Guy Mannering Part 25

"--How do you really know that he is in this country?"

"Why, Gabriel saw him up among the hills."

"Gabriel! who is he?"

A fellow from the gipsies, that, about eighteen years since, was pressed on board that d-d fellow Pritchard's sloop-of-war. It was he came off and gave us warning that the Shark was coming round upon us the day Kennedy was done; and he told us how Kennedy had given the information. The gipsies and Kennedy had some quarrel besides. This Gab went to the East Indies in the same s.h.i.+p with your younker, and, sapperment! knew him well, though the other did not remember him. Gab kept out of his eye though, as he had served the States against England, and was a deserter to boot; and he sent us word directly, that we might know of his being here--though it does not concern us a rope's end."

"So, then, really, and in sober earnest, he is actually in this country, Hatteraick, between friend and friend?" asked Glossin seriously.

"Wetter and donner, yawl What do you take me for?"

"For a bloodthirsty, fearless miscreant!" thought Glossin internally; but said aloud, "And which of your people was it that shot young Hazlewood?"

"Sturm-wetter!" said the Captain, "do ye think we were mad?-none of us, man--Gott! the country was too hot for the trade already with that d-d frolic of Brown's, attacking what you call Woodbourne House."

"Why, I am told," said Glossin, "it was Brown who shot Hazlewood?"

"Not our lieutenant, I promise you; for he was laid six feet deep at Derncleugh the day before the thing happened.--Tausend deyvils, man I do ye think that he could rise out of the earth to shoot another man?"

A light here began to break upon Glossin's confusion of ideas. "Did you not say that the younker, as you call him, goes by the name of Brown

"Of Brown? yaw-Vanbeest Brown; old Vanbeest Brown, of our Vanbeest and Vanbruggen, gave him his own name--he did."

"Then," said Glossin, rubbing his hands, "it is he, by Heaven, who has committed this crime!"

"And what have we to do with that?" demanded Hatteraick.

Glossin paused, and, fertile in expedients, hastily ran over his project in his own mind, and then drew near the smuggler with a confidential air. "You know, my dear Hatteraick, it is our princ.i.p.al business to get rid of this young man?"

"Umph!" answered Dirk Hatteraick-.

"Not," continued Glossin--"not that I would wish any personal harm to him--if--if--if we can do without. Now, he is liable to be seized upon by justice, both as bearing the same name with your lieutenant, who was engaged in that affair at Woodbourne, and for firing at young Hazlewood with intent to kill or wound."

"Ay, ay," said Dirk Hatteraick; "but what good will that do you?

He'll be loose again as soon as he shows himself to carry other colours."

"True, my dear Dirk; well noticed, my friend Hatteraick! But there is ground enough for a temporary imprisonment till he fetch his proofs from England or elsewhere, my good friend. I understand the law, Captain Hatteraick, and I'll take it upon me, simple Gilbert Glossin of Ellangowan, justice of peace for the county of--, to refuse his bail, if he should offer the best in the country, until he is brought up for a second examination--now where d'ye think I'll incarcerate him?

"Hagel and wetter! what do I care?"

"Stay, my friend--you do care a great deal. Do you know your goods, that were seized and carried to Woodbourne, are now lying in the Custom-house at Portanferry?" (a small fis.h.i.+ng-town).--"Now I will commit this younker--"

"When you have caught him?"

"Ay, ay, when I have caught him; I shall not be long about that--I will commit him to the Workhouse, or Bridewell, which you know is beside the Custom-house."

"Yaw, the Rasp-house; I know it very well."

"I will take care that the red-coats are dispersed through the country; you land at night with the crew of your lugger, receive your own goods, and carry the younker Brown with you back to Flus.h.i.+ng. Won't that do?"

"Ay, carry him to Flus.h.i.+ng," said the Captain, "or--to America?"

"Ay, ay, my friend."

"Or--to Jericho?"

"Psha! Wherever you have a mind."

"Ay, or--pitch him overboard?"

"Nay, I advise no violence."

"Nein, nein--you leave that to me. Sturm-wetter! I know you of old. But, hark ye, what am I, Dirk Hatteraick, to be the better of this?"

"Why, is it not your interest as well as mine?" said Glossin; "besides, I set you free this morning."

"You set me free!--Donner and deyvil! I set myself free. Besides, it was all in the way of your profession, and happened a long time ago, ha, ha, ha!"

"Pshaw! pshaw! don't let us jest; I am not against making a handsome compliment--but it's your affair as well as mine."

"What do you talk of my affair? is it not you that keep the bouncer's whole estate from him? Dirk Hatteraick never touched a stiver of his rents."

"Hush-hush--I tell you it shall be a joint business."

"Why, will ye give me half the kit?"

"What, half the estate?--d'ye mean . Ye should set up house together at Ellangowan, and take the barony, ridge about?"

"Sturm-wetter, no! but you might give me half the value--half the gelt. Live with you? Nein--I would have a l.u.s.thaus of mine own on the Middleburgh d.y.k.e, and a blumengarten like a burgomaster's."

"Ay, and a wooden lion at the door, and a painted sentinel in the garden, with a pipe in his mouth!--But, hark ye, Hatteraick; what will all the tulips, and flower-gardens, and pleasure-houses in the Netherlands do for you, if you are hanged here in Scotland?"

Hatteraick's countenance fell. "Der deyvil! hanged?"

"Ay, hanged, meinheer Captain. The devil can scarce save Dirk Hatteraick from being hanged for a murderer and kidnapper, if the younker of Ellangowan should settle in this country, and if the gallant Captain chances to be caught here re-establis.h.i.+ng his fair trade! And I won't say, but, as peace is now so much talked of, their High Mightinesses may not hand him over to oblige their new allies, even if he remained in faderiand."

"Poz bagel blitzen and donner! I--I doubt you say true."

"Not," said Glossin, perceiving he had made the desired impression, "not that I am against being civil;" and he slid into Hatteraick's pa.s.sive hand a bank-note of some value.

"Is this all?" said the smuggler; "you had the price of half a cargo for winking at our job, and made us do your business too."

"But, my good friend, you forget--in this case you will recover all your own goods."

"Ay, at the risk of all our own necks--we could do that without you."

"I doubt that, Captain Hatteraick," said Glossin dryly, "because you would probably find a dozen red-coats at the Custom-house, whom it must be my business, if we agree about this matter, to have removed. Come, come, I will be as liberal as I can, but you should have a conscience."