Cardigan

CHAPTER XXVI

It was nearly ten o'clock; a freezing rain still swept the black Boston streets, with now and again a volley of hail, rattling on closed shutters and swinging shop-signs.

In the dark mews behind the "Wild Goose Tavern" had gathered a shadowy company of horsemen, unfortunate patriots who had not been quick enough to leave the city before the troops shut its landward gates.

Caught by the Governor's malignant move, separated from their companies of Minute Men, these half-score gentlemen had met at the "Wild Goose" to consult how best they might leave the city and join their comrades at Lexington and Concord.

Some were for riding to the Neck and making a dash across the causeway; some wanted boats, among the latter, Jack Mount, who naturally desired to rid the town of his person as speedily as might be.

"There's a hempen neck-cloth to fit my pipes in Queen Street," he said, plaintively, "and I desire it not, having no mind for flummery. Let us find a flat-boat, in God's name, and get us to Charlestown with our horses while the rain endures."

"Ay," replied an officer of Roxbury Minute Men, "but what if our horses neigh in mid-stream?"

"The Somerset ran out her deck-guns at sunset," added another. "What if she turned her swivel on us?"

"And how if they swept us off the causeway with a chain-shot?" asked Mount.

"What think you, Mr. Cardigan?" demanded an officer of Sudbury militia, leaning forward in his wet saddle to pat the dripping neck of his roan.

"I only know that I shall ride this night to Lexington," I said, impatiently, "and I am at your service, gentlemen, by land or sea. Pray you, decide quickly while the rain favours us."

"Is there a man among us dare demand a pass of the Governor?" asked the Sudbury officer, abruptly. "By Heaven, gentlemen, it is death by land or by sea if we make to force the lines this night!"

"And it is death to me if I stay here cackling," muttered Mount, as we caught the distant gallop of dragoons through stony Wiltshire Street.

We sat moodily in our saddles, huddled together in the darkness and rain, listening to the sound of the horses' feet on the pavement.

"I'd give a thousand guineas if I were on the Charlestown shore with Revere," muttered an officer.

"The Governor might sell you a pass for ten," observed another, sneeringly. "It will cost him a penny to keep his pretty bird o' paradise in plumes."

"If John Hancock were here he would get us a pass from Mrs. Hamilton," remarked the Sudbury officer.

There was a silence, then one or two men laughed.

"Is Mrs. Hamilton at Province House?" I asked, not understanding the careless handling of her name among these gentlemen.

Again came laughter.

"It is easy to see that you have been in prison," observed the Sudbury officer. "Mrs. Hamilton rules at Province House, and leads Tommy Gage by the nose – "

"By the left hand," interrupted another, maliciously.

"You mean that Mrs. Hamilton is – is – " I began.

"Town scandal," said the officer.

"It may be a lie," observed a young man mounted on a powerful gray.

"It is a lie," I said, with an ugly emphasis.

"Is that remark addressed to me, sir?" demanded the Sudbury officer, sharply.

"And to company, also," I replied.

"Gentlemen!" cried the Roxbury officer, "are we to have quarrels among us at such a time?"

"Certainly," said I, "if you or your company affront me. Tattle is dirty work for a gentleman's tongue, and the sooner that tongue is stopped with honest mud the better."

"I've called a gentleman out for less than that," said an old officer, dryly.

"I am at your service," I replied, disgusted.

"And I'm with you, lad," said Mount, walking up to my stirrup. "I have no stomach for those who wink at a woman's name."

"I also," said the young man on the gray, gravely.

A constrained silence followed, broken by the Sudbury officer.

"Hats off to the beautiful Mrs. Hamilton, gentlemen! Cardigan is right, by God! If we stand not for our women, who will?"

And he stretched out his hand in the rain. I took it; others offered me their hands.

"I ride to Province House," I said, briefly. "Jack, fetch a cloak to hide your buckskins and wait me here. Gentlemen, I wish you fortune in your journey."

As I rode out into Cambridge Street, thunder boomed in the east, and I saw the forked lightning racing through inky heavens, veining the storm with jewelled signs.

"God writes on heaven's wall!" I said, aloud.

A strange exultation stirred me; the dark world lay free and wide before me, and I would ride it, now, from end to end, till Silver Heels was mine and Butler's soul had dropped back into that pit from whence it had crawled to hide within his demon's body.

In Hillier's Lane I put Warlock to a gallop, but drew bridle in muddy Sudbury Street, where, from the darkness, a strident voice called on me to halt.

"Who comes there?" repeated the voice. I heard the trample of horsemen and the clink of sabres striking stirrups.

"Coureur-de-bois for Province House!" I answered, calmly. A chafing temper began to heat my blood; I gathered my bridle and dropped one hand on my hatchet.

"On whose affairs ride you?" demanded the spectral dragoon, laying his horse broadside across mine.

"On my own affairs!" I cried, angrily; "pull out there! – do you hear me, fellow?"

A lanthorn was lifted to my face.

"Let the forest wild-cat go," muttered an officer, riding back to the picket as I crowded my horse against the dragoon who had hailed me.

Without giving them a glance I pushed through the cluster of horsemen, and heard them cursing my insolence as I wheeled into School Street and cantered along Governor's Alley.

There were torches lighted in the mews; an hostler took Warlock; I swung out of the saddle and stepped back to a shelter from the storm.

Through the rain, up Marlborough Street, down School Street, and along Cornhill, drove the coaches and carriages of the Tory quality, all stopping at the brilliantly lighted mansion, where, as an hostler informed me, the Governor was giving a play and a supper to the wealthy Tory families of Boston and to all the officers of the British regiments quartered in the city. I knew the latter statement was false.

I stood for a while in the rain among the throng of poor who had come to wait there, in patience, on the chance of a scrap from the servants' quarters after the servants had picked the bones their surfeited masters would scarcely deign to lick.

At first, as the coaches dashed up and the chairs jogged into the gateway, a few squalid watchers in the crowd fought to open the carriage-doors, hoping for a coin flung to them for their pains; but the sentinels soon put a finish to this, driving the ragged rabble savagely, with thrusts of their musket-butts, out into Marlborough Street. Under the gate-lanthorn's smeared reflections I saw the poor things huddled in a half-circle, pinched and chattering and white with hunger, soaked to the bone with the icy rain, yet lingering, God knows why, for a brief glimpse of My Lady in pink silk and powder, picking her way from her carriage across the puddles, while My Lord minced at her side and the footman ran behind to cover them both with a glistening umbrella.

The stony street echoed with the clatter of shod horses, the rattle of wheels, the shouts of footmen, and the bawling of chair-bearers.

Once, when the wind sharpened, shifted, and blew the slanting rain from the north, a warm odour of roasted butcher's meats came to us, and I could hear a hollow sound rising from the throng, which was like a groan.

In the Province House fiddlers were fiddling; it was chill enough in the street, but it was doubtless over-hot within, for servants came and threw open the windows and we could hear the fiddles plainly and the sweet confusion of voices and a young girl's laughter.

A hoarse cry broke out, wrung from the very vitals of the wretches around me.

"Silence!" shouted the officer of the gate-guard, striding out in his long rain-cloak and glaring about him, with tasselled stick upraised. The rain powdered his gilded French hat and laced vest, and he stepped back hastily under shelter.

There was perfect quiet for an instant, then a movement near me, a mutter, a quick surging of people, a cry: "Give room! Back there! Bear him up!"

A voice broke out, "He is starving; the smell o' meat sickens him!"

Two men staggered past, supporting a mere lad, whose deathly face hung on his rain-soaked cotton shirt.

"He has the spotted sickness!" muttered a chair-bearer near me; "it's death to take his breath! Let me pass!"

"The pest!" cried another, shrinking back, and stumbling away in a panic.

The officer watched the scene for a moment, then his heavy, inflamed face darkened.

"Back there! Be off, I say!" he bawled. "Ye stinking beggars, d'ye mean to poison us all with the pest? Turn out the gate-guard! Drive those filthy whelps up Cornhill!" he shouted to the corporal of the guard.

The soldiers came tumbling out of the gate-lodge, but before they could move on the throng another officer hurried up, and I heard him sharply recalling the soldiers and rebuking the officer who had given the order.

"No, no, that will not do," he said. "The town would flame if you drive the citizens from their own streets. Let them stand there. What harm are they doing?"

"The lout yonder fell down with the spotted pest," remonstrated the first officer. "Faugh! The rabble's rotten with scurvy or some filthy abomination – "

"They'll harm no one but themselves," replied the other in a sad voice, which sounded strangely familiar to me, so familiar that I involuntarily stepped out into the lighted space under the gate and peered at him through the rain, shielding my eyes with my hands.

The officer was Mr. Bevan.

Should I speak to him? Should I count on his friendship for me to get me an audience with the Governor? Here was a chance; he could vouch for me; so could Mrs. Hamilton.

As I hesitated somebody beside me clutched my elbow, and I swung around instantly, one hand on my hunting-knife.

The next moment Saul Shemuel almost rolled at my feet in an ecstasy of humble delight, sniffling, writhing, breathing hard, and clawing at my sleeve in his transports at sight of me.

I seized his arm, drew him along the wall, and into the dusky mews.

Impatient, yet touched, I suffered his mauling, demanding what news he might have, and he, beside himself with joy and excitement, could scarce find breath to pant out the news which concerned me. "I haf seen Foxcroft," he gasped. "Mr. Foxcroft he hass come to-day on dot Pomona frigate to Scarlet's Wharf, twelve weeks from Queenstown, sir. It wass printed in dot Efening Gazette, all apout Foxcroft how he iss come from Sir Peter Warren to make some troubles for Sir John Johnson mit dot money he took from Miss Warren, sir!"

"Foxcroft! Here?" I stammered.

"Yess, sir; I ran mit my legs to Queen Street, und I told him how you wass in dot prison come, und he run mit his legs to Province House, but too late, for we hear dot bell ring und dose guns shooting. Und I said, 'Gott of Isaac, I bet you Jack Mount he hass run avay!' Und Mr. Foxcroft he sees some dragoon soldiers come into Cornhill, calling out: 'Dose highwaymens is gone! Vatch 'em by dot Mall!' So Mr. Foxcroft he comes to Province House mit me, sir, und he iss gone in to make some troubles mit Governor Gage apout Sir John Johnson und dot money of Miss Warren! Ach, here iss Mr. Foxcroft, now, sir – "

I turned to confront a stout, florid gentleman, swathed in a riding-cloak, whose little, angry eyes snapped as he cried: "Governor Gage is a meddling ass! I care not who listens to me, and, I repeat, he is a meddlesome ass! Sir Peter Warren shall hear of this, damme! Am I a free agent, damme? I take it that I am a free agent, yet I may not leave this town to-night for lack of a pass. But I'll go! They shall not stop me! No, damme if they shall!"

The hostlers were all staring at him; I stepped towards him, eagerly, but the peppery and inflamed barrister waved me off.

"Damme, sir!" he bawled; "who the devil are you, sir? Take your hands from me, sir! I wish to go to my client in Lexington, and this Tory peacock will give me no pass! I will not suffer this outrage; I will appeal to – "

I gave him a jerk that shook the breath from his body, whispering in his ear: "Be silent, in Heaven's name, sir! I am Michael Cardigan!"

At first, in his passion, astonishment, and incredulity, he found no voice to answer me; but as Shemuel eagerly vouched for me, Mr. Foxcroft's fury and suspicion subsided.

"You? Cardigan?" he repeated. "Well, where the devil have you been, sir, and what the devil have you been about, sir? Eh? Answer me that, now!"

"I've been in prison, under sentence of death," I replied. "Where have you been, sir, to leave your client, Miss Warren, at the mercy of Walter Butler?"

At that he took fire, and, with trembling fist quivering towards heaven, he justified his absence in warm terms.

"I've been in England, sir, that's where I've been!" he cried. "I've been there to find out why your blackguard of a kinsman, Sir John Johnson, should rob my client of her property. And I've found out that your blackguard Sir John has not only robbed her of her means, but of the very name she has a right to! That's what I've done, sir. And if it does not please you, you may go to the devil!"

His impudence and oaths I scarcely noted, such a fierce happiness was surging through me to the very bones. I could have hugged the choleric barrister as he stood there, affronting me at every breath; I fairly beamed upon him when he bade me go to the devil, and, to his amazement, I seized his fat hands and thanked him so gratefully that the defiance died on his lips and he stared at me open-mouthed.

"My dear sir, my dear, dear friend," I cried, "I will get you your pass to clear the Neck to-night, and we will go together to find my cousin, Miss Warren. Wait me here, sir; I will leave Boston this night or my name is not Cardigan!"

Then bidding Shemuel keep an eye on Warlock, I hurried around to the gate-house, where the rabble still slunk, watching the lighted windows with famished eyes.

The clouds in mid-heaven had caked into snowy jets of fleece, and now the full moon of April flooded the soaked pavements with pools of silver.

The sentry halted me as I entered the court-yard, but when I asked for Mr. Bevan, he called to a comrade to take my message. The next moment Bevan stepped out into the moonlight.

"What is it, my man? Can I serve you?" he said, pleasantly, peering at me.

"Do you not know me, Mr. Bevan?" I asked.

"Cardigan!" he stammered, "is that you, Cardigan – "

He was close to me at a stride, both hands on my shoulders, his kindly, troubled eyes full of wonder and pity. Perhaps I appeared to him somewhat haggard and careworn, and then the rain had chilled and pinched me.

"I am not in want," I said, trying to smile.

"But – but why are you not among the guests at Province House?" he asked, quickly. "The son of Captain Cardigan needs no friend at court, I fancy."

He linked his gilded sleeve in my arm and drew me past the guard-house, and ere I could protest, I found myself inside the cloak-room among a company of old beaux and young fops, all in the hands of footmen and body-servants who were busily dusting the hair-powder from silken shoulders, smoothing out laces, hanging hats and cloaks to dry, and polishing sword-hilts for their languid, insolent-eyed masters.

"Can we not find a quiet corner hereabouts?" I asked. "I came to demand a pass for Lexington. Will you use your privilege with the Governor, Bevan?"

"A pass!" he exclaimed, stopping short in his tracks.

"To Lexington," I repeated.

"To-night?"

"Yes."

He raised his honest, perplexed eyes to me.

"I must have a pass; it concerns the welfare of Miss Warren," I began, then hesitated, remembering that I was also to take Jack Mount in my company, whose business in Lexington was very different from mine.

"Cardigan," he said, with troubled eyes on me, "I cannot lend myself to such a service, even for Miss Warren's sake, unless you first give me your word of honour that your journey concerns only Miss Warren's welfare."

My heart sank; I could not betray the comrade who counted on me. Jack Mount must get free o' Boston as well as I. But how could I lie to Bevan or requite his courtesy with treachery? Yet honour forbade me to leave Jack Mount, even for Silver Heels's sake.

"Pass or no pass, I go this night," I said, sullenly.

"Hush!" he said; "don't talk here."

He led me through the card-rooms, where a score of old bucks and purple-necked officers sat, all playing picquet in owlish silence, then through a partition, where a fountain sprayed beds of tall ferns, out into a lamp-illumined circular alcove, hung with China silks, and bowered deep in flowers and tiny, blossoming trees no higher than one's knee-buckle.

"The Chinese alcove," he observed. "Nobody will disturb us here, I fancy. You have heard of the Chinese alcove, Cardigan? There is the door to the famous golden gallery."

I glanced at the gilded door in the corner, half-hidden by Chinese drapery. I had heard that the Governor's sweetheart dwelt here.

Bevan reached up and pulled a velvet cord. Presently a servant brought us a silver bowl of steaming punch made with tea and fruit in the Regent's fashion.

"I drink no tea," I said, shortly.

"I suppose not," observed Bevan, laughing, and commanded the servant to fetch me a bowl without tea.

"Your courtesy to a rebel is extraordinary," I said, after an interval.

"Oh, I'm half rebel myself," he laughed. "I'd be in my shirt-sleeves out Middlesex way, drilling yokels – Minute Men, I believe – were it not that – that – oh, well, I'll wear the red jacket as long as I live and let the future weed out the goats from the sheep."

"It's different with you," I said. "You are English bred."

"Ay, and the red o' the uniform has dyed my flesh to the bone," he replied.

"You mean that you will fight – us?" I asked.

"Tooth and nail, my dear fellow," he said, gayly; "foot, horse, and dragoons! But what can I do to serve you – first?"

I tasted a glass of punch, then set it down impatiently. "I tell you I must ride to Lexington," I said, firmly, "and I mean to take friends if I choose – "

"Tell me no more, Cardigan," he broke in, "else I must refuse you what little service I may render. You know as well as I why the gates on the Neck are closed to-night. If you do not know, listen to me. The rebels have been storing war materials. Last October we gave their spokesmen full warning that we could no longer tolerate the collecting of arms and ammunition. We sent expeditions into the country to destroy what stores they had gathered."

He hesitated; a perplexed smile passed over his face. "You know perfectly well," he said, "that we have good reasons for closing the city gates to-night. I cannot give you a pass. Yet, for Miss Warren's sake" – he lifted his hat as he spoke – "I have done what I could in honour. Now I must leave you."

"What have you done?" I asked, angrily.

"I have conducted you to the Chinese alcove, my friend."

"The ante-chamber of the Governor's mistress," I retorted. "Am I to find my pass here among these flowers and blossoms?"

He looked down at the glasses on the table beside us, stirred the contents of his own, and nodded.

"What do you mean?" I demanded, hotly.

"I mean, Cardigan, that, except the Governor, there is only one person to-night in Boston who can secure you a pass for Lexington. If she chooses to do so, it is not my affair."

"If who chooses to do so?"

"She."

"Who?"

"Wait and – ask her," he said, gravely.

He was gone, wading waist-deep in flowers, ere I could compose my mind to think or protest, leaving me speechless; standing by the table.

A minute passed; through the thickets of sweet-smelling blossoms the candles flamed like those slender witch-lights that dance over nature's gardens, where bergamot and cardinal robe our dim woods in crimson glory under the October stars.

"What does he mean by leaving me here?" I muttered, pacing to and fro through the fragrant, flowering lane. Then, as I stood still, listening, far away I heard a glass door close with a crystalline clash; there came the rustle of brocade sweeping like a breeze along the passage; the door of the golden gallery swung outward; a figure all silk and lace stood poised on the step above me, screened to the knees behind the flowers.

"Where is the forest-runner who desires a pass to Lexington?" she began; then, perceiving my lank, dark form against the candle-light, she laughed a sweet, contented little laugh and bade me approach.