Читать книгу Castle Vane - J H M Abbott - Страница 6

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ALL through the long day the refugee remained in Jacob Losky's strange subterranean hiding-place.

It was an interminable day, and the first part of it, before he had become a little accustomed to his situation, seemed to Richard Delane to be the most wearisome and dreary of it all. The hours dragged with heavy feet, and he had nothing to do but pace up and down the tunnel and consider the somewhat unpromising outlook that was his. There was a strange collection of all manner of odds and ends stored along the sides of the passage, and he whiled away part of his captivity by examining it.

The old Jew seemed to be a veritable human jackdaw—so diverse and dissimilar were the contents of the cavern. Boats' sails and oars, firearms, bales of cotton goods, furniture, doors and window frames, tools of all description, old boots, pictures, and rolled carpets were a few items of the strange jumble. There were heavy iron-bound chests and tin deed boxes, and an immense accumulation of faded yellow papers tied in bundles. He seemed to have overlooked in his collection nothing that was portable, and what use much of it might be to him was more than his guest could imagine.

A wooden door closed the further end of the tunnel, which was almost thirty feet long by ten feet wide and high. It was securely locked—apparently on the other side. Delane took the ship's lamp down from its hook to explore the place, and it was while he was examining the closed door that it opened, and Rachel, the old man's granddaughter, appeared on the threshhold.

"Thank you, Mr. Delane," she laughed, picking up a tray of food and drink, which she had placed upon the ground while manipulating the heavy padlock. "How did you know I was coming."

"'Twas but chance, Miss Losky. I was exploring this queer place," he replied, a little startled by her sudden appearance.

"Rachel, if you please," she smilingly corrected him. "Grandfather tells me you are going to join the Free Company. We are all Tom, Dick, Harry, and Rachel to one another in the Company. So you are Dick, or Dicky, to me, and I am Rachel to you. It is just as well. We will get to know one another's—weaknesses—pretty well, I've no doubt."

Dicky Delane (he was a young man) looked into her splendid eyes—deep, dark pools of mystic depth—and realized that he would be a bold man who would seek to fathom Rachel Losky's weaknesses. Strength and beauty—the handsome, over-beautiful beauty of the young Jewess—were in every curve of her face and every line of her lissome body. There was in her regard of him something that was entirely frank and fearless, nothing of a kind that would earn Mrs. Grundy's classification of "bold." There was friendliness in it, combined with a certain you-be-damnedness and utter independence.

"And are you of the Company too—Rachel?" He baulked a little at the name. "I hardly thought it had women in its membership."

"I am no lady, Dick—or Dicky, I think. I am my father's daughter—and my father was hanged outside Newgate. And I am Jacob Losky's granddaughter—and maybe Father Jacob will hang some day. But I am the only woman in the Company. The only one of my sex who has its freedom. And sometimes I think that, but, for my grandfather, I am the best man in it."

She laughed in his face.

"I know I am a better man than you," she continued.

He looked down at her in a puzzled fashion.

"How then? You are but a girl," he began.

"Aye, a girl—but nevertheless a better man than Dick Delane. I would not go mad, and break the major's nose, and ruin my own life, and be driven into the earth—into the depths—as you are driven—because of my bad temper. I would do better than that."

"But to be flogged—for two buttons!"

"You might have escaped, as you did, without making an active enemy of John Vane."

She laughed again, and changed her tone to one of business-like instructions.

"But come—you must eat. It is past mid-day. And then you must fill in the afternoon. Sleep, I should. You have a rough night before you. Later on, my grandfather will come down to prepare you for your journey."

"A journey?"

"Yes. You do not think you can stay here. You are to take the field to-night. Take to the bush, as they put it in New South Wales."

"To the bush!"

"Yes, my friend. There is nothing for you now but the bushranging profession. People of your violence of nature generally come to it here—and the gallows. You see, I hold out no hope to you of retiring on a competence. We are all gallows-birds in the Company—and most of us will find our perch below the cross-beam one of these fine days. Even I—perhaps. You—for certain!"

"But where am I to go to-night—what to do?"

"You will go where I take you, and you will do what the Jewboy says."

"The Jewboy!" he exclaimed. It was becoming a well-known name. "The Jewboy—is he of the Company?"

"The very soul of it. But good-bye for the present," and she was gone before he could question further, slamming the door behind her.

Delane sat down, and attacked the food and wine with eager appetite. After his meal he stretched himself upon the floor of the tunnel and slept the afternoon away.

How long he slept he did not know, but he was awakened by hearing his name pronounced. The old Jew was bending over him, and shaking him by the shoulder.

"You are a sound sleeper, Richard," he grumbled. "But come now, it is time you were moving. I am going to dress you for a new part."

The soldier rose, and stretched himself, yawning. "Egad, Father Jacob," he said, "it seems years to me since I played in my last one. What is this to be?"

"Strip off those regimentals, and put these clothes on. I have to get you away from Sydney to-night, and it would not be easy to get you off in that costume. Sydney is being scoured for you. There has been a soldier at my door all day, and Major Vane himself came to see me. He is a pretty sight. Both eyes are black, and his nose is all sticking plaster. I think he would dearly love a sight of you, Dicky. Shall I send for him?" he asked banteringly.

"What had he to say?"

"He said that if he ever found that I had harbored you he would have me hounded out of Sydney. And he would, too. But there is no chance."

"He is a devil," growled the young soldier, "I wish it was his neck I had broken, instead of his nose."

He busied himself changing his clothes, and when he had put on the rough countryman's suit which the Jew had provided for him, the latter made him sit down while he completed the disguise.

"Now I will make you so that your mother would not know you. I was a dresser at Drury Lane in my young days, Dicky—you may count that as one of the favours Providence has dispensed to you to-day. I don't think I've lost my skill. Why, I made the Jewboy into a Christian when I got him away!"

He rubbed some dark stain into Delane's face and hands, and completed his metamorphosis by adorning him with beard, whiskers, and moustache. It was skilfully done. The old man had not forgotten the art of theatrical make-up. When he was finished he held a hand mirror up to his subject, and the latter was startled by the change.

"You'll do for to-night, at any rate," said Losky. "By the next daylight you should be where you won't want a disguise. And now we'll start—come. Supper is waiting above."

He opened the door, and led the way down a very long, dark passage, carrying the ship's lamp in his hand. At its further end they mounted a short flight of steps, and the old man opened a door at their top. They came into a lighted room in which was a table spread with a substantial supper. Seated at the table was a boyish-looking young man, whose face seemed strangely familiar to Delane.

"Be seated," said Losky, "and eat your fill. You have a long night before you. This is your travelling companion," he said, with a smile, motioning with his hand towards the young man.

Delane stared in a puzzled fashion at the latter. He was a fair-haired youth, with reddish mutton-chop side whiskers adorning a handsome face. He was dressed in riding costume, and he smiled at Dick in a friendly and quizzical fashion.

"Good evening," he said. "I think Mr. Delane and I have met before."

"I'm puzzling about that," returned Delane. "Where was it—and when?"

"Twice to-day. Once in Father Jacob's shop, and once in the place whence you have just arrived. Don't you know me, Dicky?"

"Good heavens! Is it Rachel?"

"Well—it was. It's Jimmy Smith, or Jacky Jones—anyone you please in this costume. How do you like it?"

"It's a marvellous disguise!"

"Not so good as yours, though. Father Jacob is an artist, isn't he? But make a start—we must be off soon."

The soldier set to willingly, and whilst they supped Jacob Losky explained the plans he had formed for getting Delane out of the way.

"I am sending you to join the Jewboy, Dick, as I have told you. He will find you something to do. Rachel here will be your guide. To-night you must ride to the Hawkesbury, and there you will be handed over to another guide, who will conduct you to where the Jewboy—Edward Davis—has his headquarters."

"What part of the Hawkesbury?" asked Delane, looking up from his plate. "There is a detachment of the regiment at Windsor?"

"No, no—not to Windsor. That would be from the frying pan to the fire. I am sending you to the mouth of the river at Broken Bay. A boat will carry you across the bay into Brisbane Water, and there you will come into touch with the Free Company. Fine fellows they are, Dick, living a venturous, open life, full of excitement, such as a soldier should love, and gaining rich rewards. You will be a welcome addition to their number. In time you will be rich, and can find a means of leaving the country and getting back to England."

"But they are outlaws—bushrangers!"

"True. But what are you yourself but an outlaw? What else is there for you? Nothing—but the road gangs. There is your choice. Make what you can of it. Join in with us, or join the canaries—the poor devils, who are lashed, and driven, and starved. Give yourself up to the military authorities, and you will be put in the way of joining them—with a couple of hundred lashes to begin with. It should not be a difficult choice. You will join us?"

Delane stared gloomily at the table for a little while before he replied. At last, with an angry shake of the head, he answered:—

"Yes—there is no choice. I must. I can never go back now. And I see no way of getting clear except this. But I tell you, Father Jacob, that whenever an opportunity offers I mean to get away. I have been out after bushrangers myself, and I know that the life of a hunted dog is not an agreeable one. Let it be clearly understood that I leave your gang."

"Company, Richard—the Free Company," murmured the old man.

"Your Company, then—as soon as it is safe to do so."

"Of course—that is what they all aim at. The Company, of which I am president and Sydney agent—ha, ha—the Company was formed in order to assist the deserving to escape from servitude, and to enable them to pay themselves back for the slavery that society has inflicted upon them. They make war upon society—but it is only that they may recompense themselves for the outrages that society has inflicted upon them. That is all. Compensation, Richard, compensation—and escape."

"Well—I join you. Here is my hand upon it," said the young man.

"Good. You will not regret. And now you had better start. You will be back to-morrow evening, Rachel. Good-bye, Richard. You will hear of me often, but I don't think we will meet for many months. Rachel will deliver you safely."

"But how do we get away from here?"

"You are in a house in Pitt Street that the tunnel connects with my shop. You have but to cross the harbour to Sirius Cove, and you will find horses waiting for you. Rachel has everything arranged. Good-bye."

He opened the street door, and the soldier and the girl slipped out into a wet and windy night, and made their way towards the harbour side.