Kitabı oku: «Beau Brocade», sayfa 9

He had spoken so low, she scarce could hear, but she could feel his hand scorching hers with its fever-heat, and when he ceased speaking she heard a sigh, like a sob, a sigh of bitter longing, of hopeless regret, that made her heart ache with a new pain which was greater, more holy than pity.

A strange excitement seemed to pervade him. Madness was in his veins. He longed to seize her, to lift her up on Jack o' Lantern's back and gallop away with her over the Moor, far, far out beyond bracken and heather, over those distant Tors, on, on to the mountains of the moon, to the valley of the shadows, she lying passive in his arms, whilst he looked for ever into the clear blue depths of her eyes. Perhaps she too felt this excitement gradually creeping over her; she tried to withdraw her hand, but he would not let it go. To her also there came the sense of unreality, of a vision of dreamland, wherein no one dwelt but she and this one man, where no sound came save that of his voice, rugged and tender, which brought tears of joy and pity to her eyes.

In the grass at her feet a cricket began to chirp, and suddenly from a little distance there came the quaint, sweet sound of a shepherd's pipe, playing an old-time rigadoon.

"Hark!" she whispered.

The sound came nearer and nearer: she loved to hear the faint, elusive echo, the fairy accompaniment to her own dreamlike mood.

"What a sweet tune," she murmured, as instinctively her foot began tapping the measure on the ground. "I mind it well! How oft have I danced to it beneath the Maypole!"

"Will you then dance it with me to-night?"

"Nay, sir … you do but jest…"

But his excitement was at fever-point now. The outlaw at least could work his will upon this Heath, of which he alone was king. He could not carry her away on Jack o' Lantern's back, but he could make her stay with him a while longer, dance with him, here in the moonlight, her hand in his, his arm at times round her waist in the mazes of the dance, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright, her breath panting, aye! for she should feel too that reckless fire that scorched him. All the fierce, untamed blood in him ran like molten lava in his veins. Aye! for one more brief half-hour he – the lonely dweller on the Moor – the pariah, the outcast, would taste the joys of the gods.

"I was never more earnest in my life!" he vowed, with that gay, mad, merry laugh of his, "a dance with you here in the moonlight! Aye! a dance in the midst of my dreams!"

"But indeed, indeed, sir," she pleaded, "the hour is late and my business in London is very urgent."

"Nay, ten minutes for this dance will not much delay your journey, and I swear by your sweet eyes that after that you shall go unmolested."

"But if I refuse?"

"An you refuse," he said, bending the knee before her, and bowing humbly at her feet, "I will entreat you on my knees…"

"And if I still refuse?" she murmured.

"Then will I uproot the trees, break the carriage that bears you away, tear up the Heath and murder yon knaves! God in heaven only knows what I would not do an you refuse."

"No, no, sir, I pray you…" she said, alarmed at his vehemence, puzzled, fascinated, carried away by his wild, reckless mood and the potent spell of the witching moon. "Nay! how can I refuse? … I am in your power … and must do as you bid me… An you really wish for a dance…"

She allowed him to lead her away to a short distance off the beaten track, there, where a carpet of ling and grass, and walls of bramble and gorse formed a ball-room fit for gods and goddesses to dance in. At the further end of this clearing the quaint, shrivelled figure of Jock Miggs, the shepherd, had just come into view. At a little distance to the left, and close to the roadside, there was a small wooden shed, and beyond it a pen, used by the shepherds as a shelter on rough nights when tending their sheep on the Heath.

For the moment the pen was empty, and Jock Miggs was evidently making his way to the hut for a few hours' sleep, and had been playing his pipe for the sake of company.

"Aye! a dance here!" said Beau Brocade, "with the moon and stars to light us, a shepherd to play the tune, and the sprites that haunt the Heath for company! What ho! there! friend shepherd!" he shouted to Miggs.

The worthy Jock caught sight of the two figures standing in the centre of the clearing, not twenty paces away from him.

"Lud have mercy upon me!" he gasped. "Robbery! Violence! Murder!"

"Nay, friend! only merry-making," quoth Beau Brocade, gaily. "We want to dance upon this Heath, and you to play the tune for us."

"Eh? what?" muttered the shepherd, in his vague, apologetic way, "dancing at this hour o' the night?"

"Aye!"

"And me to play for a parcel of mad folk?"

"Well said, honest shepherd! Let us all be mad to-night! but you shall play for us, and here! – here is the wherewithal to set your pipe in tune."

He threw a heavy purse across to Miggs, who, still muttering something about lunatics on the Heath, slowly stooped and picked it up.

"Guineas!" he muttered, weighing it in his hand, "guineas, as I live! Guineas for playing a dance tune. Nay, sir, you're mad, sure enough."

"Wilt play the tune, shepherd?" shouted Beau Brocade in wild impatience.

Jock Miggs shook his head with a determined air.

"Nay! your madness is nought to me. You've paid for a tune, and you shall have the tune. But, Lordy! Lordy! these be 'mazing times."

He settled himself down on a clump of grass-covered earth, and stolidly began piping the same old-time rigadoon. These were a pair of lunatics, for sure, but since the gentleman had paid for this extraordinary pleasure, 'twas not for a poor shepherd to refuse to earn a few honest guineas.

Beau Brocade bowed to his lady with all the courtly grace of a town gallant.

"Madam! your most humble, and most obedient servant."

As in a dream Patience began to tread the measure. It was all so strange, so unreal! surely this was a dream, and she would wake anon.

She turned and twisted in the mazes of the dance, gradually the intoxication of it all had reached her brain; she seemed to see round her in the grass pixie faces gazing curiously upon her. All the harebells seemed to tinkle, the shepherd's pipe sounded like fairy bells. Through the holes in the black mask she could see a pair of burning eyes watching her as if entranced.

She felt like a creature of some other world, a witch mayhap, dancing a wild saraband with this man, her lord and master, a mad, merry sprite who had arranged this moonlight Sabbath.

Her cheeks began to glow, her eyes were sparkling with the joy of this dance. Her breath came panting through her parted lips.

Aye! mad were they both! what else? Their madness was the intoxication which man alone can feel when his joy equals that of the gods! Quicker, shepherd! quicker! let thy pipe wake all the fairy echoes of this mystic, ghostlike Moor! Let all the ghouls and gnomes come running hither, let the stars pale with envy, let fairies and sprites clap their hands for joy, since one man in all this world was happier than all the spirits in heaven!

How long it lasted neither of them could tell. The honey-coloured moon lighted them all the while, the blue mist wrapped them as in a mystic veil. Still they danced on; at times she almost lay in his arms, hot, panting, yet never weary, then she would slip away, and with eyes aglow, cheeks in rosy flame, beckon to him, evade, advance, then once more put her hand in his and madden him with the touch.

Oh! that heaven-born hour! why did it ever cease?

A wild shriek, twice repeated, brought them both to a standstill.

She, with heart beating, and hand pressed to her panting bosom, was unable to stir. Whilst the excitement kept her up she had danced, but now, with that piercing shriek, the dream had vanished and she was back on earth once more.

"What was that?"

Thomas and Timothy, attracted by the strange spectacle, had gradually crept up to the clearing, and through a clump of gorse and bracken had been watching the weird, midnight dance. On the further side, and close to Jock Miggs, John Stich had been standing in the shadow of a thorn bush. He had been running all the way, ever since he heard the two pistol-shots. Amazed at the strange sight that met his honest eyes, he had not dared to interfere. Perhaps his honest faithful heart felt with, even if it did not altogether comprehend, the wayward, half-crazy mood of his friend.

Betty alone, terrified and not a little sulky, had remained in the coach. It was her shriek that roused the spectators and performers of this phantasy on the Heath.

"My lady! my lady!" screamed Betty once more at the top of her voice.

Then, all of a sudden, Patience understood. Fairyland had indeed vanished. The awful reality came upon her with appalling cruelty.

"My letters!" she gasped, and started running towards the coach.

But already Jack Bathurst had bounded across the clearing, closely followed by John Stich. Patience's cry of mad, terror-stricken appeal had gone straight to his brain, and dissipated in the fraction of a second the reckless excitement of the past hour.

The wild creature of one moment's wayward mood was in that same fraction of time re-transformed into the cool and daring dweller of the Moor, on whose head the law had set a price, and who in revenge had made every law his slave.

His keen, quick eye had already sighted the smith.

"After me, John!" he commanded, "and run for your life."

When the two men had fought their way through the clumps of gorse and bracken which screened the clearing from the road, they were just in time to see a man quickly mounting a dark brown horse, which stood some twenty yards in front of the coach.

The carriage door nearest to them was open, and poor Mistress Betty lay on the ground close beside it, still screaming at the top of her voice.

With one bound Beau Brocade had reached Jack o' Lantern, who, accustomed to his unfettered life on the Heath, had quietly roamed about at will, patiently waiting for his master's call. The young man was unarmed, since he had placed his pistols awhile ago at Patience's feet, but Jack o' Lantern was swift-footed as the deer, and would overtake any strange horseman easily.

Beau Brocade's hand was on his horse's bridle and there were barely a few yards between him and the mysterious horseman, who was preparing to gallop away, when the latter turned, and suddenly pointing a pistol at his pursuer, fired two shots in rapid succession.

The young man did not stop at once. He clutched Jack o' Lantern's bridle and tried to mount, but he staggered and almost fell.

"After him, John," he cried in a hoarse voice, as, staggering once more, he fell upon one knee. "After him! quick! take Jack o' Lantern, don't mind me!"

John had no need to be told twice. He seized the horse's bridle and swung himself into the saddle as quickly as he could.

But these few seconds had given the horseman a sufficient start. Although the moon was bright the mist was thick, and the bracken and thorn bushes very dense on the other side of the road. Already he had disappeared from view, and John's ears and eyes were not so keen as those of Beau Brocade, the highwayman, the wounded monarch of the Heath.

CHAPTER XIX
HIS OATH

Patience's first thought as soon as she reached the road was for Betty; she helped the poor girl to her feet and tried to get some coherent explanation from her.

"I was listening to the tune, my lady, and leaning my head out of the window," moaned Mistress Betty, who was more frightened than hurt, "when suddenly the carriage door was torn open, I was dragged out and left screaming on the ground… That's all I know."

But one glance at the interior of the coach had revealed the whole awful truth. It had been ransacked, and the receptacle beneath the cushions, where had lain the all-important letters, was now obviously empty.

"The letters! oh, the letters!" moaned Patience in an agony of misery and remorse. "Philip, my dear, dear one, you entrusted your precious life in my hands, and I have proved unworthy of the trust."

Her spirit wholly broken by the agony of this cruel thought, she cowered on the step of the carriage, her head buried in her hands, in a passion of heart-broken tears.

"My lady…"

She looked down, and by the dim light of the moon she saw a figure on its knees, dragging itself with a visibly painful effort slowly towards her.

In a moment she was on her feet, tall, haughty, a world of scorn in her eyes; she looked down with horror at the prostrate figure before her.

"Nay, sir," she said with icy contempt, "an you have a spark of honour left in you, take off that mask, let me at least see who you are."

The agony of shame was more than she could bear. She who had deemed herself so proud, so strong, that she should have been thus fooled, duped, tricked, and by this man! this thief! this low class robber who had dared to touch her hand! All the pride of race and caste rose in revolt within her. Who was he that he should dare to have spoken to her as he did? Her cheeks glowed with shame at the memory of that voice which she had loved to hear, the tender accent in it, and oh! she had been his plaything, his tool, for this infamous trick which had placed her dear, dear brother's life in peril worse than before.

Meekly he had obeyed her, his own proud spirit bent before her grief. His face – ashy pale now and drawn with pain and weakness – looked up in mute appeal for forgiveness.

"A poor wretch," he murmured feebly, "whose mad and foolish whim…"

But she turned from him in bitter loathing, drawing herself up to her full height, trying by every means in her power to show the contempt which she felt for him. So absorbed was she in her grief and humiliation, in her agony of remorse for her broken trust, that she did not realise that he was hurt, and fainting with loss of blood.

"You … you…" she murmured with horror and contempt. "Nay! I pray you do not speak to me… You … you have duped and tricked me, and I … I … Oh!" she added with a wealth of bitter reproach, "what wrong had I or my dear brother done to you that you should wish to do him so much harm? What price had his enemies set upon his head that you should sell it to them?"

He tried to interrupt her, for her words hurt him ten thousand times more than the wound in his shoulder: with almost superhuman effort he dragged himself to his feet, clinging to the bracken to hold himself upright. He would not let her see how she made him suffer. She! his beautiful white rose, whom unwittingly he had, it seemed, so grievously wronged. Her mind was distraught, she did not understand, and oh! it was impossible that she couldrealise the cruelty of her words, more hard to endure than any torture the fiendish brain of man could devise.

"I'd have given you gold," she continued, whilst heavy sobs choked the voice in her throat, "if 'twas gold you wanted… Here is the purse you did not take just now! Two hundred guineas for you, sir, an you bring me back those letters!"

And with a last gesture of infinite scorn she threw the purse on the ground before him.

A cry escaped him then: the terrible, heart-rending cry of the wild beast wounded unto death. But it was momentary; that great love he bore her helped him to understand. Love is never selfish – always kind. Love always understands.

He could scarcely speak now, and the seconds were very precious, but with infinite gentleness he contrived to murmur faintly, —

"Madam! I swear by those sweet lips of yours now turned in anger against me that you do me grievous wrong. My fault, alas! is great! I cannot deny it, since in this short, mad hour of the dance my eyes were blind and mine ears deaf to all save to your own dear presence."

"Aye! 'twas a clever trick," she retorted, lashing herself to scorn, wilfully deaf to the charm of that faint voice, turning away from the tender appeal of his eyes: "a trick from beginning to end! Your chivalry at the forge! your rôle of gallant gentleman of the road! the while you plotted with a boon companion to rob me of the very letters that would have saved my brother's life."

"Letters? … that would have saved your brother's life? … What letters?.."

"Nay, sir! I pray you fool me no further. Heaven only knows how you learnt our secret, for I'll vouch that John Stich was no traitor. Those letters were stolen, sir, by your accomplice, whilst you tricked me into this dance."

He pulled himself together with a vigorous effort of will, forcing himself to speak quietly and firmly, conquering the faintness and dizziness which was rapidly overpowering him.

"Madam!" he said gently, "dare I hope that you will believe me when I say that I know naught of those letters? … John Stich, as you know, is loyal and true … not even to me would he have revealed your secret … nay, more! … it seems that I too have been tricked to further a villain's ends. Will you not try and believe that had I known what those letters were I would have guarded them, for your sweet sake, with my last dying breath?"

She did not reply: for the moment she could not, for her tears choked her, and there was the magic of that voice which she could not resist. Still she would not look at him.

"Sir!" she said a little more calmly, "Heaven has given you a gentle voice, and the power of tender words, with which to cajole women. I would wish to believe you, but…"

She was interrupted by the sound of voices, those of Thomas and Timothy, her men, who had kept a lookout for John Stich. The next moment the smith himself, breathless and panting, came into view. He had ridden hard, for Jack o' Lantern's flanks were dripping with sweat, but there was a look of grave disappointment on the honest man's face.

"Well?" queried Beau Brocade, excitedly, as soon as John had dismounted.

"I'm feared that I've lost the scoundrel's track," muttered John, ruefully.

"No?"

"At first I was in hot pursuit, he galloping towards Brassington; suddenly he seemed to draw rein, and the next moment a riderless horse came tearing past me, and then disappeared in the direction of Aldwark."

"A riderless horse?"

"Aye! I thought at first that maybe he'd been thrown; I scoured the Heath for half a mile around, but … the mist was so thick in the hollow, and there was not a sound… I'd have needed a blood-hound to track the rascal down."

An exclamation of intense disappointment escaped from the lips of Lady Patience and of Beau Brocade.

"Do you know who it was, John?" queried the latter.

"No doubt of that, Captain. It was Sir Humphrey Challoner right enough."

"Sir Humphrey Challoner!" cried Patience, in accents of hopeless despair, "the man who covets my fortune now holds my brother's life in the hollow of his hand."

Excitedly, defiantly, she once more turned to Beau Brocade.

"Nay, sir," she said, "an you wish me to believe that you had no part in this villainy, get those letters back for me from Sir Humphrey Challoner!"

He drew himself up to his full height, his pride at least was equal to her own.

"Madam! I swear to you…" he began. He staggered and would have fallen, but faithful Stich was nigh, and caught him in his arms.

"You are hurt, Captain?" he whispered, a world of anxiety in his kindly eyes.

"Nay! nay!" murmured Beau Brocade, faintly, "'tis nothing! … help me up, John! … I have something to say … and must say it … standing!"

But Nature at last would have her will with him, the wild, brave spirit that had kept him up all this while was like to break at last. He fell back dizzy and faint against faithful John's stout breast.

Then only did she understand and realise. She saw his young face, once so merry and boyish, now pale with a hue almost of death; she saw his once laughing eyes now dimmed with the keenness of his suffering. Her woman's heart went out to him, she loathed herself for her cruelty, her heart, overburdened with grief, nearly broke at the thought of what she had done.

"You are hurt, sir," she said, as she bent over him, her eyes swimming in tears, "and I … I knew it not."

The spell of her voice brought his wandering spirit back to earth and to her.

"Aye, hurt, sweet dream!" he murmured feebly, "deeply wounded by those dear lips, which spoke such cruel words; but for the rest 'tis naught. See!" he added, trying to raise himself and stretching a yearning hand towards her, "the moon has hid her face behind that veil of mist … and I can no longer see the glory of your hair! … my eyes are dim, or is it that the Heath is dark? … I would fain see your blue eyes once again… By the tender memory of my dream born this autumn afternoon, I swear, sweet lady, that your brother's life shall be safe! … Whilst I have one drop of blood left in my veins, I will protect him."

With trembling hand he sought the white rose which still lay close to her breast: she allowed him to take it, and he pressed it to his lips.

Then, with a final effort he drew himself up once more, and said loudly and clearly, —

"By this dear token I swear that I will get those letters back for you before the sun has risen twice o'er our green-clad hills."

"Sir … I…"

"Tell me but once that you believe me … and I will have the strength that moves the mountains."

"I believe you, sir," she said simply. "I believe you absolutely."

"Then place your dear hand in mine," he whispered, "and trust in me."

And the last thought of which he was conscious was of her cool, white fingers grasping his fevered hand. Then the poor aching head fell back on John's shoulder, the burning eyes were closed, kindly Nature had taken the outlaw to her breast and spread her beneficent mantle of oblivion over his weary senses at last.