The O'Donoghue Part 52

"If I thought he was a friend of yours, Master Mark---- But it's no matter--I know he's off. I heard the gallop of a beast on the stones since we came in. Well, well, I never expected to see you here."

Mark made no other reply to this speech than a steady frown, whose contemptuous expression Lanty cowered under, as he said once more--

"It wasn't my fault at all, if I was obliged to come with the constables. There's more charges nor mine against him, the chap with the black whiskers says----"

"It's quite clear," said the chief of the party, as he re-entered the room, "it's quite clear this man was here a few minutes since, and equally so that you know of his place of concealment. I tell you plainly, sir, if you continue to refuse information concerning him, I'll take you as my prisoner. I have two warrants against him--one for highway robbery, the other for treason."

"Why the devil have you no informations sworn against him for murder?"

said Mark, insolently, for the language of the bailiff had completely aroused his pa.s.sion. "Whoever he is, you are looking for, seems to have a clear conscience."

"Master Mark knows nothing at all about him, I'll go bail to any amount."

"We don't want your bail, my good friend; we want the man who calls himself Harvey Middleton in Herts, G.o.dfrey Middleton in Surrey, the Chevalier Duchatel in France, Harry Talbot in Ireland, but who is better known in the police sheet;" and here he opened a printed paper, and pointing to the words,--"full description of John Barrington, convicted at the Maidstone a.s.sizes, and sentenced to fifteen years transportation."

The smile of insolent incredulity with which Mark listened to these imputations on the honour of his friend, if it did not a.s.suage the anger of the constable, served to satisfy him that he was at least no practised colleague in crime, and turning to Lanty, he talked to him in a low whisper for several minutes.

"I tell ye," said Lanty, eagerly, in reply to some remark of the other, "his worship will never forgive you if you arrest him; his time is not yet come, and you'll get little thanks for interfering where ye had no business."

Whether convinced by these arguments, or deterred from making Mark his prisoner, by the conscious illegality of the act, the man collected his party, and having given them his orders in a low voice, left the room, followed by the others.

A gesture from Mark arrested Lanty, as he was in the act of pa.s.sing out. "A word with you Lanty," said he, firmly. "What is the information against Talbot?--what is he accused of?"

"Sure didn't you hear yourself," replied Lanty, in a simpering, mock bashful voice. "They say he's Barrington the robber, and faith, they've strong evidence that they're not far out. 'Tis about a horse I sold him that I came here. I didn't want to harm or hurt any body, and if I thought he was a friend of yours----"

"He is a friend of mine," said Mark, "and therefore these stories are but one tissue of falsehoods. Are you aware, Lanty"--and here as the youth spoke his voice became low and whispering--"are you aware that Talbot is an agent of the French Government--that he is over here to report on the condition of our party, and arrange for the rising?"

"Is it in earnest you are?" cried Lanty, with an expression of admirably dissembled astonishment. "Are you telling me truth, Master Mark."

"Yes, and more still--the day is not far distant now, when we shall strike the blow."

"I want you here, my worthy friend," said the constable, putting his head into the room, and touching Lanty's shoulder. The horsedealer looked confused, and for a second seemed undetermined how to act; but suddenly recovering his composure, he smiled significantly at Mark, wished him a good night, and departed.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV. THE DAYBREAK ON THE STRAND

It was with an impatience almost amounting to madness that Mark O'Donoghue awaited the dawn of day; long before that hour had arrived he had made every preparation for joining his friend. A horse stood ready saddled awaiting him in the stable, and his pistols--the weapons Talbot knew so well how to handle--were carefully packed in the heavy holsters.

The time settled for the meeting was seven o'clock, but he was certain that Talbot would be near the place before that hour, if not already there. The scene which followed Talbot's escape also stimulated his anxiety to meet with him; not that any, even the faintest suspicion of his friend's honour ever crossed Mark's mind, but he wished to warn him of the dangers that were gathering around him, for were he arrested on a suspicion, who was to say what material evidence might not arise against him in his real character of a French spy. Mark's was not a character long to brood over doubtful circ.u.mstances, and seek an explanation for difficulties which only a.s.sumed the guise of suspicions. Too p.r.o.ne always to be led by first impressions of every body and every thing, he hated and avoided whatever should disturb the opinions he thus hastily formed. When matters too complicated and knotty for his immediate comprehension crossed him, he turned from them without an effort, and rather satisfied himself that it was a point of honour to "go on believing," than harbour a doubt even where the circ.u.mstances were calculated to suggest it. This frame of mind saved him from all uneasiness on the score of Talbot's honour; he had often heard how many disguises and masks his friend had worn in the events of his wild and dangerous career, and if he felt how incapable he himself would have been to play so many different parts, the same reason prevented his questioning the necessity of such subterfuges. That Harry Talbot had personated any or all of the persons mentioned by the constable, he little doubted, and therefore he regarded their warrant after him as only another evidence of his skill and cleverness, but that his character were in the least involved, was a supposition that never once occurred to him. Amid all his anxieties of that weary night, not one arose from this cause; no secret distrust of his friend lurked in any corner of his heart; his fear was solely for Talbot's safety, and for what he probably ranked as highly--the certainty of his keeping his appointment with Frederick Travers; and what a world of conflicting feelings were here! At one moment a sense of savage, unrelenting hatred to the man who had grossly insulted himself, at the next a dreadful thrill of agony that this same Travers might be the object of his cousin's love, and that on _his_ fate, _her_ whole happiness in life depended. Had the meeting been between himself and Travers--had the time come round to settle that old score of insult that lay between them, he thought that such feelings as these would have been merged in the gratified sense of vengeance, but now, how should he look on, and see him fall by another's pistol?--how see another expose his life in the place he felt to be his own? He could not forgive Talbot for this, and every painful thought the whole event suggested, embittered him against his friend as the cause of his suffering. And yet, was it possible for him ever himself to have challenged Travers? Did not the discovery of Kate's secret, as he called it to her, on the road below the cliff, at once and for ever, prevent such a catastrophe? Such were some of the hara.s.sing reflections which distracted Mark's mind, and to which his own wayward temper and natural excitability gave additional poignancy; while jealousy, a pa.s.sion that fed and ministered to his hate, lived through every sentiment and tinctured every thought. Such had been his waking and sleeping thoughts for many a day-thoughts which, though lurking, like a slow poison, within him, had never become so palpable to his mind before; his very patriotism, the attachment he thought he felt to his native country, his ardent desire for liberty, his aspirations for national greatness, all sprung from this one sentiment of hate to the Saxon, and jealousy of the man who was his rival. Frederick Travers was the embodiment of all those feelings he himself believed were enlisted in the cause of his country.

As these reflections crowded on him, they suggested new sources of suffering, and in the bewildered frame of mind to which he was now reduced, there seemed no possible issue to his difficulties. Mark was not, however, one of those who chalk out their line in life in moments of quiet reflection, and then pursue the career they have fixed upon.

His course was rather to throw pa.s.sion and impulse into the same scale with circ.u.mstances, and take his chance of the result. He had little power of antic.i.p.ation, nor was his a mind that could calmly array facts before it, and draw the inferences from them. No, he met the dangers of life, as he would have done those of battle, with a heart undaunted, and a spirit resolved never to turn back. The sullen courage of his nature, if it did not suggest hope, at least supplied resolution--and how many go through life with no other star to guide them!

At last the grey dawn of breaking day appeared above the house-tops, and the low distant sounds that prelude the movement of life in great cities, stirred faintly without.

"Thank heaven, the night is over at last," was Mark's exclamation, as he gazed upon the leaden streak of cloud that told of morning.

All his preparations for departure were made, so that he had only to descend to the stable, and mount his horse. The animal, he was told, had formerly belonged to Talbot, and nothing save the especial favour of Billy Crossley could have procured him so admirable a mount.

"He has never left the stable, sir," said Billy, as he held the stirrup himself--"he has never left the stable for ten days, but he has wind enough to carry you two and twenty miles within the hour, if you were put to it."

"And if I were, Billy," said Mark, for a sudden thought just flashed across him--"if I were, and if I should not bring him back to you, his price is----

"I wouldn't take a hundred guineas for him from any man living save Mr.

Talbot himself; but if it were a question of saving him from danger, or any man he deems his friend, then, then, sir, I tell you fairly, Billy Crossley isn't so poor a man, but he can afford to do a generous thing.

Take him. I see you know how to sit on him; use him well and tenderly, keep him until you find the time to give him back, and now a good journey to you wherever you go; and go quickly, whispered Billy, for I see two fellows at the gate who appear listening attentively to our conversation.

"Take that in any case as a pledge," said Mark, as he pitched a purse, containing above a hundred pounds in gold, towards Crossley, and before the other could interpose to restore it, Mark had dashed his spurs into the beast's flanks, and in another minute was hastening down Thomas-street.

Mark had not proceeded far when he slackened his pace to a walk--he remembered that it was yet two hours before the time, and with the old spirit of a horseman, he husbanded the qualities of the n.o.ble animal he bestrode. Whether it was, that as the moment approached which should solve some of the many difficulties that beset him, or that the free air of the morning, and the pleasure he felt on being once more in the saddle, had rallied his mind and raised his courage, I know not, but so it was; Mark's spirits grew each instant lighter, and he rode along revolving other ones, if not happier thoughts, such as were at least in a frame more befitting his youth and the bold heart that beat within his bosom. The streets were deserted, the great city was sleeping, the thoroughfares he had seen crowded with brilliant equipages and hurrying ma.s.ses of foot pa.s.sengers, were still and vacant; and as Mark turned from side to side to gaze on the stately public edifices now sleeping in their own shadows, he thought of the dreadful conflict which, perchance, it might be his own lot to lead in that same city--he thought of the wild shout of the insurgent ma.s.ses, as with long-pent-up, but now loosened fury they poured into the devoted streets--he fancied the swelling clangour which denoted the approach of troops, ringing through the various approaches, and the clattering sounds of distant musketry as post after post in different parts of the town was a.s.sailed. He halted before the Castle gate, where a single dragoon sat motionless in his saddle, his carbine at rest beneath his long cloak, the very emblem of peaceful security, and as Mark gazed on him, his lip curled with an insolent sneer as he thought over the false security of those within; and that proud banner whose lazy folds scarce moved with the breath of morning, "How soon may we see a national flag replace it?"--were the words he muttered, as he resumed his way as slowly as before. A few minutes after brought him in front of the College. All was still silent in that vast area, along which at noon-day the wealth and the life of the city poured. A single figure here appeared, a poor miserable object in tattered black, who was occupied in affixing a placard on the front of the Post-office. Mark stopped to watch him--there seemed something sad and miserable in the lot of this one poor creature, singled out as it were to labour while others were sunk in sleep. He drew near, and as the paper was unfolded before him, read, in large letters, the words "Capital Felony--500 Reward"--and then followed a description of John Barrington, which in every particular of height, age, look, and gesture, seemed perfectly applicable to Talbot.

"Then, sorra one of me but would rather be tearing you down than putting you up," said the bill-sticker, as with his arms folded leisurely on his breast, and his ragged hat set sideways on his head, he apostrophized his handiwork.

"And why so, my good fellow," said Mark, replying to the words. He turned round rapidly, and pulling off his hat, exclaimed, in an accent of unfeigned delight--"Tear-an-ages, captain, is it yourself? Och! och!

no," added he, in a tone of as great despondency--"it is the black horse that deceived me. I beg your honor's pardon."

"And you know this horse," said Mark, with some anxiety of manner.

The bill-sticker made no answer, but carefully surveyed Mark, for a few moments from head to foot, and then, as if not perfectly satisfied with the result of his scrutiny, he slowly resumed the implements of his trade, and prepared to move on.

"Stop a moment," said Mark, "I know what you mean, this horse belonged to----" and he pointed with his whip to the name on the placard. "Don't be afraid of me, then, for I am his friend, perhaps the nearest friend he has in the world."

"Av you were his brother, you don't like him better than I do myself.

I'll never forget the night he got his head laid open for me on the bridge there beyant. The polis wanted to take me up for a bit of a ballad I was singing about Major Sirr, and they were hauling me along through the gutter, and kicking me at every step, when up comes the captain, and he sent one flying here, and the other flying there, and he tripped up the chief, calling out to me the whole time, 'Run for it, Dinny--run for it like a man; I'll give you five minutes fair start of them any way.' And he kept his word, though one of them cut his forehead clean down to the bone; and here I am now sticking up a reward to take him, G.o.d pardon me"--and the poor fellow uttered the last words in a voice of self-reproach, that actually brought the tears into his eyes.

Mark threw him a crown, and pressed on once more; but somehow the convictions which resisted, before, were now shaken by this chance meeting. The recognition of the horse at once identified Talbot with Barrington, and although Mark rejected altogether any thought which impugned the honour of his friend, he felt obliged to believe that, for some object of intrigue, Talbot had a.s.sumed the name and character of this celebrated personage. The very fact of his rescuing the bill-sticker strengthened this impression. Such an act seemed to Mark far more in unison with the wayward recklessness of Talbot's character, than with the bearing of a man who might thus expose himself to capture.

With the subtlety which the will supplies to furnish arguments for its own conviction, Mark fancied how readily Talbot might have made this personation of Barrington a master-stroke of policy, and while thus he ruminated, he reached the sea sh.o.r.e, and could see before him that long bleak track of sand, which, uncovered save at high tide, is called "the Bull." This was the spot appointed for the meeting, and, although now within half an hour of the time, no figure was seen upon its bleak surface. Mark rode on, and crossing the narrow channel of water which separates "the Bull" from the main-land, reached the place over which, for above two miles in extent, his eye could range freely. Still no one was to be seen; the light ripple of the ebbing tide was the only sound in the stillness of the morning; there was a calmness over the surface of the sea, on which the morning sunbeams were slanting faintly, and glittering like freckled gold, wherever some pa.s.sing breeze or sh.o.r.e-current stirred the waters. One solitary vessel could be seen, and she, a small schooner, with all her canvas bent, seemed scarcely to move.

Mark watched her, as one watches any object which relieves the dreariness of waiting, he gazed on her tall spars and white sails reflected in the sea, when suddenly a bright flash burst from her side, a light-blue smoke, followed by a booming sound, rolled forth, and a shot was seen skimming the surface of the water, for above a mile in her wake; the next moment a flag was run up to her peak, when it fluttered for a moment and was then lowered again. Mark's experience of a smuggling life taught him at once to recognize these signs as signals, and he turned his gaze towards the land to discover to whom they were made; but although for miles long the coast lay beneath his view, he could see nothing that corresponded with this suspicion. A single figure on horseback was all that he could detect, and he was too far off to observe minutely. Once more Mark turned towards the ship, which now was feeling a fresher breeze and beginning to bead beneath it. The white curl that broke from her bow, and rushed foaming along her sides, showed that she was making way through the water, not as it seemed without the will of those on board, for as the wind freshened they shook out their mainsail more fully, and continued at every moment to spread sail after sail. The hollow tramp of a horse's feet galloping on the strand made Mark turn quickly round, and he saw the rider, whom he had observed before, bending his course directly towards him. Supposing it must be Talbot, Mark turned to meet him, and the horseman, who never slackened his speed, came quickly within view, and discovered the features of Frederick Travers. He was unaccompanied by friend or servant, and seemed, from the condition of his horse, to have ridden at the top of his speed. Before Mark could think of what apology he should make for, or how explain Talbot's absence, Travers addressed him----

"I half feared that it might not be you, Mr. O'Donoghue," said he, as he wiped the perspiration from his brow, for he seemed no less exhausted than his horse.

"I'm alone, sir," said Mark; "and were you not unaccompanied by a friend, I should feel the difficulty of my present position more severely."

"I know--I am aware," said Travers, hurriedly, "your friend is gone. I heard it but an hour since; you, in all likelihood, were not aware of the fact, till you saw the signal yonder."

"What!--Talbot's signal! Was that his?"

"Talbot, or Barrington," said Travers, smiling; "perhaps we should better call him by the name he is best known by."

"And do you concur in the silly notion that confounds Harry Talbot with a highwayman?" said Mark, sternly.

"I fear," said Travers, "that in doing so I but follow the impression of all the world. It was not the least clever thing he has eyer done, his deception of you. Be a.s.sured, Mr. O'Donoghue, that the matter admits of no doubt. The warrant for his apprehension, the informations sworn against him, are not only plain and precise, but I have myself read certain facts of his intimacy with you, the places you have frequented, the objects for which, it is alleged, you were confederated--all these are at this moment in the hands of the Secretary of State. Forgive me, sir, if I tell you that you appear to have trusted too implicitly to men who were not guided by your own principles of honor. This very day a warrant for your own arrest will be issued from the Privy Council, on the information of a man whom, I believe, you never suspected. He is a horsedealer named Lawler--Lanty Lawler."

"And he has sworn informations against me?"

"He has done more; he has produced letters written by your hand, and addressed to different leaders of the United Irish party, letters whose treasonable contents do not admit of a doubt.

"And the scoundrel has my letters?" said Mark, as his face grew purple with pa.s.sion.