Janice Meredith Part 57

"Who 's name are you going to paint in this time, Si?" he questioned, as the girl came within hearing.

The tavern-keeper, having freed the sign-board from the support, descended with it. "This 'ere tavern's got tew git along without no sign," he said, as he mopped his brow. "I'm jus' wore out talkin' first on one side o' my mouth, an' next on t' other."

"You ain't tired, I guess, of lining first one pocket and then the other?" surmised Bagby.

"'T ain't fer yer tew throw that in my teeth," retorted the publican. "It 's little money o' yours has got intew my pocket, Joe, often as yer treat yerself an' the rest."

Janice went up to the captain. "Mr. Bagby, I want to go across the river to my father, and--" so far she spoke steadily, her head held proudly erect; but then, worn out with the anxiety, the fatigue, and the heat, her self-control suddenly deserted her, and she collapsed on the bench and began to sob.

"Now, miss," expostulated Bagby, "there is n't any call to take on so." He took the girl's hand in his own. "Here, take some of my swizzle. 'T will set you right up."

Before the words had pa.s.sed his lips, Janice had jerked her hand away and was on her feet. "Don't you dare touch me,"

she said, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng.

"I was only trying to comfort you," a.s.serted Joe, while the tavern loungers gave vent to various degrees of laughter.

"Then let me go to my father."

"Can't for a moment," answered Bagby, angrily. "He 's shown himself inimical to his country, and we must n't on no account allow communications with the enemy. That 's the rule as laid down in the general orders, and in a Congress resolution."

Bagby's voice, quite as much as his words, told the girl that argument was useless, and without further parley she walked away. She had not gone ten paces when the publican overtook her and asked:--

"Say, miss, where be yer a-goin'?"

"Home," answered Janice.

"Then come yer back an' rest a bit in the settin'-room, an'

I'll have my boy hitch up an' take yer thar. 'T is a mortal warm day, an' I calkerlate yer've walked your stent." He put his hand kindly on her arm, and the girl obediently turned about and entered the tavern.

"You are very kind," she said huskily.

"That's all right," he replied. "The squire 's done me a turn now an' agin, an' then quality 's quality, though 't ain't fer the moment havin' its way."

While she awaited the harnessing, Bagby came into the room.

"I wanted to say something to you, miss, but I guessed it might fl.u.s.ter you with all the boys about," he said. "Has the squire ever told you anything concerning a scheme I proposed to him?"

"No," Janice replied, coldly.

"Well, perhaps he would have, if he could have seen forward a little further. It's being far-seeing that wins, miss." The speaker paused, as if he expected a response, but getting none, he continued, "Would you like to see him home, and everything quiet and easy again?"

"Oh!" said the girl, starting to her feet. "I'd give anything if--"

"Now we're talking," interjected the captain, quite as eagerly. "Only say that you'll be Mrs. Bagby, and back he is before sundown, and I'll see to it that he is n't troubled no more."

Janice had stepped forward impulsively, but she shrank back at his words as if he had struck her; then without a word she walked from the room, went to where the cart was being got ready, and rested a trembling hand upon it, as if in need of support, while her swift breathing bespoke the intensity of her emotion.

At Greenwood she found her mother still suffering from the fright and the blow too much to allow the girl to tell her own troubles, or to ask counsel for the future, and the occupation of trying to make the sufferer more comfortable was in fact a good diversion, exhausted though she was with her fruitless journey.

Before Mrs. Meredith was entirely recovered, or any news of the squire had reached the household, fresh trouble was upon them. Captain Bagby and two other men drove up the third morning after the incursion, and, without going through the.

form of knocking, came into the parlour.

"You'll get ready straight off to go to Philadelphia," the officer announced.

"For what?" demanded Mrs. Meredith.

"The Congress's orders is that any one guilty of seeking to communicate with the enemy is to be put under arrest, and sent to Philadelphia to be examined."

"But we have n't made the slightest attempt, nor so much as thought of it," protested the matron.

"Oh, no!" sneered Joe; "but, all the same, we intercepted a letter last night written to you by your old Tory husband, and--"

"Oh, prithee," broke in Janice, without a thought of anything but her father, "was he well, and where is he?"

"He was smarting a bit when he wrote," Bagby remarked with evident enjoyment, "but he's got safe to his friends on Staten Island, so we are n't going to let you stay where you can be sneaking news to the British through him. I'll give you just half an hour to pack, and if you are n't done then, off you goes."

Protests and pleadings were wholly useless, though Joe yielded so far as to suggestively remark in an aside to the girl, that "there was one way that you know of, for fixing this thing." Getting together what they could in the brief time accorded to them, and with vague directions to Peg and Sukey as to the care of all they were forced to leave behind, the two women took their places in the waggon, and with only one man to drive them, set out for their enforced destination.

How little of public welfare and how much of private spite there was in their arrest was proven upon their arrival the following day in the city of brotherly love. The escort, or captor, first took them to the headquarters of the general in command of the Continental forces of the town, only to find that he was inspecting the forts down the Delaware. Leaving the papers, he took his charges to the Indian King Tavern, and after telling them that they 'd hear from the general "like as not to-morrow," he departed on his return to Brunswick.

Whether the papers were mislaid by the orderly to whom they had been delivered, or were examined and deemed too trivial for attention, or, as is most probable, were prevented consideration by greater events, no word came from headquarters the next day, or for many following ones. Nor could the initiative come from the captives, for Mrs. Meredith sickened the second day after their arrival, and developed a high fever on the third, which the physician who was called in declared to be what was then termed putrid fever,--a disease to which some three hundred of the English and Hessian soldiery at Brunswick had fallen victims during the winter. Under his advice, and without hindrance from the innkeeper, who took good care to forget that he was to "keep tight hold on the prisoners till the general sends for 'em," she was removed to quieter lodgings on Chestnut Street.

The nursing, the anxiety, and the isolation all served to make public events of no moment to Janice, though from the doctor or her loquacious landlady she heard of how Burgoyne's force, advancing from Canada, had captured Ticonderoga, and of how Sir William had put the flower of his army on board of transports and gone to sea, his destination thus becoming a sort of national conundrum affording infinite opportunity for the wiseacres of the taverns.

Mrs. Meredith, for the sake of the quiet, had been put in the back room, the daughter taking that on the street, and this arrangement, as it proved, was a fortunate one. Late in August, after a hard all-night's tendance of her mother, Janice was relieved, once the sun was up, by the daughter of the lodging-house keeper, and wearily sought her chamber, with nothing but sleep in her thoughts, if thoughts she had at all, for, too exhausted to undress, she threw herself upon the bed. Scarcely was her head resting on the pillow when there came from down the street the riffle of drums and the squeaks of fifes, and half in fright, and half in curiosity, the girl sprang up and pushed open her blinds.

Toward the river she could see what looked like an approaching mob, but behind them could be distinguished hors.e.m.e.n. As she stood, the rabble ran, or pattered, or, keeping step to the music, marched by, followed by a drum-and-fife corps. After them came the hors.e.m.e.n, and the girl's tired eyes suddenly sparkled and her pale face glowed, as she recognised, pre-eminent among them, the tall, soldierly figure of Was.h.i.+ngton, sitting Blueskin with such ease, grace, and dignity. He was talking to an odd, foreign-looking officer of extremely youthful appearance--whom, if Janice had been better in touch with the gossip of the day, she would have known to be the Marquis de Lafayette, just appointed by Congress a major-general; and while the commander-in-chief bowed and removed his hat in response to the cheers of the people, this absorption prevented him from seeing the girl, though she leaned far out of the window in the hope that he would do so. To the lonely, worried maid it seemed as if one glance of the kindly blue eyes, and one sympathetic grasp of the large, firm hand, would have cut her troubles in half.

After the group of officers came the rank and file,--lines of men no two of whom were dressed alike, many of them without coats, and some without shoes; old uniforms faded or soiled to a scarcely recognisable point, civilian clothing of all types, but with the hunting-s.h.i.+rt of linen or leather as the predominant garb; and equipped with every kind of gun, from the old Queen Anne musket which had seen service in Marlborough's day to the pea rifle of the frontiers-man.

A faint attempt to give an appearance of uniformity had been made by each man sticking a sprig of green leaves in his hat, yet had it not been for the guns, cartouch boxes, powder horns, and an occasional bayonet and canteen, only the regimental order, none too well maintained, differentiated the army from the mob which had preceded them.

While yet the girl gazed wistfully after the familiar figure, her ears were greeted with a still more familiar voice.

"Close up there and dress your lines, Captain Balch. If this is your 'Column in parade,' what, in Heaven's name, is your 'March at ease'?" shouted Brereton, cantering along the column from the rear.

He caught sight of Janice as he rode up, and an exclamation of mingled surprise and pleasure burst from him. Throwing his bridle over a post, he sprang up the three steps, l.u.s.tily hammered with the knocker, and in another moment was in the girl's presence.

"This is luck beyond belief," he exclaimed, as he seized her hand. "Your father wrote me from New York, begging that I see or send you word that he was well, and asking that you be permitted to join him. At Brunswick I learned you were here, but, seek you as I might, I could not get wind of your whereabout. And now I cannot bide to aid you, for we are in full march to meet the British."

"Where?"

"They have landed at the head of the Chesapeake, so we are hastening to get between them and Philadelphia, and only diverged from our route to parade through the streets this morning, that the people might have a chance to see us, so 't is given out, but in fact to overawe them; for the city is none too loyal to us, as will be shown in a few days, when they hear of our defeat."

"You mean?" questioned the girl.

"General Was.h.i.+ngton, generous as he always is, has sent some of his best regiments to Gates, and so we are marching eleven thousand ill-armed and worse officered men, mostly new levies, to face on open ground nineteen thousand picked troops. What can come but defeat in the field? If it depended on us, the cause would be as good as ended, but they are beaten, thanks to their dirty politics, before they even face us."

"I don't understand."