The Black Box 31

The Black Box 31

Dismounting, I went in and glanced about. Nothing was there except a

manger full of straw--so bulging full, in fact, that I was minded to

explore it. But barely had I gone a step when methought I heard a

rustling of the straw, and sure enough next moment something bright came

poking through. A pistol barrel! With a diving leap, I seized and

turned the threatening thing, forcing the muzzle upwards; and not a whit

too soon, for even as I did so it exploded, and the bullet crashed into

the rafters. Then as I clutched a bony wrist, and twisted it, a

smothered cry arose, the pistol fell, a close-cropped head shot forth,

and I was face to face with Tubal Ammon.

 

Letting go my hold I sprang back, whipped out my sword, and stared at

him as one would at a fearsome apparition, while he sat up and fixed me

with his cunning eyes.

 

"At last!" I hissed, as soon as I could find my voice.

 

"Aye, verily," grinned he, shaking the straw from off his shoulders;

"’twould seem that you and I, friend, were ordained to come across each

other; ’tis indeed as if our horoscope were cast in----"

 

"Enough of that," I broke in fiercely. "Come forth, you dog!"

 

He instantly obeyed. Leaping out, he stood there with folded arms, his

ugly head thrust forward, and his eyes fixed hungrily upon the doorway

towards which my back was turned.

 

"What now?" he asked at last, and though he grinned, I saw that fear

lurked on his face.

 

"Why, this," I answered, slowly. "I should do well to put a bullet

through so foul a cur, but that is scarcely to my liking. No, Tubal

Ammon, I will kill thee in a closer fashion. Therefore, draw sword and

fight for it."

 

Out flashed his blade, while by his look I knew that he was mightily

relieved to have so fine a chance, and thought to kill me.

 

"Art ready?"

 

"Yes."

 

"Then, have at you for a murderer and a villain!" With that our swords

crossed, and even on that night of battle, with its many hand-to-hand

encounters, no fiercer, deadlier combat could have raged than that which

now commenced inside that lonely building. If ever two men strove amain

to kill each other, we were those two; if ever steel shot forth with

hate behind it, that steel was surely ours.

 

My foe soon proved himself a skilful, wary swordsman, but had he been

the finest then in England, methinks I would have mastered him at last.

Fearing, if chance afforded, that he might dart out into the night and

thus escape me, I kept a stolid back towards the doorway. Thus it was

he who did most of the attacking, and so swift and furious was it that

more than once his point came dangerously near my heart.

 

At last I tried a sudden twist (learnt from my father), and thereby

forced Ammon’s weapon from his grasp. He sprang back hissing like a

cat, and doubtless thought his hour was come. But though I longed to

kill him that was not my way of doing it. I bid him take his sword

again--an act of fairness which came near costing me my life; for

presently, presuming on it, he made pretence to lose his weapon yet

again, and when I motioned him to take it, made a sudden, upward thrust

at me ere I was ready for him. But at last the craftiness of Tubal Ammon

failed him utterly. I turned his blade aside so that it ran beneath my

arm, and, as he thus rushed blindly forward, my sword shot straight into

his breast. Staggering to the wall, he stood there glaring at me for a

moment, while the life-blood spurted from him; then with a vengeful cry

he tried to spring upon me--failed, and crashed dead at my feet.

 

Thus died Tubal Ammon, King of Subtlety, and verily it seemed to me the

manner of his end was one which well befitted him. ’Twas in a barn that

he had tried to kill me privily--’twas in a hovel that I left him dead.

 

One half of my vow thus happily accomplished, I went in search of him

whom Ammon’s sword had smitten. I found him lying with his shoulders

partly propped up by a tree, to which he had made shift to crawl. His

hands were spread in front of him, his chin hung down upon his breast,

and so I thought that he was dead. But on kneeling down beside him I

found that he still breathed. Having taken off his steel cap I raised

the drooping head, then nearly let it fall again, for the bloodless

face, on which a setting moon shone, was none other than John Coram’s.

 

His eyes were closed, but when I called his name he opened them and

gazed at me in a dim, dazed fashion.

 

"You here--you?" he murmured.

 

"Yes, yes; how came it thus?" I said.

 

"Stark!" he gasped. "We met in battle--I pursued--he led me on--then

turned upon me here--and--faith, his accursed sword hath gone clean

through my lungs. I bleed within. I die."

 

"Stark is dead," I said by way of comfort.

 

"What! didst kill him?"

 

"Yes. He lies dead scarce two hundred yards from here."

 

"Good--good!" he murmured fervently. "But stay--it grows amazing dark!

Come near, friend."

 

I put my ear close to his mouth.

 

"That money which you gave me, friend," he whispered faintly, "’tis in

my pocket with some more besides. I have a wife and little girl in

Bridgewater. Wilt see they get it?"

 

"It shall be done," I answered.

 

Seeking my hand he pressed it closely, saying:

 

"Thanks, good, true friend; now can I die in peace."

 

With that he closed his eyes again, his head sank back upon my shoulder,

and I thought his life had sped; but suddenly he looked forth with a

wild, unearthly stare, and pointed skywards, saying:

 

"See! see! A mighty army which no man can number! Hark to the tramp of

feet! They march, and I must join them! Let me go, friend!"

 

Springing to his feet, he stood there swaying like a drunken man; and,

waving a hand above his head, cried:

 

"Monmouth! Liberty! God with----"

 

The choking blood gushed up into his throat, and so he staggered back

into my arms--a corpse.

 

I laid him gently down, folded his hands upon his breast, and having

said a simple prayer above him, rode swiftly back to other scenes of

death.

 

 

 

 

*CHAPTER XXI*

 

*I Leave the Service of King James*

 

 

When I reached the battle-field, the dawn was breaking and the fight was

all but done. Only the gallant men of Somerset still held their

ground--a handful of doomed heroes, who scorned to yield to anything

save death, which rushed upon them from all sides. ’Twas a moving sight

indeed to see these brave, misguided fellows standing there--hemmed in

on every side; deserted by their comrades; mowed down by dozens every

minute: yet still fighting manfully with pike and scythe and musket for

the cause they held so dear. In the midst of them stood a tall,

red-coated minister waving a sword in one hand and a Bible in the other,

the while he shouted words of exhortation and encouragement; but just as

I drew close a musket bullet struck him in the mouth, and down he went

to everlasting silence. Almost as he fell their firing slackened, and a

wild, beseeching cry broke from them:

 

"Powder! for God’s sake, powder!"

 

Their only answer to this piteous appeal was another furious onfall of

the Royalist horse, which swept them clean away--and all was over. The

struggle for a kingly crown had once more been decided by the sacrifice

of innocent and simple men.

 

The Duke had long since fled the field. While there was hope he fought

with bravery (or at least ’tis said so, for I never saw him), leading

his men on foot, with pike in hand. But no sooner did defeat seem

certain than he galloped off with Grey--his general of horse, and Buyse,

the German soldier--leaving his hapless followers to their fate; an act

of perfidy, it seems to me, which must for ever brand him as a coward.

Yet it availed him nothing, for, as ye know, he was taken two days

afterwards, hiding in a ditch at Ringwood, in Hampshire--a wretched,

half-starved, bearded creature, disguised in shepherd’s clothing, and so

changed that those who captured him scarce knew him for the handsome,

smiling fellow who had stepped ashore at Lyme less than a month before.

From Ringwood he was borne to London, and, notwithstanding all his

abject cries for pardon to the king, his uncle, he lost his head within

a week on Tower Hill.

 

But to return to Sedgemoor. The fight was over, and what had it cost?

Well, a thousand of the Duke’s men lay there dead upon the moor, with

some three hundred of our own to keep them company. But this was only

the beginning of such wanton butchery as sent all England cold with

horror when the tidings of it spread abroad. For throughout those

western counties men were harried day and night--hunted down like

vermin--and either shot, stabbed, or hanged; while those who escaped so

swift a death were driven into the towns chained together like great

flocks of sheep, and there cast into prison to await a no less certain

doom when Jeffreys came his bloody rounds.

 

The frightened tithing-men, fearful lest lack of zeal might be construed

into a favouring of the rebels, made haste to set up rough gibbets in

wellnigh every village, and thereon, day in, day out, hanging went

forward at a sickening pace. Nor was this all. It did not stop at

hanging. Commands went forth that drawing and quartering was to follow;

and so heads and trunks, well seethed in pitch, were scattered

broadcast, to be set up as warnings to a people who were already far too

terrified to need them.