Tom Burke Of "Ours" Volume I Part 27

"Stop!" cried I, maddened by this taunt. "What could I have done? where was my place?"

"Don't ask me; if your own heart doesn't teach thee, how can I? But it's over now; the day is gone, and I must take to the road again. My heart is lighter since I seen you; and it will be lighter again when I give you this wamin',--G.o.d knows if you 'll mind it. You think yourself safe now since you joined the sodgers; you think they trust you, and that Barton's eye is n't on ye still. There is n't a word you say is n't noted down,--not a man you spake to isn't watched. You don't know it; but I know it. There 's more go to the gallows in Ireland over their wine, than with the pike in their hands. Take care of your friends, I say."

"You wrong them. Darby; and you wrong me. Never have I heard from one here a single word that could offend the proudest heart among us."

"Why would they? what need of it? Ar'n't we down, down? ar'n't we hunted like wild beasts? is the roof left to shelter us? dare we walk the roads? dare we say 'G.o.d save ye!' when we meet, and not be tried for pa.s.s words? It 's no wonder they pity us; the hardest heart must melt sometimes."

"As to myself," said I,--for there was no use in attempting to reason with him further,--"my every wish is with the cause as warmly as on the day we parted. But I look to France--"

"Ay, and why not? I remember the time your eye flashed and your cheek grew another color when you spoke of that."

"Yes, Darby," said I, after a pause; "and I had not been here now, but that the only means I possessed of forwarding myself in the French service are unfortunately lost to me."

"And what was that?" interrupted he, eagerly.

"Some letters which the poor Captain de Meudon gave me," said I, endeavoring to seem as much at ease as I could.

Darby stooped down as I spoke, and ripping open the lining of his cloak, produced a small parcel fastened with a cord, saying, "Are these what you mean?"

I opened it with a trembling hand, and to my inexpressible delight, discovered Charles's letter to the head of the Ecole Polytechnique, together with a letter of credit and two cheques on his banker. The note to his sister was not, however, among them.

"How came you by these papers, Darby?" inquired I, eagerly.

"I found them on the road Barton travelled, the same evening you made your escape from the yeomanry; you remember that? They were soon missed, and an orderly was sent back to search for them. Since that, I 've kept them by me; and it was only yesterday that I thought of bringing them to you, thinking you might know something about them."

"There 's a mark on this one," said I, still gazing on the paper in my hand; "it looks like blood."

"If it is, it 's mine, then," said Darby, doggedly. And after a pause, he continued: "The soldier galloped up the very minute I was stooping for the papers. He called out to me to give them up; but I pretended not to hear, and took a long look round to see what way I could escape where his horse could n't follow me. But he saw what I was at; and the same instant his sabre was in my shoulder, and the blood running hot down my arm. I fell on my knees; but if I did, I took this from my breast" (here he drew forth a long-barrelled rusty pistol), "and shot him through the neck."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Darby Exchanges Compliments with a "Sodger" 188]

"Was he killed?" said I, in horror at the coolness of the recital.

"Sorrow one o' me knows. He fell on his horse's mane, and I saw the beast gallop with him up the road with his arms hanging at each side of the neck. And then I heard a crash, and I saw that he was down, and the horse was dragging him by the stirrup; but the dust soon hid him from my sight. And indeed I was growing weak too; so I crept into the bushes until it was dark, and then got down to Glencree."

The easy indifference with which he spoke, the tone of coolness in which he narrated this circ.u.mstance, thrilled through me far more painfully than the most pa.s.sionate description; and I stood gazing on him with a feeling of dread that unhappily my features but too plainly indicated.

He seemed to know what was pa.s.sing in my mind; and as if stung by what he deemed my ingrat.i.tude for the service he had rendered me, his face grew darkly red, the swollen veins stood out thick and knotted in his forehead, his livid lips quivered, and he said in a thick, guttural voice,--

"Maybe ye think I murdered him?" And then, as I made no answer, he resumed in a different tone: "And faix, ye war n't long larnin' their lessons. But hear me now: there never was a traitor to the cause had a happy life or an easy death; there never was one betrayed us but we were revenged on him or his. I don't think ye 're come to that yet; for if I did, by the mortial--"

As he p.r.o.nounced the last word, in a tone of the fiercest menace, the sound of many voices talking without, and the noise of a key turning in the lock, broke in upon our colloquy; and Darby had scarcely time to resume his disguise when Bubbleton entered, followed by three of his brother officers, all speaking together, and in accents that evidently betokened their having drunk somewhat freely.

"I tell you, again and again, the diamond wins it But here we are,"

cried Bubbleton; "and now for a pack of cards, and let 's decide the thing at once."

"You said you 'd bet fifty, I think?" drawled out Crofts, who was unquestionably the most sober of the party. "But what have we here?" At this instant his eye fell upon Darby, who had quietly ensconced himself behind the door, and hoped to escape unseen. "Eh, what's this, I say?"

"What!" cried Bubbleton; "what do I see? A nymph with bright and flowing hair; a hag like Hecuba, by Jove! Tom Burke, my man, how comes the damsel here?"

"'Tis Kitty, ould Kitty Cole, your honor--The young gentleman was buying a ballad from me, the Heavens prosper him!" said Darby.

"Nothing treasonous, I hope; no disloyal effusion, Tom; no scandal about Queen Elizabeth, my boy,--eh?"

"Come, old lady," said Cradock, "let's have the latest novelty of the Liberty."

"Yes," said Bubbleton; "strike the harp in praise of--Confound the word!"

"Hang the old crone!" broke in Hilliard. "Here are the cards. The game stands thus: a spade is led,--you 've got none; hearts are trumps."

"No, you mistake; the diamond's the trump," said Cradock.

"I cry halt," said Crofts, holding up both his hands; "the first thing is, what's the bet?"

"Anything you like," cried Bubbleton; "fifty,--a hundred,--five hundred."

"Be it then five hundred. I take you," said Crofts, coolly, taking a memorandum book from his pocket.

"No, no," interposed Hilliard; "Bubbleton, you sha'n't do any such thing. Five,--ten,--twenty, if you wish; but I 'll not stand by at such a wager."

"Well, then, if twenty be as much as you have got permission to bet,"

replied Crofts, insolently, "there's my stake." So saying, he threw a note on the table, and looked over at Bubbleton, as if awaiting his doing the same.

I saw my poor friend's embarra.s.sment, and without stirring from my place, slipped a note into his hand in silence. A squeeze of his fingers replied to me, and the same instant he threw the crumpled piece of paper down, and cried out, "Now for it; decide the point."

Crofts at once drew his chair to the table, and began with the utmost coolness to arrange the cards; while the others, deeply interested in the point at issue, looked on without speaking. I thought this a good opportunity for Darby to effect his escape, and raising my hand noiselessly, I pointed to the door. Darby, who had been only waiting for the fortunate moment, stole quietly towards it; but while his hand was on the lock, Crofts lifted his eyes towards me, and then throwing them half round, intimated at once that he observed the manoeuvre. The blood suffused my face and temples, and though I saw the door close behind the piper, I could not recover from my embarra.s.sment, or the fear that pressed on me lest Crofts should have penetrated the secret of Darby's disguise, and augured from the fact something to my discredit.

"The game is now arranged," said he. "The spade being led here, the second player follows suit; the third, having none, trumps the card, and is overtrumped by the last in play. The trick is lost, therefore, and with it the game."

"No, no," interrupted Bubbleton, "you mistake altogether. The diamond,--no, the heart; I mean the--the--What the deuce is it? I say, Cradock, I had it all correct a minute ago; how is it, old fellow?"

"Why, you 've lost, that's all," said the other, as he looked intently on the table, and seemed to consider the point.

"Yes, Bubbleton, there's no doubt about it; you've lost. We forgot all about the last player," said Hilliard.

A violent knocking at the outer door drowned the voices of all within, while a gruff voice shouted out, "Captain Bubbleton, the grand round is coming up Parliament Street."

Bubbleton s.n.a.t.c.hed up his sword, and das.h.i.+ng through the room, was followed by the others in a roar of laughter, Crofts alone remaining behind, proceeded leisurely to open the folded piece of bank paper that lay before him, while I stood opposite unable to take my eyes from him. Slowly unfolding the note, he flattened it with his hand, and then proceeded to read aloud,--

"Payez au porteur la somme de deux mille livres--,'

"I beg pardon," interrupted I. "There's a mistake there; that belongs to me."

"I thought as much," replied Crofts, with a very peculiar smile; "I scarcely supposed my friend Bubbleton had gone so far."

"There's the sum, sir," said I, endeavoring to control my temper, and only eager to regain possession of what would at once have compromised me, if discovered. "This is what Captain Bubbleton lost; twenty pounds, if I mistake not?"

"I must entreat your pardon, sir," said Crofts, folding up the French billet de hanque, "My wager was not with you, nor can I permit you to pay it. This is at present my property, and remains so until Captain Bubbleton demands it from me."