The Continental Dragoon Part 9

The voice rang for a moment in the remoteness of the hall above. Then complete silence within. All in the hall remained motionless, listening. The sound of the horses came fainter and fainter.

"Carrington! Help! I'm in the manor-house,--a prisoner!"

A look of despair came over his face. On Elizabeth's the suspense gave way to a smile of triumph.

The sound of the horses died away.

CHAPTER VI.

THE ONE CHANCE.

Peyton staggered back to the settle and sank down on it, exhausted.

Elizabeth, hearing black Sam moving about in the dining-room, which was directly north of the hall, bade Molly summon him. When he appeared, she ordered him and Cuff to carry the settle, with the wounded man on it, into the east parlor, and to place the man on the sofa there. She then told Molly to hasten the supper, and to send Williams to her up-stairs, and thereupon rejoined her excited aunt above. When Williams attended her, she gave him commands regarding the prisoner.

Peyton was thus carried through the deep doorway in the south side of the hall into the east parlor, which was now exceedingly habitable with fire roaring and candles lighted. In the east and south sides of this richly ornamented room were deeply embrasured windows, with low seats. In the west side was a mahogany door opening from the old or south hall. In the north side, which was adorned with wooden pillars and other carved woodwork, was the door through which Peyton had been carried; west of that, the decorated chimney-breast with its English mantel and fireplace, and further west a pair of doors opening from a closet, whence a winding staircase descended cellarward. The ceiling was rich with fanciful arabesque woodwork. Set in the chimney-breast, over the mantel, was an oblong mirror. The wainscoting, pillars, and other woodwork were of a creamy white. But Peyton had no eye for details at the moment. He noticed only that his entrance disturbed the slumbers of the old gentleman--Matthias Valentine--who had been sleeping in a great armchair by the fire, and who now blinked in wonderment.

The negroes put down the settle and lifted Peyton to a sofa that stood against the western side of the room, between a spinet and the northern wall. At Peyton's pantomimic request they then moved the sofa to a place near the fire, and then, taking the settle along, marched out of the room, back to the hall, closing the door as they went.

Peyton, too pain-racked and exhausted to speak, lay back on the sofa, with closed eyes. Old Valentine stared at him a few moments; then, curious both as to this unexpected advent and as to the proximity of supper, rose and hobbled from the parlor and across the hall to the dining-room. For some time Peyton was left alone. He opened his eyes, studied the flying figures on the ceiling, the portraits on the walls, the carpet,--Philipse Manor-house, like the best English houses of the time, had carpet on its floors,--the carving of the mantel, the clock and candelabrum thereupon, the crossed rapiers thereabove, the curves of the imported furniture. His twinges and aches were so many and so diverse that he made no attempt to locate them separately. He could feel that the left leg of his breeches was soaked with blood.

Finally the door opened, and in came Williams and Cuff, the former with shears and bands of linen, the latter with a basin of water.

Williams, whom Peyton had not before seen, scrutinized him critically, and forthwith proceeded to expose, examine, wash, and bind up the wounded leg, while Cuff stood by and played the role of surgeon's a.s.sistant. Peyton speedily perceived on the steward's part a reliable acquaintance with the art of dressing cuts, and therefore submitted without a word to his operations. Williams was equally silent, breaking his reticence only now and then to utter some monosyllabic command to Cuff.

When the wound was dressed, Williams put the patient's disturbed attire to rights, and adjusted his hair. Peyton, with a feeling of some relief, made to stretch the wounded leg, but a sharp twinge cut the movement short.

"You should make a good surgeon," Peyton said at last, "you tie so d.a.m.nably tight a bandage."

"I've bound up many a wound, sir," said Williams; "and some far worse than yours. 'Tis not a dangerous cut, yours, though 'twill be irritating while it lasts. You won't walk for a day or two."

"It's remarkable your mistress has so much trouble taken with me, when she intends to deliver me to the British."

Peyton had inferred the steward's place in the house, from his appearance and manner.

"Why, sir," said Williams, "we couldn't have you bleeding over the floor and furniture. Besides, I suppose she wants to hand you over in good condition."

"I see! No bedraggled remnant of a man, but a complete, clean, and comfortable candidate for Cunningham's gallows!" Peyton here forgot his wound and attempted to sit upright, but quickly fell back with a grimace and a groan.

"Better lie still, sir," counselled Williams, sagely. "If you need any one, you are to call Cuff. He will be in waiting in that hall, sir."

And the steward pointed towards the east hall. "There will be no use trying to get away. I doubt if you could walk half across the room without fainting. And if you could get out of the house, you'd find black Sam on guard, with his duck-gun,--and Sam doesn't miss once in a hundred times with that duck-gun. Bring those things, Cuff."

Williams indicated Peyton's hat, remnant of sword, and scabbard, which had been placed on the armchair by the fireside.

"Leave my sword!" commanded Peyton.

"Can't, sir!" said Williams, affably. "Miss Elizabeth's orders were to take it away."

Williams thereupon went from the room, crossed the east hall, and entered the dining-room, to report to Elizabeth, who now sat at supper with Miss Sally and Mr. Valentine.

Cuff, with basin of water in one hand, took up the hat, sword, and scabbard, with the other.

"Miss Elizabeth!" mused Peyton. "Queen Elizabeth, I should say, in this house. Gad, to be a girl's prisoner, tied down to a sofa by so small a cut!" Hereupon he addressed Cuff, who was about to depart: "Where is your mistress?"

"In the dining-room, eating supper."

"And Mr. Colden, whom I saw in that hall about an hour ago, when I bought the horse?"

"Major Colden rode back to New York."

"_Major_ Colden! Major of what?"

"New Juzzey Vollingteers, sir."

"What? Then he is in the King's service, after all? And when I was here with my troops he said he was neutral. I'll never take a Tory's word again."

"Am you like to hab de chance, sir?" queried Cuff, with a grin.

"What! You taunt me with my situation?" And Harry's head shot up from the sofa as he made to rise and chastise the boy; but he could not stand on his leg, and so remained sitting, propped on his right arm, panting and glaring at the negro.

Cuff, whose whiteness of teeth had shown in his moment of mirth, now displayed much whiteness of eye in his alarm at Peyton's movement, and glided to the door. As he went out to the hall, he pa.s.sed Molly, who was coming into the parlor with a bowl of broth.

"Hah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Peyton as she came towards him. "They would feed the animal for the slaughter, eh?"

Molly curtseyed.

"Please, sir, it wa'n't they sent this. I brought it of my own accord, sir, though with Miss Elizabeth's permission."

"Oh! so Miss Elizabeth _did_ give her permission, then?"

"Yes, sir. At least, she said it didn't matter, if I wished to."

"And you did wish to? Well, you're a good girl, and I thank you."

Whereupon Peyton took the bowl and sipped of the broth with relish.

"Thank you, sir," said Molly, who then moved a small light chair from its place by the wall to a spot beside the sofa and within Peyton's reach. "You can set the bowl on this," she added. "I must go back to the kitchen." And, after another curtsey, she was gone.

The broth revived Peyton, and with all his pain and fatigue he had some sense of comfort. The handsome, well warmed, well lighted parlor, so richly furnished, so well protected from the wind and weather by the solid shutters outside its four small-paned windows, was certainly a snug corner of the world. So far seemed all this from stress and war, that Peyton lost his strong realization of the fate that Elizabeth's threat promised him. Appreciation of his surroundings drove away other thoughts and feelings. That he should be taken and hanged was an idea so remote from his present situation, it seemed rather like a dream than an imminent reality. There surely would be a way of his getting hence in safety. And he imbibed mouthful after mouthful of the warm broth.

Presently old Mr. Valentine reappeared, from the east hall, looking none the less comfortable for the supper he had eaten. A long pipe was in his hand, and, that he might absorb smoke and liquor at the same time, he had brought with him from the table, where the two ladies remained, a vast mug of hot rum punch of Williams's brewing. He now set the mug on the mantel, lighted his pipe with a brand from the fire, repossessed himself of the mug, and sat down in the armchair, with a sigh of huge satisfaction. It mattered not that this was the parlor of Philipse Manor-house,--for Mr. Valentine, in his innocent way, indulged himself freely in the privileges and presumptions of old age.

Peyton, after staring for some time with curiosity at the smoky old gentleman, who rapidly grew smokier, at last raised the bowl of broth for a last gulp, saying, cheerily:

"To your very good health, sir!"

"Thank you, sir!" said the old man, complacently, not making any movement to reciprocate.