Читать книгу Collected Works (Historical Novel) - D. K. Broster - Страница 84

So, by the time they came with lighted lamps to Dalmally, and the little inn in the strath where they were to spend the night, Ewen, by way of revulsion, was almost ready to laugh at himself and his fears. Even if the news about the issue of the warrant were true, the information which had caused it was palpably false. As if Archie would lie hid, as Lord Aveling’s correspondent reported, within reach of Inversnaid barracks! Again, if it had been true, then, having regard to the time which had elapsed, and the extraordinary swiftness with which news was wont to travel from mouth to mouth in the Highlands, the news of Doctor Cameron’s capture in Perthshire would certainly be known here at Dalmally, almost on the borders. And a few careful questions put to the innkeeper soon after their arrival, out of Lord Aveling’s hearing, showed Ardroy that it was not. He sat down to supper with that young man in a somewhat happier frame of mind.

The most esteemed bedroom of the inn had been put at the disposal of the guests. There happened to be two beds in it, and for persons of the same sex travelling together—or even not travelling—to share a room was so usual that the landlord did not even apologise for the necessity; he was only overheard to congratulate himself that he could offer the superior amenities of his best bedchamber to these two gentlemen.

But the gentlemen in question did not congratulate themselves when they saw it.

“Did you say that you once shared a room with my poor brother?” enquired Lord Aveling when their mails had been brought in and they were alone together in that uninviting apartment.

“Hardly a room,” answered Ewen. “It was but a little hut, where one slept upon bracken.”

“I believe that I should prefer bracken to this bed,” observed his lordship, looking with distaste at the dingy sheets which he had uncovered. “I shall not venture myself completely into it. Yet, by Gad, I’m sleepy enough.” He yawned. “I wager I shall sleep as well, perhaps better, than I have done of late at Dunstaffnage Castle, where one heard the sea-wind blowing so strong of nights.”

“Yes, and I dare venture you found Edinburgh none too quiet neither,” observed Ewen idly, surveying his equally dubious sheets, and resolving to follow his companion’s example.

“Oh, down at General Churchill’s quarters ’twas peaceful enough,” returned Lord Aveling, stifling another yawn, “for the Abbey stands—but there,” he added, beginning to take off his coat, “you must know better than I what is the situation of Holyrood House.”

Ewen’s pulse suddenly quickened. “So it was General Churchill whom you were visiting in Edinburgh, my lord?”

“Yes,” replied the young man. “I thought I had already mentioned it.” And then he began to redden; even in the meagre candle-light the colour could be seen mounting hotly to his face. “He is an old acquaintance of my father’s.”

Ewen remained motionless, one arm out of his coat; but he was not speculating as to why the young nobleman had so curiously flushed. The thought had shot through him like an arrow: if he has been visiting the Commander-in-Chief, then his news about the warrant out for Archie is no hearsay, it is cold and deadly truth . . . and probably the letter which he received this morning announcing the fact was from General Churchill himself.

Talking amiably between yawns, Lord Aveling proceeded to remove his wig and coat. Ewen watched him almost without realising that he was watching, so overcome was he with the revelation of the identity of the youth’s correspondent. And in the same half-tranced state he saw his fellow-traveller bend rather hurriedly over the coat, which he had flung on a chair, extract something from an inner pocket and thrust it under his pillow. The Commander-in-Chief’s letter, no doubt, which he seemed so oddly to guard from sight.

Ewen came to life again, finished taking off his own coat, and removed his boots, in silence. Meanwhile Lord Aveling had fetched a case of pistols from his valise, and, taking out a couple of small, handsomely mounted weapons, placed them on the rickety chair beside his bed. “We are not like to use these, I hope, Mr. Cameron, but there they are, to serve whichever of us wakes first and finds a housebreaker in the room.”

A moment or two afterwards, apologising for what he termed his unmannerly drowsiness, he had blown out his candle, thrown himself upon his bed, pulled a long travelling cloak over himself, and was asleep almost at once. Ardroy took up his candle meaning to blow it out too, but for a moment he stood there looking across his own bed at what he could see of the sleeper—no more, really, than the back of a fair, close-cropped head half-sunk in the pillow, and one slim, silk-clad foot and ankle projecting beyond the cloak. If Keith could see them together now, him and this rather charming and ingenuous young half-brother of his! Ewen blew out the light, and sat down on the side of his bed, his back to his fellow-traveller, and stared out through the greyish square of the uncurtained window.

Had he but known that General Churchill himself was the boy’s informant, he would certainly have forced him somehow to look at his letter again, if not in the chaise, then at supper, and to tell him the name of that glen. But it was not yet too late. The letter was still there—here, rather, in this room, and only a few feet away. He had only to wake Lord Aveling and say, ‘Show me the line, the word, in your letter which concerns Doctor Cameron, for I’ll take no denial!’

And then? Was the young Englishman going to accede quietly to that demand? Naturally not. There would be an unseemly, an unchivalrous struggle, ending, no doubt, in his overpowering the boy and reading the letter by force. Meanwhile, the house would probably be roused, and all chance of his slipping away undetected on the task of warning Archie gone.

There was, it could not be denied, another method . . . the only prudent one . . .

“No, that I cannot do!” said Ardroy to himself. He took his head in his hands for a moment, then got up, fetched his cloak and, lying down and covering himself up, tried to compose himself to sleep.

The attempt was foredoomed to failure, for he could think of only one thing: Archie, betrayed but ignorant of his betrayal, and the soldiers already on their way from Inversnaid to surprise and drag him off. And here he, his cousin and friend, who had always professed so much affection for him, and into whose hands the knowledge of this attempt had so surprisingly come, lay peaceably sleeping while the tragedy drew nearer and nearer, and would not, on account of a scruple, put out one of those hands to learn the final clue—an act which, with luck, could be carried through in a few moments, and which could harm no one. . . . But no, he was going to allow Archibald Cameron, his dead Chief’s brother, to go unwarned to capture because a gentleman did not clandestinely read another’s letters.

Ewen lay there in torment. Through the window close to his bed he could see a wild white sky, where the thin clouds drove like wraiths before a phantom pursuer, though there was no sound of wind at all. It was so light a night that even in the room he could probably see to do that without the aid of a candle; so light that outside, if he succeeded in getting away unhindered with one of the horses, the same witchlike sky would enable him to find his way without too much difficulty along the road to Tyndrum and Perthshire. He saw himself riding, riding hard . . .

What nonsense! Was he not almost convinced that the information on which the warrant had been issued was false, and that Doctor Cameron would not lie in any place within reach of Inversnaid? . . . so why indulge this overmastering desire to see the name of the alleged place? And, said the same voice, you are sure also that any action would be too late now, for the warrant sent express to Loch Lomond some days ago must either have been carried out by this time or have failed of its purpose. In either case the dishonourable and repugnant act which you propose is futile. . . . And if the boy wakes while you are engaged upon it, what will you say to him?

Ewen turned over on his other side, not to see that tempting sky. But could one be sure that the danger was not real, was not still within his power to avert? And was not the true dishonour to let a friend go to his doom because one was afraid of a slight stain on one’s own reputation? He wondered if Keith Windham, in his place, would have hesitated—Yes, any gentleman would hesitate. It was an ignominious, a mean thing to do. But not a crime. It was not for himself. Had one the right to cherish selfish scruples when so much was at stake for another man? No! . . . For Archie’s sake, then!

He rose very softly from his bed and put on the clothes he had laid aside, but not his boots. Then, standing up, he took his bearing in the dim room, where Aveling’s breathing showed how soundly he was asleep. The first step was to find out where the young man had put the letter. Ewen had seen him take something from his coat and slip it under his pillow: probably this was a letter-case or something of the kind and contained the carefully guarded epistle. This was unfortunate, because it would be much more difficult to extricate it without waking him, though, for some obscure reason, the thought of withdrawing it from that hiding-place was less distasteful—perhaps because attended with more risk—than that of searching the pockets of the discarded coat.

Ewen could see now, if not very distinctly, the position of everything in the room, which was important, lest he should stumble over any object and make a noise. The key was in the locked door; he tiptoed over and removed it to his own pocket, since above all things the lad, if he woke, must not be allowed to rouse the inn. Being light on his feet, for all his stature, Ardroy accomplished this without a sound. The next step was to remove the pistols, lest the youth, thinking, not unnaturally, that he was being robbed, should try to use them. Ewen lifted them from the chair and slipped them also into his pockets. And still the sleeper showed no signs of waking.

Then, tingling with repugnance, but quite resolved and unrelenting, Ewen stood over him—he could only see him as a dark mass—and began carefully to slide his hand under the paler mass which was the pillow. Every fibre in his body and brain revolted from what he was doing, but he went on with it; it was for Archie. He wondered, as his fingers gently sought about there, what he should do or say if the young Englishman woke. Try to explain? Hold him down? Half-measures would be of no use . . . What a weight a man’s head was! Yes, Keith’s had lain heavy on his arm that night, but Keith had been dying . . . His groping fingers encountered something at last, and with infinite precautions he slipped it out at the top of the pillow and tiptoed away to the window with his prize.

It was a small leather letter-case which he held. Ardroy hastily pulled out the contents, rather dismayed to find how little he could make of them in the dusk. There came out first some bank-notes, which he stuffed back as though his fingers had encountered a snake; then some papers which might have been bills, and lastly three letters, of which, peer at them as he might, he could not distinguish a word.

This was extremely daunting. Either he would be obliged to light the candle, which he particularly wished to avoid doing, or he must take all three letters down to the stable with him, and trust to find a lantern there to read them by. But that would indeed be theft, and unnecessary theft. He only wanted one line—one word—in one letter, General Churchill’s.

Annoyed, he took up his candlestick. The problem was where to put it, so that the light might not wake the sleeper. On the floor, he decided, between the window and his own bed, whose bulk would shield the flame. He did so, and knelt down on one knee by it. What a disconcertingly sharp sound flint and steel made; he had to strike more than once, too, for the tinder would not catch. At last the candle sprang into flame, and, kneeling there behind his bed, holding his breath, Ardroy examined the letters.

The first he took up was some weeks old, and bore a London address, so he did not examine it further; the second, in a small fine writing, was dated from ‘The Abbey, March 16th’, and signed—Ewen turned hurriedly to the end—yes, signed ‘Churchill’.

But not ‘William’ or ‘James’ or whatever the General’s name was . . . no—‘Georgina’.

Ewen stared at the signature, horror-struck. This was infinitely worse than bank-notes, worse, even, than a real snake would have been. Now he knew why its recipient was reluctant to bring forth, in the close proximity of the chaise, this letter so palpably in a lady’s hand, and—as the present reader could not avoid seeing—thick-studded with maidenly endearments. That was why Lord Aveling had coloured so, had repudiated the idea of destroying the epistle. Obviously he was not of the stuff of the complacent jeune homme à bonnes fortunes. His shy delicacy in the matter made the present thief’s task tenfold more odious. But having gone so far he could not draw back, and the writer, be she never so fond, was also General Churchill’s daughter . . . or niece, perhaps? No, at the bottom of the first sheet—there were two separate ones of a large size—was a reference to ‘Papa’, presumably the Commander-in-Chief.

But where in all this was the name for the sake of which he had embarked upon the repulsive business? Ewen could not see it anywhere, as, hot with embarrassment, he picked his way among expressions not meant for the eyes of any third person, which seemed, too, to show that Lord Aveling was a recently accepted suitor. But the shamed reader of these lovers’ confidences did not want to have any knowledge of the sort thrust upon him. Not yet finding what he wanted he put down this letter and took up the third; no, that was from London, and signed ‘Your affectionate Father, Stowe’. So with an inward sigh he went back to the love-letter, wishing with all his soul that the enamoured Miss Georgina Churchill did not write both so fine a hand and so long an epistle.

And, just as he thought that he was coming to the place, he heard a creak from Aveling’s bed.

“Great Heavens, what’s wrong? What are you at there, Mr. Cameron—are you ill?” And then a further movement and an ejaculation, “Who the devil has taken my pistols from this chair?”

Ewen was still on one knee beyond his bed, feverishly scanning the letter held below its level. “It was I who removed them. I was afraid,” he said with perfect truth, “that you might wake, and, seeing a light, use them by error.” And he went on searching—ah, thank God, here he was coming to it at last!

‘I must tell you that Papa had a message last night from the Lord Justice-Clerk informing him that Doctor Cameron——’

The word ‘warrant’ swam for a second before his eyes, but he could get no farther, for now he was to pay the price of his villainy. Young Aveling, who must have thrust his hand instinctively under his pillow, had by this time discovered his second, his greater loss, and with one movement had thrown off his covering and was on his feet, his voice shaking with rage. “You have stolen my wallet! Give it back to me at once, you damned lying, treacherous thief!”

Ewen rose quickly to his own feet and threw the little case on to his bed, which was still between them. “You will find your money all there, my lord.” Then, very swiftly, he picked up the candle, put it on the window-sill behind him, found the passage again and tried to go on with his reading of it. But he knew that he would have the young man upon him in a moment, and so he had.

“Money! It’s not the money! You have my letters, my most private letters. . . .” And uttering a cry of rage he precipitated himself round the bottom of Ewen’s bed.

But Ewen, despite his preoccupation, could be just as quick. The young Englishman found himself confronted by the barrel of one of his own pistols. “You shall have this letter in one moment if you wait,” said its abductor coolly. “But if you desire it intact do not try to take it from me.”

“Wait!” ejaculated the boy, half-choking. Alight with fury—for instinct no doubt told him which of the three letters the robber held—he did a surprising thing: disregarding entirely the levelled pistol, he dropped suddenly to his knees, and, seizing his enemy by the leg, tried to throw him off his balance—and nearly succeeded. For a second Ardroy staggered; then he recovered himself.

“You young fool!” he exclaimed angrily; clapped the pistol on the window ledge behind him, stuffed Miss Georgina Churchill’s letter into his pocket, stooped, seized the young man’s arms, tore their grip apart, and brought him, struggling and panting, to his feet. “You young fool, I want to give you your letter unharmed, and how can I, if you persist in attacking me?”

“Unharmed!” echoed the young man, with tears of rage in his eyes. He was helpless in that grip, and knew it now. “You call it unharmed, when you have read it!”

“I regret the necessity even more than you,” retorted Ardroy. “But you would not tell me what I needed to know. If you will go back to your bed, and give me your word of honour not to stir thence for a couple of moments, you shall have your letter again at the end of them.”

“My word of honour—to you!” flashed the captive. “You false Highland thief, I should think you never heard the term in your life before! Give me back the letter which you have contaminated by reading—at once!”

Ewen did not relish his language, but what right had he to resent it? “You shall have the letter back on the condition I have named,” he answered sternly. “If you oblige me to hold you like this . . . no, ’tis of no use, you cannot break away. . . . God knows when you’ll get it back. And if you attempt to cry for help” (for he thought he saw a determination of the kind pass over the handsome, distorted features) “I’ll gag you! You may be sure I should never have embarked upon this odious business if I had not meant to carry it through!”

“ ‘Odious’!” his captive caught up the word. “You are a spy and a thief, and you pretend to dislike your trade!”

Ewen did not trouble to deny the charge. He felt that no stone which his victim could fling at him was too sharp. “Will you give me your word?” he asked again, more gently. “I do not wish to hurt you . . . and I have not read your letter through. I was but searching in it for what I need.”

But that avowal only raised the young lover’s fury afresh. “Damn you for a scoundrelly pickpocket!” he said between his teeth, and began to struggle anew until he was mastered once more, and his arms pinned to his sides. And thus, very white, he asked in a voice like a dagger:

“Did you turn out my brother Keith’s pockets before, or after, you murdered him?”

As a weapon of assault the query had more success than all his physical efforts. This stone was too sharp. Ewen caught his breath, and his grip loosened a little.

“I deserve everything that you have said to me, Lord Aveling, but not that! Your brother was my friend.”

“And did you read his most private correspondence when he was asleep? Give me my letter, or I’ll rouse the house—somehow!”

The matter had come to something of an impasse. Ewen was no nearer to his goal, for as long as he had to hold this young and struggling piece of indignation he could not finish reading the passage in the letter. He decided that he should have to take a still more brutal step. At any rate, nothing could make his victim think worse of him than he did already.

“If you do not go back and sit quietly upon your bed,” he said, with a rather ominous quietness himself, “I shall hold you with one hand, and thrust one sheet of your letter in the candle-flame with the other!”

“You may do it—for I’ll not take it back now!” flashed out the boy instantly.

“But if you give me your word to do as I say,” went on Ewen, as though he had not spoken, “I will restore you a sheet of it now as earnest for the return of the rest, when I have finished reading the one sentence which concerns me—Now, which is it to be, Lord Aveling?”

In that extremely close proximity their eyes met. The young man saw no relenting in those blue ones fixed on his, hard as only blue eyes can be at need. And Ewen—Ewen did not like to think to what desperate measures he might have to resort if the card he had just played were in truth not high enough. . . .

But the trick was won. Despite his frenzied interjection, the young lover wanted his property too much to see it reduced to ashes before him. He choked back something like a sob. “I’ll never believe in fair words . . . and a moving story again! . . . Yes, I will do it. Give me the sheet of my letter.”

“You pledge your word not to molest or attempt to stop me, nor to give any kind of alarm?”

“Before I do, I suppose I may know whether you intend to cut my throat, as you——” But, frantic as the youth was, Ewen’s face became so grim that he did not finish.

“I’ll not lay a finger on you further.”

“Then I pledge you my word—the word of an Englishman!” said the boy haughtily.

“And I keep mine—as a Highlander,” retorted Ewen. He loosed him at once, selected that sheet of Miss Churchill’s letter which he did not require, and handed it to its owner in silence. The youth thrust it passionately inside his shirt, went back to his own bed, and, shivering with rage and exhaustion, sat down and hid his face in his hands.

Ewen, his back half-turned, found the passage again.

‘Papa had a message last night from the Lord Justice-Clerk informing him that Doctor Cameron was said to be at the house of Stewart of Glenbuckie, and a warrant was immediately despatched to the post at Inversnaid.’

Glenbuckie . . . Glenbuckie . . . in what connection had he heard of that place before? Glenbuckie was . . . good God, was it possible that he did not really know with sufficient exactitude . . . that he had committed this shameful violence for nothing? The sweat started out all over Ewen’s body, and he prayed desperately for an illuminating flash of memory. Well had that poor boy huddled there spoken of the many glens there were in Scotland!

Then the knowledge returned to him, bearing with it a tragic recollection from the early days of the Rising, when the notoriety given to Stewart of Glenbuckie’s name by the mysterious death of its then bearer, in Buchanan of Arnprior’s house, had resulted in one’s learning the whereabouts of the glen from which he came. Yes, Glenbuckie was somewhere in the Balquhidder district—a glen running directly southward from the farther end of Loch Voil, he believed . . . a long way and a difficult. And, his mind already calculating distances and route, Ewen read the passage again. There was a little more, for Miss Georgina Churchill had been at the pains to tell her lover that the person who had sent this information to the Lord Justice-Clerk was someone who claimed to have recently met and spoken with Doctor Cameron. . . . Ewen sat down and pulled on his boots.

For the last few moments he had almost forgotten Aveling. Putting the pistol in his pocket again he went over to him. “Here is the other sheet of your letter, my lord. You will not accept my apologies, I know, but I make them to you none the less, and sincerely—and also for borrowing the horse from Bonawe, which I propose to do as far as Tyndrum, where I hope you will find him when you arrive. If I can, I will leave your pistols there also. If not, I will pay for them.”

The young Englishman jumped up and snatched his letter. “You’ll pay for everything one day, by God—in Newgate, or wherever in this barbarous country of yours they bestow their Highland robbers! And I’ll have you indicted for my brother’s murder as well as for assaulting me in order to assist an attainted rebel! Since you are his confederate, you shall swing with Doctor Cameron at Tyburn!”

But Ewen was already unlocking the door of the room. His great dread was that the young man, strung up by rage and disillusionment to what in a woman would have been hysteria point, might forget his promise and proceed unwittingly to rouse the inn. He did not want to use the pistols in order to get clear of the premises, so he slipped as quickly as possible out of the room and locked the door on the outside, hearing, not without remorse, sounds from within which suggested that the boy had flung himself upon the bed and was weeping aloud.

So ended, in dishonour and brutality, this encounter with his dead friend’s brother, who had acted so generously towards him, and to whom he had felt so strongly attracted. A moment only that thought flashed bitingly through Ewen’s brain; it was no time to indulge in regret or to think of consequences to himself—his immediate task was to warn Archie. To his crimes of treachery and violence he must, therefore, if he could, add that of horse-stealing.

* * * * *

And even as Ardroy cautiously lifted the latch of the stable door at Dalmally, away in the little rebuilt barracks near Inversnaid, on Loch Lomond, Captain Craven of Beauclerk’s regiment was reading the belated despatch from the Commander-in-Chief at Edinburgh which he had been roused from his bed to receive.

“Too late to do anything to-night,” was his comment. Then his eyes fell upon the date which it bore. “Gad, man,” he said to the wearied messenger, “I should have received this warrant yesterday! The bird may be flown by to-morrow. What in God’s name delayed you so?”