By the end of March a great and unexpected change came over the weather. The wind, which had long blown from the chill north, now came softly and mildly from the west, but still the atmosphere was cold; for though the vast field-ice floated away from, the Guldborg sound, and the dark blue water rolled freely between the isles, their shores were covered with a pure white mantle of deep and dazzling snow.
Hearing that an expedition led by Christian IV. was about to be made against the Imperialists, and that a king's ship had been seen off the coast, I rode one day beyond Skielbye towards the mouth of the Sound, to see her, as I looked anxiously for the return of Ian.
On leaving Ernestine, I thought she seemed more sad than usual, and that her voice trembled when I bade her adieu. This might all have been fancy; but I could not expel such fancies from my head, and again and again they recurred to me, as I spurred a stout Holstein troop-horse (which Baron Fœyœ had lent me) along the frozen beach.
I waited long at a small house near the seashore, watching a little dogger beating with her two sails to seaward against a head wind, and threading a devious passage between the fragments of ice that flecked the sea with white; and in the evening I had the satisfaction of seeing a large king's ship, with her white sails shining in the setting sun, and her decks evidently crowded by soldiers, standing up the bosom of the narrow Sound.
I remounted my trooper, which I received from a cottager, who was remarkably polite for a Danish boor, and who informed me that he was half a Scot, as his father had come over with Captain Michael Wemyss' Scottish band in the preceding century, to serve in the old Swedish war. But the peasants were frequently very insolent to us, as foreign soldiers; on many occasions our men had been maltreated, and in two instances our officers had been murdered. For these pranks we usually made the people pay dearly, by sending the slain man's nearest kinsmen under a sergeant to the immediate locality, where, if they failed to find and shoot the perpetrators, they burned the houses, and houghed the cattle by a gash of the skene-dhu, in the old Highland fashion.
On this evening I was involved in one of those quarrels, when returning through a village at the entrance of which the bailiff of Laaland had established a toll, for some reason best known to his worship. In consequence of the dilapidated condition of King Christian's exchequer, we had been without pay for three months; thus I was without a coin to satisfy the gate ward, who peremptorily demanded a Danish fourpenny piece (twelve of which make a rixdollar), and deliberately barred my progress with a halbert.
In vain did I tell this churlish boor that I was travelling on the king's service (which by the by was not quite the case), others sallied out from the adjacent houses variously armed; and it was evident that, unless I chose to share the fate of poor Ensign Ludovick Lamond, who had lately been cut to pieces by the boors at Rodbye, there was no time to be lost. Drawing my claymore, and putting spurs to my horse, I hewed the fellow's halbert in two by one blow, hurled him to the earth, and passed the toll-gate, narrowly escaping the discharge of five or six pistolettes which were fired at that moment from behind an evergreen hedge; the leaves of which were scattered about me by the bullets.
Intent on avenging this outrage; I galloped back to the castle of Nyekiöbing; but soon found that fate had prepared other work for me.
By that time the king's ship had just come to anchor abreast of the town; a boat which shot off her side had just reached the landing-place; an officer of Highlanders sprang upon the mole, and I recognised the outspread eagle's pinion of Ian's helmet, even before he approached me.
With two thousand five hundred musketeers and pikemen, the wreck of his army, King Christian required us to repair to Rodbye, whither he had commanded the scattered companies of the regiment to muster under Ian Dhu, our lieutenant-colonel; and as the rash prince was about to make a bold attack upon the cantonments of some of Wallenstein and Tilly's now united and mighty host, which occupied all the promontory of North and South Juteland, from the banks of the Elbe to the Skagen cape, my company was to embark without an hour's delay on board theAnna Catharina, the ship of Sir Nickelas Valdemar, who had already received the companies of Angus Roy M'Alpine, Munro of Culcraigie, and Sir Patrick Mackay, from Maribœ, in the centre of Laaland, and all the little detachments of ours which occupied the castles of the isles.
"Alas, for Ernestine!" thought I, when hurrying back to the castle of Nyekibing; "how joyous to me would these tidings once have been!"
I met one of her attendants (Juliane Vüg, the warder's daughter), and desired her to inform Lady Ernestine that I craved a moment's interview, to bid a long farewell.
The girl went to her apartments, and returned to me almost immediately, with an expression of astonishment and consternation impressed on her fair, florid, and otherwise stolid visage, but unable to articulate a syllable, save some trash about "the fate of her mother—and the Trolds."
"Juliane, have you lost your tongue?" said I. "Speak, girl—Ernestine is ill—ill, my God! and I am to sail in an hour!"
Regardless of all etiquette in the excitement of the moment, I rushed up-stairs to her chamber, and knocked. There was no reply. My heart beat violently as I entered; there was no one within, and every thing bore marked evidence of confusion, and a hurried departure. A wardrobe with its drawers stood open—ransacked and in disorder; a letter, addressed to me, lay upon the table.
My brain became giddy; Prudentia had left me just in the same manner; but I thought not of her then, as I snatched up the letter and tore it open.
"Forgive me, dearest Philip," it ran; "forgive me the step I have taken—to leave this island; it is a course I have long contemplated, but lacked the spirit to put in execution, until this day at noon, when a faithful messenger in a small vessel arrived from our father to say, that he is dying in Holstein, and cannot depart from this world in peace unless he beholds us once again. You know how he loves Gabrielle and me. Could we remain after a request so touching and so terrible? Beg the good queen to pardon us. Moreover, Gabrielle is ill; and I know that a change of scene alone can cure her. The vessel we sail with is a Dantzic dogger, with two large sails. Should you see her in the Sound, do say one prayer for us; and, until we meet again, farewell, dearest Philip, and believe me your own
"ERNESTINE."
"Nyekiöbing,March28th."
I remembered the little craft I had seen tacking out of the Sound, and my heart sank as, with a feeling of bitterness and desolation, I descended to the castle-yard, where old Torquil Gorm, our pipe-major, was playing the gathering, strutting to and fro with his helmet on, and the long ribands streaming from his drones.
"Dioul! my kinsman—accoutre! accoutre!" exclaimed Ian, rushing after me with his cuirass half buckled; "hark to the gallant war-pipe! Mars and Bellona require new victims. And what do you think Heinrich Vug (the warder whose wife was carried off by the fairies) has just told me?"
"Oh, Ian, do not talk to me," said I; "my mind is a chaos! I am a fit companion only for madmen. But what did Heinrich tell you?"
"That our old friend Bandolo has been seen in the Sound by Fynböe the pilot, on board of a dogger with two large sails—the same we passed near Skeilbye."
"A dogger with two sails! Bandolo!—dost thou say so?" I exclaimed in a broken voice. My heart shrunk up at the words of Ian—a mountain seemed to fall upon me. "Ernestine in his power!" I staggered, and supported myself upon my claymore; the light seemed to leave my eyes.
Ernestine, in whom was centred all my hopes of the future—entwined with life itself—my happiness, my glory, and fortune, for she was all to me—and Gabrielle, too!—what might be her fate?
I knew that Bandolo had long fostered the most extravagant ambition—to become the purchaser of a county and coronet in some of those beggared states of Germany where such things were saleable; and Tilly's favour and the Imperial gold had made the bravo and scoutmaster rich as a Lombard Jew. I remembered the conversation between the wretch and his patron at Luneburg; and, if their father was really dying, trembled for the fate of the sisters.
I was stunned, benumbed, and had no sense save that a dreadful calamity—I knew not altogether what—had suddenly dissolved every tie between the world and me. Some time elapsed before Ian could understand me—that Ernestine and her sister had but too surely been decoyed away by a stratagem of the accomplished desperado.
All that passed on this evening appeared to me as a dream. Phadrig Mhor accoutred me; the parade, and inspection of locks and ammunition, the rattle of our drums as we marched under the old castle arch, and filed down to the landing-place; the tears of the kind old queen, who, in her goodness of heart, wept as the brave Highland band embarked on that desperate expedition, from which few—perhaps none—might ever return; all seemed parts of the same misty dream. Then came our reception onboard, the warm congratulations of our comrades, stout old Culcraigie, and Red M'Alpine, still wearing his scarf of crape; then the noisy supper in the gun-room, where salted beef, cold Russian tongue, and Holstein bacon, were washed down by many a brown flagon of German wine; then came the frolics and merriment—for, with the heedlessness of soldiers, my comrades forgot the hardships and dangers of the past year, and cared nothing for those that were to come. They spent that night in jovialty as our ship bore away for Rodbye.
I alone was mute, pale, downcast, and inexpressibly miserable.
I was at times in a state of absolute horror. I could not realize my separation from Ernestine; and if, when overcome by thought, sleep closed my eyes, it was but for a moment—her voice came to my ear, and I started and awoke.
I did my duty well, but mechanically; for my mind was always wandering, and occupied by vague surmises, foreign from what passed around me.
Amid severe storms of frost and snow we came to anchor off Rodbye, and were joined by Kildon's company; thus the whole regiment now was under the command of Ian. With us were one battalion of the Lord Spynie's regiment of Scottish Lowlanders; the Baron Klosterfiörd's new troop of pistoliers (for Karl had escaped from the Imperialists); the Comte de Montgomerie's regiment of French Protestants, and a few slender companies of Danish pikes and musketeers, making barely in all three thousand men. With these the brave King Christian, regardless that he was but as a mouse attacking a lion, resolved to beat up the quarters of the invader at Fehmarn and elsewhere; and if he could not conquer, at least to harass and slay as many of the Imperialists as possible.
Storms of snow detained us a week; at last there was a fine day, when the air was clear, and the hoar-frost hung on the boughs of the leafless trees, and when the black ravens were seen floating above the snow in the sunbeams. This clear weather accompanied us into Fehmer-sund, a channel of deep water, about one mile broad, which separates the isle of Fehmarn from the coast of Holstein.
Looking upon this little place—the jointure of his wife-of-the-left-hand—as a key to the German empire, Christian had resolved on driving out the Imperialists; and at noon came to anchor off Burg, its capital, where we prepared to disembark under a fire of cannon and musketry from a regiment of Walloon infantry, who garrisoned the place.
Though early, in April, the day was bitterly cold; for the season was one of intense severity. The sky and the narrow Sound were both of the purest blue; but the whole island and the opposite coast lay buried under a thick mantle of snow. Here and there along the shore, we could perceive the deep tracks cut to denote the highways leading into the interior; the whole atmosphere glittered, and the breath of the soldiers froze on the cheek-plates of their helmets, or ascended in steamy vapour from the boats, which, with thirty musketeers of our regiment in each, made straight for the shore with drums beating and pipes playing.
I gazed earnestly at the low and level beach of Fehmarn, in the dim hope that Ernestine might have been conveyed there. My whole thoughts were of her, and I am sure Gabrielle was almost forgotten. Love, like grief, makes one very selfish at times. My recollections of that day are dreamy and indistinct. I was desperate, careless of life, and in that frame of mind which would have enabled me to confront a battalion of pikes as readily as I would have encountered a single man. I cared not a fig for what happened, and at the command of Ian Dhu, now our lieutenant-colonel, I gladly sprang into the first boat which, from theAnna Catharina, shot off for the shore.
Two men of my company (a M'Farquhar and a Mackay) fell overboard; but the cannon-balls from a flying battery on the shore, were ploughing the water about us, and we had not time to pick up the poor fellows. They called loudly for that succour which, in the hurry of that desperate moment, we were totally unable to yield; and, loaded by their iron trappings, accoutrements, and knapsacks, they sank like stones. What are the lives of two men, when those of thousands, perhaps, are hovering on the brink of eternity?
We landed under cover of a fire from our ships, which battered down the snow-clad houses of Burg to dislodge the Walloons. My company of M'Farquhars had the honour of first touching the ground. The kilted clansmen leaped into the half-frozen water—formed in line, and blew their matches as they advanced. Amid a storm of shot and forest of pikes, we fell on the Walloons with clubbed muskets, and after receiving and returning one volley drove them back.
"Who commands here in Fehmarn?" I asked of one poor fellow, a Walloon ensign, who had been shot through the side, and lay writhing on the ground.
He made no reply, but spat blood at me in his agony and animosity.
"Speak!" said I, holding my sword at his throat; "is it the Count of Carlstein?"
"No—it is Colonel Walter Butler."
"Then Ernestine is not here," thought I, hurrying after my men, who, on being reinforced by Spynie's Scots and Montgomerie's French, soon drove the Walloons pell-mell into the town, compelling them to leave their cannon behind. They had securely barricaded and loopholed Burg; and, as we knew their commander to be an Irishman, we prepared to encounter a resolute, and for us perhaps a disastrous defence. Landing his entire force, the king invested the place on all sides; and, perceiving that our ships cut off all succour by sea, Colonel Butler sent a drummer to crave a parley, which ended in his entire force marching out with the honours of war, their drums beating and colours flying, amid the yells and execrations of the boors, on whom they had committed innumerable ravages and outrages. From the beach, our boats in a few hours conveyed the whole safely over to the coast of Holstein.
Thus, with a slight loss, King Christian regained the whole island, and after collecting tribute from its capital, and the villages of Petersdorf and Puttgarten, and after tarrying there a few days to refresh, we prepared to reimbark, encouraged by the good success of our new campaign to make another essay upon the mainland of Holstein.
The house of the burgomaster was converted into a temporary hospital, and among the wounded who had been conveyed there, I recognised my former acquaintance, the Walloon ensign, and gave him a flask of corn brandy, apologising at the same time for the fright I had given him. He was now in better humour, and, being somewhat disposed for conversation, I asked him if he knew "the Count Tilly's confidant and scoutmaster, Bandolo, the Spanish bravo?"
"I have seen him a thousand times," he replied; "but you know not, cavalier, how we soldiers despise this cowardly truckler, who handles, but only in secret, the knife and the pistol. The day before you attacked us, he sailed into the Fehmer-sund with tidings of your coming, for which he received a hundred good dollars from Colonel Butler; hence our barricades at Burg, and our batteries on the beach."
"His vessel?" said I, turning breathlessly towards the Sound.
"A small dogger, with two sails, had on board only himself and three other men, I believe; but the fellow is bold as Ogier le Dane, or the devil himself."
"Were there any ladies with him!"
"Ladies with Bandolo!" repeated the Walloon, laughing, and then making a grimace as his wound twitched him; "why, cavalier, though the fellow is rich as Crœsus, the most degraded camp-follower would shudder at his touch. Rumour says that he is steeped to the lips in blood—the blood of assassinated men."
"And where is he now?" I asked, making a terrible effort to appear calm.
"I know not. As your ships entered the Sound on the east, he sailed out by the west, and is gone, I believe, towards Eckernfiörd, where a body of Tilly's troops are cantoned."
"Heaven be thanked!" thought I, leaving the poor officer on his bed of blood-stained straw; "it is on Eckernfiörd that we are next to bend our cannon."
As Fehmarn is a fertile island, we procured an ample store of the butter, cheese, and fresh provisions which the frugal inhabitants had been able to conceal from the Imperial marauders; and in lieu of their hose—now somewhat tattered—our Highlanders obtained some hundred pairs of soft stockings, which had been knitted by the wives and daughters of the boors.
We then re-embarked about the middle of April, minus our preacher or chaplain, the Rev. Mr. Zerubabbel Bang, who had the misfortune to fall in a duel. He and a lieutenant of Karl's pistoliers, having quarrelled about the burgomaster's daughter, a pretty littlejungfrauwith blue eyes and blooming complexion, came to high words, and from thence to hard blows with backsword and dagger, and our poor minister (an old fellow student of mine at the King's College in the Brave City) was fairly run through the body and slain.
Being a commissioned officer, and having the rank of major, we buried him under the dismantled batteries with military honours. The right wing of the regiment fired three volleys above the grave, and our drums beat thePoint of War, while the shovels of the pioneers closed his last abode for ever.
Agitated by emotions of no ordinary kind, on the evening of the 26th April I saw the broad harbour of Eckernfiörd open to receive our ships; for in that little town, the painted walls and church spire of which I could see shining afar off in the cold yellow light of a stormy setting sun, Ernestine might be in safety by her father's side, or perhaps with Bandolo.
I cannot describe all that I endured of anger, bitterness, impatience, and anxiety during these weeks of warfare and wandering among the Danish isles and Juteland coasts. Relief could only be found by plunging into the fierce tumult and excitement of strife. When that passed away, my agony and suspense returned with redoubled force.
Old superstition has made the 26th of April, St. Mark's day, an unlucky time for an expedition; and I have known more than one worthy crofter and bien bonnet-laird, near my father's tower at home, who dared not plough on St. Mark's day, lest a blight should destroy the fruit of their labour; neither would their wives churn or spin, lest the milk should become soured and the rock ravelled. King Christian knew little of such fancies of the olden time, and cared less for them; thus, after deceiving the enemy by standing off to the seaward, he returned again when the darkness set in, and ordered all to be in readiness for breaking the strong boom which closed the harbour mouth, and for obtaining the town by storm.
By a sudden change in the weather, the snow had almost entirely disappeared, and vegetation had fully commenced; but a cold and stormy wind swept over the darkened waters of the bay, a pitchy gloom enveloped the whole sky, and shrouded in obscurity the low, flat shore of South Juteland. Steadily and noiselessly our vessel stood towards the harbour mouth, a fire-ship leading the van to burst and destroy the boom, and to force a passage for us. We expected to be all engaged in an hour, and mustered in our arms and in silence on the decks of the three royal ships. We endeavoured in vain to discover the bearing of the shore. It seemed to be visible to King Christian alone; for that able and valiant monarch, being a mariner as well as a warrior, sheathed in his full armour, stood by the tiller, steering the fireship in person, and gazing into the gloom with his keen but solitary eye.
"Phadrig," said I to my sergeant; "look to it, and see that our company have all their matches and bandoliers in service order."
"I have anticipated your orders, and looked well to their arms and powder," he replied in his native Gaëlic; but there was an expression in the tall sergeant's dark face, visible below his steel cap, which startled me, apathetic even as I had now become to casual circumstances.
"How is this, Phadrig?" said I; "are you ill, my good man?"
"It is a dark night even for this kind of work, and the darker the better, perhaps," said he; "but of all others in the year, St. Mark's night is the least lucky, either for fighting or ferrying on. I will tell you a story. On this night, fifteen years ago, my father, Dunachadh Bane, and two men of our tribe, who had been sent on a mission from M'Farquhar to M'lan of Glencoe, quarrelled with some M'Donalds, whom they met on acreaghnear Glen Etive and the Black Mountain. They fled by Keanlochleven. The night was dark as this; and like a well at the bottom of its steep, black hills, lay the deep but narrow waters of the Leven. It is said a spirit guards them—a dangerous, a shapeless, and revengeful spirit—whose form is concealed by a cloud, but whose voice is often heard before a storm, shrieking from among the rocks that overhang the lake. In the murky midnight they heard a wild cry tossed after them on the gusty wind, as they rushed down the steep Highland pass; again came the cry, and again loud, shrill, and wailing; now it seemed to come from the dark lake, now from the darker mountains, and now from the blasted pines that overhung the foaming stream which fed the narrow Leven. It curdled their hearts' blood and froze the marrow in their bones—for amid the starless gloom they could see a dark cloud floating over the bosom of the lake; but they were bold and desperate men, and heeding less this terrible warning than the arrows of the M'Donaids, they sprang down the side of the shelving mountain, and reached the still, black, solemn lake, the waters of which were partly frozen. A boat lay among the withered reeds; they leaped in—they put off with an exulting shout, and my father grasped the tiller.
"'Black be your end!' shouted a voice like thunder over their heads, and the Glencoe men heard it with terror, as they rushed to the shore of the Leven. 'Bu dubh a dhiol!'" said Phadrig, pausing; "yes—black indeed was my father's fate. The dark vapour descended between the steep hills, a torrent of wind tore up the bosom of the Leven, revealing its ghastly depths; the water rose in billows, and lashed the overhanging hills; again the shriek was heard, the cloud of the angry spirit swept away; but the boat had vanished, for it had been engulfed by the ebbing water. The M'Donalds fled, abandoning in their terror all the cattle they had taken in the creagh. Dunachadh Bane and his two companions had perished, unshriven and unassoiled; and long the priest of our tribe, James of Jerusalem, prayed for their souls in the old kirk of Strathdee. Now, Captain Rollo," continued Phadrig, in a low impressive voice, and while drawing closer to me; "ever as St. Mark's night returns, a boat with three men in it is seen to cross the Leven."
"Pshaw, Phadrig—can a stout fellow like you believe this?"
"Firmly as I believe the blessed gospels. Once I saw it myself."
"It must have been mere imagination," said I.
"It wasnot," said he; "the April night was cold and clear. To the sorrow of the poor, the season had been backward, and the snow-wreaths lay deep in glen and corrie. With no companion but my dog, I had come through the savage glen of Larochmhor, and round by the base of Ben Nevis, on whose peaks the snow seldom melts. I reached Keanlochleven. Though the month was April, the water lay at my feet a sheet of waveless ice. All was still as death, and my own shadow spread far before me over the wilderness of snow, for the moon was low at the end of the narrow vale. It hung there like a silver shield, broad, round, and full, between a cleft of the rugged mountains.
"I paused a moment to mutter a prayer, and look on the place where my father had perished. The lake lay at my feet, I have said; but I had no fear of the water spirit, for then the moon was bright. I had a good dram under my belt, and my claymore at my side. Suddenly, I perceived something moving across the frozen surface of the lake—three hundred feet below me; my dog uttered a howl, and crept close to my side. 'Blessed be Heaven!—am I blind!' I exclaimed, pressing a hand upon my eyes; 'am I blind, or dreaming?' A boat with three Highlanders in it passed before me—I knew they were Strathdee men by the cock of their bonnets—one steered, while two pulled the oars; and, like the shadow of a cloud, the boat and its rowers glided across thehard frozen surfaceof the Leven, slowly and noiselessly, until it disappeared under the dark shadow cast by the mountain side across the salt lake at its foot. A deathly chill came over me; my hair stood on end; for I knew that my father's spirit had passed before me.
"Since that hour, captain," said Phadrig, pressing his hand upon his brow; "I have never gone within twenty miles of Ben Nevis, nor would I for all the gold in the hill of Keir. I have gone round by the Braes of Rannoch, by the great desert and the Uisc Dhu, rather than pass the glen of the Leven. But how I crossed the mountains—how I came down the Devil's Staircase, and reached Glencoe (for I also was going on a mission from Ian Dhu to M'lan), the Lord alone knows; for of that dire April night—the night of St. Mark—I remember no more."
Phadrig had just finished this wild story when a blue light was burned low, almost under the counter of the fireship, as a warning to drop our anchors; and they were let go noiselessly, the rope-cables running through hauseholes deluged by buckets of grease, to prevent the sound alarming the enemy, whose batteries swept the boom and its vicinity.
While our vessels hauled up their courses, and swung round with their heads to the wind, the fireship, favoured by the obscurity which concealed her, and by a north-east wind, with all her sails and studding-sails set, ran right towards the boom, which closed the narrowStrait; for the promontory on which the town stands closes in the extremity of the outer harbour, and divides it from the inner fiörd. The boom itself was an enormous log of Memel timber, to which a number of masts, yards, and spars were lashed. At each end strong cables secured it to the shore. Immediately within it lay a number of ships full of Imperial stores, and on board of these the crews must have kept but a sleepy watch that night, or the northern mist had blinded them.
The warlike Christian had seen the fireship, which was about a hundred and fifty tons of burden, constructed under his own eye; she was crammed to the hatches with combustibles, and fitted with grappling irons, to seize and destroy the boom and shipping. She was fitted up with troughs full of powder and melted pitch; these communicated with her fire-barrels and chambers for blowing open the ports, at which the flames were to be emitted. Her decks were sheeted over with powder, rosin, sulphur, tar, pitch, and grease. Her gunwale was surrounded by bavins of brushwood, having the bushends all laid outwards, forming a thick hedge, which was saturated in the same conglomeration of inflammable matter with which she was loaded from keel to hatches; and with which her whole rigging and masts, sails and running cordage, were thickly coated; while barrels of oil and tar, powder and other preparations, were piled upon her deck.
Through the dark gloom we discerned—or imagined we could discern—this floating magazine of destruction standing steadily on towards the boom, at a safe distance from which our ships had come to anchor. All the large boats were lowered, and noiselessly two thousand armed men, with the old blades of our own regiment leading the van, slowly and with well-muffled oars put off towards the shore.
Ian with my company—once his own—composed entirely of brave men of his own name and kindred, led the way. Red M'Alpine and Kildon followed in the next boat, with their companies; then came the remainder of our Highlanders in pinnaces; then the Danish musketeers of the King's regiment, and the French companies of the gallant Count de Montgomerie.
The boats grounded at a distance from the shore; there was a murmur of discontent among the French and Danes; but now, as at Fehmarn, our bold Scottish lads slung their muskets, sprang overboard, formed line in the water, and, grasping each others' hands, led the way towards the shore.
"Softly and quickly, comrades!" cried Ian Dhu, whose head, surmounted by the entire eagle's wing, towered above all others, as he advanced to the front with a colour in his hand; "we shall be at them with our pikes before helmets are buckled or matches blown."
At that moment the fireship blew up!
After firing the train with his own royal hand, King Christian had dropped into a small boat, and been pulled on board of theAnna Catharina, on the poop of which he stood anxiously watching the effect of his skill.
The fireship reached the boom, and running full tilt against it, was retained there by her grapnels; the lighted trains rushed through all parts of the ship, and in a moment the troughs, the decks, the rigging and the tarred sails, were enveloped in one vast pyramid of roaring flame, which shed a lurid glow on the waters around it, and the shore before us. Brighter and brighter it grew; we could see in the foreground the whole outline of Eckernfiörd, then esteemed the prettiest town in Juteland, with its high old German gables and wooden spire, the long rows of trees that shaded its streets, and surrounded the half circular harbour; the barricades which closed its avenues; the palisaded breastwork we had come to storm, and the long bridge with its Tollbooth bristling with cannon. Brighter yet and broader grew that sheet of wavering light, and tipped with it, as they rose and fell, the waves of the Baltic rolled like billows of liquid fire; the low flat shore on which they broke was bathed in alternate glows of yellow flame and dusky-red, as the various combustibles ignited in succession.
We saw the white froth amid which the vast boom was surging and chafing; we saw distinctly the masts, spars, and rigging of the storeships within; we saw the casements of the town—even the gilt vane on the church spire shone in this glorious but terrible flush of flame; while the hoarse drums beat to arms, and we heard the loud and sudden murmur, as from a crowd of startled men, arise within the town. The Imperialists rushed to their posts, and in three minutes their helmets were seen glittering in lines behind the barricades, for the town, from which all the inhabitants had fled, was but rudely and hastily fortified.
Like a volcano showering a million of burning brands over the whole fiörd, the fireship blew up with a shock which made the waters vibrate and lash the level shore, while the concussion was felt at the bottom of every ship in the fleet.
The great boom broke in two like a withered reed. A momentary silence followed; then, from the vast height to which they had been shot by the explosion, we heard the burning pieces fall hissing into the water. But their expiring blaze was almost immediately renewed by the storeships, which caught fire, and enabled the Danish vessels to cannonade the town, from the falling roofs of which the bricks and tiles flew in showers through the air, as the round shot boomed among them.
Having formed in the water in three columns, under the Count de Montgomerie, with the Highlanders in front, we advanced pell-mell to storm the graff and stockade which enclosed the town, on that side where a gate opened towards the road from Kiel; from these works the enemy opened a brisk fire on us. Ian Dhu, an officer as skilful as he was brave, sent Captain-lieutenant Sir Patrick Mackay, with fifty musketeers of his own company, into a lofty house, from the windows of which their fire swept the stockades in flank. Under cover of this we stormed them with comparative ease, throwing ourselves into the graff, officers and men, pikes, musketeers, and colours; we rushed from thence up the rough glacis, climbing with one hand and fighting with the other, though, by the storm of lead which rained upon our ranks, many a brave fellow was swept back into the slough of the ditch to die among its mud and slime.
Torn down or hewn to pieces in some places, surmounted in others, the palisades were won, and Ian Dhu, though bleeding from three wounds, had the honour first to place St Andrew's cross on the summit, and, with a wild yell of triumph, the hardy Highlanders closed up beneath it, and broad over their heads its blue silk folds were rustling in the midnight blast. In the deadly melée that ensued here, the Austrians were overmatched by our Scottish cavaliers, who used their long claymores with both hands, hewing down with the edge, while the former only gave point with their slender rapiers, which were much less effective. I found this particularly the case when encountering a gigantic Spanish officer (for there were three companies of Castilians in the town). He lunged at me incessantly; but parrying one terrible thrust with my claymore, after narrowly escaping being run through by a demi-lance, I overthrew the Don by a backhanded blow from my dirk.
Another Spanish cavalier, a tall and powerful man, wearing a burganet of bright steel, was disarmed by Phadrig Mhor, at whom he discharged his pistols after surrender.
"Yield—yield!" cried Phadrig in Gaëlic, "or I'll run a yard of my halbert into your haggis-bag!"
"Quartel, señor Valoroso!" exclaimed the Spaniard; but the prayer came too late; for by one blow of his Lochaber axe, Phadrig, who was not blessed with over much patience, sliced his head in two like a Swedish turnip, cutting him through bone and steel helmet to the neck.
The Imperialists now gave way from the gate of Kiel along the whole line of ramparts, and retired through the streets with great precipitation to the church, which they entered in confusion, and followed so closely by our soldiers, that many Highlanders entered with them, and were shot or taken. Save a hundred or so, who were killed as they retired through the streets, all reached the church, got in, barricadoed the doors, and from every part of the edifice opened a terrible fire upon us.
Montgomerie's Frenchmen assailed one flank, the king's Danish regiment another, and Ian led us to the assault of the great door; but for a time we failed to make any impression upon it. The night was bleak, dark, and exceedingly stormy; the wind shook our standards and rustled our lofty plumes, and we heard it (during the pauses of the musketry) howling through the louvre-boarded spire of the church, and the high gables of the old houses; but the pauses in the fusilade were few and far between. Through the windows and from behind the planks and benches with which they had barricaded them, four or five companies of Imperialists continued to fire upon us; and the bright red streaks of flame, as they burst forth incessantly above, below, and on every side, lighted up the quaint façade of the old church, the greater part of which was of wood. Every moment our bullets tore away large splinters. A company of Irishmen in the belfry made a terrible slaughter among my company, on whom they shot down in security without receiving a ball in return, for their position was too elevated for our muskets to reach them. Ian became greatly excited by the loss of so many of his soldiers and kinsmen.
"Count of Montgomerie!" he exclaimed; "let cannon be brought and the door blown in! My brave followers—the children of my father's people—shall not perish thus!"
"Dioul, my colonel!" added Kildon, whose company united its efforts with mine to burst open the door, before which the dead encumbered the steps three deep, and which resounded beneath our mingled blows like the head of a gigantic drum; "let us blow the d—d kirk up, and, by my father's hand, I will place the first stone of your cairn."
"May the ashes of these Spaniards be scattered on the waters!" added M'Alpine in the same forcible language, and staggering as a bullet grazed his helmet; "for, by the grey stone of M'Gregor! I believe they are the same men who so cruelly slew old Dunbar and five hundred of our gallant hearts at Bredenburg."
"Yea—after surrender, in cold blood," said Lumsdaine, my lieutenant, the sole survivor of that affair; "I know them by the fashion of their doublets—forward then—let us cut to pieces this kennel of blood-hounds!"
"Tullach Ard!" cried the Mackenzies of Kildon's company.
"Cairn na cuimhne!" added my men of Strathdee.
"Revenge! remember Dunbar and Bredenburg!" cried the whole battalion, with a wild Highland hurrah; and the soldiers redoubled their efforts, while the dying and dead fell fast on every side.
Suddenly there arose a cry of—
"The vaults—the church vaults are full of powder—five hundred barrels—Bredenburg! Bredenburg mercy! let us blow them up!"
This proved to be actually the case. Whether it was a mere speculation of our soldiers, or that they had been informed of the circumstances by some wounded Holsteiner (who had been compelled to serve the Austrians), I know not; but it was immediately acted upon.
Heedless of the leaden storm which was poured upon them, Phadrig Mhor, and a score of the brave fellows, rushed close to the walls of the church, beat down the bars of certain wooden gratings which admitted air to the vaults, and threw in five or six fireballs—engines formed of every combustible. These filled the whole basement story with a deluge of light, as they blazed, roared, and rolled about like flaming dragons; and to the eyes of a few revealed, in the very centre of the place, a goodly pile of wooden powder barrels.
"Retire—retire!" was the cry, and our men fell back on all sides, dragging with them several of the wounded, who were unable to crawl away; but we had scarcely retreated fifty paces down the main street, each side of which was bordered by stately beech-trees, when the earth shook beneath our feet, a blaze of yellow light filled the windows of the church, its broad roof of slates was shot into the air and rent asunder, to descend like rain upon the streets; a mighty column of fire poured upwards from the crater formed by the walls; I saw them gape and rend, in every direction; the taper spire shook like a willow wand, then crumbled and vanished with a crash. One half the edifice was blown into the air, the other half fell inwards. In an instant all became dark (save where the store-ships, half-burned to the water-edge, shed a sickly light upon the half-ruined town), and we heard a shower of stones, beams, slates, and materials of every kind, falling on the tops of the houses and into the street around us. With these came down many a scorched and shattered fragment of a human form; for at least five hundred men had, in one moment, been blown into eternity.
Among these were a hundred stout-hearted Irishmen of Butler's regiment.
Many of our men were severely injured by the debris of the explosion; after which I remember little more of that night, being struck senseless by a piece of falling timber.
I have a dim recollection of being borne away somewhere; and then of feeling the soft hands of a woman chafing mine, and pouring a cooling essence on my brow.
I thought of Ernestine; and then, as if that dear thought had conjured up her image and her presence, I seemed to hear her voice murmuring in my ear, as she wept and mourned bitterly.
While I am thus disposed of at Eckernfiörd, it may not be out of place to relate the adventures of the fair sisters (on their being decoyed from Nyekiöbing), as I afterwards learned from them, and so far as I can remember.
In the course of this narrative, many a long forgotten scene and face have come back to my memory by pursuing a train of thought. At first, it was my intention to have related only the battles and sieges wherein our valiant Scots of the old invincible regiment of Strathnaver distinguished themselves; but I have been compelled to linger fondly over the past, and thus long buried thoughts and hopes; the sentiments of my earlier years, have come back to me in all their strength and freshness. Hence I can relate the faith and pride of Ernestine, and the love of poor Gabrielle—one man's knavery and another man's valour—as if the events of those stirring times had all occurred but yesterday.
On board the dogger which bore the sisters from Falster, were only Bandolo, his friend Bernhard, the amiable woodman of Korslack (who has been already introduced to the reader), and three sailors of Dantzig, to whom the craft belonged.
Bandolo was disguised as a well-fed Lutheran clergyman of Glückstadt, and Bernhard acted as his servant, and had knots of black riband, on each of his shoulders. He had brought to Ernestine a feigned message, that the count her father was dying of wounds in Holstein; although quite aware that, by the intrigues and jealousy of old Tilly, he had been summoned to Vienna by the Emperor, who—as it was currently reported—now viewed him with the utmost coldness. Bandolo had been despatched by Tilly towards Assens and Falster, to inquire into the number of the Danish forces, and the probable movements of their king; but hearing that the count's daughters were at Nyekiöbing, he immediately conceived the project of conveying them away; and as he considered that he had now amassed a sufficient sum to realise the dream of his ambition—a Hanoverian count-ship—he resolved to retire from public life, to repose upon his laurels, with the high-born bride whom, Tilly in his cynical and mischievous spirit, had urged him by all means to procure; for secretly the generalissimo owed the colonel-general of the cavalry a mortal grudge.
By a profitable speculation, Bandolo had sold the younger sister, Gabrielle, to Count Merodé for a thousand ducats; and, being highly pleased with his investment, that gentle commander—who had compelled a Holstein merchant to furnish the ducats under terror of musket-shot, and place them in his hands—was impatiently awaiting her arrival at the strong fortress of Fredricksort, on the gulf of Kiel in Danische-wald, the capital of which is Eckernfiörd. The castle was occupied by the soldiers of the count; who, by a despatch from Vienna, had been desired to constitute himself governor of all that district, the poor boors of which were nearly driven mad by the severity with which he exacted tribute.
Bandolo's dogger sailed towards Fehmarn, where he gave such information to Colonel Butler as enabled that officer to afford us a warm reception. The scout-master then bore away towards the coast of Danische-wald; but on both sides of the isle of Fehmarn he encountered such tremendous gales, that the whole thoughts and energies of himself and his accomplice were occupied by fears for their own safety; thus, without the sisters being disturbed by their attentions or insults, the dogger entered the gulf of Kiel, and anchored off the Wohlder shore.
Confined to the little cabin during this cold and dreary voyage of nearly a hundred and fifty miles, and being wholly occupied by anxiety to reach their father, the sisters had failed to observe the very remarkable conduct of their guardian, the Lutheran clergyman, and his valet, who seemed to be on the most familiar terms with each other; and who, when the wind blew, and the dogger dipped surging down into the trough of the angry sea, drank schnaps out of the same horn, and swore a few round oaths as emphatically as a couple of Merodeurs.
A large black doublet, well bombasted in front, white clerical bands, and black satin knee breeches, with a white wig and smoothly shaven chin, so completely metamorphosed Bandolo into a sleek oily clergyman, with a somewhat comical but leering eye, that his own mother would not have recognised the bravo she had brought into the world—that dreaded and avowed bravo, who was usually to be seen loitering like a bull-dog about the door of Tilly's tent, wearing a leather doublet, and a belt stuck full of poniards, a long lovelock, a rapier five feet in length, and a visage bloated by beer and excesses of every description.
Whatever strange ideas might have floated through his evil brain, or whatever promptings to mischief, the circumstance of these two beautiful girls being far out on the open ocean, and completely at the mercy of him and Bernhard, might have been suggested by his bad angel, thank Heaven! which sent the stormy wind to furrow up the deep, and roll the little bark upon its waters like a cork, their coward hearts were solely occupied by fears for their own safety—fears which every bottle of schnaps in the locker could not allay. Thus, without the least suspicion of the trick which had been played them, or the trap into which they had fallen, the sisters saw, from a window in the little cabin, the setting sun of the 20th of April reddening the shores of Holstein, as the dogger ran into the little gulf of Kiel.
Ernestine was pleased to perceive that Gabrielle had revived a little during this brief voyage. Either the separation from Ian, a transference to new scenes, or that all her thoughts were with her dying father, had produced this salutary effect; and she hoped that in time, this passion, which she deemed so degrading even to her impulsive nature, would soon be forgotten like a dream.
Instead of entering the harbour of any of the large towns, the dogger was anchored off a miserable little village, inhabited by poor people, who subsisted by dressing the skins of squirrels, which abound in that neighbourhood.
The first object of Bandolo was to separate the sisters, and, without creating any alarm, to exchange Gabrielle for the thousand ducats of Count Merodé, whose garrison of Fredricksort was but a few miles off. About sunset he presented himself in the cabin, and, with all the suavity of manner he could muster, requested that "the ladies would prepare for going shoreward."
During the short voyage they had seen but little of him; for, as I have already mentioned, the stormy weather had given him ample occupation elsewhere; and in truth, he was invariably awed into a state of unpleasant stupidity in their presence, and found himself almost unable to address them. This wretched man—this spy and assassin—steeped to the lips in a thousand secret crimes and dishonourable acts, found his blustering spirit and savage heart quail before the dignity of perfect innocence, and the angelic purity which pervaded the presence of Ernestine and Gabrielle.
Arrayed in his white wig, ample black doublet, white bands and Geneva cloak, like a Lutheran churchman, and wearing a broad velvet hat with a steeple-crown, an enormous pair of barnacles, and a silver-headed cane dangling at his dexter wrist, to increase the respectability of his appearance, Bandolo presented a hand to each of the sisters, and conducted them into the boat, by which they were rowed ashore. Bernard of Korslack, dressed in modest dark livery, carried the mails and saddlebags; but Ernestine remarked that there was one mail, which the worthy clergyman averred to be full of MS. sermons, but would scarcely trust out of his hand for a single moment, and which seemed to be very heavy, and his own peculiar care.
In fact, this mail afterwards proved to be filled with gold, and ample orders on the Imperial treasury, signed by Wallenstein, by Tilly, and Count Leslie of Balquhan, high chamberlain of the Empire—the dear-earned fruits of a long career of espionage and atrocity; and on the contents of that beloved mail, Bandolo (that human compound of avarice and cruelty), based all his ambitious hopes of future rank; for it contained the price of his expected county.
Now, when in the open boat, and when the bright flush of the setting sun shone along the rippling water, Ernestine for the first time remarked, with undefined uneasiness, the peculiar aspect of those who accompanied them. The countenance of the clergyman—he called himself Doctor, having taken degrees at Leyden—was somewhat livid, and marked by two or three unseemly scars; but he might have served as a chaplain in the army, or fought a few college duels. He had certainly a very remarkable expression of eye; and, whichever way Ernestine turned, it was fixed upon her in a manner that made her feel inexpressibly uncomfortable; but the moment her calm, steady, and inquiring glance met his, the reverend doctor turned abruptly, and gazed in another direction.
Bernhard, the valet, had a somewhat bloated countenance, and sleepy red eyes, like those of a sot; with a continual expression of suppressed merriment about them, as if he would gladly have indulged himself in a hoarse laugh, but dared not.
Gabrielle did not see these things; her mind was too intently occupied by the shore they were nearing; by the expectation of embracing her father; and by heartfelt satisfaction to exchange the miseries of the dingy little cabin for the comforts and confidence experienced on terra firma, to observe either the eyes or noses of those who were conducting her there.
"What is the name of this village, Herr?" asked Ernestine, as the boat ran alongside a little jetty built of large rough stones.
"I do not know, madam," replied Bandolo, adjusting his barnacles, and gazing intently at the half-dozen of red-tiled cottages occupied by the squirrel-curriers; "do you, Bernhard?'
"Nay, not I—how should I? I never was in Danische-wald before."
"Then do you know, how far it is from this to Fredricksort?"
"Where the count awaits you—ten miles—is it not so, Bernhard?"
Bernhard growled an assent.
"Ah, if we should be too late to reach my father!" said Gabrielle, clasping her hands; "and we have been so many hours in yonder little vessel."
"What is Fredricksort?" asked Ernestine.
"A castle of vast strength, lady."
"And what troops are with our father there?"
"I do not know, grafine," replied Bandolo; for he knew that to have mentioned Merodé and his Merodeurs might excite suspicion; "do you know, Bernhard?"
"Why, Herr Doctor," stammered the pretended valet; "I thought that you knew very well that the regiment of——"
"Carlstein—oh yes!" interrupted Bandolo just in time, but eyeing his valet savagely out of the corners of his barnacles; "how could I forget! yes, lady, the musketeers of Carlstein—none know them better than I do—occupy the fortress."
"Musketeers!" reiterated Ernestine; "our father's regiment isCavalry!'
"To be sure—how could I forget—you blundering ass, Bernhard!—'Tis my valet who makes such mistakes; but here we are. Welcome to Wohlder, ladies!" said Bandolo, raising his hat, and with it his long white wig, a mistake by which he nearly discovered his black hair and face, by which Ernestine might have recognised the terrible familiar of Count Tilly, who had been pointed out to her on two occasions—once in Vienna, and once in the Imperial camp.
During this brief conversation, Bandolo had experienced all the uneasiness already described; and his admiration for the fine person of Ernestine combated with restraint and fear, which at times kindled a spark of rage in his heart, and made him almost hate her for possessing a power that awed him by a glance. Yet Ernestine was quite unconscious of possessing this power, and knew not that it was required.
Feeling, she knew not why, a sentiment of disdain for her conductors, she relapsed into silence, and permitted herself and Gabrielle to be led to a cottage, the poor occupants of which received them with the utmost respect. This was increased by the appearance of the leathern mails, and still more by a piece of gold, which Bandolo placed in the hand of the goodman of the cottage, requesting him to search the whole neighbourhood, and hire horses for Fredricksort, whither they were travelling on the service of the King of Denmark.
The husbonde replied, that "close by there was a farm, the goodman of which had been cruelly murdered last week by the Merodeurs in Fredricksort; and whose widow, he believed, would gladly lend the Herr her spouse's horses for a small consideration, as she and her children were starving, Count Merodé's men having made every thing march, from the haystacks in the yard to the eggs in the coop."
"Away then, boor, get these horses, and this shall be the happiest night of your life."
"What was the peasant saying, reverend sir?" asked the anxious Ernestine on the departure of the Jutelander, whose language she did not understand.
"Alas, Lady!" said Bandolo, seating himself with an air of dejection; "prepare yourself for melancholy intelligence. The poor count—ah me—well, what a world it is!"
"My father—what of my poor father?" asked both girls together, rushing to his side with their eyes full of tears.
"He is still lingering at Fredricksort, but life is scarcely expected for him; and the emperor has sent his own physician, Herr Blyster, to attend him."
"Oh! the dear, good emperor!" exclaimed Gabrielle, with sorrowful ardour.
"Herr Blyster!" mused Ernestine; "I did not think that was the name of the emperor's physician." Neither it was; but the name was the suggestion of Bandolo's own imagination, which sometimes was not a very happy one.
"Trust in the Lord, lady—trust in the Lord!" said he, turning up his eyes.
Gabrielle clung to her sister, and did nothing but weep. Bernhard stood behind them, making grimaces and grotesque contortions of visage at his reverend master, who one moment seemed inclined to laugh, and the next to swear, at a folly which might undo all, and perhaps prevent their obtaining peacefully the Count of Merodé's thousand ducats, of which Master Bernhard was to receive a good share—as Bandolo had promised faithfully; but without the least intention of giving him a stiver.
Darkness set in; the poor woman of the cottage lighted a solitary candle, and from her cupboard brought a glass of birch-wine for each of the ladies, and another of schnaps for the Herr and his valet.
Ernestine was just expressing to Gabrielle her impatience to be gone—her uneasiness to be in this unknown cottage at night, on an enemy's coast, with two strangers—for when in the dogger with the sailors, she did not feel herself so desolate—when the boor returned with the horses, two of which had side-saddles, and they all mounted hastily.
After securely buckling his beloved portmanteau to the crupper of his horse, after paying the peasant, and after carefully examining in the dark four small pistols and two poniards, which he carried under his clerical doublet, señor Bandolo whispered to Bernhard the project he wished to accomplish—the quiet separation of the sisters by a little piece of finesse, which he was certain they would never suspect or discover, until too late to retrieve themselves. It was simply this—
He had learned from the boor which couple of the four horses were the swiftest, and on them he mounted Bernhard and Gabrielle, instructing the former to spur on to the front, and wheel off by a certain bypath towards Fredricksort; while he, with the other sister, meant to ride slowly, and pursue a path quite different towards a certain cottage, which they both knew of in the wood of Eckernfiörd. There Bernhard was to meet them, and bring the ducats of Count Merodé—the price of Gabrielle.
"Now, ladies," said Bandolo, "are you good horsewomen?"
"Ernestine was the best at Vienna," said Gabrielle, whipping up her Holsteiner, which caracoled under her light weight.
"Gabrielle—Gabrielle!" exclaimed her eldest sister; "take care what you are about, madcap! You will unhorse yourself and me too. Will she not, reverend sir?"
"Now, ladies, we have ten miles of clear road before us, and the moon will soon rise. Let us start by pairs along this bridle road, and see which couple will first reach Fredricksort."
"Away—I shall be first with our dear father," said Gabrielle, anxious to keep in front, and giving a lash to her Holsteiner, which shot away at a headlong pace. Bernhard dashed on by her side, for he was a good horseman, having been a valet to Merodé at Vienna, where he had been scourged and dismissed for selling his master's cloaks and doublets.
Ernestine and Bandolo followed at full gallop; but as the road was narrow, the bravo contrived to incommode her horse and his own in such a manner, that their speed was considerably retarded. Bernhard and Gabrielle bore on at an uninterrupted pace, and, despite all the entreaties of Ernestine, disappeared into the darkness in front. This was the very thing Bandolo had hoped to accomplish.
"Do not be alarmed, grafine, they will not reach the fortress ten minutes before us," said he, quite enchanted by the sudden success of his scheme.
At last he and Ernestine passed on their right the narrow path which led towards the gulf of Kiel, and by which he knew that Bernhard and Gabrielle had struck off to the castle of Fredricksort; and far along the level way his quick and practised ear detected the tramp of their horses' hoofs. He passed it, and spurring on, slyly administered now and then a lash to the horse of Ernestine, urging it along a road which he knew conducted them straight to the place of rendezvous—the solitary cottage in the forest of Eckernfiörd.
Ernestine whipped and caressed her horse. Every pace the poor girl supposed was bringing her nearer and more near to the couch of her dying father.
Bandolo, who knew every foot of the way, avoided the villages and rode towards Eckernfiörd, which, from the landing-place, was double the distance he had mentioned to Ernestine as the space to be travelled. As she was too acute not to perceive this, after they had ridden without speaking for some miles in the dark (for there was no moon, and scarcely a star visible, as the clouds were coming up in heavy masses from the Baltic on their right), she made some inquiries about this fortress, where, as he had said, her father commanded, and how far it might yet be distant.
"It should be just beyond those trees, lady," replied the disguised spy.
"Should," retorted Ernestine in great displeasure; "are you not quite certain that it is?"
"How can one be certain of any thing in so dark a night? But trust in the Lord, lady—trust in the Lord!"
"Herr Doctor, you are very fond of repeating that tiresome phrase; but remember, sir, that at present I trust toyou, and it seems that you are leading me towards a dense forest.
"Through that forest lies our way, grafine. I did not make the road. If I had, I should perhaps have taken it round by the shore of the haven; but, as it lies through the forest, we must pursue it, or remain where we are."
The narrow horse-path, which hitherto had been bordered only by smooth green meadows, divided by quickset hedges, now became gradually lost in that forest of tall trees which lies between Eckernfiörd and Kiel,* and so dense became the entwined branches and other obstructions incident to a wood growing in a state of nature, that their horses could scarcely move at times, and Bandolo now dispensed with his circular barnacles (a severe impediment to the vision of one who did not require them), and gazed around with all the air of a man who had completely lost himself.
* I know not whether the forest referred to by our cavalier is still extant. It was so in 1702. See "Travels in the retinue of the English Envoy, 1702"—printed at the Ship in St. Paul's churchyard, 1707.
"Now, sir," said the impatient Ernestine, "what a scrape you have brought me into! Separated from my sister, who cannot have come this way, else we should have found her in this labyrinth; and separated also from my dear father, who may die before I reach Fredricksort, and while we are fruitlessly wandering in this provoking wood; besides, there may be wild animals or robbers in it, and you are, of course, without arms."
"Heaven forbid, lady, I should ever trust to other weapons than those of the spirit.Maldicion—Maldicion de Dios!" he growled between his teeth; "if once I have her safe in the cottage of old Dame Krümpel, I will make her pay dearly for all the trouble her pride has cost me, and for having my face scratched in this rascally thicket."
"What did you say, Herr Doctor?"
"Only a prayer, that we may not meet with any robbers or wild animals, as you said—ha—ha!"
"Or broken soldiers."
"Or with Bandolo," he added.
"Count Tilly's spy?" said Ernestine; "'tis rumoured that he knows every foot of ground in Denmark, so I wish that we could meet with him; though he is a guilty wretch of whom even the Merodeurs speak with contempt and horror."
Bandolo uttered a low, ferocious laugh. Ruffian as he was, and callous to every sentiment of humanity, her words stung him to the soul; for there was something inexpressibly cutting in this hearty and undisguised contempt, as expressed by a beautiful woman. He writhed under it, and a savage glow of mingled triumph and revenge spread through his breast, as he exultingly contemplated the terror, the catastrophe, and the downfall that were awaiting her. His eagerness sharpened his faculties.
"I see a light—a spark—to our left. This way, lady," said he, seizing the bridle of her horse, and conducting her down a narrow track, where the pine trunks grew so close that there was scarcely room for steed and rider to pass between them; but in a few minutes they reached a small and rudely built cottage, which stood by the margin of a little tarn. It was the place where Bernhard was to rejoin Bandolo, and pay over the price of poor Gabrielle.
The bravo alighted from his saddle, and, fastening the bridles of both horses to the branch of a tree, threw open the cottage door, and led in Ernestine.
An oil lamp shed a faint light on the interior of this poor habitation, the furniture of which consisted of a table and couple of stools, of such rough construction that the bark yet adhered to the wood. Here and there a naked spar of the rough wooden roof came out of the obscurity in which dust, cobwebs, and darkness involved it; the floor was of hard-beaten clay. The cottage consisted of what we Scots call a but and a ben, or two apartments. One end of the outer was spanned by the rude lintel of a wide chimney, within which, and close to a few smouldering embers, an old hag, with hands like a kite's claws, sat on a block of wood, skinning squirrels and chattering over her work. She looked up, and Bandolo, as he expected, recognised Dame Krümpel, who, after her expulsion from Glückstadt by order of the puissant burgomaster, Herr Dubbelsteirn, had found her way to the eastern coast of the peninsula.
They greeted each other in a dialect of the German so guttural that Ernestine did not understand it. Then the old woman snatched up her lamp, and, holding it aloft, surveyed with her fierce eyes—which were keen and deep as two gimlet holes—the tall figure of Ernestine, who, on seeing this repulsive old woman approach with her shrivelled hands dyed in blood, shrunk back, and drew herself up to her full height, while a disdainful expression stole over her beautiful face, on which her broad Spanish hat and long black feather cast an impressive shadow.
Old Krümpel croaked and grinned as she set down her iron lamp, and quietly resumed her occupation.
Bandolo now brought in his heavy portmanteau, which he carefully deposited on the table; he then placed beside it two leathern bottles, which he took from his pockets, after securing the cottage-door.
"Be seated, madame—and here Krümpel, old hag! get us glasses, cups, or whatever you have; I long for a taste of schnaps, as doubtless the lady does for a drop of kirschwasser—for I have both."
"I beseech you, sir, to lose no time in procuring a guide," said Ernestine, whose heart was bursting with impatience, grief, and alarm.
"A guide—for where?"
"Fredricksort."
"Content yourself, my pretty one; what the devil would you do at Fredricksort?" he asked, abandoning all his assumed manner. "Surely one of you is quite enough among the rough Merodeurs."
Ernestine was petrified by this speech, and still more when the pretended clergyman threw aside his wig, revealing his coal black hair, and that long and peculiar lock by which he was generally known; and, opening his ample doublet, displayed below, his cases of poniards and pistols.
"Maldicion de Dios! ha, ha! what use is there in masquerading any longer? I am Bandolo, Madame Ernestine, and we may as well be friends at once; so give me a kiss to begin with, though I am one upon whom even the wild Merodeurs lookwith contempt and horror!"
He bluntly approached her, but paused; for the expression of her eyes arrested him, and he quailed before it—he, Bandolo!
Never did terror, anger, and aversion lend a brighter flash to more beautiful eyes than those of Ernestine; and their lofty gaze arrested the insolence of Bandolo, charming the steps of one whom the laws of neither God nor man could bind. He growled an oath and a laugh together; sat down and took a mouthful of schnaps. Ernestine turned anxiously towards the old woman; but that worthy appeared to have neither ears nor eyes for what was passing, and was tearing the skin from the body of a squirrel with the utmost unconcern.
Disdaining to say a word, Ernestine grasped her riding-rod, gave another fiery glance at Bandolo with her tearless eyes, and boldly prepared to retire. Seizing her arm, he forced her into a seat, and, placing his back against the door, burst into a shout of derisive laughter, which made her blood curdle.
The thought of Gabrielle, away, she knew not where, with this man's companion, filled her whole soul with alarm; and in that thought all sense of her own danger was swept away. Terror almost paralysed her, and she burst into tears.
Bandolo eyed her with a strange glance of mingled ferocity, perplexity, and admiration; for in every impulse—his anger, his avarice, and all his passions—this man was a mere animal. He took another draught of the strong schnaps, and warned her to take care what she was about, and what she did and said now; for she was alone with one who would not stand trifling—alone in the heart of a forest where no living thing could hear her outcries but the birds in their nests, or the foxes in their holes—that she was perfectly helpless, and beyond all rescue.
Alone—and with him! ........