Matilda Montgomerie Or The Prophecy Fulfilled Part 8

"Never mind, my boy, we shall be at home presently," pursued Simon, patting the neck of his unquiet companion. "But, no--I had forgotten; we must give chase to these (hiccup) to these rascals. Now there's that son Bill of mine fast asleep, I suppose, in the arms of his little wife.

They do nothing but lie in bed, while their poor old father is obliged to be up at all hours, devising plans for the good of the King's service, G.o.d bless him! But I shall soon (hiccup)--Whoa, Silvertail!

whoa, I say! D----n you, you brute, do you mean to throw me?"

The restlessness of Silvertail, despite of his rider's caresses, had been visibly increasing as they approached the dark cl.u.s.ter of walnuts.

Arrived opposite to this, his ears and tail erect, he had evinced even more than restlessness--alarm: and something, that did not meet the eye of his rider, caused him to take a sideward spring of several feet. It was this action that, nearly unseating Simon, had drawn from him the impatient exclamation just recorded.

At length the thicket was pa.s.sed, and Silvertail, recovered from his alarm, moved forward once more on the bound, in obedience to the well known whistle of his master.

"Good speed have they made," again mused Simon, as he approached his home: "if indeed, as I suspect, it be them who are hiding in yonder thicket. Silvertail could not have been more than ten minutes finishing his (hiccup) his corn, and the sands had but little time to warm beneath his boots when he did start. These Yankees are swift footed fellows, as I have had good (hiccup) good experience in the old war, when I could run a little myself like the best of them. But here we are at last. Whoa, Silvertail, whoa! and now to turn out Bill from his little wife. Bill, I say, hilloa! hilloa! Bill, hilloa!"

Long habit, which had taught the old man's truly excellent and exemplary son the utter hopelessness of his disease, had also familiarized him with these nightly interruptions to his slumbers. A light was speedily seen to flash across the chamber in which he slept, and presently the princ.i.p.al door of the lower building was unbarred, and unmurmuring and uncomplaining, the half-dressed young man stood in the presence of his father. Placing the light on the threshold, he prepared to a.s.sist him as usual to dismount, but Simon, contrary to custom, rejected for a time every offer of the kind. His rapid gallop through the night air, added to the more than ordinary quant.i.ty of whiskey he had that day swallowed, was now producing its effect, and, while every feature of his countenance manifested the extreme of animal stupidity, his apprehension wandered and his voice became almost inarticulate. Without the power to acquaint his son with the purpose he had in view, and of which he himself now entertained but a very indistinct recollection, he yet strove, impelled as he was by his confusedness of intention, to retain his seat, but was eventually unhorsed and handed over to the care of his pretty daughter-in-law, whose office it was to dispose of him for the night, while her husband rubbed down, fed, and otherwise attended to Silvertail.

A few hours of sound sleep restored Simon to his voice and his recollection, when his desire to follow the two individuals he had seen in the yard of the inn the preceding night, and whom he felt persuaded he must have pa.s.sed on the road, was more than ever powerfully revived.

And yet, was it not highly probable that the favorable opportunity had been lost, and that, taking advantage of the night, they were already departed from the country, if such (and he doubted it not) was their intention. "What a cursed fool," he muttered to himself, "to let a thimbleful of liquor upset me on such an occasion, but, at all events, here goes for another trial." With the impatient, over-indulged Simon, to determine on a course of action, was to carry it into effect.

"Hilloa, Bill! I say, Bill my boy!" he shouted from the chamber next to that in which his son slept. "Hilloa! Bill, come here directly."

Bill answered not, but sounds were heard in his room as of one stepping out of bed, and presently the noise of flint and steel announced that a light was being struck. In a few minutes the rather jaded-looking youth appeared at the bedstead of his parent.

"Bill, my dear boy," said Simon, in a more subdued voice, "did you see anybody pa.s.s last night after I came home? Try and recollect yourself; did you see two men on the road?"

"I did, father; just as I had locked the stable door, and was coming in for the night, I saw two men pa.s.sing down the road. But why do you ask?"

"Did you speak to them--could you recognise them?" asked Simon, without stating his motive for the question.

"I wished them good night; and one of them gruffly bade me good night too; but I could not make out who they were, though one did for a moment strike me to be Desborough, and both were tallish sort of men."

"You're a lad of penetration, Bill; now saddle me Silvertail as fast as you can."

"Saddle Silvertail! Surely, father, you are not going out yet; it's not daylight."

"Saddle Silvertail, Bill," repeated the old man, with the air of one whose mandate was not to be questioned. "But where the devil are you going, sir?" he added, impatiently.

"Why to saddle Silvertail, to be sure," said the youth, who was just closing the door for that purpose.

"What, and leave me, a miserable old man, to get up without a light? Oh fie, Bill. I thought you loved your poor old father better than to neglect him so--there, that will do. Now send in Lucy to dress me."

The light was kindled, Bill went in and spoke to his wife, then descended to the stable. A gentle tap at the door of the old interpreter, and Lucy entered in her pretty night dress, and, half asleep, half awake, but without a shadow of discontent in her look, proceeded to a.s.sist him in drawing on his stockings, &c. Simon's toilet was soon completed, and Silvertail being announced as "all ready," he, without communicating a word of his purpose, issued forth from his home just as the day was beginning to dawn.

Although the reflective powers of Girtie had been in some measure restored by sleep, it is by no means to be a.s.sumed he was yet thoroughly sober. Uncertain in regard to the movements of those who had so strongly excited his loyal hostility, (and, mayhap, at the moment his curiosity,) it occurred to him that if Desborough had not already baffled his pursuit, a knowledge of the movements and intentions of that individual might be better obtained from an observation of what was pa.s.sing on the beach in front of his hut. The object of this reconnaissance was, therefore, only to see if the canoe of the settler was still on the sh.o.r.e, and with this object he suffered Silvertail to take the road along the sands, while he himself, with his arms folded and his head sunk on his chest, fell into a reverie with which was connected the manner and the means of securing the disloyal Desborough, should it happen that he had not yet departed. The accidental discharge of Middlemore's pistol, at the very moment when Silvertail had doubled a point that kept the scene of contention from his view, caused him to raise his eyes, and then the whole truth flashed suddenly upon him. We have already seen how gallantly he advanced to them, and how madly, and in a manner peculiarly his own, he sought to arrest the traitor Desborough in his flight.

"Sorry I couldn't force the scoundrel back, gentlemen," said Simon, as he now approached the discomfited officers. "Not much hurt, I hope,"

pointing with his own maimed and bleeding hand to the leg of Middlemore, which that officer, seated on the sand, was preparing to bind with a silk handkerchief. "Ah, a mere flesh wound, I see. Henry, Henry Grantham, my poor dear boy, what still alive after the desperate clutching of that fellow at your throat? But now that we have routed the enemy--must be off--drenched to the skin. No liquor on the stomach to keep out the cold, and if I once get an ague fit, its all over with poor old Simon. Must gallop home, and, while his little wife wraps a bandage round my hand, shall send down Bill with a litter. Good morning, Mr.

Middlemore, good bye, Henry, my boy." And then, without giving time to either to reply, the old man applied his spurs once more to the flanks of Silvertail, who, with drooping mane and tail, resembled a half drowned rat; and again hallooing defiance to Desborough, who lay to at a distance, apparently watching the movements of his enemies, he retraced his way along the sands at full gallop, and was speedily out of sight.

Scarcely had Girty disappeared, when two other individuals, evidently officers, and cloaked precisely like the party he had just quitted, issued from the wood near the hut upon the clearing, and thence upon the sands--their countenances naturally expressing all the surprise that might be supposed to arise from the picture now offered to their view.

"What in the name of Heaven is the meaning of all this?" asked one of the new comers, as both now rapidly advanced to the spot where Middlemore was yet employed in coolly binding up his leg, while Henry Grantham, who had just risen, was gasping with almost ludicrous efforts to regain his respiration.

"You must ask the meaning of our friend here," answered Middlemore, with the low chuckling good-natured laugh that was habitual to him, while he proceeded with his bandaging. "All I know is, that I came out as a second, and here have I been made a first--a princ.i.p.al, which, by the way, is contrary to all my principle."

"Do be serious for once, Middlemore. How did you get wounded, and who are those scoundrels who have just quitted you?" anxiously inquired Captain Molineux, for it was he, and Lieutenant Villiers, who, (the party already stated to have been expected), had at length arrived.

"Two desperate fellows in their way, I can a.s.sure you," replied Middlemore, more amused than annoyed at the adventure. "Ensign Paul, Emilius, Theophilus, Arnoldi, is, I calculate, a pretty considerable strong ac_tyve_ sort of fellow; and, to judge by Henry Grantham's half strangled look, his companion lacks not the same qualities. Why, in the name of all that is precious would you persist in poking your nose into the rascal's skins, Grantham? The ruffians had nearly made dried skins of ours."

"Ha! is that the scoundrel who calls himself Arnoldi," asked Captain Molineux? "I have heard," and he glanced at Henry Grantham as he spoke, "a long story of his villainy from his captor within this very hour."

"Which is your apology, I suppose," said Middlemore, "for having so far exceeded your appointment, gentlemen."

"It certainly is," said Lieutenant Villiers, "but the fault was not ours. We chanced to fall in with Gerald Grantham, on our way here, and that he detained us, should be a matter of congratulation to us all."

"Congratulation!" exclaimed Middlemore, dropping his bandage, and lifting his eyes with an expression of indescribable humor. "Am I then to think it matter of congratulation that, as an innocent second, I should have had a cursed piece of lead stuck in my flesh to spoil my next winter's dancing. And Grantham is to think it matter of congratulation that, instead of putting a bullet through you, Molineux, (as I intend he shall when I have finished dressing this confounded leg, if his nerves are not too much shaken), he should have felt the gripe of that monster Desborough around his throat, until his eyes seem ready to start from their sockets, and all this because you did not choose to be in time. Upon my word, I do not know that it is quite meet that we should meet you. What say you, Grantham?"

"I hope," said Captain Molineux with a smile, "your princ.i.p.al will think as you do, for should he decline the meeting, nothing will afford more satisfaction to myself."

Both Grantham and Middlemore looked their utter surprise at the language thus used by Captain Molineux, but neither of them spoke.

"If an apology the most ample for my observation of yesterday,"

continued that officer, "an apology founded on my perfect conviction of error, (that conviction produced by certain recent explanations with your brother), can satisfy you, Mr. Grantham, most sincerely do I make it. If, however, you hold me to my pledge, here am I of course to redeem it. I may as well observe to you in the presence of our friends, (and Villiers can corroborate my statement), that my original intention on leaving your brother, was to receive your fire and then tender my apology, but, under the circ.u.mstances in which both you and Middlemore are placed at this moment, the idea would be altogether absurd. Again I tender my apology, which it will be a satisfaction to me to repeat this day at the mess table, where I yesterday refused to drink your brother's health. All I can add is that when you have heard the motives for my conduct, and learnt to what extent I have been deceived, you will readily admit that I acted not altogether from caprice."

"Your apology I accept, Captain Molineux," said Grantham, coming forward and unhesitatingly offering his hand. "If you have seen my brother, I am satisfied. Let there be no further question on the subject."

"So then I am to be the only bulleted man on this occasion," interrupted Middlemore, with ludicrous pathos--"the only poor devil who is to be made to remember Hartley's point for ever. But no matter. I am not the first instance of a second being shot, through the awkward bungling of his princ.i.p.al, and certainly Grantham you were in every sense the princ.i.p.al in this affair, for had you taken my advice you would have let the fellows go to the devil their own way."

"What! knowing, as I did, that the traitor Desborough had concealed in his canoe a prisoner on parole--nay, worse, a deserter from our service--with a view of conveying him out of the country."

"How did you know it."

"Because I at once recognised him, through the disguise in which he left the hut, for what he was. That discovery made, there remained but one course to pursue."

"Ah! and coa.r.s.e work you made of it, with a vengeance," said Middlemore, "first started him up like a fox from his cover, got the mark of his teeth, and then suffered him to escape."

"Is there no chance of following--no means of overtaking them?" said Captain Molineux--"No, by Heaven," as he glanced his eye from right to left, "not a single canoe to be seen anywhere along the sh.o.r.e."

"Following!" echoed Middlemore; "faith the scoundrels would desire nothing better: if two of us had such indifferent play with them on terra firma, you may rely upon it that double the number would have no better chance in one of these rickety canoes. See there how the rascals lie to within half musket shot, apparently hailing us."

Middlemore was right. Desborough had risen in the stern of the canoe, and now, stretched to his full height, called leisurely, through his closed hands, on the name of Henry Grantham. When he observed the attention of that officer had, in common with that of his companions, been arrested, he proceeded at the full extent of his lungs.

"I reckon, young man, as how I shall pay you out for this, and drot my skin, if I once twists my fingers round your neck again, if anything on this side h.e.l.l shall make me quit it, afore you squeaks your last squeak. You've druv me from my home, and I'll have your curst blood for it yet. I'll sarve you as I sarved your old father. You got my small bore, I expect, and if its any good to you to know that one of its nineties to the pound sent the old rascal to the devil--why then you have it from Jeremiah Desborough's own lips, and be d----d to you."

And, with this horrible admission, the settler again seated himself in the stern of his canoe, and making good use of his paddle soon scudded away until his little vessel appeared but as a speck on the lake.

Henry Grantham was petrified with astonishment and dismay at a declaration, the full elucidation of which we must reserve for a future opportunity. The daring confession rang in his ears long after the voice had ceased, and it was not until a light vehicle had been brought for Middlemore from Simon's farm, that he could be induced to quit the sh.o.r.e, where he still lingered, as if in expectation of the return of the avowed _murderer of his Father_.

CHAPTER IX.