The Tory Lover 33

The Tory Lover 33

With one bound Wallingford leaped upon the scoundrel and caught him in a

mighty clutch. There was the look of a fiend in Dickson’s face, in the

dim light, as he turned and saw the man he hated most, and the two

clinched in a fury. Then Dickson remembered the straight knife in his

belt, and as they fought he twisted himself free enough to get it in his

hand and strike; next moment Wallingford was flat on the cobblestones,

heavily fallen with a deep cut in his shoulder.

 

There were men running their way, and Dickson fled before them. He had

been badly mauled before the trick of stabbing could set him free; the

breath was sobbing out of his lungs from the struggle, but he ran

unhindered to the pier end, past the gaping townsfolk, and threw himself

into the water, striking out for the boat, which had drawn well away

from shore. There was a loud shout at his escape, but he was a good

swimmer. They were watching from the boat, and when they saw that

Dickson lagged, they drew nearer and dragged him in. It was all in a

moment; there was firing at them now from the shore. Hall and the

midshipman were at the very worst of their disappointment; they had

failed in their errand; the whole thing was a fiasco, and worse.

 

Then Dickson, though sick and heavy from such an intake of salt water,

managed to speak and tell them that Wallingford had waked the town; he

must have found the guardhouse at once, for the watch was out, and had

even set upon himself as he returned. He had reconnoitred carefully and

found all safe, when he heard a man behind him, and had to fight for his

life. Then he heard Wallingford calling and beating upon the doors.

They might know whether they had shipped a Tory, now! Dickson could

speak no more, and sank down, as if he were spent indeed, into the

bottom of the boat. He could tell already where every blow had struck

him, and a faintness weakened his not too sturdy frame.

 

Now they could see the shipping all afire across the harbor as they drew

out; the other boat’s party had done their work, and it was near to

broad day. Now the people were running and crying confusion, and boats

were putting out along the shore, and an alarm bell kept up an incessant

ringing in the town. The Ranger’s men rowed with all their might.

Dickson did not even care because the captain would give the boat a

rating; he had paid back old scores to the lofty young squire, his enemy

and scorner; the fault of their failure would be Wallingford’s. His

heart was light enough; he had done his work well. If Wallingford was

not already dead or bleeding to death like a pig, back there in the

street, the Whitehaven folk were like to make a pretty hanging of him

before sunset. There was one pity,—he had left his knife sticking in the

Tory’s shoulder, and this caused a moment of sharp regret; but it was a

plain sailor’s knife which he had lately got by chance at Brest, and

there were no witnesses to the encounter; his word was as good as

Wallingford’s to most men on their ship. He began to long for the

moment when the captain should hear their news. "He ’s none so great a

hero yet," thought Dickson, and groaned with pain as the boat lurched

and shifted him where he lay like ballast among the unused kindlings.

Wallingford had given him a fine lasting legacy of blows.

 

 

 

 

*XXVII*

 

*A PRISONER AND CAPTIVE*

 

"Close at thy side I walk unseen,

And feel thy passion and thy prayer.

Wide separation doth but prove

The mystic might of human love."

 

 

The poor lieutenant was soon turned over scornfully by a musket butt and

the toe of a stout Whitehaven shoe. The blood was steadily running from

his shoulder, and his coat was all sodden with a sticky wetness. He had

struck his head as he fell, and was at this moment happily unconscious

of all his woes.

 

"Let him lie, the devil!" growled a second man who came along,—a citizen

armed with a long cutlass, but stupid with fear, and resenting the loss

of his morning sleep and all his peace of mind. They could see the

light of the burning vessel on the roofs above. "Let’s get away a bit

further from the shore," said he; "there may be their whole ship’s

company landed and ranging the town."

 

"This damned fellow ’ll do nobody any mischief," agreed the soldier, and

away they ran. But presently his companion stole back to find if there

were anything for an honest man and a wronged one in this harmless

officer’s pockets. There were some letters in women’s writing that

could be of no use to any one, and some tobacco. "’T is the best

American sort," said the old citizen, who had once been a sailor in the

Virginia trade. He saw the knife sticking fast, and pulled it out; but

finding it was a cheap thing enough, and disagreeable just now to have

in hand, he tossed it carelessly aside. He found a purse of money in

one pocket, and a handsome watch with a seal like some great

gentleman’s; but this was strangely hooked and ringed to the fob

buttons, and the chain so strong that though a man pulled hard enough to

break it, and even set his foot on the stranger’s thigh to get a good

purchase, the links would not give way. The citizen looked for the

convenient knife again, but missed it under the shadow of the wall.

There were people coming. He pocketed what he had got, and looked

behind him anxiously: then he got up and ran away, only half content

with the purse and good tobacco.

 

An old woman, and a girl with her, were peeping through the dirty panes

of a poor, narrow house close by; and now, seeing that there was such a

pretty gentleman in distress, and that the citizen, whom they knew and

treasured a grudge against, had been frightened away, they came out to

drag him into shelter. Just as they stepped forth together on the

street, however, a squad of soldiers, coming up at double-quick,

captured this easy prisoner, whose heart was beating yet. One of them

put the hanging watch into his own pocket, unseen,—oddly enough, it came

easily into his hand; and after some consideration of so grave a matter

of military necessity, two of them lifted Wallingford, and finding him

both long and heavy called a third to help, and turned back to carry him

to the guard-house. By the time they reached the door a good quarter

part of the townsfolk seemed to be following in procession, with angry

shouts, and tearful voices of women begging to know if their husbands or

lovers had been seen in danger; and there were loud threats, too, meant

for the shaming of the silent figure carried by stout yeomen of the

guard.

 

After some hours Wallingford waked, wretched with the smart of his

wounds, and dazed by the first sight of his strange lodging in the town

jail. There were no friends to succor him; he had not even the resource

of being mistaken for a Tory and a friend of the Crown. There were at

least three strutting heroes showing themselves in different quarters of

the town, that evening, who claimed the honor of giving such a dangerous

pirate his deathblow.

 

Some days passed before the officer in charge of this frightened seaport

(stricken with sincere dismay, and apprehensive of still greater

disaster from such stealthy neighbors on the sea) could receive the

answer to his report sent to headquarters. Wallingford felt more and

more the despair of his situation. The orders came at last that, as

soon as he could be moved, he should be sent to join his fellow rebels

in the old Mill Prison at Plymouth. The Whitehaven citizens should not

risk or invite any attempt at his rescue by his stay. But, far from

regretting his presence, there were even those who lamented his

departure; who would have willingly bought new ribbons to their bonnets

to go and see such a rogue hanged, wounded shoulder and all, on a

convenient hill and proper gallows outside the town.

 

 

None of the heavy-laden barley ships or colliers dared to come or go.

The fishing boats that ventured out to their business came home in a

flutter at the sight of a strange sail; and presently Whitehaven was

aghast at the news of the robbery of all my Lady Selkirk’s plate, and

the astonishing capture of his Majesty’s guardship Drake out of

Carrickfergus, and six merchantmen taken beside in the Irish Sea,—three

of them sunk, and three of them sent down as prizes to French ports.

The quicker such a prisoner left this part of the realm, the better for

Whitehaven. The sheriff and a strong guard waited next morning at the

door of the jail, and Wallingford, taken from his hard bed, was set on a

steady horse to begin the long southward journey, and be handed on from

jail to jail. The fresh air of the spring morning, after the close

odors of his prison, at first revived him. Even the pain of his wound

was forgotten, and he took the change gladly, not knowing whither he

went or what the journey was meant to bring him.

 

At first they climbed long hills in sight of the sea. Notwithstanding

all his impatience of the sordid jealousies and discomforts of life on

board the Ranger, Roger Wallingford turned his weak and painful body

more than once, trying to catch a last glimpse of the tall masts of the

brave, fleet little ship. A remembrance of the good-fellowship of his

friends aboard seemed to make a man forget everything else, and to put

warmth in his heart, though the chill wind on the fells blew through his

very bones. For the first time he had been treated as a man among men

on board the Ranger. In early youth the heir of a rich man could not

but be exposed to the flatteries of those who sought his father’s

favors, and of late his property and influence counted the Loyalists far

more than any of that counsel out of his own heart for which some of

them had begged obsequiously. Now he had come face to face with life as

plain men knew it, and his sentiment of sympathy had grown and doubled

in the hard process. He winced at the remembrance of that

self-confidence he had so cherished in earlier years. He had come near

to falling an easy prey to those who called him Sir Roger, and were but

serving their own selfish ends; who cared little for either Old England

or New, and still less for their King. There was no such thing as a

neutral, either; a man was one thing or the other. And now his head

grew light and dizzy, while one of those sudden visions of Mary

Hamilton’s face, the brave sweetness of her living eyes as if they were

close to his own, made him forget the confused thoughts of the moment

before.

 

The quick bracing of the morning air was too much for the prisoner; he

felt more and more as if he were dreaming. There was a strange longing

in his heart to be back in the shelter and quiet of the jail itself;

there began to be a dull roaring in his ears. Like a sharp pain there

came to him the thought of home, of his mother’s looks and her smile as

she stood watching at the window when he came riding home. He was not

riding home now: the thought of it choked his throat. He remembered his

mother as he had proudly seen her once in her satin gown and her laces

and diamonds, at the great feast for Governor Hutchinson’s birthday, in

the Province House,—by far the first, to his young eyes, of the fine

distinguished ladies who were there. How frail and slender she stood

among them! But now a wretched weakness mastered him; he was afraid to

think where he might be going. They could not know how ill and helpless

he was, these stout men of his guard, who sometimes watched him angrily,

and then fell to talking together in low voices. The chill of the

mountain cloud they were riding into seemed to have got to his heart.

Again his brain failed him, and then grew frightfully clear again; then

he began to fall asleep in the saddle, and to know that he slept,

jolting and swaying as they began to ride faster. The horse was a

steady, plodding creature, whose old sides felt warm and comfortable to

the dreaming rider. He wished, ever so dimly, that if he fell they

would leave him there by the road and let him sleep. He lost a stirrup

now, and it struck his ankle sharply to remind him, but there was no use

to try to get it again; then everything turned black.

 

One of the soldiers caught the horse just as the prisoner’s head began

to drag along the frozen road.

 

"His wound’s a-bleeding bad. Look-a-here!" he shouted to the others,

who were riding on, their horses pressing each other close, and their

cloaks held over their faces in the cold mountain wind. "Here, ahoy!

our man ’s dead, lads! The blood’s trailed out o’ him all along the

road!"

 

"He ’s cheated justice, then, curse him!" said the officer smartly,

looking down from his horse; but the old corporal, who had fought at

Quebec with Wolfe, and knew soldiering by heart, though he was low on

the ladder of promotion by reason of an unconquerable love of

brandy,—the old corporal dropped on his knees, and felt Wallingford’s

heart beating small and quick inside the wet, stained coat, and then

took off his own ragged riding cloak to wrap him from the cold.