Cardigan Part 87

CHAPTER XXIV

I was taken, in company with Jack Mount, on Monday morning, the 29th of October, 1774, without warrant or process, without a shadow of legal right, without the faintest justification or excuse, save that I had been seen conversing with Mount on the Mall, and had resisted the thief-taker Bishop and his filthy gang of bailiffs.

From the 29th of October until the 15th day of December, chained ankle to ankle, wrist to wrist, and wearing a steel collar from which chains hung and were riveted to the rings on my legs, I lay in that vile iron cage known as the "Pirates' Chapel," in company with Mount and eight sullen, cursing ruffians, taken in piracy off the Virginia capes by his Majesty's ship _Hebe_, consort of the frigate _Asia_.

During those six weeks not a moment pa.s.sed in which I despaired, not an hour dragged out its chain of minutes but I believed it must be the hour for my delivery from this hideous injustice.

From the minute I had entered the "Chapel," the dull amazement which had fettered mind and body in a strange paralysis gave way to a deadly patience. My benumbed faculties grew clear; every sense became abnormally alert. Calmly I faced the terrible dilemma; I probed its consequences coolly; I understood that while Walter Butler held the Governor's ear, and while the Governor held the civil power at his own pleasure, and used it as whim or caprice moved him, I could neither hope for a hearing before a magistrate nor dare expect a trial by my countrymen. The soiled hand of England had polluted the ermine of the judges; the bayonets of England cleared the court-rooms; the mocking Governor brooded in Province House, watching the structure of civil rights crumble and collapse, while his judges, his sheriffs, his bailiffs, and his soldiers prowled through the debris of a structure which had been reared by my own people's martyrdom.

As for communication with the outside world, with friends, even with hostile relatives, or with the Governor himself, there was no possible chance. Our steel cage was set in the centre of a stone chamber, the barred windows of which opened on a bare stony parade, bounded on the east by Cornhill, on the west by Treamount Street, and on the south by School Street and the dead wall enclosing King's Chapel. There was not a soul to be seen in the prison or outside save the marine sentinels, the jailers, the warden of the prison, and the eight ruffians who were caged with us, among whom there was but a single Englishman.

Our cage was bedded with straw like a kennel; our food was brought us three times a day, in earthen bowls. A wooden spoon went with each bowl, otherwise the feed differed nothing from the feed of dogs.

Mount, in the beginning, had conducted like a madman, pa.s.sing swiftly up and down his cage, pacing to and fro along the ranks of steel bars, blank fury glaring from his eyes, jaw hanging like the jowl of a committed panther.

All that first night he stalked the cage, brushing the bars with brow and thigh, and deep in his blue eyes there burned a terrible light, like the livid witch-fires which flare in haunted swamps.

At first the manacled ruffians who lay about us in the straw watched him doggedly, but as the night wore on and his pacing never ceased, they growled sullen protest. Then he slowly turned on them, baring his white teeth.

From that moment they gave him room and he ruled the cage as a silent, powerful beast rules, scarcely conscious of the cringing creatures who huddle around his legs, and whose presence cannot invade the solitude of his own fierce misery.

The light in the stone chamber was cool and gray--clear enough, yet never tinged with sunlight. Night brought thick, troubled shadows creeping around the single candle which dripped from an iron socket riveted to the wall. Then the shades of the jailers fell across the floor as the large lanthorn was set outside in the corridor, and all night long the shuffling tread of the sentry marked the dead march of time.

For three days, now, I had not touched the broth which was set on the straw beside me; I do not know that I should have made the effort to eat at all, except for an accident. It happened in this manner: one day, towards the middle of December, I had been lying on my belly, trying to think out something of that future which I had not yet despaired of. Musing there, nose buried in my arms, I lay almost on the verge of slumber, yet with one eye on the corridor beyond, when I saw distinctly a woman's face peer through the thick grating which separated the corridor from our stone chamber.

After a while the face disappeared; I lay still a moment, then touched Mount's arm.

He turned his haggard face to me.

"Bishop's daughter is in the corridor," I whispered.

"Where?" asked Mount, vacantly.

"Out there behind the grating. She may do something for--for you. If she should, I think we had better try to eat."

"Yes," he said, "we must eat." And he turned with a snarl on one of the caged wretches behind us who for days had been battening on the food that neither Jack nor I touched.

The man was in the act of dragging Mount's bowl and spoon towards his own nest in the straw, but he dropped the food and shrank back as Mount seized it with an oath.

I also secured my own bowl of bread and broth, and, together, we ate as animals eat, eying the others malevolently and askance.

That night Mount lay awake, watching the grating. At dawn I awoke to watch, and Mount rolled himself up into a ball of buckskin and slept the first peaceful sleep which had come to him since his taking.

The day pa.s.sed in horrible monotony; our straw had become so foul that my head swam with the stench. But towards evening came a jailer and two soldiers, who raked the filthy straw from our cage, mopped the reeking floor, and when it had partly dried, shook us down a bedding of sweet rye-straw, into which we burrowed like dogs.

That night we heard the noise of hammers overhead, and at first terror seized on all in the cage, for we believed that workmen had come to build gibbets. In the morning, when our jailer arrived to fetch us water, I spoke to him, scarcely expecting a reply, for he had never before paid the faintest attention to questions from any of us.

I was surprised, therefore, when he hesitated, glanced up at me, and finally informed me that the hammering we heard was made by masons and carpenters who were reconstructing the upper tiers of the prison for the new warden and his family.

Presuming on his pleasant manner, I continued my questioning, but he soon silenced me with a shake of his head.

"I know nothing about your case," he said. "Matters move slowly here; the prison is crowded with rebels who have defied the Governor's edict against public a.s.semblies. Their cases come before yours, young man."

"And the others here?" I asked.

He paid no attention to my question.

I asked for news of the outside world, but he would give me none.

Mount, whose morbid curiosity had been aroused by the sight of some workmen digging holes in the yard outside the prison, stood up to watch them. The other prisoners also huddled to the south side of the cage, their chains making a great clanking as they moved. At the moment when their backs were turned the jailer looked at them significantly, then at me, and, to my horror, pa.s.sed his withered fingers over his corded throat.

I stared at him, fascinated, but he shrugged his stooping shoulders, shuffled off to the wicket, let himself out, and slammed the grating.

That night I sat close to Jack Mount, my hand on his broad shoulder, crushing back the lump in my throat. I believed he was to die soon; when, I did not know; but the grim gesture of the jailer had conveyed a hint that could not be mistaken.

At dawn I stood up to gaze fearfully out into the prison yard. Snow had fallen; workmen were digging at the holes with pick and crow.

When the jailer brought breakfast to us, he laid two bundles of sail-cloth on the floor under the windows beyond our cage. Later he returned and carefully nailed each strip of cloth over the windows, hiding our view of the prison yard.

Mount asked him why he did that; the other prisoners became restless and suspicious, calling out to the jailer in Spanish and Portuguese; even the Englishman broke his long silence with a sneering inquiry as to the reason of cutting off our view. The jailer continued his task without answering or even glancing at the imprisoned men, who now crowded against the bars, clamouring, gesticulating, and clanking their manacles. They were stunted, swarthy fellows, bull-necked, s.h.a.ggy of hair and beard, clothed in filthy shreds of finery to which the straw stuck.

Some were frightfully scarred; some were still swathed in bandages, greasy with filth, tied over unhealed sores or wounds. One of them, who wore large gold hoops in his ears, had lost his right hand, but he beat against the steel bars with the mangled stump, and cried ever: "Listen, senor, you good fellow! He! Senor! I say, senor! They will to do me no harm, eh? I am innocent, what? And thus I say to your senor Governor; eh, you good fellow? What? It is the holy truth, by Jesu!"

The Englishman laughed scornfully: "They're planting trees in the yard outside. We'll all climb them soon, won't we, jailer?"

"By G.o.d," muttered Mount, "they are planting gallows!"

When he had shrouded the windows, the jailer scrambled briskly to the floor and hastened out through the wicket, unheeding the shouts and shrill cries of the ruffians, who had rushed to the other side of the cage. When the wicket slammed the panic ceased; a dead silence followed, then one of the Spaniards uttered a piercing scream and fell down into the straw, tearing and biting at his chains.

"Die like a man! Die like a man!" said the Englishman, contemptuously; but terror had seized another of the ruffians, and he began hobbling around the cage, shrieking out prayer on prayer.

Mount, pale and composed, lay at full length in our corner, watching the wicket, a straw between his white teeth. I sat beside him, my heart hammering under my torn shirt, resolutely crushing back the terror which was feeling my throat with icy fingers.

"Do you believe they are setting the gibbets?" I asked.

"Yes," he said.

After a moment he added: "Why did you not leave me, lad? This is foul company for a gentleman to die in."

Terror choked me. I sank face downward in the straw, blind with fright, and lay there shaking till the candle was lighted and the lanthorn in the corridor sent its yellow rays through the wicket.

Black, whirling thoughts swarmed through my brain; again and again I fought the battle for courage, only to lose it and again find myself faint with horror, tearing silently at my chains.

"Now that I know I am to die," said Mount, calmly, "I shall die easily enough. It was hope that hurt. I shall die easily."

"I shall die hard," I stammered; "no one will know it, but I shall die hard out there in the snow."

"I will stand next to you if I can," said Mount. "If you feel weak, reach out and touch me. I shall jest with the hangman. It is easy; you will see how easy it can be." I raised my head to look at him.