CHAPTER XII
VOLNEY PAYS A DEBT
There are some to whom strange changes never come. They pursue the eventenor of their way in humdrum monotony, content to tread the broad safepath of routine. For them the fascination of the mountain peaks of giddychance has no allurement, the swift turbulent waters of intrigue no charm.There are others with whom Dame Fortune plays many an exciting game, andto these adventure becomes as the very breath of life. To such everyhazard of new fortune is a diversion to be eagerly sought.
Something of this elation seized me--for I am of this latter class--asMurdoch and his gillies rowed me across the sound to Skye in the darknessof the early morning. It was a drab dawn as ever I have seen, and everytug at the oars shot me nearer to the red bloodhounds who were debouchedover the island. What then? Was I not two years and twenty, and did I notventure for the life of a king's son? To-day I staked my head on luck andskill; to-morrow--but let the future care for her own.
In a grove of beeches about half a mile from Portree we landed, andMurdoch gave the call of the whaup to signal Donald Roy. From a clump ofwhins in the gorse the whistle echoed back to us, and presently CaptainMacdonald came swinging down to the shore. It appeared that anotherboatload of soldiers had been landed during the night, a squad of clanmilitia under the command of a Lieutenant Campbell. We could but guessthat this portended some knowledge as to the general whereabouts of thePrince, and 'twas my mission to learn the extent and reliability of thatknowledge if I could. That there was some danger in the attempt I knew,but it had been minimized by the philibeg and hose, the Glengarry bonnetand Macleod plaid which I had donned at the instance of Malcolm.
I have spoken of chance. The first stroke of it fell as I strode along thehighway to Portree. At a crossroad intersection I chanced on a fellowtrudging the same way as myself. He was one of your furtive-faced fellows,with narrow slits of eyes and an acquired habit of skellying sidewise atone out of them. Cunning he was beyond doubt, and from the dour look ofhim one to bear malice. His trews were like Joseph's coat for the colourof the many patches, but I made them out to have been originally of theCampbell plaid.
"A fine day, my man," says I with vast irony.
"Wha's finding faut wi' the day?" he answers glumly.
"You'll be from across the mountains on the mainland by the tongue ofyou," I ventured.
"Gin you ken that there'll be nae use telling you."
"A Campbell, I take it."
He turned his black-a-vised face on me, scowling.
"Or perhaps you're on the other side of the hedge--implicated in thisbarelegged rebellion, I dare say."
Under my smiling, watchful eye he began to grow restless. His hand creptto his breast, and I heard the crackle of papers.
"Deil hae't, what's it to you?" he growled.
"To me? Oh, nothing at all. Merely a friendly interest. On the whole Ithink my first guess right. I wouldn't wonder but you're carryingdispatches from Lieutenant Campbell."
The fellow went all colours and was as easy as a worm on a hook.
"I make no doubt you'll be geyan tired from long travel, and theresponsibility of carrying such important documents must weigh down yourspirits," I drolled, "and so I will trouble you"--with a pistol clapped tohis head and a sudden ring of command in my voice--"to hand them over tome at once."
The fellow's jaw dropped lankly. He looked hither and thither for a way ofescape and found none. He was confronting an argument that had a greatdeal of weight with him, and out of the lining of his bonnet he ripped aletter.
"Thanks, but I'll take the one in your breast pocket," I told him dryly.
Out it came with a deal of pother. The letter was addressed to the Duke ofCumberland, Portree, Skye. My lips framed themselves to a long whistle.Here was the devil to pay. If the butcher was on the island I knew he hadcome after bigger game than muircocks. No less a quarry than the Princehimself would tempt him to this remote region. I marched my prisoner backto Captain Roy and Murdoch. To Donald I handed the letter, and he rippedit open without ceremony. 'Twas merely a note from the Campbell Lieutenantof militia, to say that the orders of his Highness regarding the watchingof the coast would be fulfilled to the least detail.
"Well, and here's a pirn to unravel. What's to be done now?" asked theMacdonald.
"By Heaven, I have it," cried I. "Let Murdoch carry the news to Raasaythat the Prince may get away at once. Do you guard our prisoner here,while I, dressed in his trews and bonnet, carry the letter to the Duke.His answer may throw more light on the matter."
Not to make long, so it was decided. We made fashion to plaster up theenvelope so as not to show a casual looker that it had been tampered with,and I footed it to Portree in the patched trews of the messenger, not withthe lightest heart in the world. The first redcoat I met directed me tothe inn where the Duke had his headquarters, and I was presently admittedto a hearing.
The Duke was a ton of a little man with the phlegmatic Dutch face. He readthe letter stolidly and began to ask questions as to the disposition ofour squad. I lied generously, magnificently, my face every whit as woodenas his; and while I was still at it the door behind me opened and a mancame in leisurely. He waited for the Duke to have done with me, softlyhumming a tune the while, his shadow flung in front across my track; andwhile he lilted there came to me a dreadful certainty that on occasion Ihad heard the singer and his song before.
"'Then come kiss me sweet and twenty. Youth's a stuff will not endure,'"
carolled the melodious voice lazily. Need I say that it belonged to myumquhile friend Sir Robert Volney.
Cumberland brushed me aside with a wave of his hand.
"Donner! If the Pretender is on Skye--and he must be--we've got himtrapped, Volney. Our cordon stretches clear across the isle, and everyoutlet is guarded," he cried.
"Immensely glad to hear it, sir. Let's see! Is this the twelfth timeyou've had him sure? 'Pon honour, he must have more lives than theproverbial cat," drawled Sir Robert insolently.
There was one thing about Volney I could never enough admire. He was norespecter of persons. Come high, come low, the bite of his ironic tonguestruck home. For a courtier he had the laziest scorn of those he courtedthat ever adventurer was hampered with; and strangely enough from him hisfriends in high place tolerated anything. The Prince of Wales and hisbrother Cumberland would not speak to each other, yet each of them foughtto retain Volney as his follower. Time-servers wondered that his uncurbedspeech never brought him to grief. Perhaps the secret of his security layin his splendid careless daring; in that, and in his winning personality.
"By God, Volney, sometimes I think you're half a Jacobite," saidCumberland, frowning.
"Your Grace does me injustice. My bread is buttered on the Brunswickside," answered the baronet, carelessly.
"But otherwise--at heart----"
Volney's sardonic smile came into play. "Otherwise my well-known caution,and my approved loyalty,--Egad, I had almost forgotten that!--refute suchan aspersion."
"Himmel! If your loyalty is no greater than your caution it may be countedout. At the least you take delight in tormenting me. Never deny it, man! Ibelieve you want the Pretender to get away."
"One may wish the Prince----"
"The Prince?" echoed Cumberland, blackly.
"The Young Chevalier then, if you like that better. 'Slife, what's in aname? One may wish him to escape and be guilty of no crime. He and hisbrave Highlanders deserve a better fate than death. I dare swear that halfyour redcoats have the sneaking desire to see the young man win free outof the country. Come, my good fellow"--turning to me--"What do they callyou--Campbell? Well then, Campbell, speak truth and shame the devil. Areyou as keen to have the Young Chevalier taken as you pretend?"
Doggedly I turned my averted head toward him, saw the recognition leap tohis eyes, and waited for the word to fall from his lips that would condemnme. Amusement chased amazement across his face.
A moment passed,
still another moment. The word was not spoken. Instead hebegan to smile, presently to hum,
"'You'll on an' you'll march to Carlisle ha' To be hanged and quartered, an' a', an' a'.'
"Come, Mont-Campbell, you haven't answered my question yet. If you knewwhere Charles Edward Stuart was in hiding would you give him up?" Helooked at me from under lowered lids, vastly entertained, playing with meas a cat does with a mouse.
"I am a fery good servant of the King, God bless him whatefer, and I wouldjust do my duty," answered I, still keeping the role I had assumed.
"Of course he would. Ach, liebe himmel! Any loyal man would be bound to doso," broke in Cumberland.
Volney's eyes shone. "I'm not so sure," said he. "Now supposing, sir, thatone had a very dear friend among the rebels; given the chance, ought he toturn him over to justice?"
"No doubt about it. Friendship ends when rebellion begins," said the Duke,sententiously.
Sir Robert continued blandly to argue the case, looking at me out of thetail of his eye. Faith, he enjoyed himself prodigiously, which was morethan I did, for I was tasting a bad quarter of an hour. "Put it this way,sir: I have a friend who has done me many good turns. Now assume that Ihave but to speak the word to send him to his death. Should the word bespoken?"
The Duke said dogmatically that a soldier's first duty was to work for thesuccess of his cause regardless of private feelings.
"Or turn it this way," continued Volney, "that the man is not a friend.Suppose him a rival claimant to an estate I mean to possess. Can I inhonour give him up? What would you think, Mont--er--Campbell?"
"Not Mont-Campbell, but Campbell," I corrected. "I will be thinking, sir,that it would be a matter for your conscience, and at all events it issfery lucky that you do not hafe to decide it."
"Still the case might arise. It's always well to be prepared," heanswered, laughing.
"Nonsense, Robert! What the deuce do you mean by discussing such a matterwith a Highland kerne? I never saw your match for oddity," said the Duke.
While he was still speaking there was a commotion in the outer room of theinn. There sounded a rap at the door, and on the echo of the knock anofficer came into the room to announce the capture of a suspect. He wasfollowed by the last man in the world I wanted to see at that moment, noother than the Campbell soldier whose place I was usurping. The fat was inthe fire with a vengeance now, and though I fell back to the rear I knewit was but a question of time till his eye lit on me.
The fellow began to tell his story, got nearly through before his ferreteyes circled round to me, then broke off to burst into a screed of theGaelic as he pointed a long finger at me.
The Duke flung round on me in a cold fury. "Is this true, fellow?"
I came forward shrugging.
"To deny were folly when the evidence is writ so plain," I said.
"And who the devil are you?"
"Kenneth Montagu, at your service."
Cumberland ordered the room cleared, then turned on Volney a very grimface. "I'll remember this, Sir Robert. You knew him all the time. It has abad look, I make plain to say."
"'Twas none of my business. Your troopers can find enough victims for youwithout my pointing out any. I take the liberty of reminding your Highnessthat I'm not a hangman by profession," returned Volney stiffly.
"You go too far, sir," answered the Duke haughtily. "I know my duty toowell to allow me to be deterred from performing it by you or by anybodyelse. Mr. Montagu, have you any reason to give why I should not hang youfor a spy?"
"No reason that would have any weight with your Grace," I answered.
He looked long at me, frowning blackly out of the grimmest face I had everfronted; and yet that countenance, inexorable as fate, belonged to a youngman not four years past his majority.
"Without dubiety you deserve death," he said at the last, "but because ofyour youth I give you one chance. Disclose to me the hiding-place of thePretender and you shall come alive out of the valley of the shadow."
A foretaste of the end clutched icily at my heart, but the price of theproffered safety was too great. Since I must die, I resolved that itshould be with a good grace.
"I do not know whom your Grace can mean by the Pretender."
His heavy jaw set and his face grew cold and hard as steel.
"You fool, do you think to bandy words with me? You will speak or byheaven you will die the death of a traitor."
"I need not fear to follow where so many of my brave comrades have shownthe way," I answered steadily.
"Bah! You deal in heroics. Believe me, this is no time for theatricals.Out with it. When did you last see Charles Stuart?"
"I can find no honourable answer to that question, sir."
"Then your blood be on your own head, fool. You die to-morrow morning bythe cord."
"As God wills; perhaps to-morrow, perhaps not for fifty years."
While I was being led out another prisoner passed in on his way tojudgment. The man was Captain Roy Macdonald.
"I'm wae to see you here, lad, and me the cause of it by sending you," hesaid, smiling sadly.
"How came they to take you?" I asked.
"I was surprised on the beach just after Murdoch left," he told me in theGaelic so that the English troopers might not understand. "All should bewell with the yellow haired laddie now that the warning has been given.Are you for Carlisle, Kenneth?"
I shook my head. "No, my time is set for to-morrow. If they give youlonger you'll find a way to send word to Aileen how it went with me,Donald?"
He nodded, and we gripped hands in silence, our eyes meeting steadily.From his serene courage I gathered strength.
They took me to a bothy in the village which had been set apart as aprison for me, and here, a picket of soldiers with loaded musketssurrounding the hut, they left me to myself. I had asked for paper andink, but my request had been refused.
In books I have read how men under such circumstance came quietly tophilosophic and religious contemplation, looking at the issue with thefar-seeing eyes of those who count death but an incident. But for me, I amneither philosopher nor saint. Connected thought I found impossible. Mymind was alive with fleeting and chaotic fragmentary impulses. Memoriesconnected with Cloe, Charles, Balmerino, and a hundred others occupied me.Trivial forgotten happenings flashed through my brain. All the differentAileens that I knew trooped past in procession. Gay and sad, wistful andmerry, eager and reflective, in passion and in tender guise, I saw my lovein all her moods; and melted always at the vision of her.
I descended to self-pity, conceiving myself a hero and a martyr, revellingin an agony of mawkish sentiment concerning the post-mortem grief of myfriends. From this at length I snatched myself by calling to mind the manysimple Highlanders who had preceded me in the past months without anymorbid craving for applause. Back harked my mind to Aileen, imaginationspanning the future as well as the past. Tender pity and love suffused me.Mingled with all my broken reflections was many a cry of the heart formercy to a sinner about to render his last account and for healing balm tothat dear friend who would be left to mourn the memory of me painted inradiant colours.
Paradoxical though it may seem, the leaden hours flew on feathered foot.Dusk fell, then shortly darkness. Night deepened, and the stars came out.From the window I watched the moon rise till it flooded the room with itspale light, my mind at last fallen into the sombre quiet of deepabstraction.
A mocking voice brought me to earth with a start.
"Romantic spectacle! A world bathed in moonlight. Do you compose verses toyour love's bright eyes, Mr. Montagu? Or perhaps an epitaph for some closefriend?"
An elegant figure in dark cloak, riding boots, and three-cornered hatconfronted me, when I slowly turned.
"Hope I don't intrude," he said jauntily.
I gave him a plain hint. "Sir Robert, like Lord Chesterfield, when he wasso ill last year, if I do not press you to remain it is because I mustrehearse my funeral obsequies."
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His laugh rang merrily. Coming forward a step or two, he flung a legacross the back of a chair.
"Egad, you're not very hospitable, my friend. Or isn't this your eveningat home?" he fleered.
I watched him narrowly, answering nothing.
"Cozy quarters," he said, looking round with polite interest. "May I askwhether you have taken them for long?"
"The object of your visit, sir," I demanded coldly.
"There you gravel me," he laughed. "I wish I knew the motives for myvisit. They are perhaps a blend--some pique, some spite, some curiosity,and faith! a little admiration, Mr. Montagu."
"All of which being presumably now satisfied----"
"But they're not, man! Far from it. And so I accept the courteousinvitation you were about to extend me to prolong my call and join you ina glass of wine."
Seeing that he was determined to remain willy-nilly, I made the best ofit.
"You have interpreted my sentiments exactly, Sir Robert," I told him. "ButI fear the wine will have to be postponed till another meeting. My cellaris not well stocked."
He drew a flask from his pocket, found glasses on the table, and filledthem.
"Then let me thus far play host, Mr. Montagu. Come, I give you a toast!"He held the glass to the light and viewed the wine critically. "'T is adevilish good vintage, though I say it myself. Montagu, may you alwaysfind a safe port in time of storm!" he said with jesting face, but with acertain undercurrent of meaning that began to set my blood pounding.
But though I took a glimmer of the man's purpose I would not meet himhalf-way. If he had any proposal to make the advances must come from him.Nor would I allow myself to hope too much.
"I' faith, 'tis a good port," I said, and eyed the wine no less judiciallythan he.
Volney's gaze loitered deliberately over the cottage furnishings. "Cozyenough, but after all not quite to my liking, if I may make so bold as tocriticise your apartments. I wonder now you don't make a change."
"I'm thinking of moving to-morrow," I told him composedly. "To a lessroomy apartment, but one just as snug."
"Shall you live there permanently?" he asked with innocent face.
"I shall stay there permanently," I corrected.
Despite my apparent unconcern I was playing desperately for my life. ThatVolney was dallying with some plan of escape for me I became moreconfident, and I knew from experience that nothing would touch the man onhis weak side so surely as an imperturbable manner.
"I mentioned pique and spite, Mr. Montagu, and you did not take mymeaning. Believe me, not against you, but against that oaf Cumberland," hesaid.
"And what may your presence here have to do with your pique against theDuke? I confess that the connection is not plain to me," I said incareless fashion.
"After you left to-day, Mr. Montagu, I humbled myself to ask a favour ofthe Dutchman--the first I ever asked, and I have done him many. He refusedit and turned his back on me."
"The favour was----?"
"That you might be taken to London for trial and executed there."
I looked up as if surprised. "And why this interest on my behalf, SirRobert?"
He shrugged. "I do not know--a fancy--a whim. George Selwyn would neverforgive me if I let you be hanged and he not there to see."
"Had you succeeded Selwyn would have had you to thank for a pleasantdiversion, but I think you remarked that the Dutchman was obstinate. 'Tisa pity--for Selwyn's sake."
"Besides, I had another reason. You and I had set ourselves to play out acertain game in which I took an interest. Now I do not allow anyblundering foreigners to interfere with my amusements."
"I suppose you mean you do not like the foreigner to anticipate you."
"By God, I do not allow him to when I can prevent it."
"But as in this instance you cannot prevent it----" My sentence tailedinto a yawn.
"That remains to be seen," he retorted, and whipped off first one boot andthen the other. The unfastened cloak fell to the floor, and he began tounloose his doublet.
I stared calmly, though my heart stood still.
"Really, Sir Robert! Are you going to stay all night? I fear myaccommodations are more limited than those to which you have beenaccustomed."
"Don't stand gaping there, Montagu. Get off those uncivilized rags ofyours and slip on these. You're going out as Sir Robert Volney."
"I am desolated to interfere with your revenge, but--the guards?"
"Fuddled with drink," he said. "I took care of that. Don't waste timeasking questions."
"The Duke will be in a fearful rage with you."
His eyes grew hard. "Am I a child that I should tremble when Cumberlandfrowns?"
"He'll make you pay for this."
"A fig for the payment!"
"You'll lose favour."
"I'll teach the sullen beast to refuse me one. The boots next."
He put on the wig and hat for me, arranged the muffler over the lower partof my face, and fastened the cloak.
"The watchword for the night is 'Culloden.' You should have no trouble inpassing. I needn't tell you to be bold," he finished dryly.
"I'll not forget this," I told him.
"That's as you please," he answered carelessly. "I ask no gratitude. I'msettling a debt, or rather two--one due Cumberland and the other you."
"Still, I'll remember."
"Oh, all right. Hope we'll have the pleasure of renewing our little gamesome day. Better take to the hills or the water. You'll find the roadsstrictly guarded. Don't let yourself get killed, my friend. The pleasureof running you through I reserve for myself."
I passed out of the hut into the night. The troopers who guarded the bothywere in either the stupid or the uproarious stage of their drink. Two ofthem sang a catch of a song, and I wondered that they had not alreadybrought down on them the officer of the day. I passed them carelessly witha nod. One of them bawled out, "The watchword!" and I gave them"Culloden." Toward the skirts of the village I sauntered, fear dogging myfootsteps; and when I was once clear of the houses, cut across a meadowtoward the shore, wary as a panther, eyes and ears alert for signals ofdanger. Without mishap I reached the sound, beat my way up the sand linksfor a mile or more, and saw a boat cruising in the moonlight off shore. Igave the whaup's cry, and across the water came an answer.
Five minutes later I was helping the gillie in the boat pull across toRaasay. When half way over we rested on our oars for a breathing space andI asked the news, the rug-headed kerne shot me with the dismal tidingsthat Malcolm Macleod and Creagh, rowing to Skyes for a conference withCaptain Roy, had fallen into the hands of the troopers waiting for themamong the sand dunes. He had but one bit of comfort in his budget, andthat was "ta yellow-haired Sassenach body wass leaving this morning withRaasay hersel' and Murdoch." At least I had some assurance that myundertaking had secured the safety of the Prince, even though threestaunch men were on their way to their death by reason of it.
Once landed on Raasay, I made up the brae to the great house. Lights werestill burning, and when I got close 'twas easy to be seen that terror andconfusion filled it. Whimpering, white-faced women and wailing bairns ranhither and thither blindly. Somewhere in the back part of the house thebagpipes were soughing a dismal kind of dirge. Fierce-eyed men with mopsof shock hair were gathered into groups of cursing clansmen. Through themall I pushed my way in to Aileen.