brought
+me a snuff-box, which he had just completed, and which, while it was
+yet in hand, he had often declared he would not part with under fifteen
+dollars.&nbsp; I believe the piece was worth the money too!&nbsp; And
+yet the voice stuck in my throat with which I must thank him.&nbsp;
+I found myself, in a word, to be fed up like a prisoner in a camp of
+anthropophagi, and honoured like the sacrificial bull.&nbsp; And what
+with these annoyances, and the risky venture immediately ahead, I found
+my part a trying one to play.<br>
+<br>
+It was a good deal of a relief when the third evening closed about the
+castle with volumes of sea-fog.&nbsp; The lights of Princes Street sometimes
+disappeared, sometimes blinked across at us no brighter than the eyes
+of cats; and five steps from one of the lanterns on the ramparts it
+was already groping dark.&nbsp; We made haste to lie down.&nbsp; Had
+our jailers been upon the watch, they must have observed our conversation
+to die out unusually soon.&nbsp; Yet I doubt if any of us slept.&nbsp;
+Each lay in his place, tortured at once with the hope of liberty and
+the fear of a hateful death.&nbsp; The guard call sounded; the hum of
+the town declined by little and little.&nbsp; On all sides of us, in
+their different quarters, we could hear the watchman cry the hours along
+the street.&nbsp; Often enough, during my stay in England, have I listened
+to these gruff or broken voices; or perhaps gone to my window when I
+lay sleepless, and watched the old gentleman hobble by upon the causeway
+with his cape and his cap, his hanger and his rattle.&nbsp; It was ever
+a thought with me how differently that cry would re-echo in the chamber
+of lovers, beside the bed of death, or in the condemned cell.&nbsp;
+I might be said to hear it that night myself in the condemned cell!&nbsp;
+At length a fellow with a voice like a bull&rsquo;s began to roar out
+in the opposite thoroughfare:<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Past yin o&rsquo;cloak, and a dark, haary moarnin&rsquo;.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At which we were all silently afoot.<br>
+<br>
+As I stole about the battlements towards the - gallows, I was about
+to write - the sergeant-major, perhaps doubtful of my resolution, kept
+close by me, and occasionally proffered the most indigestible reassurances
+in my ear.&nbsp; At last I could bear them no longer.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Be so obliging as to let me be!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+am neither a coward nor a fool.&nbsp; What do <i>you</i> know of whether
+the rope be long enough?&nbsp; But I shall know it in ten minutes!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The good old fellow laughed in his moustache, and patted me.<br>
+<br>
+It was all very well to show the disposition of my temper before a friend
+alone; before my assembled comrades the thing had to go handsomely.&nbsp;
+It was then my time to come on the stage; and I hope I took it handsomely.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, gentlemen,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;if the rope is ready, here
+is the criminal!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The tunnel was cleared, the stake driven, the rope extended.&nbsp; As
+I moved forward to the place, many of my comrades caught me by the hand
+and wrung it, an attention I could well have done without.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Keep an eye on Clausel!&rsquo; I whispered to Laclas; and with
+that, got down on my elbows and knees took the rope in both hands, and
+worked myself, feet foremost, through the tunnel.&nbsp; When the earth
+failed under my feet, I thought my heart would have stopped; and a moment
+after I was demeaning myself in mid-air like a drunken jumping-jack.&nbsp;
+I have never been a model of piety, but at this juncture prayers and
+a cold sweat burst from me simultaneously.<br>
+<br>
+The line was knotted at intervals of eighteen inches; and to the inexpert
+it may seem as if it should have been even easy to descend.&nbsp; The
+trouble was, this devil of a piece of rope appeared to be inspired,
+not with life alone, but with a personal malignity against myself.&nbsp;
+It turned to the one side, paused for a moment, and then spun me like
+a toasting-jack to the other; slipped like an eel from the clasp of
+my feet; kept me all the time in the most outrageous fury of exertion;
+and dashed me at intervals against the face of the rock.&nbsp; I had
+no eyes to see with; and I doubt if there was anything to see but darkness.&nbsp;
+I must occasionally have caught a gasp of breath, but it was quite unconscious.&nbsp;
+And the whole forces of my mind were so consumed with losing hold and
+getting it again, that I could scarce have told whether I was going
+up or coming down.<br>
+<br>
+Of a sudden I knocked against the cliff with such a thump as almost
+bereft me of my sense; and, as reason twinkled back, I was amazed to
+find that I was in a state of rest, that the face of the precipice here
+inclined outwards at an angle which relieved me almost wholly of the
+burthen of my own weight, and that one of my feet was safely planted
+on a ledge.&nbsp; I drew one of the sweetest breaths in my experience,
+hugged myself against the rope, and closed my eyes in a kind of ecstasy
+of relief.&nbsp; It occurred to me next to see how far I was advanced
+on my unlucky journey, a point on which I had not a shadow of a guess.&nbsp;
+I looked up: there was nothing above me but the blackness of the night
+and the fog.&nbsp; I craned timidly forward and looked down.&nbsp; There,
+upon a floor of darkness, I beheld a certain pattern of hazy lights,
+some of them aligned as in thoroughfares, others standing apart as in
+solitary houses; and before I could well realise it, or had in the least
+estimated my distance, a wave of nausea and vertigo warned me to lie
+back and close my eyes.&nbsp; In this situation I had really but the
+one wish, and that was: something else to think of!&nbsp; Strange to
+say, I got it: a veil was torn from my mind, and I saw what a fool I
+was - what fools we had all been - and that I had no business to be
+thus dangling between earth and heaven by my arms.&nbsp; The only thing
+to have done was to have attached me to a rope and lowered me, and I
+had never the wit to see it till that moment!<br>
+<br>
+I filled my lungs, got a good hold on my rope, and once more launched
+myself on the descent.&nbsp; As it chanced, the worst of the danger
+was at an end, and I was so fortunate as to be never again exposed to
+any violent concussion.&nbsp; Soon after I must have passed within a
+little distance of a bush of wallflower, for the scent of it came over
+me with that impression of reality which characterises scents in darkness.&nbsp;
+This made me a second landmark, the ledge being my first.&nbsp; I began
+accordingly to compute intervals of time: so much to the ledge, so much
+again to the wallflower, so much more below.&nbsp; If I were not at
+the bottom of the rock, I calculated I must be near indeed to the end
+of the rope, and there was no doubt that I was not far from the end
+of my own resources.&nbsp; I began to be light-headed and to be tempted
+to let go, - now arguing that I was certainly arrived within a few feet
+of the level and could safely risk a fall, anon persuaded I was still
+close at the top and it was idle to continue longer on the rock.&nbsp;
+In the midst of which I came to a bearing on plain ground, and had nearly
+wept aloud.&nbsp; My hands were as good as flayed, my courage entirely
+exhausted, and, what with the long strain and the sudden relief, my
+limbs shook under me with more than the violence of ague, and I was
+glad to cling to the rope.<br>
+<br>
+But this was no time to give way.&nbsp; I had (by God&rsquo;s single
+mercy) got myself alive out of that fortress; and now I had to try to
+get the others, my comrades.&nbsp; There was about a fathom of rope
+to spare; I got it by the end, and searched the whole ground thoroughly
+for anything to make it fast to.&nbsp; In vain: the ground was broken
+and stony, but there grew not there so much as a bush of furze.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now then,&rsquo; thought I to myself, &lsquo;here begins a new
+lesson, and I believe it will prove richer than the first.&nbsp; I am
+not strong enough to keep this rope extended.&nbsp; If I do not keep
+it extended the next man will be dashed against the precipice.&nbsp;
+There is no reason why he should have my extravagant good luck.&nbsp;
+I see no reason why he should not fall - nor any place for him to fall
+on but my head.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible, as the
+fog lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which gave me a
+measure of the height he had to fall and the horrid force that he must
+strike me with.&nbsp; What was yet worse, we had agreed to do without
+signals: every so many minutes by Laclas&rsquo; watch another man was
+to be started from the battlements.&nbsp; Now, I had seemed to myself
+to be about half an hour in my descent, and it seemed near as long again
+that I waited, straining on the rope for my next comrade to begin.&nbsp;
+I began to be afraid that our conspiracy was out, that my friends were
+all secured, and that I should pass the remainder of the night, and
+be discovered in the morning, vainly clinging to the rope&rsquo;s end
+like a hooked fish upon an angle.&nbsp; I could not refrain, at this
+ridiculous image, from a chuckle of laughter.&nbsp; And the next moment
+I knew, by the jerking of the rope, that my friend had crawled out of
+the tunnel and was fairly launched on his descent.&nbsp; It appears
+it was the sailor who had insisted on succeeding me: as soon as my continued
+silence had assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier, for that
+was his name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself so
+extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.&nbsp; It was like the
+fellow, who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive selfishness.&nbsp;
+But he was like to have paid pretty dearly for the privilege.&nbsp;
+Do as I would, I could not keep the rope as I could have wished it;
+and he ended at last by falling on me from a height of several yards,
+so that we both rolled together on the ground.&nbsp; As soon as he could
+breathe he cursed me beyond belief, wept over his finger, which he had
+broken, and cursed me again.&nbsp; I bade him be still and think shame
+of himself to be so great a cry-baby.&nbsp; Did he not hear the round
+going by above? I asked; and who could tell but what the noise of his
+fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the very moment leaning
+upon the battlements to listen?<br>
+<br>
+The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the third man
+came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of course, child&rsquo;s
+play; and before there were ten of us collected, it seemed to me that,
+without the least injustice to my comrades, I might proceed to take
+care of myself.<br>
+<br>
+I knew their plan: they had a map and an almanack, and designed for
+Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.&nbsp; Suppose them to
+do so, I had no idea they were qualified to manage it after it was stolen.&nbsp;
+Their whole escape, indeed, was the most haphazard thing imaginable;
+only the impatience of captives and the ignorance of private soldiers
+would have entertained so misbegotten a device; and though I played
+the good comrade and worked with them upon the tunnel, but for the lawyer&rsquo;s
+message I should have let them go without me.&nbsp; Well, now they were
+beyond my help, as they had always been beyond my counselling; and,
+without word said or leave taken, I stole out of the little crowd.&nbsp;
+It is true I would rather have waited to shake hands with Laclas, but
+in the last man who had descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and
+since the scene in the shed my distrust of Clausel was perfect.&nbsp;
+I believed the man to be capable of any infamy, and events have since
+shown that I was right.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VII - SWANSTON COTTAGE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I had two views.&nbsp; The first was, naturally, to get clear of Edinburgh
+Castle and the town, to say nothing of my fellow-prisoners; the second
+to work to the southward so long as it was night, and be near Swanston
+Cottage by morning.&nbsp; What I should do there and then, I had no
+guess, and did not greatly care, being a devotee of a couple of divinities
+called Chance and Circumstance.&nbsp; Prepare, if possible; where it
+is impossible, work straight forward, and keep your eyes open and your
+tongue oiled.&nbsp; Wit and a good exterior - there is all life in a
+nutshell.<br>
+<br>
+I had at first a rather chequered journey: got involved in gardens,
+butted into houses, and had even once the misfortune to awake a sleeping
+family, the father of which, as I suppose, menaced me from the window
+with a blunderbuss.&nbsp; Altogether, though I had been some time gone
+from my companions, I was still at no great distance, when a miserable
+accident put a period to the escape.&nbsp; Of a sudden the night was
+divided by a scream.&nbsp; This was followed by the sound of something
+falling, and that again by the report of a musket from the Castle battlements.&nbsp;
+It was strange to hear the alarm spread through the city.&nbsp; In the
+fortress drums were beat and a bell rung backward.&nbsp; On all hands
+the watchmen sprang their rattles.&nbsp; Even in that limbo or no-man&rsquo;s-land
+where I was wandering, lights were made in the houses; sashes were flung
+up; I could hear neighbouring families converse from window to window,
+and at length I was challenged myself.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Wha&rsquo;s that?&rsquo; cried a big voice.<br>
+<br>
+I could see it proceeded from a big man in a big nightcap, leaning from
+a one-pair window; and as I was not yet abreast of his house, I judged
+it was more wise to answer.&nbsp; This was not the first time I had
+had to stake my fortunes on the goodness of my accent in a foreign tongue;
+and I have always found the moment inspiriting, as a gambler should.&nbsp;
+Pulling around me a sort of great-coat I had made of my blanket, to
+cover my sulphur-coloured livery, - &lsquo;A friend!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What like&rsquo;s all this collieshangie?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I had never heard of a collieshangie in my days, but with the racket
+all about us in the city, I could have no doubt as to the man&rsquo;s
+meaning.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I do not know, sir, really,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but I suppose
+some of the prisoners will have escaped.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Bedamned!&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, sir, they will be soon taken,&rsquo; I replied: &lsquo;it
+has been found in time.&nbsp; Good morning, sir!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ye walk late, sir?&rsquo; he added.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, surely not,&rsquo; said I, with a laugh.&nbsp; &lsquo;Earlyish,
+if you like!&rsquo; which brought me finally beyond him, highly pleased
+with my success.<br>
+<br>
+I was now come forth on a good thoroughfare, which led (as well as I
+could judge) in my direction.&nbsp; It brought me almost immediately
+through a piece of street, whence I could hear close by the springing
+of a watchman&rsquo;s rattle, and where I suppose a sixth part of the
+windows would be open, and the people, in all sorts of night gear, talking
+with a kind of tragic gusto from one to another.&nbsp; Here, again,
+I must run the gauntlet of a half-dozen questions, the rattle all the
+while sounding nearer; but as I was not walking inordinately quick,
+as I spoke like a gentleman, and the lamps were too dim to show my dress,
+I carried it off once more.&nbsp; One person, indeed, inquired where
+I was off to at that hour.<br>
+<br>
+I replied vaguely and cheerfully, and as I escaped at one end of this
+dangerous pass I could see the watchman&rsquo;s lantern entering by
+the other.&nbsp; I was now safe on a dark country highway, out of sight
+of lights and out of the fear of watchmen.&nbsp; And yet I had not gone
+above a hundred yards before a fellow made an ugly rush at me from the
+roadside.&nbsp; I avoided him with a leap, and stood on guard, cursing
+my empty hands, wondering whether I had to do with an officer or a mere
+footpad, and scarce knowing which to wish.&nbsp; My assailant stood
+a little; in the thick darkness I could see him bob and sidle as though
+he were feinting at me for an advantageous onfall.&nbsp; Then he spoke.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My goo&rsquo; frien&rsquo;,&rsquo; says he, and at the first
+word I pricked my ears, &lsquo;my goo&rsquo; frien&rsquo;, will you
+oblishe me with lil neshary infamation?&nbsp; Whish roa&rsquo; t&rsquo;
+Cramond?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I laughed out clear and loud, stepped up to the convivialist, took him
+by the shoulders and faced him about.&nbsp; &lsquo;My good friend,&rsquo;
+said I, &lsquo;I believe I know what is best for you much better than
+yourself, and may God forgive you the fright you have given me!&nbsp;
+There, get you gone to Edinburgh!&rsquo;&nbsp; And I gave a shove, which
+he obeyed with the passive agility of a ball, and disappeared incontinently
+in the darkness down the road by which I had myself come.<br>
+<br>
+Once clear of this foolish fellow, I went on again up a gradual hill,
+descended on the other side through the houses of a country village,
+and came at last to the bottom of the main ascent leading to the Pentlands
+and my destination.&nbsp; I was some way up when the fog began to lighten;
+a little farther, and I stepped by degrees into a clear starry night,
+and saw in front of me, and quite distinct, the summits of the Pentlands,
+and behind, the valley of the Forth and the city of my late captivity
+buried under a lake of vapour.&nbsp; I had but one encounter - that
+of a farm-cart, which I heard, from a great way ahead of me, creaking
+nearer in the night, and which passed me about the point of dawn like
+a thing seen in a dream, with two silent figures in the inside nodding
+to the horse&rsquo;s steps.&nbsp; I presume they were asleep; by the
+shawl about her head and shoulders, one of them should be a woman.&nbsp;
+Soon, by concurrent steps, the day began to break and the fog to subside
+and roll away.&nbsp; The east grew luminous and was barred with chilly
+colours, and the Castle on its rock, and the spires and chimneys of
+the upper town, took gradual shape, and arose, like islands, out of
+the receding cloud.&nbsp; All about me was still and sylvan; the road
+mounting and winding, with nowhere a sign of any passenger, the birds
+chirping, I suppose for warmth, the boughs of the trees knocking together,
+and the red leaves falling in the wind.<br>
+<br>
+It was broad day, but still bitter cold and the sun not up, when I came
+in view of my destination.&nbsp; A single gable and chimney of the cottage
+peeped over the shoulder of the hill; not far off, and a trifle higher
+on the mountain, a tall old white-washed farmhouse stood among the trees,
+beside a falling brook; beyond were rough hills of pasture.&nbsp; I
+bethought me that shepherd folk were early risers, and if I were once
+seen skulking in that neighbourhood it might prove the ruin of my prospects;
+took advantage of a line of hedge, and worked myself up in its shadow
+till I was come under the garden wall of my friends&rsquo; house.&nbsp;
+The cottage was a little quaint place of many rough-cast gables and
+grey roofs.&nbsp; It had something the air of a rambling infinitesimal
+cathedral, the body of it rising in the midst two storeys high, with
+a steep-pitched roof, and sending out upon all hands (as it were chapter-houses,
+chapels, and transepts) one-storeyed and dwarfish projections.&nbsp;
+To add to this appearance, it was grotesquely decorated with crockets
+and gargoyles, ravished from some medieval church.&nbsp; The place seemed
+hidden away, being not only concealed in the trees of the garden, but,
+on the side on which I approached it, buried as high as the eaves by
+the rising of the ground.&nbsp; About the walls of the garden there
+went a line of well-grown elms and beeches, the first entirely bare,
+the last still pretty well covered with red leaves, and the centre was
+occupied with a thicket of laurel and holly, in which I could see arches
+cut and paths winding.<br>
+<br>
+I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the better.&nbsp;
+The house appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to wake any one, I had
+no guarantee it might not prove either the aunt with the gold eyeglasses
+(whom I could only remember with trembling), or some ass of a servant-maid
+who should burst out screaming at sight of me.&nbsp; Higher up I could
+hear and see a shepherd shouting to his dogs and striding on the rough
+sides of the mountain, and it was clear I must get to cover without
+loss of time.&nbsp; No doubt the holly thickets would have proved a
+very suitable retreat, but there was mounted on the wall a sort of signboard
+not uncommon in the country of Great Britain, and very damping to the
+adventurous: SPRING GUNS AND MAN-TRAPS was the legend that it bore.&nbsp;
+I have learned since that these advertisements, three times out of four,
+were in the nature of Quaker guns on a disarmed battery, but I had not
+learned it then, and even so, the odds would not have been good enough.&nbsp;
+For a choice, I would a hundred times sooner be returned to Edinburgh
+Castle and my corner in the bastion, than to leave my foot in a steel
+trap or have to digest the contents of an automatic blunderbuss.&nbsp;
+There was but one chance left - that Ronald or Flora might be the first
+to come abroad; and in order to profit by this chance if it occurred,
+I got me on the cope of the wall in a place where it was screened by
+the thick branches of a beech, and sat there waiting.<br>
+<br>
+As the day wore on, the sun came very pleasantly out.&nbsp; I had been
+awake all night, I had undergone the most violent agitations of mind
+and body, and it is not so much to be wondered at, as it was exceedingly
+unwise and foolhardy, that I should have dropped into a doze.&nbsp;
+From this I awakened to the characteristic sound of digging, looked
+down, and saw immediately below me the back view of a gardener in a
+stable waistcoat.&nbsp; Now he would appear steadily immersed in his
+business; anon, to my more immediate terror, he would straighten his
+back, stretch his arms, gaze about the otherwise deserted garden, and
+relish a deep pinch of snuff.&nbsp; It was my first thought to drop
+from the wall upon the other side.&nbsp; A glance sufficed to show me
+that even the way by which I had come was now cut off, and the field
+behind me already occupied by a couple of shepherds&rsquo; assistants
+and a score or two of sheep.&nbsp; I have named the talismans on which
+I habitually depend, but here was a conjuncture in which both were wholly
+useless.&nbsp; The copestone of a wall arrayed with broken bottles is
+no favourable rostrum; and I might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as fascinating
+as Richelieu, and neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads would care
+a halfpenny.&nbsp; In short, there was no escape possible from my absurd
+position: there I must continue to sit until one or other of my neighbours
+should raise his eyes and give the signal for my capture.<br>
+<br>
+The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could be scarce
+less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of the beech which
+made a fashion of sheltering me were already partly fallen; and I was
+thus not only perilously exposed myself, but enabled to command some
+part of the garden walks and (under an evergreen arch) the front lawn
+and windows of the cottage.&nbsp; For long nothing stirred except my
+friend with the spade; then I heard the opening of a sash; and presently
+after saw Miss Flora appear in a morning wrapper and come strolling
+hitherward between the borders, pausing and visiting her flowers - herself
+as fair.&nbsp; <i>There</i> was a friend; <i>here</i>, immediately beneath
+me, an unknown quantity - the gardener: how to communicate with the
+one and not attract the notice of the other?&nbsp; To make a noise was
+out of the question; I dared scarce to breathe.&nbsp; I held myself
+ready to make a gesture as soon as she should look, and she looked in
+every possible direction but the one.&nbsp; She was interested in the
+vilest tuft of chickweed, she gazed at the summit of the mountain, she
+came even immediately below me and conversed on the most fastidious
+topics with the gardener; but to the top of that wall she would not
+dedicate a glance!&nbsp; At last she began to retrace her steps in the
+direction of the cottage; whereupon, becoming quite desperate, I broke
+off a piece of plaster, took a happy aim, and hit her with it in the
+nape of the neck.&nbsp; She clapped her hand to the place, turned about,
+looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying me (as indeed I was
+parting the branches to make it the more easy), half uttered and half
+swallowed down again a cry of surprise.<br>
+<br>
+The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.&nbsp; &lsquo;What&rsquo;s
+your wull, miss?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+Her readiness amazed me.&nbsp; She had already turned and was gazing
+in the opposite direction.&nbsp; &lsquo;There&rsquo;s a child among
+the artichokes,&rsquo; she said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The Plagues of Egyp&rsquo;!&nbsp; <i>I&rsquo;ll</i> see to them!&rsquo;
+cried the gardener truculently, and with a hurried waddle disappeared
+among the evergreens.<br>
+<br>
+That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms stretched
+out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with heavenly blushes,
+the next pale as death.&nbsp; &lsquo;Monsieur de. Saint-Yves!&rsquo;
+she said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear young lady,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;this is the damnedest
+liberty - I know it!&nbsp; But what else was I to do?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have escaped?&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you call this escape,&rsquo; I replied.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But you cannot possibly stop there!&rsquo; she cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I know it,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And where am I to go?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She struck her hands together.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have it!&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Come down by the beech trunk - you must leave no footprint in
+the border - quickly, before Robie can get back!&nbsp; I am the hen-wife
+here: I keep the key; you must go into the hen-house - for the moment.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was by her side at once.&nbsp; Both cast a hasty glance at the blank
+windows of the cottage and so much as was visible of the garden alleys;
+it seemed there was none to observe us.&nbsp; She caught me by the sleeve
+and ran.&nbsp; It was no time for compliments; hurry breathed upon our
+necks; and I ran along with her to the next corner of the garden, where
+a wired court and a board hovel standing in a grove of trees advertised
+my place of refuge.&nbsp; She thrust me in without a word; the bulk
+of the fowls were at the same time emitted; and I found myself the next
+moment locked in alone with half a dozen sitting hens.&nbsp; In the
+twilight of the place all fixed their eyes on me severely, and seemed
+to upbraid me with some crying impropriety.&nbsp; Doubtless the hen
+has always a puritanic appearance, although (in its own behaviour) I
+could never observe it to be more particular than its neighbours.&nbsp;
+But conceive a British hen!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER VIII - THE HEN-HOUSE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I was half an hour at least in the society of these distressing bipeds,
+and alone with my own reflections and necessities.&nbsp; I was in great
+pain of my flayed hands, and had nothing to treat them with; I was hungry
+and thirsty, and had nothing to eat or to drink; I was thoroughly tired,
+and there was no place for me to sit.&nbsp; To be sure there was the
+floor, but nothing could be imagined less inviting.<br>
+<br>
+At the sound of approaching footsteps, my good-humour was restored.&nbsp;
+The key rattled in the lock, and Master Ronald entered, closed the door
+behind him, and leaned his back to it.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I say, you know!&rsquo; he said, and shook a sullen young head.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I know it&rsquo;s a liberty,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s infernally awkward: my position is infernally embarrassing,&rsquo;
+said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and what do you think of mine?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+This seemed to pose him entirely, and he remained gazing upon me with
+a convincing air of youth and innocence.&nbsp; I could have laughed,
+but I was not so inhumane.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am in your hands,&rsquo; said I, with a little gesture.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You must do with me what you think right.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah, yes!&rsquo; he cried: &lsquo;if I knew!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You see,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it would be different if you had
+received your commission.&nbsp; Properly speaking, you are not yet a
+combatant; I have ceased to be one; and I think it arguable that we
+are just in the position of one ordinary gentleman to another, where
+friendship usually comes before the law.&nbsp; Observe, I only say <i>arguable</i>.&nbsp;
+For God&rsquo;s sake, don&rsquo;t think I wish to dictate an opinion.&nbsp;
+These are the sort of nasty little businesses, inseparable from war,
+which every gentleman must decide for himself.&nbsp; If I were in your
+place - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, what would you do, then?&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Upon my word, I do not know,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hesitate,
+as you are doing, I believe.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I will tell you,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a kinsman,
+and it is what <i>he</i> would think, that I am thinking.&nbsp; It is
+General Graham of Lynedoch - Sir Thomas Graham.&nbsp; I scarcely know
+him, but I believe I admire him more than I do God.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I admire him a good deal myself,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and have
+good reason to.&nbsp; I have fought with him, been beaten, and run away.&nbsp;
+<i>Veni, victus sum, evasi</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;You were at Barossa?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There and back, which many could not say,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It was a pretty affair and a hot one, and the Spaniards behaved
+abominably, as they usually did in a pitched field; the Marshal Duke
+of Belluno made a fool of himself, and not for the first time; and your
+friend Sir Thomas had the best of it, so far as there was any best.&nbsp;
+He is a brave and ready officer.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, then, you will understand!&rsquo; said the boy.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+wish to please Sir Thomas: what would he do?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I can tell you a story,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;a true one
+too, and about this very combat of Chiclana, or Barossa as you call
+it.&nbsp; I was in the Eighth of the Line; we lost the eagle of the
+First Battalion, more betoken, but it cost you dear.&nbsp; Well, we
+had repulsed more charges than I care to count, when your 87th Regiment
+came on at a foot&rsquo;s pace, very slow but very steady; in front
+of them a mounted officer, his hat in his hand, white-haired, and talking
+very quietly to the battalions.&nbsp; Our Major, Vigo-Roussillon, set
+spurs to his horse and galloped out to sabre him, but seeing him an
+old man, very handsome, and as composed as if he were in a coffee-house,
+lost heart and galloped back again.&nbsp; Only, you see, they had been
+very close together for the moment, and looked each other in the eyes.&nbsp;
+Soon after the Major was wounded, taken prisoner, and carried into Cadiz.&nbsp;
+One fine day they announced to him the visit of the General, Sir Thomas
+Graham.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well, sir,&rdquo; said the General, taking him
+by the hand, &ldquo;I think we were face to face upon the field.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+It was the white-haired officer!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; cried the boy, - his eyes were burning.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, and here is the point,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;Sir
+Thomas fed the Major from his own table from that day, and served him
+with six covers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, it is a beautiful - a beautiful story,&rsquo; said Ronald.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And yet somehow it is not the same - is it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I admit it freely,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+The boy stood awhile brooding.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, I take my risk of
+it,&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;I believe it&rsquo;s treason to my
+sovereign - I believe there is an infamous punishment for such a crime
+- and yet I&rsquo;m hanged if I can give you up&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was as much moved as he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I could almost beg you to do
+otherwise,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I was a brute to come to you,
+a brute and a coward.&nbsp; You are a noble enemy; you will make a noble
+soldier.&rsquo;&nbsp; And with rather a happy idea of a compliment for
+this warlike youth, I stood up straight and gave him the salute.<br>
+<br>
+He was for a moment confused; his face flushed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, well,
+I must be getting you something to eat, but it will not be for six,&rsquo;
+he added, with a smile: &lsquo;only what we can get smuggled out.&nbsp;
+There is my aunt in the road, you see,&rsquo; and he locked me in again
+with the indignant hens.<br>
+<br>
+I always smile when I recall that young fellow; and yet, if the reader
+were to smile also, I should feel ashamed.&nbsp; If my son shall be
+only like him when he comes to that age, it will be a brave day for
+me and not a bad one for his country.<br>
+<br>
+At the same time I cannot pretend that I was sorry when his sister succeeded
+in his place.&nbsp; She brought me a few crusts of bread and a jug of
+milk, which she had handsomely laced with whisky after the Scottish
+manner.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am so sorry,&rsquo; she said: &lsquo;I dared not bring on anything
+more.&nbsp; We are so small a family, and my aunt keeps such an eye
+upon the servants.&nbsp; I have put some whisky in the milk - it is
+more wholesome so - and with eggs you will be able to make something
+of a meal.&nbsp; How many eggs will you be wanting to that milk? for
+I must be taking the others to my aunt - that is my excuse for being
+here.&nbsp; I should think three or four.&nbsp; Do you know how to beat
+them? or shall I do it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Willing to detain her a while longer in the hen-house, I displayed my
+bleeding palms; at which she cried aloud.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear Miss Flora, you cannot make an omelette without breaking
+eggs,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and it is no bagatelle to escape from Edinburgh
+Castle.&nbsp; One of us, I think, was even killed.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And you are as white as a rag, too,&rsquo; she exclaimed, &lsquo;and
+can hardly stand!&nbsp; Here is my shawl, sit down upon it here in the
+corner, and I will beat your eggs.&nbsp; See, I have brought a fork
+too; I should have been a good person to take care of Jacobites or Covenanters
+in old days!&nbsp; You shall have more to eat this evening; Ronald is
+to bring it you from town.&nbsp; We have money enough, although no food
+that we can call our own.&nbsp; Ah, if Ronald and I kept house, you
+should not be lying in this shed!&nbsp; He admires you so much.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear friend,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;for God&rsquo;s sake do
+not embarrass me with more alms.&nbsp; I loved to receive them from
+that hand, so long as they were needed; but they are so no more, and
+whatever else I may lack - and I lack everything - it is not money.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I pulled out my sheaf of notes and detached the top one: it was written
+for ten pounds, and signed by that very famous individual, Abraham Newlands.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Oblige me, as you would like me to oblige your brother if the
+parts were reversed, and take this note for the expenses.&nbsp; I shall
+need not only food, but clothes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Lay it on the ground,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;I must not
+stop my beating.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are not offended?&rsquo; I exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+She answered me by a look that was a reward in itself, and seemed to
+imply the most heavenly offers for the future.&nbsp; There was in it
+a shadow of reproach, and such warmth of communicative cordiality as
+left me speechless.&nbsp; I watched her instead till her hens&rsquo;
+milk was ready.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;taste that.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I did so, and swore it was nectar.&nbsp; She collected her eggs and
+crouched in front of me to watch me eat.&nbsp; There was about this
+tall young lady at the moment an air of motherliness delicious to behold.&nbsp;
+I am like the English general, and to this day I still wonder at my
+moderation.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What sort of clothes will you be wanting?&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The clothes of a gentleman,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Right
+or wrong, I think it is the part I am best qualified to play.&nbsp;
+Mr. St. Ives (for that&rsquo;s to be my name upon the journey) I conceive
+as rather a theatrical figure, and his make-up should be to match.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And yet there is a difficulty,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;If
+you got coarse clothes the fit would hardly matter.&nbsp; But the clothes
+of a fine gentleman - O, it is absolutely necessary that these should
+fit!&nbsp; And above all, with your&rsquo; - she paused a moment - &lsquo;to
+our ideas somewhat noticeable manners.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Alas for my poor manners!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But my
+dear friend Flora, these little noticeabilities are just what mankind
+has to suffer under.&nbsp; Yourself, you see, you&rsquo;re very noticeable
+even when you come in a crowd to visit poor prisoners in the Castle.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was afraid I should frighten my good angel visitant away, and without
+the smallest breath of pause went on to add a few directions as to stuffs
+and colours.<br>
+<br>
+She opened big eyes upon me.&nbsp; &lsquo;O, Mr. St. Ives!&rsquo; she
+cried - &lsquo;if that is to be your name - I do not say they would
+not be becoming; but for a journey, do you think they would be wise?&nbsp;
+I am afraid&rsquo; - she gave a pretty break of laughter - &lsquo;I
+am afraid they would be daft-like!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, and am I not daft?&rsquo; I asked her.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I do begin to think you are,&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There it is, then!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have been long
+enough a figure of fun.&nbsp; Can you not feel with me that perhaps
+the bitterest thing in this captivity has been the clothes?&nbsp; Make
+me a captive - bind me with chains if you like - but let me be still
+myself.&nbsp; You do not know what it is to be a walking travesty -
+among foes,&rsquo; I added bitterly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, but you are too unjust!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+speak as though any one ever dreamed of laughing at you.&nbsp; But no
+one did.&nbsp; We were all pained to the heart.&nbsp; Even my aunt -
+though sometimes I do think she was not quite in good taste - you should
+have seen her and heard her at home!&nbsp; She took so much interest.&nbsp;
+Every patch in your clothes made us sorry; it should have been a sister&rsquo;s
+work.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That is what I never had - a sister,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+since you say that I did not make you laugh - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, Mr. St. Ives! never!&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not
+for one moment.&nbsp; It was all too sad.&nbsp; To see a gentleman&nbsp;
+- &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In the clothes of a harlequin, and begging?&rsquo; I suggested.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To see a gentleman in distress, and nobly supporting it,&rsquo;
+she said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And do you not understand, my fair foe,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;that
+even if all were as you say - even if you had thought my travesty were
+becoming - I should be only the more anxious, for my sake, for my country&rsquo;s
+sake, and for the sake of your kindness, that you should see him whom
+you have helped as God meant him to be seen? that you should have something
+to remember him by at least more characteristic than a misfitting sulphur-yellow
+suit, and half a week&rsquo;s beard?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You think a great deal too much of clothes,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am not that kind of girl.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I am afraid I am that kind of man,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+do not think of me too harshly for that.&nbsp; I talked just now of
+something to remember by.&nbsp; I have many of them myself, of these
+beautiful reminders, of these keepsakes, that I cannot be parted from
+until I lose memory and life.&nbsp; Many of them are great things, many
+of them are high virtues - charity, mercy, faith.&nbsp; But some of
+them are trivial enough.&nbsp; Miss Flora, do you remember the day that
+I first saw you, the day of the strong east wind?&nbsp; Miss Flora,
+shall I tell you what you wore?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+We had both risen to our feet, and she had her hand already on the door
+to go.&nbsp; Perhaps this attitude emboldened me to profit by the last
+seconds of our interview; and it certainly rendered her escape the more
+easy.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, you are too romantic!&rsquo; she said, laughing; and with
+that my sun was blown out, my enchantress had fled away, and I was again
+left alone in the twilight with the lady hens.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER IX - THREE IS COMPANY, AND FOUR NONE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The rest of the day I slept in the corner of the hen-house upon Flora&rsquo;s
+shawl.&nbsp; Nor did I awake until a light shone suddenly in my eyes,
+and starting up with a gasp (for, indeed, at the moment I dreamed I
+was still swinging from the Castle battlements) I found Ronald bending
+over me with a lantern.&nbsp; It appeared it was past midnight, that
+I had slept about sixteen hours, and that Flora had returned her poultry
+to the shed and I had heard her not.&nbsp; I could not but wonder if
+she had stooped to look at me as I slept.&nbsp; The puritan hens now
+slept irremediably; and being cheered with the promise of supper I wished
+them an ironical good-night, and was lighted across the garden and noiselessly
+admitted to a bedroom on the ground floor of the cottage.&nbsp; There
+I found soap, water, razors - offered me diffidently by my beardless
+host - and an outfit of new clothes.&nbsp; To be shaved again without
+depending on the barber of the gaol was a source of a delicious, if
+a childish joy.&nbsp; My hair was sadly too long, but I was none so
+unwise as to make an attempt on it myself.&nbsp; And, indeed, I thought
+it did not wholly misbecome me as it was, being by nature curly.&nbsp;
+The clothes were about as good as I expected.&nbsp; The waistcoat was
+of toilenet, a pretty piece, the trousers of fine kerseymere, and the
+coat sat extraordinarily well.&nbsp; Altogether, when I beheld this
+changeling in the glass, I kissed my hand to him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear fellow,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;have you no scent?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good God, no!&rsquo; cried Ronald.&nbsp; &lsquo;What do you want
+with scent?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Capital thing on a campaign,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+I can do without.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was now led, with the same precautions against noise, into the little
+bow-windowed dining-room of the cottage.&nbsp; The shutters were up,
+the lamp guiltily turned low; the beautiful Flora greeted me in a whisper;
+and when I was set down to table, the pair proceeded to help me with
+precautions that might have seemed excessive in the Ear of Dionysius.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;She sleeps up there,&rsquo; observed the boy, pointing to the
+ceiling; and the knowledge that I was so imminently near to the resting-place
+of that gold eyeglass touched even myself with some uneasiness.<br>
+<br>
+Our excellent youth had imported from the city a meat pie, and I was
+glad to find it flanked with a decanter of really admirable wine of
+Oporto.&nbsp; While I ate, Ronald entertained me with the news of the
+city, which had naturally rung all day with our escape: troops and mounted
+messengers had followed each other forth at all hours and in all directions;
+but according to the last intelligence no recapture had been made.&nbsp;
+Opinion in town was very favourable to us: our courage was applauded,
+and many professed regret that our ultimate chance of escape should
+be so small.&nbsp; The man who had fallen was one Sombref, a peasant;
+he was one who slept in a different part of the Castle; and I was thus
+assured that the whole of my former companions had attained their liberty,
+and Shed A was untenanted.<br>
+<br>
+From this we wandered insensibly into other topics.&nbsp; It is impossible
+to exaggerate the pleasure I took to be thus sitting at the same table
+with Flora, in the clothes of a gentleman, at liberty and in the full
+possession of my spirits and resources; of all of which I had need,
+because it was necessary that I should support at the same time two
+opposite characters, and at once play the cavalier and lively soldier
+for the eyes of Ronald, and to the ears of Flora maintain the same profound
+and sentimental note that I had already sounded.&nbsp; Certainly there
+are days when all goes well with a man; when his wit, his digestion,
+his mistress are in a conspiracy to spoil him, and even the weather
+smiles upon his wishes.&nbsp; I will only say of myself upon that evening
+that I surpassed my expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.&nbsp;
+Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution; until at
+last we were brought back to earth by a catastrophe that might very
+easily have been foreseen, but was not the less astonishing to us when
+it occurred.<br>
+<br>
+I had filled all the glasses.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a toast to propose,&rsquo;
+I whispered, &lsquo;or rather three, but all so inextricably interwoven
+that they will not bear dividing.&nbsp; I wish first to drink to the
+health of a brave and therefore a generous enemy.&nbsp; He found me
+disarmed, a fugitive and helpless.&nbsp; Like the lion, he disdained
+so poor a triumph; and when he might have vindicated an easy valour,
+he preferred to make a friend.&nbsp; I wish that we should next drink
+to a fairer and a more tender foe.&nbsp; She found me in prison; she
+cheered me with a priceless sympathy; what she has done since, I know
+she has done in mercy, and I only pray - I dare scarce hope - her mercy
+may prove to have been merciful.&nbsp; And I wish to conjoin with these,
+for the first, and perhaps the last time, the health - and I fear I
+may already say the memory - of one who has fought, not always without
+success, against the soldiers of your nation; but who came here, vanquished
+already, only to be vanquished again by the loyal hand of the one, by
+the unforgettable eyes of the other.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It is to be feared I may have lent at times a certain resonancy to my
+voice; it is to be feared that Ronald, who was none the better for his
+own hospitality, may have set down his glass with something of a clang.&nbsp;
+Whatever may have been the cause, at least, I had scarce finished my
+compliment before we were aware of a thump upon the ceiling overhead.&nbsp;
+It was to be thought some very solid body had descended to the floor
+from the level (possibly) of a bed.&nbsp; I have never seen consternation
+painted in more lively colours than on the faces of my hosts.&nbsp;
+It was proposed to smuggle me forth into the garden, or to conceal my
+form under a horsehair sofa which stood against the wall.&nbsp; For
+the first expedient, as was now plain by the approaching footsteps,
+there was no longer time; from the second I recoiled with indignation.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear creatures,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us die, but do not
+let us be ridiculous.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The words were still upon my lips when the door opened and my friend
+of the gold eyeglass appeared, a memorable figure, on the threshold.&nbsp;
+In one hand she bore a bedroom candlestick; in the other, with the steadiness
+of a dragoon, a horse-pistol.&nbsp; She was wound about in shawls which
+did not wholly conceal the candid fabric of her nightdress, and surmounted
+by a nightcap of portentous architecture.&nbsp; Thus accoutred, she
+made her entrance; laid down the candle and pistol, as no longer called
+for; looked about the room with a silence more eloquent than oaths;
+and then, in a thrilling voice - &lsquo;To whom have I the pleasure?&rsquo;
+she said, addressing me with a ghost of a bow.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam, I am charmed, I am sure,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+story is a little long; and our meeting, however welcome, was for the
+moment entirely unexpected by myself.&nbsp; I am sure - &rsquo; but
+here I found I was quite sure of nothing, and tried again.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+have the honour,&rsquo; I began, and found I had the honour to be only
+exceedingly confused.&nbsp; With that, I threw myself outright upon
+her mercy.&nbsp; &lsquo;Madam, I must be more frank with you,&rsquo;
+I resumed.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have already proved your charity and compassion
+for the French prisoners, I am one of these; and if my appearance be
+not too much changed, you may even yet recognise in me that <i>Oddity</i>
+who had the good fortune more than once to make you smile.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Still gazing upon me through her glass, she uttered an uncompromising
+grunt; and then, turning to her niece - &lsquo;Flora,&rsquo; said she,
+&lsquo;how comes he here?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The culprits poured out for a while an antiphony of explanations, which
+died out at last in a miserable silence.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think at least you might have told your aunt,&rsquo; she snorted.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; I interposed, &lsquo;they were about to do so.&nbsp;
+It is my fault if it be not done already.&nbsp; But I made it my prayer
+that your slumbers might be respected, and this necessary formula of
+my presentation should be delayed until to-morrow in the morning.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The old lady regarded me with undissembled incredulity, to which I was
+able to find no better repartee than a profound and I trust graceful
+reverence.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;French prisoners are very well in their place,&rsquo; she said,
+&lsquo;but I cannot see that their place is in my private dining-room.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I hope it may be said without offence,
+but (except the Castle of Edinburgh) I cannot think upon the spot from
+which I would so readily be absent.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this, to my relief, I thought I could perceive a vestige of a smile
+to steal upon that iron countenance and to be bitten immediately in.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And if it is a fair question, what do they call ye?&rsquo; she
+asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;At your service, the Vicomte Anne de St.-Yves,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mosha the Viscount,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;I am afraid you do
+us plain people a great deal too much honour.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear lady,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us be serious for a moment.&nbsp;
+What was I to do?&nbsp; Where was I to go?&nbsp; And how can you be
+angry with these benevolent children who took pity on one so unfortunate
+as myself?&nbsp; Your humble servant is no such terrific adventurer
+that you should come out against him with horse-pistol and&rsquo; -
+smiling - &lsquo;bedroom candlesticks.&nbsp; It is but a young gentleman
+in extreme distress, hunted upon every side, and asking no more than
+to escape from his pursuers.&nbsp; I know your character, I read it
+in your face&rsquo; - the heart trembled in my body as I said these
+daring words.&nbsp; &lsquo;There are unhappy English prisoners in France
+at this day, perhaps at this hour.&nbsp; Perhaps at this hour they kneel
+as I do; they take the hand of her who might conceal and assist them;
+they press it to their lips as I do - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here, here!&rsquo; cried the old lady, breaking from my solicitations.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Behave yourself before folk!&nbsp; Saw ever anyone the match
+of that?&nbsp; And on earth, my dears, what are we to do with him?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pack him off, my dear lady,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;pack off the
+impudent fellow double-quick!&nbsp; And if it may be, and if your good
+heart allows it, help him a little on the way he has to go.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What&rsquo;s this pie?&rsquo; she cried stridently.&nbsp; &lsquo;Where
+is this pie from, Flora?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+No answer was vouchsafed by my unfortunate and (I may say) extinct accomplices.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is that my port?&rsquo; she pursued.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hough!&nbsp;
+Will somebody give me a glass of my port wine?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I made haste to serve her.<br>
+<br>
+She looked at me over the rim with an extraordinary expression.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I hope ye liked it?&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is even a magnificent wine,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Aweel, it was my father laid it down,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There were few knew more about port wine than my father, God
+rest him!&rsquo;&nbsp; She settled herself in a chair with an alarming
+air of resolution.&nbsp; &lsquo;And so there is some particular direction
+that you wish to go in?&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O,&rsquo; said I, following her example, &lsquo;I am by no means
+such a vagrant as you suppose.&nbsp; I have good friends, if I could
+get to them, for which all I want is to be once clear of Scotland; and
+I have money for the road.&rsquo;&nbsp; And I produced my bundle.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;English bank-notes?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s
+not very handy for Scotland.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s been some fool of an Englishman
+that&rsquo;s given you these, I&rsquo;m thinking.&nbsp; How much is
+it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I declare to heaven I never thought to count!&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But that is soon remedied.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And I counted out ten notes of ten pound each, all in the name of Abraham
+Newlands, and five bills of country bankers for as many guineas.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;One hundred and twenty six pound five,&rsquo; cried the old lady.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And you carry such a sum about you, and have not so much as counted
+it!&nbsp; If you are not a thief, you must allow you are very thief-like.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And yet, madam, the money is legitimately mine,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+She took one of the bills and held it up.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is there any
+probability, now, that this could be traced?&rsquo; she asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;None, I should suppose; and if it were, it would be no matter,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;With your usual penetration, you guessed right.&nbsp;
+An Englishman brought it me.&nbsp; It reached me, through the hands
+of his English solicitor, from my great-uncle, the Comte de K&eacute;roual
+de Saint-Yves, I believe the richest <i>&eacute;migr&eacute;</i> in
+London.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I can do no more than take your word for it,&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I trust, madam, not less,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;at this rate the matter may be
+feasible.&nbsp; I will cash one of these five-guinea bills, less the
+exchange, and give you silver and Scots notes to bear you as far as
+the border.&nbsp; Beyond that, Mosha the Viscount, you will have to
+depend upon yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I could not but express a civil hesitation as to whether the amount
+would suffice, in my case, for so long a journey.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;but you havenae heard me out.&nbsp;
+For if you are not too fine a gentleman to travel with a pair of drovers,
+I believe I have found the very thing, and the Lord forgive me for a
+treasonable old wife!&nbsp; There are a couple stopping up by with the
+shepherd-man at the farm; to-morrow they will take the road for England,
+probably by skriegh of day - and in my opinion you had best be travelling
+with the stots,&rsquo; said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;For Heaven&rsquo;s sake do not suppose me to be so effeminate
+a character!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;An old soldier of Napoleon
+is certainly beyond suspicion.&nbsp; But, dear lady, to what end? and
+how is the society of these excellent gentlemen supposed to help me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear sir,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;you do not at all understand
+your own predicament, and must just leave your matters in the hands
+of those who do.&nbsp; I dare say you have never even heard tell of
+the drove-roads or the drovers; and I am certainly not going to sit
+up all night to explain it to you.&nbsp; Suffice it, that it is me who
+is arranging this affair - the more shame to me! - and that is the way
+ye have to go.&nbsp; Ronald,&rsquo; she continued, &lsquo;away up-by
+to the shepherds; rowst them out of their beds, and make it perfectly
+distinct that Sim is not to leave till he has seen me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Ronald was nothing loath to escape from his aunt&rsquo;s neighbourhood,
+and left the room and the cottage with a silent expedition that was
+more like flight than mere obedience.&nbsp; Meanwhile the old lady turned
+to her niece.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I would like to know what we are to do with him the night!&rsquo;
+she cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ronald and I meant to put him in the hen-house,&rsquo; said the
+encrimsoned Flora.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I can tell you he is to go to no such a place,&rsquo; replied
+the aunt.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hen-house, indeed!&nbsp; If a guest he is to
+be, he shall sleep in no mortal hen-house.&nbsp; Your room is the most
+fit, I think, if he will consent to occupy it on so great a suddenty.&nbsp;
+And as for you, Flora, you shall sleep with me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I could not help admiring the prudence and tact of this old dowager,
+and of course it was not for me to make objections.&nbsp; Ere I well
+knew how, I was alone with a flat candlestick, which is not the most
+sympathetic of companions, and stood studying the snuff in a frame of
+mind between triumph and chagrin.&nbsp; All had gone well with my flight:
+the masterful lady who had arrogated to herself the arrangement of the
+details gave me every confidence; and I saw myself already arriving
+at my uncle&rsquo;s door.&nbsp; But, alas! it was another story with
+my love affair.&nbsp; I had seen and spoken with her alone; I had ventured
+boldly; I had been not ill received; I had seen her change colour, had
+enjoyed the undissembled kindness of her eyes; and now, in a moment,
+down comes upon the scene that apocalyptic figure with the nightcap
+and the horse-pistol, and with the very wind of her coming behold me
+separated from my love!&nbsp; Gratitude and admiration contended in
+my breast with the extreme of natural rancour.&nbsp; My appearance in
+her house at past midnight had an air (I could not disguise it from
+myself) that was insolent and underhand, and could not but minister
+to the worst suspicions.&nbsp; And the old lady had taken it well.&nbsp;
+Her generosity was no more to be called in question than her courage,
+and I was afraid that her intelligence would be found to match.&nbsp;
+Certainly, Miss Flora had to support some shrewd looks, and certainly
+she had been troubled.&nbsp; I could see but the one way before me:
+to profit by an excellent bed, to try to sleep soon, to be stirring
+early, and to hope for some renewed occasion in the morning.&nbsp; To
+have said so much and yet to say no more, to go out into the world upon
+so half-hearted a parting, was more than I could accept.<br>
+<br>
+It is my belief that the benevolent fiend sat up all night to baulk
+me.&nbsp; She was at my bedside with a candle long ere day, roused me,
+laid out for me a damnable misfit of clothes, and bade me pack my own
+(which were wholly unsuited to the journey) in a bundle.&nbsp; Sore
+grudging, I arrayed myself in a suit of some country fabric, as delicate
+as sackcloth and about as becoming as a shroud; and, on coming forth,
+found the dragon had prepared for me a hearty breakfast.&nbsp; She took
+the head of the table, poured out the tea, and entertained me as I ate
+with a great deal of good sense and a conspicuous lack of charm.&nbsp;
+How often did I not regret the change! - how often compare her, and
+condemn her in the comparison, with her charming niece!&nbsp; But if
+my entertainer was not beautiful, she had certainly been busy in my
+interest.&nbsp; Already she was in communication with my destined fellow-travellers;
+and the device on which she had struck appeared entirely suitable.&nbsp;
+I was a young Englishman who had outrun the constable; warrants were
+out against me in Scotland, and it had become needful I should pass
+the border without loss of time, and privately.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have given a very good account of you,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;which
+I hope you may justify.&nbsp; I told them there was nothing against
+you beyond the fact that you were put to the haw (if that is the right
+word) for debt.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I pray God you have the expression incorrectly, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I do not give myself out for a person easily alarmed;
+but you must admit there is something barbarous and mediaeval in the
+sound well qualified to startle a poor foreigner.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is the name of a process in Scots Law, and need alarm no honest
+man,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;But you are a very idle-minded young
+gentleman; you must still have your joke, I see: I only hope you will
+have no cause to regret it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I pray you not to suppose, because I speak lightly, that I do
+not feel deeply,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your kindness has quite
+conquered me; I lay myself at your disposition, I beg you to believe,
+with real tenderness; I pray you to consider me from henceforth as the
+most devoted of your friends.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;here comes your devoted friend
+the drover.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m thinking he will be eager for the road;
+and I will not be easy myself till I see you well off the premises,
+and the dishes washed, before my servant-woman wakes.&nbsp; Praise God,
+we have gotten one that is a treasure at the sleeping!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The morning was already beginning to be blue in the trees of the garden,
+and to put to shame the candle by which I had breakfasted.&nbsp; The
+lady rose from table, and I had no choice but to follow her example.&nbsp;
+All the time I was beating my brains for any means by which I should
+be able to get a word apart with Flora, or find the time to write her
+a billet.&nbsp; The windows had been open while I breakfasted, I suppose
+to ventilate the room from any traces of my passage there; and, Master
+Ronald appearing on the front lawn, my ogre leaned forth to address
+him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ronald,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;wasn&rsquo;t that Sim that went
+by the wall?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I snatched my advantage.&nbsp; Right at her back there was pen, ink,
+and paper laid out.&nbsp; I wrote: &lsquo;I love you&rsquo;; and before
+I had time to write more, or so much as to blot what I had written,
+I was again under the guns of the gold eyeglasses.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s time,&rsquo; she began; and then, as she observed
+my occupation, &lsquo;Umph!&rsquo; she broke off.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ye have
+something to write?&rsquo; she demanded.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Some notes, madam,&rsquo; said I, bowing with alacrity.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Notes,&rsquo; she said; &lsquo;or a note?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There is doubtless some <i>finesse</i> of the English language
+that I do not comprehend,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll contrive, however, to make my meaning very plain to
+ye, Mosha le Viscount,&rsquo; she continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;I suppose
+you desire to be considered a gentleman?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Can you doubt it, madam?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I doubt very much, at least, whether you go to the right way
+about it,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have come here to me, I
+cannot very well say how; I think you will admit you owe me some thanks,
+if it was only for the breakfast I made ye.&nbsp; But what are you to
+me?&nbsp; A waif young man, not so far to seek for looks and manners,
+with some English notes in your pocket and a price upon your head.&nbsp;
+I am a lady; I have been your hostess, with however little will; and
+I desire that this random acquaintance of yours with my family will
+cease and determine.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I believe I must have coloured.&nbsp; &lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;the
+notes are of no importance; and your least pleasure ought certainly
+to be my law.&nbsp; You have felt, and you have been pleased to express,
+a doubt of me.&nbsp; I tear them up.&rsquo;&nbsp; Which you may be sure
+I did thoroughly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There&rsquo;s a good lad!&rsquo; said the dragon, and immediately
+led the way to the front lawn.<br>
+<br>
+The brother and sister were both waiting us here, and, as well as I
+could make out in the imperfect light, bore every appearance of having
+passed through a rather cruel experience.&nbsp; Ronald seemed ashamed
+to so much as catch my eye in the presence of his aunt, and was the
+picture of embarrassment.&nbsp; As for Flora, she had scarce the time
+to cast me one look before the dragon took her by the arm, and began
+to march across the garden in the extreme first glimmer of the dawn
+without exchanging speech.&nbsp; Ronald and I followed in equal silence.<br>
+<br>
+There was a door in that same high wall on the top of which I had sat
+perched no longer gone than yesterday morning.&nbsp; This the old lady
+set open with a key; and on the other side we were aware of a rough-looking,
+thick-set man, leaning with his arms (through which was passed a formidable
+staff) on a dry-stone dyke.&nbsp; Him the old lady immediately addressed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sim,&rsquo; said she, &lsquo;this is the young gentleman.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Sim replied with an inarticulate grumble of sound, and a movement of
+one arm and his head, which did duty for a salutation.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, Mr. St. Ives,&rsquo; said the old lady, &lsquo;it&rsquo;s
+high time for you to be taking the road.&nbsp; But first of all let
+me give the change of your five-guinea bill.&nbsp; Here are four pounds
+of it in British Linen notes, and the balance in small silver, less
+sixpence.&nbsp; Some charge a shilling, I believe, but I have given
+you the benefit of the doubt.&nbsp; See and guide it with all the sense
+that you possess.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And here, Mr. St. Ives,&rsquo; said Flora, speaking for the first
+time, &lsquo;is a plaid which you will find quite necessary on so rough
+a journey.&nbsp; I hope you will take it from the hands of a Scotch
+friend,&rsquo; she added, and her voice trembled.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Genuine holly: I cut it myself,&rsquo; said Ronald, and gave
+me as good a cudgel as a man could wish for in a row.<br>
+<br>
+The formality of these gifts, and the waiting figure of the driver,
+told me loudly that I must be gone.&nbsp; I dropped on one knee and
+bade farewell to the aunt, kissing her hand.&nbsp; I did the like -
+but with how different a passion! - to her niece; as for the boy, I
+took him to my arms and embraced him with a cordiality that seemed to
+strike him speechless.&nbsp; &lsquo;Farewell!&rsquo; and &lsquo;Farewell!&rsquo;
+I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I shall never forget my friends.&nbsp; Keep me
+sometimes in memory.&nbsp; Farewell!&rsquo; With that I turned my back
+and began to walk away; and had scarce done so, when I heard the door
+in the high wall close behind me.&nbsp; Of course this was the aunt&rsquo;s
+doing; and of course, if I know anything of human character, she would
+not let me go without some tart expressions.&nbsp; I declare, even if
+I had heard them, I should not have minded in the least, for I was quite
+persuaded that, whatever admirers I might be leaving behind me in Swanston
+Cottage, the aunt was not the least sincere.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER X - THE DROVERS<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It took me a little effort to come abreast of my new companion; for
+though he walked with an ugly roll and no great appearance of speed,
+he could cover the around at a good rate when he wanted to.&nbsp; Each
+looked at the other: I with natural curiosity, he with a great appearance
+of distaste.&nbsp; I have heard since that his heart was entirely set
+against me; he had seen me kneel to the ladies, and diagnosed me for
+a &lsquo;gesterin&rsquo; eediot.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So, ye&rsquo;re for England, are ye?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I told him yes.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Weel, there&rsquo;s waur places, I believe,&rsquo; was his reply;
+and he relapsed into a silence which was not broken during a quarter
+of an hour of steady walking.<br>
+<br>
+This interval brought us to the foot of a bare green valley, which wound
+upwards and backwards among the hills.&nbsp; A little stream came down
+the midst and made a succession of clear pools; near by the lowest of
+which I was aware of a drove of shaggy cattle, and a man who seemed
+the very counterpart of Mr. Sim making a breakfast upon bread and cheese.&nbsp;
+This second drover (whose name proved to be Candlish) rose on our approach.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here&rsquo;s a mannie that&rsquo;s to gang through with us,&rsquo;
+said Sim.&nbsp; &lsquo;It was the auld wife, Gilchrist, wanted it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Aweel, aweel,&rsquo; said the other; and presently, remembering
+his manners, and looking on me with a solemn grin, &lsquo;A fine day!&rsquo;
+says he.<br>
+<br>
+I agreed with him, and asked him how he did.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Brawly,&rsquo; was the reply; and without further civilities,
+the pair proceeded to get the cattle under way.&nbsp; This, as well
+as almost all the herding, was the work of a pair of comely and intelligent
+dogs, directed by Sim or Candlish in little more than monosyllables.&nbsp;
+Presently we were ascending the side of the mountain by a rude green
+track, whose presence I had not hitherto observed.&nbsp; A continual
+sound of munching and the crying of a great quantity of moor birds accompanied
+our progress, which the deliberate pace and perennial appetite of the
+cattle rendered wearisomely slow.&nbsp; In the midst my two conductors
+marched in a contented silence that I could not but admire.&nbsp; The
+more I looked at them, the more I was impressed by their absurd resemblance
+to each other.&nbsp; They were dressed in the same coarse homespun,
+carried similar sticks, were equally begrimed about the nose with snuff,
+and each wound in an identical plaid of what is called the shepherd&rsquo;s
+tartan.&nbsp; In a back view they might be described as indistinguishable;
+and even from the front they were much alike.&nbsp; An incredible coincidence
+of humours augmented the impression.&nbsp; Thrice and four times I attempted
+to pave the way for some exchange of thought, sentiment, or - at the
+least of it - human words.&nbsp; An <i>Ay</i> or an <i>Nhm</i> was the
+sole return, and the topic died on the hill-side without echo.&nbsp;
+I can never deny that I was chagrined; and when, after a little more
+walking, Sim turned towards me and offered me a ram&rsquo;s horn of
+snuff, with the question &lsquo;Do ye use it?&rsquo; I answered, with
+some animation, &lsquo;Faith, sir, I would use pepper to introduce a
+little cordiality.&rsquo;&nbsp; But even this sally failed to reach,
+or at least failed to soften, my companions.<br>
+<br>
+At this rate we came to the summit of a ridge, and saw the track descend
+in front of us abruptly into a desert vale, about a league in length,
+and closed at the farther end by no less barren hilltops.&nbsp; Upon
+this point of vantage Sim came to a halt, took off his hat, and mopped
+his brow.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Weel,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;here we&rsquo;re at the top o&rsquo;
+Howden.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The top o&rsquo; Howden, sure eneuch,&rsquo; said Candlish.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivey, are ye dry?&rsquo; said the first.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, really,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;is not this Satan reproving
+sin?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What ails ye, man?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m offerin&rsquo;
+ye a dram.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, if it be anything to drink,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am as
+dry as my neighbours.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Whereupon Sim produced from the corner of his plaid a black bottle,
+and we all drank and pledged each other.&nbsp; I found these gentlemen
+followed upon such occasions an invariable etiquette, which you may
+be certain I made haste to imitate.&nbsp; Each wiped his mouth with
+the back of his left hand, held up the bottle in his right, remarked
+with emphasis, &lsquo;Here&rsquo;s to ye!&rsquo; and swallowed as much
+of the spirit as his fancy prompted.&nbsp; This little ceremony, which
+was the nearest thing to manners I could perceive in either of my companions,
+was repeated at becoming intervals, generally after an ascent.&nbsp;
+Occasionally we shared a mouthful of ewe-milk cheese and an inglorious
+form of bread, which I understood (but am far from engaging my honour
+on the point) to be called &lsquo;shearer&rsquo;s bannock.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And that may be said to have concluded our whole active intercourse
+for the first day.<br>
+<br>
+I had the more occasion to remark the extraordinarily desolate nature
+of that country, through which the drove road continued, hour after
+hour and even day after day, to wind.&nbsp; A continual succession of
+insignificant shaggy hills, divided by the course of ten thousand brooks,
+through which we had to wade, or by the side of which we encamped at
+night; infinite perspectives of heather, infinite quantities of moorfowl;
+here and there, by a stream side, small and pretty clumps of willows
+or the silver birch; here and there, the ruins of ancient and inconsiderable
+fortresses - made the unchanging characters of the scene.&nbsp; Occasionally,
+but only in the distance, we could perceive the smoke of a small town
+or of an isolated farmhouse or cottage on the moors; more often, a flock
+of sheep and its attendant shepherd, or a rude field of agriculture
+perhaps not yet harvested.&nbsp; With these alleviations, we might almost
+be said to pass through an unbroken desert - sure, one of the most impoverished
+in Europe; and when I recalled to mind that we were yet but a few leagues
+from the chief city (where the law courts sat every day with a press
+of business, soldiers garrisoned the castle, and men of admitted parts
+were carrying on the practice of letters and the investigations of science),
+it gave me a singular view of that poor, barren, and yet illustrious
+country through which I travelled.&nbsp; Still more, perhaps, did it
+commend the wisdom of Miss Gilchrist in sending me with these uncouth
+companions and by this unfrequented path.<br>
+<br>
+My itinerary is by no means clear to me; the names and distances I never
+clearly knew, and have now wholly forgotten; and this is the more to
+be regretted as there is no doubt that, in the course of those days,
+I must have passed and camped among sites which have been rendered illustrious
+by the pen of Walter Scott.&nbsp; Nay, more, I am of opinion that I
+was still more favoured by fortune, and have actually met and spoken
+with that inimitable author.&nbsp; Our encounter was of a tall, stoutish,
+elderly gentleman, a little grizzled, and of a rugged but cheerful and
+engaging countenance.&nbsp; He sat on a hill pony, wrapped in a plaid
+over his green coat, and was accompanied by a horse-woman, his daughter,
+a young lady of the most charming appearance.&nbsp; They overtook us
+on a stretch of heath, reined up as they came alongside, and accompanied
+us for perhaps a quarter of an hour before they galloped off again across
+the hillsides to our left.&nbsp; Great was my amazement to find the
+unconquerable Mr. Sim thaw immediately on the accost of this strange
+gentleman, who hailed him with a ready familiarity, proceeded at once
+to discuss with him the trade of droving and the prices of cattle, and
+did not disdain to take a pinch from the inevitable ram&rsquo;s horn.&nbsp;
+Presently I was aware that the stranger&rsquo;s eye was directed on
+myself; and there ensued a conversation, some of which I could not help
+overhearing at the time, and the rest have pieced together more or less
+plausibly from the report of Sim.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Surely that must be an <i>amateur drover</i> ye have gotten there?&rsquo;
+the gentleman seems to have asked.<br>
+<br>
+Sim replied, I was a young gentleman that had a reason of his own to
+travel privately.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well, ye must tell me nothing of that.&nbsp; I am in the
+law, you know, and <i>tace</i> is the Latin for a candle,&rsquo; answered
+the gentleman.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I hope it&rsquo;s nothing bad.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Sim told him it was no more than debt.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, Lord, if that be all!&rsquo; cried the gentleman; and turning
+to myself, &lsquo;Well, sir,&rsquo; he added, &lsquo;I understand you
+are taking a tramp through our forest here for the pleasure of the thing?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, yes, sir,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and I must say I am very
+well entertained.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I envy you,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have jogged many miles
+of it myself when I was younger.&nbsp; My youth lies buried about here
+under every heather-bush, like the soul of the licentiate Lucius.&nbsp;
+But you should have a guide.&nbsp; The pleasure of this country is much
+in the legends, which grow as plentiful as blackberries.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And directing my attention to a little fragment of a broken wall no
+greater than a tombstone, he told me for an example a story of its earlier
+inhabitants.&nbsp; Years after it chanced that I was one day diverting
+myself with a Waverley Novel, when what should I come upon but the identical
+narrative of my green-coated gentleman upon the moors!&nbsp; In a moment
+the scene, the tones of his voice, his northern accent, and the very
+aspect of the earth and sky and temperature of the weather, flashed
+back into my mind with the reality of dreams.&nbsp; The unknown in the
+green-coat had been the Great Unknown!&nbsp; I had met Scott; I had
+heard a story from his lips; I should have been able to write, to claim
+acquaintance, to tell him that his legend still tingled in my ears.&nbsp;
+But the discovery came too late, and the great man had already succumbed
+under the load of his honours and misfortunes.<br>
+<br>
+Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us farewell and
+disappeared with his daughter over the hills.&nbsp; And when I applied
+to Sim for information, his answer of &lsquo;The Shirra, man!&nbsp;
+A&rsquo;body kens the Shirra!&rsquo; told me, unfortunately, nothing.<br>
+<br>
+A more considerable adventure falls to be related.&nbsp; We were now
+near the border.&nbsp; We had travelled for long upon the track beaten
+and browsed by a million herds, our predecessors, and had seen no vestige
+of that traffic which had created it.&nbsp; It was early in the morning
+when we at last perceived, drawing near to the drove road, but still
+at a distance of about half a league, a second caravan, similar to but
+larger than our own.&nbsp; The liveliest excitement was at once exhibited
+by both my comrades.&nbsp; They climbed hillocks, they studied the approaching
+drove from under their hand, they consulted each other with an appearance
+of alarm that seemed to me extraordinary.&nbsp; I had learned by this
+time that their stand-oft manners implied, at least, no active enmity;
+and I made bold to ask them what was wrong.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Bad yins,&rsquo; was Sim&rsquo;s emphatic answer.<br>
+<br>
+All day the dogs were kept unsparingly on the alert, and the drove pushed
+forward at a very unusual and seemingly unwelcome speed.&nbsp; All day
+Sim and Candlish, with a more than ordinary expenditure both of snuff
+and of words, continued to debate the position.&nbsp; It seems that
+they had recognised two of our neighbours on the road - one Faa, and
+another by the name of Gillies.&nbsp; Whether there was an old feud
+between them still unsettled I could never learn; but Sim and Candlish
+were prepared for every degree of fraud or violence at their hands.&nbsp;
+Candlish repeatedly congratulated himself on having left &lsquo;the
+watch at home with the mistress&rsquo;; and Sim perpetually brandished
+his cudgel, and cursed his ill-fortune that it should be sprung.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I willna care a damn to gie the daashed scoon&rsquo;rel a fair
+clout wi&rsquo; it,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;The daashed thing micht
+come sindry in ma hand.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, gentlemen,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;suppose they do come on,
+I think we can give a very good account of them.&rsquo;&nbsp; And I
+made my piece of holly, Ronald&rsquo;s gift, the value of which I now
+appreciated, sing about my head.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, man?&nbsp; Are ye stench?&rsquo; inquired Sim, with a gleam
+of approval in his wooden countenance.<br>
+<br>
+The same evening, somewhat wearied with our day-long expedition, we
+encamped on a little verdant mound, from the midst of which there welled
+a spring of clear water scarce great enough to wash the hands in.&nbsp;
+We had made our meal and lain down, but were not yet asleep, when a
+growl from one of the collies set us on the alert.&nbsp; All three sat
+up, and on a second impulse all lay down again, but now with our cudgels
+ready.&nbsp; A man must be an alien and an outlaw, an old soldier and
+a young man in the bargain, to take adventure easily.&nbsp; With no
+idea as to the rights of the quarrel or the probable consequences of
+the encounter, I was as ready to take part with my two drovers, as ever
+to fall in line on the morning of a battle.&nbsp; Presently there leaped
+three men out of the heather; we had scarce time to get to our feet
+before we were assailed; and in a moment each one of us was engaged
+with an adversary whom the deepening twilight scarce permitted him to
+see.&nbsp; How the battle sped in other quarters I am in no position
+to describe.&nbsp; The rogue that fell to my share was exceedingly agile
+and expert with his weapon; had and held me at a disadvantage from the
+first assault; forced me to give ground continually, and at last, in
+mere self-defence, to let him have the point.&nbsp; It struck him in
+the throat, and he went down like a ninepin and moved no more.<br>
+<br>
+It seemed this was the signal for the engagement to be discontinued.&nbsp;
+The other combatants separated at once; our foes were suffered, without
+molestation, to lift up and bear away their fallen comrade; so that
+I perceived this sort of war to be not wholly without laws of chivalry,
+and perhaps rather to partake of the character of a tournament than
+of a battle <i>&agrave; outrance</i>.&nbsp; There was no doubt, at least,
+that I was supposed to have pushed the affair too seriously.&nbsp; Our
+friends the enemy removed their wounded companion with undisguised consternation;
+and they were no sooner over the top of the brae, than Sim and Candlish
+roused up their wearied drove and set forth on a night march.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;m thinking Faa&rsquo;s unco bad,&rsquo; said the one.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said the other, &lsquo;he lookit dooms gash.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He did that,&rsquo; said the first.<br>
+<br>
+And their weary silence fell upon them again.<br>
+<br>
+Presently Sim turned to me.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ye&rsquo;re unco ready with
+the stick,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Too ready, I&rsquo;m afraid,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am
+afraid Mr. Faa (if that be his name) has got his gruel.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Weel, I wouldnae wonder,&rsquo; replied Sim.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And what is likely to happen?&rsquo; I inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Aweel,&rsquo; said Sim, snuffing profoundly, &lsquo;if I were
+to offer an opeenion, it would not be conscientious.&nbsp; For the plain
+fac&rsquo; is, Mr. St. Ivy, that I div not ken.&nbsp; We have had crackit
+heids - and rowth of them - ere now; and we have had a broken leg or
+maybe twa; and the like of that we drover bodies make a kind of a practice
+like to keep among oursel&rsquo;s.&nbsp; But a corp we have none of
+us ever had to deal with, and I could set nae leemit to what Gillies
+micht consider proper in the affair.&nbsp; Forbye that, he would be
+in raither a hobble himsel&rsquo;, if he was to gang hame wantin&rsquo;
+Faa.&nbsp; Folk are awfu&rsquo; throng with their questions, and parteecularly
+when they&rsquo;re no wantit.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s a fac&rsquo;,&rsquo; said Candlish.<br>
+<br>
+I considered this prospect ruefully; and then making the best of it,
+&lsquo;Upon all which accounts,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;the best will
+be to get across the border and there separate.&nbsp; If you are troubled,
+you can very truly put the blame upon your late companion; and if I
+am pursued, I must just try to keep out of the way.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; said Sim, with something resembling enthusiasm,
+&lsquo;no&rsquo; a word mair!&nbsp; I have met in wi&rsquo; mony kinds
+o&rsquo; gentry ere now; I hae seen o&rsquo; them that was the tae thing,
+and I hae seen o&rsquo; them that was the tither; but the wale of a
+gentleman like you I have no sae very frequently seen the bate of.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Our night march was accordingly pursued with unremitting diligence.&nbsp;
+The stars paled, the east whitened, and we were still, both dogs and
+men, toiling after the wearied cattle.&nbsp; Again and again Sim and
+Candlish lamented the necessity: it was &lsquo;fair ruin on the bestial,&rsquo;
+they declared; but the thought of a judge and a scaffold hunted them
+ever forward.&nbsp; I myself was not so much to be pitied.&nbsp; All
+that night, and during the whole of the little that remained before
+us of our conjunct journey, I enjoyed a new pleasure, the reward of
+my prowess, in the now loosened tongue of Mr. Sim.&nbsp; Candlish was
+still obdurately taciturn: it was the man&rsquo;s nature; but Sim, having
+finally appraised and approved me, displayed without reticence a rather
+garrulous habit of mind and a pretty talent for narration.&nbsp; The
+pair were old and close companions, co-existing in these endless moors
+in a brotherhood of silence such as I have heard attributed to the trappers
+of the west.&nbsp; It seems absurd to mention love in connection with
+so ugly and snuffy a couple; at least, their trust was absolute; and
+they entertained a surprising admiration for each other&rsquo;s qualities;
+Candlish exclaiming that Sim was &lsquo;grand company!&rsquo; and Sim
+frequently assuring me in an aside that for &lsquo;a rale, auld, stench
+bitch, there was nae the bate of Candlish in braid Scotland.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+The two dogs appeared to be entirely included in this family compact,
+and I remarked that their exploits and traits of character were constantly
+and minutely observed by the two masters.&nbsp; Dog stories particularly
+abounded with them; and not only the dogs of the present but those of
+the past contributed their quota.&nbsp; &lsquo;But that was naething,&rsquo;
+Sim would begin: &lsquo;there was a herd in Manar, they ca&rsquo;d him
+Tweedie - ye&rsquo;ll mind Tweedie, Can&rsquo;lish?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Fine,
+that!&rsquo; said Candlish.&nbsp; &lsquo;Aweel, Tweedie had a dog -
+&rsquo;&nbsp; The story I have forgotten; I dare say it was dull, and
+I suspect it was not true; but indeed, my travels with the drove rendered
+me indulgent, and perhaps even credulous, in the matter of dog stories.&nbsp;
+Beautiful, indefatigable beings! as I saw them at the end of a long
+day&rsquo;s journey frisking, barking, bounding, striking attitudes,
+slanting a bushy tail, manifestly playing to the spectator&rsquo;s eye,
+manifestly rejoicing in their grace and beauty - and turned to observe
+Sim and Candlish unornamentally plodding in the rear with the plaids
+about their bowed shoulders and the drop at their snuffy nose - I thought
+I would rather claim kinship with the dogs than with the men!&nbsp;
+My sympathy was unreturned; in their eyes I was a creature light as
+air; and they would scarce spare me the time for a perfunctory caress
+or perhaps a hasty lap of the wet tongue, ere they were back again in
+sedulous attendance on those dingy deities, their masters - and their
+masters, as like as not, damning their stupidity.<br>
+<br>
+Altogether the last hours of our tramp were infinitely the most agreeable
+to me, and I believe to all of us; and by the time we came to separate,
+there had grown up a certain familiarity and mutual esteem that made
+the parting harder.&nbsp; It took place about four of the afternoon
+on a bare hillside from which I could see the ribbon of the great north
+road, henceforth to be my conductor.&nbsp; I asked what was to pay.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Naething,&rsquo; replied Sim.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What in the name of folly is this?&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You have led me, you have fed me, you have filled me full of
+whisky, and now you will take nothing!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ye see we indentit for that,&rsquo; replied Sim.<br>
+<br>
+&nbsp;&lsquo;Indented?&rsquo; I repeated; &lsquo;what does the man mean?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; said Sim, &lsquo;this is a maitter entirely
+between Candlish and me and the auld wife, Gilchrist.&nbsp; You had
+naething to say to it; weel, ye can have naething to do with it, then.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My good man,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I can allow myself to be placed
+in no such ridiculous position.&nbsp; Mrs. Gilchrist is nothing to me,
+and I refuse to be her debtor.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I dinna exac&rsquo;ly see what way ye&rsquo;re gaun to help it,&rsquo;
+observed my drover.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By paying you here and now,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There&rsquo;s aye twa to a bargain, Mr. St. Ives,&rsquo; said
+he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You mean that you will not take it?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There or thereabout,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Forbye, that
+it would set ye a heap better to keep your siller for them you awe it
+to.&nbsp; Ye&rsquo;re young, Mr. St. Ivy, and thoughtless; but it&rsquo;s
+my belief that, wi&rsquo; care and circumspection, ye may yet do credit
+to yoursel&rsquo;.&nbsp; But just you bear this in mind: that him that
+<i>awes</i> siller should never <i>gie</i> siller.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Well, what was there to say?&nbsp; I accepted his rebuke, and bidding
+the pair farewell, set off alone upon my southward way.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. St. Ivy,&rsquo; was the last word of Sim, &lsquo;I was never
+muckle ta&rsquo;en up in Englishry; but I think that I really ought
+to say that ye seem to me to have the makings of quite a decent lad.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XI - THE GREAT NORTH ROAD<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It chanced that as I went down the hill these last words of my friend
+the drover echoed not unfruitfully in my head.&nbsp; I had never told
+these men the least particulars as to my race or fortune, as it was
+a part, and the best part, of their civility to ask no questions: yet
+they had dubbed me without hesitation English.&nbsp; Some strangeness
+in the accent they had doubtless thus explained.&nbsp; And it occurred
+to me, that if I could pass in Scotland for an Englishman, I might be
+able to reverse the process and pass in England for a Scot.&nbsp; I
+thought, if I was pushed to it, I could make a struggle to imitate the
+brogue; after my experience with Candlish and Sim, I had a rich provision
+of outlandish words at my command; and I felt I could tell the tale
+of Tweedie&rsquo;s dog so as to deceive a native.&nbsp; At the same
+time, I was afraid my name of St. Ives was scarcely suitable; till I
+remembered there was a town so called in the province of Cornwall, thought
+I might yet be glad to claim it for my place of origin, and decided
+for a Cornish family and a Scots education.&nbsp; For a trade, as I
+was equally ignorant of all, and as the most innocent might at any moment
+be the means of my exposure, it was best to pretend to none.&nbsp; And
+I dubbed myself a young gentleman of a sufficient fortune and an idle,
+curious habit of mind, rambling the country at my own charges, in quest
+of health, information, and merry adventures.<br>
+<br>
+At Newcastle, which was the first town I reached, I completed my preparations
+for the part, before going to the inn, by the purchase of a knapsack
+and a pair of leathern gaiters.&nbsp; My plaid I continued to wear from
+sentiment.&nbsp; It was warm, useful to sleep in if I were again benighted,
+and I had discovered it to be not unbecoming for a man of gallant carriage.&nbsp;
+Thus equipped, I supported my character of the light-hearted pedestrian
+not amiss.&nbsp; Surprise was indeed expressed that I should have selected
+such a season of the year; but I pleaded some delays of business, and
+smilingly claimed to be an eccentric.&nbsp; The devil was in it, I would
+say, if any season of the year was not good enough for me; I was not
+made of sugar, I was no mollycoddle to be afraid of an ill-aired bed
+or a sprinkle of snow; and I would knock upon the table with my fist
+and call for t&rsquo;other bottle, like the noisy and free-hearted young
+gentleman I was.&nbsp; It was my policy (if I may so express myself)
+to talk much and say little.&nbsp; At the inn tables, the country, the
+state of the roads, the business interest of those who sat down with
+me, and the course of public events, afforded me a considerable field
+in which I might discourse at large and still communicate no information
+about myself.&nbsp; There was no one with less air of reticence; I plunged
+into my company up to the neck; and I had a long cock-and-bull story
+of an aunt of mine which must have convinced the most suspicious of
+my innocence.&nbsp; &lsquo;What!&rsquo; they would have said, &lsquo;that
+young ass to be concealing anything!&nbsp; Why, he has deafened me with
+an aunt of his until my head aches.&nbsp; He only wants you should give
+him a line, and he would tell you his whole descent from Adam downward,
+and his whole private fortune to the last shilling.&rsquo; A responsible
+solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my inexperience as to
+give me a word or two of good advice: that I was but a young man after
+all - I had at this time a deceptive air of youth that made me easily
+pass for one-and-twenty, and was, in the circumstances, worth a fortune
+- that the company at inns was very mingled, that I should do well to
+be more careful, and the like; to all which I made answer that I meant
+no harm myself and expected none from others, or the devil was in it.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You are one of those d-d prudent fellows that I could never abide
+with,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are the kind of man that has a
+long head.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s all the world, my dear sir: the long-heads
+and the short-horns!&nbsp; Now, I am a short-horn.&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+doubt,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;that you will not go very far without
+getting sheared.&rsquo;&nbsp; I offered to bet with him on that, and
+he made off, shaking his head.<br>
+<br>
+But my particular delight was to enlarge on politics and the war.&nbsp;
+None damned the French like me; none was more bitter against the Americans.&nbsp;
+And when the north-bound mail arrived, crowned with holly, and the coachman
+and guard hoarse with shouting victory, I went even so far as to entertain
+the company to a bowl of punch, which I compounded myself with no illiberal
+hand, and doled out to such sentiments as the following:-<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Our glorious victory on the Nivelle&rsquo;!&nbsp; &lsquo;Lord
+Wellington, God bless him! and may victory ever attend upon his arms!&rsquo;
+and, &lsquo;Soult, poor devil! and may he catch it again to the same
+tune!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Never was oratory more applauded to the echo - never any one was more
+of the popular man than I.&nbsp; I promise you, we made a night of it.&nbsp;
+Some of the company supported each other, with the assistance of boots,
+to their respective bedchambers, while the rest slept on the field of
+glory where we had left them; and at the breakfast table the next morning
+there was an extraordinary assemblage of red eyes and shaking fists.&nbsp;
+I observed patriotism to burn much lower by daylight.&nbsp; Let no one
+blame me for insensibility to the reverses of France!&nbsp; God knows
+how my heart raged.&nbsp; How I longed to fall on that herd of swine
+and knock their heads together in the moment of their revelry!&nbsp;
+But you are to consider my own situation and its necessities; also a
+certain lightheartedness, eminently Gallic, which forms a leading trait
+in my character, and leads me to throw myself into new circumstances
+with the spirit of a schoolboy.&nbsp; It is possible that I sometimes
+allowed this impish humour to carry me further than good taste approves:
+and I was certainly punished for it once.<br>
+<br>
+This was in the episcopal city of Durham.&nbsp; We sat down, a considerable
+company, to dinner, most of us fine old vatted English tories of that
+class which is often so enthusiastic as to be inarticulate.&nbsp; I
+took and held the lead from the beginning; and, the talk having turned
+on the French in the Peninsula, I gave them authentic details (on the
+authority of a cousin of mine, an ensign) of certain cannibal orgies
+in Galicia, in which no less a person than General Caffarelli had taken
+a part.&nbsp; I always disliked that commander, who once ordered me
+under arrest for insubordination; and it is possible that a spice of
+vengeance added to the rigour of my picture.&nbsp; I have forgotten
+the details; no doubt they were high-coloured.&nbsp; No doubt I rejoiced
+to fool these jolter-heads; and no doubt the sense of security that
+I drank from their dull, gasping faces encouraged me to proceed extremely
+far.&nbsp; And for my sins, there was one silent little man at table
+who took my story at the true value.&nbsp; It was from no sense of humour,
+to which he was quite dead.&nbsp; It was from no particular intelligence,
+for he had not any.&nbsp; The bond of sympathy, of all things in the
+world, had rendered him clairvoyant.<br>
+<br>
+Dinner was no sooner done than I strolled forth into the streets with
+some design of viewing the cathedral; and the little man was silently
+at my heels.&nbsp; A few doors from the inn, in a dark place of the
+street, I was aware of a touch on my arm, turned suddenly, and found
+him looking up at me with eyes pathetically bright.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir; but that story of yours was particularly
+rich.&nbsp; He - he!&nbsp; Particularly racy,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I tell you, sir, I took you wholly!&nbsp; I <i>smoked</i> you!&nbsp;
+I believe you and I, sir, if we had a chance to talk, would find we
+had a good many opinions in common.&nbsp; Here is the &ldquo;Blue Bell,&rdquo;
+a very comfortable place.&nbsp; They draw good ale, sir.&nbsp; Would
+you be so condescending as to share a pot with me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+There was something so ambiguous and secret in the little man&rsquo;s
+perpetual signalling, that I confess my curiosity was much aroused.&nbsp;
+Blaming myself, even as I did so, for the indiscretion, I embraced his
+proposal, and we were soon face to face over a tankard of mulled ale.&nbsp;
+He lowered his voice to the least attenuation of a whisper.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here, sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;is to the Great Man.&nbsp;
+I think you take me?&nbsp; No?&rsquo;&nbsp; He leaned forward till our
+noses touched.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here is to the Emperor!&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I was extremely embarrassed, and, in spite of the creature&rsquo;s innocent
+appearance, more than half alarmed.&nbsp; I thought him too ingenious,
+and, indeed, too daring for a spy.&nbsp; Yet if he were honest he must
+be a man of extraordinary indiscretion, and therefore very unfit to
+be encouraged by an escaped prisoner.&nbsp; I took a half course, accordingly
+- accepted his toast in silence, and drank it without enthusiasm.<br>
+<br>
+He proceeded to abound in the praises of Napoleon, such as I had never
+heard in France, or at least only on the lips of officials paid to offer
+them.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And this Caffarelli, now,&rsquo; he pursued: &lsquo;he is a splendid
+fellow, too, is he not?&nbsp; I have not heard vastly much of him myself.&nbsp;
+No details, sir - no details!&nbsp; We labour under huge difficulties
+here as to unbiassed information.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I believe I have heard the same complaint in other countries,&rsquo;
+I could not help remarking.&nbsp; &lsquo;But as to Caffarelli, he is
+neither lame nor blind, he has two legs and a nose in the middle of
+his face.&nbsp; And I care as much about him as you care for the dead
+body of Mr. Perceval!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He studied me with glowing eyes.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You cannot deceive me!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have
+served under him.&nbsp; You are a Frenchman!&nbsp; I hold by the hand,
+at last, one of that noble race, the pioneers of the glorious principles
+of liberty and brotherhood.&nbsp; Hush!&nbsp; No, it is all right.&nbsp;
+I thought there had been somebody at the door.&nbsp; In this wretched,
+enslaved country we dare not even call our souls our own.&nbsp; The
+spy and the hangman, sir - the spy and the hangman!&nbsp; And yet there
+is a candle burning, too.&nbsp; The good leaven is working, sir - working
+underneath.&nbsp; Even in this town there are a few brave spirits, who
+meet every Wednesday.&nbsp; You must stay over a day or so, and join
+us.&nbsp; We do not use this house.&nbsp; Another, and a quieter.&nbsp;
+They draw fine ale, however - fair, mild ale.&nbsp; You will find yourself
+among friends, among brothers.&nbsp; You will hear some very daring
+sentiments expressed!&rsquo; he cried, expanding his small chest.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Monarchy, Christianity - all the trappings of a bloated past
+- the Free Confraternity of Durham and Tyneside deride.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Here was a devil of a prospect for a gentleman whose whole design was
+to avoid observation!&nbsp; The Free Confraternity had no charms for
+me; daring sentiments were no part of my baggage; and I tried, instead,
+a little cold water.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You seem to forget, sir, that my Emperor has re-established Christianity,&rsquo;
+I observed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah, sir, but that was policy!&rsquo; he exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+do not understand Napoleon.&nbsp; I have followed his whole career.&nbsp;
+I can explain his policy from first to last.&nbsp; Now for instance
+in the Peninsula, on which you were so very amusing, if you will come
+to a friend&rsquo;s house who has a map of Spain, I can make the whole
+course of the war quite clear to you, I venture to say, in half an hour.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+This was intolerable.&nbsp; Of the two extremes, I found I preferred
+the British tory; and, making an appointment for the morrow, I pleaded
+sudden headache, escaped to the inn, packed my knapsack, and fled, about
+nine at night, from this accursed neighbourhood.&nbsp; It was cold,
+starry, and clear, and the road dry, with a touch of frost.&nbsp; For
+all that, I had not the smallest intention to make a long stage of it;
+and about ten o&rsquo;clock, spying on the right-hand side of the way
+the lighted windows of an alehouse, I determined to bait there for the
+night.<br>
+<br>
+It was against my principle, which was to frequent only the dearest
+inns; and the misadventure that befell me was sufficient to make me
+more particular in the future.&nbsp; A large company was assembled in
+the parlour, which was heavy with clouds of tobacco smoke, and brightly
+lighted up by a roaring fire of coal.&nbsp; Hard by the chimney stood
+a vacant chair in what I thought an enviable situation, whether for
+warmth or the pleasure of society; and I was about to take it, when
+the nearest of the company stopped me with his hand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Beg thy pardon, sir,&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;but that there chair
+belongs to a British soldier.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+A chorus of voices enforced and explained.&nbsp; It was one of Lord
+Wellington&rsquo;s heroes.&nbsp; He had been wounded under Rowland Hill.&nbsp;
+He was Colbourne&rsquo;s right-hand man.&nbsp; In short, this favoured
+individual appeared to have served with every separate corps, and under
+every individual general in the Peninsula.&nbsp; Of course I apologised.&nbsp;
+I had not known.&nbsp; The devil was in it if a soldier had not a right
+to the best in England.&nbsp; And with that sentiment, which was loudly
+applauded, I found a corner of a bench, and awaited, with some hopes
+of entertainment, the return of the hero.&nbsp; He proved, of course,
+to be a private soldier.&nbsp; I say of course, because no officer could
+possibly enjoy such heights of popularity.&nbsp; He had been wounded
+before San Sebastian, and still wore his arm in a sling.&nbsp; What
+was a great deal worse for him, every member of the company had been
+plying him with drink.&nbsp; His honest yokel&rsquo;s countenance blazed
+as if with fever, his eyes were glazed and looked the two ways, and
+his feet stumbled as, amidst a murmur of applause, he returned to the
+midst of his admirers.<br>
+<br>
+Two minutes afterwards I was again posting in the dark along the highway;
+to explain which sudden movement of retreat I must trouble the reader
+with a reminiscence of my services.<br>
+<br>
+I lay one night with the out-pickets in Castile.&nbsp; We were in close
+touch with the enemy; the usual orders had been issued against smoking,
+fires, and talk, and both armies lay as quiet as mice, when I saw the
+English sentinel opposite making a signal by holding up his musket.&nbsp;
+I repeated it, and we both crept together in the dry bed of a stream,
+which made the demarcation of the armies.&nbsp; It was wine he wanted,
+of which we had a good provision, and the English had quite run out.&nbsp;
+He gave me the money, and I, as was the custom, left him my firelock
+in pledge, and set off for the canteen.&nbsp; When I returned with a
+skin of wine, behold, it had pleased some uneasy devil of an English
+officer to withdraw the outposts!&nbsp; Here was a situation with a
+vengeance, and I looked for nothing but ridicule in the present and
+punishment in the future.&nbsp; Doubtless our officers winked pretty
+hard at this interchange of courtesies, but doubtless it would be impossible
+to wink at so gross a fault, or rather so pitiable a misadventure as
+mine; and you are to conceive me wandering in the plains of Castile,
+benighted, charged with a wine-skin for which I had no use, and with
+no knowledge whatever of the whereabouts of my musket, beyond that it
+was somewhere in my Lord Wellington&rsquo;s army.&nbsp; But my Englishman
+was either a very honest fellow, or else extremely thirsty, and at last
+contrived to advertise me of his new position.&nbsp; Now, the English
+sentry in Castile, and the wounded hero in the Durham public-house,
+were one and the same person; and if he had been a little less drunk,
+or myself less lively in getting away, the travels of M. St. Ives might
+have come to an untimely end.<br>
+<br>
+I suppose this woke me up; it stirred in me besides a spirit of opposition,
+and in spite of cold, darkness, the highwaymen and the footpads, I determined
+to walk right on till breakfast-time: a happy resolution, which enabled
+me to observe one of those traits of manners which at once depict a
+country and condemn it.&nbsp; It was near midnight when I saw, a great
+way ahead of me, the light of many torches; presently after, the sound
+of wheels reached me, and the slow tread of feet, and soon I had joined
+myself to the rear of a sordid, silent, and lugubrious procession, such
+as we see in dreams.&nbsp; Close on a hundred persons marched by torchlight
+in unbroken silence; in their midst a cart, and in the cart, on an inclined
+platform, the dead body of a man - the centre-piece of this solemnity,
+the hero whose obsequies we were come forth at this unusual hour to
+celebrate.&nbsp; It was but a plain, dingy old fellow of fifty or sixty,
+his throat cut, his shirt turned over as though to show the wound.&nbsp;
+Blue trousers and brown socks completed his attire, if we can talk so
+of the dead.&nbsp; He had a horrid look of a waxwork.&nbsp; In the tossing
+of the lights he seemed to make faces and mouths at us, to frown, and
+to be at times upon the point of speech.&nbsp; The cart, with this shabby
+and tragic freight, and surrounded by its silent escort and bright torches,
+continued for some distance to creak along the high-road, and I to follow
+it in amazement, which was soon exchanged for horror.&nbsp; At the corner
+of a lane the procession stopped, and, as the torches ranged themselves
+along the hedgerow-side, I became aware of a grave dug in the midst
+of the thoroughfare, and a provision of quicklime piled in the ditch.&nbsp;
+The cart was backed to the margin, the body slung off the platform and
+dumped into the grave with an irreverent roughness.&nbsp; A sharpened
+stake had hitherto served it for a pillow.&nbsp; It was now withdrawn,
+held in its place by several volunteers, and a fellow with a heavy mallet
+(the sound of which still haunts me at night) drove it home through
+the bosom of the corpse.&nbsp; The hole was filled with quicklime, and
+the bystanders, as if relieved of some oppression, broke at once into
+a sound of whispered speech.<br>
+<br>
+My shirt stuck to me, my heart had almost ceased beating, and I found
+my tongue with difficulty.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon,&rsquo; I gasped to a neighbour, &lsquo;what
+is this? what has he done? is it allowed?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, where do you come from?&rsquo; replied the man.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am a traveller, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and a total stranger
+in this part of the country.&nbsp; I had lost my way when I saw your
+torches, and came by chance on this - this incredible scene.&nbsp; Who
+was the man?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A suicide,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ay, he was a bad one,
+was Johnnie Green.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It appeared this was a wretch who had committed many barbarous murders,
+and being at last upon the point of discovery fell of his own hand.&nbsp;
+And the nightmare at the crossroads was the regular punishment, according
+to the laws of England, for an act which the Romans honoured as a virtue!&nbsp;
+Whenever an Englishman begins to prate of civilisation (as, indeed,
+it&rsquo;s a defect they are rather prone to), I hear the measured blows
+of a mallet, see the bystanders crowd with torches about the grave,
+smile a little to myself in conscious superiority - and take a thimbleful
+of brandy for the stomach&rsquo;s sake.<br>
+<br>
+I believe it must have been at my next stage, for I remember going to
+bed extremely early, that I came to the model of a good old-fashioned
+English inn, and was attended on by the picture of a pretty chambermaid.&nbsp;
+We had a good many pleasant passages as she waited table or warmed my
+bed for me with a devil of a brass warming pan, fully larger than herself;
+and as she was no less pert than she was pretty, she may be said to
+have given rather better than she took.&nbsp; I cannot tell why (unless
+it were for the sake of her saucy eyes), but I made her my confidante,
+told her I was attached to a young lady in Scotland, and received the
+encouragement of her sympathy, mingled and connected with a fair amount
+of rustic wit.&nbsp; While I slept the down-mail stopped for supper;
+it chanced that one of the passengers left behind a copy of the <i>Edinburgh
+Courant</i>, and the next morning my pretty chambermaid set the paper
+before me at breakfast, with the remark that there was some news from
+my lady-love.&nbsp; I took it eagerly, hoping to find some further word
+of our escape, in which I was disappointed; and I was about to lay it
+down, when my eye fell on a paragraph immediately concerning me.&nbsp;
+Faa was in hospital, grievously sick, and warrants were out for the
+arrest of Sim and Candlish.&nbsp; These two men had shown themselves
+very loyal to me.&nbsp; This trouble emerging, the least I could do
+was to be guided by a similar loyalty to them.&nbsp; Suppose my visit
+to my uncle crowned with some success, and my finances re-established,
+I determined I should immediately return to Edinburgh, put their case
+in the hands of a good lawyer, and await events.&nbsp; So my mind was
+very lightly made up to what proved a mighty serious matter.&nbsp; Candlish
+and Sim were all very well in their way, and I do sincerely trust I
+should have been at some pains to help them, had there been nothing
+else.&nbsp; But in truth my heart and my eyes were set on quite another
+matter, and I received the news of their tribulation almost with joy.&nbsp;
+That is never a bad wind that blows where we want to go, and you may
+be sure there was nothing unwelcome in a circumstance that carried me
+back to Edinburgh and Flora.&nbsp; From that hour I began to indulge
+myself with the making of imaginary scenes and interviews, in which
+I confounded the aunt, flattered Ronald, and now in the witty, now in
+the sentimental manner, declared my love and received the assurance
+of its return.&nbsp; By means of this exercise my resolution daily grew
+stronger, until at last I had piled together such a mass of obstinacy
+as it would have taken a cataclysm of nature to subvert.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I to the chambermaid, &lsquo;here is news of
+my lady-love indeed, and very good news too.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+All that day, in the teeth of a keen winter wind, I hugged myself in
+my plaid, and it was as though her arms were flung around me.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XII - I FOLLOW A COVERED CART NEARLY TO MY DESTINATION<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+At last I began to draw near, by reasonable stages, to the neighbourhood
+of Wakefield; and the name of Mr. Burchell Fenn came to the top in my
+memory.&nbsp; This was the gentleman (the reader may remember) who made
+a trade of forwarding the escape of French prisoners.&nbsp; How he did
+so: whether he had a sign-board, <i>Escapes forwarded, apply within</i>;
+what he charged for his services, or whether they were gratuitous and
+charitable, were all matters of which I was at once ignorant and extremely
+curious.&nbsp; Thanks to my proficiency in English, and Mr. Romaine&rsquo;s
+bank-notes, I was getting on swimmingly without him; but the trouble
+was that I could not be easy till I had come to the bottom of these
+mysteries, and it was my difficulty that I knew nothing of him beyond
+the name.&nbsp; I knew not his trade beyond that of Forwarder of Escapes
+- whether he lived in town or country, whether he were rich or poor,
+nor by what kind of address I was to gain his confidence.&nbsp; It would
+have a very bad appearance to go along the highwayside asking after
+a man of whom I could give so scanty an account; and I should look like
+a fool, indeed, if I were to present myself at his door and find the
+police in occupation!&nbsp; The interest of the conundrum, however,
+tempted me, and I turned aside from my direct road to pass by Wakefield;
+kept my ears pricked, as I went, for any mention of his name, and relied
+for the rest on my good fortune.&nbsp; If Luck (who must certainly be
+feminine) favoured me as far as to throw me in the man&rsquo;s way,
+I should owe the lady a candle; if not, I could very readily console
+myself.&nbsp; In this experimental humour, and with so little to help
+me, it was a miracle that I should have brought my enterprise to a good
+end; and there are several saints in the calendar who might be happy
+to exchange with St. Ives!<br>
+<br>
+I had slept that night in a good inn at Wakefield, made my breakfast
+by candle-light with the passengers of an up-coach, and set off in a
+very ill temper with myself and my surroundings.&nbsp; It was still
+early; the air raw and cold; the sun low, and soon to disappear under
+a vast canopy of rain-clouds that had begun to assemble in the north-west,
+and from that quarter invaded the whole width of the heaven.&nbsp; Already
+the rain fell in crystal rods; already the whole face of the country
+sounded with the discharge of drains and ditches; and I looked forward
+to a day of downpour and the hell of wet clothes, in which particular
+I am as dainty as a cat.&nbsp; At a corner of the road, and by the last
+glint of the drowning sun, I spied a covered cart, of a kind that I
+thought I had never seen before, preceding me at the foot&rsquo;s pace
+of jaded horses.&nbsp; Anything is interesting to a pedestrian that
+can help him to forget the miseries of a day of rain; and I bettered
+my pace and gradually overtook the vehicle.<br>
+<br>
+The nearer I came, the more it puzzled me.&nbsp; It was much such a
+cart as I am told the calico printers use, mounted on two wheels, and
+furnished with a seat in front for the driver.&nbsp; The interior closed
+with a door, and was of a bigness to contain a good load of calico,
+or (at a pinch and if it were necessary) four or five persons.&nbsp;
+But, indeed, if human beings were meant to travel there, they had my
+pity!&nbsp; They must travel in the dark, for there was no sign of a
+window; and they would be shaken all the way like a phial of doctor&rsquo;s
+stuff, for the cart was not only ungainly to look at - it was besides
+very imperfectly balanced on the one pair of wheels, and pitched unconscionably.&nbsp;
+Altogether, if I had any glancing idea that the cart was really a carriage,
+I had soon dismissed it; but I was still inquisitive as to what it should
+contain, and where it had come from.&nbsp; Wheels and horses were splashed
+with many different colours of mud, as though they had come far and
+across a considerable diversity of country.&nbsp; The driver continually
+and vainly plied his whip.&nbsp; It seemed to follow they had made a
+long, perhaps an all-night, stage; and that the driver, at that early
+hour of a little after eight in the morning, already felt himself belated.&nbsp;
+I looked for the name of the proprietor on the shaft, and started outright.&nbsp;
+Fortune had favoured the careless: it was Burchell Fenn!<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A wet morning, my man,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+The driver, a loutish fellow, shock-headed and turnip-faced, returned
+not a word to my salutation, but savagely flogged his horses.&nbsp;
+The tired animals, who could scarce put the one foot before the other,
+paid no attention to his cruelty; and I continued without effort to
+maintain my position alongside, smiling to myself at the futility of
+his attempts, and at the same time pricked with curiosity as to why
+he made them.&nbsp; I made no such formidable a figure as that a man
+should flee when I accosted him; and my conscience not being entirely
+clear, I was more accustomed to be uneasy myself than to see others
+timid.&nbsp; Presently he desisted, and put back his whip in the holster
+with the air of a man vanquished.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So you would run away from me?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Come,
+come, that&rsquo;s not English.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Beg pardon, master: no offence meant,&rsquo; he said, touching
+his hat.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And none taken!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;All I desire is
+a little gaiety by the way.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I understood him to say he didn&rsquo;t &lsquo;take with gaiety.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then I will try you with something else,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Oh, I can be all things to all men, like the apostle!&nbsp; I
+dare to say I have travelled with heavier fellows than you in my time,
+and done famously well with them.&nbsp; Are you going home?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, I&rsquo;m a goin&rsquo; home, I am,&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A very fortunate circumstance for me!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;At
+this rate we shall see a good deal of each other, going the same way;
+and, now I come to think of it, why should you not give me a cast?&nbsp;
+There is room beside you on the bench.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+With a sudden snatch, he carried the cart two yards into the roadway.&nbsp;
+The horses plunged and came to a stop.&nbsp; &lsquo;No, you don&rsquo;t!&rsquo;
+he said, menacing me with the whip.&nbsp; &lsquo;None o&rsquo; that
+with me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;None of what?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I asked you for a lift,
+but I have no idea of taking one by force.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve got to take care of the cart and &rsquo;orses,
+I have,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t take up with no runagate
+vagabones, you see, else.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I ought to thank you for your touching confidence,&rsquo; said
+I, approaching carelessly nearer as I spoke.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I admit
+the road is solitary hereabouts, and no doubt an accident soon happens.&nbsp;
+Little fear of anything of the kind with you!&nbsp; I like you for it,
+like your prudence, like that pastoral shyness of disposition.&nbsp;
+But why not put it out of my power to hurt?&nbsp; Why not open the door
+and bestow me here in the box, or whatever you please to call it?&rsquo;
+And I laid my hand demonstratively on the body of the cart.<br>
+<br>
+He had been timorous before; but at this, he seemed to lose the power
+of speech a moment, and stared at me in a perfect enthusiasm of fear.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why not?&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;The idea is good.&nbsp;
+I should be safe in there if I were the monster Williams himself.&nbsp;
+The great thing is to have me under lock and key.&nbsp; For it does
+lock; it is locked now,&rsquo; said I, trying the door.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>A
+propos</i>, what have you for a cargo?&nbsp; It must be precious.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He found not a word to answer.<br>
+<br>
+Rat-tat-tat, I went upon the door like a well-drilled footman.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Any one at home?&rsquo; I said, and stooped to listen.<br>
+<br>
+There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of an uncontrollable
+paroxysm; another followed immediately on the heels of it; and then
+the driver turned with an oath, laid the lash upon the horses with so
+much energy that they found their heels again, and the whole equipage
+fled down the road at a gallop.<br>
+<br>
+At the first sound of the sneeze, I had started back like a man shot.&nbsp;
+The next moment, a great light broke on my mind, and I understood.&nbsp;
+Here was the secret of Fenn&rsquo;s trade: this was how he forwarded
+the escape of prisoners, hawking them by night about the country in
+his covered cart.&nbsp; There had been Frenchmen close to me; he who
+had just sneezed was my countryman, my comrade, perhaps already my friend!&nbsp;
+I took to my heels in pursuit.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hold hard!&rsquo; I shouted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Stop!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s all right!&nbsp; Stop!&rsquo;&nbsp; But
+the driver only turned a white face on me for a moment, and redoubled
+his efforts, bending forward, plying his whip and crying to his horses;
+these lay themselves down to the gallop and beat the highway with flying
+hoofs; and the cart bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a
+halo of rain and spattering mud.&nbsp; But a minute since, and it had
+been trundling along like a lame cow; and now it was off as though drawn
+by Apollo&rsquo;s coursers.&nbsp; There is no telling what a man can
+do, until you frighten him!<br>
+<br>
+It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly, to maintain
+my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so near) was become
+a chief point with me.&nbsp; A hundred yards farther on the cart whipped
+out of the high-road into a lane embowered with leafless trees, and
+became lost to view.&nbsp; When I saw it next, the driver had increased
+his advantage considerably, but all danger was at an end, and the horses
+had again declined into a hobbling walk.&nbsp; Persuaded that they could
+not escape me, I took my time, and recovered my breath as I followed
+them.<br>
+<br>
+Presently the lane twisted at right angles, and showed me a gate and
+the beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as I continued
+to advance, a red brick house about seventy years old, in a fine style
+of architecture, and presenting a front of many windows to a lawn and
+garden.&nbsp; Behind, I could see outhouses and the peaked roofs of
+stacks; and I judged that a manor-house had in some way declined to
+be the residence of a tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and
+substantial comfort.&nbsp; The marks of neglect were visible on every
+side, in flower-bushes straggling beyond the borders, in the ill-kept
+turf, and in the broken windows that were incongruously patched with
+paper or stuffed with rags.&nbsp; A thicket of trees, mostly evergreen,
+fenced the place round and secluded it from the eyes of prying neighbours.&nbsp;
+As I came in view of it, on that melancholy winter&rsquo;s morning,
+in the deluge of the falling rain, and with the wind that now rose in
+occasional gusts and hooted over the old chimneys, the cart had already
+drawn up at the front-door steps, and the driver was already in earnest
+discourse with Mr. Burchell Fenn.&nbsp; He was standing with his hands
+behind his back - a man of a gross, misbegotten face and body, dewlapped
+like a bull and red as a harvest moon; and in his jockey cap, blue coat
+and top boots, he had much the air of a good, solid tenant-farmer.<br>
+<br>
+The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but received
+me at last in a sort of goggling silence.&nbsp; I had my hat in my hand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Burchell Fenn?&rsquo; said
+I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The same, sir,&rsquo; replied Mr. Fenn, taking off his jockey
+cap in answer to my civility, but with the distant look and the tardy
+movements of one who continues to think of something else.&nbsp; &lsquo;And
+who may you be?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I shall tell you afterwards,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Suffice
+it, in the meantime, that I come on business.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He seemed to digest my answer laboriously, his mouth gaping, his little
+eyes never straying from my face.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Suffer me to point out to you, sir,&rsquo; I resumed, &lsquo;that
+this is a devil of a wet morning; and that the chimney corner, and possibly
+a glass of something hot, are clearly indicated.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Indeed, the rain was now grown to be a deluge; the gutters of the house
+roared; the air was filled with the continuous, strident crash.&nbsp;
+The stolidity of his face, on which the rain streamed, was far from
+reassuring me.&nbsp; On the contrary, I was aware of a distinct qualm
+of apprehension, which was not at all lessened by a view of the driver,
+craning from his perch to observe us with the expression of a fascinated
+bird.&nbsp; So we stood silent, when the prisoner again began to sneeze
+from the body of the cart; and at the sound, prompt as a transformation,
+the driver had whipped up his horses and was shambling off round the
+corner of the house, and Mr. Fenn, recovering his wits with a gulp,
+had turned to the door behind him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come in, come in, sir,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I beg your
+pardon, sir; the lock goes a trifle hard.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Indeed, it took him a surprising time to open the door, which was not
+only locked on the outside, but the lock seemed rebellious from disuse;
+and when at last he stood back and motioned me to enter before him,
+I was greeted on the threshold by that peculiar and convincing sound
+of the rain echoing over empty chambers.&nbsp; The entrance-hall, in
+which I now found myself, was of a good size and good proportions; potted
+plants occupied the corners; the paved floor was soiled with muddy footprints
+and encumbered with straw; on a mahogany hall-table, which was the only
+furniture, a candle had been stuck and suffered to burn down - plainly
+a long while ago, for the gutterings were green with mould.&nbsp; My
+mind, under these new impressions, worked with unusual vivacity.&nbsp;
+I was here shut off with Fenn and his hireling in a deserted house,
+a neglected garden, and a wood of evergreens: the most eligible theatre
+for a deed of darkness.&nbsp; There came to me a vision of two flagstones
+raised in the hall-floor, and the driver putting in the rainy afternoon
+over my grave, and the prospect displeased me extremely.&nbsp; I felt
+I had carried my pleasantry as far as was safe; I must lose no time
+in declaring my true character, and I was even choosing the words in
+which I was to begin, when the hall-door was slammed-to behind me with
+a bang, and I turned, dropping my stick as I did so, in time - and not
+any more than time - to save my life.<br>
+<br>
+The surprise of the onslaught and the huge weight of my assailant gave
+him the advantage.&nbsp; He had a pistol in his right hand of a portentous
+size, which it took me all my strength to keep deflected.&nbsp; With
+his left arm he strained me to his bosom, so that I thought I must be
+crushed or stifled.&nbsp; His mouth was open, his face crimson, and
+he panted aloud with hard animal sounds.&nbsp; The affair was as brief
+as it was hot and sudden.&nbsp; The potations which had swelled and
+bloated his carcase had already weakened the springs of energy.&nbsp;
+One more huge effort, that came near to overpower me, and in which the
+pistol happily exploded, and I felt his grasp slacken and weakness come
+on his joints; his legs succumbed under his weight, and he grovelled
+on his knees on the stone floor.&nbsp; &lsquo;Spare me!&rsquo; he gasped.<br>
+<br>
+I had not only been abominably frightened; I was shocked besides: my
+delicacy was in arms, like a lady to whom violence should have been
+offered by a similar monster.&nbsp; I plucked myself from his horrid
+contact, I snatched the pistol - even discharged, it was a formidable
+weapon - and menaced him with the butt.&nbsp; &lsquo;Spare you!&rsquo;
+I cried, &lsquo;you beast!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+His voice died in his fat inwards, but his lips still vehemently framed
+the same words of supplication.&nbsp; My anger began to pass off, but
+not all my repugnance; the picture he made revolted me, and I was impatient
+to be spared the further view of it.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;stop this performance: it sickens
+me.&nbsp; I am not going to kill you, do you hear?&nbsp; I have need
+of you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+A look of relief, that I could almost have called beautiful, dawned
+on his countenance.&nbsp; &lsquo;Anything - anything you wish,&rsquo;
+said he.<br>
+<br>
+Anything is a big word, and his use of it brought me for a moment to
+a stand.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, what do you mean?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do
+you mean that you will blow the gaff on the whole business?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He answered me Yes with eager asseverations.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I know Monsieur de Saint-Yves is in it; it was through his papers
+we traced you,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you consent to make a
+clean breast of the others?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I do - I will!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;The &rsquo;ole crew
+of &rsquo;em; there&rsquo;s good names among &rsquo;em.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll
+be king&rsquo;s evidence.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So that all shall hang except yourself?&nbsp; You damned villain!&rsquo;
+I broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Understand at once that I am no spy or thief-taker.&nbsp;
+I am a kinsman of Monsieur de St. Yves - here in his interest.&nbsp;
+Upon my word, you have put your foot in it prettily, Mr. Burchell Fenn!&nbsp;
+Come, stand up; don&rsquo;t grovel there.&nbsp; Stand up, you lump of
+iniquity!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He scrambled to his feet.&nbsp; He was utterly unmanned, or it might
+have gone hard with me yet; and I considered him hesitating, as, indeed,
+there was cause.&nbsp; The man was a double-dyed traitor: he had tried
+to murder me, and I had first baffled his endeavours and then exposed
+and insulted him.&nbsp; Was it wise to place myself any longer at his
+mercy?&nbsp; With his help I should doubtless travel more quickly; doubtless
+also far less agreeably; and there was everything to show that it would
+be at a greater risk.&nbsp; In short, I should have washed my hands
+of him on the spot, but for the temptation of the French officers, whom
+I knew to be so near, and for whose society I felt so great and natural
+an impatience.&nbsp; If I was to see anything of my countrymen, it was
+clear I had first of all to make my peace with Mr. Fenn; and that was
+no easy matter.&nbsp; To make friends with any one implies concessions
+on both sides; and what could I concede?&nbsp; What could I say of him,
+but that he had proved himself a villain and a fool, and the worse man?<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;here has been rather a poor piece
+of business, which I dare say you can have no pleasure in calling to
+mind; and, to say truth, I would as readily forget it myself.&nbsp;
+Suppose we try.&nbsp; Take back your pistol, which smells very ill;
+put it in your pocket or wherever you had it concealed.&nbsp; There!&nbsp;
+Now let us meet for the first time. - Give you good morning, Mr. Fenn!&nbsp;
+I hope you do very well.&nbsp; I come on the recommendation of my kinsman,
+the Vicomte de St. Yves.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you mean it?&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you mean you
+will pass over our little scrimmage?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, certainly!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It shows you are
+a bold fellow, who may be trusted to forget the business when it comes
+to the point.&nbsp; There is nothing against you in the little scrimmage,
+unless that your courage is greater than your strength.&nbsp; You are
+not so young as you once were, that is all.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I beg of you, sir, don&rsquo;t betray me to the Vis-count,&rsquo;
+he pleaded.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll not deny but what my &rsquo;eart
+failed me a trifle; but it was only a word, sir, what anybody might
+have said in the &rsquo;eat of the moment, and over with it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Certainly,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That is quite my own opinion.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The way I came to be anxious about the Vis-count,&rsquo; he continued,
+&lsquo;is that I believe he might be induced to form an &rsquo;asty
+judgment.&nbsp; And the business, in a pecuniary point of view, is all
+that I could ask; only trying, sir - very trying.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s making
+an old man of me before my time.&nbsp; You might have observed yourself,
+sir, that I &rsquo;aven&rsquo;t got the knees I once &rsquo;ad.&nbsp;
+The knees and the breathing, there&rsquo;s where it takes me.&nbsp;
+But I&rsquo;m very sure, sir, I address a gentleman as would be the
+last to make trouble between friends.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sure you do me no more than justice,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and
+I shall think it quite unnecessary to dwell on any of these passing
+circumstances in my report to the Vicomte.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Which you do favour him (if you&rsquo;ll excuse me being so bold
+as to mention it) exac&rsquo;ly!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I should
+have known you anywheres.&nbsp; May I offer you a pot of &rsquo;ome-brewed
+ale, sir?&nbsp; By your leave!&nbsp; This way, if you please.&nbsp;
+I am &rsquo;eartily grateful - &rsquo;eartily pleased to be of any service
+to a gentleman like you, sir, which is related to the Vis-count, and
+really a fambly of which you might well be proud!&nbsp; Take care of
+the step, sir.&nbsp; You have good news of &rsquo;is &rsquo;ealth, I
+trust? as well as that of Monseer the Count?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+God forgive me! the horrible fellow was still puffing and panting with
+the fury of his assault, and already he had fallen into an obsequious,
+wheedling familiarity like that of an old servant, - already he was
+flattering me on my family connections!<br>
+<br>
+I followed him through the house into the stable-yard, where I observed
+the driver washing the cart in a shed.&nbsp; He must have heard the
+explosion of the pistol.&nbsp; He could not choose but hear it: the
+thing was shaped like a little blunderbuss, charged to the mouth, and
+made a report like a piece of field artillery.&nbsp; He had heard, he
+had paid no attention; and now, as we came forth by the back-door, he
+raised for a moment a pale and tell-tale face that was as direct as
+a confession.&nbsp; The rascal had expected to see Fenn come forth alone;
+he was waiting to be called on for that part of sexton, which I had
+already allotted to him in fancy.<br>
+<br>
+I need not detain the reader very long with any description of my visit
+to the back-kitchen; of how we mulled our ale there, and mulled it very
+well; nor of how we sat talking, Fenn like an old, faithful, affectionate
+dependant, and I - well!&nbsp; I myself fallen into a mere admiration
+of so much impudence, that transcended words, and had very soon conquered
+animosity.&nbsp; I took a fancy to the man, he was so vast a humbug.&nbsp;
+I began to see a kind of beauty in him, his <i>aplomb</i> was so majestic.&nbsp;
+I never knew a rogue to cut so fat; his villainy was ample, like his
+belly, and I could scarce find it in my heart to hold him responsible
+for either.&nbsp; He was good enough to drop into the autobiographical;
+telling me how the farm, in spite of the war and the high prices, had
+proved a disappointment; how there was &lsquo;a sight of cold, wet land
+as you come along the &rsquo;igh-road&rsquo;; how the winds and rains
+and the seasons had been misdirected, it seemed &lsquo;o&rsquo; purpose&rsquo;;
+how Mrs. Fenn had died - &lsquo;I lost her coming two year agone; a
+remarkable fine woman, my old girl, sir! if you&rsquo;ll excuse me,&rsquo;
+he added, with a burst of humility.&nbsp; In short, he gave me an opportunity
+of studying John Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked - his greed, his
+usuriousness, his hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled
+to the superlative - such as was well worth the little disarray and
+fluster of our passage in the hall.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIII - I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+As soon as I judged it safe, and that was not before Burchell Fenn had
+talked himself back into his breath and a complete good humour, I proposed
+he should introduce me to the French officers, henceforth to become
+my fellow-passengers.&nbsp; There were two of them, it appeared, and
+my heart beat as I approached the door.&nbsp; The specimen of Perfidious
+Albion whom I had just been studying gave me the stronger zest for my
+fellow-countrymen.&nbsp; I could have embraced them; I could have wept
+on their necks.&nbsp; And all the time I was going to a disappointment.<br>
+<br>
+It was in a spacious and low room, with an outlook on the court, that
+I found them bestowed.&nbsp; In the good days of that house the apartment
+had probably served as a library, for there were traces of shelves along
+the wainscot.&nbsp; Four or five mattresses lay on the floor in a corner,
+with a frowsy heap of bedding; near by was a basin and a cube of soap;
+a rude kitchen-table and some deal chairs stood together at the far
+end; and the room was illuminated by no less than four windows, and
+warmed by a little, crazy, sidelong grate, propped up with bricks in
+the vent of a hospitable chimney, in which a pile of coals smoked prodigiously
+and gave out a few starveling flames.&nbsp; An old, frail, white-haired
+officer sat in one of the chairs, which he had drawn close to this apology
+for a fire.&nbsp; He was wrapped in a camlet cloak, of which the collar
+was turned up, his knees touched the bars, his hands were spread in
+the very smoke, and yet he shivered for cold.&nbsp; The second - a big,
+florid, fine animal of a man, whose every gesture labelled him the cock
+of the walk and the admiration of the ladies - had apparently despaired
+of the fire, and now strode up and down, sneezing hard, bitterly blowing
+his nose, and proffering a continual stream of bluster, complaint, and
+barrack-room oaths.<br>
+<br>
+Fenn showed me in with the brief form of introduction: &lsquo;Gentlemen
+all, this here&rsquo;s another fare!&rsquo; and was gone again at once.&nbsp;
+The old man gave me but the one glance out of lack-lustre eyes; and
+even as he looked a shiver took him as sharp as a hiccough.&nbsp; But
+the other, who represented to admiration the picture of a Beau in a
+Catarrh, stared at me arrogantly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And who are you, sir?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+I made the military salute to my superiors.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Champdivers, private, Eighth of the Line,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pretty business!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;And you are going
+on with us?&nbsp; Three in a cart, and a great trolloping private at
+that!&nbsp; And who is to pay for you, my fine fellow?&rsquo; he inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If monsieur comes to that,&rsquo; I answered civilly, &lsquo;who
+paid for him?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, if you choose to play the wit!&rsquo; said he, - and began
+to rail at large upon his destiny, the weather, the cold, the danger
+and the expense of the escape, and, above all, the cooking of the accursed
+English.&nbsp; It seemed to annoy him particularly that I should have
+joined their party.&nbsp; &lsquo;If you knew what you were doing, thirty
+thousand millions of pigs! you would keep yourself to yourself!&nbsp;
+The horses can&rsquo;t drag the cart; the roads are all ruts and swamps.&nbsp;
+No longer ago than last night the Colonel and I had to march half the
+way - thunder of God! - half the way to the knees in mud - and I with
+this infernal cold - and the danger of detection!&nbsp; Happily we met
+no one: a desert - a real desert - like the whole abominable country!&nbsp;
+Nothing to eat - no, sir, there is nothing to eat but raw cow and greens
+boiled in water - nor to drink but Worcestershire sauce!&nbsp; Now I,
+with my catarrh, I have no appetite; is it not so?&nbsp; Well, if I
+were in France, I should have a good soup with a crust in it, an omelette,
+a fowl in rice, a partridge in cabbages - things to tempt me, thunder
+of God!&nbsp; But here - day of God! - what a country!&nbsp; And cold,
+too!&nbsp; They talk about Russia - this is all the cold I want!&nbsp;
+And the people - look at them!&nbsp; What a race!&nbsp; Never any handsome
+men; never any fine officers!&rsquo; - and he looked down complacently
+for a moment at his waist - &lsquo;And the women - what faggots!&nbsp;
+No, that is one point clear, I cannot stomach the English!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+There was something in this man so antipathetic to me, as sent the mustard
+into my nose.&nbsp; I can never bear your bucks and dandies, even when
+they are decent-looking and well dressed; and the Major - for that was
+his rank - was the image of a flunkey in good luck.&nbsp; Even to be
+in agreement with him, or to seem to be so, was more than I could make
+out to endure.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You could scarce be expected to stomach them,&rsquo; said I civilly,
+&lsquo;after having just digested your parole.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He whipped round on his heel and turned on me a countenance which I
+dare say he imagined to be awful; but another fit of sneezing cut him
+off ere he could come the length of speech.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have not tried the dish myself,&rsquo; I took the opportunity
+to add.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is said to be unpalatable.&nbsp; Did monsieur
+find it so?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+With surprising vivacity the Colonel woke from his lethargy.&nbsp; He
+was between us ere another word could pass.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Shame, gentlemen!&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is this a time
+for Frenchmen and fellow-soldiers to fall out?&nbsp; We are in the midst
+of our enemies; a quarrel, a loud word, may suffice to plunge us back
+into irretrievable distress.&nbsp; <i>Monsieur le Commandant</i>, you
+have been gravely offended.&nbsp; I make it my request, I make it my
+prayer - if need be, I give you my orders - that the matter shall stand
+by until we come safe to France.&nbsp; Then, if you please, I will serve
+you in any capacity.&nbsp; And for you, young man, you have shown all
+the cruelty and carelessness of youth.&nbsp; This gentleman is your
+superior; he is no longer young&rsquo; - at which word you are to conceive
+the Major&rsquo;s face.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is admitted he has broken his
+parole.&nbsp; I know not his reason, and no more do you.&nbsp; It might
+be patriotism in this hour of our country&rsquo;s adversity, it might
+be humanity, necessity; you know not what in the least, and you permit
+yourself to reflect on his honour.&nbsp; To break parole may be a subject
+for pity and not derision.&nbsp; I have broken mine - I, a colonel of
+the Empire.&nbsp; And why?&nbsp; I have been years negotiating my exchange,
+and it cannot be managed; those who have influence at the Ministry of
+War continually rush in before me, and I have to wait, and my daughter
+at home is in a decline.&nbsp; I am going to see my daughter at last,
+and it is my only concern lest I should have delayed too long.&nbsp;
+She is ill, and very ill, - at death&rsquo;s door.&nbsp; Nothing is
+left me but my daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my honour,
+blame me for it who dare!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this my heart smote me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;For God&rsquo;s sake,&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;think no more of
+what I have said!&nbsp; A parole? what is a parole against life and
+death and love?&nbsp; I ask your pardon; this gentleman&rsquo;s also.&nbsp;
+As long as I shall be with you, you shall not have cause to complain
+of me again.&nbsp; I pray God you will find your daughter alive and
+restored.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That is past praying for,&rsquo; said the Colonel; and immediately
+the brief fire died out of him, and, returning to the hearth, he relapsed
+into his former abstraction.<br>
+<br>
+But I was not so easy to compose.&nbsp; The knowledge of the poor gentleman&rsquo;s
+trouble, and the sight of his face, had filled me with the bitterness
+of remorse; and I insisted upon shaking hands with the Major (which
+he did with a very ill grace), and abounded in palinodes and apologies.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;After all,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;who am I to talk?&nbsp; I am
+in the luck to be a private soldier; I have no parole to give or to
+keep; once I am over the rampart, I am as free as air.&nbsp; I beg you
+to believe that I regret from my soul the use of these ungenerous expressions.&nbsp;
+Allow me . . . Is there no way in this damned house to attract attention?&nbsp;
+Where is this fellow, Fenn?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.&nbsp; Fenn, who was at
+the moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms like one in
+despair, called to me to keep back, plunged into the house, and appeared
+next moment in the doorway of the chamber.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, sir!&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;keep away from those there windows.&nbsp;
+A body might see you from the back lane.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is registered,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Henceforward I
+will be a mouse for precaution and a ghost for invisibility.&nbsp; But
+in the meantime, for God&rsquo;s sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy!&nbsp;
+Your room is as damp as the bottom of a well, and these gentlemen are
+perishing of cold.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be paid in
+advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether because I threw
+greater energy into the business, or because the coals were now warmed
+and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze that made the chimney roar
+again.&nbsp; The shine of it, in that dark, rainy day, seemed to reanimate
+the Colonel like a blink of sun.&nbsp; With the outburst of the flames,
+besides, a draught was established, which immediately delivered us from
+the plague of smoke; and by the time Fenn returned, carrying a bottle
+under his arm and a single tumbler in his hand, there was already an
+air of gaiety in the room that did the heart good.<br>
+<br>
+I poured out some of the brandy.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Colonel,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am a young man and a private
+soldier.&nbsp; I have not been long in this room, and already I have
+shown the petulance that belongs to the one character and the ill manners
+that you may look for in the other.&nbsp; Have the humanity to pass
+these slips over, and honour me so far as to accept this glass.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My lad,&rsquo; says he, waking up and blinking at me with an
+air of suspicion, &lsquo;are you sure you can afford it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I assured him I could.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I thank you, then: I am very cold.&rsquo;&nbsp; He took the glass
+out, and a little colour came in his face.&nbsp; &lsquo;I thank you
+again,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;It goes to the heart.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a good deal
+of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the morning, now with
+some sort of apology, now with none at all; and the bottle began to
+look foolish before dinner was served.&nbsp; It was such a meal as he
+had himself predicted: beef, greens, potatoes, mustard in a teacup,
+and beer in a brown jug that was all over hounds, horses, and hunters,
+with a fox at the fat end and a gigantic John Bull - for all the world
+like Fenn - sitting in the midst in a bob-wig and smoking tobacco.&nbsp;
+The beer was a good brew, but not good enough for the Major; he laced
+it with brandy - for his cold, he said; and in this curative design
+the remainder of the bottle ebbed away.&nbsp; He called my attention
+repeatedly to the circumstance; helped me pointedly to the dregs, threw
+the bottle in the air and played tricks with it; and at last, having
+exhausted his ingenuity, and seeing me remain quite blind to every hint,
+he ordered and paid for another himself.<br>
+<br>
+As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and only awoke
+occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he was supposed to
+be doing.&nbsp; On each of these occasions he showed a gratitude and
+kind courtesy that endeared him to me beyond expression.&nbsp; &lsquo;Champdivers,
+my lad, your health!&rsquo; he would say.&nbsp; &lsquo;The Major and
+I had a very arduous march last night, and I positively thought I should
+have eaten nothing, but your fortunate idea of the brandy has made quite
+a new man of me - quite a new man.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he would fall to
+with a great air of heartiness, cut himself a mouthful, and, before
+he had swallowed it, would have forgotten his dinner, his company, the
+place where he then was, and the escape he was engaged on, and become
+absorbed in the vision of a sick-room and a dying girl in France.&nbsp;
+The pathos of this continual preoccupation, in a man so old, sick, and
+over-weary, and whom I looked upon as a mere bundle of dying bones and
+death-pains, put me wholly from my victuals: it seemed there was an
+element of sin, a kind of rude bravado of youth, in the mere relishing
+of food at the same table with this tragic father; and though I was
+well enough used to the coarse, plain diet of the English, I ate scarce
+more than himself.&nbsp; Dinner was hardly over before he succumbed
+to a lethargic sleep; lying on one of the mattresses with his limbs
+relaxed, and his breath seemingly suspended - the very image of dissolution.<br>
+<br>
+This left the Major and myself alone at the table.&nbsp; You must not
+suppose our <i>t&ecirc;te-&agrave;-t&ecirc;te</i> was long, but it was
+a lively period while it lasted.&nbsp; He drank like a fish or an Englishman;
+shouted, beat the table, roared out songs, quarrelled, made it up again,
+and at last tried to throw the dinner-plates through the window, a feat
+of which he was at that time quite incapable.&nbsp; For a party of fugitives,
+condemned to the most rigorous discretion, there was never seen so noisy
+a carnival; and through it all the Colonel continued to sleep like a
+child.&nbsp; Seeing the Major so well advanced, and no retreat possible,
+I made a fair wind of a foul one, keeping his glass full, pushing him
+with toasts; and sooner than I could have dared to hope, he became drowsy
+and incoherent.&nbsp; With the wrong-headedness of all such sots, he
+would not be persuaded to lie down upon one of the mattresses until
+I had stretched myself upon another.&nbsp; But the comedy was soon over;
+soon he slept the sleep of the just, and snored like a military music;
+and I might get up again and face (as best I could) the excessive tedium
+of the afternoon.<br>
+<br>
+I had passed the night before in a good bed; I was denied the resource
+of slumber; and there was nothing open for me but to pace the apartment,
+maintain the fire, and brood on my position.&nbsp; I compared yesterday
+and to-day - the safety, comfort, jollity, open-air exercise and pleasant
+roadside inns of the one, with the tedium, anxiety, and discomfort of
+the other.&nbsp; I remembered that I was in the hands of Fenn, who could
+not be more false - though he might be more vindictive - than I fancied
+him.&nbsp; I looked forward to nights of pitching in the covered cart,
+and days of monotony in I knew not what hiding-places; and my heart
+failed me, and I was in two minds whether to slink off ere it was too
+late, and return to my former solitary way of travel.&nbsp; But the
+Colonel stood in the path.&nbsp; I had not seen much of him; but already
+I judged him a man of a childlike nature - with that sort of innocence
+and courtesy that, I think, is only to be found in old soldiers or old
+priests - and broken with years and sorrow.&nbsp; I could not turn my
+back on his distress; could not leave him alone with the selfish trooper
+who snored on the next mattress.&nbsp; &lsquo;Champdivers, my lad, your
+health!&rsquo; said a voice in my ear, and stopped me - and there are
+few things I am more glad of in the retrospect than that it did.<br>
+<br>
+It must have been about four in the afternoon - at least the rain had
+taken off, and the sun was setting with some wintry pomp - when the
+current of my reflections was effectually changed by the arrival of
+two visitors in a gig.&nbsp; They were farmers of the neighbourhood,
+I suppose - big, burly fellows in great-coats and top-boots, mightily
+flushed with liquor when they arrived, and, before they left, inimitably
+drunk.&nbsp; They stayed long in the kitchen with Burchell, drinking,
+shouting, singing, and keeping it up; and the sound of their merry minstrelsy
+kept me a kind of company.&nbsp; The night fell, and the shine of the
+fire brightened and blinked on the panelled wall.&nbsp; Our illuminated
+windows must have been visible not only from the back lane of which
+Fenn had spoken, but from the court where the farmers&rsquo; gig awaited
+them.&nbsp; In the far end of the firelit room lay my companions, the
+one silent, the other clamorously noisy, the images of death and drunkenness.&nbsp;
+Little wonder if I were tempted to join in the choruses below, and sometimes
+could hardly refrain from laughter, and sometimes, I believe, from tears
+- so unmitigated was the tedium, so cruel the suspense, of this period.<br>
+<br>
+At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy minstrels appeared
+in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern, and knocking together as
+they came.&nbsp; The visitors clambered noisily into the gig, one of
+them shook the reins, and they were snatched out of sight and hearing
+with a suddenness that partook of the nature of prodigy.&nbsp; I am
+well aware there is a Providence for drunken men, that holds the reins
+for them and presides over their troubles; doubtless he had his work
+cut out for him with this particular gigful!&nbsp; Fenn rescued his
+toes with an ejaculation from under the departing wheels, and turned
+at once with uncertain steps and devious lantern to the far end of the
+court.&nbsp; There, through the open doors of a coach-house, the shock-headed
+lad was already to be seen drawing forth the covered cart.&nbsp; If
+I wished any private talk with our host, it must be now or never.<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly I groped my way downstairs, and came to him as he looked
+on at and lighted the harnessing of the horses.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The hour approaches when we have to part,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and
+I shall be obliged if you will tell your servant to drop me at the nearest
+point for Dunstable.&nbsp; I am determined to go so far with our friends,
+Colonel X and Major Y, but my business is peremptory, and it takes me
+to the neighbourhood of Dunstable.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Orders were given to my satisfaction, with an obsequiousness that seemed
+only inflamed by his potations.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIV - TRAVELS OF THE COVERED CART<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+My companions were aroused with difficulty: the Colonel, poor old gentleman,
+to a sort of permanent dream, in which you could say of him only that
+he was very deaf and anxiously polite; the Major still maudlin drunk.&nbsp;
+We had a dish of tea by the fireside, and then issued like criminals
+into the scathing cold of the night.&nbsp; For the weather had in the
+meantime changed.&nbsp; Upon the cessation of the rain, a strict frost
+had succeeded.&nbsp; The moon, being young, was already near the zenith
+when we started, glittered everywhere on sheets of ice, and sparkled
+in ten thousand icicles.&nbsp; A more unpromising night for a journey
+it was hard to conceive.&nbsp; But in the course of the afternoon the
+horses had been well roughed; and King (for such was the name of the
+shock-headed lad) was very positive that he could drive us without misadventure.&nbsp;
+He was as good as his word; indeed, despite a gawky air, he was simply
+invaluable in his present employment, showing marked sagacity in all
+that concerned the care of horses, and guiding us by one short cut after
+another for days, and without a fault.<br>
+<br>
+The interior of that engine of torture, the covered cart, was fitted
+with a bench, on which we took our places; the door was shut; in a moment,
+the night closed upon us solid and stifling; and we felt that we were
+being driven carefully out of the courtyard.&nbsp; Careful was the word
+all night, and it was an alleviation of our miseries that we did not
+often enjoy.&nbsp; In general, as we were driven the better part of
+the night and day, often at a pretty quick pace and always through a
+labyrinth of the most infamous country lanes and by-roads, we were so
+bruised upon the bench, so dashed against the top and sides of the cart,
+that we reached the end of a stage in truly pitiable case, sometimes
+flung ourselves down without the formality of eating, made but one sleep
+of it until the hour of departure returned, and were only properly awakened
+by the first jolt of the renewed journey.&nbsp; There were interruptions,
+at times, that we hailed as alleviations.&nbsp; At times the cart was
+bogged, once it was upset, and we must alight and lend the driver the
+assistance of our arms; at times, too (as on the occasion when I had
+first encountered it), the horses gave out, and we had to trail alongside
+in mud or frost until the first peep of daylight, or the approach to
+a hamlet or a high road, bade us disappear like ghosts into our prison.<br>
+<br>
+The main roads of England are incomparable for excellence, of a beautiful
+smoothness, very ingeniously laid down, and so well kept that in most
+weathers you could take your dinner off any part of them without distaste.&nbsp;
+On them, to the note of the bugle, the mail did its sixty miles a day;
+innumerable chaises whisked after the bobbing postboys; or some young
+blood would flit by in a curricle and tandem, to the vast delight and
+danger of the lieges.&nbsp; On them, the slow-pacing waggons made a
+music of bells, and all day long the travellers on horse-back and the
+travellers on foot (like happy Mr. St. Ives so little a while before!)
+kept coming and going, and baiting and gaping at each other, as though
+a fair were due, and they were gathering to it from all England.&nbsp;
+No, nowhere in the world is travel so great a pleasure as in that country.&nbsp;
+But unhappily our one need was to be secret; and all this rapid and
+animated picture of the road swept quite apart from us, as we lumbered
+up hill and down dale, under hedge and over stone, among circuitous
+byways.&nbsp; Only twice did I receive, as it were, a whiff of the highway.&nbsp;
+The first reached my ears alone.&nbsp; I might have been anywhere.&nbsp;
+I only knew I was walking in the dark night and among ruts, when I heard
+very far off, over the silent country that surrounded us, the guard&rsquo;s
+horn wailing its signal to the next post-house for a change of horses.&nbsp;
+It was like the voice of the day heard in darkness, a voice of the world
+heard in prison, the note of a cock crowing in the mid-seas - in short,
+I cannot tell you what it was like, you will have to fancy for yourself
+- but I could have wept to hear it.&nbsp; Once we were belated: the
+cattle could hardly crawl, the day was at hand, it was a nipping, rigorous
+morning, King was lashing his horses, I was giving an arm to the old
+Colonel, and the Major was coughing in our rear.&nbsp; I must suppose
+that King was a thought careless, being nearly in desperation about
+his team, and, in spite of the cold morning, breathing hot with his
+exertions.&nbsp; We came, at last, a little before sunrise to the summit
+of a hill, and saw the high-road passing at right angles through an
+open country of meadows and hedgerow pollards; and not only the York
+mail, speeding smoothly at the gallop of the four horses, but a post-chaise
+besides, with the post-boy titupping briskly, and the traveller himself
+putting his head out of the window, but whether to breathe the dawn,
+or the better to observe the passage of the mail, I do not know.&nbsp;
+So that we enjoyed for an instant a picture of free life on the road,
+in its most luxurious forms of despatch and comfort.&nbsp; And thereafter,
+with a poignant feeling of contrast in our hearts, we must mount again
+into our wheeled dungeon.<br>
+<br>
+We came to our stages at all sorts of odd hours, and they were in all
+kinds of odd places.&nbsp; I may say at once that my first experience
+was my best.&nbsp; Nowhere again were we so well entertained as at Burchell
+Fenn&rsquo;s.&nbsp; And this, I suppose, was natural, and indeed inevitable,
+in so long and secret a journey.&nbsp; The first stop, we lay six hours
+in a barn standing by itself in a poor, marshy orchard, and packed with
+hay; to make it more attractive, we were told it had been the scene
+of an abominable murder, and was now haunted.&nbsp; But the day was
+beginning to break, and our fatigue was too extreme for visionary terrors.&nbsp;
+The second or third, we alighted on a barren heath about midnight, built
+a fire to warm us under the shelter of some thorns, supped like beggars
+on bread and a piece of cold bacon, and slept like gipsies with our
+feet to the fire.&nbsp; In the meanwhile, King was gone with the cart,
+I know not where, to get a change of horses, and it was late in the
+dark morning when he returned and we were able to resume our journey.&nbsp;
+In the middle of another night, we came to a stop by an ancient, whitewashed
+cottage of two stories; a privet hedge surrounded it; the frosty moon
+shone blankly on the upper windows; but through those of the kitchen
+the firelight was seen glinting on the roof and reflected from the dishes
+on the wall.&nbsp; Here, after much hammering on the door, King managed
+to arouse an old crone from the chimney-corner chair, where she had
+been dozing in the watch; and we were had in, and entertained with a
+dish of hot tea.&nbsp; This old lady was an aunt of Burchell Fenn&rsquo;s
+- and an unwilling partner in his dangerous trade.&nbsp; Though the
+house stood solitary, and the hour was an unlikely one for any passenger
+upon the road, King and she conversed in whispers only.&nbsp; There
+was something dismal, something of the sick-room, in this perpetual,
+guarded sibilation.&nbsp; The apprehensions of our hostess insensibly
+communicated themselves to every one present.&nbsp; We ate like mice
+in a cat&rsquo;s ear; if one of us jingled a teaspoon, all would start;
+and when the hour came to take the road again, we drew a long breath
+of relief, and climbed to our places in the covered cart with a positive
+sense of escape.&nbsp; The most of our meals, however, were taken boldly
+at hedgerow alehouses, usually at untimely hours of the day, when the
+clients were in the field or the farmyard at labour.&nbsp; I shall have
+to tell presently of our last experience of the sort, and how unfortunately
+it miscarried; but as that was the signal for my separation from my
+fellow-travellers, I must first finish with them.<br>
+<br>
+I had never any occasion to waver in my first judgment of the Colonel.&nbsp;
+The old gentleman seemed to me, and still seems in the retrospect, the
+salt of the earth.&nbsp; I had occasion to see him in the extremes of
+hardship, hunger and cold; he was dying, and he looked it; and yet I
+cannot remember any hasty, harsh, or impatient word to have fallen from
+his lips.&nbsp; On the contrary, he ever showed himself careful to please;
+and even if he rambled in his talk, rambled always gently - like a humane,
+half-witted old hero, true to his colours to the last.&nbsp; I would
+not dare to say how often he awoke suddenly from a lethargy, and told
+us again, as though we had never heard it, the story of how he had earned
+the cross, how it had been given him by the hand of the Emperor, and
+of the innocent - and, indeed, foolish - sayings of his daughter when
+he returned with it on his bosom.&nbsp; He had another anecdote which
+he was very apt to give, by way of a rebuke, when the Major wearied
+us beyond endurance with dispraises of the English.&nbsp; This was an
+account of the <i>braves gens</i> with whom he had been boarding.&nbsp;
+True enough, he was a man so simple and grateful by nature, that the
+most common civilities were able to touch him to the heart, and would
+remain written in his memory; but from a thousand inconsiderable but
+conclusive indications, I gathered that this family had really loved
+him, and loaded him with kindness.&nbsp; They made a fire in his bedroom,
+which the sons and daughters tended with their own hands; letters from
+France were looked for with scarce more eagerness by himself than by
+these alien sympathisers; when they came, he would read them aloud in
+the parlour to the assembled family, translating as he went.&nbsp; The
+Colonel&rsquo;s English was elementary; his daughter not in the least
+likely to be an amusing correspondent; and, as I conceived these scenes
+in the parlour, I felt sure the interest centred in the Colonel himself,
+and I thought I could feel in my own heart that mixture of the ridiculous
+and the pathetic, the contest of tears and laughter, which must have
+shaken the bosoms of the family.&nbsp; Their kindness had continued
+till the end.&nbsp; It appears they were privy to his flight, the camlet
+cloak had been lined expressly for him, and he was the bearer of a letter
+from the daughter of the house to his own daughter in Paris.&nbsp; The
+last evening, when the time came to say good-night, it was tacitly known
+to all that they were to look upon his face no more.&nbsp; He rose,
+pleading fatigue, and turned to the daughter, who had been his chief
+ally: &lsquo;You will permit me, my dear - to an old and very unhappy
+soldier - and may God bless you for your goodness!&rsquo;&nbsp; The
+girl threw her arms about his neck and sobbed upon his bosom; the lady
+of the house burst into tears; &lsquo;<i>et je vous le jure, le p&egrave;re
+se mouchait</i>!&rsquo; quoth the Colonel, twisting his moustaches with
+a cavalry air, and at the same time blinking the water from his eyes
+at the mere recollection.<br>
+<br>
+It was a good thought to me that he had found these friends in captivity;
+that he had started on this fatal journey from so cordial a farewell.&nbsp;
+He had broken his parole for his daughter: that he should ever live
+to reach her sick-bed, that he could continue to endure to an end the
+hardships, the crushing fatigue, the savage cold, of our pilgrimage,
+I had early ceased to hope.&nbsp; I did for him what I was able, - nursed
+him, kept him covered, watched over his slumbers, sometimes held him
+in my arms at the rough places of the road.&nbsp; &lsquo;Champdivers,&rsquo;
+he once said, &lsquo;you are like a son to me - like a son.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+It is good to remember, though at the time it put me on the rack.&nbsp;
+All was to no purpose.&nbsp; Fast as we were travelling towards France,
+he was travelling faster still to another destination.&nbsp; Daily he
+grew weaker and more indifferent.&nbsp; An old rustic accent of Lower
+Normandy reappeared in his speech, from which it had long been banished,
+and grew stronger; old words of the <i>patois</i>, too: <i>Ouistreham</i>,
+<i>matrass&eacute;</i>, and others, the sense of which we were sometimes
+unable to guess.&nbsp; On the very last day he began again his eternal
+story of the cross and the Emperor.&nbsp; The Major, who was particularly
+ill, or at least particularly cross, uttered some angry words of protest.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;<i>Pardonnez-moi, monsieur le commandant, mais c&rsquo;est pour
+monsieur</i>,&rsquo; said the Colonel: &lsquo;Monsieur has not yet heard
+the circumstance, and is good enough to feel an interest.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Presently after, however, he began to lose the thread of his narrative;
+and at last: &lsquo;<i>Qu&eacute; que j&rsquo;ai?&nbsp; Je m&rsquo;embrouille</i>!&rsquo;
+says he, &lsquo;<i>Suffit: s&rsquo;m&rsquo;a la donn&eacute;, et Berthe
+en &eacute;tait bien contente</i>.&rsquo;&nbsp; It struck me as the
+falling of the curtain or the closing of the sepulchre doors.<br>
+<br>
+Sure enough, in but a little while after, he fell into a sleep as gentle
+as an infant&rsquo;s, which insensibly changed into the sleep of death.&nbsp;
+I had my arm about his body at the time and remarked nothing, unless
+it were that he once stretched himself a little, so kindly the end came
+to that disastrous life.&nbsp; It was only at our evening halt that
+the Major and I discovered we were travelling alone with the poor clay.&nbsp;
+That night we stole a spade from a field - I think near Market Bosworth
+- and a little farther on, in a wood of young oak trees and by the light
+of King&rsquo;s lantern, we buried the old soldier of the Empire with
+both prayers and tears.<br>
+<br>
+We had needs invent Heaven if it had not been revealed to us; there
+are some things that fall so bitterly ill on this side Time!&nbsp; As
+for the Major, I have long since forgiven him.&nbsp; He broke the news
+to the poor Colonel&rsquo;s daughter; I am told he did it kindly; and
+sure, nobody could have done it without tears!&nbsp; His share of purgatory
+will be brief; and in this world, as I could not very well praise him,
+I have suppressed his name.&nbsp; The Colonel&rsquo;s also, for the
+sake of his parole.&nbsp; <i>Requiescat</i>.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XV - THE ADVENTURE OF THE ATTORNEY&rsquo;S CLERK<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I have mentioned our usual course, which was to eat in inconsiderable
+wayside hostelries, known to King.&nbsp; It was a dangerous business;
+we went daily under fire to satisfy our appetite, and put our head in
+the loin&rsquo;s mouth for a piece of bread.&nbsp; Sometimes, to minimise
+the risk, we would all dismount before we came in view of the house,
+straggle in severally, and give what orders we pleased, like disconnected
+strangers.&nbsp; In like manner we departed, to find the cart at an
+appointed place, some half a mile beyond.&nbsp; The Colonel and the
+Major had each a word or two of English - God help their pronunciation!&nbsp;
+But they did well enough to order a rasher and a pot or call a reckoning;
+and, to say truth, these country folks did not give themselves the pains,
+and had scarce the knowledge, to be critical.<br>
+<br>
+About nine or ten at night the pains of hunger and cold drove us to
+an alehouse in the flats of Bedfordshire, not far from Bedford itself.&nbsp;
+In the inn kitchen was a long, lean, characteristic-looking fellow of
+perhaps forty, dressed in black.&nbsp; He sat on a settle by the fireside,
+smoking a long pipe, such as they call a yard of clay.&nbsp; His hat
+and wig were hanged upon the knob behind him, his head as bald as a
+bladder of lard, and his expression very shrewd, cantankerous, and inquisitive.&nbsp;
+He seemed to value himself above his company, to give himself the airs
+of a man of the world among that rustic herd; which was often no more
+than his due; being, as I afterwards discovered, an attorney&rsquo;s
+clerk.&nbsp; I took upon myself the more ungrateful part of arriving
+last; and by the time I entered on the scene the Major was already served
+at a side table.&nbsp; Some general conversation must have passed, and
+I smelled danger in the air.&nbsp; The Major looked flustered, the attorney&rsquo;s
+clerk triumphant, and three or four peasants in smock-frocks (who sat
+about the fire to play chorus) had let their pipes go out.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Give you good evening, sir!&rsquo; said the attorney&rsquo;s
+clerk to me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The same to you, sir,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think this one will do,&rsquo; quoth the clerk to the yokels
+with a wink; and then, as soon as I had given my order, &lsquo;Pray,
+sir, whither are you bound?&rsquo; he added.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I am not one of those who speak either
+of their business or their destination in houses of public entertainment.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A good answer,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;and an excellent principle.&nbsp;
+Sir, do you speak French?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, no, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A little Spanish at
+your service.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But you know the French accent, perhaps?&rsquo; said the clerk.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well do I do that!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The French accent?&nbsp;
+Why, I believe I can tell a Frenchman in ten words.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here is a puzzle for you, then!&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+have no material doubt myself, but some of these gentlemen are more
+backward.&nbsp; The lack of education, you know.&nbsp; I make bold to
+say that a man cannot walk, cannot hear, and cannot see, without the
+blessings of education.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He turned to the Major, whose food plainly stuck in his throat.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, sir,&rsquo; pursued the clerk, &lsquo;let me have the pleasure
+to hear your voice again.&nbsp; Where are you going, did you say?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sare, I am go-ing to Lon-don,&rsquo; said the Major.<br>
+<br>
+I could have flung my plate at him to be such an ass, and to have so
+little a gift of languages where that was the essential.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What think ye of that?&rsquo; said the clerk.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is
+that French enough?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good God!&rsquo; cried I, leaping up like one who should suddenly
+perceive an acquaintance, &lsquo;is this you, Mr. Dubois?&nbsp; Why,
+who would have dreamed of encountering you so far from home?&rsquo;&nbsp;
+As I spoke, I shook hands with the Major heartily; and turning to our
+tormentor, &lsquo;Oh, sir, you may be perfectly reassured!&nbsp; This
+is a very honest fellow, a late neighbour of mine in the city of Carlisle.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I thought the attorney looked put out; I little knew the man!<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But he is French,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;for all that?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, to be sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;A Frenchman of the
+emigration!&nbsp; None of your Buonaparte lot.&nbsp; I will warrant
+his views of politics to be as sound as your own.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What is a little strange,&rsquo; said the clerk quietly, &lsquo;is
+that Mr. Dubois should deny it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I got it fair in the face, and took it smiling; but the shock was rude,
+and in the course of the next words I contrived to do what I have rarely
+done, and make a slip in my English.&nbsp; I kept my liberty and life
+by my proficiency all these months, and for once that I failed, it is
+not to be supposed that I would make a public exhibition of the details.&nbsp;
+Enough, that it was a very little error, and one that might have passed
+ninety-nine times in a hundred.&nbsp; But my limb of the law was as
+swift to pick it up as though he had been by trade a master of languages.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Aha!&rsquo; cries he; &lsquo;and you are French, too!&nbsp; Your
+tongue bewrays you.&nbsp; Two Frenchmen coming into an alehouse, severally
+and accidentally, not knowing each other, at ten of the clock at night,
+in the middle of Bedfordshire?&nbsp; No, sir, that shall not pass!&nbsp;
+You are all prisoners escaping, if you are nothing worse.&nbsp; Consider
+yourselves under arrest.&nbsp; I have to trouble you for your papers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Where is your warrant, if you come to that?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;My papers!&nbsp; A likely thing that I would show my papers on
+the <i>ipse dixit</i> of an unknown fellow in a hedge alehouse!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Would you resist the law?&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not the law, sir!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I hope I am too
+good a subject for that.&nbsp; But for a nameless fellow with a bald
+head and a pair of gingham small-clothes, why certainly!&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis
+my birthright as an Englishman.&nbsp; Where&rsquo;s <i>Magna Charta</i>,
+else?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;We will see about that,&rsquo; says he; and then, addressing
+the assistants, &lsquo;where does the constable live?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Lord love you, sir!&rsquo; cried the landlord, &lsquo;what are
+you thinking of?&nbsp; The constable at past ten at night!&nbsp; Why,
+he&rsquo;s abed and asleep, and good and drunk two hours agone!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah that a&rsquo; be!&rsquo; came in chorus from the yokels.<br>
+<br>
+The attorney&rsquo;s clerk was put to a stand.&nbsp; He could not think
+of force; there was little sign of martial ardour about the landlord,
+and the peasants were indifferent - they only listened, and gaped, and
+now scratched a head, and now would get a light to their pipes from
+the embers on the hearth.&nbsp; On the other hand, the Major and I put
+a bold front on the business and defied him, not without some ground
+of law.&nbsp; In this state of matters he proposed I should go along
+with him to one Squire Merton, a great man of the neighbourhood, who
+was in the commission of the peace, the end of his avenue but three
+lanes away.&nbsp; I told him I would not stir a foot for him if it were
+to save his soul.&nbsp; Next he proposed I should stay all night where
+I was, and the constable could see to my affair in the morning, when
+he was sober.&nbsp; I replied I should go when and where I pleased;
+that we were lawful travellers in the fear of God and the king, and
+I for one would suffer myself to be stayed by nobody.&nbsp; At the same
+time, I was thinking the matter had lasted altogether too long, and
+I determined to bring it to an end at once.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;See here,&rsquo; said I, getting up, for till now I had remained
+carelessly seated, &lsquo;there&rsquo;s only one way to decide a thing
+like this - only one way that&rsquo;s right <i>English</i> - and that&rsquo;s
+man to man.&nbsp; Take off your coat, sir, and these gentlemen shall
+see fair play.&rsquo;&nbsp; At this there came a look in his eye that
+I could not mistake.&nbsp; His education had been neglected in one essential
+and eminently British particular: he could not box.&nbsp; No more could
+I, you may say; but then I had the more impudence - and I had made the
+proposal.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He says I&rsquo;m no Englishman, but the proof of the pudding
+is the eating of it,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; And here I stripped my
+coat and fell into the proper attitude, which was just about all I knew
+of this barbarian art.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, sir, you seem to me to hang
+back a little,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Come, I&rsquo;ll meet you;
+I&rsquo;ll give you an appetiser - though hang me if I can understand
+the man that wants any enticement to hold up his hands.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I drew a bank-note out of my fob and tossed it to the landlord.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There are the stakes,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll
+fight you for first blood, since you seem to make so much work about
+it.&nbsp; If you tap my claret first, there are five guineas for you,
+and I&rsquo;ll go with you to any squire you choose to mention.&nbsp;
+If I tap yours, you&rsquo;ll perhaps let on that I&rsquo;m the better
+man, and allow me to go about my lawful business at my own time and
+convenience, by God; is that fair, my lads?&rsquo; says I, appealing
+to the company.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, ay,&rsquo; said the chorus of chawbacons; &lsquo;he can&rsquo;t
+say no fairer nor that, he can&rsquo;t.&nbsp; Take off thy coat master!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The limb of the law was now on the wrong side of public opinion, and,
+what heartened me to go on, the position was rapidly changing in our
+favour.&nbsp; Already the Major was paying his shot to the very indifferent
+landlord, and I could see the white face of King at the back-door, making
+signals of haste.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oho!&rsquo; quoth my enemy, &lsquo;you are as full of doubles
+as a fox, are you not?&nbsp; But I see through you; I see through and
+through you.&nbsp; You would change the venue, would you?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I may be transparent, sir,&rsquo; says I, &lsquo;but if you&rsquo;ll
+do me the favour to stand up, you&rsquo;ll find I can hit dam hard.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Which is a point, if you will observe, that I had never called
+in question,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, you ignorant clowns,&rsquo;
+he proceeded, addressing the company, &lsquo;can&rsquo;t you see the
+fellow&rsquo;s gulling you before your eyes?&nbsp; Can&rsquo;t you see
+that he has changed the point upon me?&nbsp; I say he&rsquo;s a French
+prisoner, and he answers that he can box!&nbsp; What has that to do
+with it?&nbsp; I would not wonder but what he can dance, too - they&rsquo;re
+all dancing masters over there.&nbsp; I say, and I stick to it, that
+he&rsquo;s a Frenchy.&nbsp; He says he isn&rsquo;t.&nbsp; Well then,
+let him out with his papers, if he has them!&nbsp; If he had, would
+he not show them?&nbsp; If he had, would he not jump at the idea of
+going to Squire Merton, a man you all know?&nbsp; Now, you are all plain,
+straightforward Bedfordshire men, and I wouldn&rsquo;t ask a better
+lot to appeal to.&nbsp; You&rsquo;re not the kind to be talked over
+with any French gammon, and he&rsquo;s plenty of that.&nbsp; But let
+me tell him, he can take his pigs to another market; they&rsquo;ll never
+do here; they&rsquo;ll never go down in Bedfordshire.&nbsp; Why! look
+at the man!&nbsp; Look at his feet!&nbsp; Has anybody got a foot in
+the room like that?&nbsp; See how he stands! do any of you fellows stand
+like that?&nbsp; Does the landlord, there?&nbsp; Why, he has Frenchman
+wrote all over him, as big as a sign-post!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+This was all very well; and in a different scene I might even have been
+gratified by his remarks; but I saw clearly, if I were to allow him
+to talk, he might turn the tables on me altogether.&nbsp; He might not
+be much of a hand at boxing; but I was much mistaken, or he had studied
+forensic eloquence in a good school.&nbsp; In this predicament I could
+think of nothing more ingenious than to burst out of the house, under
+the pretext of an ungovernable rage.&nbsp; It was certainly not very
+ingenious - it was elementary, but I had no choice.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You white-livered dog!&rsquo; I broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you
+dare to tell me you&rsquo;re an Englishman, and won&rsquo;t fight?&nbsp;
+But I&rsquo;ll stand no more of this!&nbsp; I leave this place, where
+I&rsquo;ve been insulted!&nbsp; Here! what&rsquo;s to pay?&nbsp; Pay
+yourself!&rsquo; I went on, offering the landlord a handful of silver,
+&lsquo;and give me back my bank-note!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The landlord, following his usual policy of obliging everybody, offered
+no opposition to my design.&nbsp; The position of my adversary was now
+thoroughly bad.&nbsp; He had lost my two companions.&nbsp; He was on
+the point of losing me also.&nbsp; There was plainly no hope of arousing
+the company to help; and watching him with a corner of my eye, I saw
+him hesitate for a moment.&nbsp; The next, he had taken down his hat
+and his wig, which was of black horsehair; and I saw him draw from behind
+the settle a vast hooded great-coat and a small valise.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+devil!&rsquo; thought I: &lsquo;is the rascal going to follow me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was scarce clear of the inn before the limb of the law was at my heels.&nbsp;
+I saw his face plain in the moonlight; and the most resolute purpose
+showed in it, along with an unmoved composure.&nbsp; A chill went over
+me.&nbsp; &lsquo;This is no common adventure,&rsquo; thinks I to myself.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You have got hold of a man of character, St. Ives!&nbsp; A bite-hard,
+a bull-dog, a weasel is on your trail; and how are you to throw him
+off?&rsquo;&nbsp; Who was he?&nbsp; By some of his expressions I judged
+he was a hanger-on of courts.&nbsp; But in what character had he followed
+the assizes?&nbsp; As a simple spectator, as a lawyer&rsquo;s clerk,
+as a criminal himself, or - last and worst supposition - as a Bow-street
+&lsquo;runner&rsquo;?<br>
+<br>
+The cart would wait for me, perhaps, half a mile down our onward road,
+which I was already following.&nbsp; And I told myself that in a few
+minutes&rsquo; walking, Bow-street runner or not, I should have him
+at my mercy.&nbsp; And then reflection came to me in time.&nbsp; Of
+all things, one was out of the question.&nbsp; Upon no account must
+this obtrusive fellow see the cart.&nbsp; Until I had killed or shook
+him off, I was quite divorced from my companions - alone, in the midst
+of England, on a frosty by-way leading whither I knew not, with a sleuth-hound
+at my heels, and never a friend but the holly-stick!<br>
+<br>
+We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes.&nbsp; The branch to
+the left was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and dark.&nbsp; Not
+a ray of moonlight penetrated its recesses; and I took it at a venture.&nbsp;
+The wretch followed my example in silence; and for some time we crunched
+together over frozen pools without a word.&nbsp; Then he found his voice,
+with a chuckle.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This is not the way to Mr. Merton&rsquo;s,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No?&rsquo; said I. &lsquo;It is mine, however.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And therefore mine,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+Again we fell silent; and we may thus have covered half a mile before
+the lane, taking a sudden turn, brought us forth again into the moonshine.&nbsp;
+With his hooded great-coat on his back, his valise in his hand, his
+black wig adjusted, and footing it on the ice with a sort of sober doggedness
+of manner, my enemy was changed almost beyond recognition: changed in
+everything but a certain dry, polemical, pedantic air, that spoke of
+a sedentary occupation and high stools.&nbsp; I observed, too, that
+his valise was heavy; and, putting this and that together, hit upon
+a plan.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A seasonable night, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;What do
+you say to a bit of running?&nbsp; The frost has me by the toes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;With all the pleasure in life,&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+His voice seemed well assured, which pleased me little.&nbsp; However,
+there was nothing else to try, except violence, for which it would always
+be too soon.&nbsp; I took to my heels accordingly, he after me; and
+for some time the slapping of our feet on the hard road might have been
+heard a mile away.&nbsp; He had started a pace behind me, and he finished
+in the same position.&nbsp; For all his extra years and the weight of
+his valise, he had not lost a hair&rsquo;s breadth.&nbsp; The devil
+might race him for me - I had enough of it!<br>
+<br>
+And, besides, to run so fast was contrary to my interests.&nbsp; We
+could not run long without arriving somewhere.&nbsp; At any moment we
+might turn a corner and find ourselves at the lodge-gate of some Squire
+Merton, in the midst of a village whose constable was sober, or in the
+hands of a patrol.&nbsp; There was no help for it - I must finish with
+him on the spot, as long as it was possible.&nbsp; I looked about me,
+and the place seemed suitable; never a light, never a house - nothing
+but stubble-fields, fallows, and a few stunted trees.&nbsp; I stopped
+and eyed him in the moonlight with an angry stare.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Enough of this foolery!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+He had tamed, and now faced me full, very pale, but with no sign of
+shrinking.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am quite of your opinion,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+have tried me at the running; you can try me next at the high jump.&nbsp;
+It will be all the same.&nbsp; It must end the one way.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I made my holly whistle about my head.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I believe you know what way!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;We are
+alone, it is night, and I am wholly resolved.&nbsp; Are you not frightened?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;not in the smallest.&nbsp; I do not
+box, sir; but I am not a coward, as you may have supposed.&nbsp; Perhaps
+it will simplify our relations if I tell you at the outset that I walk
+armed.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Quick as lightning I made a feint at his head; as quickly he gave ground,
+and at the same time I saw a pistol glitter in his hand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No more of that, Mr. French-Prisoner!&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;It
+will do me no good to have your death at my door.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Faith, nor me either!&rsquo; said I; and I lowered my stick and
+considered the man, not without a twinkle of admiration.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+see,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;there is one consideration that you appear
+to overlook: there are a great many chances that your pistol may miss
+fire.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have a pair,&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never travel
+without a brace of barkers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I make you my compliment,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are
+able to take care of yourself, and that is a good trait.&nbsp; But,
+my good man! let us look at this matter dispassionately.&nbsp; You are
+not a coward, and no more am I; we are both men of excellent sense;
+I have good reason, whatever it may be, to keep my concerns to myself
+and to walk alone.&nbsp; Now I put it to you pointedly, am I likely
+to stand it?&nbsp; Am I likely to put up with your continued and - excuse
+me - highly impudent <i>ing&eacute;rence</i> into my private affairs?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Another French word,&rsquo; says he composedly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh! damn your French words!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+seem to be a Frenchman yourself!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have had many opportunities by which I have profited,&rsquo;
+he explained.&nbsp; &lsquo;Few men are better acquainted with the similarities
+and differences, whether of idiom or accent, of the two languages.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are a pompous fellow, too!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, I can make distinctions, sir,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+can talk with Bedfordshire peasants; and I can express myself becomingly,
+I hope, in the company of a gentleman of education like yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you set up to be a gentleman - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pardon me,&rsquo; he interrupted: &lsquo;I make no such claim.&nbsp;
+I only see the nobility and gentry in the way of business.&nbsp; I am
+quite a plain person.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;For the Lord&rsquo;s sake,&rsquo; I exclaimed, &lsquo;set my
+mind at rest upon one point.&nbsp; In the name of mystery, who and what
+are you?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have no cause to be ashamed of my name, sir,&rsquo; said he,
+&lsquo;nor yet my trade.&nbsp; I am Thomas Dudgeon, at your service,
+clerk to Mr. Daniel Romaine, solicitor of London; High Holborn is our
+address, sir.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It was only by the ecstasy of the relief that I knew how horribly I
+had been frightened.&nbsp; I flung my stick on the road.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Romaine?&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Daniel Romaine?&nbsp; An
+old hunks with a red face and a big head, and got up like a Quaker?&nbsp;
+My dear friend, to my arms!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Keep back, I say!&rsquo; said Dudgeon weakly.<br>
+<br>
+I would not listen to him.&nbsp; With the end of my own alarm, I felt
+as if I must infallibly be at the end of all dangers likewise; as if
+the pistol that he held in one hand were no more to be feared than the
+valise that he carried with the other, and now put up like a barrier
+against my advance.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Keep back, or I declare I will fire,&rsquo; he was crying.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Have a care, for God&rsquo;s sake!&nbsp; My pistol - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He might scream as be pleased.&nbsp; Willy nilly, I folded him to my
+breast, I pressed him there, I kissed his ugly mug as it had never been
+kissed before and would never be kissed again; and in the doing so knocked
+his wig awry and his hat off.&nbsp; He bleated in my embrace; so bleats
+the sheep in the arms of the butcher.&nbsp; The whole thing, on looking
+back, appears incomparably reckless and absurd; I no better than a madman
+for offering to advance on Dudgeon, and he no better than a fool for
+not shooting me while I was about it.&nbsp; But all&rsquo;s well that
+ends well; or, as the people in these days kept singing and whistling
+on the streets:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There&rsquo;s a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft<br>
+And looks out for the life of poor Jack.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There!&rsquo; said I, releasing him a little, but still keeping
+my hands on his shoulders, &lsquo;<i>je vous ai bel et bien embrass&eacute;</i>
+- and, as you would say, there is another French word.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+With his wig over one eye, he looked incredibly rueful and put out.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Cheer up, Dudgeon; the ordeal is over, you shall be embraced
+no more.&nbsp; But do, first of all, for God&rsquo;s-sake, put away
+your pistol; you handle it as if you were a cockatrice; some time or
+other, depend upon it, it will certainly go off.&nbsp; Here is your
+hat.&nbsp; No, let me put it on square, and the wig before it.&nbsp;
+Never suffer any stress of circumstances to come between you and the
+duty you owe to yourself.&nbsp; If you have nobody else to dress for,
+dress for God!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Put your wig straight<br>
+On your bald pate,<br>
+Keep your chin scraped,<br>
+And your figure draped.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Can you match me that?&nbsp; The whole duty of man in a quatrain!&nbsp;
+And remark, I do not set up to be a professional bard; these are the
+outpourings of a <i>dilettante</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But, my dear sir!&rsquo; he exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But, my dear sir!&rsquo; I echoed, &lsquo;I will allow no man
+to interrupt the flow of my ideas.&nbsp; Give me your opinion on my
+quatrain, or I vow we shall have a quarrel of it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Certainly you are quite an original,&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Quite,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and I believe I have my counterpart
+before me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, for a choice,&rsquo; says he, smiling, &lsquo;and whether
+for sense or poetry, give me<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;&ldquo;Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow:<br>
+The rest is all but leather and prunello.&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, but that&rsquo;s not fair - that&rsquo;s Pope!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+not original, Dudgeon.&nbsp; Understand me,&rsquo; said I, wringing
+his breast-button, &lsquo;the first duty of all poetry is to be mine,
+sir - mine.&nbsp; Inspiration now swells in my bosom, because - to tell
+you the plain truth, and descend a little in style - I am devilish relieved
+at the turn things have taken.&nbsp; So, I dare say, are you yourself,
+Dudgeon, if you would only allow it.&nbsp; And <i>&agrave; propos</i>,
+let me ask you a home question.&nbsp; Between friends, have you ever
+fired that pistol?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, yes, sir,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Twice - at hedgesparrows.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And you would have fired at me, you bloody-minded man?&rsquo;
+I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you go to that, you seemed mighty reckless with your stick,&rsquo;
+said Dudgeon.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Did I indeed?&nbsp; Well, well, &rsquo;tis all past history;
+ancient as King Pharamond - which is another French word, if you cared
+to accumulate more evidence,&rsquo; says I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But happily
+we are now the best of friends, and have all our interests in common.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You go a little too fast, if you&rsquo;ll excuse me, Mr. -: I
+do not know your name, that I am aware,&rsquo; said Dudgeon.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, to be sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never heard of it!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A word of explanation - &rsquo; he began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, Dudgeon!&rsquo; I interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be practical;
+I know what you want, and the name of it is supper.&nbsp; <i>Rien ne
+creuse comme l&rsquo;emotion</i>.&nbsp; I am hungry myself, and yet
+I am more accustomed to warlike palpitations than you, who are but a
+hunter of hedgesparrows.&nbsp; Let me look at your face critically:
+your bill of fare is three slices of cold rare roast beef, a Welsh rabbit,
+a pot of stout, and a glass or two of sound tawny port, old in bottle
+- the right milk of Englishmen.&rsquo;&nbsp; Methought there seemed
+a brightening in his eye and a melting about his mouth at this enumeration.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The night is young,&rsquo; I continued; &lsquo;not much past
+eleven, for a wager.&nbsp; Where can we find a good inn?&nbsp; And remark
+that I say <i>good</i>, for the port must be up to the occasion - not
+a headache in a pipe of it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Really, sir,&rsquo; he said, smiling a little, &lsquo;you have
+a way of carrying things - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Will nothing make you stick to the subject?&rsquo; I cried; &lsquo;you
+have the most irrelevant mind!&nbsp; How do you expect to rise in your
+profession?&nbsp; The inn?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I will say you are a facetious gentleman!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You must have your way, I see.&nbsp; We are not three miles from
+Bedford by this very road.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Done!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bedford be it!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I tucked his arm under mine, possessed myself of the valise, and walked
+him off unresisting.&nbsp; Presently we came to an open piece of country
+lying a thought downhill.&nbsp; The road was smooth and free of ice,
+the moonshine thin and bright over the meadows and the leafless trees.&nbsp;
+I was now honestly done with the purgatory of the covered cart; I was
+close to my great-uncle&rsquo;s; I had no more fear of Mr. Dudgeon;
+which were all grounds enough for jollity.&nbsp; And I was aware, besides,
+of us two as of a pair of tiny and solitary dolls under the vast frosty
+cupola of the midnight; the rooms decked, the moon burnished, the least
+of the stars lighted, the floor swept and waxed, and nothing wanting
+but for the band to strike up and the dancing to begin.&nbsp; In the
+exhilaration of my heart I took the music on myself -<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Merrily danced the Quaker&rsquo;s wife,<br>
+And merrily danced the Quaker.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I broke into that animated and appropriate air, clapped my arm about
+Dudgeon&rsquo;s waist, and away down the hill at a dancing step!&nbsp;
+He hung back a little at the start, but the impulse of the tune, the
+night, and my example, were not to be resisted.&nbsp; A man made of
+putty must have danced, and even Dudgeon showed himself to be a human
+being.&nbsp; Higher and higher were the capers that we cut; the moon
+repeated in shadow our antic footsteps and gestures; and it came over
+my mind of a sudden - really like balm - what appearance of man I was
+dancing with, what a long bilious countenance he had shown under his
+shaven pate, and what a world of trouble the rascal had given me in
+the immediate past.<br>
+<br>
+Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.&nbsp; My Puritanic
+companion stopped and disengaged himself.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This is a trifle <i>infra dig</i>., sir, is it not?&rsquo; said
+he.&nbsp; &lsquo;A party might suppose we had been drinking.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And so you shall be, Dudgeon,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+shall not only be drinking, you old hypocrite, but you shall be drunk
+- dead drunk, sir - and the boots shall put you to bed!&nbsp; We&rsquo;ll
+warn him when we go in.&nbsp; Never neglect a precaution; never put
+off till to-morrow what you can do to-day!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+But he had no more frivolity to complain of.&nbsp; We finished our stage
+and came to the inn-door with decorum, to find the house still alight
+and in a bustle with many late arrivals; to give our orders with a prompt
+severity which ensured obedience, and to be served soon after at a side-table,
+close to the fire and in a blaze of candle-light, with such a meal as
+I had been dreaming of for days past.&nbsp; For days, you are to remember,
+I had been skulking in the covered cart, a prey to cold, hunger, and
+an accumulation of discomforts that might have daunted the most brave;
+and the white table napery, the bright crystal, the reverberation of
+the fire, the red curtains, the Turkey carpet, the portraits on the
+coffee-room wall, the placid faces of the two or three late guests who
+were silently prolonging the pleasures of digestion, and (last, but
+not by any means least) a glass of an excellent light dry port, put
+me in a humour only to be described as heavenly.&nbsp; The thought of
+the Colonel, of how he would have enjoyed this snug room and roaring
+fire, and of his cold grave in the wood by Market Bosworth, lingered
+on my palate, <i>amari aliquid</i>, like an after-taste, but was not
+able - I say it with shame - entirely to dispel my self-complacency.&nbsp;
+After all, in this world every dog hangs by its own tail.&nbsp; I was
+a free adventurer, who had just brought to a successful end - or, at
+least, within view of it - an adventure very difficult and alarming;
+and I looked across at Mr. Dudgeon, as the port rose to his cheeks,
+and a smile, that was semi-confidential and a trifle foolish, began
+to play upon his leathery features, not only with composure, but with
+a suspicion of kindness.&nbsp; The rascal had been brave, a quality
+for which I would value the devil; and if he had been pertinacious in
+the beginning, he had more than made up for it before the end.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And now, Dudgeon, to explain,&rsquo; I began.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+know your master, he knows me, and he knows and approves of my errand.&nbsp;
+So much I may tell you, that I am on my way to Amersham Place.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oho!&rsquo; quoth Dudgeon, &lsquo;I begin to see.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am heartily glad of it,&rsquo; said I, passing the bottle,
+&lsquo;because that is about all I can tell you.&nbsp; You must take
+my word for the remainder.&nbsp; Either believe me or don&rsquo;t.&nbsp;
+If you don&rsquo;t, let&rsquo;s take a chaise; you can carry me to-morrow
+to High Holborn, and confront me with Mr. Romaine; the result of which
+will be to set your mind at rest - and to make the holiest disorder
+in your master&rsquo;s plans.&nbsp; If I judge you aright (for I find
+you a shrewd fellow), this will not be at all to your mind.&nbsp; You
+know what a subordinate gets by officiousness; if I can trust my memory,
+old Romaine has not at all the face that I should care to see in anger;
+and I venture to predict surprising results upon your weekly salary
+- if you are paid by the week, that is.&nbsp; In short, let me go free,
+and &rsquo;tis an end of the matter; take me to London, and &rsquo;tis
+only a beginning - and, by my opinion, a beginning of troubles.&nbsp;
+You can take your choice.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And that is soon taken,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Go to Amersham
+tomorrow, or go to the devil if you prefer - I wash my hands of you
+and the whole transaction.&nbsp; No, you don&rsquo;t find me putting
+my head in between Romaine and a client!&nbsp; A good man of business,
+sir, but hard as millstone grit.&nbsp; I might get the sack, and I shouldn&rsquo;t
+wonder!&nbsp; But, it&rsquo;s a pity, too,&rsquo; he added, and sighed,
+shook his head, and took his glass off sadly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That reminds me,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have a great curiosity,
+and you can satisfy it.&nbsp; Why were you so forward to meddle with
+poor Mr. Dubois?&nbsp; Why did you transfer your attentions to me?&nbsp;
+And generally, what induced you to make yourself such a nuisance?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He blushed deeply.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, sir,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;there is such a thing as patriotism,
+I hope.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVI - THE HOME-COMING OF MR. ROWLEY&rsquo;S VISCOUNT<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+By eight the next morning Dudgeon and I had made our parting.&nbsp;
+By that time we had grown to be extremely familiar; and I would very
+willingly have kept him by me, and even carried him to Amersham Place.&nbsp;
+But it appeared he was due at the public-house where we had met, on
+some affairs of my great-uncle the Count, who had an outlying estate
+in that part of the shire.&nbsp; If Dudgeon had had his way the night
+before, I should have been arrested on my uncle&rsquo;s land and by
+my uncle&rsquo;s agent, a culmination of ill-luck.<br>
+<br>
+A little after noon I started, in a hired chaise, by way of Dunstable.&nbsp;
+The mere mention of the name Amersham Place made every one supple and
+smiling.&nbsp; It was plainly a great house, and my uncle lived there
+in style.&nbsp; The fame of it rose as we approached, like a chain of
+mountains; at Bedford they touched their caps, but in Dunstable they
+crawled upon their bellies.&nbsp; I thought the landlady would have
+kissed me; such a flutter of cordiality, such smiles, such affectionate
+attentions were called forth, and the good lady bustled on my service
+in such a pother of ringlets and with such a jingling of keys.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You&rsquo;re probably expected, sir, at the Place?&nbsp; I do
+trust you may &rsquo;ave better accounts of his lordship&rsquo;s &rsquo;elth,
+sir.&nbsp; We understood that his lordship, Mosha de Carwell, was main
+bad.&nbsp; Ha, sir, we shall all feel his loss, poor, dear, noble gentleman;
+and I&rsquo;m sure nobody more polite!&nbsp; They do say, sir, his wealth
+is enormous, and before the Revolution, quite a prince in his own country!&nbsp;
+But I beg your pardon, sir; &rsquo;ow I do run on, to be sure; and doubtless
+all beknown to you already!&nbsp; For you do resemble the family, sir.&nbsp;
+I should have known you anywheres by the likeness to the dear viscount.&nbsp;
+Ha, poor gentleman, he must &rsquo;ave a &rsquo;eavy &rsquo;eart these
+days.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In the same place I saw out of the inn-windows a man-servant passing
+in the livery of my house, which you are to think I had never before
+seen worn, or not that I could remember.&nbsp; I had often enough, indeed,
+pictured myself advanced to be a Marshal, a Duke of the Empire, a Grand
+Cross of the Legion of Honour, and some other kickshaws of the kind,
+with a perfect rout of flunkeys correctly dressed in my own colours.&nbsp;
+But it is one thing to imagine, and another to see; it would be one
+thing to have these liveries in a house of my own in Paris - it was
+quite another to find them flaunting in the heart of hostile England;
+and I fear I should have made a fool of myself, if the man had not been
+on the other side of the street, and I at a one-pane window.&nbsp; There
+was something illusory in this transplantation of the wealth and honours
+of a family, a thing by its nature so deeply rooted in the soil; something
+ghostly in this sense of home-coming so far from home.<br>
+<br>
+From Dunstable I rolled away into a crescendo of similar impressions.&nbsp;
+There are certainly few things to be compared with these castles, or
+rather country seats, of the English nobility and gentry; nor anything
+at all to equal the servility of the population that dwells in their
+neighbourhood.&nbsp; Though I was but driving in a hired chaise, word
+of my destination seemed to have gone abroad, and the women curtseyed
+and the men louted to me by the wayside.&nbsp; As I came near, I began
+to appreciate the roots of this widespread respect.&nbsp; The look of
+my uncle&rsquo;s park wall, even from the outside, had something of
+a princely character; and when I came in view of the house itself, a
+sort of madness of vicarious vain-glory struck me dumb and kept me staring.&nbsp;
+It was about the size of the Tuileries.&nbsp; It faced due north; and
+the last rays of the sun, that was setting like a red-hot shot amidst
+a tumultuous gathering of snow clouds, were reflected on the endless
+rows of windows.&nbsp; A portico of Doric columns adorned the front,
+and would have done honour to a temple.&nbsp; The servant who received
+me at the door was civil to a fault - I had almost said, to offence;
+and the hall to which he admitted me through a pair of glass doors was
+warmed and already partly lighted by a liberal chimney heaped with the
+roots of beeches.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Vicomte Anne de St. Yves,&rsquo; said I, in answer to the man&rsquo;s
+question; whereupon he bowed before me lower still, and stepping upon
+one side introduced me to the truly awful presence of the major-domo.&nbsp;
+I have seen many dignitaries in my time, but none who quite equalled
+this eminent being; who was good enough to answer to the unassuming
+name of Dawson.&nbsp; From him I learned that my uncle was extremely
+low, a doctor in close attendance, Mr. Romaine expected at any moment,
+and that my cousin, the Vicomte de St. Yves, had been sent for the same
+morning.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It was a sudden seizure, then?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+Well, he would scarcely go as far as that.&nbsp; It was a decline, a
+fading away, sir; but he was certainly took bad the day before, had
+sent for Mr. Romaine, and the major-domo had taken it on himself a little
+later to send word to the Viscount.&nbsp; &lsquo;It seemed to me, my
+lord,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;as if this was a time when all the fambly
+should be called together.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I approved him with my lips, but not in my heart.&nbsp; Dawson was plainly
+in the interests of my cousin.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And when can I expect to see my great-uncle, the Count?&rsquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+In the evening, I was told; in the meantime he would show me to my room,
+which had been long prepared for me, and I should be expected to dine
+in about an hour with the doctor, if my lordship had no objections.<br>
+<br>
+My lordship had not the faintest.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;At the same time,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;I have had an accident:
+I have unhappily lost my baggage, and am here in what I stand in.&nbsp;
+I don&rsquo;t know if the doctor be a formalist, but it is quite impossible
+I should appear at table as I ought.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He begged me to be under no anxiety.&nbsp; &lsquo;We have been long
+expecting you,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;All is ready.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Such I found to be the truth.&nbsp; A great room had been prepared for
+me; through the mullioned windows the last flicker of the winter sunset
+interchanged with the reverberation of a royal fire; the bed was open,
+a suit of evening clothes was airing before the blaze, and from the
+far corner a boy came forward with deprecatory smiles.&nbsp; The dream
+in which I had been moving seemed to have reached its pitch.&nbsp; I
+might have quitted this house and room only the night before; it was
+my own place that I had come to; and for the first time in my life I
+understood the force of the words home and welcome.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This will be all as you would want, sir?&rsquo; said Mr. Dawson.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;This &rsquo;ere boy, Rowley, we place entirely at your disposition.&nbsp;
+&rsquo;E&rsquo;s not exactly a trained vallet, but Mossho Powl, the
+Viscount&rsquo;s gentleman, &rsquo;ave give him the benefick of a few
+lessons, and it is &rsquo;oped that he may give sitisfection.&nbsp;
+Hanythink that you may require, if you will be so good as to mention
+the same to Rowley, I will make it my business myself, sir, to see you
+sitisfied.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So saying, the eminent and already detested Mr. Dawson took his departure,
+and I was left alone with Rowley.&nbsp; A man who may be said to have
+wakened to consciousness in the prison of the Abbaye, among those ever
+graceful and ever tragic figures of the brave and fair, awaiting the
+hour of the guillotine and denuded of every comfort, I had never known
+the luxuries or the amenities of my rank in life.&nbsp; To be attended
+on by servants I had only been accustomed to in inns.&nbsp; My toilet
+had long been military, to a moment, at the note of a bugle, too often
+at a ditch-side.&nbsp; And it need not be wondered at if I looked on
+my new valet with a certain diffidence.&nbsp; But I remembered that
+if he was my first experience of a valet, I was his first trial as a
+master.&nbsp; Cheered by which consideration, I demanded my bath in
+a style of good assurance.&nbsp; There was a bathroom contiguous; in
+an incredibly short space of time the hot water was ready; and soon
+after, arrayed in a shawl dressing-gown, and in a luxury of contentment
+and comfort, I was reclined in an easy-chair before the mirror, while
+Rowley, with a mixture of pride and anxiety which I could well understand,
+laid out his razors.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Hey, Rowley?&rsquo; I asked, not quite resigned to go under fire
+with such an inexperienced commander.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s all right,
+is it?&nbsp; You feel pretty sure of your weapons?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, my lord,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s all
+right, I assure your lordship.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon, Mr. Rowley, &lsquo;but for the sake of shortness,
+would you mind not belording me in private?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It
+will do very well if you call me Mr. Anne.&nbsp; It is the way of my
+country, as I dare say you know.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Mr. Rowley looked blank.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But you&rsquo;re just as much a Viscount as Mr. Powl&rsquo;s,
+are you not?&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;As Mr. Powl&rsquo;s Viscount?&rsquo; said I, laughing.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Oh, keep your mind easy, Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s is every bit as good.&nbsp;
+Only, you see, as I am of the younger line, I bear my Christian name
+along with the title.&nbsp; Alain is the <i>Viscount</i>; I am the <i>Viscount
+Anne</i>.&nbsp; And in giving me the name of Mr. Anne, I assure you
+you will be quite regular.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said the docile youth.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+about the shaving, sir, you need be under no alarm.&nbsp; Mr. Powl says
+I &rsquo;ave excellent dispositions.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Powl?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That doesn&rsquo;t seem
+to me very like a French name.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, sir, indeed, my lord,&rsquo; said he, with a burst of confidence.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;No, indeed, Mr. Anne, and it do not surely.&nbsp; I should say
+now, it was more like Mr. Pole.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And Mr. Powl is the Viscount&rsquo;s man?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;He &rsquo;ave a hard
+billet, he do.&nbsp; The Viscount is a very particular gentleman.&nbsp;
+I don&rsquo;t think as you&rsquo;ll be, Mr. Anne?&rsquo; he added, with
+a confidential smile in the mirror.<br>
+<br>
+He was about sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry, freckled
+face, and a pair of dancing eyes.&nbsp; There was an air at once deprecatory
+and insinuating about the rascal that I thought I recognised.&nbsp;
+There came to me from my own boyhood memories of certain passionate
+admirations long passed away, and the objects of them long ago discredited
+or dead.&nbsp; I remembered how anxious I had been to serve those fleeting
+heroes, how readily I told myself I would have died for <i>them</i>,
+how much greater and handsomer than life they had appeared.&nbsp; And
+looking in the mirror, it seemed to me that I read the face of Rowley,
+like an echo or a ghost, by the light of my own youth.&nbsp; I have
+always contended (somewhat against the opinion of my friends) that I
+am first of all an economist; and the last thing that I would care to
+throw away is that very valuable piece of property - a boy&rsquo;s hero-worship.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you shave like an angel, Mr. Rowley!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Thank you, my lord,&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr. Powl had
+no fear of me. You may be sure, sir, I should never &rsquo;ave had this
+berth if I &rsquo;adn&rsquo;t &rsquo;ave been up to Dick.&nbsp; We been
+expecting of you this month back.&nbsp; My eye!&nbsp; I never see such
+preparations.&nbsp; Every day the fires has been kep&rsquo; up, the
+bed made, and all!&nbsp; As soon as it was known you were coming, sir,
+I got the appointment; and I&rsquo;ve been up and down since then like
+a Jack-in-the-box.&nbsp; A wheel couldn&rsquo;t sound in the avenue
+but what I was at the window!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ve had a many disappointments;
+but to-night, as soon as you stepped out of the shay, I knew it was
+my - it was you.&nbsp; Oh, you had been expected!&nbsp; Why, when I
+go down to supper, I&rsquo;ll be the &rsquo;ero of the servants&rsquo;
+&rsquo;all: the &rsquo;ole of the staff is that curious!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I hope you may be able to give a
+fair account of me - sober, steady, industrious, good-tempered, and
+with a first-rate character from my last place?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He laughed an embarrassed laugh.&nbsp; &lsquo;Your hair curls beautiful,&rsquo;
+he said, by way of changing the subject.&nbsp; &lsquo;The Viscount&rsquo;s
+the boy for curls, though; and the richness of it is, Mr. Powl tells
+me his don&rsquo;t curl no more than that much twine - by nature.&nbsp;
+Gettin&rsquo; old, the Viscount is.&nbsp; He &rsquo;<i>ave</i> gone
+the pace, &rsquo;aven&rsquo;t &rsquo;e, sir?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The fact is,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;that I know very little about
+him.&nbsp; Our family has been much divided, and I have been a soldier
+from a child.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A soldier, Mr. Anne, sir?&rsquo; cried Rowley, with a sudden
+feverish animation.&nbsp; &lsquo;Was you ever wounded?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It is contrary to my principles to discourage admiration for myself;
+and, slipping back the shoulder of the dressing-gown, I silently exhibited
+the scar which I had received in Edinburgh Castle.&nbsp; He looked at
+it with awe.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah, well!&rsquo; he continued, &lsquo;there&rsquo;s where the
+difference comes in!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s in the training.&nbsp; The other
+Viscount have been horse-racing, and dicing, and carrying on all his
+life.&nbsp; All right enough, no doubt; but what I do say is, that it
+don&rsquo;t lead to nothink.&nbsp; Whereas - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Whereas Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s?&rsquo; I put in.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My Viscount?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, sir, I <i>did</i>
+say it; and now that I&rsquo;ve seen you, I say it again!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I could not refrain from smiling at this outburst, and the rascal caught
+me in the mirror and smiled to me again.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;d say it again, Mr. Hanne,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+know which side my bread&rsquo;s buttered.&nbsp; I know when a gen&rsquo;leman&rsquo;s
+a gen&rsquo;leman.&nbsp; Mr. Powl can go to Putney with his one!&nbsp;
+Beg your pardon, Mr. Anne, for being so familiar,&rsquo; said he, blushing
+suddenly scarlet.&nbsp; &lsquo;I was especially warned against it by
+Mr. Powl.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Discipline before all,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Follow your
+front-rank man.<br>
+<br>
+With that, we began to turn our attention to the clothes.&nbsp; I was
+amazed to find them fit so well: not <i>&agrave; la diable</i>, in the
+haphazard manner of a soldier&rsquo;s uniform or a ready-made suit;
+but with nicety, as a trained artist might rejoice to make them for
+a favourite subject.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis extraordinary,&rsquo; cried I: &lsquo;these things
+fit me perfectly.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Indeed, Mr. Anne, you two be very much of a shape,&rsquo; said
+Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who?&nbsp; What two?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The Viscount,&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Damnation!&nbsp; Have I the man&rsquo;s clothes on me, too?&rsquo;
+cried I.<br>
+<br>
+But Rowley hastened to reassure me.&nbsp; On the first word of my coming,
+the Count had put the matter of my wardrobe in the hands of his own
+and my cousin&rsquo;s tailors; and on the rumour of our resemblance,
+my clothes had been made to Alain&rsquo;s measure.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But they were all made for you express, Mr. Anne.&nbsp; You may
+be certain the Count would never do nothing by &rsquo;alf: fires kep&rsquo;
+burning; the finest of clothes ordered, I&rsquo;m sure, and a body-servant
+being trained a-purpose.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it&rsquo;s a good fire, and a good
+set-out of clothes; and what a valet, Mr. Rowley!&nbsp; And there&rsquo;s
+one thing to be said for my cousin - I mean for Mr. Powl&rsquo;s Viscount
+- he has a very fair figure.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t you be took in, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; quoth the faithless
+Rowley: &lsquo;he has to be hyked into a pair of stays to get them things
+on!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come, come, Mr. Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;this is telling
+tales out of school!&nbsp; Do not you be deceived.&nbsp; The greatest
+men of antiquity, including Caesar and Hannibal and Pope Joan, may have
+been very glad, at my time of life or Alain&rsquo;s, to follow his example.&nbsp;
+&rsquo;Tis a misfortune common to all; and really,&rsquo; said I, bowing
+to myself before the mirror like one who should dance the minuet, &lsquo;when
+the result is so successful as this, who would do anything but applaud?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+My toilet concluded, I marched on to fresh surprises.&nbsp; My chamber,
+my new valet and my new clothes had been beyond hope: the dinner, the
+soup, the whole bill of fare was a revelation of the powers there are
+in man.&nbsp; I had not supposed it lay in the genius of any cook to
+create, out of common beef and mutton, things so different and dainty.&nbsp;
+The wine was of a piece, the doctor a most agreeable companion; nor
+could I help reflecting on the prospect that all this wealth, comfort
+and handsome profusion might still very possibly become mine.&nbsp;
+Here were a change indeed, from the common soldier and the camp kettle,
+the prisoner and his prison rations, the fugitive and the horrors of
+the covered cart!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVII - THE DESPATCH-BOX<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The doctor had scarce finished his meal before he hastened with an apology
+to attend upon his patient; and almost immediately after I was myself
+summoned and ushered up the great staircase and along interminable corridors
+to the bedside of my great-uncle the Count.&nbsp; You are to think that
+up to the present moment I had not set eyes on this formidable personage,
+only on the evidences of his wealth and kindness.&nbsp; You are to think
+besides that I had heard him miscalled and abused from my earliest childhood
+up.&nbsp; The first of the <i>&eacute;migr&eacute;s</i> could never
+expect a good word in the society in which my father moved.&nbsp; Even
+yet the reports I received were of a doubtful nature; even Romaine had
+drawn of him no very amiable portrait; and as I was ushered into the
+room, it was a critical eye that I cast on my great-uncle.&nbsp; He
+lay propped on pillows in a little cot no greater than a camp-bed, not
+visibly breathing.&nbsp; He was about eighty years of age, and looked
+it; not that his face was much lined, but all the blood and colour seemed
+to have faded from his body, and even his eyes, which last he kept usually
+closed as though the light distressed him.&nbsp; There was an unspeakable
+degree of slyness in his expression, which kept me ill at ease; he seemed
+to lie there with his arms folded, like a spider waiting for prey.&nbsp;
+His speech was very deliberate and courteous, but scarce louder than
+a sigh.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I bid you welcome, <i>Monsieur le Vicomte Anne</i>,&rsquo; said
+he, looking at me hard with his pale eyes, but not moving on his pillows.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I have sent for you, and I thank you for the obliging expedition
+you have shown.&nbsp; It is my misfortune that I cannot rise to receive
+you.&nbsp; I trust you have been reasonably well entertained?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;<i>Monsieur mon oncle</i>,&rsquo; I said, bowing very low, &lsquo;I
+am come at the summons of the head of my family.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is well,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be seated.&nbsp; I should
+be glad to hear some news - if that can be called news that is already
+twenty years old - of how I have the pleasure to see you here.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+By the coldness of his address, not more than by the nature of the times
+that he bade me recall, I was plunged in melancholy.&nbsp; I felt myself
+surrounded as with deserts of friendlessness, and the delight of my
+welcome was turned to ashes in my mouth.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That is soon told, <i>monseigneur</i>,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+understand that I need tell you nothing of the end of my unhappy parents?&nbsp;
+It is only the story of the lost dog.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are right.&nbsp; I am sufficiently informed of that deplorable
+affair; it is painful to me.&nbsp; My nephew, your father, was a man
+who would not be advised,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Tell me, if you
+please, simply of yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am afraid I must run the risk of harrowing your sensibility
+in the beginning,&rsquo; said I, with a bitter smile, &lsquo;because
+my story begins at the foot of the guillotine.&nbsp; When the list came
+out that night, and her name was there, I was already old enough, not
+in years but in sad experience, to understand the extent of my misfortune.&nbsp;
+She - &rsquo;&nbsp; I paused.&nbsp; &lsquo;Enough that she arranged
+with a friend, Madame de Chasserades, that she should take charge of
+me, and by the favour of our jailers I was suffered to remain in the
+shelter of the <i>Abbaye</i>.&nbsp; That was my only refuge; there was
+no corner of France that I could rest the sole of my foot upon except
+the prison.&nbsp; Monsieur le Comte, you are as well aware as I can
+be what kind of a life that was, and how swiftly death smote in that
+society.&nbsp; I did not wait long before the name of Madame de Chasserades
+succeeded to that of my mother on the list.&nbsp; She passed me on to
+Madame de Noytot; she, in her turn, to Mademoiselle de Braye; and there
+were others.&nbsp; I was the one thing permanent; they were all transient
+as clouds; a day or two of their care, and then came the last farewell
+and - somewhere far off in that roaring Paris that surrounded us - the
+bloody scene.&nbsp; I was the cherished one, the last comfort, of these
+dying women.&nbsp; I have been in pitched fights, my lord, and I never
+knew such courage.&nbsp; It was all done smiling, in the tone of good
+society; <i>belle maman</i> was the name I was taught to give to each;
+and for a day or two the new &ldquo;pretty mamma&rdquo; would make much
+of me, show me off, teach me the minuet, and to say my prayers; and
+then, with a tender embrace, would go the way of her predecessors, smiling.&nbsp;
+There were some that wept too.&nbsp; There was a childhood!&nbsp; All
+the time Monsieur de Culemberg kept his eye on me, and would have had
+me out of the <i>Abbaye</i> and in his own protection, but my &ldquo;pretty
+mammas&rdquo; one after another resisted the idea.&nbsp; Where could
+I be safer? they argued; and what was to become of them without the
+darling of the prison?&nbsp; Well, it was soon shown how safe I was!&nbsp;
+The dreadful day of the massacre came; the prison was overrun; none
+paid attention to me, not even the last of my &ldquo;pretty mammas,&rdquo;
+for she had met another fate.&nbsp; I was wandering distracted, when
+I was found by some one in the interests of Monsieur de Culemberg.&nbsp;
+I understand he was sent on purpose; I believe, in order to reach the
+interior of the prison, he had set his hand to nameless barbarities:
+such was the price paid for my worthless, whimpering little life!&nbsp;
+He gave me his hand; it was wet, and mine was reddened; he led me unresisting.&nbsp;
+I remember but the one circumstance of my flight - it was my last view
+of my last pretty mamma.&nbsp; Shall I describe it to you?&rsquo; I
+asked the Count, with a sudden fierceness.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Avoid unpleasant details,&rsquo; observed my great-uncle gently.<br>
+<br>
+At these words a sudden peace fell upon me.&nbsp; I had been angry with
+the man before; I had not sought to spare him; and now, in a moment,
+I saw that there was nothing to spare.&nbsp; Whether from natural heartlessness
+or extreme old age, the soul was not at home; and my benefactor, who
+had kept the fire lit in my room for a month past - my only relative
+except Alain, whom I knew already to be a hired spy - had trodden out
+the last sparks of hope and interest.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Certainly,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and, indeed, the day for them
+is nearly over.&nbsp; I was taken to Monsieur de Culemberg&rsquo;s,
+- I presume, sir, that you know the Abbe de Culemberg?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He indicated assent without opening his eyes.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He was a very brave and a very learned man - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And a very holy one,&rsquo; said my uncle civilly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And a very holy one, as you observe,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;He did an infinity of good, and through all the Terror kept himself
+from the guillotine.&nbsp; He brought me up, and gave me such education
+as I have.&nbsp; It was in his house in the country at Dammarie, near
+Melun, that I made the acquaintance of your agent, Mr. Vicary, who lay
+there in hiding, only to fall a victim at the last to a gang of <i>chauffeurs</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That poor Mr. Vicary!&rsquo; observed my uncle.&nbsp; &lsquo;He
+had been many times in my interests to France, and this was his first
+failure.&nbsp; <i>Quel charmant homme, n&rsquo;est-ce pas</i>?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Infinitely so,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I would not willingly
+detain you any further with a story, the details of which it must naturally
+be more or less unpleasant for you to hear.&nbsp; Suffice it that, by
+M. de Culemberg&rsquo;s own advice, I said farewell at eighteen to that
+kind preceptor and his books, and entered the service of France; and
+have since then carried arms in such a manner as not to disgrace my
+family.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You narrate well; <i>vous aves la voix chaude</i>,&rsquo; said
+my uncle, turning on his pillows as if to study me.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have
+a very good account of you by Monsieur de Mauseant, whom you helped
+in Spain.&nbsp; And you had some education from the Abbe de Culemberg,
+a man of a good house?&nbsp; Yes, you will do very well.&nbsp; You have
+a good manner and a handsome person, which hurts nothing.&nbsp; We are
+all handsome in the family; even I myself, I have had my successes,
+the memories of which still charm me.&nbsp; It is my intention, my nephew,
+to make of you my heir.&nbsp; I am not very well content with my other
+nephew, Monsieur le Vicomte: he has not been respectful, which is the
+flattery due to age.&nbsp; And there are other matters.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was half tempted to throw back in his face that inheritance so coldly
+offered.&nbsp; At the same time I had to consider that he was an old
+man, and, after all, my relation; and that I was a poor one, in considerable
+straits, with a hope at heart which that inheritance might yet enable
+me to realise.&nbsp; Nor could I forget that, however icy his manners,
+he had behaved to me from the first with the extreme of liberality and
+- I was about to write, kindness, but the word, in that connection,
+would not come.&nbsp; I really owed the man some measure of gratitude,
+which it would be an ill manner to repay if I were to insult him on
+his deathbed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Your will, monsieur, must ever be my rule,&rsquo; said I, bowing.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have wit, <i>monsieur mon neveu</i>,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;the
+best wit - the wit of silence.&nbsp; Many might have deafened me with
+their gratitude.&nbsp; Gratitude!&rsquo; he repeated, with a peculiar
+intonation, and lay and smiled to himself.&nbsp; &lsquo;But to approach
+what is more important.&nbsp; As a prisoner of war, will it be possible
+for you to be served heir to English estates?&nbsp; I have no idea:
+long as I have dwelt in England, I have never studied what they call
+their laws.&nbsp; On the other hand, how if Romaine should come too
+late?&nbsp; I have two pieces of business to be transacted - to die,
+and to make my will; and, however desirous I may be to serve you, I
+cannot postpone the first in favour of the second beyond a very few
+hours.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, sir, I must then contrive to be doing as I did before,&rsquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not so,&rsquo; said the Count.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have an alternative.&nbsp;
+I have just drawn my balance at my banker&rsquo;s, a considerable sum,
+and I am now to place it in your hands.&nbsp; It will be so much for
+you and so much less - &rsquo; he paused, and smiled with an air of
+malignity that surprised me.&nbsp; &lsquo;But it is necessary it should
+be done before witnesses.&nbsp; <i>Monsieur le Vicomte</i> is of a particular
+disposition, and an unwitnessed donation may very easily be twisted
+into a theft.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He touched a bell, which was answered by a man having the appearance
+of a confidential valet.&nbsp; To him he gave a key.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Bring me the despatch-box that came yesterday, La Ferriere,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;You will at the same time present my compliments
+to Dr. Hunter and M. l&rsquo;Abbe, and request them to step for a few
+moments to my room.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The despatch-box proved to be rather a bulky piece of baggage, covered
+with Russia leather.&nbsp; Before the doctor and an excellent old smiling
+priest it was passed over into my hands with a very clear statement
+of the disposer&rsquo;s wishes; immediately after which, though the
+witnesses remained behind to draw up and sign a joint note of the transaction,
+Monsieur de K&eacute;roual dismissed me to my own room, La Ferriere
+following with the invaluable box.<br>
+<br>
+At my chamber door I took it from him with thanks, and entered alone.&nbsp;
+Everything had been already disposed for the night, the curtains drawn
+and the fire trimmed; and Rowley was still busy with my bedclothes.&nbsp;
+He turned round as I entered with a look of welcome that did my heart
+good.&nbsp; Indeed, I had never a much greater need of human sympathy,
+however trivial, than at that moment when I held a fortune in my arms.&nbsp;
+In my uncle&rsquo;s room I had breathed the very atmosphere of disenchantment.&nbsp;
+He had gorged my pockets; he had starved every dignified or affectionate
+sentiment of a man.&nbsp; I had received so chilling an impression of
+age and experience that the mere look of youth drew me to confide in
+Rowley: he was only a boy, his heart must beat yet, he must still retain
+some innocence and natural feelings, he could blurt out follies with
+his mouth, he was not a machine to utter perfect speech!&nbsp; At the
+same time, I was beginning to outgrow the painful impressions of my
+interview; my spirits were beginning to revive; and at the jolly, empty
+looks of Mr. Rowley, as he ran forward to relieve me of the box, St.
+Ives became himself again.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, Rowley, don&rsquo;t be in a hurry,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;This is a momentous juncture.&nbsp; Man and boy, you have been
+in my service about three hours.&nbsp; You must already have observed
+that I am a gentleman of a somewhat morose disposition, and there is
+nothing that I more dislike than the smallest appearance of familiarity.&nbsp;
+Mr. Pole or Mr. Powl, probably in the spirit of prophecy, warned you
+against this danger.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said Rowley blankly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now there has just arisen one of those rare cases, in which I
+am willing to depart from my principles.&nbsp; My uncle has given me
+a box - what you would call a Christmas box.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t know
+what&rsquo;s in it, and no more do you: perhaps I am an April fool,
+or perhaps I am already enormously wealthy; there might be five hundred
+pounds in this apparently harmless receptacle!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Lord, Mr. Anne!&rsquo; cried Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, Rowley, hold up your right hand and repeat the words of
+the oath after me,&rsquo; said I, laying the despatch-box on the table.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Strike me blue if I ever disclose to Mr. Powl, or Mr. Powl&rsquo;s
+Viscount, or anything that is Mr. Powl&rsquo;s, not to mention Mr. Dawson
+and the doctor, the treasures of the following despatch-box; and strike
+me sky-blue scarlet if I do not continually maintain, uphold, love,
+honour and obey, serve, and follow to the four corners of the earth
+and the waters that are under the earth, the hereinafter before-mentioned
+(only that I find I have neglected to mention him) Viscount Anne de
+K&eacute;roual de St.-Yves, commonly known as Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s Viscount.&nbsp;
+So be it.&nbsp; Amen.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He took the oath with the same exaggerated seriousness as I gave it
+to him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here is the key for you; I will
+hold the lid with both hands in the meanwhile.&rsquo;&nbsp; He turned
+the key.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bring up all the candles in the room, and range
+them along-side.&nbsp; What is it to be?&nbsp; A live gorgon, a Jack-in-the-box,
+or a spring that fires a pistol?&nbsp; On your knees, sir, before the
+prodigy!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the table.&nbsp;
+At sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay in front of us,
+between the candles, or rolled upon the floor alongside, I stood astonished.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O Lord!&rsquo; cried Mr. Rowley; &lsquo;oh Lordy, Lordy, Lord!&rsquo;
+and he scrambled after the fallen guineas.&nbsp; &lsquo;O my, Mr. Anne!
+what a sight o&rsquo; money!&nbsp; Why, it&rsquo;s like a blessed story-book.&nbsp;
+It&rsquo;s like the Forty Thieves.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now Rowley, let&rsquo;s be cool, let&rsquo;s be businesslike,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Riches are deceitful, particularly when you haven&rsquo;t
+counted them; and the first thing we have to do is to arrive at the
+amount of my - let me say, modest competency.&nbsp; If I&rsquo;m not
+mistaken, I have enough here to keep you in gold buttons all the rest
+of your life.&nbsp; You collect the gold, and I&rsquo;ll take the paper.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for some time
+there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the jingling of guineas,
+broken occasionally by the exulting exclamations of Rowley.&nbsp; The
+arithmetical operation on which we were embarked took long, and it might
+have been tedious to others; not to me nor to my helper.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ten thousand pounds!&rsquo; I announced at last.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ten thousand!&rsquo; echoed Mr. Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+And we gazed upon each other.<br>
+<br>
+The greatness of this fortune took my breath away.&nbsp; With that sum
+in my hands, I need fear no enemies.&nbsp; People are arrested, in nine
+cases out of ten, not because the police are astute, but because they
+themselves run short of money; and I had here before me in the despatch-box
+a succession of devices and disguises that insured my liberty.&nbsp;
+Not only so; but, as I felt with a sudden and overpowering thrill, with
+ten thousand pounds in my hands I was become an eligible suitor.&nbsp;
+What advances I had made in the past, as a private soldier in a military
+prison, or a fugitive by the wayside, could only be qualified or, indeed,
+excused as acts of desperation.&nbsp; And now, I might come in by the
+front door; I might approach the dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and
+rich settlements to offer.&nbsp; The poor French prisoner, Champdivers,
+might be in a perpetual danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman,
+St.-Ives, in his post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side, could
+smile at fate and laugh at locksmiths.&nbsp; I repeated the proverb,
+exulting, <i>Love laughs at locksmiths</i>!&nbsp; In a moment, by the
+mere coming of this money, my love had become possible - it had come
+near, it was under my hand - and it may be by one of the curiosities
+of human nature, but it burned that instant brighter.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;your Viscount is a made man.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, we both are, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, both,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and you shall dance at the wedding;&rsquo;
+and I flung at his head a bundle of bank notes, and had just followed
+it up with a handful of guineas, when the door opened, and Mr. Romaine
+appeared upon the threshold.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XVIII - MR. ROMAINE CALLS ME NAMES<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Feeling very much of a fool to be thus taken by surprise, I scrambled
+to my feet and hastened to make my visitor welcome.&nbsp; He did not
+refuse me his hand; but he gave it with a coldness and distance for
+which I was quite unprepared, and his countenance, as he looked on me,
+was marked in a strong degree with concern and severity.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So, sir, I find you here?&rsquo; said he, in tones of little
+encouragement.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is that you, George?&nbsp; You can run away;
+I have business with your master.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He showed Rowley out, and locked the door behind him.&nbsp; Then he
+sat down in an armchair on one side of the fire, and looked at me with
+uncompromising sternness.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am hesitating how to begin,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;In
+this singular labyrinth of blunders and difficulties that you have prepared
+for us, I am positively hesitating where to begin.&nbsp; It will perhaps
+be best that you should read, first of all, this paragraph.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And he handed over to me a newspaper.<br>
+<br>
+The paragraph in question was brief.&nbsp; It announced the recapture
+of one of the prisoners recently escaped from Edinburgh Castle; gave
+his name, Clausel, and added that he had entered into the particulars
+of the recent revolting murder in the Castle, and denounced the murderer:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is a common soldier called Champdivers, who had himself escaped,
+and is in all probability involved in the common fate of his comrades.&nbsp;
+In spite of the activity along all the Forth and the East Coast, nothing
+has yet been seen of the sloop which these desperadoes seized at Grangemouth,
+and it is now almost certain that they have found a watery grave.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+At the reading of this paragraph, my heart turned over.&nbsp; In a moment
+I saw my castle in the air ruined; myself changed from a mere military
+fugitive into a hunted murderer, fleeing from the gallows; my love,
+which had a moment since appeared so near to me, blotted from the field
+of possibility.&nbsp; Despair, which was my first sentiment, did not,
+however, endure for more than a moment.&nbsp; I saw that my companions
+had indeed succeeded in their unlikely design; and that I was supposed
+to have accompanied and perished along with them by shipwreck - a most
+probable ending to their enterprise.&nbsp; If they thought me at the
+bottom of the North Sea, I need not fear much vigilance on the streets
+of Edinburgh.&nbsp; Champdivers was wanted: what was to connect him
+with St. Ives?&nbsp; Major Chevenix would recognise me if he met me;
+that was beyond bargaining: he had seen me so often, his interest had
+been kindled to so high a point, that I could hope to deceive him by
+no stratagem of disguise.&nbsp; Well, even so; he would have a competition
+of testimony before him: he knew Clausel, he knew me, and I was sure
+he would decide for honour.&nbsp; At the same time the image of Flora
+shot up in my mind&rsquo;s eye with such a radiancy as fairly overwhelmed
+all other considerations; the blood sprang to every corner of my body,
+and I vowed I would see and win her, if it cost my neck.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Very annoying, no doubt,&rsquo; said I, as I returned the paper
+to Mr. Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is annoying your word for it?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Exasperating, if you like,&rsquo; I admitted.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And true?&rsquo; he inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, true in a sense,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But perhaps
+I had better answer that question by putting you in possession of the
+facts?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think so, indeed,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+I narrated to him as much as seemed necessary of the quarrel, the duel,
+the death of Goguelat, and the character of Clausel.&nbsp; He heard
+me through in a forbidding silence, nor did he at all betray the nature
+of his sentiments, except that, at the episode of the scissors, I could
+observe his mulberry face to turn three shades paler.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I suppose I may believe you?&rsquo; said he, when I had done.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Or else conclude this interview,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Can you not understand that we are here discussing matters of
+the gravest import?&nbsp; Can you not understand that I feel myself
+weighed with a load of responsibility on your account - that you should
+take this occasion to air your fire-eating manners against your own
+attorney?&nbsp; There are serious hours in life, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; he
+said severely.&nbsp; &lsquo;A capital charge, and that of a very brutal
+character and with singularly unpleasant details; the presence of the
+man Clausel, who (according to your account of it) is actuated by sentiments
+of real malignity, and prepared to swear black white; all the other
+witnesses scattered and perhaps drowned at sea; the natural prejudice
+against a Frenchman and a runaway prisoner: this makes a serious total
+for your lawyer to consider, and is by no means lessened by the incurable
+folly and levity of your own disposition.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, my expressions have been selected with scrupulous accuracy,&rsquo;
+he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;How did I find you, sir, when I came to announce
+this catastrophe?&nbsp; You were sitting on the hearthrug playing, like
+a silly baby, with a servant, were you not, and the floor all scattered
+with gold and bank paper?&nbsp; There was a tableau for you!&nbsp; It
+was I who came, and you were lucky in that.&nbsp; It might have been
+any one - your cousin as well as another.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have me there, sir,&rsquo; I admitted.&nbsp; &lsquo;I had
+neglected all precautions, and you do right to be angry.&nbsp; <i>Apropos</i>,
+Mr. Romaine, how did you come yourself, and how long have you been in
+the house?&rsquo; I added, surprised, on the retrospect, not to have
+heard him arrive.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I drove up in a chaise and pair,&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;Any
+one might have heard me.&nbsp; But you were not listening, I suppose?
+being so extremely at your ease in the very house of your enemy, and
+under a capital charge!&nbsp; And I have been long enough here to do
+your business for you.&nbsp; Ah, yes, I did it, God forgive me! - did
+it before I so much as asked you the explanation of the paragraph.&nbsp;
+For some time back the will has been prepared; now it is signed; and
+your uncle has heard nothing of your recent piece of activity.&nbsp;
+Why?&nbsp; Well, I had no fancy to bother him on his death-bed: you
+might be innocent; and at bottom I preferred the murderer to the spy.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+No doubt of it but the man played a friendly part; no doubt also that,
+in his ill-temper and anxiety, he expressed himself unpalatably.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will perhaps find me over delicate,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There is a word you employed - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I employ the words of my brief, sir,&rsquo; he cried, striking
+with his hand on the newspaper.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is there in six letters.&nbsp;
+And do not be so certain - you have not stood your trial yet.&nbsp;
+It is an ugly affair, a fishy business.&nbsp; It is highly disagreeable.&nbsp;
+I would give my hand off - I mean I would give a hundred pound down,
+to have nothing to do with it.&nbsp; And, situated as we are, we must
+at once take action.&nbsp; There is here no choice.&nbsp; You must at
+once quit this country, and get to France, or Holland, or, indeed, to
+Madagascar.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There may be two words to that,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not so much as one syllable!&rsquo; he retorted.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here
+is no room for argument.&nbsp; The case is nakedly plain.&nbsp; In the
+disgusting position in which you have found means to place yourself,
+all that is to be hoped for is delay.&nbsp; A time may come when we
+shall be able to do better.&nbsp; It cannot be now: now it would be
+the gibbet.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You labour under a false impression, Mr. Romaine,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have no impatience to figure in the dock.&nbsp; I
+am even as anxious as yourself to postpone my first appearance there.&nbsp;
+On the other hand, I have not the slightest intention of leaving this
+country, where I please myself extremely.&nbsp; I have a good address,
+a ready tongue, an English accent that passes, and, thanks to the generosity
+of my uncle, as much money as I want.&nbsp; It would be hard indeed
+if, with all these advantages, Mr. St. Ives should not be able to live
+quietly in a private lodging, while the authorities amuse themselves
+by looking for Champdivers.&nbsp; You forget, there is no connection
+between these two personages.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And you forget your cousin,&rsquo; retorted Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;There
+is the link.&nbsp; There is the tongue of the buckle.&nbsp; He knows
+you are Champdivers.&rsquo;&nbsp; He put up his hand as if to listen.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And, for a wager, here he is himself!&rsquo; he exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+As when a tailor takes a piece of goods upon his counter, and rends
+it across, there came to our ears from the avenue the long tearing sound
+of a chaise and four approaching at the top speed of the horses.&nbsp;
+And, looking out between the curtains, we beheld the lamps skimming
+on the smooth ascent.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay,&rsquo; said Romaine, wiping the window-pane that he might
+see more clearly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ay, that is he by the driving!&nbsp;
+So he squanders money along the king&rsquo;s highway, the triple idiot!
+gorging every man he meets with gold for the pleasure of arriving -
+where?&nbsp; Ah, yes, where but a debtor&rsquo;s jail, if not a criminal
+prison!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is he that kind of a man?&rsquo; I said, staring on these lamps
+as though I could decipher in them the secret of my cousin&rsquo;s character.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will find him a dangerous kind,&rsquo; answered the lawyer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;For you, these are the lights on a lee shore!&nbsp; I find I
+fall in a muse when I consider of him; what a formidable being he once
+was, and what a personable! and how near he draws to the moment that
+must break him utterly! we none of us like him here; we hate him, rather;
+and yet I have a sense - I don&rsquo;t think at my time of life it can
+be pity - but a reluctance rather, to break anything so big and figurative,
+as though he were a big porcelain pot or a big picture of high price.&nbsp;
+Ay, there is what I was waiting for!&rsquo; he cried, as the lights
+of a second chaise swam in sight.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is he beyond a doubt.&nbsp;
+The first was the signature and the next the flourish.&nbsp; Two chaises,
+the second following with the baggage, which is always copious and ponderous,
+and one of his valets: he cannot go a step without a valet.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I hear you repeat the word big,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+it cannot be that he is anything out of the way in stature.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said the attorney.&nbsp; &lsquo;About your height,
+as I guessed for the tailors, and I see nothing wrong with the result.&nbsp;
+But, somehow, he commands an atmosphere; he has a spacious manner; and
+he has kept up, all through life, such a volume of racket about his
+personality, with his chaises and his racers and his dicings, and I
+know not what - that somehow he imposes!&nbsp; It seems, when the farce
+is done, and he locked in Fleet prison - and nobody left but Buonaparte
+and Lord Wellington and the Hetman Platoff to make a work about - the
+world will be in a comparison quite tranquil.&nbsp; But this is beside
+the mark,&rsquo; he added, with an effort, turning again from the window.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;We are now under fire, Mr. Anne, as you soldiers would say, and
+it is high time we should prepare to go into action.&nbsp; He must not
+see you; that would be fatal.&nbsp; All that he knows at present is
+that you resemble him, and that is much more than enough.&nbsp; If it
+were possible, it would be well he should not know you were in the house.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Quite impossible, depend upon it,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Some
+of the servants are directly in his interests, perhaps in his pay: Dawson,
+for an example.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My own idea!&rsquo; cried Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;And at least,&rsquo;
+he added, as the first of the chaises drew up with a dash in front of
+the portico, &lsquo;it is now too late.&nbsp; Here he is.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+We stood listening, with a strange anxiety, to the various noises that
+awoke in the silent house: the sound of doors opening and closing, the
+sound of feet near at hand and farther off.&nbsp; It was plain the arrival
+of my cousin was a matter of moment, almost of parade, to the household.&nbsp;
+And suddenly, out of this confused and distant bustle, a rapid and light
+tread became distinguishable.&nbsp; We heard it come upstairs, draw
+near along the corridor, pause at the door, and a stealthy and hasty
+rapping succeeded.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Anne - Mr. Anne, sir!&nbsp; Let me in!&rsquo; said the voice
+of Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+We admitted the lad, and locked the door again behind him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s <i>him</i>, sir,&rsquo; he panted.&nbsp; &lsquo;He&rsquo;ve
+come.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You mean the Viscount?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;So we supposed.&nbsp;
+But come, Rowley - out with the rest of it!&nbsp; You have more to tell
+us, or your face belies you !&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Anne, I do,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr. Romaine, sir,
+you&rsquo;re a friend of his, ain&rsquo;t you?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, George, I am a friend of his,&rsquo; said Romaine, and,
+to my great surprise, laid his hand upon my shoulder.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, it&rsquo;s this way,&rsquo; said Rowley - &lsquo;Mr. Powl
+have been at me!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s to play the spy!&nbsp; I thought he
+was at it from the first!&nbsp; From the first I see what he was after
+- coming round and round, and hinting things!&nbsp; But to-night he
+outs with it plump!&nbsp; I&rsquo;m to let him hear all what you&rsquo;re
+to do beforehand, he says; and he gave me this for an arnest&rsquo;
+- holding up half a guinea; &lsquo;and I took it, so I did!&nbsp; Strike
+me sky-blue scarlet?&rsquo; says he, adducing the words of the mock
+oath; and he looked askance at me as he did so.<br>
+<br>
+I saw that he had forgotten himself, and that he knew it.&nbsp; The
+expression of his eye changed almost in the passing of the glance from
+the significant to the appealing - from the look of an accomplice to
+that of a culprit; and from that moment he became the model of a well-drilled
+valet.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sky-blue scarlet?&rsquo; repeated the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is
+the fool delirious?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;he is only reminding me of something.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well - and I believe the fellow will be faithful,&rsquo; said
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;So you are a friend of Mr. Anne&rsquo;s&rsquo;
+too?&rsquo; he added to Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis something sudden,&rsquo; observed Romaine; &lsquo;but
+it may be genuine enough.&nbsp; I believe him to be honest.&nbsp; He
+comes of honest people.&nbsp; Well, George Rowley, you might embrace
+some early opportunity to earn that half-guinea, by telling Mr. Powl
+that your master will not leave here till noon to-morrow, if he go even
+then.&nbsp; Tell him there are a hundred things to be done here, and
+a hundred more that can only be done properly at my office in Holborn.&nbsp;
+Come to think of it - we had better see to that first of all,&rsquo;
+he went on, unlocking the door.&nbsp; &lsquo;Get hold of Powl, and see.&nbsp;
+And be quick back, and clear me up this mess.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Mr. Rowley was no sooner gone than the lawyer took a pinch of snuff,
+and regarded me with somewhat of a more genial expression.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;it is very fortunate for you that
+your face is so strong a letter of recommendation.&nbsp; Here am I,
+a tough old practitioner, mixing myself up with your very distressing
+business; and here is this farmer&rsquo;s lad, who has the wit to take
+a bribe and the loyalty to come and tell you of it - all, I take it,
+on the strength of your appearance.&nbsp; I wish I could imagine how
+it would impress a jury!&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And how it would affect the hangman, sir?&rsquo; I asked<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;<i>Absit omen</i>!&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine devoutly.<br>
+<br>
+We were just so far in our talk, when I heard a sound that brought my
+heart into my mouth: the sound of some one slyly trying the handle of
+the door.&nbsp; It had been preceded by no audible footstep.&nbsp; Since
+the departure of Rowley our wing of the house had been entirely silent.&nbsp;
+And we had every right to suppose ourselves alone, and to conclude that
+the new-comer, whoever he might be, was come on a clandestine, if not
+a hostile, errand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who is there?&rsquo; asked Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s only me, sir,&rsquo; said the soft voice of Dawson.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s the Viscount, sir.&nbsp; He is very desirous to speak
+with you on business.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Tell him I shall come shortly, Dawson,&rsquo; said the lawyer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am at present engaged.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Thank you, sir!&rsquo; said Dawson.<br>
+<br>
+And we heard his feet draw off slowly along the corridor.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine, speaking low, and maintaining the
+attitude of one intently listening, &lsquo;there is another foot.&nbsp;
+I cannot be deceived!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think there was indeed!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And what
+troubles me - I am not sure that the other has gone entirely away.&nbsp;
+By the time it got the length of the head of the stair the tread was
+plainly single.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ahem - blockaded?&rsquo; asked the lawyer.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A siege <i>en r&egrave;gle</i>!&rsquo; I exclaimed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Let us come farther from the door,&rsquo; said Romaine, &lsquo;and
+reconsider this damnable position.&nbsp; Without doubt, Alain was this
+moment at the door.&nbsp; He hoped to enter and get a view of you, as
+if by accident.&nbsp; Baffled in this, has he stayed himself, or has
+he planted Dawson here by way of sentinel?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Himself, beyond a doubt,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;And yet
+to what end?&nbsp; He cannot think to pass the night there!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If it were only possible to pay no heed!&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;But this is the accursed drawback of your position.&nbsp; We
+can do nothing openly.&nbsp; I must smuggle you out of this room and
+out of this house like seizable goods; and how am I to set about it
+with a sentinel planted at your very door?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There is no good in being agitated,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;None at all,&rsquo; he acquiesced.&nbsp; &lsquo;And, come to
+think of it, it is droll enough that I should have been that very moment
+commenting on your personal appearance, when your cousin came upon this
+mission.&nbsp; I was saying, if you remember, that your face was as
+good or better than a letter of recommendation.&nbsp; I wonder if M.
+Alain would be like the rest of us - I wonder what he would think of
+it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Mr. Romaine was sitting in a chair by the fire with his back to the
+windows, and I was myself kneeling on the hearthrug and beginning mechanically
+to pick up the scattered bills, when a honeyed voice joined suddenly
+in our conversation.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He thinks well of it, Mr. Romaine.&nbsp; He begs to join himself
+to that circle of admirers which you indicate to exist already.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XIX - THE DEVIL AND ALL AT AMERSHAM PLACE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+Never did two human creatures get to their feet with more alacrity than
+the lawyer and myself.&nbsp; We had locked and barred the main gates
+of the citadel; but unhappily we had left open the bath-room sally-port;
+and here we found the voice of the hostile trumpets sounding from within,
+and all our defences taken in reverse.&nbsp; I took but the time to
+whisper Mr. Romaine in the ear: &lsquo;Here is another tableau for you!&rsquo;
+at which he looked at me a moment with a kind of pathos, as who should
+say, &lsquo;Don&rsquo;t hit a man when he&rsquo;s down.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Then I transferred my eyes to my enemy.<br>
+<br>
+He had his hat on, a little on one side: it was a very tall hat, raked
+extremely, and had a narrow curling brim.&nbsp; His hair was all curled
+out in masses like an Italian mountebank - a most unpardonable fashion.&nbsp;
+He sported a huge tippeted overcoat of frieze, such as watchmen wear,
+only the inside was lined with costly furs, and he kept it half open
+to display the exquisite linen, the many-coloured waistcoat, and the
+profuse jewellery of watch-chains and brooches underneath.&nbsp; The
+leg and the ankle were turned to a miracle.&nbsp; It is out of the question
+that I should deny the resemblance altogether, since it has been remarked
+by so many different persons whom I cannot reasonably accuse of a conspiracy.&nbsp;
+As a matter of fact, I saw little of it and confessed to nothing.&nbsp;
+Certainly he was what some might call handsome, of a pictorial, exuberant
+style of beauty, all attitude, profile, and impudence: a man whom I
+could see in fancy parade on the grand stand at a race-meeting or swagger
+in Piccadilly, staring down the women, and stared at himself with admiration
+by the coal-porters.&nbsp; Of his frame of mind at that moment his face
+offered a lively if an unconscious picture.&nbsp; He was lividly pale,
+and his lip was caught up in a smile that could almost be called a snarl,
+of a sheer, arid malignity that appalled me and yet put me on my mettle
+for the encounter.&nbsp; He looked me up and down, then bowed and took
+off his hat to me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My cousin, I presume?&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I understand I have that honour,&rsquo; I replied.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The honour is mine,&rsquo; said he, and his voice shook as he
+said it.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I should make you welcome, I believe,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why?&rsquo; he inquired.&nbsp; &lsquo;This poor house has been
+my home for longer than I care to claim.&nbsp; That you should already
+take upon yourself the duties of host here is to be at unnecessary pains.&nbsp;
+Believe me, that part would be more becomingly mine.&nbsp; And, by the
+way, I must not fail to offer you my little compliment.&nbsp; It is
+a gratifying surprise to meet you in the dress of a gentleman, and to
+see&rsquo; - with a circular look upon the scattered bills - &lsquo;that
+your necessities have already been so liberally relieved.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I bowed with a smile that was perhaps no less hateful than his own.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There are so many necessities in this world,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Charity has to choose.&nbsp; One gets relieved, and some other,
+no less indigent, perhaps indebted, must go wanting.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Malice is an engaging trait,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And envy, I think?&rsquo; was my reply.<br>
+<br>
+He must have felt that he was not getting wholly the better of this
+passage at arms; perhaps even feared that he should lose command of
+his temper, which he reined in throughout the interview as with a red-hot
+curb, for he flung away from me at the word, and addressed the lawyer
+with insulting arrogance.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Romaine,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;since when have you presumed
+to give orders in this house?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am not prepared to admit that I have given any,&rsquo; replied
+Romaine; &lsquo;certainly none that did not fall in the sphere of my
+responsibilities.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By whose orders, then, am I denied entrance to my uncle&rsquo;s
+room?&rsquo; said my cousin.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By the doctor&rsquo;s, sir,&rsquo; replied Romaine; &lsquo;and
+I think even you will admit his faculty to give them.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Have a care, sir,&rsquo; cried Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do not be
+puffed up with your position.&nbsp; It is none so secure, Master Attorney.&nbsp;
+I should not wonder in the least if you were struck off the rolls for
+this night&rsquo;s work, and the next I should see of you were when
+I flung you alms at a pothouse door to mend your ragged elbows.&nbsp;
+The doctor&rsquo;s orders?&nbsp; But I believe I am not mistaken!&nbsp;
+You have to-night transacted business with the Count; and this needy
+young gentleman has enjoyed the privilege of still another interview,
+in which (as I am pleased to see) his dignity has not prevented his
+doing very well for himself.&nbsp; I wonder that you should care to
+prevaricate with me so idly.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I will confess so much,&rsquo; said Mr. Romaine, &lsquo;if you
+call it prevarication.&nbsp; The order in question emanated from the
+Count himself.&nbsp; He does not wish to see you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;For which I must take the word of Mr. Daniel Romaine?&rsquo;
+asked Alain.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In default of any better,&rsquo; said Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+There was an instantaneous convulsion in my cousin&rsquo;s face, and
+I distinctly heard him gnash his teeth at this reply; but, to my surprise,
+he resumed in tones of almost good humour:<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come, Mr. Romaine, do not let us be petty!&rsquo;&nbsp; He drew
+in a chair and sat down.&nbsp; &lsquo;Understand you have stolen a march
+upon me.&nbsp; You have introduced your soldier of Napoleon, and (how,
+I cannot conceive) he has been apparently accepted with favour.&nbsp;
+I ask no better proof than the funds with which I find him literally
+surrounded - I presume in consequence of some extravagance of joy at
+the first sight of so much money.&nbsp; The odds are so far in your
+favour, but the match is not yet won.&nbsp; Questions will arise of
+undue influence, of sequestration, and the like: I have my witnesses
+ready.&nbsp; I tell it you cynically, for you cannot profit by the knowledge;
+and, if the worst come to the worst, I have good hopes of recovering
+my own and of ruining you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You do what you please,&rsquo; answered Romaine; &lsquo;but I
+give it you for a piece of good advice, you had best do nothing in the
+matter.&nbsp; You will only make yourself ridiculous; you will only
+squander money, of which you have none too much, and reap public mortification.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah, but there you make the common mistake, Mr. Romaine!&rsquo;
+returned Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;You despise your adversary.&nbsp; Consider,
+if you please, how very disagreeable I could make myself, if I chose.&nbsp;
+Consider the position of your <i>prot&eacute;g&eacute;</i> - an escaped
+prisoner!&nbsp; But I play a great game.&nbsp; I condemn such petty
+opportunities.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this Romaine and I exchanged a glance of triumph.&nbsp; It seemed
+manifest that Alain had as yet received no word of Clausel&rsquo;s recapture
+and denunciation.&nbsp; At the same moment the lawyer, thus relieved
+of the instancy of his fear, changed his tactics.&nbsp; With a great
+air of unconcern, he secured the newspaper, which still lay open before
+him on the table.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think, Monsieur Alain, that you labour under some illusion,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Believe me, this is all beside the mark.&nbsp;
+You seem to be pointing to some compromise.&nbsp; Nothing is further
+from my views.&nbsp; You suspect me of an inclination to trifle with
+you, to conceal how things are going.&nbsp; I cannot, on the other hand,
+be too early or too explicit in giving you information which concerns
+you (I must say) capitally.&nbsp; Your great-uncle has to-night cancelled
+his will, and made a new one in favour of your cousin Anne.&nbsp; Nay,
+and you shall hear it from his own lips, if you choose!&nbsp; I will
+take so much upon me,&rsquo; said the lawyer, rising.&nbsp; &lsquo;Follow
+me, if you please, gentlemen.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Mr. Romaine led the way out of the room so briskly, and was so briskly
+followed by Alain, that I had hard ado to get the remainder of the money
+replaced and the despatch-box locked, and to overtake them, even by
+running ere they should be lost in that maze of corridors, my uncle&rsquo;s
+house.&nbsp; As it was, I went with a heart divided; and the thought
+of my treasure thus left unprotected, save by a paltry lid and lock
+that any one might break or pick open, put me in a perspiration whenever
+I had the time to remember it.&nbsp; The lawyer brought us to a room,
+begged us to be seated while he should hold a consultation with the
+doctor, and, slipping out of another door, left Alain and myself closeted
+together.<br>
+<br>
+Truly he had done nothing to ingratiate himself; his every word had
+been steeped in unfriendliness, envy, and that contempt which (as it
+is born of anger) it is possible to support without humiliation.&nbsp;
+On my part, I had been little more conciliating; and yet I began to
+be sorry for this man, hired spy as I knew him to be.&nbsp; It seemed
+to me less than decent that he should have been brought up in the expectation
+of this great inheritance, and now, at the eleventh hour, be tumbled
+forth out of the house door and left to himself, his poverty and his
+debts - those debts of which I had so ungallantly reminded him so short
+a time before.&nbsp; And we were scarce left alone ere I made haste
+to hang out a flag of truce.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My cousin,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;trust me, you will not find
+me inclined to be your enemy.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He paused in front of me - for he had not accepted the lawyer&rsquo;s
+invitation to be seated, but walked to and fro in the apartment - took
+a pinch of snuff, and looked at me while he was taking it with an air
+of much curiosity.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is it even so?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Am I so far favoured
+by fortune as to have your pity?&nbsp; Infinitely obliged, my cousin
+Anne!&nbsp; But these sentiments are not always reciprocal, and I warn
+you that the day when I set my foot on your neck, the spine shall break.&nbsp;
+Are you acquainted with the properties of the spine?&rsquo; he asked
+with an insolence beyond qualification.<br>
+<br>
+It was too much.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am acquainted also with the properties
+of a pair of pistols,&rsquo; said I, toising him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, no, no!&rsquo; says he, holding up his finger.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+will take my revenge how and when I please.&nbsp; We are enough of the
+same family to understand each other, perhaps; and the reason why I
+have not had you arrested on your arrival, why I had not a picket of
+soldiers in the first clump of evergreens, to await and prevent your
+coming - I, who knew all, before whom that pettifogger, Romaine, has
+been conspiring in broad daylight to supplant me - is simply this: that
+I had not made up my mind how I was to take my revenge.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At that moment he was interrupted by the tolling of a bell.&nbsp; As
+we stood surprised and listening, it was succeeded by the sound of many
+feet trooping up the stairs and shuffling by the door of our room.&nbsp;
+Both, I believe, had a great curiosity to set it open, which each, owing
+to the presence of the other, resisted; and we waited instead in silence,
+and without moving, until Romaine returned and bade us to my uncle&rsquo;s
+presence.<br>
+<br>
+He led the way by a little crooked passage, which brought us out in
+the sick-room, and behind the bed.&nbsp; I believe I have forgotten
+to remark that the Count&rsquo;s chamber was of considerable dimensions.&nbsp;
+We beheld it now crowded with the servants and dependants of the house,
+from the doctor and the priest to Mr. Dawson and the housekeeper, from
+Dawson down to Rowley and the last footman in white calves, the last
+plump chambermaid in her clean gown and cap, and the last ostler in
+a stable waiscoat.&nbsp; This large congregation of persons (and I was
+surprised to see how large it was) had the appearance, for the most
+part, of being ill at ease and heartily bewildered, standing on one
+foot, gaping like zanies, and those who were in the corners nudging
+each other and grinning aside.&nbsp; My uncle, on the other hand, who
+was raised higher than I had yet seen him on his pillows, wore an air
+of really imposing gravity.&nbsp; No sooner had we appeared behind him,
+than he lifted his voice to a good loudness, and addressed the assemblage.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I take you all to witness - can you hear me? - I take you all
+to witness that I recognise as my heir and representative this gentleman,
+whom most of you see for the first time, the Viscount Anne de St.-Yves,
+my nephew of the younger line.&nbsp; And I take you to witness at the
+same time that, for very good reasons known to myself, I have discarded
+and disinherited this other gentleman whom you all know, the Viscount
+de St.-Yves.&nbsp; I have also to explain the unusual trouble to which
+I have put you all - and, since your supper was not over, I fear I may
+even say annoyance.&nbsp; It has pleased M. Alain to make some threats
+of disputing my will, and to pretend that there are among your number
+certain estimable persons who may be trusted to swear as he shall direct
+them.&nbsp; It pleases me thus to put it out of his power and to stop
+the mouths of his false witnesses.&nbsp; I am infinitely obliged by
+your politeness, and I have the honour to wish you all a very good evening.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As the servants, still greatly mystified, crowded out of the sickroom
+door, curtseying, pulling the forelock, scraping with the foot, and
+so on, according to their degree, I turned and stole a look at my cousin.&nbsp;
+He had borne this crushing public rebuke without change of countenance.&nbsp;
+He stood, now, very upright, with folded arms, and looking inscrutably
+at the roof of the apartment.&nbsp; I could not refuse him at that moment
+the tribute of my admiration.&nbsp; Still more so when, the last of
+the domestics having filed through the doorway and left us alone with
+my great-uncle and the lawyer, he took one step forward towards the
+bed, made a dignified reverence, and addressed the man who had just
+condemned him to ruin.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My lord,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you are pleased to treat me in
+a manner which my gratitude, and your state, equally forbid me to call
+in question.&nbsp; It will be only necessary for me to call your attention
+to the length of time in which I have been taught to regard myself as
+your heir.&nbsp; In that position, I judged it only loyal to permit
+myself a certain scale of expenditure.&nbsp; If I am now to be cut off
+with a shilling as the reward of twenty years of service, I shall be
+left not only a beggar, but a bankrupt.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Whether from the fatigue of his recent exertion, or by a well-inspired
+ingenuity of hate, my uncle had once more closed his eyes; nor did he
+open them now.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not with a shilling,&rsquo; he contented
+himself with replying; and there stole, as he said it, a sort of smile
+over his face, that flickered there conspicuously for the least moment
+of time, and then faded and left behind the old impenetrable mask of
+years, cunning, and fatigue.&nbsp; There could be no mistake: my uncle
+enjoyed the situation as he had enjoyed few things in the last quarter
+of a century.&nbsp; The fires of life scarce survived in that frail
+body; but hatred, like some immortal quality, was still erect and unabated.<br>
+<br>
+Nevertheless my cousin persevered.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I speak at a disadvantage,&rsquo; he resumed.&nbsp; &lsquo;My
+supplanter, with perhaps more wisdom than delicacy, remains in the room,&rsquo;
+and he cast a glance at me that might have withered an oak tree.<br>
+<br>
+I was only too willing to withdraw, and Romaine showed as much alacrity
+to make way for my departure.&nbsp; But my uncle was not to be moved.&nbsp;
+In the same breath of a voice, and still without opening his eyes, he
+bade me remain.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is well,&rsquo; said Alain.&nbsp; &lsquo;I cannot then go
+on to remind you of the twenty years that have passed over our heads
+in England, and the services I may have rendered you in that time.&nbsp;
+It would be a position too odious.&nbsp; Your lordship knows me too
+well to suppose I could stoop to such ignominy.&nbsp; I must leave out
+all my defence - your lordship wills it so!&nbsp; I do not know what
+are my faults; I know only my punishment, and it is greater than I have
+the courage to face.&nbsp; My uncle, I implore your pity: pardon me
+so far; do not send me for life into a debtors&rsquo; jail - a pauper
+debtor.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;<i>Chat et vieux, pardonnez</i>?&rsquo; said my uncle, quoting
+from La Fontaine; and then, opening a pale-blue eye full on Alain, he
+delivered with some emphasis:<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;La jeunesse se flatte et croit tout obtenir;<br>
+La vieillesse est impitoyable.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The blood leaped darkly into Alain&rsquo;s face.&nbsp; He turned to
+Romaine and me, and his eyes flashed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is your turn now,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;At least it
+shall be prison for prison with the two viscounts.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not so, Mr. Alain, by your leave,&rsquo; said Romaine.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There are a few formalities to be considered first.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+But Alain was already striding towards the door.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Stop a moment, stop a moment!&rsquo; cried Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;Remember
+your own counsel not to despise an adversary.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Alain turned.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If I do not despise I hate you!&rsquo; he cried, giving a loose
+to his passion.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be warned of that, both of you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I understand you to threaten Monsieur le Vicomte Anne,&rsquo;
+said the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you know, I would not do that.&nbsp;
+I am afraid, I am very much afraid, if you were to do as you propose,
+you might drive me into extremes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have made me a beggar and a bankrupt,&rsquo; said Alain.&nbsp;
+What extreme is left?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I scarce like to put a name upon it in this company,&rsquo; replied
+Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;But there are worse things than even bankruptcy,
+and worse places than a debtors&rsquo; jail.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The words were so significantly said that there went a visible thrill
+through Alain; sudden as a sword-stroke, he fell pale again.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I do not understand you,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O yes, you do,&rsquo; returned Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;I believe
+you understand me very well.&nbsp; You must not suppose that all this
+time, while you were so very busy, others were entirely idle.&nbsp;
+You must not fancy, because I am an Englishman, that I have not the
+intelligence to pursue an inquiry.&nbsp; Great as is my regard for the
+honour of your house, M. Alain de St.-Yves, if I hear of you moving
+directly or indirectly in this matter, I shall do my duty, let it cost
+what it will: that is, I shall communicate the real name of the Buonapartist
+spy who signs his letters <i>Rue Gr&eacute;goire de Tours</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I confess my heart was already almost altogether on the side of my insulted
+and unhappy cousin; and if it had not been before, it must have been
+so now, so horrid was the shock with which he heard his infamy exposed.&nbsp;
+Speech was denied him; he carried his hand to his neckcloth; he staggered;
+I thought he must have fallen.&nbsp; I ran to help him, and at that
+he revived, recoiled before me, and stood there with arms stretched
+forth as if to preserve himself from the outrage of my touch.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Hands off!&rsquo; he somehow managed to articulate.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will now, I hope,&rsquo; pursued the lawyer, without any
+change of voice, &lsquo;understand the position in which you are placed,
+and how delicately it behoves you to conduct yourself.&nbsp; Your arrest
+hangs, if I may so express myself, by a hair; and as you will be under
+the perpetual vigilance of myself and my agents, you must look to it
+narrowly that you walk straight.&nbsp; Upon the least dubiety, I will
+take action.&rsquo;&nbsp; He snuffed, looking critically at the tortured
+man.&nbsp; &lsquo;And now let me remind you that your chaise is at the
+door.&nbsp; This interview is agitating to his lordship - it cannot
+be agreeable for you - and I suggest that it need not be further drawn
+out.&nbsp; It does not enter into the views of your uncle, the Count,
+that you should again sleep under this roof.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As Alain turned and passed without a word or a sign from the apartment,
+I instantly followed.&nbsp; I suppose I must be at bottom possessed
+of some humanity; at least, this accumulated torture, this slow butchery
+of a man as by quarters of rock, had wholly changed my sympathies.&nbsp;
+At that moment I loathed both my uncle and the lawyer for their coldblooded
+cruelty.<br>
+<br>
+Leaning over the banisters, I was but in time to hear his hasty footsteps
+in that hall that had been crowded with servants to honour his coming,
+and was now left empty against his friendless departure.&nbsp; A moment
+later, and the echoes rang, and the air whistled in my ears, as he slammed
+the door on his departing footsteps.&nbsp; The fury of the concussion
+gave me (had one been still wanted) a measure of the turmoil of his
+passions.&nbsp; In a sense, I felt with him; I felt how he would have
+gloried to slam that door on my uncle, the lawyer, myself, and the whole
+crowd of those who had been witnesses to his humiliation.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XX - AFTER THE STORM<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+No sooner was the house clear of my cousin than I began to reckon up,
+ruefully enough, the probable results of what had passed.&nbsp; Here
+were a number of pots broken, and it looked to me as if I should have
+to pay for all!&nbsp; Here had been this proud, mad beast goaded and
+baited both publicly and privately, till he could neither hear nor see
+nor reason; whereupon the gate had been set open, and he had been left
+free to go and contrive whatever vengeance he might find possible.&nbsp;
+I could not help thinking it was a pity that, whenever I myself was
+inclined to be upon my good behaviour, some friends of mine should always
+determine to play a piece of heroics and cast me for the hero - or the
+victim - which is very much the same.&nbsp; The first duty of heroics
+is to be of your own choosing.&nbsp; When they are not that, they are
+nothing.&nbsp; And I assure you, as I walked back to my own room, I
+was in no very complaisant humour: thought my uncle and Mr. Romaine
+to have played knuckle-bones with my life and prospects; cursed them
+for it roundly; had no wish more urgent than to avoid the pair of them;
+and was quite knocked out of time, as they say in the ring, to find
+myself confronted with the lawyer.<br>
+<br>
+He stood on my hearthrug, leaning on the chimney-piece, with a gloomy,
+thoughtful brow, as I was pleased to see, and not in the least as though
+he were vain of the late proceedings.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You have done it now!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is he gone?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He is gone,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;We shall have the devil
+to pay with him when he comes back.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are right,&rsquo; said the lawyer, &lsquo;and very little
+to pay him with but flams and fabrications, like to-night&rsquo;s.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s?&rsquo; I repeated.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, to-night&rsquo;s!&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s <i>what</i>?&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To-night&rsquo;s flams and fabrications.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;God be good to me, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;have I something
+more to admire in your conduct than ever <i>I</i> had suspected?&nbsp;
+You cannot think how you interest me!&nbsp; That it was severe, I knew;
+I had already chuckled over that.&nbsp; But that it should be false
+also!&nbsp; In what sense, dear sir?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but the lawyer
+paid no heed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;False in all senses of the word,&rsquo; he replied seriously.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;False in the sense that they were not true, and false in the
+sense that they were not real; false in the sense that I boasted, and
+in the sense that I lied.&nbsp; How can I arrest him?&nbsp; Your uncle
+burned the papers!&nbsp; I told you so - but doubtless you have forgotten
+- the day I first saw you in Edinburgh Castle.&nbsp; It was an act of
+generosity; I have seen many of these acts, and always regretted - always
+regretted!&nbsp; &ldquo;That shall be his inheritance,&rdquo; he said,
+as the papers burned; he did not mean that it should have proved so
+rich a one.&nbsp; How rich, time will tell.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon a hundred thousand times, my dear sir, but
+it strikes me you have the impudence - in the circumstances, I may call
+it the indecency - to appear cast down?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is true,&rsquo; said he: &lsquo;I am.&nbsp; I am cast down.&nbsp;
+I am literally cast down.&nbsp; I feel myself quite helpless against
+your cousin.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, really!&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is this serious?&nbsp;
+And is it perhaps the reason why you have gorged the poor devil with
+every species of insult? and why you took such surprising pains to supply
+me with what I had so little need of - another enemy?&nbsp; That you
+were helpless against them?&nbsp; &ldquo;Here is my last missile,&rdquo;
+say you; &ldquo;my ammunition is quite exhausted: just wait till I get
+the last in - it will irritate, it cannot hurt him.&nbsp; There - you
+see! - he is furious now, and I am quite helpless.&nbsp; One more prod,
+another kick: now he is a mere lunatic!&nbsp; Stand behind me; I am
+quite helpless!&rdquo;&nbsp; Mr. Romaine, I am asking myself as to the
+background or motive of this singular jest, and whether the name of
+it should not be called treachery?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I can scarce wonder,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;In truth it
+has been a singular business, and we are very fortunate to be out of
+it so well.&nbsp; Yet it was not treachery: no, no, Mr. Anne, it was
+not treachery; and if you will do me the favour to listen to me for
+the inside of a minute, I shall demonstrate the same to you beyond cavil.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+He seemed to wake up to his ordinary briskness.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see
+the point?&rsquo; he began.&nbsp; &lsquo;He had not yet read the newspaper,
+but who could tell when he might?&nbsp; He might have had that damned
+journal in his pocket, and how should we know?&nbsp; We were - I may
+say, we are - at the mercy of the merest twopenny accident.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, true,&rsquo; said I: &lsquo;I had not thought of that.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I warrant you,&rsquo; cried Romaine, &lsquo;you had supposed
+it was nothing to be the hero of an interesting notice in the journals!&nbsp;
+You had supposed, as like as not, it was a form of secrecy!&nbsp; But
+not so in the least.&nbsp; A part of England is already buzzing with
+the name of Champdivers; a day or two more and the mail will have carried
+it everywhere: so wonderful a machine is this of ours for disseminating
+intelligence!&nbsp; Think of it!&nbsp; When my father was born - but
+that is another story.&nbsp; To return: we had here the elements of
+such a combustion as I dread to think of - your cousin and the journal.&nbsp;
+Let him but glance an eye upon that column of print, and where were
+we?&nbsp; It is easy to ask; not so easy to answer, my young friend.&nbsp;
+And let me tell you, this sheet is the Viscount&rsquo;s usual reading.&nbsp;
+It is my conviction he had it in his pocket.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have been
+unjust.&nbsp; I did not appreciate my danger.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think you never do,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But yet surely that public scene - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It was madness.&nbsp; I quite agree with you,&rsquo; Mr. Romaine
+interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;But it was your uncle&rsquo;s orders, Mr.
+Anne, and what could I do?&nbsp; Tell him you were the murderer of Goguelat?&nbsp;
+I think not.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, sure!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;That would but have been
+to make the trouble thicker.&nbsp; We were certainly in a very ill posture.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You do not yet appreciate how grave it was,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It was necessary for you that your cousin should go, and go at
+once.&nbsp; You yourself had to leave to-night under cover of darkness,
+and how could you have done that with the Viscount in the next room?&nbsp;
+He must go, then; he must leave without delay.&nbsp; And that was the
+difficulty.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pardon me, Mr. Romaine, but could not my uncle have bidden him
+go?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, I see I must tell you that this is not so simple as it sounds,&rsquo;
+he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;You say this is your uncle&rsquo;s house, and
+so it is.&nbsp; But to all effects and purposes it is your cousin&rsquo;s
+also.&nbsp; He has rooms here; has had them coming on for thirty years
+now, and they are filled with a prodigious accumulation of trash - stays,
+I dare say, and powder-puffs, and such effeminate idiocy - to which
+none could dispute his title, even suppose any one wanted to.&nbsp;
+We had a perfect right to bid him go, and he had a perfect right to
+reply, &ldquo;Yes, I will go, but not without my stays and cravats.&nbsp;
+I must first get together the nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine chestsfull
+of insufferable rubbish, that I have spent the last thirty years collecting
+- and may very well spend the next thirty hours a-packing of.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And what should we have said to that?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By way of repartee?&rsquo; I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Two tall footmen
+and a pair of crabtree cudgels, I suggest.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The Lord deliver me from the wisdom of laymen!&rsquo; cried Romaine.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Put myself in the wrong at the beginning of a lawsuit?&nbsp;
+No, indeed!&nbsp; There was but one thing to do, and I did it, and burned
+my last cartridge in the doing of it.&nbsp; I stunned him.&nbsp; And
+it gave us three hours, by which we should make haste to profit; for
+if there is one thing sure, it is that he will be up to time again to-morrow
+in the morning.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I own myself an idiot.&nbsp; Well
+do they say, <i>an old soldier, an old innocent</i>!&nbsp; For I guessed
+nothing of all this.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And, guessing it, have you the same objections to leave England?&rsquo;
+he inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The same,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is indispensable,&rsquo; he objected.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And it cannot be,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Reason has nothing
+to say in the matter; and I must not let you squander any of yours.&nbsp;
+It will be enough to tell you this is an affair of the heart.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is it even so?&rsquo; quoth Romaine, nodding his head.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And I might have been sure of it.&nbsp; Place them in a hospital,
+put them in a jail in yellow overalls, do what you will, young Jessamy
+finds young Jenny.&nbsp; O, have it your own way; I am too old a hand
+to argue with young gentlemen who choose to fancy themselves in love;
+I have too much experience, thank you.&nbsp; Only, be sure that you
+appreciate what you risk: the prison, the dock, the gallows, and the
+halter - terribly vulgar circumstances, my young friend; grim, sordid,
+earnest; no poetry in that!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And there I am warned,&rsquo; I returned gaily.&nbsp; &lsquo;No
+man could be warned more finely or with a greater eloquence.&nbsp; And
+I am of the same opinion still.&nbsp; Until I have again seen that lady,
+nothing shall induce me to quit Great Britain.&nbsp; I have besides
+- &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And here I came to a full stop.&nbsp; It was upon my tongue to have
+told him the story of the drovers, but at the first word of it my voice
+died in my throat.&nbsp; There might be a limit to the lawyer&rsquo;s
+toleration, I reflected.&nbsp; I had not been so long in Britain altogether;
+for the most part of that time I had been by the heels in limbo in Edinburgh
+Castle; and already I had confessed to killing one man with a pair of
+scissors; and now I was to go on and plead guilty to having settled
+another with a holly stick!&nbsp; A wave of discretion went over me
+as cold and as deep as the sea.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In short, sir, this is a matter of feeling,&rsquo; I concluded,
+&lsquo;and nothing will prevent my going to Edinburgh.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+If I had fired a pistol in his ear he could not have been more startled.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To Edinburgh?&rsquo; he repeated.&nbsp; &lsquo;Edinburgh? where
+the very paving-stones know you!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then is the murder out!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But, Mr.
+Romaine, is there not sometimes safety in boldness?&nbsp; Is it not
+a common-place of strategy to get where the enemy least expects you?&nbsp;
+And where would he expect me less?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Faith, there is something in that, too!&rsquo; cried the lawyer.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Ay, certainly, a great deal in that.&nbsp; All the witnesses
+drowned but one, and he safe in prison; you yourself changed beyond
+recognition - let us hope - and walking the streets of the very town
+you have illustrated by your - well, your eccentricity!&nbsp; It is
+not badly combined, indeed!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You approve it, then?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, approve!&rsquo; said he; &lsquo;there is no question of approval.&nbsp;
+There is only one course which I could approve, and that were to escape
+to France instanter.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You do not wholly disapprove, at least?&rsquo; I substituted.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not wholly; and it would not matter if I did,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Go your own way; you are beyond argument.&nbsp; And I am not
+sure that you will run more danger by that course than by any other.&nbsp;
+Give the servants time to get to bed and fall asleep, then take a country
+cross-road and walk, as the rhyme has it, like blazes all night.&nbsp;
+In the morning take a chaise or take the mail at pleasure, and continue
+your journey with all the decorum and reserve of which you shall be
+found capable.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am taking the picture in,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Give
+me time.&nbsp; &rsquo;Tis the <i>tout ensemble</i> I must see: the whole
+as opposed to the details.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mountebank!&rsquo; he murmured.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, I have it now; and I see myself with a servant, and that
+servant is Rowley,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So as to have one more link with your uncle?&rsquo; suggested
+the lawyer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Very judicious!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And, pardon me, but that is what it is,&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Judicious is the word.&nbsp; I am not making a deception fit
+to last for thirty years; I do not found a palace in the living granite
+for the night.&nbsp; This is a shelter tent - a flying picture - seen,
+admired, and gone again in the wink of an eye.&nbsp; What is wanted,
+in short, is a <i>trompe-l&rsquo;&oelig;il</i> that shall be good enough
+for twelve hours at an inn: is it not so?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is, and the objection holds.&nbsp; Rowley is but another danger,&rsquo;
+said Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;will pass as a servant from a distance
+- as a creature seen poised on the dicky of a bowling chaise.&nbsp;
+He will pass at hand as a smart, civil fellow one meets in the inn corridor,
+and looks back at, and asks, and is told, &ldquo;Gentleman&rsquo;s servant
+in Number 4.&rdquo;&nbsp; He will pass, in fact, all round, except with
+his personal friends!&nbsp; My dear sir, pray what do you expect?&nbsp;
+Of course if we meet my cousin, or if we meet anybody who took part
+in the judicious exhibition of this evening, we are lost; and who&rsquo;s
+denying it?&nbsp; To every disguise, however good and safe, there is
+always the weak point; you must always take (let us say - and to take
+a simile from your own waistcoat pocket) a snuff box-full of risk.&nbsp;
+You&rsquo;ll get it just as small with Rowley as with anybody else.&nbsp;
+And the long and short of it is, the lad&rsquo;s honest, he likes me,
+I trust him; he is my servant, or nobody.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;He might not accept,&rsquo; said Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I bet you a thousand pounds he does!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+no matter; all you have to do is to send him out to-night on this cross-country
+business, and leave the thing to me.&nbsp; I tell you, he will be my
+servant, and I tell you, he will do well.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I had crossed the room, and was already overhauling my wardrobe as I
+spoke.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; concluded the lawyer, with a shrug, &lsquo;one risk
+with another: <i>&agrave; la guerre comme &agrave; la guerre</i>, as
+you would say.&nbsp; Let the brat come and be useful, at least.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And he was about to ring the bell, when his eye was caught by my researches
+in the wardrobe.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do not fall in love with these coats,
+waistcoats, cravats, and other panoply and accoutrements by which you
+are now surrounded.&nbsp; You must not run the post as a dandy.&nbsp;
+It is not the fashion, even.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are pleased to be facetious, sir,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and
+not according to knowledge.&nbsp; These clothes are my life, they are
+my disguise; and since I can take but few of them, I were a fool indeed
+if I selected hastily!&nbsp; Will you understand, once and for all,
+what I am seeking?&nbsp; To be invisible, is the first point; the second,
+to be invisible in a post-chaise and with a servant.&nbsp; Can you not
+perceive the delicacy of the quest?&nbsp; Nothing must be too coarse,
+nothing too fine; <i>rien de voyant, rien qui d&eacute;tonne</i>; so
+that I may leave everywhere the inconspicuous image of a handsome young
+man of a good fortune travelling in proper style, whom the landlord
+will forget in twelve hours - and the chambermaid perhaps remember,
+God bless her! with a sigh.&nbsp; This is the very fine art of dress.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have practised it with success for fifty years,&rsquo; said
+Romaine, with a chuckle.&nbsp; &lsquo;A black suit and a clean shirt
+is my infallible recipe.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You surprise me; I did not think you would be shallow!&rsquo;
+said I, lingering between two coats.&nbsp; &lsquo;Pray, Mr. Romaine,
+have I your head? or did you travel post and with a smartish servant?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Neither, I admit,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Which change the whole problem,&rsquo; I continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+have to dress for a smartish servant and a Russia leather despatch-box.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+That brought me to a stand.&nbsp; I came over and looked at the box
+with a moment&rsquo;s hesitation.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; I resumed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Yes, and for the despatch-box!&nbsp; It looks moneyed and landed;
+it means I have a lawyer.&nbsp; It is an invaluable property.&nbsp;
+But I could have wished it to hold less money.&nbsp; The responsibility
+is crushing.&nbsp; Should I not do more wisely to take five hundred
+pounds, and intrust the remainder with you, Mr. Romaine?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you are sure you will not want it,&rsquo; answered Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am far from sure of that,&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;In the
+first place, as a philosopher.&nbsp; This is the first time I have been
+at the head of a large sum, and it is conceivable - who knows himself?
+- that I may make it fly.&nbsp; In the second place, as a fugitive.&nbsp;
+Who knows what I may need?&nbsp; The whole of it may be inadequate.&nbsp;
+But I can always write for more.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You do not understand,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I break
+off all communication with you here and now.&nbsp; You must give me
+a power of attorney ere you start to-night, and then be done with me
+trenchantly until better days.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I believe I offered some objection.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Think a little for once of me!&rsquo; said Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+must not have seen you before to-night.&nbsp; To-night we are to have
+had our only interview, and you are to have given me the power; and
+to-night I am to have lost sight of you again - I know not whither,
+you were upon business, it was none of my affairs to question you!&nbsp;
+And this, you are to remark, in the interests of your own safety much
+more than mine.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am not even to write to you?&rsquo; I said, a little bewildered.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects you with
+common sense,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;But that is the plain
+English of it.&nbsp; You are not even to write; and if you did, I would
+not answer.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A letter, however - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Listen to me,&rsquo; interrupted Romaine.&nbsp; &lsquo;So soon
+as your cousin reads the paragraph, what will he do?&nbsp; Put the police
+upon looking into my correspondence!&nbsp; So soon as you write to me,
+in short, you write to Bow Street; and if you will take my advice, you
+will date that letter from France.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The devil!&rsquo; said I, for I began suddenly to see that this
+might put me out of the way of my business.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What is it now?&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There will be more to be done, then, before we can part,&rsquo;
+I answered.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I give you the whole night,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;So long
+as you are off ere daybreak, I am content.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In short, Mr. Romaine,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I have had so much
+benefit of your advice and services that I am loth to sever the connection,
+and would even ask a substitute.&nbsp; I would be obliged for a letter
+of introduction to one of your own cloth in Edinburgh - an old man for
+choice, very experienced, very respectable, and very secret.&nbsp; Could
+you favour me with such a letter?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, no,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Certainly not.&nbsp; I
+will do no such thing, indeed.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It would be a great favour, sir,&rsquo; I pleaded.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It would be an unpardonable blunder,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;What?&nbsp; Give you a letter of introduction? and when the police
+come, I suppose, I must forget the circumstance?&nbsp; No, indeed.&nbsp;
+Talk of it no more.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You seem to be always in the right,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+letter would be out of the question, I quite see that.&nbsp; But the
+lawyer&rsquo;s name might very well have dropped from you in the way
+of conversation; having heard him mentioned, I might profit by the circumstance
+to introduce myself; and in this way my business would be the better
+done, and you not in the least compromised.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What is this business?&rsquo; said Romaine.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have not said that I had any,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;It
+might arise.&nbsp; This is only a possibility that I must keep in view.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, with a gesture of the hands, &lsquo;I mention
+Mr. Robbie; and let that be an end of it! - Or wait!&rsquo; he added,
+&lsquo;I have it.&nbsp; Here is something that will serve you for an
+introduction, and cannot compromise me.&rsquo;&nbsp; And he wrote his
+name and the Edinburgh lawyer&rsquo;s address on a piece of card and
+tossed it to me.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXI - I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED CHAISE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an excellent cold
+supper in the lawyer&rsquo;s room, it was past two in the morning before
+we were ready for the road.&nbsp; Romaine himself let us out of a window
+in a part of the house known to Rowley: it appears it served as a kind
+of postern to the servants&rsquo; hall, by which (when they were in
+the mind for a clandestine evening) they would come regularly in and
+out; and I remember very well the vinegar aspect of the lawyer on the
+receipt of this piece of information - how he pursed his lips, jutted
+his eyebrows, and kept repeating, &lsquo;This must be seen to, indeed!
+this shall be barred to-morrow in the morning!&rsquo;&nbsp; In this
+preoccupation, I believe he took leave of me without observing it; our
+things were handed out; we heard the window shut behind us; and became
+instantly lost in a horrid intricacy of blackness and the shadow of
+woods.<br>
+<br>
+A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling again;
+it seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually leaving off;
+and the darkness was intense.&nbsp; Time and again we walked into trees;
+time and again found ourselves adrift among garden borders or stuck
+like a ram in the thicket.&nbsp; Rowley had possessed himself of the
+matches, and he was neither to be terrified nor softened.&nbsp; &lsquo;No,
+I will not, Mr. Anne, sir,&rsquo; he would reply.&nbsp; &lsquo;You know
+he tell me to wait till we were over the &rsquo;ill.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
+only a little way now.&nbsp; Why, and I thought you was a soldier, too!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I was at least a very glad soldier when my valet consented at last to
+kindle a thieves&rsquo; match.&nbsp; From this, we easily lit the lantern;
+and thenceforward, through a labyrinth of woodland paths, were conducted
+by its uneasy glimmer.&nbsp; Both booted and great-coated, with tall
+hats much of a shape, and laden with booty in the form of a despatch-box,
+a case of pistols, and two plump valises, I thought we had very much
+the look of a pair of brothers returning from the sack of Amersham Place.<br>
+<br>
+We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk abreast
+and without precaution.&nbsp; It was nine miles to Aylesbury, our immediate
+destination; by a watch, which formed part of my new outfit, it should
+be about half-past three in the morning; and as we did not choose to
+arrive before daylight, time could not be said to press.&nbsp; I gave
+the order to march at ease.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;so far so good.&nbsp; You
+have come, in the most obliging manner in the world, to carry these
+valises.&nbsp; The question is, what next?&nbsp; What are we to do at
+Aylesbury? or, more particularly, what are you?&nbsp; Thence, I go on
+a journey.&nbsp; Are you to accompany me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He gave a little chuckle.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s all settled already,
+Mr. Anne, sir,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, I&rsquo;ve got my
+things here in the valise - a half a dozen shirts and what not; I&rsquo;m
+all ready, sir: just you lead on: <i>you&rsquo;ll</i> see.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The devil you have!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You made pretty
+sure of your welcome.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; said Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish shyness
+and triumph that awoke my conscience.&nbsp; I could never let this innocent
+involve himself in the perils and difficulties that beset my course,
+without some hint of warning, which it was a matter of extreme delicacy
+to make plain enough and not too plain.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, no,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;you may think you have made a choice,
+but it was blindfold, and you must make it over again.&nbsp; The Count&rsquo;s
+service is a good one; what are you leaving it for?&nbsp; Are you not
+throwing away the substance for the shadow?&nbsp; No, do not answer
+me yet.&nbsp; You imagine that I am a prosperous nobleman, just declared
+my uncle&rsquo;s heir, on the threshold of the best of good fortune,
+and, from the point of view of a judicious servant, a jewel of a master
+to serve and stick to?&nbsp; Well, my boy, I am nothing of the kind,
+nothing of the kind.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the lantern to
+his face.&nbsp; He stood before me, brilliantly illuminated on the background
+of impenetrable night and falling snow, stricken to stone between his
+double burden like an ass between two panniers, and gaping at me like
+a blunderbuss.&nbsp; I had never seen a face so predestined to be astonished,
+or so susceptible of rendering the emotion of surprise; and it tempted
+me as an open piano tempts the musician.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Nothing of the sort, Rowley,&rsquo; I continued, in a churchyard
+voice.&nbsp; &lsquo;These are appearances, petty appearances.&nbsp;
+I am in peril, homeless, hunted.&nbsp; I count scarce any one in England
+who is not my enemy.&nbsp; From this hour I drop my name, my title;
+I become nameless; my name is proscribed.&nbsp; My liberty, my life,
+hang by a hair.&nbsp; The destiny which you will accept, if you go forth
+with me, is to be tracked by spies, to hide yourself under a false name,
+to follow the desperate pretences and perhaps share the fate of a murderer
+with a price upon his head.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from one depth
+to another of tragic astonishment, and really worth paying to see; but
+at this it suddenly cleared.&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh, I ain&rsquo;t afraid!&rsquo;
+he said; and then, choking into laughter, &lsquo;why, I see it from
+the first!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I could have beaten him.&nbsp; But I had so grossly overshot the mark
+that I suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour of
+elocution to persuade him I had been in earnest.&nbsp; In the course
+of which I became so interested in demonstrating my present danger that
+I forgot all about my future safety, and not only told him the story
+of Goguelat, but threw in the business of the drovers as well, and ended
+by blurting out that I was a soldier of Napoleon&rsquo;s and a prisoner
+of war.<br>
+<br>
+This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common complaint
+of me that I have a long tongue.&nbsp; I believe it is a fault beloved
+by fortune.&nbsp; Which of you considerate fellows would have done a
+thing at once so foolhardy and so wise as to make a confidant of a boy
+in his teens, and positively smelling of the nursery?&nbsp; And when
+had I cause to repent it?&nbsp; There is none so apt as a boy to be
+the adviser of any man in difficulties such as mine.&nbsp; To the beginnings
+of virile common sense he adds the last lights of the child&rsquo;s
+imagination; and he can fling himself into business with that superior
+earnestness that properly belongs to play.&nbsp; And Rowley was a boy
+made to my hand.&nbsp; He had a high sense of romance, and a secret
+cultus for all soldiers and criminals.&nbsp; His travelling library
+consisted of a chap-book life of Wallace and some sixpenny parts of
+the &lsquo;Old Bailey Sessions Papers&rsquo; by Gurney the shorthand
+writer; and the choice depicts his character to a hair.&nbsp; You can
+imagine how his new prospects brightened on a boy of this disposition.&nbsp;
+To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a soldier, and a murderer,
+rolled in one - to live by stratagems, disguises, and false names, in
+an atmosphere of midnight and mystery so thick that you could cut it
+with a knife - was really, I believe, more dear to him than his meals,
+though he was a great trencherman, and something of a glutton besides.&nbsp;
+For myself, as the peg by which all this romantic business hung, I was
+simply idolised from that moment; and he would rather have sacrificed
+his hand than surrendered the privilege of serving me.<br>
+<br>
+We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in the snow,
+which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall to purpose.&nbsp;
+I chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from its likeness to Romaine;
+Rowley, from an irresistible conversion of ideas, I dubbed Gammon.&nbsp;
+His distress was laughable to witness: his own choice of an unassuming
+nickname had been Claude Duval!&nbsp; We settled our procedure at the
+various inns where we should alight, rehearsed our little manners like
+a piece of drill until it seemed impossible we should ever be taken
+unprepared; and in all these dispositions, you maybe sure the despatch-box
+was not forgotten.&nbsp; Who was to pick it up, who was to set it down,
+who was to remain beside it, who was to sleep with it - there was no
+contingency omitted, all was gone into with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant
+on the one hand and a child with a new plaything on the other.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I say, wouldn&rsquo;t it look queer if you and me was to come
+to the post-house with all this luggage?&rsquo; said Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I dare say,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;But what else is to
+be done?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, now, sir - you hear me,&rsquo; says Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+think it would look more natural-like if you was to come to the post-house
+alone, and with nothing in your &rsquo;ands - more like a gentleman,
+you know.&nbsp; And you might say that your servant and baggage was
+a-waiting for you up the road.&nbsp; I think I could manage, somehow,
+to make a shift with all them dratted things - leastways if you was
+to give me a &rsquo;and up with them at the start.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to try, Mr.
+Rowley!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, you would be quite defenceless!&nbsp;
+A footpad that was an infant child could rob you.&nbsp; And I should
+probably come driving by to find you in a ditch with your throat cut.&nbsp;
+But there is something in your idea, for all that; and I propose we
+put it in execution no farther forward than the next corner of a lane.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we headed by
+cross-roads for some point to the northward of it, whither I might assist
+Rowley with the baggage, and where I might leave him to await my return
+in the post-chaise.<br>
+<br>
+It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and ourselves walking
+snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the morning showed us an inn upon
+the highwayside.&nbsp; Some distance off, under the shelter of a corner
+of the road and a clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with the whole of
+our possessions, and watched him till he staggered in safety into the
+doors of the <i>Green Dragon</i>, which was the sign of the house.&nbsp;
+Thence I walked briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in my freedom and
+the causeless good spirits that belong to a snowy morning; though, to
+be sure, long before I had arrived the snow had again ceased to fall,
+and the eaves of Aylesbury were smoking in the level sun.&nbsp; There
+was an accumulation of gigs and chaises in the yard, and a great bustle
+going forward in the coffee-room and about the doors of the inn.&nbsp;
+At these evidences of so much travel on the road I was seized with a
+misgiving lest it should be impossible to get horses, and I should be
+detained in the precarious neighbourhood of my cousin.&nbsp; Hungry
+as I was, I made my way first of all to the postmaster, where he stood
+- a big, athletic, horsey-looking man, blowing into a key in the corner
+of the yard.<br>
+<br>
+On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference into
+what seemed passion.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A po&rsquo;-shay and &rsquo;osses!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do
+I look as if I &rsquo;ad a po&rsquo;-shay and &rsquo;osses?&nbsp; Damn
+me, if I &rsquo;ave such a thing on the premises.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t
+<i>make</i> &rsquo;osses and chaises - I &rsquo;<i>ire</i> &rsquo;em.&nbsp;
+You might be God Almighty!&rsquo; said he; and instantly, as if he had
+observed me for the first time, he broke off, and lowered his voice
+into the confidential.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, now that I see you are a gentleman,&rsquo;
+said he, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you what!&nbsp; If you like to <i>buy</i>,
+I have the article to fit you.&nbsp; Second-&rsquo;and shay by Lycett,
+of London.&nbsp; Latest style; good as new.&nbsp; Superior fittin&rsquo;s,
+net on the roof, baggage platform, pistol &rsquo;olsters - the most
+com-plete and the most gen-teel turn-out I ever see!&nbsp; The &rsquo;ole
+for seventy-five pound!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s as good as givin&rsquo; her
+away!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a hawker&rsquo;s
+barrow?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, my good man, if I had to stop
+here, anyway, I should prefer to buy a house and garden!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come and look at her!&rsquo; he cried; and, with the word, links
+his arm in mine and carries me to the outhouse where the chaise was
+on view.<br>
+<br>
+It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my purpose:
+eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though I thought the
+postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree with him so far.&nbsp;
+The body was painted a dark claret, and the wheels an invisible green.&nbsp;
+The lamp and glasses were bright as silver; and the whole equipage had
+an air of privacy and reserve that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm
+suspicion.&nbsp; With a servant like Rowley, and a chaise like this,
+I felt that I could go from the Land&rsquo;s End to John o&rsquo; Groat&rsquo;s
+House amid a population of bowing ostlers.&nbsp; And I suppose I betrayed
+in my manner the degree in which the bargain tempted me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come,&rsquo; cried the postmaster - &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll make it
+seventy, to oblige a friend!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The point is: the horses,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; said he, consulting his watch, &lsquo;it&rsquo;s
+now gone the &rsquo;alf after eight.&nbsp; What time do you want her
+at the door?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Horses and all?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;&lsquo;Osses and all!&rsquo; says he.&nbsp; &lsquo;One good turn
+deserves another.&nbsp; You give me seventy pound for the shay, and
+I&rsquo;ll &rsquo;oss it for you.&nbsp; I told you I didn&rsquo;t <i>make</i>
+&rsquo;osses; but I <i>can</i> make &rsquo;em, to oblige a friend.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+What would you have?&nbsp; It was not the wisest thing in the world
+to buy a chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle&rsquo;s house; but
+in this way I got my horses for the next stage.&nbsp; And by any other
+it appeared that I should have to wait.&nbsp; Accordingly I paid the
+money down - perhaps twenty pounds too much, though it was certainly
+a well-made and well-appointed vehicle - ordered it round in half an
+hour, and proceeded to refresh myself with breakfast.<br>
+<br>
+The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a bay-window, and
+commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I continued to be amused
+by the successive departures of travellers - the fussy and the offhand,
+the niggardly and the lavish - all exhibiting their different characters
+in that diagnostic moment of the farewell: some escorted to the stirrup
+or the chaise door by the chamberlain, the chambermaids and the waiters
+almost in a body, others moving off under a cloud, without human countenance.&nbsp;
+In the course of this I became interested in one for whom this ovation
+began to assume the proportions of a triumph; not only the under-servants,
+but the barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the postmaster himself,
+crowding about the steps to speed his departure.&nbsp; I was aware,
+at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though the traveller
+were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to air it in that society.&nbsp;
+I leaned forward with a lively curiosity; and the next moment I had
+blotted myself behind the teapot.&nbsp; The popular traveller had turned
+to wave a farewell; and behold! he was no other than my cousin Alain.&nbsp;
+It was a change of the sharpest from the angry, pallid man I had seen
+at Amersham Place.&nbsp; Ruddy to a fault, illuminated with vintages,
+crowned with his curls like Bacchus, he now stood before me for an instant,
+the perfect master of himself, smiling with airs of conscious popularity
+and insufferable condescension.&nbsp; He reminded me at once of a royal
+duke, or an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman who
+should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman.&nbsp; A moment
+after he was gliding noiselessly on the road to London.<br>
+<br>
+I breathed again.&nbsp; I recognised, with heartfelt gratitude, how
+lucky I had been to go in by the stable-yard instead of the hostelry
+door, and what a fine occasion of meeting my cousin I had lost by the
+purchase of the claret-coloured chaise!&nbsp; The next moment I remembered
+that there was a waiter present.&nbsp; No doubt but he must have observed
+me when I crouched behind the breakfast equipage; no doubt but he must
+have commented on this unusual and undignified behaviour; and it was
+essential that I should do something to remove the impression.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Waiter!&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;that was the nephew of Count Carwell
+that just drove off, wasn&rsquo;t it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, sir: Viscount Carwell we calls him,&rsquo; he replied.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah, I thought as much,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, well,
+damn all these Frenchmen, say I!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You may say so indeed, sir,&rsquo; said the waiter.&nbsp; &lsquo;They
+ain&rsquo;t not to say in the same field with our &rsquo;ome-raised
+gentry.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Nasty tempers?&rsquo; I suggested.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Beas&rsquo;ly temper, sir, the Viscount &rsquo;ave,&rsquo; said
+the waiter with feeling.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why, no longer agone than this
+morning, he was sitting breakfasting and reading in his paper.&nbsp;
+I suppose, sir, he come on some pilitical information, or it might be
+about &rsquo;orses, but he raps his &rsquo;and upon the table sudden
+and calls for curacoa.&nbsp; It gave me quite a turn, it did; he did
+it that sudden and &rsquo;ard.&nbsp; Now, sir, that may be manners in
+France, but hall I can say is, that I&rsquo;m not used to it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Reading the paper, was he?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;What paper,
+eh?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here it is, sir,&rsquo; exclaimed the waiter.&nbsp; &lsquo;Seems
+like as if he&rsquo;d dropped it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.<br>
+<br>
+I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what to expect;
+but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped beating.&nbsp; There
+it was: the fulfilment of Romaine&rsquo;s apprehension was before me;
+the paper was laid open at the capture of Clausel.&nbsp; I felt as if
+I could take a little curacoa myself, but on second thoughts called
+for brandy.&nbsp; It was badly wanted; and suddenly I observed the waiter&rsquo;s
+eye to sparkle, as it were, with some recognition; made certain he had
+remarked the resemblance between me and Alain; and became aware - as
+by a revelation - of the fool&rsquo;s part I had been playing.&nbsp;
+For I had now managed to put my identification beyond a doubt, if Alain
+should choose to make his inquiries at Aylesbury; and, as if that were
+not enough, I had added, at an expense of seventy pounds, a clue by
+which he might follow me through the length and breadth of England,
+in the shape of the claret-coloured chaise!&nbsp; That elegant equipage
+(which I began to regard as little better than a claret-coloured ante-room
+to the hangman&rsquo;s cart) coming presently to the door, I left my
+breakfast in the middle and departed; posting to the north as diligently
+as my cousin Alain was posting to the south, and putting my trust (such
+as it was) in an opposite direction and equal speed.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXII - CHARACTER AND ACQUIREMENTS OF MR.&nbsp; ROWLEY<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I am not certain that I had ever really appreciated before that hour
+the extreme peril of the adventure on which I was embarked.&nbsp; The
+sight of my cousin, the look of his face - so handsome, so jovial at
+the first sight, and branded with so much malignity as you saw it on
+the second - with his hyperbolical curls in order, with his neckcloth
+tied as if for the conquests of love, setting forth (as I had no doubt
+in the world he was doing) to clap the Bow Street runners on my trail,
+and cover England with handbills, each dangerous as a loaded musket,
+convinced me for the first time that the affair was no less serious
+than death.&nbsp; I believe it came to a near touch whether I should
+not turn the horses&rsquo; heads at the next stage and make directly
+for the coast.&nbsp; But I was now in the position of a man who should
+have thrown his gage into the den of lions; or, better still, like one
+who should have quarrelled overnight under the influence of wine, and
+now, at daylight, in a cold winter&rsquo;s morning, and humbly sober,
+must make good his words.&nbsp; It is not that I thought any the less,
+or any the less warmly, of Flora.&nbsp; But, as I smoked a grim segar
+that morning in a corner of the chaise, no doubt I considered, in the
+first place, that the letter-post had been invented, and admitted privately
+to myself, in the second, that it would have been highly possible to
+write her on a piece of paper, seal it, and send it skimming by the
+mail, instead of going personally into these egregious dangers, and
+through a country that I beheld crowded with gibbets and Bow Street
+officers.&nbsp; As for Sim and Candlish, I doubt if they crossed my
+mind.<br>
+<br>
+At the Green Dragon Rowley was waiting on the doorsteps with the luggage,
+and really was bursting with unpalatable conversation.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who do you think we&rsquo;ve &rsquo;ad &rsquo;ere, sir?&rsquo;
+he began breathlessly, as the chaise drove off.&nbsp; &lsquo;Red Breasts&rsquo;;
+and he nodded his head portentously.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Red Breasts?&rsquo; I repeated, for I stupidly did not understand
+at the moment an expression I had often heard.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Red weskits.&nbsp; Runners.&nbsp;
+Bow Street runners.&nbsp; Two on&rsquo; em, and one was Lavender himself!&nbsp;
+I hear the other say quite plain, &ldquo;Now, Mr. Lavender, <i>if</i>
+you&rsquo;re ready.&rdquo;&nbsp; They was breakfasting as nigh me as
+I am to that postboy.&nbsp; They&rsquo;re all right; they ain&rsquo;t
+after us.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s a forger; and I didn&rsquo;t send them off
+on a false scent - O no!&nbsp; I thought there was no use in having
+them over our way; so I give them &ldquo;very valuable information,&rdquo;
+Mr. Lavender said, and tipped me a tizzy for myself; and they&rsquo;re
+off to Luton.&nbsp; They showed me the &rsquo;andcuffs, too - the other
+one did - and he clicked the dratted things on my wrist; and I tell
+you, I believe I nearly went off in a swound!&nbsp; There&rsquo;s something
+so beastly in the feel of them!&nbsp; Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne,&rsquo;
+he added, with one of his delicious changes from the character of the
+confidential schoolboy into that of the trained, respectful servant.<br>
+<br>
+Well, I must not be proud!&nbsp; I cannot say I found the subject of
+handcuffs to my fancy; and it was with more asperity than was needful
+that I reproved him for the slip about the name.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, Mr. Ramornie,&rsquo; says he, touching his hat.&nbsp; &lsquo;Begging
+your pardon, Mr. Ramornie.&nbsp; But I&rsquo;ve been very piticular,
+sir, up to now; and you may trust me to be very piticular in the future.&nbsp;
+It were only a slip, sir.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My good boy,&rsquo; said I, with the most imposing severity,
+&lsquo;there must be no slips.&nbsp; Be so good as to remember that
+my life is at stake.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had made myself.&nbsp;
+It is my principle that an officer must never be wrong.&nbsp; I have
+seen two divisions beating their brains out for a fortnight against
+a worthless and quite impregnable castle in a pass: I knew we were only
+doing it for discipline, because the General had said so at first, and
+had not yet found any way out of his own words; and I highly admired
+his force of character, and throughout these operations thought my life
+exposed in a very good cause.&nbsp; With fools and children, which included
+Rowley, the necessity was even greater.&nbsp; I proposed to myself to
+be infallible; and even when he expressed some wonder at the purchase
+of the claret-coloured chaise, I put him promptly in his place.&nbsp;
+In our situation, I told him, everything had to be sacrificed to appearances;
+doubtless, in a hired chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look
+at the dignity!&nbsp; I was so positive, that I had sometimes almost
+convinced myself.&nbsp; Not for long, you may be certain!&nbsp; This
+detestable conveyance always appeared to me to be laden with Bow Street
+officers, and to have a placard upon the back of it publishing my name
+and crimes.&nbsp; If I had paid seventy pounds to get the thing, I should
+not have stuck at seven hundred to be safely rid of it.<br>
+<br>
+And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the despatch-box
+and its golden cargo!&nbsp; I had never had a care but to draw my pay
+and spend it; I had lived happily in the regiment, as in my father&rsquo;s
+house, fed by the great Emperor&rsquo;s commissariat as by ubiquitous
+doves of Elijah - or, my faith! if anything went wrong with the commissariat,
+helping myself with the best grace in the world from the next peasant!&nbsp;
+And now I began to feel at the same time the burthen of riches and the
+fear of destitution.&nbsp; There were ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box,
+but I reckoned in French money, and had two hundred and fifty thousand
+agonies; I kept it under my hand all day, I dreamed of it at night.&nbsp;
+In the inns, I was afraid to go to dinner and afraid to go to sleep.&nbsp;
+When I walked up a hill I durst not leave the doors of the claret-coloured
+chaise.&nbsp; Sometimes I would change the disposition of the funds:
+there were days when I carried as much as five or six thousand pounds
+on my own person, and only the residue continued to voyage in the treasure-chest
+- days when I bulked all over like my cousin, crackled to a touch with
+bank paper, and had my pockets weighed to bursting-point with sovereigns.&nbsp;
+And there were other days when I wearied of the thing - or grew ashamed
+of it - and put all the money back where it had come from: there let
+it take its chance, like better people!&nbsp; In short, I set Rowley
+a poor example of consistency, and in philosophy, none at all.<br>
+<br>
+Little he cared!&nbsp; All was one to him so long as he was amused,
+and I never knew any one amused more easily.&nbsp; He was thrillingly
+interested in life, travel, and his own melodramatic position.&nbsp;
+All day he would be looking from the chaise windows with ebullitions
+of gratified curiosity, that were sometimes justified and sometimes
+not, and that (taken altogether) it occasionally wearied me to be obliged
+to share.&nbsp; I can look at horses, and I can look at trees too, although
+not fond of it.&nbsp; But why should I look at a lame horse, or a tree
+that was like the letter Y?&nbsp; What exhilaration could I feel in
+viewing a cottage that was the same colour as &lsquo;the second from
+the miller&rsquo;s&rsquo; in some place where I had never been, and
+of which I had not previously heard?&nbsp; I am ashamed to complain,
+but there were moments when my juvenile and confidential friend weighed
+heavy on my hands.&nbsp; His cackle was indeed almost continuous, but
+it was never unamiable.&nbsp; He showed an amiable curiosity when he
+was asking questions; an amiable guilelessness when he was conferring
+information.&nbsp; And both he did largely.&nbsp; I am in a position
+to write the biographies of Mr. Rowley, Mr. Rowley&rsquo;s father and
+mother, his Aunt Eliza, and the miller&rsquo;s dog; and nothing but
+pity for the reader, and some misgivings as to the law of copyright,
+prevail on me to withhold them.<br>
+<br>
+A general design to mould himself upon my example became early apparent,
+and I had not the heart to check it.&nbsp; He began to mimic my carriage;
+he acquired, with servile accuracy, a little manner I had of shrugging
+the shoulders; and I may say it was by observing it in him that I first
+discovered it in myself.&nbsp; One day it came out by chance that I
+was of the Catholic religion.&nbsp; He became plunged in thought, at
+which I was gently glad.&nbsp; Then suddenly -<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Odd-rabbit it!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll be Catholic too!&rsquo; he broke
+out.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must teach me it, Mr. Anne - I mean, Ramornie.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I dissuaded him: alleging that he would find me very imperfectly informed
+as to the grounds and doctrines of the Church, and that, after all,
+in the matter of religions, it was a very poor idea to change.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Of course, my Church is the best,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but that
+is not the reason why I belong to it: I belong to it because it was
+the faith of my house.&nbsp; I wish to take my chances with my own people,
+and so should you.&nbsp; If it is a question of going to hell, go to
+hell like a gentleman with your ancestors.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, it wasn&rsquo;t that,&rsquo; he admitted.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+don&rsquo;t know that I was exactly thinking of hell.&nbsp; Then there&rsquo;s
+the inquisition, too.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s rather a cawker, you know.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I don&rsquo;t believe you were thinking of anything in the
+world,&rsquo; said I - which put a period to his respectable conversion.<br>
+<br>
+He consoled himself by playing for awhile on a cheap flageolet, which
+was one of his diversions, and to which I owed many intervals of peace.&nbsp;
+When he first produced it, in the joints, from his pocket, he had the
+duplicity to ask me if I played upon it.&nbsp; I answered, no; and he
+put the instrument away with a sigh and the remark that he had thought
+I might.&nbsp; For some while he resisted the unspeakable temptation,
+his fingers visibly itching and twittering about his pocket, even his
+interest in the landscape and in sporadic anecdote entirely lost.&nbsp;
+Presently the pipe was in his hands again; he fitted, unfitted, refitted,
+and played upon it in dumb show for some time.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I play it myself a little,&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you?&rsquo; said I, and yawned.<br>
+<br>
+And then he broke down.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Ramornie, if you please, would it disturb you, sir, if I
+was to play a chune?&rsquo; he pleaded.&nbsp; And from that hour, the
+tootling of the flageolet cheered our way.<br>
+<br>
+He was particularly keen on the details of battles, single combats,
+incidents of scouting parties, and the like.&nbsp; These he would make
+haste to cap with some of the exploits of Wallace, the only hero with
+whom he had the least acquaintance.&nbsp; His enthusiasm was genuine
+and pretty.&nbsp; When he learned we were going to Scotland, &lsquo;Well,
+then,&rsquo; he broke out, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll see where Wallace lived!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And presently after, he fell to moralising.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s
+a strange thing, sir,&rsquo; he began, &lsquo;that I seem somehow to
+have always the wrong sow by the ear.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m English after
+all, and I glory in it.&nbsp; My eye! don&rsquo;t I, though!&nbsp; Let
+some of your Frenchies come over here to invade, and you&rsquo;ll see
+whether or not!&nbsp; Oh, yes, I&rsquo;m English to the backbone, I
+am.&nbsp; And yet look at me!&nbsp; I got hold of this &rsquo;ere William
+Wallace and took to him right off; I never heard of such a man before!&nbsp;
+And then you came along, and I took to you.&nbsp; And both the two of
+you were my born enemies!&nbsp; I - I beg your pardon, Mr. Ramornie,
+but would you mind it very much if you didn&rsquo;t go for to do anything
+against England&rsquo; - he brought the word out suddenly, like something
+hot - &lsquo;when I was along of you?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was more affected than I can tell.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;you need have no fear.&nbsp; By
+how much I love my own honour, by so much I will take care to protect
+yours.&nbsp; We are but fraternising at the outposts, as soldiers do.&nbsp;
+When the bugle calls, my boy, we must face each other, one for England,
+one for France, and may God defend the right!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+So I spoke at the moment; but for all my brave airs, the boy had wounded
+me in a vital quarter.&nbsp; His words continued to ring in my hearing.&nbsp;
+There was no remission all day of my remorseful thoughts; and that night
+(which we lay at Lichfield, I believe) there was no sleep for me in
+my bed.&nbsp; I put out the candle and lay down with a good resolution;
+and in a moment all was light about me like a theatre, and I saw myself
+upon the stage of it playing ignoble parts.&nbsp; I remembered France
+and my Emperor, now depending on the arbitrament of war, bent down,
+fighting on their knees and with their teeth against so many and such
+various assailants.&nbsp; And I burned with shame to be here in England,
+cherishing an English fortune, pursuing an English mistress, and not
+there, to handle a musket in my native fields, and to manure them with
+my body if I fell.&nbsp; I remembered that I belonged to France.&nbsp;
+All my fathers had fought for her, and some had died; the voice in my
+throat, the sight of my eyes, the tears that now sprang there, the whole
+man of me, was fashioned of French earth and born of a French mother;
+I had been tended and caressed by a succession of the daughters of France,
+the fairest, the most ill-starred; and I had fought and conquered shoulder
+to shoulder with her sons.&nbsp; A soldier, a noble, of the proudest
+and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to the prattle of a hobbledehoy
+lackey in an English chaise to recall me to the consciousness of duty.<br>
+<br>
+When I saw how it was I did not lose time in indecision.&nbsp; The old
+classical conflict of love and honour being once fairly before me, it
+did not cost me a thought.&nbsp; I was a Saint-Yves de K&eacute;roual;
+and I decided to strike off on the morrow for Wakefield and Burchell
+Fenn, and embark, as soon as it should be morally possible, for the
+succour of my downtrodden fatherland and my beleaguered Emperor.&nbsp;
+Pursuant on this resolve, I leaped from bed, made a light, and as the
+watchman was crying half-past two in the dark streets of Lichfield,
+sat down to pen a letter of farewell to Flora.&nbsp; And then - whether
+it was the sudden chill of the night, whether it came by association
+of ideas from the remembrance of Swanston Cottage I know not, but there
+appeared before me - to the barking of sheep-dogs - a couple of snuffy
+and shambling figures, each wrapped in a plaid, each armed with a rude
+staff; and I was immediately bowed down to have forgotten them so long,
+and of late to have thought of them so cavalierly.<br>
+<br>
+Sure enough there was my errand!&nbsp; As a private person I was neither
+French nor English; I was something else first: a loyal gentleman, an
+honest man.&nbsp; Sim and Candlish must not be left to pay the penalty
+of my unfortunate blow.&nbsp; They held my honour tacitly pledged to
+succour them; and it is a sort of stoical refinement entirely foreign
+to my nature to set the political obligation above the personal and
+private.&nbsp; If France fell in the interval for the lack of Anne de
+St.-Yves, fall she must!&nbsp; But I was both surprised and humiliated
+to have had so plain a duty bound upon me for so long - and for so long
+to have neglected and forgotten it.&nbsp; I think any brave man will
+understand me when I say that I went to bed and to sleep with a conscience
+very much relieved, and woke again in the morning with a light heart.&nbsp;
+The very danger of the enterprise reassured me: to save Sim and Candlish
+(suppose the worst to come to the worst) it would be necessary for me
+to declare myself in a court of justice, with consequences which I did
+not dare to dwell upon; it could never be said that I had chosen the
+cheap and the easy - only that in a very perplexing competition of duties
+I had risked my life for the most immediate.<br>
+<br>
+We resumed the journey with more diligence: thenceforward posted day
+and night; did not halt beyond what was necessary for meals; and the
+postillions were excited by gratuities, after the habit of my cousin
+Alain.&nbsp; For twopence I could have gone farther and taken four horses;
+so extreme was my haste, running as I was before the terrors of an awakened
+conscience.&nbsp; But I feared to be conspicuous.&nbsp; Even as it was,
+we attracted only too much attention, with our pair and that white elephant,
+the seventy-pounds-worth of claret-coloured chaise.<br>
+<br>
+Meanwhile I was ashamed to look Rowley in the face.&nbsp; The young
+shaver had contrived to put me wholly in the wrong; he had cost me a
+night&rsquo;s rest and a severe and healthful humiliation; and I was
+grateful and embarrassed in his society.&nbsp; This would never do;
+it was contrary to all my ideas of discipline; if the officer has to
+blush before the private, or the master before the servant, nothing
+is left to hope for but discharge or death.&nbsp; I hit upon the idea
+of teaching him French; and accordingly, from Lichfield, I became the
+distracted master, and he the scholar - how shall I say? indefatigable,
+but uninspired.&nbsp; His interest never flagged.&nbsp; He would hear
+the same word twenty times with profound refreshment, mispronounce it
+in several different ways, and forget it again with magical celerity.&nbsp;
+Say it happened to be <i>stirrup</i>.&nbsp; &lsquo;No, I don&rsquo;t
+seem to remember that word, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; he would say: &lsquo;it
+don&rsquo;t seem to stick to me, that word don&rsquo;t.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And then, when I had told it him again, &lsquo;<i>Etrier</i>!&rsquo;
+he would cry.&nbsp; &lsquo;To be sure!&nbsp; I had it on the tip of
+my tongue.&nbsp; <i>Eterier</i>!&rsquo; (going wrong already, as if
+by a fatal instinct).&nbsp; &lsquo;What will I remember it by, now?&nbsp;
+Why, <i>interior</i>, to be sure!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll remember it by its
+being something that ain&rsquo;t in the interior of a horse.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And when next I had occasion to ask him the French for stirrup, it was
+a toss-up whether he had forgotten all about it, or gave me <i>exterior</i>
+for an answer.&nbsp; He was never a hair discouraged.&nbsp; He seemed
+to consider that he was covering the ground at a normal rate.&nbsp;
+He came up smiling day after day.&nbsp; &lsquo;Now, sir, shall we do
+our French?&rsquo; he would say; and I would put questions, and elicit
+copious commentary and explanation, but never the shadow of an answer.&nbsp;
+My hands fell to my sides; I could have wept to hear him.&nbsp; When
+I reflected that he had as yet learned nothing, and what a vast deal
+more there was for him to learn, the period of these lessons seemed
+to unroll before me vast as eternity, and I saw myself a teacher of
+a hundred, and Rowley a pupil of ninety, still hammering on the rudiments!&nbsp;
+The wretched boy, I should say, was quite unspoiled by the inevitable
+familiarities of the journey.&nbsp; He turned out at each stage the
+pink of serving-lads, deft, civil, prompt, attentive, touching his hat
+like an automaton, raising the status of Mr. Ramornie in the eyes of
+all the inn by his smiling service, and seeming capable of anything
+in the world but the one thing I had chosen - learning French!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIII - THE ADVENTURE OF THE RUNAWAY COUPLE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+The country had for some time back been changing in character.&nbsp;
+By a thousand indications I could judge that I was again drawing near
+to Scotland.&nbsp; I saw it written in the face of the hills, in the
+growth of the trees, and in the glint of the waterbrooks that kept the
+high-road company.&nbsp; It might have occurred to me, also, that I
+was, at the same time, approaching a place of some fame in Britain -
+Gretna Green.&nbsp; Over these same leagues of road - which Rowley and
+I now traversed in the claret-coloured chaise, to the note of the flageolet
+and the French lesson - how many pairs of lovers had gone bowling northwards
+to the music of sixteen scampering horseshoes; and how many irate persons,
+parents, uncles, guardians, evicted rivals, had come tearing after,
+clapping the frequent red face to the chaise-window, lavishly shedding
+their gold about the post-houses, sedulously loading and re-loading,
+as they went, their avenging pistols!&nbsp; But I doubt if I had thought
+of it at all, before a wayside hazard swept me into the thick of an
+adventure of this nature; and I found myself playing providence with
+other people&rsquo;s lives, to my own admiration at the moment - and
+subsequently to my own brief but passionate regret.<br>
+<br>
+At rather an ugly corner of an uphill reach I came on the wreck of a
+chaise lying on one side in the ditch, a man and a woman in animated
+discourse in the middle of the road, and the two postillions, each with
+his pair of horses, looking on and laughing from the saddle.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Morning breezes! here&rsquo;s a smash!&rsquo; cried Rowley, pocketing
+his flageolet in the middle of the <i>Tight Little Island</i>.<br>
+<br>
+I was perhaps more conscious of the moral smash than the physical -
+more alive to broken hearts than to broken chaises; for, as plain as
+the sun at morning, there was a screw loose in this runaway match.&nbsp;
+It is always a bad sign when the lower classes laugh: their taste in
+humour is both poor and sinister; and for a man, running the posts with
+four horses, presumably with open pockets, and in the company of the
+most entrancing little creature conceivable, to have come down so far
+as to be laughed at by his own postillions, was only to be explained
+on the double hypothesis, that he was a fool and no gentleman.<br>
+<br>
+I have said they were man and woman.&nbsp; I should have said man and
+child.&nbsp; She was certainly not more than seventeen, pretty as an
+angel, just plump enough to damn a saint, and dressed in various shades
+of blue, from her stockings to her saucy cap, in a kind of taking gamut,
+the top note of which she flung me in a beam from her too appreciative
+eye.&nbsp; There was no doubt about the case: I saw it all.&nbsp; From
+a boarding-school, a black-board, a piano, and Clementi&rsquo;s <i>Sonatinas</i>,
+the child had made a rash adventure upon life in the company of a half-bred
+hawbuck; and she was already not only regretting it, but expressing
+her regret with point and pungency.<br>
+<br>
+As I alighted they both paused with that unmistakable air of being interrupted
+in a scene.&nbsp; I uncovered to the lady and placed my services at
+their disposal.<br>
+<br>
+It was the man who answered.&nbsp; &lsquo;There&rsquo;s no use in shamming,
+sir,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;This lady and I have run away, and
+her father&rsquo;s after us: road to Gretna, sir.&nbsp; And here have
+these nincompoops spilt us in the ditch and smashed the chaise!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Very provoking,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t know when I&rsquo;ve been so provoked!&rsquo; cried
+he, with a glance down the road, of mortal terror.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The father is no doubt very much incensed?&rsquo; I pursued civilly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O God!&rsquo; cried the hawbuck.&nbsp; &lsquo;In short, you see,
+we must get out of this.&nbsp; And I&rsquo;ll tell you what - it may
+seem cool, but necessity has no law - if you would lend us your chaise
+to the next post-house, it would be the very thing, sir.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I confess it seems cool,&rsquo; I replied.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What&rsquo;s that you say, sir?&rsquo; he snapped.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I was agreeing with you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, it
+does seem cool; and what is more to the point, it seems unnecessary.&nbsp;
+This thing can be arranged in a more satisfactory manner otherwise,
+I think.&nbsp; You can doubtless ride?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+This opened a door on the matter of their previous dispute, and the
+fellow appeared life-sized in his true colours.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s
+what I&rsquo;ve been telling her: that, damn her! she must ride!&rsquo;
+he broke out.&nbsp; &lsquo;And if the gentleman&rsquo;s of the same
+mind, why, damme, you shall!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As he said so, he made a snatch at her wrist, which she evaded with
+horror.<br>
+<br>
+I stepped between them.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, sir,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;the lady shall not.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He turned on me raging.&nbsp; &lsquo;And who are you to interfere?&rsquo;
+he roared.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There is here no question of who I am,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I may be the devil or the Archbishop of Canterbury for what you
+know, or need know.&nbsp; The point is that I can help you - it appears
+that nobody else can; and I will tell you how I propose to do it.&nbsp;
+I will give the lady a seat in my chaise, if you will return the compliment
+by allowing my servant to ride one of your horses.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I thought he would have sprung at my throat.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have always the alternative before you: to wait here for
+the arrival of papa,&rsquo; I added.<br>
+<br>
+And that settled him.&nbsp; He cast another haggard look down the road,
+and capitulated.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sure, sir, the lady is very much obliged to you,&rsquo;
+he said, with an ill grace.<br>
+<br>
+I gave her my hand; she mounted like a bird into the chaise; Rowley,
+grinning from ear to ear, closed the door behind us; the two impudent
+rascals of post-boys cheered and laughed aloud as we drove off; and
+my own postillion urged his horses at once into a rattling trot.&nbsp;
+It was plain I was supposed by all to have done a very dashing act,
+and ravished the bride from the ravisher.<br>
+<br>
+In the meantime I stole a look at the little lady.&nbsp; She was in
+a state of pitiable discomposure, and her arms shook on her lap in her
+black lace mittens.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+And she, in the same moment, finding her voice: &lsquo;O, what you must
+think of me!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;what must any gentleman think when
+he sees youth, beauty and innocence in distress?&nbsp; I wish I could
+tell you that I was old enough to be your father; I think we must give
+that up,&rsquo; I continued, with a smile.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I will tell
+you something about myself which ought to do as well, and to set that
+little heart at rest in my society.&nbsp; I am a lover.&nbsp; May I
+say it of myself - for I am not quite used to all the niceties of English
+- that I am a true lover?&nbsp; There is one whom I admire, adore, obey;
+she is no less good than she is beautiful; if she were here, she would
+take you to her arms: conceive that she has sent me - that she has said
+to me, &ldquo;Go, be her knight!&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, I know she must be sweet, I know she must be worthy of you!&rsquo;
+cried the little lady.&nbsp; &lsquo;She would never forget female decorum
+- nor make the terrible <i>erratum</i> I&rsquo;ve done!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And at this she lifted up her voice and wept.<br>
+<br>
+This did not forward matters: it was in vain that I begged her to be
+more composed and to tell me a plain, consecutive tale of her misadventures;
+but she continued instead to pour forth the most extraordinary mixture
+of the correct school miss and the poor untutored little piece of womanhood
+in a false position - of engrafted pedantry and incoherent nature.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am certain it must have been judicial blindness,&rsquo; she
+sobbed.&nbsp; &lsquo;I can&rsquo;t think how I didn&rsquo;t see it,
+but I didn&rsquo;t; and he isn&rsquo;t, is he?&nbsp; And then a curtain
+rose . . . O, what a moment was that!&nbsp; But I knew at once that
+<i>you were</i>; you had but to appear from your carriage, and I knew
+it, O, she must be a fortunate young lady!&nbsp; And I have no fear
+with you, none - a perfect confidence.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;a gentleman.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s what I mean - a gentleman,&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And he - and that - <i>he</i> isn&rsquo;t.&nbsp; O, how shall
+I dare meet father!&rsquo;&nbsp; And disclosing to me her tear-stained
+face, and opening her arms with a tragic gesture: &lsquo;And I am quite
+disgraced before all the young ladies, my school-companions!&rsquo;
+she added.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, not so bad as that!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Come, come,
+you exaggerate, my dear Miss - ?&nbsp; Excuse me if I am too familiar:
+I have not yet heard your name.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My name is Dorothy Greensleeves, sir: why should I conceal it?&nbsp;
+I fear it will only serve to point an adage to future generations, and
+I had meant so differently!&nbsp; There was no young female in the county
+more emulous to be thought well of than I.&nbsp; And what a fall was
+there!&nbsp; O, dear me, what a wicked, piggish donkey of a girl I have
+made of myself, to be sure!&nbsp; And there is no hope! O, Mr. - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And at that she paused and asked my name.<br>
+<br>
+I am not writing my eulogium for the Academy; I will admit it was unpardonably
+imbecile, but I told it her.&nbsp; If you had been there - and seen
+her, ravishingly pretty and little, a baby in years and mind - and heard
+her talking like a book, with so much of schoolroom propriety in her
+manner, with such an innocent despair in the matter - you would probably
+have told her yours.&nbsp; She repeated it after me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I shall pray for you all my life,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Every
+night, when I retire to rest, the last thing I shall do is to remember
+you by name.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Presently I succeeded in winning from her her tale, which was much what
+I had anticipated: a tale of a schoolhouse, a walled garden, a fruit-tree
+that concealed a bench, an impudent raff posturing in church, an exchange
+of flowers and vows over the garden wall, a silly schoolmate for a confidante,
+a chaise and four, and the most immediate and perfect disenchantment
+on the part of the little lady.&nbsp; &lsquo;And there is nothing to
+be done!&rsquo; she wailed in conclusion.&nbsp; &lsquo;My error is irretrievable,
+I am quite forced to that conclusion.&nbsp; O, Monsieur de Saint-Yves!
+who would have thought that I could have been such a blind, wicked donkey!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I should have said before - only that I really do not know when it came
+in - that we had been overtaken by the two post-boys, Rowley and Mr.
+Bellamy, which was the hawbuck&rsquo;s name, bestriding the four post-horses;
+and that these formed a sort of cavalry escort, riding now before, now
+behind the chaise, and Bellamy occasionally posturing at the window
+and obliging us with some of his conversation.&nbsp; He was so ill-received
+that I declare I was tempted to pity him, remembering from what a height
+he had fallen, and how few hours ago it was since the lady had herself
+fled to his arms, all blushes and ardour.&nbsp; Well, these great strokes
+of fortune usually befall the unworthy, and Bellamy was now the legitimate
+object of my commiseration and the ridicule of his own post-boys!<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Miss Dorothy,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;you wish to be delivered
+from this man?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, if it were possible!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;But not
+by violence.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not in the least, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+simplest thing in life.&nbsp; We are in a civilised country; the man&rsquo;s
+a malefactor - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, never!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do not even dream it!&nbsp;
+With all his faults, I know he is not <i>that</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Anyway, he&rsquo;s in the wrong in this affair - on the wrong
+side of the law, call it what you please,&rsquo; said I; and with that,
+our four horsemen having for the moment headed us by a considerable
+interval, I hailed my post-boy and inquired who was the nearest magistrate
+and where he lived.&nbsp; Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a prodigious
+dignitary, and one who lived but a lane or two back, and at the distance
+of only a mile or two out of the direct road.&nbsp; I showed him the
+king&rsquo;s medallion.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Take the lady there, and at full gallop,&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Right, sir!&nbsp; Mind yourself,&rsquo; says the postillion.<br>
+<br>
+And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the carriage
+to the rightabout and we were galloping south.<br>
+<br>
+Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre, and came
+flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate shouting; so that
+the fine, sober picture of a carriage and escort, that we had presented
+but a moment back, was transformed in the twinkling of an eye into the
+image of a noisy fox-chase.&nbsp; The two postillions and my own saucy
+rogue were, of course, disinterested actors in the comedy; they rode
+for the mere sport, keeping in a body, their mouths full of laughter,
+waving their hats as they came on, and crying (as the fancy struck them)
+Tally-ho!&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Stop, thief!&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;A highwayman!&nbsp;
+A highwayman!&rsquo;&nbsp; It was otherguess work with Bellamy.&nbsp;
+That gentleman no sooner observed our change of direction than he turned
+his horse with so much violence that the poor animal was almost cast
+upon its side, and launched her in immediate and desperate pursuit.&nbsp;
+As he approached I saw that his face was deadly white and that he carried
+a drawn pistol in his hand.&nbsp; I turned at once to the poor little
+bride that was to have been, and now was not to be; she, upon her side,
+deserting the other window, turned as if to meet me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, O, don&rsquo;t let him kill me!&rsquo; she screamed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Never fear,&rsquo; I replied.<br>
+<br>
+Her face was distorted with terror.&nbsp; Her hands took hold upon me
+with the instinctive clutch of an infant.&nbsp; The chaise gave a flying
+lurch, which took the feet from under me and tumbled us anyhow upon
+the seat.&nbsp; And almost in the same moment the head of Bellamy appeared
+in the window which Missy had left free for him.<br>
+<br>
+Conceive the situation!&nbsp; The little lady and I were falling - or
+had just fallen - backward on the seat, and offered to the eye a somewhat
+ambiguous picture.&nbsp; The chaise was speeding at a furious pace,
+and with the most violent leaps and lurches, along the highway.&nbsp;
+Into this bounding receptacle Bellamy interjected his head, his pistol
+arm, and his pistol; and since his own horse was travelling still faster
+than the chaise, he must withdraw all of them again in the inside of
+the fraction of a minute.&nbsp; He did so, but he left the charge of
+the pistol behind him - whether by design or accident I shall never
+know, and I dare say he has forgotten!&nbsp; Probably he had only meant
+to threaten, in hopes of causing us to arrest our flight.&nbsp; In the
+same moment came the explosion and a pitiful cry from Missy; and my
+gentleman, making certain he had struck her, went down the road pursued
+by the furies, turned at the first corner, took a flying leap over the
+thorn hedge, and disappeared across country in the least possible time.<br>
+<br>
+Rowley was ready and eager to pursue; but I withheld him, thinking we
+were excellently quit of Mr. Bellamy, at no more cost than a scratch
+on the forearm and a bullet-hole in the left-hand claret-coloured panel.&nbsp;
+And accordingly, but now at a more decent pace, we proceeded on our
+way to Archdeacon Clitheroe&rsquo;s, Missy&rsquo;s gratitude and admiration
+were aroused to a high pitch by this dramatic scene, and what she was
+pleased to call my wound.&nbsp; She must dress it for me with her handkerchief,
+a service which she rendered me even with tears.&nbsp; I could well
+have spared them, not loving on the whole to be made ridiculous, and
+the injury being in the nature of a cat&rsquo;s scratch.&nbsp; Indeed,
+I would have suggested for her kind care rather the cure of my coat-sleeve,
+which had suffered worse in the encounter; but I was too wise to risk
+the anti-climax.&nbsp; That she had been rescued by a hero, that the
+hero should have been wounded in the affray, and his wound bandaged
+with her handkerchief (which it could not even bloody), ministered incredibly
+to the recovery of her self-respect; and I could hear her relate the
+incident to &lsquo;the young ladies, my school-companions,&rsquo; in
+the most approved manner of Mrs. Radcliffe!&nbsp; To have insisted on
+the torn coat-sleeve would have been unmannerly, if not inhuman.<br>
+<br>
+Presently the residence of the archdeacon began to heave in sight.&nbsp;
+A chaise and four smoking horses stood by the steps, and made way for
+us on our approach; and even as we alighted there appeared from the
+interior of the house a tall ecclesiastic, and beside him a little,
+headstrong, ruddy man, in a towering passion, and brandishing over his
+head a roll of paper.&nbsp; At sight of him Miss Dorothy flung herself
+on her knees with the most moving adjurations, calling him father, assuring
+him she was wholly cured and entirely repentant of her disobedience,
+and entreating forgiveness; and I soon saw that she need fear no great
+severity from Mr. Greensleeves, who showed himself extraordinarily fond,
+loud, greedy of caresses and prodigal of tears.<br>
+<br>
+To give myself a countenance, as well as to have all ready for the road
+when I should find occasion, I turned to quit scores with Bellamy&rsquo;s
+two postillions.&nbsp; They had not the least claim on me, but one of
+which they were quite ignorant - that I was a fugitive.&nbsp; It is
+the worst feature of that false position that every gratuity becomes
+a case of conscience.&nbsp; You must not leave behind you any one discontented
+nor any one grateful.&nbsp; But the whole business had been such a &lsquo;hurrah-boys&rsquo;
+from the beginning, and had gone off in the fifth act so like a melodrama,
+in explosions, reconciliations, and the rape of a post-horse, that it
+was plainly impossible to keep it covered.&nbsp; It was plain it would
+have to be talked over in all the inn-kitchens for thirty miles about,
+and likely for six months to come.&nbsp; It only remained for me, therefore,
+to settle on that gratuity which should be least conspicuous - so large
+that nobody could grumble, so small that nobody would be tempted to
+boast.&nbsp; My decision was hastily and nor wisely taken.&nbsp; The
+one fellow spat on his tip (so he called it) for luck; the other developing
+a sudden streak of piety, prayed God bless me with fervour.&nbsp; It
+seemed a demonstration was brewing, and I determined to be off at once.&nbsp;
+Bidding my own post-boy and Rowley be in readiness for an immediate
+start, I reascended the terrace and presented myself, hat in hand, before
+Mr. Greensleeves and the archdeacon.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You will excuse me, I trust,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;I think
+shame to interrupt this agreeable scene of family effusion, which I
+have been privileged in some small degree to bring about.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And at these words the storm broke.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Small degree! small degree, sir!&rsquo; cries the father; &lsquo;that
+shall not pass, Mr. St. Eaves!&nbsp; If I&rsquo;ve got my darling back,
+and none the worse for that vagabone rascal, I know whom I have to thank.&nbsp;
+Shake hands with me - up to the elbows, sir!&nbsp; A Frenchman you may
+be, but you&rsquo;re one of the right breed, by God!&nbsp; And, by God,
+sir, you may have anything you care to ask of me, down to Dolly&rsquo;s
+hand, by God!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+All this he roared out in a voice surprisingly powerful from so small
+a person.&nbsp; Every word was thus audible to the servants, who had
+followed them out of the house and now congregated about us on the terrace,
+as well as to Rowley and the five postillions on the gravel sweep below.&nbsp;
+The sentiments expressed were popular; some ass, whom the devil moved
+to be my enemy, proposed three cheers, and they were given with a will.&nbsp;
+To hear my own name resounding amid acclamations in the hills of Westmorland
+was flattering, perhaps; but it was inconvenient at a moment when (as
+I was morally persuaded) police handbills were already speeding after
+me at the rate of a hundred miles a day.<br>
+<br>
+Nor was that the end of it.&nbsp; The archdeacon must present his compliments,
+and pressed upon me some of his West India sherry, and I was carried
+into a vastly fine library, where I was presented to his lady wife.&nbsp;
+While we were at sherry in the library, ale was handed round upon the
+terrace.&nbsp; Speeches were made, hands were shaken, Missy (at her
+father&rsquo;s request) kissed me farewell, and the whole party reaccompanied
+me to the terrace, where they stood waving hats and handkerchiefs, and
+crying farewells to all the echoes of the mountains until the chaise
+had disappeared.<br>
+<br>
+The echoes of the mountains were engaged in saying to me privately:
+&lsquo;You fool, you have done it now!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;They do seem to have got &rsquo;old of your name, Mr. Anne,&rsquo;
+said Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;It weren&rsquo;t my fault this time.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It was one of those accidents that can never be foreseen,&rsquo;
+said I, affecting a dignity that I was far from feeling.&nbsp; &lsquo;Some
+one recognised me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Which on &rsquo;em, Mr. Anne?&rsquo; said the rascal.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That is a senseless question; it can make no difference who it
+was,&rsquo; I returned.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, nor that it can&rsquo;t!&rsquo; cried Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+say, Mr. Anne, sir, it&rsquo;s what you would call a jolly mess, ain&rsquo;t
+it? looks like &ldquo;clean bowled-out in the middle stump,&rdquo; don&rsquo;t
+it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I fail to understand you, Rowley.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, what I mean is, what are we to do about this one?&rsquo;
+pointing to the postillion in front of us, as he alternately hid and
+revealed his patched breeches to the trot of his horse.&nbsp; &lsquo;He
+see you get in this morning under <i>Mr. Ramornie</i> - I was very piticular
+to <i>Mr. Ramornie</i> you, if you remember, sir - and he see you get
+in again under Mr. Saint Eaves, and whatever&rsquo;s he going to see
+you get out under? that&rsquo;s what worries me, sir.&nbsp; It don&rsquo;t
+seem to me like as if the position was what you call <i>stratetegic</i>!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;<i>Parrrbleu</i>! will you let me be!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+have to think; you cannot imagine how your constant idiotic prattle
+annoys me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Beg pardon, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; said he; and the next moment, &lsquo;You
+wouldn&rsquo;t like for us to do our French now, would you, Mr. Anne?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Certainly not,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Play upon your flageolet.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The which he did with what seemed to me to be irony.<br>
+<br>
+Conscience doth make cowards of us all!&nbsp; I was so downcast by my
+pitiful mismanagement of the morning&rsquo;s business that I shrank
+from the eye of my own hired infant, and read offensive meanings into
+his idle tootling.<br>
+<br>
+I took off my coat, and set to mending it, soldier-fashion, with a needle
+and thread.&nbsp; There is nothing more conducive to thought, above
+all in arduous circumstances; and as I sewed, I gradually gained a clearness
+upon my affairs.&nbsp; I must be done with the claret-coloured chaise
+at once.&nbsp; It should be sold at the next stage for what it would
+bring.&nbsp; Rowley and I must take back to the road on our four feet,
+and after a decent interval of trudging, get places on some coach for
+Edinburgh again under new names!&nbsp; So much trouble and toil, so
+much extra risk and expense and loss of time, and all for a slip of
+the tongue to a little lady in blue!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIV - THE INN-KEEPER OF KIRKBY-LONSDALE<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I had hitherto conceived and partly carried out an ideal that was dear
+to my heart.&nbsp; Rowley and I descended from our claret-coloured chaise,
+a couple of correctly dressed, brisk, bright-eyed young fellows, like
+a pair of aristocratic mice; attending singly to our own affairs, communicating
+solely with each other, and that with the niceties and civilities of
+drill.&nbsp; We would pass through the little crowd before the door
+with high-bred preoccupation, inoffensively haughty, after the best
+English pattern; and disappear within, followed by the envy and admiration
+of the bystanders, a model master and servant, point-device in every
+part.&nbsp; It was a heavy thought to me, as we drew up before the inn
+at Kirkby-Lonsdale, that this scene was now to be enacted for the last
+time.&nbsp; Alas! and had I known it, it was to go of with so inferior
+a grace!<br>
+<br>
+I had been injudiciously liberal to the post-boys of the chaise and
+four.&nbsp; My own post-boy, he of the patched breeches, now stood before
+me, his eyes glittering with greed, his hand advanced.&nbsp; It was
+plain he anticipated something extraordinary by way of a <i>pourboire</i>;
+and considering the marches and counter-marches by which I had extended
+the stage, the military character of our affairs with Mr. Bellamy, and
+the bad example I had set before him at the archdeacon&rsquo;s, something
+exceptional was certainly to be done.&nbsp; But these are always nice
+questions, to a foreigner above all: a shade too little will suggest
+niggardliness, a shilling too much smells of hush-money.&nbsp; Fresh
+from the scene at the archdeacon&rsquo;s, and flushed by the idea that
+I was now nearly done with the responsibilities of the claret-coloured
+chaise, I put into his hands five guineas; and the amount served only
+to waken his cupidity.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, come, sir, you ain&rsquo;t going to fob me of with this?&nbsp;
+Why, I seen fire at your side!&rsquo; he cried.<br>
+<br>
+It would never do to give him more; I felt I should become the fable
+of Kirkby-Lonsdale if I did; and I looked him in the face, sternly but
+still smiling, and addressed him with a voice of uncompromising firmness.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you do not like it, give it back,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+He pocketed the guineas with the quickness of a conjurer, and, like
+a base-born cockney as he was, fell instantly to casting dirt.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;&rsquo;Ave your own way of it, Mr. Ramornie - leastways Mr. St.
+Eaves, or whatever your blessed name may be.&nbsp; Look &rsquo;ere&rsquo;
+- turning for sympathy to the stable-boys - &lsquo;this is a blessed
+business.&nbsp; Blessed &rsquo;ard, I calls it.&nbsp; &rsquo;Ere I takes
+up a blessed son of a pop-gun what calls hisself anything you care to
+mention, and turns out to be a blessed <i>mounseer</i> at the end of
+it!&nbsp; &rsquo;Ere &rsquo;ave I been drivin&rsquo; of him up and down
+all day, a-carrying off of gals, a-shootin&rsquo; of pistyils, and a-drinkin&rsquo;
+of sherry and hale; and wot does he up and give me but a blank, blank,
+blanketing blank!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The fellow&rsquo;s language had become too powerful for reproduction,
+and I passed it by.<br>
+<br>
+Meanwhile I observed Rowley fretting visibly at the bit; another moment,
+and he would have added a last touch of the ridiculous to our arrival
+by coming to his hands with the postillion.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley!&rsquo; cried I reprovingly.<br>
+<br>
+Strictly it should have been Gammon; but in the hurry of the moment,
+my fault (I can only hope) passed unperceived.&nbsp; At the same time
+I caught the eye of the postmaster.&nbsp; He was long and lean, and
+brown and bilious; he had the drooping nose of the humourist, and the
+quick attention of a man of parts.&nbsp; He read my embarrassment in
+a glance, stepped instantly forward, sent the post-boy to the rightabout
+with half a word, and was back next moment at my side.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Dinner in a private room, sir?&nbsp; Very well.&nbsp; John, No.
+4!&nbsp; What wine would you care to mention?&nbsp; Very well, sir.&nbsp;
+Will you please to order fresh horses?&nbsp; Not, sir?&nbsp; Very well.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Each of these expressions was accompanied by something in the nature
+of a bow, and all were prefaced by something in the nature of a smile,
+which I could very well have done without.&nbsp; The man&rsquo;s politeness
+was from the teeth outwards; behind and within, I was conscious of a
+perpetual scrutiny: the scene at his doorstep, the random confidences
+of the post-boy, had not been thrown away on this observer; and it was
+under a strong fear of coming trouble that I was shown at last into
+my private room.&nbsp; I was in half a mind to have put off the whole
+business.&nbsp; But the truth is, now my name had got abroad, my fear
+of the mail that was coming, and the handbills it should contain, had
+waxed inordinately, and I felt I could never eat a meal in peace till
+I had severed my connection with the claret-coloured chaise.<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly, as soon as I had done with dinner, I sent my compliments
+to the landlord and requested he should take a glass of wine with me.&nbsp;
+He came; we exchanged the necessary civilities, and presently I approached
+my business.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;By the bye,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;we had a brush down the road
+to-day.&nbsp; I dare say you may have heard of it?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He nodded.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I was so unlucky as to get a pistol ball in the panel of
+my chaise,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;which makes it simply useless
+to me.&nbsp; Do you know any one likely to buy?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I can well understand that,&rsquo; said the landlord, &lsquo;I
+was looking at it just now; it&rsquo;s as good as ruined, is that chaise.&nbsp;
+General rule, people don&rsquo;t like chaises with bullet-holes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Too much <i>Romance of the Forest</i>?&rsquo; I suggested, recalling
+my little friend of the morning, and what I was sure had been her favourite
+reading - Mrs. Radcliffe&rsquo;s novels.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Just so,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;They may be right, they
+may be wrong; I&rsquo;m not the judge.&nbsp; But I suppose it&rsquo;s
+natural, after all, for respectable people to like things respectable
+about them; not bullet-holes, nor puddles of blood, nor men with aliases.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I took a glass of wine and held it up to the light to show that my hand
+was steady.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I suppose so.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have papers, of course, showing you are the proper owner?&rsquo;
+he inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;There is the bill, stamped and receipted,&rsquo; said I, tossing
+it across to him.<br>
+<br>
+He looked at it.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This all you have?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is enough, at least,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;It shows
+you where I bought and what I paid for it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t know,&rsquo; he said.&nbsp; &lsquo;You want
+some paper of identification.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To identify the chaise?&rsquo; I inquired.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not at all: to identify <i>you</i>,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My good sir, remember yourself!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+title-deeds of my estate are in that despatch-box; but you do not seriously
+suppose that I should allow you to examine them?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, you see, this paper proves that some Mr. Ramornie paid
+seventy guineas for a chaise,&rsquo; said the fellow.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s
+all well and good; but who&rsquo;s to prove to me that you are Mr. Ramornie?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Fellow!&rsquo; cried I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, fellow as much as you please!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Fellow,
+with all my heart!&nbsp; That changes nothing.&nbsp; I am fellow, of
+course - obtrusive fellow, impudent fellow, if you like - but who are
+you?&nbsp; I hear of you with two names; I hear of you running away
+with young ladies, and getting cheered for a Frenchman, which seems
+odd; and one thing I will go bail for, that you were in a blue fright
+when the post-boy began to tell tales at my door.&nbsp; In short, sir,
+you may be a very good gentleman; but I don&rsquo;t know enough about
+you, and I&rsquo;ll trouble you for your papers, or to go before a magistrate.&nbsp;
+Take your choice; if I&rsquo;m not fine enough, I hope the magistrates
+are.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My good man,&rsquo; I stammered, for though I had found my voice,
+I could scarce be said to have recovered my wits, &lsquo;this is most
+unusual, most rude.&nbsp; Is it the custom in Westmorland that gentlemen
+should be insulted?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That depends,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;When it&rsquo;s suspected
+that gentlemen are spies it <i>is</i> the custom; and a good custom,
+too.&nbsp; No no,&rsquo; he broke out, perceiving me to make a movement.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Both hands upon the table, my gentleman!&nbsp; I want no pistol
+balls in my chaise panels.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Surely, sir, you do me strange injustice!&rsquo; said I, now
+the master of myself.&nbsp; &lsquo;You see me sitting here, a monument
+of tranquillity: pray may I help myself to wine without umbraging you?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I took this attitude in sheer despair.&nbsp; I had no plan, no hope.&nbsp;
+The best I could imagine was to spin the business out some minutes longer,
+then capitulate.&nbsp; At least, I would not capituatle one moment too
+soon.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Am I to take that for <i>no</i>?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Referring to your former obliging proposal?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;My good sir, you are to take it, as you say, for &ldquo;No.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Certainly I will not show you my deeds; certainly I will not rise from
+table and trundle out to see your magistrates.&nbsp; I have too much
+respect for my digestion, and too little curiosity in justices of the
+peace.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He leaned forward, looked me nearly in the face, and reached out one
+hand to the bell-rope.&nbsp; &lsquo;See here, my fine fellow!&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Do you see that bell-rope?&nbsp; Let me tell you,
+there&rsquo;s a boy waiting below: one jingle, and he goes to fetch
+the constable.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you tell me so?&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, there&rsquo;s
+no accounting for tastes!&nbsp; I have a prejudice against the society
+of constables, but if it is your fancy to have one in for the dessert
+- &rsquo;&nbsp; I shrugged my shoulders lightly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Really,
+you know,&rsquo; I added, &lsquo;this is vastly entertaining.&nbsp;
+I assure you, I am looking on, with all the interest of a man of the
+world, at the development of your highly original character.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He continued to study my face without speech, his hand still on the
+button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the decisive heat.&nbsp;
+My face seemed to myself to dislimn under his gaze, my expression to
+change, the smile (with which I had began) to degenerate into the grin
+of the man upon the rack.&nbsp; I was besides harassed with doubts.&nbsp;
+An innocent man, I argued, would have resented the fellow&rsquo;s impudence
+an hour ago; and by my continued endurance of the ordeal, I was simply
+signing and sealing my confession; in short, I had reached the end of
+my powers.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Have you any objection to my putting my hands in my breeches
+pockets?&rsquo; I inquired.&nbsp; &lsquo;Excuse me mentioning it, but
+you showed yourself so extremely nervous a moment back.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+My voice was not all I could have wished, but it sufficed.&nbsp; I could
+hear it tremble, but the landlord apparently could not.&nbsp; He turned
+away and drew a long breath, and you may be sure I was quick to follow
+his example.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You&rsquo;re a cool hand at least, and that&rsquo;s the sort
+I like,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be you what you please, I&rsquo;ll
+deal square.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll take the chaise for a hundred pound down,
+and throw the dinner in.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon,&rsquo; I cried, wholly mystified by this form
+of words.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You pay me a hundred down,&rsquo; he repeated, &lsquo;and I&rsquo;ll
+take the chaise.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s very little more than it cost,&rsquo;
+he added, with a grin, &lsquo;and you know you must get it off your
+hands somehow.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this impudent
+proposal.&nbsp; It was broadly funny, and I suppose the least tempting
+offer in the world.&nbsp; For all that, it came very welcome, for it
+gave me the occasion to laugh.&nbsp; This I did with the most complete
+abandonment, till the tears ran down my cheeks; and ever and again,
+as the fit abated, I would get another view of the landlord&rsquo;s
+face, and go off into another paroxysm.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You droll creature, you will be the death of me yet!&rsquo; I
+cried, drying my eyes.<br>
+<br>
+My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to look, nor
+yet what to say; and began for the first time to conceive it possible
+he was mistaken.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, yes!&nbsp; I am quite an original,&rsquo; I replied, and laughed
+again.<br>
+<br>
+Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for the chaise;
+I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the offer: indeed, I was
+glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it was not in the desire of
+gain, but with the view at any price of securing a safe retreat.&nbsp;
+For although hostilities were suspended, he was yet far from satisfied;
+and I could read his continued suspicions in the cloudy eye that still
+hovered about my face.&nbsp; At last they took shape in words.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This is all very well,&rsquo; says he: &lsquo;you carry it off
+well; but for all that, I must do my duty.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I had my strong effect in reserve; it was to burn my ships with a vengeance!&nbsp;
+I rose.&nbsp; &lsquo;Leave the room,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;This
+is insuperable.&nbsp; Is the man mad?&rsquo;&nbsp; And then, as if already
+half-ashamed of my passion: &lsquo;I can take a joke as well as any
+one,&rsquo; I added; &lsquo;but this passes measure.&nbsp; Send my servant
+and the bill.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+When he had left me alone, I considered my own valour with amazement.&nbsp;
+I had insulted him; I had sent him away alone; now, if ever, he would
+take what was the only sensible resource, and fetch the constable.&nbsp;
+But there was something instinctively treacherous about the man which
+shrank from plain courses.&nbsp; And, with all his cleverness, he missed
+the occasion of fame.&nbsp; Rowley and I were suffered to walk out of
+his door, with all our baggage, on foot, with no destination named,
+except in the vague statement that we were come &lsquo;to view the lakes&rsquo;;
+and my friend only watched our departure with his chin in his hand,
+still moodily irresolute.<br>
+<br>
+I think this one of my great successes.&nbsp; I was exposed, unmasked,
+summoned to do a perfectly natural act, which must prove my doom and
+which I had not the slightest pretext for refusing.&nbsp; I kept my
+head, stuck to my guns, and, against all likelihood, here I was once
+more at liberty and in the king&rsquo;s highway.&nbsp; This was a strong
+lesson never to despair; and, at the same time, how many hints to be
+cautious! and what a perplexed and dubious business the whole question
+of my escape now appeared!&nbsp; That I should have risked perishing
+upon a trumpery question of a <i>pourboire</i>, depicted in lively colours
+the perils that perpetually surrounded us.&nbsp; Though, to be sure,
+the initial mistake had been committed before that; and if I had not
+suffered myself to be drawn a little deep in confidences to the innocent
+Dolly, there need have been no tumble at the inn of Kirkby-Lonsdale.&nbsp;
+I took the lesson to heart, and promised myself in the future to be
+more reserved.&nbsp; It was none of my business to attend to broken
+chaises or shipwrecked travellers.&nbsp; I had my hands full of my own
+affairs; and my best defence would be a little more natural selfishness
+and a trifle less imbecile good-nature.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXV - I MEET A CHEERFUL EXTRAVAGANT<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I pass over the next fifty or sixty leagues of our journey without comment.&nbsp;
+The reader must be growing weary of scenes of travel; and for my own
+part I have no cause to recall these particular miles with any pleasure.&nbsp;
+We were mainly occupied with attempts to obliterate our trail, which
+(as the result showed) were far from successful; for, on my cousin following,
+he was able to run me home with the least possible loss of time, following
+the claret-coloured chaise to Kirkby-Lonsdale, where I think the landlord
+must have wept to learn what he had missed, and tracing us thereafter
+to the doors of the coach-office in Edinburgh without a single check.&nbsp;
+Fortune did not favour me, and why should I recapitulate the details
+of futile precautions which deceived nobody, and wearisome arts which
+proved to be artless?<br>
+<br>
+The day was drawing to an end when Mr. Rowley and I bowled into Edinburgh
+to the stirring sound of the guard&rsquo;s bugle and the clattering
+team.&nbsp; I was here upon my field of battle; on the scene of my former
+captivity, escape and exploits; and in the same city with my love.&nbsp;
+My heart expanded; I have rarely felt more of a hero.&nbsp; All down
+the Bridges I sat by the driver with my arms folded and my face set,
+unflinchingly meeting every eye, and prepared every moment for a cry
+of recognition.&nbsp; Hundreds of the population were in the habit of
+visiting the Castle, where it was my practice (before the days of Flora)
+to make myself conspicuous among the prisoners; and I think it an extraordinary
+thing that I should have encountered so few to recognise me.&nbsp; But
+doubtless a clean chin is a disguise in itself; and the change is great
+from a suit of sulphur-yellow to fine linen, a well-fitting mouse-coloured
+great-coat furred in black, a pair of tight trousers of fashionable
+cut, and a hat of inimitable curl.&nbsp; After all, it was more likely
+that I should have recognised our visitors, than that they should have
+identified the modish gentleman with the miserable prisoner in the Castle.<br>
+<br>
+I was glad to set foot on the flagstones, and to escape from the crowd
+that had assembled to receive the mail.&nbsp; Here we were, with but
+little daylight before us, and that on Saturday afternoon, the eve of
+the famous Scottish Sabbath, adrift in the New Town of Edinburgh, and
+overladen with baggage.&nbsp; We carried it ourselves.&nbsp; I would
+not take a cab, nor so much as hire a porter, who might afterwards serve
+as a link between my lodgings and the mail, and connect me again with
+the claret-coloured chaise and Aylesbury.&nbsp; For I was resolved to
+break the chain of evidence for good, and to begin life afresh (so far
+as regards caution) with a new character.&nbsp; The first step was to
+find lodgings, and to find them quickly.&nbsp; This was the more needful
+as Mr. Rowley and I, in our smart clothes and with our cumbrous burthen,
+made a noticeable appearance in the streets at that time of the day
+and in that quarter of the town, which was largely given up to fine
+folk, bucks and dandies and young ladies, or respectable professional
+men on their way home to dinner.<br>
+<br>
+On the north side of St. James&rsquo; Square I was so happy as to spy
+a bill in a third-floor window.&nbsp; I was equally indifferent to cost
+and convenience in my choice of a lodging - &lsquo;any port in a storm&rsquo;
+was the principle on which I was prepared to act; and Rowley and I made
+at once for the common entrance and sealed the stair.<br>
+<br>
+We were admitted by a very sour-looking female in bombazine.&nbsp; I
+gathered she had all her life been depressed by a series of bereavements,
+the last of which might very well have befallen her the day before;
+and I instinctively lowered my voice when I addressed her.&nbsp; She
+admitted she had rooms to let - even showed them to us - a sitting-room
+and bedroom in a <i>suite</i>, commanding a fine prospect to the Firth
+and Fifeshire, and in themselves well proportioned and comfortably furnished,
+with pictures on the wall, shells on the mantelpiece, and several books
+upon the table which I found afterwards to be all of a devotional character,
+and all presentation copies, &lsquo;to my Christian friend,&rsquo; or
+&lsquo;to my devout acquaintance in the Lord, Bethiah McRankine.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Beyond this my &lsquo;Christian friend&rsquo; could not be made to advance:
+no, not even to do that which seemed the most natural and pleasing thing
+in the world - I mean to name her price - but stood before us shaking
+her head, and at times mourning like the dove, the picture of depression
+and defence.&nbsp; She had a voice the most querulous I have ever heard,
+and with this she produced a whole regiment of difficulties and criticisms.<br>
+<br>
+She could not promise an attendance.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, madam,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and what is my servant for?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Him?&rsquo; she asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Be gude to us!&nbsp; Is <i>he</i>
+your servant?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sorry, ma&rsquo;am, he meets with your disapproval.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Na, I never said that.&nbsp; But he&rsquo;s young.&nbsp; He&rsquo;ll
+be a great breaker, I&rsquo;m thinkin&rsquo;.&nbsp; Ay! he&rsquo;ll
+be a great responsibeelity to ye, like.&nbsp; Does he attend to his
+releegion?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, m&rsquo;m,&rsquo; returned Rowley, with admirable promptitude,
+and, immediately closing his eyes, as if from habit, repeated the following
+distich with more celerity than fervour:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Matthew, Mark, Luke and John<br>
+Bless the bed that I lie on!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Nhm!&rsquo; said the lady, and maintained an awful silence.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;it seems we are never
+to hear the beginning of your terms, let alone the end of them.&nbsp;
+Come - a good movement! and let us be either off or on.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She opened her lips slowly.&nbsp; &lsquo;Ony raferences?&rsquo; she
+inquired, in a voice like a bell.<br>
+<br>
+I opened my pocket-book and showed her a handful of bank bills.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I think, madam, that these are unexceptionable,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ye&rsquo;ll be wantin&rsquo; breakfast late?&rsquo; was her reply.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madam, we want breakfast at whatever hour it suits you to give
+it, from four in the morning till four in the afternoon!&rsquo; I cried.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Only tell us your figure, if your mouth be large enough to let
+it out!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I couldnae give ye supper the nicht,&rsquo; came the echo.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;We shall go out to supper, you incorrigible female!&rsquo; I
+vowed, between laughter and tears.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here - this is going
+to end!&nbsp; I want you for a landlady - let me tell you that! - and
+I am going to have my way.&nbsp; You won&rsquo;t tell me what you charge?&nbsp;
+Very well; I will do without!&nbsp; I can trust you!&nbsp; You don&rsquo;t
+seem to know when you have a good lodger; but I know perfectly when
+I have an honest landlady!&nbsp; Rowley, unstrap the valises!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Will it be credited?&nbsp; The monomaniac fell to rating me for my indiscretion!&nbsp;
+But the battle was over; these were her last guns, and more in the nature
+of a salute than of renewed hostilities.&nbsp; And presently she condescended
+on very moderate terms, and Rowley and I were able to escape in quest
+of supper.&nbsp; Much time had, however, been lost; the sun was long
+down, the lamps glimmered along the streets, and the voice of a watchman
+already resounded in the neighbouring Leith Road.&nbsp; On our first
+arrival I had observed a place of entertainment not far off, in a street
+behind the Register House.&nbsp; Thither we found our way, and sat down
+to a late dinner alone.&nbsp; But we had scarce given our orders before
+the door opened, and a tall young fellow entered with something of a
+lurch, looked about him, and approached the same table.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Give you good evening, most grave and reverend seniors!&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Will you permit a wanderer, a pilgrim - the pilgrim
+of love, in short - to come to temporary anchor under your lee?&nbsp;
+I care not who knows it, but I have a passionate aversion from the bestial
+practice of solitary feeding!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are welcome, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;if I may take upon
+me so far to play the host in a public place.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He looked startled, and fixed a hazy eye on me, as he sat down.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;you are a man not without some tincture
+of letters, I perceive!&nbsp; What shall we drink, sir?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I mentioned I had already called for a pot of porter.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A modest pot - the seasonable quencher?&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Well, I do not know but what I could look at a modest pot myself!&nbsp;
+I am, for the moment, in precarious health.&nbsp; Much study hath heated
+my brain, much walking wearied my - well, it seems to be more my eyes!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have walked far, I dare say?&rsquo; I suggested.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not so much far as often,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;There
+is in this city - to which, I think, you are a stranger?&nbsp; Sir,
+to your very good health and our better acquaintance! - there is, in
+this city of Dunedin, a certain implication of streets which reflects
+the utmost credit on the designer and the publicans - at every hundred
+yards is seated the Judicious Tavern, so that persons of contemplative
+mind are secure, at moderate distances, of refreshment.&nbsp; I have
+been doing a trot in that favoured quarter, favoured by art and nature.&nbsp;
+A few chosen comrades - enemies of publicity and friends to wit and
+wine - obliged me with their society.&nbsp; &ldquo;Along the cool, sequestered
+vale of Register Street we kept the uneven tenor of our way,&rdquo;
+sir.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It struck me, as you came in - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, don&rsquo;t make any bones about it!&rsquo; he interrupted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Of course it struck you! and let me tell you I was devilish lucky
+not to strike myself.&nbsp; When I entered this apartment I shone &ldquo;with
+all the pomp and prodigality of brandy and water,&rdquo; as the poet
+Gray has in another place expressed it.&nbsp; Powerful bard, Gray! but
+a niminy-piminy creature, afraid of a petticoat and a bottle - not a
+man, sir, not a man!&nbsp; Excuse me for being so troublesome, but what
+the devil have I done with my fork?&nbsp; Thank you, I am sure.&nbsp;
+<i>Temulentia, quoad me ipsum, brevis colligo est</i>.&nbsp; I sit and
+eat, sir, in a London fog.&nbsp; I should bring a link-boy to table
+with me; and I would too, if the little brutes were only washed!&nbsp;
+I intend to found a Philanthropical Society for Washing the Deserving
+Poor and Shaving Soldiers.&nbsp; I am pleased to observe that, although
+not of an unmilitary bearing, you are apparently shaved.&nbsp; In my
+calendar of the virtues shaving comes next to drinking.&nbsp; A gentleman
+may be a low-minded ruffian without sixpence, but he will always be
+close shaved.&nbsp; See me, with the eye of fancy, in the chill hours
+of the morning, say about a quarter to twelve, noon - see me awake!&nbsp;
+First thing of all, without one thought of the plausible but unsatisfactory
+small beer, or the healthful though insipid soda-water, I take the deadly
+razor in my vacillating grasp; I proceed to skate upon the margin of
+eternity.&nbsp; Stimulating thought!&nbsp; I bleed, perhaps, but with
+medicable wounds.&nbsp; The stubble reaped, I pass out of my chamber,
+calm but triumphant.&nbsp; To employ a hackneyed phrase, I would not
+call Lord Wellington my uncle!&nbsp; I, too, have dared, perhaps bled,
+before the imminent deadly shaving-table.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In this manner the bombastic fellow continued to entertain me all through
+dinner, and by a common error of drunkards, because he had been extremely
+talkative himself, leaped to the conclusion that he had chanced on very
+genial company.&nbsp; He told me his name, his address; he begged we
+should meet again; finally he proposed that I should dine with him in
+the country at an early date.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The dinner is official,&rsquo; he explained.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+office-bearers and Senatus of the University of Cramond - an educational
+institution in which I have the honour to be Professor of Nonsense -
+meet to do honour to our friend Icarus, at the old-established <i>howff</i>,
+Cramond Bridge.&nbsp; One place is vacant, fascinating stranger, - I
+offer it to you!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And who is your friend Icarus?&rsquo; I asked,<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The aspiring son of Daedalus!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Is
+it possible that you have never heard the name of Byfield?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Possible and true,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And is fame so small a thing?&rsquo; cried he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Byfield,
+sir, is an aeronaut.&nbsp; He apes the fame of a Lunardi, and is on
+the point of offering to the inhabitants - I beg your pardon, to the
+nobility and gentry of our neighbourhood - the spectacle of an ascension.&nbsp;
+As one of the gentry concerned I may be permitted to remark that I am
+unmoved.&nbsp; I care not a Tinker&rsquo;s Damn for his ascension.&nbsp;
+No more - I breathe it in your ear - does anybody else.&nbsp; The business
+is stale, sir, stale.&nbsp; Lunardi did it, and overdid it.&nbsp; A
+whimsical, fiddling, vain fellow, by all accounts - for I was at that
+time rocking in my cradle.&nbsp; But once was enough.&nbsp; If Lunardi
+went up and came down, there was the matter settled.&nbsp; We prefer
+to grant the point.&nbsp; We do not want to see the experiment repeated
+<i>ad nauseam</i> by Byfield, and Brown, and Butler, and Brodie, and
+Bottomley.&nbsp; Ah! if they would go up and <i>not</i> come down again!&nbsp;
+But this is by the question.&nbsp; The University of Cramond delights
+to honour merit in the man, sir, rather than utility in the profession;
+and Byfield, though an ignorant dog, is a sound reliable drinker, and
+really not amiss over his cups.&nbsp; Under the radiance of the kindly
+jar partiality might even credit him with wit.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It will be seen afterwards that this was more my business than I thought
+it at the time.&nbsp; Indeed, I was impatient to be gone.&nbsp; Even
+as my friend maundered ahead a squall burst, the jaws of the rain were
+opened against the coffee-house windows, and at that inclement signal
+I remembered I was due elsewhere.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVI - THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence of the
+squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting words.&nbsp; All the
+way along Princes Street (whither my way led) the wind hunted me behind
+and screamed in my ears.&nbsp; The city was flushed with bucketfuls
+of rain that tasted salt from the neighbouring ocean.&nbsp; It seemed
+to darken and lighten again in the vicissitudes of the gusts.&nbsp;
+Now you would say the lamps had been blown out from end to end of the
+long thoroughfare; now, in a lull, they would revive, re-multiply, shine
+again on the wet pavements, and make darkness sparingly visible.<br>
+<br>
+By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there was a
+distinct improvement.&nbsp; For one thing, I had now my shoulder to
+the wind; for a second, I came in the lee of my old prison-house, the
+Castle; and, at any rate, the excessive fury of the blast was itself
+moderating.&nbsp; The thought of what errand I was on re-awoke within
+me, and I seemed to breast the rough weather with increasing ease.&nbsp;
+With such a destination, what mattered a little buffeting of wind or
+a sprinkle of cold water?&nbsp; I recalled Flora&rsquo;s image, I took
+her in fancy to my arms, and my heart throbbed.&nbsp; And the next moment
+I had recognised the inanity of that fool&rsquo;s paradise.&nbsp; If
+I could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might count myself lucky.<br>
+<br>
+I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and now deep
+in mire.&nbsp; So soon as I was clear of the last street lamp, darkness
+received me - a darkness only pointed by the lights of occasional rustic
+farms, where the dogs howled with uplifted heads as I went by.&nbsp;
+The wind continued to decline: it had been but a squall, not a tempest.&nbsp;
+The rain, on the other hand, settled into a steady deluge, which had
+soon drenched me thoroughly.&nbsp; I continued to tramp forward in the
+night, contending with gloomy thoughts and accompanied by the dismal
+ululation of the dogs.&nbsp; What ailed them that they should have been
+thus wakeful, and perceived the small sound of my steps amid the general
+reverberation of the rain, was more than I could fancy.&nbsp; I remembered
+tales with which I had been entertained in childhood.&nbsp; I told myself
+some murderer was going by, and the brutes perceived upon him the faint
+smell of blood; and the next moment, with a physical shock, I had applied
+the words to my own case!<br>
+<br>
+Here was a dismal disposition for a lover.&nbsp; &lsquo;Was ever lady
+in this humour wooed?&rsquo; I asked myself, and came near turning back.&nbsp;
+It is never wise to risk a critical interview when your spirits are
+depressed, your clothes muddy, and your hands wet!&nbsp; But the boisterous
+night was in itself favourable to my enterprise: now, or perhaps never,
+I might find some way to have an interview with Flora; and if I had
+one interview (wet clothes, low spirits and all), I told myself there
+would certainly be another.<br>
+<br>
+Arrived in the cottage-garden I found the circumstances mighty inclement.&nbsp;
+From the round holes in the shutters of the parlour, shafts of candle-light
+streamed forth; elsewhere the darkness was complete.&nbsp; The trees,
+the thickets, were saturated; the lower parts of the garden turned into
+a morass.&nbsp; At intervals, when the wind broke forth again, there
+passed overhead a wild coil of clashing branches; and between whiles
+the whole enclosure continuously and stridently resounded with the rain.&nbsp;
+I advanced close to the window and contrived to read the face of my
+watch.&nbsp; It was half-past seven; they would not retire before ten,
+they might not before midnight, and the prospect was unpleasant.&nbsp;
+In a lull of the wind I could hear from the inside the voice of Flora
+reading aloud; the words of course inaudible - only a flow of undecipherable
+speech, quiet, cordial, colourless, more intimate and winning, more
+eloquent of her personality, but not less beautiful than song.&nbsp;
+And the next moment the clamour of a fresh squall broke out about the
+cottage; the voice was drowned in its bellowing, and I was glad to retreat
+from my dangerous post.<br>
+<br>
+For three egregious hours I must now suffer the elements to do their
+worst upon me, and continue to hold my ground in patience.&nbsp; I recalled
+the least fortunate of my services in the field: being out-sentry of
+the pickets in weather no less vile, sometimes unsuppered and with nothing
+to look forward to by way of breakfast but musket-balls; and they seemed
+light in comparison.&nbsp; So strangely are we built: so much more strong
+is the love of woman than the mere love of life.<br>
+<br>
+At last my patience was rewarded.&nbsp; The light disappeared from the
+parlour and reappeared a moment after in the room above.&nbsp; I was
+pretty well informed for the enterprise that lay before me.&nbsp; I
+knew the lair of the dragon - that which was just illuminated.&nbsp;
+I knew the bower of my Rosamond, and how excellently it was placed on
+the ground-level, round the flank of the cottage and out of earshot
+of her formidable aunt.&nbsp; Nothing was left but to apply my knowledge.&nbsp;
+I was then at the bottom of the garden, whether I had gone (Heaven save
+the mark!) for warmth, that I might walk to and fro unheard and keep
+myself from perishing.&nbsp; The night had fallen still, the wind ceased;
+the noise of the rain had much lightened, if it had not stopped, and
+was succeeded by the dripping of the garden trees.&nbsp; In the midst
+of this lull, and as I was already drawing near to the cottage, I was
+startled by the sound of a window-sash screaming in its channels; and
+a step or two beyond I became aware of a gush of light upon the darkness.&nbsp;
+It fell from Flora&rsquo;s window, which she had flung open on the night,
+and where she now sat, roseate and pensive, in the shine of two candles
+falling from behind, her tresses deeply embowering and shading her;
+the suspended comb still in one hand, the other idly clinging to the
+iron stanchions with which the window was barred.<br>
+<br>
+Keeping to the turf, and favoured by the darkness of the night and the
+patter of the rain which was now returning, though without wind, I approached
+until I could almost have touched her.&nbsp; It seemed a grossness of
+which I was incapable to break up her reverie by speech.&nbsp; I stood
+and drank her in with my eyes; how the light made a glory in her hair,
+and (what I have always thought the most ravishing thing in nature)
+how the planes ran into each other, and were distinguished, and how
+the hues blended and varied, and were shaded off, between the cheek
+and neck.&nbsp; At first I was abashed: she wore her beauty like an
+immediate halo of refinement; she discouraged me like an angel, or what
+I suspect to be the next most discouraging, a modern lady.&nbsp; But
+as I continued to gaze, hope and life returned to me; I forgot my timidity,
+I forgot the sickening pack of wet clothes with which I stood burdened,
+I tingled with new blood.<br>
+<br>
+Still unconscious of my presence, still gazing before her upon the illuminated
+image of the window, the straight shadows of the bars, the glinting
+of pebbles on the path, and the impenetrable night on the garden and
+the hills beyond it, she heaved a deep breath that struck upon my heart
+like an appeal.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why does Miss Gilchrist sigh?&rsquo; I whispered.&nbsp; &lsquo;Does
+she recall absent friends?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She turned her head swiftly in my direction; it was the only sign of
+surprise she deigned to make.&nbsp; At the same time I stepped into
+the light and bowed profoundly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You!&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, I am here,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have come very
+far, it may be a hundred and fifty leagues, to see you.&nbsp; I have
+waited all this night in your garden.&nbsp; Will Miss Gilchrist not
+offer her hand - to a friend in trouble?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She extended it between the bars, and I dropped upon one knee on the
+wet path and kissed it twice.&nbsp; At the second it was withdrawn suddenly,
+methought with more of a start than she had hitherto displayed.&nbsp;
+I regained my former attitude, and we were both silent awhile.&nbsp;
+My timidity returned on me tenfold.&nbsp; I looked in her face for any
+signals of anger, and seeing her eyes to waver and fall aside from mine,
+augured that all was well.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You must have been mad to come here!&rsquo; she broke out.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Of all places under heaven this is no place for you to come.&nbsp;
+And I was just thinking you were safe in France!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You were thinking of me!&rsquo; I cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. St. Ives, you cannot understand your danger,&rsquo; she replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I am sure of it, and yet I cannot find it in my heart to tell
+you.&nbsp; O, be persuaded, and go!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I believe I know the worst.&nbsp; But I was never one to set
+an undue value on life, the life that we share with beasts.&nbsp; My
+university has been in the wars, not a famous place of education, but
+one where a man learns to carry his life in his hand as lightly as a
+glove, and for his lady or his honour to lay it as lightly down.&nbsp;
+You appeal to my fears, and you do wrong.&nbsp; I have come to Scotland
+with my eyes quite open to see you and to speak with you - it may be
+for the last time.&nbsp; With my eyes quite open, I say; and if I did
+not hesitate at the beginning do you think that I would draw back now?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You do not know!&rsquo; she cried, with rising agitation.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;This country, even this garden, is death to you.&nbsp; They all
+believe it; I am the only one that does not.&nbsp; If they hear you
+now, if they heard a whisper - I dread to think of it.&nbsp; O, go,
+go this instant.&nbsp; It is my prayer.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Dear lady, do not refuse me what I have come so far to seek;
+and remember that out of all the millions in England there is no other
+but yourself in whom I can dare confide.&nbsp; I have all the world
+against me; you are my only ally; and as I have to speak, you have to
+listen.&nbsp; All is true that they say of me, and all of it false at
+the same time.&nbsp; I did kill this man Goguelat - it was that you
+meant?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She mutely signed to me that it was; she had become deadly pale.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But I killed him in fair fight.&nbsp; Till then, I had never
+taken a life unless in battle, which is my trade.&nbsp; But I was grateful,
+I was on fire with gratitude, to one who had been good to me, who had
+been better to me than I could have dreamed of an angel, who had come
+into the darkness of my prison like sunrise.&nbsp; The man Goguelat
+insulted her.&nbsp; O, he had insulted me often, it was his favourite
+pastime, and he might insult me as he pleased - for who was I?&nbsp;
+But with that lady it was different.&nbsp; I could never forgive myself
+if I had let it pass.&nbsp; And we fought, and he fell, and I have no
+remorse.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I waited anxiously for some reply.&nbsp; The worst was now out, and
+I knew that she had heard of it before; but it was impossible for me
+to go on with my narrative without some shadow of encouragement.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You blame me?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, not at all.&nbsp; It is a point I cannot speak on - I am
+only a girl.&nbsp; I am sure you were in the right: I have always said
+so - to Ronald.&nbsp; Not, of course, to my aunt.&nbsp; I am afraid
+I let her speak as she will.&nbsp; You must not think me a disloyal
+friend; and even with the Major - I did not tell you he had become quite
+a friend of ours - Major Chevenix, I mean - he has taken such a fancy
+to Ronald!&nbsp; It was he that brought the news to us of that hateful
+Clausel being captured, and all that he was saying.&nbsp; I was indignant
+with him.&nbsp; I said - I dare say I said too much - and I must say
+he was very good-natured.&nbsp; He said, &ldquo;You and I, who are his
+friends, <i>know</i> that Champdivers is innocent.&nbsp; But what is
+the use of saying it?&rdquo;&nbsp; All this was in the corner of the
+room in what they call an aside.&nbsp; And then he said, &ldquo;Give
+me a chance to speak to you in private, I have much to tell you.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+And he did.&nbsp; And told me just what you did - that it was an affair
+of honour, and no blame attached to you.&nbsp; O, I must say I like
+that Major Chevenix!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+At this I was seized with a great pang of jealousy.&nbsp; I remembered
+the first time that he had seen her, the interest that he seemed immediately
+to conceive; and I could not but admire the dog for the use he had been
+ingenious enough to make of our acquaintance in order to supplant me.&nbsp;
+All is fair in love and war.&nbsp; For all that, I was now no less anxious
+to do the speaking myself than I had been before to hear Flora.&nbsp;
+At least, I could keep clear of the hateful image of Major Chevenix.&nbsp;
+Accordingly I burst at once on the narrative of my adventures.&nbsp;
+It was the same as you have read, but briefer, and told with a very
+different purpose.&nbsp; Now every incident had a particular bearing,
+every by-way branched off to Rome - and that was Flora.<br>
+<br>
+When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel withoutside
+the low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and lowered my voice to
+the most confidential whisper.&nbsp; Flora herself must kneel upon the
+other side, and this brought our heads upon a level with only the bars
+between us.&nbsp; So placed, so separated, it seemed that our proximity,
+and the continuous and low sounds of my pleading voice, worked progressively
+and powerfully on her heart, and perhaps not less so on my own.&nbsp;
+For these spells are double-edged.&nbsp; The silly birds may be charmed
+with the pipe of the fowler, which is but a tube of reeds.&nbsp; Not
+so with a bird of our own feather!&nbsp; As I went on, and my resolve
+strengthened, and my voice found new modulations, and our faces were
+drawn closer to the bars and to each other, not only she, but I, succumbed
+to the fascination, and were kindled by the charm.&nbsp; We make love,
+and thereby ourselves fall the deeper in it.&nbsp; It is with the heart
+only that one captures a heart.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And now,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I will tell you what you
+can still do for me.&nbsp; I run a little risk just now, and you see
+for yourself how unavoidable it is for any man of honour.&nbsp; But
+if - but in case of the worst I do not choose to enrich either my enemies
+or the Prince Regent.&nbsp; I have here the bulk of what my uncle gave
+me.&nbsp; Eight thousand odd pounds.&nbsp; Will you take care of it
+for me?&nbsp; Do not think of it merely as money; take and keep it as
+a relic of your friend or some precious piece of him.&nbsp; I may have
+bitter need of it ere long.&nbsp; Do you know the old country story
+of the giant who gave his heart to his wife to keep for him, thinking
+it safer to repose on her loyalty than his own strength?&nbsp; Flora,
+I am the giant - a very little one: will you be the keeper of my life?&nbsp;
+It is my heart I offer you in this symbol.&nbsp; In the sight of God,
+if you will have it, I give you my name, I endow you with my money.&nbsp;
+If the worst come, if I may never hope to call you wife, let me at least
+think that you will use my uncle&rsquo;s legacy as my widow.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, not that,&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Never that.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What then?&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;What else, my angel?&nbsp;
+What are words to me?&nbsp; There is but one name that I care to know
+you by.&nbsp; Flora, my love!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Anne!&rsquo; she said.<br>
+<br>
+What sound is so full of music as one&rsquo;s own name uttered for the
+first time in the voice of her we love!<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My darling!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+The jealous bars, set at the top and bottom in stone and lime, obstructed
+the rapture of the moment; but I took her to myself as wholly as they
+allowed.&nbsp; She did not shun my lips.&nbsp; My arms were wound round
+her body, which yielded itself generously to my embrace.&nbsp; As we
+so remained, entwined and yet severed, bruising our faces unconsciously
+on the cold bars, the irony of the universe - or as I prefer to say,
+envy of some of the gods - again stirred up the elements of that stormy
+night.&nbsp; The wind blew again in the tree-tops; a volley of cold
+sea-rain deluged the garden, and, as the deuce would have it, a gutter
+which had been hitherto choked up began suddenly to play upon my head
+and shoulders with the vivacity of a fountain.&nbsp; We parted with
+a shock; I sprang to my feet, and she to hers, as though we had been
+discovered.&nbsp; A moment after, but now both standing, we had again
+approached the window on either side.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Flora,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;this is but a poor offer I can make
+you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She took my hand in hers and clasped it to her bosom.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rich enough for a queen!&rsquo; she said, with a lift in her
+breathing that was more eloquent than words.&nbsp; &lsquo;Anne, my brave
+Anne!&nbsp; I would be glad to be your maidservant; I could envy that
+boy Rowley.&nbsp; But, no!&rsquo; she broke off, &lsquo;I envy no one
+- I need not - I am yours.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mine,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;for ever!&nbsp; By this and this,
+mine!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;All of me,&rsquo; she repeated.&nbsp; &lsquo;Altogether and forever!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And if the god were envious, he must have seen with mortification how
+little he could do to mar the happiness of mortals.&nbsp; I stood in
+a mere waterspout; she herself was wet, not from my embrace only, but
+from the splashing of the storm.&nbsp; The candles had guttered out;
+we were in darkness.&nbsp; I could scarce see anything but the shining
+of her eyes in the dark room.&nbsp; To her I must have appeared as a
+silhouette, haloed by rain and the spouting of the ancient Gothic gutter
+above my head.<br>
+<br>
+Presently we became more calm and confidential; and when that squall,
+which proved to be the last of the storm, had blown by, fell into a
+talk of ways and means.&nbsp; It seemed she knew Mr. Robbie, to whom
+I had been so slenderly accredited by Romaine - was even invited to
+his house for the evening of Monday, and gave me a sketch of the old
+gentleman&rsquo;s character which implied a great deal of penetration
+in herself, and proved of great use to me in the immediate sequel.&nbsp;
+It seemed he was an enthusiastic antiquary, and in particular a fanatic
+of heraldry.&nbsp; I heard it with delight, for I was myself, thanks
+to M. de Culemberg, fairly grounded in that science, and acquainted
+with the blazons of most families of note in Europe.&nbsp; And I had
+made up my mind - even as she spoke, it was my fixed determination,
+though I was a hundred miles from saying it - to meet Flora on Monday
+night as a fellow-guest in Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s house.<br>
+<br>
+I gave her my money - it was, of course, only paper I had brought.&nbsp;
+I gave it her, to be her marriage-portion, I declared.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not so bad a marriage-portion for a private soldier,&rsquo; I
+told her, laughing, as I passed it through the bars.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, Anne, and where am I to keep it?&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;If
+my aunt should find it!&nbsp; What would I say!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Next your heart,&rsquo; I suggested.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then you will always be near your treasure,&rsquo; she cried,
+&lsquo;for you are always there!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+We were interrupted by a sudden clearness that fell upon the night.&nbsp;
+The clouds dispersed; the stars shone in every part of the heavens;
+and, consulting my watch, I was startled to find it already hard on
+five in the morning.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVII - THE SABBATH DAY<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+It was indeed high time I should be gone from Swanston; but what I was
+to do in the meanwhile was another question.&nbsp; Rowley had received
+his orders last night: he was to say that I had met a friend, and Mrs.
+McRankine was not to expect me before morning.&nbsp; A good enough tale
+in itself; but the dreadful pickle I was in made it out of the question.&nbsp;
+I could not go home till I had found harbourage, a fire to dry my clothes
+at, and a bed where I might lie till they were ready.<br>
+<br>
+Fortune favoured me again.&nbsp; I had scarce got to the top of the
+first hill when I spied a light on my left, about a furlong away.&nbsp;
+It might be a case of sickness; what else it was likely to be - in so
+rustic a neighbourhood, and at such an ungodly time of the morning -
+was beyond my fancy.&nbsp; A faint sound of singing became audible,
+and gradually swelled as I drew near, until at last I could make out
+the words, which were singularly appropriate both to the hour and to
+the condition of the singers.&nbsp; &lsquo;The cock may craw, the day
+may daw,&rsquo; they sang; and sang it with such laxity both in time
+and tune, and such sentimental complaisance in the expression, as assured
+me they had got far into the third bottle at least.<br>
+<br>
+I found a plain rustic cottage by the wayside, of the sort called double,
+with a signboard over the door; and, the lights within streaming forth
+and somewhat mitigating the darkness of the morning, I was enabled to
+decipher the inscription: &lsquo;The Hunters&rsquo; Tryst, by Alexander
+Hendry.&nbsp; Porter Ales, and British Spirits.&nbsp; Beds.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+My first knock put a period to the music, and a voice challenged tipsily
+from within.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Who goes there?&rsquo; it said; and I replied, &lsquo;A lawful
+traveller.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Immediately after, the door was unbarred by a company of the tallest
+lads my eyes had ever rested on, all astonishingly drunk and very decently
+dressed, and one (who was perhaps the drunkest of the lot) carrying
+a tallow candle, from which he impartially bedewed the clothes of the
+whole company.&nbsp; As soon as I saw them I could not help smiling
+to myself to remember the anxiety with which I had approached.&nbsp;
+They received me and my hastily-concocted story, that I had been walking
+from Peebles and had lost my way, with incoherent benignity; jostled
+me among them into the room where they had been sitting, a plain hedgerow
+alehouse parlour, with a roaring fire in the chimney and a prodigious
+number of empty bottles on the floor; and informed me that I was made,
+by this reception, a temporary member of the <i>Six-Feet-High Club</i>,
+an athletic society of young men in a good station, who made of the
+Hunters&rsquo; Tryst a frequent resort.&nbsp; They told me I had intruded
+on an &lsquo;all-night sitting,&rsquo; following upon an &lsquo;all-day
+Saturday tramp&rsquo; of forty miles; and that the members would all
+be up and &lsquo;as right as ninepence&rsquo; for the noonday service
+at some neighbouring church - Collingwood, if memory serves me right.&nbsp;
+At this I could have laughed, but the moment seemed ill-chosen.&nbsp;
+For, though six feet was their standard, they all exceeded that measurement
+considerably; and I tasted again some of the sensations of childhood,
+as I looked up to all these lads from a lower plane, and wondered what
+they would do next.&nbsp; But the Six-Footers, if they were very drunk,
+proved no less kind.&nbsp; The landlord and servants of the Hunters&rsquo;
+Tryst were in bed and asleep long ago.&nbsp; Whether by natural gift
+or acquired habit they could suffer pandemonium to reign all over the
+house, and yet lie ranked in the kitchen like Egyptian mummies, only
+that the sound of their snoring rose and fell ceaselessly like the drone
+of a bagpipe.&nbsp; Here the Six-Footers invaded them - in their citadel,
+so to speak; counted the bunks and the sleepers; proposed to put me
+in bed to one of the lasses, proposed to have one of the lasses out
+to make room for me, fell over chairs, and made noise enough to waken
+the dead: the whole illuminated by the same young torch-bearer, but
+now with two candles, and rapidly beginning to look like a man in a
+snowstorm.&nbsp; At last a bed was found for me, my clothes were hung
+out to dry before the parlour fire, and I was mercifully left to my
+repose.<br>
+<br>
+I awoke about nine with the sun shining in my eyes.&nbsp; The landlord
+came at my summons, brought me my clothes dried and decently brushed,
+and gave me the good news that the Six-Feet-High Club were all abed
+and sleeping off their excesses.&nbsp; Where they were bestowed was
+a puzzle to me until (as I was strolling about the garden patch waiting
+for breakfast) I came on a barn door, and, looking in, saw all the red
+face mixed in the straw like plums in a cake.&nbsp; Quoth the stalwart
+maid who brought me my porridge and bade me &rsquo;eat them while they
+were hot,&rsquo; &lsquo;Ay, they were a&rsquo; on the ran-dan last nicht!&nbsp;
+Hout! they&rsquo;re fine lads, and they&rsquo;ll be nane the waur of
+it.&nbsp; Forby Farbes&rsquo;s coat.&nbsp; I dinna see wha&rsquo;s to
+get the creish off that!&rsquo; she added, with a sigh; in which, identifying
+Forbes as the torch-bearer, I mentally joined.<br>
+<br>
+It was a brave morning when I took the road; the sun shone, spring seemed
+in the air, it smelt like April or May, and some over-venturous birds
+sang in the coppices as I went by.&nbsp; I had plenty to think of, plenty
+to be grateful for, that gallant morning; and yet I had a twitter at
+my heart.&nbsp; To enter the city by daylight might be compared to marching
+on a battery; every face that I confronted would threaten me like the
+muzzle of a gun; and it came into my head suddenly with how much better
+a countenance I should be able to do it if I could but improvise a companion.&nbsp;
+Hard by Merchiston I was so fortunate as to observe a bulky gentleman
+in broadcloth and gaiters, stooping with his head almost between his
+knees, before a stone wall.&nbsp; Seizing occasion by the forelock,
+I drew up as I came alongside and inquired what he had found to interest
+him.<br>
+<br>
+He turned upon me a countenance not much less broad than his back.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, sir,&rsquo; he replied, &lsquo;I was even marvelling at
+my own indefeasible stupeedity: that I should walk this way every week
+of my life, weather permitting, and should never before have <i>notticed</i>
+that stone,&rsquo; touching it at the same time with a goodly oak staff.<br>
+<br>
+I followed the indication.&nbsp; The stone, which had been built sideways
+into the wall, offered traces of heraldic sculpture.&nbsp; At once there
+came a wild idea into my mind: his appearance tallied with Flora&rsquo;s
+description of Mr. Robbie; a knowledge of heraldry would go far to clinch
+the proof; and what could be more desirable than to scrape an informal
+acquaintance with the man whom I must approach next day with my tale
+of the drovers, and whom I yet wished to please?&nbsp; I stooped in
+turn.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A chevron,&rsquo; I said; &lsquo;on a chief three mullets?&nbsp;
+Looks like Douglas, does it not?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, sir, it does; you are right,&rsquo; said he: &lsquo;it <i>does</i>
+look like Douglas; though, without the tinctures, and the whole thing
+being so battered and broken up, who shall venture an opinion?&nbsp;
+But allow me to be more personal, sir.&nbsp; In these degenerate days
+I am astonished you should display so much proficiency.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman, a friend
+of my family, and I may say my guardian,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;but I
+have forgotten it since.&nbsp; God forbid I should delude you into thinking
+me a herald, sir!&nbsp; I am only an ungrammatical amateur.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And a little modesty does no harm even in a herald,&rsquo; says
+my new acquaintance graciously.<br>
+<br>
+In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained very amicable
+discourse along what remained of the country road, past the suburbs,
+and on into the streets of the New Town, which was as deserted and silent
+as a city of the dead.&nbsp; The shops were closed, no vehicle ran,
+cats sported in the midst of the sunny causeway; and our steps and voices
+re-echoed from the quiet houses.&nbsp; It was the high-water, full and
+strange, of that weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is subjected:
+the apotheosis of the <i>Sawbath</i>; and I confess the spectacle wanted
+not grandeur, however much it may have lacked cheerfulness.&nbsp; There
+are few religious ceremonies more imposing.&nbsp; As we thus walked
+and talked in a public seclusion the bells broke out ringing through
+all the bounds of the city, and the streets began immediately to be
+thronged with decent church-goers.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ah!&rsquo; said my companion, &lsquo;there are the bells!&nbsp;
+Now, sir, as you are a stranger I must offer you the hospitality of
+my pew.&nbsp; I do not know whether you are at all used with our Scottish
+form; but in case you are not I will find your places for you; and Dr.
+Henry Gray, of St. Mary&rsquo;s (under whom I sit), is as good a preacher
+as we have to show you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+This put me in a quandary.&nbsp; It was a degree of risk I was scarce
+prepared for.&nbsp; Dozens of people, who might pass me by in the street
+with no more than a second look, would go on from the second to the
+third, and from that to a final recognition, if I were set before them,
+immobilised in a pew, during the whole time of service.&nbsp; An unlucky
+turn of the head would suffice to arrest their attention.&nbsp; &lsquo;Who
+is that?&rsquo; they would think: &lsquo;surely I should know him!&rsquo;
+and, a church being the place in all the world where one has least to
+think of, it was ten to one they would end by remembering me before
+the benediction.&nbsp; However, my mind was made up: I thanked my obliging
+friend, and placed myself at his disposal.<br>
+<br>
+Our way now led us into the north-east quarter of the town, among pleasant
+new faubourgs, to a decent new church of a good size, where I was soon
+seated by the side of my good Samaritan, and looked upon by a whole
+congregation of menacing faces.&nbsp; At first the possibility of danger
+kept me awake; but by the time I had assured myself there was none to
+be apprehended, and the service was not in the least likely to be enlivened
+by the arrest of a French spy, I had to resign myself to the task of
+listening to Dr. Henry Gray.<br>
+<br>
+As we moved out, after this ordeal was over, my friend was at once surrounded
+and claimed by his acquaintances of the congregation; and I was rejoiced
+to hear him addressed by the expected name of Robbie.<br>
+<br>
+So soon as we were clear of the crowd - &lsquo;Mr. Robbie?&rsquo; said
+I, bowing.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The very same, sir,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If I mistake not, a lawyer?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A writer to His Majesty&rsquo;s Signet, at your service.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It seems we were predestined to be acquaintances!&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I have here a card in my pocket intended for you.&nbsp; It is
+from my family lawyer.&nbsp; It was his last word, as I was leaving,
+to ask to be remembered kindly, and to trust you would pass over so
+informal an introduction.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And I offered him the card.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, ay, my old friend Daniel!&rsquo; says he, looking on the
+card.&nbsp; &lsquo;And how does my old friend Daniel?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I gave a favourable view of Mr. Romaine&rsquo;s health.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, this is certainly a whimsical incident,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;And since we are thus met already - and so much to my advantage!
+- the simplest thing will be to prosecute the acquaintance instantly.&nbsp;
+Let me propose a snack between sermons, a bottle of my particular green
+seal - and when nobody is looking we can talk blazons, Mr. Ducie!&rsquo;
+- which was the name I then used and had already incidentally mentioned,
+in the vain hope of provoking a return in kind.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon, sir: do I understand you to invite me to your
+house?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That was the idea I was trying to convey,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;We have the name of hospitable people up here, and I would like
+you to try mine.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Robbie, I shall hope to try it some day, but not yet,&rsquo;
+I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I hope you will not misunderstand me.&nbsp;
+My business, which brings me to your city, is of a peculiar kind.&nbsp;
+Till you shall have heard it, and, indeed, till its issue is known,
+I should feel as if I had stolen your invitation.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, well,&rsquo; said he, a little sobered, &lsquo;it must
+be as you wish, though you would hardly speak otherwise if you had committed
+homicide!&nbsp; Mine is the loss.&nbsp; I must eat alone; a very pernicious
+thing for a person of my habit of body, content myself with a pint of
+skinking claret, and meditate the discourse.&nbsp; But about this business
+of yours: if it is so particular as all that, it will doubtless admit
+of no delay.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I must confess, sir, it presses,&rsquo; I acknowledged.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then, let us say to-morrow at half-past eight in the morning,&rsquo;
+said he; &lsquo;and I hope, when your mind is at rest (and it does you
+much honour to take it as you do), that you will sit down with me to
+the postponed meal, not forgetting the bottle.&nbsp; You have my address?&rsquo;
+he added, and gave it me - which was the only thing I wanted.<br>
+<br>
+At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual civilities,
+and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of people returning
+from church, to my lodgings in St. James&rsquo; Square.<br>
+<br>
+Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my landlady in a
+dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in her wake: no less
+than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a smart pair of tops to
+his boots!&nbsp; When I said he was in the lady&rsquo;s wake I spoke
+but in metaphor.&nbsp; As a matter of fact he was squiring her, with
+the utmost dignity, on his arm; and I followed them up the stairs, smiling
+to myself.<br>
+<br>
+Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and Mrs. McRankine
+inquired where I had been.&nbsp; I told her boastfully, giving her the
+name of the church and the divine, and ignorantly supposing I should
+have gained caste.&nbsp; But she soon opened my eyes.&nbsp; In the roots
+of the Scottish character there are knots and contortions that not only
+no stranger can understand, but no stranger can follow; he walks among
+explosives; and his best course is to throw himself upon their mercy
+- &lsquo;Just as I am, without one plea,&rsquo; a citation from one
+of the lady&rsquo;s favourite hymns.<br>
+<br>
+The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was impossible
+to be written down; and I at once executed the manoeuvre I have recommended.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your city,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;If I have done wrong, it was in mere ignorance,
+my dear lady; and this afternoon, if you will be so good as to take
+me, I shall accompany <i>you</i>.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to her own
+quarters murmuring.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, Rowley,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;and have you been to church?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; he said.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I have,&rsquo;
+I returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;And how did you get on with the Scottish form?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, sir, it was pretty &rsquo;ard, the form was, and reether
+narrow,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t know w&rsquo;y
+it is, but it seems to me like as if things were a good bit changed
+since William Wallace!&nbsp; That was a main queer church she took me
+to, Mr. Anne!&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t know as I could have sat it out, if
+she &rsquo;adn&rsquo;t &rsquo;a&rsquo; give me peppermints.&nbsp; She
+ain&rsquo;t a bad one at bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit,
+and she do worry, but, law bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain&rsquo;t nothink
+really - she don&rsquo;t <i>mean</i> it.&nbsp; W&rsquo;y, she was down
+on me like a &rsquo;undredweight of bricks this morning.&nbsp; You see,
+last night she &rsquo;ad me in to supper, and, I beg your pardon, sir,
+but I took the freedom of playing her a chune or two.&nbsp; She didn&rsquo;t
+mind a bit; so this morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced
+in, and flew up, and carried on no end about Sunday!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You see, Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;they&rsquo;re all mad
+up here, and you have to humour them.&nbsp; See and don&rsquo;t quarrel
+with Mrs. McRankine; and, above all, don&rsquo;t argue with her, or
+you&rsquo;ll get the worst of it.&nbsp; Whatever she says, touch your
+forelock and say, &ldquo;If you please!&rdquo; or &ldquo;I beg pardon,
+ma&rsquo;am.&rdquo;&nbsp; And let me tell you one thing: I am sorry,
+but you have to go to church with her again this afternoon.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s
+duty, my boy!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs. McRankine
+presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang up with readiness
+and offered her my arm.&nbsp; Rowley followed behind.&nbsp; I was beginning
+to grow accustomed to the risks of my stay in Edinburgh, and it even
+amused me to confront a new churchful.&nbsp; I confess the amusement
+did not last until the end; for if Dr. Gray were long, Mr. McCraw was
+not only longer, but more incoherent, and the matter of his sermon (which
+was a direct attack, apparently, on all the Churches of the world, my
+own among the number), where it had not the tonic quality of personal
+insult, rather inclined me to slumber.&nbsp; But I braced myself for
+my life, kept up Rowley with the end of a pin, and came through it awake,
+but no more.<br>
+<br>
+Bethiah was quite conquered by this &lsquo;mark of grace,&rsquo; though,
+I am afraid, she was also moved by more worldly considerations.&nbsp;
+The first is, the lady had not the least objection to go to church on
+the arm of an elegantly dressed young gentleman, and be followed by
+a spruce servant with a cockade in his hat.&nbsp; I could see it by
+the way she took possession of us, found us the places in the Bible,
+whispered to me the name of the minister, passed us lozenges, which
+I (for my part) handed on to Rowley, and at each fresh attention stole
+a little glance about the church to make sure she was observed.&nbsp;
+Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me if I also remembered that
+I was a favourable-looking young man.&nbsp; When we grow elderly, how
+the room brightens, and begins to look as it ought to look, on the entrance
+of youth, grace, health, and comeliness!&nbsp; You do not want them
+for yourself, perhaps not even for your son, but you look on smiling;
+and when you recall their images - again, it is with a smile.&nbsp;
+I defy you to see or think of them and not smile with an infinite and
+intimate, but quite impersonal, pleasure.&nbsp; Well, either I know
+nothing of women, or that was the case with Bethiah McRankine.&nbsp;
+She had been to church with a cockade behind her, on the one hand; on
+the other, her house was brightened by the presence of a pair of good-looking
+young fellows of the other sex, who were always pleased and deferential
+in her society and accepted her views as final.<br>
+<br>
+These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from church
+- if church it could be called - I adopted a most insidious device to
+magnify her interest.&nbsp; I took her into the confidence, that is,
+of my love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young lady with whom
+my affections were engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is she bonny?&rsquo; she inquired.<br>
+<br>
+I gave her full assurances upon that.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To what denoamination does she beloang?&rsquo; came next, and
+was so unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Upon my word, ma&rsquo;am, I have never inquired,&rsquo; cried
+I; &lsquo;I only know that she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is
+enough.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay!&rsquo; she sighed, &lsquo;if she has the root of the maitter!&nbsp;
+There&rsquo;s a remnant practically in most of the denoaminations.&nbsp;
+There&rsquo;s some in the McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites,
+and mony in the McMillanites, and there&rsquo;s a leeven even in the
+Estayblishment.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,&rsquo;
+said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel&rsquo;!&rsquo; she cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, my dear madam!&nbsp; I only - &rsquo; I began.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,&rsquo; she interrupted.<br>
+<br>
+On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our idyll
+with avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of cream;
+and, strange to say - and so expansive a passion is that of love! -
+that I derived a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding in that breast
+of iron.&nbsp; It made an immediate bond: from that hour we seemed to
+be welded into a family-party; and I had little difficulty in persuading
+her to join us and to preside over our tea-table.&nbsp; Surely there
+was never so ill-matched a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount
+Anne!&nbsp; But I am of the Apostle&rsquo;s way, with a difference:
+all things to all women!&nbsp; When I cannot please a woman, hang me
+in my cravat!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXVIII - EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER&rsquo;S PARTY<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+By half-past eight o&rsquo;clock on the next morning, I was ringing
+the bell of the lawyer&rsquo;s office in Castle Street, where I found
+him ensconced at a business table, in a room surrounded by several tiers
+of green tin cases.&nbsp; He greeted me like an old friend.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come away, sir, come away!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Here
+is the dentist ready for you, and I think I can promise you that the
+operation will be practically painless.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; I replied, as I
+shook hands with him.&nbsp; &lsquo;But at least there shall be no time
+lost with me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and
+their cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or half-murdered
+a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to having suffered
+a couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in prison on a charge
+from which I could have immediately freed them.&nbsp; All this I gave
+him first of all, to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took
+with gravity, but without the least appearance of surprise.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Now, sir,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I expect to have to pay
+for my unhappy frolic, but I would like very well if it could be managed
+without my personal appearance or even the mention of my real name.&nbsp;
+I had so much wisdom as to sail under false colours in this foolish
+jaunt of mine; my family would be extremely concerned if they had wind
+of it; but at the same time, if the case of this Faa has terminated
+fatally, and there are proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not
+going to stand by and see them vexed, far less punished; and I authorise
+you to give me up for trial if you think that best - or, if you think
+it unnecessary, in the meanwhile to make preparations for their defence.&nbsp;
+I hope, sir, that I am as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined
+to be just.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Very fairly spoken,&rsquo; said Mr. Robbie.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is
+not much in my line, as doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have
+told you.&nbsp; I rarely mix myself up with anything on the criminal
+side, or approaching it.&nbsp; However, for a young gentleman like you,
+I may stretch a point, and I dare say I may be able to accomplish more
+than perhaps another.&nbsp; I will go at once to the Procurator Fiscal&rsquo;s
+office and inquire.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You forget
+the chapter of expenses.&nbsp; I had thought, for a beginning, of placing
+a thousand pounds in your hands.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,&rsquo;
+said Mr. Robbie severely.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It seemed to me,&rsquo; I protested, &lsquo;that coming to you
+almost as a stranger, and placing in your hands a piece of business
+so contrary to your habits, some substantial guarantee of my good faith
+- &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,&rsquo; he interrupted,
+with an air of closing the dispute.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And yet, Mr. Robbie,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;I must ask you
+to allow me to proceed.&nbsp; I do not merely refer to the expenses
+of the case.&nbsp; I have my eye besides on Todd and Candlish.&nbsp;
+They are thoroughly deserving fellows; they have been subjected through
+me to a considerable term of imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that
+you should not spare money for their indemnification.&nbsp; This will
+explain,&rsquo; I added smiling, &lsquo;my offer of the thousand pounds.&nbsp;
+It was in the nature of a measure by which you should judge the scale
+on which I can afford to have this business carried through.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But
+the sooner I am off, the better this affair is like to be guided.&nbsp;
+My clerk will show you into the waiting-room and give you the day&rsquo;s
+<i>Caledonian Mercury</i> and the last <i>Register</i> to amuse yourself
+with in the interval.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.&nbsp; I saw him
+descend from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was shown
+again into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led me to augur
+the worst.&nbsp; For some time he had the inhumanity to read me a lecture
+as to the incredible silliness, &lsquo;not to say immorality,&rsquo;
+of my behaviour.&nbsp; &lsquo;I have the satisfaction in telling you
+my opinion, because it appears that you are going to get off scot free,&rsquo;
+he continued, where, indeed, I thought he might have begun.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd
+and Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been
+for their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie - or Mr. St.
+Ivey, as I believe I should now call you.&nbsp; Never a word would either
+of the two old fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence
+of such a person; and when they were confronted with Faa&rsquo;s version
+of the affair, they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their
+own former declarations, as well as with each other, that the Fiscal
+was quite nonplussed, and imaigined there was something behind it.&nbsp;
+You may believe I soon laughed him out of that!&nbsp; And I had the
+satisfaction of seeing your two friends set free, and very glad to be
+on the causeway again.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, sir,&rsquo; I cried, &lsquo;you should have brought them
+here.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No instructions, Mr. Ducie!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;How
+did I know you wished to renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated
+so fortunately?&nbsp; And, indeed, to be frank with you, I should have
+set my face against it, if you had!&nbsp; Let them go!&nbsp; They are
+paid and contented, and have the highest possible opinion of Mr. St.
+Ivey!&nbsp; When I gave them fifty pounds apiece - which was rather
+more than enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may think - the man Todd,
+who has the only tongue of the party, struck his staff on the ground.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Weel,&rdquo; says he, &ldquo;I aye said he was a gentleman!&rdquo;&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Man, Todd,&rdquo; said I, &ldquo;that was just what Mr St. Ivey
+said of yourself!&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;So it was a case of &ldquo;Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet.&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of
+your life, and a good riddance!&nbsp; They are fine fellows in their
+way, but no proper associates for the like of yourself; and do you finally
+agree to be done with all eccentricity - take up with no more drovers,
+or tinkers, but enjoy the naitural pleesures for which your age, your
+wealth, your intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your
+appearance so completely fit you.&nbsp; And the first of these,&rsquo;
+quoth he, looking at his watch, &lsquo;will be to step through to my
+dining-room and share a bachelor&rsquo;s luncheon.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the same
+theme.&nbsp; &lsquo;You&rsquo;re, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Well, on Thursday night there is the Assembly
+Ball.&nbsp; You must certainly go there, and you must permit me besides
+to do the honours of the ceety and send you a ticket.&nbsp; I am a thorough
+believer in a young man being a young man - but no more drovers or rovers,
+if you love me!&nbsp; Talking of which puts me in mind that you may
+be short of partners at the Assembly - oh, I have been young myself!
+- and if ye care to come to anything so portentiously tedious as a tea-party
+at the house of a bachelor lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces and
+nephews, and his grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and his wards, and
+generally the whole clan of the descendants of his clients, you might
+drop in to-night towards seven o&rsquo;clock.&nbsp; I think I can show
+you one or two that are worth looking at, and you can dance with them
+later on at the Assembly.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young ladies&rsquo;
+whom I might expect to meet.&nbsp; &lsquo;And then there&rsquo;s my
+parteecular friend, Miss Flora,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I&rsquo;ll
+make no attempt of a description.&nbsp; You shall see her for yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation; and returned
+home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet and the good news
+of which I was the bearer.&nbsp; The toilette, I have reason to believe,
+was a success.&nbsp; Mr. Rowley dismissed me with a farewell: &lsquo;Crikey!&nbsp;
+Mr. Anne, but you do look prime!&rsquo;&nbsp; Even the stony Bethiah
+was - how shall I say? - dazzled, but scandalised, by my appearance;
+and while, of course, she deplored the vanity that led to it, she could
+not wholly prevent herself from admiring the result.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a wayfaring Christian
+man!&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;Wi&rsquo; Christ despised and rejectit
+in all pairts of the world and the flag of the Covenant flung doon,
+you will be muckle better on your knees!&nbsp; However, I&rsquo;ll have
+to confess that it sets you weel.&nbsp; And if it&rsquo;s the lassie
+ye&rsquo;re gaun to see the nicht, I suppose I&rsquo;ll just have to
+excuse ye!&nbsp; Bairns maun be bairns!&rsquo; she said, with a sigh.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I mind when Mr. McRankine came courtin&rsquo;, and that&rsquo;s
+lang by-gane - I mind I had a green gown, passementit, that was thocht
+to become me to admiration.&nbsp; I was nae just exactly what ye would
+ca&rsquo; bonny; but I was pale, penetratin&rsquo;, and interestin&rsquo;.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And she leaned over the stair-rail with a candle to watch my descent
+as long as it should be possible.<br>
+<br>
+It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s - by which, I do not
+so much mean that there were few people, for the rooms were crowded,
+as that there was very little attempted to entertain them.&nbsp; In
+one apartment there were tables set out, where the elders were solemnly
+engaged upon whist; in the other and larger one, a great number of youth
+of both sexes entertained themselves languidly, the ladies sitting upon
+chairs to be courted, the gentlemen standing about in various attitudes
+of insinuation or indifference.&nbsp; Conversation appeared the sole
+resource, except in so far as it was modified by a number of keepsakes
+and annuals which lay dispersed upon the tables, and of which the young
+beaux displayed the illustrations to the ladies.&nbsp; Mr. Robbie himself
+was customarily in the card-room; only now and again, when he cut out,
+he made an incursion among the young folks, and rolled about jovially
+from one to another, the very picture of the general uncle.<br>
+<br>
+It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the afternoon.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Now, Miss Flora,&rsquo; he had said, &lsquo;come early, for I
+have a Phoenix to show you - one Mr. Ducie, a new client of mine that,
+I vow, I have fallen in love with&rsquo;; and he was so good as to add
+a word or two on my appearance, from which Flora conceived a suspicion
+of the truth.&nbsp; She had come to the party, in consequence, on the
+knife-edge of anticipation and alarm; had chosen a place by the door,
+where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded by a posse of vapid youths;
+and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me in the most natural manner
+in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared form of words.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;How do you do, Mr. Ducie?&rsquo; she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;It is
+quite an age since I have seen you!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;May I sit down?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the judicious use
+of her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty by her side.<br>
+<br>
+She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths had the
+discretion to melt before us.&nbsp; As soon as I was once seated her
+fan flew out, and she whispered behind it:<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Are you mad?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madly in love,&rsquo; I replied; &lsquo;but in no other sense.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have no patience!&nbsp; You cannot understand what I am suffering!&rsquo;
+she said.&nbsp; &lsquo;What are you to say to Ronald, to Major Chevenix,
+to my aunt?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Your aunt?&rsquo; I cried, with a start.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Peccavi</i>!
+is she here?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;She is in the card-room at whist,&rsquo; said Flora.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Where she will probably stay all the evening?&rsquo; I suggested.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;She may,&rsquo; she admitted; &lsquo;she generally does!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;which
+is very much what I had counted upon doing.&nbsp; I did not come here
+to play cards, but to contemplate a certain young lady to my heart&rsquo;s
+content - if it can ever be contented! - and to tell her some good news.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;But there are still Ronald and the Major!&rsquo; she persisted.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;They are not card-room fixtures!&nbsp; Ronald will be coming
+and going.&nbsp; And as for Mr. Chevenix, he - &rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Always sits with Miss Flora?&rsquo; I interrupted.&nbsp; &lsquo;And
+they talk of poor St. Ives?&nbsp; I had gathered as much, my dear; and
+Mr. Ducie has come to prevent it!&nbsp; But pray dismiss these fears!&nbsp;
+I mind no one but your aunt.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why my aunt?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Because your aunt is a lady, my dear, and a very clever lady,
+and, like all clever ladies, a very rash lady,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You can never count upon them, unless you are sure of getting
+them in a corner, as I have got you, and talking them over rationally,
+as I am just engaged on with yourself!&nbsp; It would be quite the same
+to your aunt to make the worst kind of a scandal, with an equal indifference
+to my danger and to the feelings of our good host!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;and what of Ronald, then?&nbsp;
+Do you think <i>he</i> is above making a scandal?&nbsp; You must know
+him very little!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;On the other hand, it is my pretension that I know him very well!&rsquo;
+I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;I must speak to Ronald first - not Ronald to
+me - that is all!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then, please, go and speak to him at once!&rsquo; she pleaded.&nbsp;
+He is there - do you see? - at the upper end of the room, talking to
+that girl in pink.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And so lose this seat before I have told you my good news?&rsquo;
+I exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;Catch me!&nbsp; And, besides, my dear one,
+think a little of me and my good news!&nbsp; I thought the bearer of
+good news was always welcome!&nbsp; I hoped he might be a little welcome
+for himself!&nbsp; Consider!&nbsp; I have but one friend; and let me
+stay by her!&nbsp; And there is only one thing I care to hear; and let
+me hear it!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, Anne,&rsquo; she sighed, &lsquo;if I did not love you, why
+should I be so uneasy?&nbsp; I am turned into a coward, dear!&nbsp;
+Think, if it were the other way round - if you were quite safe and I
+was in, oh, such danger!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+She had no sooner said it than I was convicted of being a dullard.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;God forgive me, dear!&rsquo;&nbsp; I made haste to reply.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I never saw before that there were two sides to this!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+And I told her my tale as briefly as I could, and rose to seek Ronald.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You see, my dear, you are obeyed,&rsquo; I said.<br>
+<br>
+She gave me a look that was a reward in itself; and as I turned away
+from her, with a strong sense of turning away from the sun, I carried
+that look in my bosom like a caress.&nbsp; The girl in pink was an arch,
+ogling person, with a good deal of eyes and teeth, and a great play
+of shoulders and rattle of conversation.&nbsp; There could be no doubt,
+from Mr. Ronald&rsquo;s attitude, that he worshipped the very chair
+she sat on.&nbsp; But I was quite ruthless.&nbsp; I laid my hand on
+his shoulder, as he was stooping over her like a hen over a chicken.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Excuse me for one moment, Mr. Gilchrist!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+He started and span about in answer to my touch, and exhibited a face
+of inarticulate wonder.<br>
+<br>
+&nbsp;&lsquo;Yes!&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;it is even myself!&nbsp;
+Pardon me for interrupting so agreeable a <i>t&ecirc;te-&agrave;-t&ecirc;te</i>,
+but you know, my good fellow, we owe a first duty to Mr. Robbie.&nbsp;
+It would never do to risk making a scene in the man&rsquo;s drawing-room;
+so the first thing I had to attend to was to have you warned.&nbsp;
+The name I go by is Ducie, too, in case of accidents.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I - I say, you know!&rsquo; cried Ronald.&nbsp; &lsquo;Deuce
+take it, what are you doing here?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Hush, hush!&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not the place, my dear
+fellow - not the place.&nbsp; Come to my rooms, if you like, to-night
+after the party, or to-morrow in the morning, and we can talk it out
+over a segar.&nbsp; But here, you know, it really won&rsquo;t do at
+all.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Before he could collect his mind for an answer, I had given him my address
+in St. James Square, and had again mingled with the crowd.&nbsp; Alas!&nbsp;
+I was not fated to get back to Flora so easily!&nbsp; Mr. Robbie was
+in the path: he was insatiably loquacious; and as he continued to palaver
+I watched the insipid youths gather again about my idol, and cursed
+my fate and my host.&nbsp; He remembered suddenly that I was to attend
+the Assembly Ball on Thursday, and had only attended to-night by way
+of a preparative.&nbsp; This put it into his head to present me to another
+young lady; but I managed this interview with so much art that, while
+I was scrupulously polite and even cordial to the fair one, I contrived
+to keep Robbie beside me all the time and to leave along with him when
+the ordeal was over.&nbsp; We were just walking away arm in arm, when
+I spied my friend the Major approaching, stiff as a ramrod and, as usual,
+obtrusively clean.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh! there&rsquo;s a man I want to know,&rsquo; said I, taking
+the bull by the horns.&nbsp; &lsquo;Won&rsquo;t you introduce me to
+Major Chevenix?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;At a word, my dear fellow,&rsquo; said Robbie; and &lsquo;Major!&rsquo;
+he cried, &lsquo;come here and let me present to you my friend Mr. Ducie,
+who desires the honour of your acquaintance.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The Major flushed visibly, but otherwise preserved his composure.&nbsp;
+He bowed very low.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m not very sure,&rsquo; he said:
+&lsquo;I have an idea we have met before?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Informally,&rsquo; I said, returning his bow; &lsquo;and I have
+long looked forward to the pleasure of regularising our acquaintance.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are very good, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;Perhaps
+you could aid my memory a little?&nbsp; Where was it that I had the
+pleasure?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, that would be telling tales out of school,&rsquo; said I,
+with a laugh, &lsquo;and before my lawyer, too!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;ll wager,&rsquo; broke in Mr. Robbie, &lsquo;that, when
+you knew my client, Chevenix - the past of our friend Mr. Ducie is an
+obscure chapter full of horrid secrets - I&rsquo;ll wager, now, you
+knew him as St. Ivey,&rsquo; says he, nudging me violently.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think not, sir,&rsquo; said the Major, with pinched lips.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I wish he may prove all right!&rsquo; continued the lawyer,
+with certainly the worst-inspired jocularity in the world.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+know nothing by him!&nbsp; He may be a swell mobsman for me with his
+aliases.&nbsp; You must put your memory on the rack, Major, and when
+ye&rsquo;ve remembered when and where ye met him, be sure ye tell me.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I will not fail, sir,&rsquo; said Chevenix.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Seek to him!&rsquo; cried Robbie, waving his hand as he departed.<br>
+<br>
+The Major, as soon as we were alone, turned upon me his impassive countenance.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;you have courage.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It is undoubted as your honour, sir,&rsquo; I returned, bowing.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Did you expect to meet me, may I ask?&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You saw, at least, that I courted the presentation,&rsquo; said
+I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And you were not afraid?&rsquo; said Chevenix.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I was perfectly at ease.&nbsp; I knew I was dealing with a gentleman.&nbsp;
+Be that your epitaph.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, there are some other people looking for you,&rsquo; he
+said, &lsquo;who will make no bones about the point of honour.&nbsp;
+The police, my dear sir, are simply agog about you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I think that that was coarse,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You have seen Miss Gilchrist?&rsquo; he inquired, changing the
+subject.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;With whom, I am led to understand, we are on a footing of rivalry?&rsquo;
+I asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, I have seen her.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I was just seeking her,&rsquo; he replied.<br>
+<br>
+I was conscious of a certain thrill of temper; so, I suppose, was he.&nbsp;
+We looked each other up and down.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The situation is original,&rsquo; he resumed.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Quite,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;But let me tell you frankly
+you are blowing a cold coal.&nbsp; I owe you so much for your kindness
+to the prisoner Champdivers.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Meaning that the lady&rsquo;s affections are more advantageously
+disposed of?&rsquo; he asked, with a sneer.&nbsp; &lsquo;Thank you,
+I am sure.&nbsp; And, since you have given me a lead, just hear a word
+of good advice in your turn.&nbsp; Is it fair, is it delicate, is it
+like a gentleman, to compromise the young lady by attentions which (as
+you know very well) can come to nothing?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I was utterly unable to find words in answer.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Excuse me if I cut this interview short,&rsquo; he went on.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;It seems to me doomed to come to nothing, and there is more attractive
+metal.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; I replied, &lsquo;as you say, it cannot amount to
+much.&nbsp; You are impotent, bound hand and foot in honour.&nbsp; You
+know me to be a man falsely accused, and even if you did not know it,
+from your position as my rival you have only the choice to stand quite
+still or to be infamous.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I would not say that,&rsquo; he returned, with another change
+of colour.&nbsp; &lsquo;I may hear it once too often.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+With which he moved off straight for where Flora was sitting amidst
+her court of vapid youths, and I had no choice but to follow him, a
+bad second, and reading myself, as I went, a sharp lesson on the command
+of temper.<br>
+<br>
+It is a strange thing how young men in their teens go down at the mere
+wind of the coming of men of twenty-five and upwards!&nbsp; The vapid
+ones fled without thought of resistance before the Major and me; a few
+dallied awhile in the neighbourhood - so to speak, with their fingers
+in their mouths - but presently these also followed the rout, and we
+remained face to face before Flora.&nbsp; There was a draught in that
+corner by the door; she had thrown her pelisse over her bare arms and
+neck, and the dark fur of the trimming set them off.&nbsp; She shone
+by contrast; the light played on her smooth skin to admiration, and
+the colour changed in her excited face.&nbsp; For the least fraction
+of a second she looked from one to the other of her pair of rival swains,
+and seemed to hesitate.&nbsp; Then she addressed Chevenix:-<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are coming to the Assembly, of course, Major Chevenix?&rsquo;
+said she.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I fear not; I fear I shall be otherwise engaged,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Even the pleasure of dancing with you, Miss Flora, must give
+way to duty.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+For awhile the talk ran harmlessly on the weather, and then branched
+off towards the war.&nbsp; It seemed to be by no one&rsquo;s fault;
+it was in the air, and had to come.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good news from the scene of operations,&rsquo; said the Major.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good news while it lasts,&rsquo; I said.&nbsp; &lsquo;But will
+Miss Gilchrist tell us her private thought upon the war?&nbsp; In her
+admiration for the victors, does not there mingle some pity for the
+vanquished?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Indeed, sir,&rsquo; she said, with animation, &lsquo;only too
+much of it!&nbsp; War is a subject that I do not think should be talked
+of to a girl.&nbsp; I am, I have to be - what do you call it? - a non-combatant?&nbsp;
+And to remind me of what others have to do and suffer: no, it is not
+fair!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Miss Gilchrist has the tender female heart,&rsquo; said Chevenix.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do not be too sure of that!&rsquo; she cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+would love to be allowed to fight myself!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;On which side?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Can you ask?&rsquo; she exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;I am a Scottish
+girl!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;She is a Scottish girl!&rsquo; repeated the Major, looking at
+me.&nbsp; &lsquo;And no one grudges you her pity!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I glory in every grain of it she has to spare,&rsquo; said
+I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Pity is akin to love.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, and let us put that question to Miss Gilchrist.&nbsp; It
+is for her to decide, and for us to bow to the decision.&nbsp; Is pity,
+Miss Flora, or is admiration, nearest love?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh come,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;let us be more concrete.&nbsp;
+Lay before the lady a complete case: describe your man, then I&rsquo;ll
+describe <i>mine</i>, and Miss Flora shall decide.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think I see your meaning,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;and I&rsquo;ll
+try.&nbsp; You think that pity - and the kindred sentiments - have the
+greatest power upon the heart.&nbsp; I think more nobly of women.&nbsp;
+To my view, the man they love will first of all command their respect;
+he will be steadfast - proud, if you please; dry, possibly - but of
+all things steadfast.&nbsp; They will look at him in doubt; at last
+they will see that stern face which he presents to all the rest of the
+world soften to them alone.&nbsp; First, trust, I say.&nbsp; It is so
+that a woman loves who is worthy of heroes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Your man is very ambitious, sir,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and very
+much of a hero!&nbsp; Mine is a humbler, and, I would fain think, a
+more human dog.&nbsp; He is one with no particular trust in himself,
+with no superior steadfastness to be admired for, who sees a lady&rsquo;s
+face, who hears her voice, and, without any phrase about the matter,
+falls in love.&nbsp; What does he ask for, then, but pity? - pity for
+his weakness, pity for his love, which is his life.&nbsp; You would
+make women always the inferiors, gaping up at your imaginary lover;
+he, like a marble statue, with his nose in the air!&nbsp; But God has
+been wiser than you; and the most steadfast of your heroes may prove
+human, after all.&nbsp; We appeal to the queen for judgment,&rsquo;
+I added, turning and bowing before Flora.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And how shall the queen judge?&rsquo; she asked.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+must give you an answer that is no answer at all.&nbsp; &ldquo;The wind
+bloweth where it listeth&rdquo;: she goes where her heart goes.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Her face flushed as she said it; mine also, for I read in it a declaration,
+and my heart swelled for joy.&nbsp; But Chevenix grew pale.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You make of life a very dreadful kind of lottery, ma&rsquo;am,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I will not despair.&nbsp; Honest and unornamental
+is still my choice.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And I must say he looked extremely handsome and very amusingly like
+the marble statue with its nose in the air to which I had compared him.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I cannot imagine how we got upon this subject,&rsquo; said Flora.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Madame, it was through the war,&rsquo; replied Chevenix.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;All roads lead to Rome,&rsquo; I commented.&nbsp; &lsquo;What
+else would you expect Mr. Chevenix and myself to talk of?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+About this time I was conscious of a certain bustle and movement in
+the room behind me, but did not pay to it that degree of attention which
+perhaps would have been wise.&nbsp; There came a certain change in Flora&rsquo;s
+face; she signalled repeatedly with her fan; her eyes appealed to me
+obsequiously; there could be no doubt that she wanted something - as
+well as I could make out, that I should go away and leave the field
+clear for my rival, which I had not the least idea of doing.&nbsp; At
+last she rose from her chair with impatience.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I think it time you were saying good-night, Mr Ducie!&rsquo;
+she said.<br>
+<br>
+I could not in the least see why, and said so.<br>
+<br>
+Whereupon she gave me this appalling answer, &lsquo;My aunt is coming
+out of the card-room.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In less time than it takes to tell, I had made my bow and my escape.&nbsp;
+Looking back from the doorway, I was privileged to see, for a moment,
+the august profile and gold eyeglasses of Miss Gilchrist issuing from
+the card-room; and the sight lent me wings.&nbsp; I stood not on the
+order of my going; and a moment after, I was on the pavement of Castle
+Street, and the lighted windows shone down on me, and were crossed by
+ironical shadows of those who had remained behind.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXIX - EVENTS OF TUESDAY: THE TOILS CLOSING<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+This day began with a surprise.&nbsp; I found a letter on my breakfast-table
+addressed to Edward Ducie, Esquire; and at first I was startled beyond
+measure.&nbsp; &lsquo;Conscience doth make cowards of us all!&rsquo;&nbsp;
+When I had opened it, it proved to be only a note from the lawyer, enclosing
+a card for the Assembly Ball on Thursday evening.&nbsp; Shortly after,
+as I was composing my mind with a segar at one of the windows of the
+sitting-room, and Rowley, having finished the light share of work that
+fell to him, sat not far off tootling with great spirit and a marked
+preference for the upper octave, Ronald was suddenly shown in.&nbsp;
+I got him a segar, drew in a chair to the side of the fire, and installed
+him there - I was going to say, at his ease, but no expression could
+be farther from the truth.&nbsp; He was plainly on pins and needles,
+did not know whether to take or to refuse the segar, and, after he had
+taken it, did not know whether to light or to return it.&nbsp; I saw
+he had something to say; I did not think it was his own something; and
+I was ready to offer a large bet it was really something of Major Chevenix&rsquo;s.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, and so here you are!&rsquo; I observed, with pointless
+cordiality, for I was bound I should do nothing to help him out.&nbsp;
+If he were, indeed, here running errands for my rival, he might have
+a fair field, but certainly no favour.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The fact is,&rsquo; he began, &lsquo;I would rather see you alone.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Why, certainly,&rsquo; I replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Rowley, you can
+step into the bedroom.&nbsp; My dear fellow,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;this
+sounds serious.&nbsp; Nothing wrong, I trust.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll be quite honest,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I
+<i>am</i> a good deal bothered.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And I bet I know why!&rsquo; I exclaimed.&nbsp; &lsquo;And I
+bet I can put you to rights, too!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What do you mean!&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You must be hard up,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;and all I can say
+is, you&rsquo;ve come to the right place.&nbsp; If you have the least
+use for a hundred pounds, or any such trifling sum as that, please mention
+it.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s here, quite at your service.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I am sure it is most kind of you,&rsquo; said Ronald, &lsquo;and
+the truth is, though I can&rsquo;t think how you guessed it, that I
+really <i>am</i> a little behind board.&nbsp; But I haven&rsquo;t come
+to talk about that.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, I dare say!&rsquo; cried I.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not worth talking
+about!&nbsp; But remember, Ronald, you and I are on different sides
+of the business.&nbsp; Remember that you did me one of those services
+that make men friends for ever.&nbsp; And since I have had the fortune
+to come into a fair share of money, just oblige me, and consider so
+much of it as your own.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;I couldn&rsquo;t take it; I couldn&rsquo;t,
+really.&nbsp; Besides, the fact is, I&rsquo;ve come on a very different
+matter.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s about my sister, St. Ives,&rsquo; and he shook
+his head menacingly at me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You&rsquo;re quite sure?&rsquo; I persisted.&nbsp; &lsquo;It&rsquo;s
+here, at your service - up to five hundred pounds, if you like.&nbsp;
+Well, all right; only remember where it is, when you do want it.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, please let me alone!&rsquo; cried Ronald: &lsquo;I&rsquo;ve
+come to say something unpleasant; and how on earth can I do it, if you
+don&rsquo;t give a fellow a chance?&nbsp; It&rsquo;s about my sister,
+as I said.&nbsp; You can see for yourself that it can&rsquo;t be allowed
+to go on.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s compromising; it don&rsquo;t lead to anything;
+and you&rsquo;re not the kind of man (you must feel it yourself) that
+I can allow my female relatives to have anything to do with.&nbsp; I
+hate saying this, St. Ives; it looks like hitting a man when he&rsquo;s
+down, you know; and I told the Major I very much disliked it from the
+first.&nbsp; However, it had to be said; and now it has been, and, between
+gentlemen, it shouldn&rsquo;t be necessary to refer to it again.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;It&rsquo;s compromising; it doesn&rsquo;t lead to anything; not
+the kind of man,&rsquo; I repeated thoughtfully.&nbsp; &lsquo;Yes, I
+believe I understand, and shall make haste to put myself <i>en r&egrave;gle</i>.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+I stood up, and laid my segar down.&nbsp; &lsquo;Mr. Gilchrist,&rsquo;
+said I, with a bow, &lsquo;in answer to your very natural observations,
+I beg to offer myself as a suitor for your sister&rsquo;s hand.&nbsp;
+I am a man of title, of which we think lightly in France, but of ancient
+lineage, which is everywhere prized.&nbsp; I can display thirty-two
+quarterings without a blot.&nbsp; My expectations are certainly above
+the average: I believe my uncle&rsquo;s income averages about thirty
+thousand pounds, though I admit I was not careful to inform myself.&nbsp;
+Put it anywhere between fifteen and fifty thousand; it is certainly
+not less.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;All this is very easy to say,&rsquo; said Ronald, with a pitying
+smile.&nbsp; &lsquo;Unfortunately, these things are in the air.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Pardon me, - in Buckinghamshire,&rsquo; said I, smiling.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, what I mean is, my dear St. Ives, that you <i>can&rsquo;t
+prove</i> them,&rsquo; he continued.&nbsp; &lsquo;They might just as
+well not be: do you follow me?&nbsp; You can&rsquo;t bring us any third
+party to back you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, come!&rsquo; cried I, springing up and hurrying to the table.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You must excuse me!&rsquo;&nbsp; I wrote Romaine&rsquo;s address.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;There is my reference, Mr. Gilchrist.&nbsp; Until you have written
+to him, and received his negative answer, I have a right to be treated,
+and I shall see that you treat me, as a gentleman.&rsquo;&nbsp; He was
+brought up with a round turn at that.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I beg your pardon, St. Ives,&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;Believe
+me, I had no wish to be offensive.&nbsp; But there&rsquo;s the difficulty
+of this affair; I can&rsquo;t make any of my points without offence!&nbsp;
+You must excuse me, it&rsquo;s not my fault.&nbsp; But, at any rate,
+you must see for yourself this proposal of marriage is - is merely impossible,
+my dear fellow.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s nonsense!&nbsp; Our countries are at
+war; you are a prisoner.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My ancestor of the time of the Ligue,&rsquo; I replied, &lsquo;married
+a Huguenot lady out of the Saintonge, riding two hundred miles through
+an enemy&rsquo;s country to bring off his bride; and it was a happy
+marriage.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well!&rsquo; he began; and then looked down into the fire, and
+became silent.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, there&rsquo;s this business of - Goguelat,&rsquo; said
+he, still looking at the coals in the grate.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What!&rsquo; I exclaimed, starting in my chair.&nbsp; &lsquo;What&rsquo;s
+that you say?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;This business about Goguelat,&rsquo; he repeated.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Ronald,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;this is not your doing.&nbsp; These
+are not your own words.&nbsp; I know where they came from: a coward
+put them in your mouth.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;St. Ives!&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;why do you make it so hard
+for me? and where&rsquo;s the use of insulting other people?&nbsp; The
+plain English is, that I can&rsquo;t hear of any proposal of marriage
+from a man under a charge like that.&nbsp; You must see it for yourself,
+man!&nbsp; It&rsquo;s the most absurd thing I ever heard of!&nbsp; And
+you go on forcing me to argue with you, too!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Because I have had an affair of honour which terminated unhappily,
+you - a young soldier, or next-door to it - refuse my offer?&nbsp; Do
+I understand you aright?&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My dear fellow!&rsquo; he wailed, &lsquo;of course you can twist
+my words, if you like.&nbsp; You <i>say</i> it was an affair of honour.&nbsp;
+Well, I can&rsquo;t, of course, tell you that - I can&rsquo;t - I mean,
+you must see that that&rsquo;s just the point!&nbsp; Was it?&nbsp; I
+don&rsquo;t know.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I have the honour to inform you,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, other people say the reverse, you see!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;They lie, Ronald, and I will prove it in time.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The short and the long of it is, that any man who is so unfortunate
+as to have such things said about him is not the man to be my brother-in-law!&rsquo;
+he cried.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Do you know who will be my first witness at the court?&nbsp;
+Arthur Chevenix!&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t care!&rsquo; he cried, rising from his chair and
+beginning to pace outrageously about the room.&nbsp; &lsquo;What do
+you mean, St. Ives?&nbsp; What is this about?&nbsp; It&rsquo;s like
+a dream, I declare!&nbsp; You made an offer, and I have refused it.&nbsp;
+I don&rsquo;t like it, I don&rsquo;t want it; and whatever I did, or
+didn&rsquo;t, wouldn&rsquo;t matter - my aunt wouldn&rsquo;t bear of
+it anyway!&nbsp; Can&rsquo;t you take your answer, man?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You must remember, Ronald, that we are playing with edged tools,&rsquo;
+said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;An offer of marriage is a delicate subject to handle.&nbsp;
+You have refused, and you have justified your refusal by several statements:
+first, that I was an impostor; second, that our countries were at war;
+and third -&nbsp; No, I will speak,&rsquo; said I; &lsquo;you can answer
+when I have done, - and third, that I had dishonourably killed - or
+was said to have done so - the man Goguelat.&nbsp; Now, my dear fellow,
+these are very awkward grounds to be taking.&nbsp; From any one else&rsquo;s
+lips I need scarce tell you how I should resent them; but my hands are
+tied.&nbsp; I have so much gratitude to you, without talking of the
+love I bear your sister, that you insult me, when you do so, under the
+cover of a complete impunity.&nbsp; I must feel the pain - and I do
+feel it acutely - I can do nothing to protect myself.&rsquo;&nbsp; He
+had been anxious enough to interrupt me in the beginning; but now, and
+after I had ceased, he stood a long while silent.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;St. Ives,&rsquo; he said at last, &lsquo;I think I had better
+go away.&nbsp; This has been very irritating.&nbsp; I never at all meant
+to say anything of the kind, and I apologise to you.&nbsp; I have all
+the esteem for you that one gentleman should have for another.&nbsp;
+I only meant to tell you - to show you what had influenced my mind;
+and that, in short, the thing was impossible.&nbsp; One thing you may
+be quite sure of: I shall do nothing against you.&nbsp; Will you shake
+hands before I go away?&rsquo; he blurted out.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;I agree with you - the interview has
+been irritating.&nbsp; Let bygones be bygones.&nbsp; Good-bye, Ronald.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good-bye, St. Ives!&rsquo; he returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m
+heartily sorry.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And with that he was gone.<br>
+<br>
+The windows of my own sitting-room looked towards the north; but the
+entrance passage drew its light from the direction of the square.&nbsp;
+Hence I was able to observe Ronald&rsquo;s departure, his very disheartened
+gait, and the fact that he was joined, about half-way, by no less a
+man than Major Chevenix.&nbsp; At this, I could scarce keep from smiling;
+so unpalatable an interview must be before the pair of them, and I could
+hear their voices, clashing like crossed swords, in that eternal antiphony
+of &lsquo;I told you,&rsquo; and &lsquo;I told you not.&rsquo;&nbsp;
+Without doubt, they had gained very little by their visit; but then
+I had gained less than nothing, and had been bitterly dispirited into
+the bargain.&nbsp; Ronald had stuck to his guns and refused me to the
+last.&nbsp; It was no news; but, on the other hand, it could not be
+contorted into good news.&nbsp; I was now certain that during my temporary
+absence in France, all irons would be put into the fire, and the world
+turned upside down, to make Flora disown the obtrusive Frenchman and
+accept Chevenix.&nbsp; Without doubt she would resist these instances:
+but the thought of them did not please me, and I felt she should be
+warned and prepared for the battle.<br>
+<br>
+It was no use to try and see her now, but I promised myself early that
+evening to return to Swanston.&nbsp; In the meantime I had to make all
+my preparations, and look the coming journey in the face.&nbsp; Here
+in Edinburgh I was within four miles of the sea, yet the business of
+approaching random fishermen with my hat in the one hand and a knife
+in the other, appeared so desperate, that I saw nothing for it but to
+retrace my steps over the northern counties, and knock a second time
+at the doors of Birchell Fenn.&nbsp; To do this, money would be necessary;
+and after leaving my paper in the hands of Flora I had still a balance
+of about fifteen hundred pounds.&nbsp; Or rather I may say I had them
+and I had them not; for after my luncheon with Mr. Robbie I had placed
+the amount, all but thirty pounds of change, in a bank in George Street,
+on a deposit receipt in the name of Mr. Rowley.&nbsp; This I had designed
+to be my gift to him, in case I must suddenly depart.&nbsp; But now,
+thinking better of the arrangement, I despatched my little man, cockade
+and all, to lift the fifteen hundred.<br>
+<br>
+He was not long gone, and returned with a flushed face, and the deposit
+receipt still in his hand.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No go, Mr. Anne,&rsquo; says he.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;How&rsquo;s that?&rsquo; I inquired,<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, sir, I found the place all right, and no mistake,&rsquo;
+said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;But I tell you what gave me a blue fright!&nbsp;
+There was a customer standing by the door, and I reckonised him!&nbsp;
+Who do you think it was, Mr. Anne?&nbsp; W&rsquo;y, that same Red-Breast
+- him I had breakfast with near Aylesbury.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;You are sure you are not mistaken?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Certain sure,&rsquo; he replied.&nbsp; &lsquo;Not Mr. Lavender,
+I don&rsquo;t mean, sir; I mean the other party.&nbsp; &ldquo;Wot&rsquo;s
+he doing here?&rsquo; says I.&nbsp; It don&rsquo;t look right.&rdquo;&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not by any means,&rsquo; I agreed.<br>
+<br>
+I walked to and fro in the apartment reflecting.&nbsp; This particular
+Bow Street runner might be here by accident; but it was to imagine a
+singular play of coincidence that he, who had met Rowley and spoken
+with him in the &lsquo;Green Dragon,&rsquo; hard by Aylesbury, should
+be now in Scotland, where he could have no legitimate business, and
+by the doors of the bank where Rowley kept his account.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;he didn&rsquo;t see you, did he?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Never a fear,&rsquo; quoth Rowley.&nbsp; &lsquo;W&rsquo;y Mr.
+Anne, sir, if he &rsquo;ad, you wouldn&rsquo;t have seen <i>me</i> any
+more!&nbsp; I ain&rsquo;t a hass, sir!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, my boy, you can put that receipt in your pocket.&nbsp;
+You&rsquo;ll have no more use for it till you&rsquo;re quite clear of
+me.&nbsp; Don&rsquo;t lose it, though; it&rsquo;s your share of the
+Christmas-box: fifteen hundred pounds all for yourself.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Begging your pardon, Mr. Anne, sir, but wot for!&rsquo; said
+Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To set up a public-house upon,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you&rsquo;ll excuse me, sir, I ain&rsquo;t got any call to
+set up a public-house, sir,&rsquo; he replied stoutly.&nbsp; &lsquo;And
+I tell you wot, sir, it seems to me I&rsquo;m reether young for the
+billet.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m your body servant, Mr. Anne, or else I&rsquo;m
+nothink.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, Rowley,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you what
+it&rsquo;s for.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s for the good service you have done
+me, of which I don&rsquo;t care - and don&rsquo;t dare - to speak.&nbsp;
+It&rsquo;s for your loyalty and cheerfulness, my dear boy.&nbsp; I had
+meant it for you; but to tell you the truth, it&rsquo;s past mending
+now - it has to be yours.&nbsp; Since that man is waiting by the bank,
+the money can&rsquo;t be touched until I&rsquo;m gone.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Until you&rsquo;re gone, sir?&rsquo; re-echoed Rowley.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;You don&rsquo;t go anywheres without me, I can tell you that,
+Mr. Anne, sir!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Yes, my boy,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;we are going to part very
+soon now; probably to-morrow.&nbsp; And it&rsquo;s for my sake, Rowley!&nbsp;
+Depend upon it, if there was any reason at all for that Bow Street man
+being at the bank, he was not there to look out for you.&nbsp; How they
+could have found out about the account so early is more than I can fathom;
+some strange coincidence must have played me false!&nbsp; But there
+the fact is; and Rowley, I&rsquo;ll not only have to say farewell to
+you presently, I&rsquo;ll have to ask you to stay indoors until I can
+say it.&nbsp; Remember, my boy, it&rsquo;s only so that you can serve
+me now.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;W&rsquo;y, sir, you say the word, and of course I&rsquo;ll do
+it!&rsquo; he cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;&ldquo;Nothink by &rsquo;alves,&rdquo;
+is my motto!&nbsp; I&rsquo;m your man, through thick and thin, live
+or die, I am!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In the meantime there was nothing to be done till towards sunset.&nbsp;
+My only chance now was to come again as quickly as possible to speech
+of Flora, who was my only practicable banker; and not before evening
+was it worth while to think of that.&nbsp; I might compose myself as
+well as I was able over the <i>Caledonian Mercury</i>, with its ill
+news of the campaign of France and belated documents about the retreat
+from Russia; and, as I sat there by the fire, I was sometimes all awake
+with anger and mortification at what I was reading, and sometimes again
+I would be three parts asleep as I dozed over the barren items of home
+intelligence.&nbsp; &lsquo;Lately arrived&rsquo; - this is what I suddenly
+stumbled on - &lsquo;at Dumbreck&rsquo;s Hotel, the Viscount of Saint-Yves.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Rowley,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you please, Mr. Anne, sir,&rsquo; answered the obsequious,
+lowering his pipe.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come and look at this, my boy,&rsquo; said I, holding out the
+paper.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My crikey!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;That&rsquo;s &rsquo;im,
+sir, sure enough!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Sure enough, Rowley,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;He&rsquo;s on
+the trail.&nbsp; He has fairly caught up with us.&nbsp; He and this
+Bow Street man have come together, I would swear.&nbsp; And now here
+is the whole field, quarry, hounds and hunters, all together in this
+city of Edinburgh.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;And wot are you goin&rsquo; to do now, sir?&nbsp; Tell you wot,
+let me take it in &rsquo;and, please!&nbsp; Gimme a minute, and I&rsquo;ll
+disguise myself, and go out to this Dum - to this hotel, leastways,
+sir - and see wot he&rsquo;s up to.&nbsp; You put your trust in me,
+Mr. Anne: I&rsquo;m fly, don&rsquo;t you make no mistake about it.&nbsp;
+I&rsquo;m all a-growing and a-blowing, I am.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Not one foot of you,&rsquo; said I.&nbsp; &lsquo;You are a prisoner,
+Rowley, and make up your mind to that.&nbsp; So am I, or next door to
+it.&nbsp; I showed it you for a caution; if you go on the streets, it
+spells death to me, Rowley.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;If you please, sir,&rsquo; says Rowley.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Come to think of it,&rsquo; I continued, &lsquo;you must take
+a cold, or something.&nbsp; No good of awakening Mrs. McRankine&rsquo;s
+suspicions.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;A cold?&rsquo; he cried, recovering immediately from his depression.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I can do it, Mr. Anne.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And he proceeded to sneeze and cough and blow his nose, till I could
+not restrain myself from smiling.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, I tell you, I know a lot of them dodges,&rsquo; he observed
+proudly.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, they come in very handy,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;d better go at once and show it to the old gal, &rsquo;adn&rsquo;t
+I?&rsquo; he asked.<br>
+<br>
+I told him, by all means; and he was gone upon the instant, gleeful
+as though to a game of football.<br>
+<br>
+I took up the paper and read carelessly on, my thoughts engaged with
+my immediate danger, till I struck on the next paragraph:-<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;In connection with the recent horrid murder in the Castle, we
+are desired to make public the following intelligence.&nbsp; The soldier,
+Champdivers, is supposed to be in the neighbourhood of this city.&nbsp;
+He is about the middle height or rather under, of a pleasing appearance
+and highly genteel address.&nbsp; When last heard of he wore a fashionable
+suit of pearl-grey, and boots with fawn-coloured tops.&nbsp; He is accompanied
+by a servant about sixteen years of age, speaks English without any
+accent, and passed under the <i>alias</i> of Ramornie.&nbsp; A reward
+is offered for his apprehension.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In a moment I was in the next room, stripping from me the pearl-coloured
+suit!<br>
+<br>
+I confess I was now a good deal agitated.&nbsp; It is difficult to watch
+the toils closing slowly and surely about you, and to retain your composure;
+and I was glad that Rowley was not present to spy on my confusion.&nbsp;
+I was flushed, my breath came thick; I cannot remember a time when I
+was more put out.<br>
+<br>
+And yet I must wait and do nothing, and partake of my meals, and entertain
+the ever-garrulous Rowley, as though I were entirely my own man.&nbsp;
+And if I did not require to entertain Mrs. McRankine also, that was
+but another drop of bitterness in my cup!&nbsp; For what ailed my landlady,
+that she should hold herself so severely aloof, that she should refuse
+conversation, that her eyes should be reddened, that I should so continually
+hear the voice of her private supplications sounding through the house?&nbsp;
+I was much deceived, or she had read the insidious paragraph and recognised
+the comminated pearl-grey suit.&nbsp; I remember now a certain air with
+which she had laid the paper on my table, and a certain sniff, between
+sympathy and defiance, with which she had announced it: &lsquo;There&rsquo;s
+your <i>Mercury</i> for ye!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+In this direction, at least, I saw no pressing danger; her tragic countenance
+betokened agitation; it was plain she was wrestling with her conscience,
+and the battle still hung dubious.&nbsp; The question of what to do
+troubled me extremely.&nbsp; I could not venture to touch such an intricate
+and mysterious piece of machinery as my landlady&rsquo;s spiritual nature:
+it might go off at a word, and in any direction, like a badly-made firework.&nbsp;
+And while I praised myself extremely for my wisdom in the past, that
+I had made so much a friend of her, I was all abroad as to my conduct
+in the present.&nbsp; There seemed an equal danger in pressing and in
+neglecting the accustomed marks of familiarity.&nbsp; The one extreme
+looked like impudence, and might annoy, the other was a practical confession
+of guilt.&nbsp; Altogether, it was a good hour for me when the dusk
+began to fall in earnest on the streets of Edinburgh, and the voice
+of an early watchman bade me set forth.<br>
+<br>
+I reached the neighbourhood of the cottage before seven; and as I breasted
+the steep ascent which leads to the garden wall, I was struck with surprise
+to hear a dog.&nbsp; Dogs I had heard before, but only from the hamlet
+on the hillside above.&nbsp; Now, this dog was in the garden itself,
+where it roared aloud in paroxysms of fury, and I could hear it leaping
+and straining on the chain.&nbsp; I waited some while, until the brute&rsquo;s
+fit of passion had roared itself out.&nbsp; Then, with the utmost precaution,
+I drew near again; and finally approached the garden wall.&nbsp; So
+soon as I had clapped my head above the level, however, the barking
+broke forth again with redoubled energy.&nbsp; Almost at the same time,
+the door of the cottage opened, and Ronald and the Major appeared upon
+the threshold with a lantern.&nbsp; As they so stood, they were almost
+immediately below me, strongly illuminated, and within easy earshot.&nbsp;
+The Major pacified the dog, who took instead to low, uneasy growling
+intermingled with occasional yelps.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good thing I brought Towzer!&rsquo; said Chevenix.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Damn him, I wonder where he is!&rsquo; said Ronald; and he moved
+the lantern up and down, and turned the night into a shifting puzzle-work
+of gleam and shadow.&nbsp; &lsquo;I think I&rsquo;ll make a sally.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t think you will,&rsquo; replied Chevenix.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;When I agreed to come out here and do sentry-go, it was on one
+condition, Master Ronald: don&rsquo;t you forget that!&nbsp; Military
+discipline, my boy!&nbsp; Our beat is this path close about the house.&nbsp;
+Down, Towzer! good boy, good boy - gently, then!&rsquo; he went on,
+caressing his confounded monster.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;To think!&nbsp; The beggar may be hearing us this minute!&rsquo;
+cried Ronald.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Nothing more probable,&rsquo; said the Major.&nbsp; &lsquo;You
+there, St. Ives?&rsquo; he added, in a distinct but guarded voice.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;I only want to tell you, you had better go home.&nbsp; Mr. Gilchrist
+and I take watch and watch.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+The game was up.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Beaucoup de plaisir</i>!&rsquo; I replied,
+in the same tones.&nbsp; &lsquo;<i>Il fait un peu froid pour veiller;
+gardez-vous des engelures</i>!&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I suppose it was done in a moment of ungovernable rage; but in spite
+of the excellent advice he had given to Ronald the moment before, Chevenix
+slipped the chain, and the dog sprang, straight as an arrow, up the
+bank.&nbsp; I stepped back, picked up a stone of about twelve pounds
+weight, and stood ready.&nbsp; With a bound the beast landed on the
+cope-stone of the wall; and, almost in the same instant, my missile
+caught him fair in the face.&nbsp; He gave a stifled cry, went tumbling
+back where he had come from, and I could hear the twelve-pounder accompany
+him in his fall.&nbsp; Chevenix, at the same moment, broke out in a
+roaring voice: &lsquo;The hell-hound!&nbsp; If he&rsquo;s killed my
+dog!&rsquo; and I judged, upon all grounds, it was as well to be off.<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+CHAPTER XXX - EVENTS OF WEDNESDAY; THE UNIVERSITY OF CRAMOND<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+I awoke to much diffidence, even to a feeling that might be called the
+beginnings of panic, and lay for hours in my bed considering the situation.&nbsp;
+Seek where I pleased, there was nothing to encourage me and plenty to
+appal.&nbsp; They kept a close watch about the cottage; they had a beast
+of a watch-dog - at least, unless I had settled it; and if I had, I
+knew its bereaved master would only watch the more indefatigably for
+the loss.&nbsp; In the pardonable ostentation of love I had given all
+the money I could spare to Flora; I had thought it glorious that the
+hunted exile should come down, like Jupiter, in a shower of gold, and
+pour thousands in the lap of the beloved.&nbsp; Then I had in an hour
+of arrant folly buried what remained to me in a bank in George Street.&nbsp;
+And now I must get back the one or the other; and which? and how?<br>
+<br>
+As I tossed in my bed, I could see three possible courses, all extremely
+perilous.&nbsp; First, Rowley might have been mistaken; the bank might
+not be watched; it might still be possible for him to draw the money
+on the deposit receipt.&nbsp; Second, I might apply again to Robbie.&nbsp;
+Or, third, I might dare everything, go to the Assembly Ball, and speak
+with Flora under the eyes of all Edinburgh.&nbsp; This last alternative,
+involving as it did the most horrid risks, and the delay of forty-eight
+hours, I did but glance at with an averted head, and turned again to
+the consideration of the others.&nbsp; It was the likeliest thing in
+the world that Robbie had been warned to have no more to do with me.
+The whole policy of the Gilchrists was in the hands of Chevenix; and
+I thought this was a precaution so elementary that he was certain to
+have taken it.&nbsp; If he had not, of course I was all right: Robbie
+would manage to communicate with Flora; and by four o&rsquo;clock I
+might be on the south road and, I was going to say, a free man.&nbsp;
+Lastly, I must assure myself with my own eyes whether the bank in George
+Street were beleaguered.<br>
+<br>
+I called to Rowley and questioned him tightly as to the appearance of
+the Bow Street officer.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;What sort of looking man is he, Rowley?&rsquo; I asked, as I
+began to dress.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Wot sort of a looking man he is?&rsquo; repeated Rowley.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t very well know wot you would say, Mr. Anne.&nbsp;
+He ain&rsquo;t a beauty, any&rsquo;ow.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is he tall?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Tall?&nbsp; Well, no, I shouldn&rsquo;t say <i>tall</i> Mr. Anne.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, then, is he short?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Short?&nbsp; No, I don&rsquo;t think I would say he was what
+you would call <i>short</i>.&nbsp; No, not piticular short, sir.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Then, I suppose, he must be about the middle height?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, you might say it, sir; but not remarkable so.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I smothered an oath.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Is he clean-shaved?&rsquo; I tried him again.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Clean-shaved?&rsquo; he repeated, with the same air of anxious
+candour.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Good heaven, man, don&rsquo;t repeat my words like a parrot!&rsquo;
+I cried.&nbsp; &lsquo;Tell me what the man was like: it is of the first
+importance that I should be able to recognise him.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I&rsquo;m trying to, Mr. Anne.&nbsp; But <i>clean-shaved</i>?&nbsp;
+I don&rsquo;t seem to rightly get hold of that p&rsquo;int.&nbsp; Sometimes
+it might appear to me like as if he was; and sometimes like as if he
+wasn&rsquo;t.&nbsp; No, it wouldn&rsquo;t surprise me now if you was
+to tell me he &rsquo;ad a bit o&rsquo; whisker.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Was the man red-faced?&rsquo; I roared, dwelling on each syllable.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I don&rsquo;t think you need go for to get cross about it, Mr.
+Anne!&rsquo; said he.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;m tellin&rsquo; you every
+blessed thing I see!&nbsp; Red-faced?&nbsp; Well, no, not as you would
+remark upon.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+A dreadful calm fell upon me.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Was he anywise pale?&rsquo; I asked.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, it don&rsquo;t seem to me as though he were.&nbsp; But
+I tell you truly, I didn&rsquo;t take much heed to that.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Did he look like a drinking man?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, no.&nbsp; If you please, sir, he looked more like an eating
+one.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, he was stout, was he?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, sir.&nbsp; I couldn&rsquo;t go so far as that.&nbsp; No,
+he wasn&rsquo;t not to say <i>stout</i>.&nbsp; If anything, lean rather.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I need not go on with the infuriating interview.&nbsp; It ended as it
+began, except that Rowley was in tears, and that I had acquired one
+fact.&nbsp; The man was drawn for me as being of any height you like
+to mention, and of any degree of corpulence or leanness; clean-shaved
+or not, as the case might be; the colour of his hair Rowley &lsquo;could
+not take it upon himself to put a name on&rsquo;; that of his eyes he
+thought to have been blue - nay, it was the one point on which he attained
+to a kind of tearful certainty.&nbsp; &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll take my davy
+on it,&rsquo; he asseverated.&nbsp; They proved to have been as black
+as sloes, very little and very near together.&nbsp; So much for the
+evidence of the artless!&nbsp; And the fact, or rather the facts, acquired?&nbsp;
+Well, they had to do not with the person but with his clothing.&nbsp;
+The man wore knee-breeches and white stockings; his coat was &lsquo;some
+kind of a lightish colour - or betwixt that and dark&rsquo;; and he
+wore a &lsquo;mole-skin weskit.&rsquo;&nbsp; As if this were not enough,
+he presently haled me from my breakfast in a prodigious flutter, and
+showed me an honest and rather venerable citizen passing in the Square.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;That&rsquo;s <i>him</i>, sir,&rsquo; he cried, &lsquo;the very
+moral of him!&nbsp; Well, this one is better dressed, and p&rsquo;r&rsquo;aps
+a trifler taller; and in the face he don&rsquo;t favour him noways at
+all, sir.&nbsp; No, not when I come to look again, &rsquo;e don&rsquo;t
+seem to favour him noways.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Jackass!&rsquo; said I, and I think the greatest stickler for
+manners will admit the epithet to have been justified.<br>
+<br>
+Meanwhile the appearance of my landlady added a great load of anxiety
+to what I already suffered.&nbsp; It was plain that she had not slept;
+equally plain that she had wept copiously.&nbsp; She sighed, she groaned,
+she drew in her breath, she shook her head, as she waited on table.&nbsp;
+In short, she seemed in so precarious a state, like a petard three times
+charged with hysteria, that I did not dare to address her; and stole
+out of the house on tiptoe, and actually ran downstairs, in the fear
+that she might call me back.&nbsp; It was plain that this degree of
+tension could not last long.<br>
+<br>
+It was my first care to go to George Street, which I reached (by good
+luck) as a boy was taking down the bank shutters.&nbsp; A man was conversing
+with him; he had white stockings and a moleskin waistcoat, and was as
+ill-looking a rogue as you would want to see in a day&rsquo;s journey.&nbsp;
+This seemed to agree fairly well with Rowley&rsquo;s <i>signalement</i>:
+he had declared emphatically (if you remember), and had stuck to it
+besides, that the companion of the great Lavender was no beauty.<br>
+<br>
+Thence I made my way to Mr. Robbie&rsquo;s, where I rang the bell.&nbsp;
+A servant answered the summons, and told me the lawyer was engaged,
+as I had half expected.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Wha shall I say was callin&rsquo;?&rsquo; she pursued; and when
+I had told her &lsquo;Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; &lsquo;I think this&rsquo;ll
+be for you, then?&rsquo; she added, and handed me a letter from the
+hall table.&nbsp; It ran:<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;DEAR MR. DUCIE,<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My single advice to you is to leave <i>quam primum</i> for the
+South.<br>
+<br>
+Yours, T. ROBBIE.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+That was short and sweet.&nbsp; It emphatically extinguished hope in
+one direction.&nbsp; No more was to be gotten of Robbie; and I wondered,
+from my heart, how much had been told him.&nbsp; Not too much, I hoped,
+for I liked the lawyer who had thus deserted me, and I placed a certain
+reliance in the discretion of Chevenix.&nbsp; He would not be merciful;
+on the other hand, I did not think he would be cruel without cause.<br>
+<br>
+It was my next affair to go back along George Street, and assure myself
+whether the man in the moleskin vest was still on guard.&nbsp; There
+was no sign of him on the pavement.&nbsp; Spying the door of a common
+stair nearly opposite the bank, I took it in my head that this would
+be a good point of observation, crossed the street, entered with a businesslike
+air and fell immediately against the man in the moleskin vest.&nbsp;
+I stopped and apologised to him; he replied in an unmistakable English
+accent, thus putting the matter almost beyond doubt.&nbsp; After this
+encounter I must, of course, ascend to the top story, ring the bell
+of a suite of apartments, inquire for Mr. Vavasour, learn (with no great
+surprise) that he did not live there, come down again and, again politely
+saluting the man from Bow Street, make my escape at last into the street.<br>
+<br>
+I was now driven back upon the Assembly Ball.&nbsp; Robbie had failed
+me.&nbsp; The bank was watched; it would never do to risk Rowley in
+that neighbourhood.&nbsp; All I could do was to wait until the morrow
+evening, and present myself at the Assembly, let it end as it might.&nbsp;
+But I must say I came to this decision with a good deal of genuine fright;
+and here I came for the first time to one of those places where my courage
+stuck.&nbsp; I do not mean that my courage boggled and made a bit of
+a bother over it, as it did over the escape from the Castle; I mean,
+stuck, like a stopped watch or a dead man.&nbsp; Certainly I would go
+to the ball; certainly I must see this morning about my clothes.&nbsp;
+That was all decided.&nbsp; But the most of the shops were on the other
+side of the valley, in the Old Town; and it was now my strange discovery
+that I was physically unable to cross the North Bridge!&nbsp; It was
+as though a precipice had stood between us, or the deep sea had intervened.&nbsp;
+Nearer to the Castle my legs refused to bear me.<br>
+<br>
+I told myself this was mere superstition; I made wagers with myself
+- and gained them; I went down on the esplanade of Princes Street, walked
+and stood there, alone and conspicuous, looking across the garden at
+the old grey bastions of the fortress, where all these troubles had
+begun.&nbsp; I cocked my hat, set my hand on my hip, and swaggered on
+the pavement, confronting detection.&nbsp; And I found I could do all
+this with a sense of exhilaration that was not unpleasing, and with
+a certain <i>cr&acirc;nerie</i> of manner that raised me in my own esteem.&nbsp;
+And yet there was one thing I could not bring my mind to face up to,
+or my limbs to execute; and that was to cross the valley into the Old
+Town.&nbsp; It seemed to me I must be arrested immediately if I had
+done so; I must go straight into the twilight of a prison cell, and
+pass straight thence to the gross and final embraces of the nightcap
+and the halter.&nbsp; And yet it was from no reasoned fear of the consequences
+that I could not go.&nbsp; I was unable.&nbsp; My horse baulked, and
+there was an end!<br>
+<br>
+My nerve was gone: here was a discovery for a man in such imminent peril,
+set down to so desperate a game, which I could only hope to win by continual
+luck and unflagging effrontery!&nbsp; The strain had been too long continued,
+and my nerve was gone.&nbsp; I fell into what they call panic fear,
+as I have seen soldiers do on the alarm of a night attack, and turned
+out of Princes Street at random as though the devil were at my heels.&nbsp;
+In St. Andrew Square, I remember vaguely hearing some one call out.&nbsp;
+I paid no heed, but pressed on blindly.&nbsp; A moment after, a hand
+fell heavily on my shoulder, and I thought I had fainted.&nbsp; Certainly
+the world went black about me for some seconds; and when that spasm
+passed I found myself standing face to face with the &lsquo;cheerful
+extravagant,&rsquo; in what sort of disarray I really dare not imagine,
+dead white at least, shaking like an aspen, and mowing at the man with
+speechless lips.&nbsp; And this was the soldier of Napoleon, and the
+gentleman who intended going next night to an Assembly Ball!&nbsp; I
+am the more particular in telling of my breakdown, because it was my
+only experience of the sort; and it is a good tale for officers.&nbsp;
+I will allow no man to call me coward; I have made my proofs; few men
+more.&nbsp; And yet I (come of the best blood in France and inured to
+danger from a child) did, for some ten or twenty minutes, make this
+hideous exhibition of myself on the streets of the New Town of Edinburgh.<br>
+<br>
+With my first available breath I begged his pardon.&nbsp; I was of an
+extremely nervous disposition, recently increased by late hours; I could
+not bear the slightest start.<br>
+<br>
+He seemed much concerned.&nbsp; &lsquo;You must be in a devil of a state!&rsquo;
+said he; &lsquo;though of course it was my fault - damnably silly, vulgar
+sort of thing to do!&nbsp; A thousand apologies!&nbsp; But you really
+must be run down; you should consult a medico.&nbsp; My dear sir, a
+hair of the dog that bit you is clearly indicated.&nbsp; A touch of
+Blue Ruin, now?&nbsp; Or, come: it&rsquo;s early, but is man the slave
+of hours? what do you say to a chop and a bottle in Dumbreck&rsquo;s
+Hotel?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+I refused all false comfort; but when he went on to remind me that this
+was the day when the University of Cramond met; and to propose a five-mile
+walk into the country and a dinner in the company of young asses like
+himself, I began to think otherwise.&nbsp; I had to wait until to-morrow
+evening, at any rate; this might serve as well as anything else to bridge
+the dreary hours.&nbsp; The country was the very place for me: and walking
+is an excellent sedative for the nerves.&nbsp; Remembering poor Rowley,
+feigning a cold in our lodgings and immediately under the guns of the
+formidable and now doubtful Bethiah, I asked if I might bring my servant.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Poor devil! it is dull for him,&rsquo; I explained.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The merciful man is merciful to his ass,&rsquo; observed my sententious
+friend.&nbsp; &lsquo;Bring him by all means!<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+&ldquo;The harp, his sole remaining joy,<br>
+Was carried by an orphan boy;&rdquo;<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+and I have no doubt the orphan boy can get some cold victuals in the
+kitchen, while the Senatus dines.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Accordingly, being now quite recovered from my unmanly condition, except
+that nothing could yet induce me to cross the North Bridge, I arranged
+for my ball dress at a shop in Leith Street, where I was not served
+ill, cut out Rowley from his seclusion, and was ready along with him
+at the trysting-place, the corner of Duke Street and York Place, by
+a little after two.&nbsp; The University was represented in force: eleven
+persons, including ourselves, Byfield the aeronaut, and the tall lad,
+Forbes, whom I had met on the Sunday morning, bedewed with tallow, at
+the &lsquo;Hunters&rsquo; Rest.&rsquo;&nbsp; I was introduced; and we
+set off by way of Newhaven and the sea beach; at first through pleasant
+country roads, and afterwards along a succession of bays of a fairylike
+prettiness, to our destination - Cramond on the Almond - a little hamlet
+on a little river, embowered in woods, and looking forth over a great
+flat of quicksand to where a little islet stood planted in the sea.&nbsp;
+It was miniature scenery, but charming of its kind.&nbsp; The air of
+this good February afternoon was bracing, but not cold.&nbsp; All the
+way my companions were skylarking, jesting and making puns, and I felt
+as if a load had been taken off my lungs and spirits, and skylarked
+with the best of them.<br>
+<br>
+Byfield I observed, because I had heard of him before, and seen his
+advertisements, not at all because I was disposed to feel interest in
+the man.&nbsp; He was dark and bilious and very silent; frigid in his
+manners, but burning internally with a great fire of excitement; and
+he was so good as to bestow a good deal of his company and conversation
+(such as it was) upon myself, who was not in the least grateful.&nbsp;
+If I had known how I was to be connected with him in the immediate future,
+I might have taken more pains.<br>
+<br>
+In the hamlet of Cramond there is a hostelry of no very promising appearance,
+and here a room had been prepared for us, and we sat down to table.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here you will find no guttling or gormandising, no turtle or
+nightingales&rsquo; tongues,&rsquo; said the extravagant, whose name,
+by the way, was Dalmahoy.&nbsp; &lsquo;The device, sir, of the University
+of Cramond is Plain Living and High Drinking.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic Latin, which
+I could by no means follow, only I could hear it rhymed, and I guessed
+it to be more witty than reverent.&nbsp; After which the <i>Senatus
+Academicus</i> sat down to rough plenty in the shape of rizzar&rsquo;d
+haddocks and mustard, a sheep&rsquo;s head, a haggis, and other delicacies
+of Scotland.&nbsp; The dinner was washed down with brown stout in bottle,
+and as soon as the cloth was removed, glasses, boiling water, sugar,
+and whisky were set out for the manufacture of toddy.&nbsp; I played
+a good knife and fork, did not shun the bowl, and took part, so far
+as I was able, in the continual fire of pleasantry with which the meal
+was seasoned.&nbsp; Greatly daring, I ventured, before all these Scotsmen,
+to tell Sim&rsquo;s Tale of Tweedie&rsquo;s dog; and I was held to have
+done such extraordinary justice to the dialect, &lsquo;for a Southron,&rsquo;
+that I was immediately voted into the Chair of Scots, and became, from
+that moment, a full member of the University of Cramond.&nbsp; A little
+after, I found myself entertaining them with a song; and a little after
+- perhaps a little in consequence - it occurred to me that I had had
+enough, and would be very well inspired to take French leave.&nbsp;
+It was not difficult to manage, for it was nobody&rsquo;s business to
+observe my movements, and conviviality had banished suspicion.<br>
+<br>
+I got easily forth of the chamber, which reverberated with the voices
+of these merry and learned gentlemen, and breathed a long breath.&nbsp;
+I had passed an agreeable afternoon and evening, and I had apparently
+escaped scot free.&nbsp; Alas! when I looked into the kitchen, there
+was my monkey, drunk as a lord, toppling on the edge of the dresser,
+and performing on the flageolet to an audience of the house lasses and
+some neighbouring ploughmen.<br>
+<br>
+I routed him promptly from his perch, stuck his hat on, put his instrument
+in his pocket, and set off with him for Edinburgh.<br>
+<br>
+His limbs were of paper, his mind quite in abeyance; I must uphold and
+guide him, prevent his frantic dives, and set him continually on his
+legs again.&nbsp; At first he sang wildly, with occasional outbursts
+of causeless laughter.&nbsp; Gradually an inarticulate melancholy succeeded;
+he wept gently at times; would stop in the middle of the road, say firmly
+&lsquo;No, no, no,&rsquo; and then fall on his back: or else address
+me solemnly as &lsquo;M&rsquo;lord&rsquo; and fall on his face by way
+of variety.&nbsp; I am afraid I was not always so gentle with the little
+pig as I might have been, but really the position was unbearable.&nbsp;
+We made no headway at all, and I suppose we were scarce gotten a mile
+away from Cramond, when the whole <i>Senatus Academicus</i> was heard
+hailing, and doubling the pace to overtake its.<br>
+<br>
+Some of them were fairly presentable; and they were all Christian martyrs
+compared to Rowley; but they were in a frolicsome and rollicking humour
+that promised danger as we approached the town.&nbsp; They sang songs,
+they ran races, they fenced with their walking-sticks and umbrellas;
+and, in spite of this violent exercise, the fun grew only the more extravagant
+with the miles they traversed.&nbsp; Their drunkenness was deep-seated
+and permanent, like fire in a peat; or rather - to be quite just to
+them - it was not so much to be called drunkenness at all, as the effect
+of youth and high spirits - a fine night, and the night young, a good
+road under foot, and the world before you!<br>
+<br>
+I had left them once somewhat unceremoniously; I could not attempt it
+a second time; and, burthened as I was with Mr. Rowley, I was really
+glad of assistance.&nbsp; But I saw the lamps of Edinburgh draw near
+on their hill-top with a good deal of uneasiness, which increased, after
+we had entered the lighted streets, to positive alarm.&nbsp; All the
+passers-by were addressed, some of them by name.&nbsp; A worthy man
+was stopped by Forbes.&nbsp; &lsquo;Sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;in the
+name of the Senatus of the University of Cramond, I confer upon you
+the degree of LL.D.,&rsquo; and with the words he bonneted him.&nbsp;
+Conceive the predicament of St. Ives, committed to the society of these
+outrageous youths, in a town where the police and his cousin were both
+looking for him!&nbsp; So far, we had pursued our way unmolested, although
+raising a clamour fit to wake the dead; but at last, in Abercromby Place,
+I believe - at least it was a crescent of highly respectable houses
+fronting on a garden - Byfield and I, having fallen somewhat in the
+rear with Rowley, came to a simultaneous halt.&nbsp; Our ruffians were
+beginning to wrench off bells and door-plates!<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Oh, I say!&rsquo; says Byfield, &lsquo;this is too much of a
+good thing!&nbsp; Confound it, I&rsquo;m a respectable man - a public
+character, by George!&nbsp; I can&rsquo;t afford to get taken up by
+the police.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;My own case exactly,&rsquo; said I.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Here, let&rsquo;s bilk them,&rsquo; said he.<br>
+<br>
+And we turned back and took our way down hill again.<br>
+<br>
+It was none too soon: voices and alarm bells sounded; watchmen here
+and there began to spring their rattles; it was plain the University
+of Cramond would soon be at blows with the police of Edinburgh!&nbsp;
+Byfield and I, running the semi-inanimate Rowley before us, made good
+despatch, and did not stop till we were several streets away, and the
+hubbub was already softened by distance.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;Well, sir,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;we are well out of that!&nbsp;
+Did ever any one see such a pack of young barbarians?&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;We are properly punished, Mr. Byfield; we had no business there,&rsquo;
+I replied.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;No, indeed, sir, you may well say that!&nbsp; Outrageous!&nbsp;
+And my ascension announced for Friday, you know!&rsquo; cried the aeronaut.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;A pretty scandal!&nbsp; Byfield the aeronaut at the police-court!&nbsp;
+Tut-tut!&nbsp; Will you be able to get your rascal home, sir?&nbsp;
+Allow me to offer you my card.&nbsp; I am staying at Walker and Poole&rsquo;s
+Hotel, sir, where I should be pleased to see you.&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;The pleasure would be mutual, sir,&rsquo; said I, but I must
+say my heart was not in my words, and as I watched Mr. Byfield departing
+I desired nothing less than to pursue the acquaintance<br>
+<br>
+One more ordeal remained for me to pass.&nbsp; I carried my senseless
+load upstairs to our lodging, and was admitted by the landlady in a
+tall white nightcap and with an expression singularly grim.&nbsp; She
+lighted us into the sitting-room; where, when I had seated Rowley in
+a chair, she dropped me a cast-iron courtesy.&nbsp; I smelt gunpowder
+on the woman.&nbsp; Her voice, tottered with emotion.<br>
+<br>
+&lsquo;I give ye nottice, Mr. Ducie,&rsquo; said she.&nbsp; &lsquo;Dacent
+folks&rsquo; houses . . .&rsquo;<br>
+<br>
+And at that apparently temper cut off her utterance, and she took herself
+off without more words.<br>
+<br>
+I looked about me at the room, the goggling Rowley, the extinguished
+fire; my mind reviewed the laughable incidents of the day and night;
+and I laughed out loud to myself - lonely and cheerless laughter!.......<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+[As this point the Author&rsquo;s manuscript breaks off]<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, ST IVES ***<br>
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+</html>
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