The Highwayman Part 34

"Egad, it's wonderful!" says the little man, with a laugh which appealed to Harry. "Hector McBean, at your service." Harry stared. "Aye, aye, I'm thinking we'll explain ourselves. Will you walk, sir?"

"If you please."

Captain McBean took his arm, said over his shoulder to the two seconds "To-morrow," and marched off with him. Once they were out in the street, "So you are Colonel Noll Boyce's son," says Captain McBean with an odd look.

"He has often told me so."

"If you had not such a look of him I wouldn't believe it. Oh, pardon, monsieur, _mille pardons_, _ma foi._ I have been insolent to you in all this affair. You'll please to observe that the whole of it, and the issue, is to your honour. Will I have to say more?"

"Oh Lud, no. Pray, let's talk sense."

"I take to you marvellously, _mon enfant_. Well now, have you heard of me?"

"Enough to want much more."

"What, has father been talking?"

"D'ye know where he is, Captain McBean?"

"I wish I did."

"So do I. It was Mr. Waverton who told the tale. Now you know why I am eager to hear what you can say of my father or my father of you."

"Are you a good son, Mr. Boyce?"

"I pay my debts."

"There's a crooked answer. Are you in the Colonel's secrets?"

"I have no reason to think so."

"I guess he did not trust you. I guess he was right. Do you remember where you met me first?"

"I remember that I can't remember."

"And me that thought I was a beauty! Well, but you were busy. You were making mud pies with Ben."

"I have it. You were his captain on the horse. Pray, sir, what was my Benjamin's mystery?"

"I am going to trust you, Mr. Boyce. I shall not require you to trust me unless you choose. I tell you frankly I hope for it. And so--come in with you."

They turned out of the Strand into Bow Street. Captain McBean let himself into a house, and took Harry up to a room very neat and cosy.

"D'ye drink usquebaugh? A pity. It's the cleanest liquor. Well, draw up."

He pushed a tobacco-box across the table. "That's right Spanish. Now, _mon cher_, are you Jacobite or Hanoverian?"

"I never could tell."

"Oh, look you, I ask no confidences. And I make no doubt of your honour.

If you had a mind to play tricks you would have tried one on me to-night.

Well, I have proved you. Your pardon again. But when I saw Noll Boyce's son lurking in Sam's, how could I know he was without guile? Now there is something I must say to you. But how much I say is a question. I have no desire to embarra.s.s you with awkward knowledge. So which is your king, _mon enfant_, James or George?"

"I care not a puff of smoke for either."

"So. I suppose there is something you care for. Well--you asked about Ben's mystery. It's a good beginning. The rascal should have stopped the Duke of Marlborough's coach and held it till I came up with my fellows.

Instead of which he went about some private thieving. I am your debtor for giving the knave his gruel. What's Marlborough to me? It's not his dirty guineas I was after, but his papers. He was then pretending to negotiate with St. Germain. There were those of us who doubted the old villain had some black design in his head again, and it was thought that if we could turn over his private papers, we should know where to have him. It was certified that he had with him something from his agents abroad. Well, we missed him, and how deep he is dipped in this business, I know no more than you.

"Now I come to your father, _mon enfant_, and I promise you I will be as delicate as I may. Do you know, _par exemple_, how Colonel Boyce is in the mouths of gentlemen?"

"Oh, sir, that's another of the matters for which I care nothing."

"_Tenez donc_. You were born old, I think. Well, Colonel Boyce has been in some few plots, devices, and manoeuvres. No man ever denied him wit, nor will I, _mordieu_. But it's his virtue that neither his friends nor his enemies were ever sure of him. I believe, Mr. Boyce, that if he heard me he would thank me for a compliment. _Bien_--I come back to my tale.

"It was known to us poor Jacobites in England that Colonel Boyce was making salutes to St. Germain. Which much intrigued us, for we would not, by your leave, have him of our side. They don't know him there as we do, and King James, G.o.d save him! is young and honourable and sanguine."

"Poor lad," says Harry with a shrug.

"You may keep your pity, Mr. Boyce," McBean said stiffly. "I would have him so, by your leave. Now we heard that letters went to St. Germain from Colonel Boyce full of windy promises--_verbosa et grandis epistola_. D'ye keep up your humanities?--in the name of my Lord Sunderland and my Lord Stair. Black names both. But they were vastly intrigued at St. Germain.

If Sunderland and Stair were ready to turn honest, then _pardieu_, there was hope of the devil himself. Oh, I don't blame the King nor even Charles Middleton, though he is old enough to be slow. The times are changing, and maybe Stair and Sunderland they see it as well as we, and mean to find salvation. I can't tell. But the thing looked ill. Stair and Sunderland--there is no treachery too foul for those names. And if they meant honestly, why--saving your presence, _mon enfant_--why did they choose Colonel Boyce for their agent? It was no good warranty. So we adventured a counter. We have friends enough now in the Government, _mon cher_, and it was arranged that the Colonel should be arrested as a Jacobite. A good stroke, I think. It was mine. Only the old gentleman dodged it."

"Pray, what did you know of Mr. Waverton?"

"That sheep's-head!" McBean laughed. "Why, a letter came to hand in which the Colonel talked of taking the pretty gentleman to France. So he was joined in the warrant. _D'ailleurs_--it made a good appearance. However, we missed him; but we found something in his papers which made me queasy.

So I e'en was off to France after him.

"The Colonel stayed at Pontoise and sent your Waverton off to St. Germain with a mighty plausible letter about secret proposals from the chiefs of the Whigs, which brought the King out to hear them secretly. _Ma foi_! I think Charles Middleton should have smelt a rat. But it was a clever trick, and to choose your Waverton to play it was masterly. For who could think that peac.o.c.k would be in anything crafty? At Pontoise I tumbled in upon them, and your father, _mon cher_, he ran off on sight of me.

Observe, I press nothing against him. I allow that the best evidence I have against him is just that--he ran away when he saw me. Secondly, he had with him some three-four rascals whose faces would hang them. And thirdly and lastly, beloved brethren, these fellows, when put to it and charged with a plot to murder King James, were frightened for their lives and babbled wildly, of which the sum was that they had been brought but to kidnap him. I grant ye, they may have lied, and I would not hang a dog (who was not a Whig) upon their word. But confess, _mon cher_, the thing is black enough. What did the Colonel want with King James alone? Why did he need his bullies? Why did he run away? I leave it with you."

Harry knocked out his pipe. "I am obliged for the story, sir. Why did you tell it?"

"You have a cold blood in you, _mon enfant_" says Captain MacBean.

"Observe, I look for nothing wonderful from you. I allow your position is very difficult to a man of honour. And with all my heart--"

"Oh Lud, sir, let's have nothing pathetic."

"Aye, aye," McBean bowed. "Mr. Boyce! I do profess I feel the delicacy of the affair, and I detest it, _pardieu_. But I dare not absolve ye from your duty."

"Oh, sir, you are very sublime."

"Hear me out, Mr. Boyce. I have shown you cause to fear that your father has it in mind to compa.s.s a vile treachery, perhaps a murder.

Would you deny it?"

"Damme, sir, I am not the day of judgment."

"_Bien_. I believe that is an answer. I declare to you there is yet a chance that he may succeed, aye, here in London."

Harry swore. "If your friends must go walking into traps what is it to me?"

"Well, sir, though you will own no loyalty to king or queen or country, I'll not be deceived. I call on you for your aid. It's believed your father is in London. It is likely he will seek you out, as he did before.

Maybe at this hour you know where he is."