The Adventures of Harry Revel

S >> Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller Couch >> The Adventures of Harry Revel

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"Maybe the red-coats have him," said Mr. Rogers, holding out his
tumbler. "Here, pass the kettle, somebody!"

"Red-coats?" she cried sharply. "You don't tell me--" But the
sentence was drowned by a new and (to me) very horrible noise--the
furious barking of dogs from the stables or kennels in the rear of
the house. Here was a new danger: and I liked it so little--the
prospect of being bayed naked through those pitch-dark shrubberies by
a pack of hounds--that I broke from my covert of laurel, hurriedly
skirted the broad patch of light on the carriage sweep, and plumped
down close to the windows, behind a bush of mock-orange at the end of
the verandah, whence a couple of leaps would land me within it among
Miss Belcher's guests. And I felt that even Mr. Whitmore was less
formidable than Miss Belcher's dogs.

Their barking died down after a minute or so, and the company, two or
three of whom had started to their feet, seemed to be reassured and
began to call upon Jack Rogers for his explanation. It now turned
out that, quite unintentionally, I had so posted myself as to hear
every word spoken; and, I regret to say, was deep in Mr. Rogers's
story--from which he considerately omitted all mention of me--when my
eye caught a movement among the shadows at the far end of the
verandah.

A man was stealing along it and towards me, close by the house wall.

He reached the first of the lighted windows, and peeped warily round
its angle. This room, as I have said, was empty: but while he
assured himself of this, the light rested on his face, and through
the branches of the mock-orange bush I saw his features distinctly.
It was Sergeant Letcher.

He wore his red uniform and white pantaloons, but had slipped off his
boots and--as I saw when he rapidly passed the next two panels of
light--was carrying them in his hand. Reaching the first of the open
windows, he stood for a while in the shade beside it, listening; and
then, to my astonishment, turned and stole back by the way he had
come. I watched him till he disappeared in the darkness beyond the
house-porch.

Meanwhile Miss Belcher had been calling to clear away the supper and
set the tables for cards.

"Nonsense, Lydia!" Mr. Rogers objected. "It's a good
one-in-the-morning, and the company tired. Where's the sense, too,
of keeping the place ablaze on a night like this, with Gauger
Rosewarne scouring the country, and the dragoons behind him, and all
in the worst possible tempers?"

"My little Magistrate," Miss Belcher retorted, "there's naught to
hinder your trotting home to bed if you're timorous. Jim's on his
way to the moor by this time with the rest of the horses: 'twas at
his starting the dogs gave tongue just now, and I'll have to teach
them better manners. As for the roan, if he's hurt or Rosewarne
happens on him, there's evidence that I sold him to a gipsy three
weeks back, at St. Germans fair. Here, Bathsheba, take the keys of
my bureau upstairs; you'll find some odd notes in the left-hand
drawer by the fire-place. Bring Mr. Rogers down his ten pounds and
let him go. We'll not compromise a Justice of the Peace if we can
help it."

"Don't play the fool, Lydia," growled Mr. Rogers, and added
ingenuously, "The fact is, I wanted a word with you alone."

"Oh, you scandalous man! And me tucked between the sheets!" she
protested, while the company haw-haw'd. "You'll have to put up with
some more innocent amusement, my dear. There's a badger somewhere
round at the back, in a barrel: we'll have him in with the dogs--
unless you prefer a quiet round with the cards."

"Oh, damn the badger at this hour!" swore Mr. Rogers. "Cards are
quiet at any rate. Here, Raby--Penrose--Tregaskis--which of you'll
cut in? Whitmore--you'll take a hand, won't you?"

"The Parson's tired to-night, and with better excuse than you.
He's ridden down from Plymouth."

"Hallo, Whitmore--what were you doing in Plymouth?"

Mr. Whitmore ignored the question. "I'm ready for a hand, Miss
Belcher," he announced quietly: "only let it be something quiet--a
rubber for choice."

"Half-guinea points?" asked somebody.

"Yes, if you will."

I heard them settle to cards, and their voices sink to a murmur.
Now and again a few coins clinked, and one of the guests yawned.

"You're as melancholy as gib-cats," announced Miss Belcher.
"The next that yawns, I'll send him out to fetch in that badger.
Tell us a story, somebody."

"I heard the beginning of a queer one," said Mr. Whitmore in his
deliberate voice. "The folks were discussing it at Torpoint Ferry as
I crossed. There's, been a murder at Plymouth, either last night or
this morning."

"A murder? Who's the victim?"

"An old Jew, living on the Barbican or thereabouts. My deal, is it
not?"

"What's his name?"

"His name?" Mr. Whitmore seemed to be considering. "Wait a moment,
or I shall misdeal." After a pause, he said, "A Spanish-sounding
one--Rodriguez, I think. They were all full of it at the Ferry."

"What! Old Ike Rodriguez? Why, he was down in these parts buying up
guineas the other day!" exclaimed Mr. Rogers.

"Was he?"

"Why, hang it all, Whitmore," said a guest, "you know he was!
More by token I pointed him out to you myself on Looe hill."

"Was that the man?"

"Of course it was. Don't you remember admiring his face? It put you
in mind of Caiaphas--those were your very words, and at the moment I
didn't clearly recollect who Caiaphas was. It can't be three weeks
since."

"Three weeks less two days," said Miss Belcher; "for he called here
and bought fifteen off me: gave me twenty-four shillings and sixpence
apiece for all but one, which he swore was light. Who's murdered
him?"

"There was talk of a boy," said Mr. Whitmore, still very
deliberately. "At least, a boy was missing who had been seen in the
house just previously, and they were watching the ferries for him.
Why, surely, Rogers, that's a revoke!"

"A revoke?" stammered Mr. Rogers. "So it is--I beg your pardon,
Tregaskis! Damn the cards! I'm too sleepy to tell one suit from
another."

"That makes our game then, and the rubber. Rub and rub--shall we
play the conqueror? No? As you please then. How do we stand?"

"We owe three guineas on points," growled a voice which, to judge by
its sulkiness, belonged to Mr. Tregaskis.

"I'm a clumsy fool," Mr. Rogers again accused himself. "Here,
Whitmore, give me change out of a note."

"With pleasure. It's as good as a gift, though, with the cards you
held," said Mr. Whitmore, and I heard the coins jingle in changing
hands, when from the shrubbery, where the gravel sweep narrowed,
there sounded the low hoot of an owl. Being town-bred and unused to
owls, I took it for a human cry in the darkness and shrank closer
against my mock-orange bush.

"Hallo, Whitmore, you've dropped a guinea. Here it is, by the
table-leg. Take twenty-four shillings for it, now that old Rodriguez
is gone?"

Mr. Whitmore thanked the speaker as the coin was restored to him.
"The room's hot, as Mr. Rogers says, and I think I'll step out for a
mouthful of fresh air. Phe--ew!" he drew a long breath as he
appeared at the window.

He strolled carelessly out beneath the verandah and stood for a
moment by one of its pillars. And at that moment the owl's cry
sounded again, but more softly, from the shrubbery on my left.
I knew, then, that it came from no true bird. With a swift glance
back into the room Mr. Whitmore stepped out upon the gravel and
followed the sound, almost brushing the mock-orange bush as he
passed.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE MOCK-ORANGE BUSH.

To my dismay, he halted but five paces from me.

"Is that you, Leicester?" he whispered.

"Sergeant Letcher, if you please," answered a quiet voice close by;
"unless you wish to be called Pickthall."

"Not so loud--the windows are open. How on earth did you come here?
You're not with the van to-night?"

"I came on a horse, and a lame one: one of your tub-carriers.
The captain saw me mount him, down at the cove, and sent me off to
scour the country for evidence. I guessed pretty well in what
direction he'd take me. But you're a careless lot, I will say.
Look at this bit of rope."

"For God's sake don't talk so loud! Rope? What rope?"

"Oh, you needn't be afraid! It's not _your_ sort! Here--if you can't
see, take hold and feel it. Left-handed, you'll notice--French
sling-stuff. And that Belcher woman has no more sense of caution
than to tie up her roses with it! Now see here, my son"--and his
voice became a snarl--"it may do for her to play tricks. All the
country knows her, the magistrates included. But for the likes of
you this dancing on the edge of the law is risky, and I can't afford
it. Understand? Why the devil you haunt the house as you do is more
than I can fathom, unless maybe you're making up to marry the old
fool." He paused and added contemplatively, "'Twould be something in
your line to be sure. Women were always your game."

"You didn't whistle me out to tell me this," said Mr. Whitmore
stiffly.

"No, I did not. I want ten pounds."

Mr. Whitmore groaned. "Look here, Leicst--"

"Be careful!"

"But this makes twice in ten days. It's pushing a man too hard
altogether!"

"Not a bit of it," Letcher assured him cheerfully. "You're too
devilish fond of your own neck, my lad; and I know it too devilish
well to be come over by that talk." He chuckled to himself.
"How's the beauty down at the cottage?"

"I don't know," Mr. Whitmore answered sulkily. "Is Plinlimmon
there?"

"No, he's not; and you ought to know he's not. Where have you been,
all day?"

The curate was silent.

"He'll be down again on Saturday, though. Leave of absence is going
cheap, just now. I've an idea that our marching orders must be about
due. Maybe I'll be able to run down myself, though my father hadn't
the luck to be a friend of the Colonel's. If I don't, you're to keep
your eye lifting, and report."

"Is there really a chance of the order coming?" asked Mr. Whitmore,
with a shake in his low voice.

"Dissemble your joy, my friend! When it comes, I shall call on
you for fifty. Meanwhile I tell you to keep your eye lifting.
The battalion's raw, yet. About the order, it's only my guesswork,
and before we sail you may yet do the christening."

"It's damnable!"

"Hush, you fool! Gad, if somebody hasn't heard you! Who's _that_?"

They held their breath; and I held mine, pressing my body into the
mock-orange bush until the twigs cracked. Mr. Jack Rogers stepped
out upon the verandah, and stood by one of the pillars, not a dozen
yards from me, contemplating the sky where the dawn was now beginning
to break over the dark shrubberies. I heard the two men tip-toeing
away through the laurels.

He, too, seemed to catch the sound, for he turned his head sharply.
But at that moment Miss Belcher's voice called him back into the
room.

A minute later he reappeared with a loaf of bread in either hand, and
walked moodily past my bush without turning his head or observing me.

I faced about cautiously and looked after him. From the end of the
verandah the ground, sheltered on the right by a belt of evergreen
trees, fell away steeply to a valley where, under the paling sky, a
sheet of water glimmered. Towards this, down the grassy slope, Mr.
Rogers went with long strides. I broke cover, and ran after him.

I ran as fast as my hurt hip and the trailing folds of the rug
allowed. The grass underfoot was grey with dew, and overhead the
birds were singing. An old horse that had been sleeping in his
pasture heaved himself up and gazed at me as I went by, and either
his snort of contempt or the sound of my footsteps must have struck
on Mr. Rogers's ear. He turned and allowed me to catch up with him.

"It's you, eh?" He eyed me between pity and distrust. "Here, catch
hold, if you're feeling peckish."

He thrust a loaf into my hands and I fell on it ravenously, plucking
off a crust and gnawing it while I trotted beside him.

"Got to feed her blessed swans now!" he muttered. "The deuce is in
her for perversity to-night."

He kept growling to himself, knitting his brow and pausing once or
twice for a moody stare. He was not drunk, and his high complexion
showed no trace of his all-night sitting; and yet something had
changed him utterly from the cheerful gentleman of a few hours back.

The water in the valley bottom proved to be an artificial lake, very
cunningly contrived to resemble a wild one. At the head of it, where
we trod on asphodels and sweet-smelling mints and brushed the young
stalks of the loose-strife, stood a rustic bridge partly screened by
alders. Here Mr. Rogers halted, and a couple of fine swans came
steering towards him out of the shadows.

He broke his loaf into two pieces. "That's for you," he exclaimed,
hurling the first chunk viciously at the male bird. The pair turned
in alarm at the splash and paddled away, hissing. "And that's for
you!" The second chunk caught the female full astern, and Mr. Rogers
leaned on the rail and laughed grimly. He thrust his hand into his
breeches pocket and drew forth a guinea. The young daylight touched
its edge as it lay in his palm.

"I'm a Justice of the Peace; or I'd toss that after the bread."

"What's the matter with it, sir?"

He turned it over gingerly with his forefinger. "See?" he said.
"I put that mark on it myself, for sport, three weeks ago, and this
very night I won it back."

"Was it one you sold to Mr. Rodriguez?"

"Hey?" I thought he would have taken me by the collar. "So you
_are_ the boy! What do you know of Rodriguez, boy?"

"I--I was listening in the verandah, sir. And oh, but I've something
to tell you! I'm the boy, sir, that Mr. Whitmore spoke about--the
boy that's being searched for--"

"Look here," Mr. Rogers interrupted, "I'm a Justice of the Peace, you
know."

"I can't help it, sir--begging your pardon. But I was in the house,
and I saw things: and if they catch me, I must tell."

"Tell the truth and shame the devil," said Mr. Rogers.

"But the more truth I told, sir, the worse it would look for someone
who's innocent."

"Whitmore?"

"You changed a note with Mr. Whitmore, didn't you, sir?"

This confused him. "You've been using your ears to some purpose," he
growled.

"I don't know how Mr. Whitmore comes to be mixed up in it.
But here's another thing, sir--You remember that he walked out after
the game--for fresh air, he said?"

"Well?"

"And he didn't come back?"

"Well?"

"He stepped out because he was whistled out. There was a man waiting
for him."

"What man?"

"His name's Letcher--at least--"

"I don't know the name."

"He was one of the soldiers on the beach this evening."

"The devil!"

"But he hadn't come about _that_ business."

"About what, then?"

"Well now, sir, I must ask you a question. They were talking about
'the beauty down at the cottage.' Who would that be?"

"That," said he slowly, "would be Isabel Brooks, for a certainty."

"And the cottage?"

"Remember the one we passed on the road?--the one with a light
downstairs? That's it. She lives there with her father--an old
soldier and three-parts blind. There's no mischief brewing against
_her_, I hope?"

"I don't know sir," I went on breathlessly. "But if you please, go
on answering me. Do you know a young man called Plinlimmon--
Archibald Plinlimmon?"

"Plinlimmon? Ay, to be sure I do. Met him there once--another
soldier, youngish and good-looking--in the ranks, but seemed a
gentleman--didn't catch his Christian name. The Major introduced him
as the son of an old friend--comrade-in-arms, he said, if I remember.
He was there with a black-faced fellow, whose name I didn't catch
either."

"That was Letcher!"

"What? The man Whitmore was talking with? What were they saying?"

"They said something about a christening. And Letcher asked for
money."

"A christening? What in thunder has a christening to do with it?"

"That's what I don't know, sir."

Mr. Rogers looked at me and rubbed his chin. "I meant to take you to
Lydia," he said; "but now that Whitmore's mixed up in this, I'll be
shot if I do. That fellow has bewitched her somehow, and where he's
concerned--" He glanced up the slope and clutched me suddenly by the
shoulder: for Whitmore himself was there, walking alone, and coming
straight towards us. "Talk of the devil--here, hide, boy--duck down,
I tell you, there behind the bushes! No! Through the hedge, then--"

I burst across the hedge and dropped through a mat of brambles,
dragging my rug after me. The fall landed me on all-fours upon the
sunken high road, along which I ran as one demented--stark naked,
too--a small Jack of Bedlam under the broadening eye of day; ran past
Miss Belcher's entrance gate with its sentinel masses of tall
laurels, and had reached the bend of the road opening the low cottage
into view, when a sudden jingling of bells and tramp of horses drove
me aside through a gate on the left, to cower behind a hedge there
while they passed.

Two wagons came rumbling by, each drawn by six horses and covered by
a huge white tilt bearing in great letters the words "Russell and
Co., Falmouth to London." On the front of each a lantern shone pale
against the daylight. At the head of each team rode a wagoner,
mounted on a separate horse and carrying a long whip. Beside the
wagons tramped four soldiers with fixed bayonets, and two followed
behind: they wore the uniform of the North Wilts Regiment.

I knew them well enough by repute--these famous wagons conveying
untold treasure between London and the Falmouth Packets.
They passed, and I crept out into the road again, to stare after
them.

With that, turning my head, I was aware of a girl in the roadway
outside the cottage door. But if she had come out to gaze after the
wagons, she was gazing now at me. It was too late to hide, and
moreover I had come almost to the end of my powers. With a cry for
pity I ran towards her.

CHAPTER XV.

MINDEN COTTAGE.

Stark naked though I was, she did not flinch as I came; only her eyes
seemed to widen upon me in wonder. And for all my desperate hurry I
had time to see, first, that they were graver than other girls' eyes,
and next that they were exceedingly beautiful.

In those days I had small learning (I have little enough, even now),
or I might have fancied her some goddess awaiting me between the
night and the dawn. She stood, tall and erect, in a loose white
wrapper, the collar of which had fallen open and revealed the
bodice-folds of her nightgown--a cloud at the base of her firm
throat. Her feet were thrust into loose slippers: and her hair hung
low on her neck in dark masses as she had knotted them for the night.

"Where do you come from, boy?" she asked; but an instant later she
put that question aside as an idle one. "Someone has been
ill-treating you! Come indoors!"

She held out a hand and, as I clung to it, led me to the door; but
turned with her other hand on the latch. "Is anyone following?"

I shook my head. She was attempting now, but gently, to draw back
the hand to which I clung; and, in resisting, my fingers met and
pulled against a ring--a single ring of plain gold.

Seeing that I had observed it, she made no further effort, but let
her hand lie, her eyes at the same moment meeting mine and searching
them gravely and curiously.

"Come upstairs," she said; "but tread softly. My father is a light
sleeper."

She took me to a room in the corner of which stood a white bed with
the sheets neatly turned down, prepared and ready for a guest.
The room was filled with the scent of flowers--fragrant scent of
roses and clean aromatic scent of carnations. There were fainter
scents, too, of jasmine and lavender; the first wafted in from a
great bush beyond the open lattice, the second (as I afterwards
discovered) exhaled by the white linen of the bed. But flowers were
everywhere, in bowls and jars and glasses; and as though other
receptacles for them had failed, one long spray of small roses
climbed the dressing-table from a brown pitcher at its foot.

She motioned me to a chair beside the bed, and, almost before I knew
what was intended, she had fetched a basin of water and was kneeling
to wash my feet.

"No--please!" I protested.

"But I love children," she whispered; "and you are but a child."

So I sat in a kind of dream while she washed away the dust and blood,
changing the water twice, and afterwards dried each foot in a towel,
pressing firmly but never once hurting me.

When this was done, she rose and stood musing, contemplating me
seriously and yet with a touch of mirth in her eyes.

"You are such a little one!" she said. "Father's would never fit."
And having poured out fresh water and bidden me wash my body, she
stole out.

She returned with a white garment in her hand and real mirth now in
her eyes. My toilet done, she slipped the garment over me. It fell
to my feet in long folds, yet so lightly that I scarcely felt I was
clothed: and she clapped her hands in dumb-show. It was one of her
own night-gowns.

I glanced uneasily towards the bed. Its daintiness frightened me,
used as I was to the housekeeping--coarse if clean--of Mrs. Trapp.

"Your prayers first," she whispered. "Don't you know any?" She eyed
me anxiously again. "But you are a good boy? Surely you are a good
boy? Don't boys say their prayers? They ought to."

Since passing out of Miss Plinlimmon's tutelage, I had sadly
neglected the habit: but I knelt down obediently and in silence.

She stepped close behind me. "But you're not speaking," she
murmured. "Father always says his aloud, and so do I. You mustn't
pretend, if you don't really know any. I can teach you."

She knelt down beside me, and began to say the Lord's Prayer softly.
I repeated it after her, sentence by sentence: and this was really
shamming, for of course I knew it perfectly. At the time I felt only
that she--this beautiful creature beside me--was in a strange state
of exaltation which I could not in the least understand. I know now
something of the springs I had touched and loosened within her--I, a
naked waif coming to her out of the night and catching her hand for
protection. It was not I she taught, nor over me that she yearned.
She was reaching through me to a child unknown, using me to press
against a strange love tearing at the roots of her body, and to break
the pain of it--the roots of her body, I say; for he who can separate
a woman's soul from her body is a wiser man than I.

She rose from her knees; threw back the sheets and tucked them about
me as I snuggled down.

"What is your name?"

"Harry Revel. Are you Miss Isabel Brooks?"

"I am Isabel."

"Why were you crying, out in the road?"

"Was I crying?"

"Well, not crying exactly: but you looked as if you wanted to."

She smiled. "We both have our secrets it seems; and you shall tell
me yours to-morrow. Will yours let you sleep?"

"I think so, Miss Isabel. I am so tired--and so clean--and this bed
is so soft--" I stretched out my arms luxuriously, and almost before
I knew it she was bending to kiss me, and they were about her neck.
Her hair fell over me in a shower and in the shade of it she laughed
happily, kissing me by the ear and whispering, "I have my happy
secret, too!"

She straightened herself up, tossed back the dark locks with curved
sweep of arm and wrist, and moved to the door.

"Good night, Harry Revel!"

A bird was cheeping in the jasmine bush when I dropped asleep, and
when I awoke he was cheeping there still. Of my dreams I only
remember that they ended in a vague sense of discomfort, somehow
arising from a vision of Mr. Rogers in the act of throwing bread at
the swans, and of the hen bird's flurry as she paddled away. But the
sound which I took for the splashing of water came in fact from the
rings of the window curtain, which Miss Isabel was drawing to shut
out the high morning sun.

She heard me stir and faced about, with her hand yet on the curtain.
"Awake?" she cried, and laughed. "You shall have a basin of
bread-and-milk presently: and after that you may get up and put on
these." She held out a suit of clothes which lay across her arm.
"I have borrowed them from Miss Belcher, who distributes all sorts of
garments at Christmas among the youngsters hereabouts, and has
rummaged this out of her stock. And after that my father will be
glad to make your acquaintance. We shall find him in the garden.
Now I must go and see to preparing dinner: for it is past noon,
though you may not know it."

Behold me, half an hour later, clad in a blue jacket very tight at
the elbows and corduroy breeches very tight at the knees and warm for
the time of year, as I descended with Isabel into the walled garden
at the back of the cottage. Its whole area cannot have been an acre,
and even so the half of it was taken up by a plot of turf, smooth as
a bowling green: but beyond this stretched a miniature orchard, and
along the walls ran two deep borders crowded with midsummer flowers--
tall white lilies and Canterbury bells; stocks, sweet williams,
mignonette, candytuft and larkspurs; bushes of lemon verbena, myrtle,
and the white everlasting pea. Near the house all was kept in
nicest order, with trim ranks of standard roses marching level with
the turfed verges, and tall carnations staked and bending towards
them across the alley: but around the orchard all grew riotous.
The orchard ended in a maze of currant bushes, through which the path
seemed to wander after the sound of running water till it emerged
upon another clearing of turf, with a tall filbert tree, and a
summer-house beneath it, and a row of beehives set beside a stream.
The stream, I afterwards learned, came down from Miss Belcher's park,
and was the real boundary of the garden: but Miss Belcher had allowed
the Major to build a wall for privacy, on the far side of it, yet not
so high as to shut off the sun from his bee-skeps; and had granted
him a private entrance through it to the park--a narrow wooden door
approached by a miniature bridge across the stream.

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