CHAPTER VIII.

"Mr. Spettigew! Mr. Spettigew!"

"Eh?" Uncle Issy turned as William Oke plucked him by the sleeve. "What's the matter now? Reload, I tell'ee!"

"I—I can't, Mr. Spettigew. I've a-fired off my ramrod!"

"Then you'm a lost man."

"Will it—will it have killed any person, d'ee think?" Oke's teeth rattled like a box of dice as he peered out over the dark and agitated crowd of boats.

"Shouldn' wonder at all."

"I didn' mean to kill any person, Mr. Spettigew!"

"'Tis the sort of accident, Oke, that might happen to anyone in war. At the worst they'll recommend 'ee to mercy. The mistake was your tellin' me."

"You won't inform upon me, Mr. Spettigew? Don't say you'll inform upon me!"

"No, I won't; not if I can help it. But dang it! first of all you swaller the fuse, and next you fire off your ramrod."

"E-everything must have a beginning, Mr. Spettigew."

Uncle Issy shook his head. "I doubt you'll never make a sojer, William Oke. You'm too frolicsome wi' the materials. Listen, there's Pengelly shoutin' for another volley! Right you be, sergeant! Make ready—prepare—Eh? Hallo!"

Why was it that suddenly, at the height of the hubbub, a panic fell upon the bandsmen of Troy? Why did the "Rout for the Looes" cease midway in a bar? What was it that hushed on an instant the shouts, the rallying cries upon the beach, the bugle-calls and challenges, the furious uproar of musketry?

Why, within twenty yards of the Cove-head, in the act of charging upon the serried ranks of Looe's main guard, did Major Hymen face about and with sword still uplifted stare behind him, and continue to stare as one petrified?

What meant that strange light, out yonder by the Cove's mouth, in the rear of his boats?

The light grew and spread until it illuminated every pebble on the beach. The men of Troy, dazzled by the glare of it, blinked in the faces of the men of Looe.

THE FRENCH!

"A trap! A trap!" yelled someone far to the right, and the cry was echoed on the instant by a sound in the rear of the Diehards—a sound yet more terrible—the pounding of hoofs upon hard turf.

Again Captain Pond rushed forward and caught the Major by the elbow.

"The Dragoons!" he whispered. "Run for your life, man!"

But already the ranks of the Diehards had begun to waver; and now, as the oncoming hoofs thundered louder, close upon their rear, they broke. Trojans and men of Looe turned tail and were swept in one commingled crowd down the beach.

"To the water, there! Down to the water, every man of you!"

A voice loud as a bull's roared out the command from the darkness. The Major, still waving his sword, was lifted by the crowd's pressure and swept along like a chip in a tideway. His feet fought for solid earth. Glancing back as he struggled, he saw, high above his shoulder, lit up by the flares from seaward, a line of flashing swords, helmets, cuirasses.

"To the boats!" yelled the crowd.

"To the water! Drive 'em to the water!" answered the stentorian voice, now recognisable as Mr. Smellie's.

The Dragoons, using the flat of their sabres, drove the fugitives down to the tide's edge, nor drew rein until their chargers stood fetlock-deep in water, still pressing the huddled throng around the boats.

"Bring a lantern, there!" shouted the Riding Officer. "And call Hymen! Where is Hymen!"

"I am here!"

The Major had picked himself up out of two feet of water, into which he had been flung on all fours. He was dripping wet, but he still clutched his naked blade, and advancing into the light of the lantern's rays, brought it up to salute with a fine cold dignity.

"I am here," he repeated quietly.

"Well, then, I'm sorry for you, Hymen; but the game's up," said Mr. Smellie.

The Major glanced at him, for a moment only.

"Will someone inform me who commands this troop?" he asked, looking first to right, then to left, along the line of the Dragoons.

"At your service, sir," answered a young officer, pressing his horse forward alongside Mr. Smellie's.

The Major reached out a hand for the lantern. Someone passed it to him obediently; and holding it he scanned the officer up and down amid the dead silence of the crowd.

"Your name, sir?"

"Arbuthnot, sir—Captain Arbuthnot, of the 5th Dragoons."

"Then allow me to ask, Captain Arbuthnot, by what right have you and your troopers assaulted my men?"

"Excuse me," the Captain answered. "I am acting on trustworthy information. The Riding Officer here, Mr. Smellie—"

But here Mr. Smellie himself interposed brusquely.

"You can stow this bluster, Hymen. I've cornered you, and you know it. The flares in the offing yonder came from two preventive boats. Back-door and front I have you, as neat as a rat in a drain; so you may just turn that lantern of yours on the cargo, own up, and sing small."

"To resume our conversation, Captain Arbuthnot," the Major went on. "Upon what information are you and your men taking a part, uninvited, in this evening's—er—proceedings? You must understand, sir, that I put this question as a magistrate."

"To be frank, sir, I am warned that under cover of a feigned attack between your two corps an illicit cargo was to be run here to-night. The Riding Officer's information is precise, and he tells me he is acquainted with the three boats in which the goods have been brought over."

"And more by token, there they are!" exclaimed Mr. Smellie, pointing to three small lugger-rigged craft that lay moored some six or eight fathoms outside the long-boats, with mainmasts unstepped, sails left to lie loose about deck with an artful show of carelessness, and hulls suspiciously deep in the water. He dismounted, caught up a lantern, and scanned them, chuckling in his glee. "See here, Captain, the rogues had their gang-planks out and ready. Now, wait till I've whistled in the preventive crews, and inside of ten minutes you shall see what game these pretty innocents were playing."

He blew his whistle, and a whistle answered from the offing, where the flares continued to blaze.

"Excuse me again," said the Major, ignoring the interruption and still addressing himself to Captain Arbuthnot, "but this is a very serious accusation, sir. If, as you surmise—or rather as your informant surmises—these boats should prove to be laden with contraband goods, the men undoubtedly deserve punishment; and I am the less likely to deprecate it since they have compromised me by their folly. For me, holding as I do the King's commission of the peace, to be involved, however innocently, however unconsciously—"

"Ay," struck in Mr. Smellie again, "it's a devilish awkward business for you, Hymen. But you won't improve it by turning cat-in-the-pan at the last moment, and so I warn you. Come along, lads!" he called to the preventive crews. "We have 'em right and tight this trip. See the three luggers, there, to port of ye?"

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"Tumble aboard, then, and fetch us out a sample of their cargo."

There was a pause. Save for the jingling of the chargers' bits and now and again the clink of scabbard on boot, silence—dead silence— held the beach. Aboard the boats the preventive men could be heard rummaging.

"Found anything?" called out Mr. Smellie.

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"What is it?"

"Casks!"

"What did I promise you?" Mr. Smellie turned to Captain Arbuthnot in triumph. "Luxmore!" he called aloud.

"Ay, ay, sir!" came the Chief Boatman's voice in answer.

"There's a plank handy. Roll us a sample or two ashore here, and fetch along chisel and auger."

"If you think it necessary, sir—"

"Do as you're told, man!… Ah, here we are!"—as a couple of preventive men splashed ashore, trundling a cask along the plank between them, and up-ended it close by the water's edge.

Captain Arbuthnot had dismounted and, advancing with his arm through his charger's bridle, bent over the cask.

"Devilish queer-smelling brandy!" he observed, drawing back a pace and sniffing.

"It has been standing in the bilge. These fellows never clean out their boats from one year's end to another," said Mr. Smellie, positively. Yet he, too, eyed the cask with momentary suspicion. In shape, in colour, it resembled the tubs in which Guernsey ordinarily exported itseau-de-vie. It was slung, too, ready for carriage, and with French left-handed rope, and yet.… It seemed unusually large for a Guernsey tub… and unusually light in scantling.…

"Shall I spile en, maister?" asked one of the preventive men, producing a large auger.

"No, stave its head in. And fetch a pannikin, somebody. There's good water at the beach-head; and I dare say your men, Captain, won't despise a tot of French liquor after their ride."

The preventive man set his chisel against the inner rim of the cask, and dealt it a short sharp blow with his hammer, a sort of trial tap, to guide his aim. "French liquor?" He sniffed. "Furrin fruit, more like. Phew! Keep back there, and stand by for lavender!"

Crash!…

"Pf—f!"

"Ar-r-r-ugh! Oh, merciful Heaven!" Captain Arbuthnot staggered back, clapping thumb and forefinger to his nose.

"PILCHARDS!"

"SALT PILCHARDS!"

"ROTTEN PILCHARDS!"

Mr. Smellie opened his mouth, but collapsed in a fit of retching, as from right and left, and from the darkness all around him, a roar of Homeric laughter woke the echoes of the Cove. Men rolled about laughing. Men leaned against one another to laugh.

Already the preventive men on board the luggers—having been rash enough to prise open some half a dozen casks—had dropped overboard and were wading ashore, coughing and spitting as they came. Amid the uproar Major Hymen kept a perfectly grave face.

"You see, sir," he explained to Captain Arbuthnot, "Mr. Smellie is fond of hunting where there is no fox. So some of my youngsters hit on the idea of providing him with a drag. They have spent a week at least in painting these casks to look like the real thing.… I am sorry, sir, that you and your gallant fellows should have been misled by an officious civilian; but if I might suggest your marching on to Looe, where a good supper awaits us, to take this taste out of our mouths—and good liquor too, not contraband, to drown resentment—"

The Captain may surely be pardoned if for the moment even this gentle speech failed to placate him. He turned in dudgeon amid the grinning crowd and was in the act of remounting, but missed the stirrup as his charger reared and backed before the noise of yet another diversion. No one knows who dipped into the cask and flung the first handful over unhappy Mr. Smellie. No one knows who led the charge down upon the boats, or gave the cry to stave in the barrels on board. But in a trice the preventive men were driven overboard and, as they leapt into the shallow water, were caught and held and drenched in the noisome mess; while the Riding Officer, plastered ere he could gain his saddle, ducked his head and galloped up the beach under a torrential shower of deliquescent pilchards.

The Dragoons did not interfere.

"Shall it be for Looe, Captain?" challenged Major Hymen, waving his blade and calling on the Gallants to re-form. And as he challenged, by the happiest of inspirations the band, catching up their instruments, crashed out with:

"Oh, the De'il's awa'—The De'il's awa'—The De'il's awa' wi' th' exciseman!"

Miss Marty drew aside her window curtain to watch the rising moon. She could not sleep. Knowing that she would not be able to sleep, she had not undressed.

She gazed out upon the street, dark now and deserted. No light signalled to her from the attic window behind which Dr. Hansombody so often sat late over his books and butterfly cases. He had gone with the others.

She listened. The house was silent save for the muffled snoring of Scipio in his cupboard-bedroom under the stairs. She raised the window-sash gently, leaned out upon the soft spring night, and listened again.

Far down the street, from the purlieus of the Town Quay, her ear caught a murmur of voices—of voices and happy subdued laughter. The maidens of Troy were embarking; and to-morrow would be May morning.

Miss Marty sighed. How long was it since she had observed May morning and its rites? The morrow, too, if the Vicar and the Major were right in their calculations, would usher in the Millennium. But again, what was the Millennium to her? Could it bring back her youth?

She heard the boats draw near and go by. The houses to the left hid them from her: but she leaned out, hearkening to the soft plash of oars, the creak of thole-pins, the girls' voices in hushed chorus practising the simple native harmonies they would lift aloud as they returned after sunrise. She recognised the tune, too; the old tune of "The Padstow Hobby-horse,"—

"Unite and unite, and let us all unite,For summer is a-come in to-day—And whither we are going we will all go in whiteIn the merry merry morning of May."Rise up, Master—, and joy you betide,For summer is a-come in to-day—And blithe is the bride lays her down by your sideIn the merry merry morning of May."

Hushed though the voices were, each word fell distinct on her ear as the boats drew near and passed up the tideway.

"Rise up, Mistress—, all in your smock of silk,For summer is a-come in to-day—And all your body under as white as any milkIn the merry merry morning of May."

The voices faded away up the river. Only the lilt of the song came back to her now, but memory supplied the words. Had they not been sung under her window years ago?

"Rise up, Mistress Marty, all out of your bed,For summer is a-come in to-day—Your chamber shall be spread with the white rose and redIn the merry merry morning of May."O where be the maidens that here now should sing?For summer is a-come in to-day—They be all in the meadows the flowers gathering,In the merry merry morning of May."

What magic was there in this artless ditty that kept Miss Marty lingering awhile with moist eyes ere she closed the window-sash?

"Wh'st! Miss Mar-ty!"

Heavens! Whose voice was that, calling up hoarsely from the shadows? She peered out, but could see nobody. Suddenly her maiden modesty took alarm. What possessed her to be standing here exposed, and exposing the interior of her lighted bed-chamber to view from the street? She ran back in a flurry and blew out the candles; then, returning, put up a hand to draw down the window-sash.

"Wh'st! Miss Mar-ty!"

"Gracious goodness!" After a moment's hesitation she craned out timorously. "Cai Tamblyn…?"

"Miss Marty!"

"What on earth are you doing there at this time of night?"

"Sentry-go."

"Nonsense. What do I want of a sentry?"

"You never can tell."

"Are you here by the Major's order?"

"Ch't!" answered Cai Tamblyn. "Him!"

"Then go away, please, and let me beg you to speak more respectfully of your master."

"I reckon," said Cai, slowly, "you don't know that, barrin' the nigger under the stairs, this here town's as empty as my hat. Well, a man can but die once, and if the French come, let 'em; that's all I say. Good night, miss."

"The town empty?"

"Males, females and otherwise, down to Miss Jex at the post-office." (Cai Tamblyn nursed an inveterate antipathy for the post-mistress. He alleged no reason for it, save that she wore moustaches, which was no reason at all, and a monstrous exaggeration.) "There's Miss Pescod gone, and Miss Tregentil with her maid."

"But where? Why?"

"Up the river. Gallivantin'. That's what I spoke ye for, just now. Mind you, I don't propose no gallivantin'; but there's safety in numbers, and if you've a mind for it, I've the boat ready by the Broad Slip."

"But what foolishness!"

"Ay," Mr. Tamblyn assented. "That's what I said to the Doctor when he first mentioned it. 'What foolishness,' I said, 'athertime o' life!' But then we never reckoned on the whole town goin' crazed."

"The Doctor?" queried Miss Marty, with a glance down the dark street. "He thinks of everything," she murmured.

There was a pause, during which Mr. Tamblyn somewhat ostentatiously tested the lock of his musket.

"You are not going to frighten me, Cai."

"No, miss."

"I—I think an expedition up the river would be very pleasant. If, as you say, Miss Pescod has gone—"

"Yes, miss."

"I must bring Scipio."

"Very well, miss. If the French come, theymightthink o' looking under the stairs."

Twenty minutes later Miss Marty—escorted by Scipio, who bore a lantern—tiptoed down the street to the Broad Slip, fearful even of her own light footstep on the cobbles.

The Broad Slip—it has since been filled in—was in those days a sort of dock, inset between the waterside houses and running up so close to the street that the vessels it berthed were forced to take in their bowsprits to allow the pack-horse traffic to pass. On its south side a flight of granite steps led down to the water: and at the foot of these (the tide being low) Cai Tamblyn waited with his boat.

"I declare my heart's in my mouth," Miss Marty panted, as she took her seat. Cai directed Scipio to sit amidships, pushed off in silence, and taking the forward thwart, began to pull.

"Now there's a thing," he said after a few strokes with a jerk of his head towards the dark longshore houses, "you don't often see nor hear about outside o' the Bible; a deserted city. Fine pickings for Boney if he only knew."

Miss Marty's thoughts flew back at once to a corner cupboard in the parlour, inlaid with tulips in Dutch marqueterie, and containing the Major's priceless eggshell china. To be sure, if the French landed, she—weak woman that she was—could not defend this treasure. But might not the Major blame her for having abandoned it?

"I—I trust," she hazarded, "that our brave fellows have succeeded in their enterprise. It seemed to me that I heard the sound of distant firing just now."

"If they hadn't, miss, they'd ha' been back afore now. I had my own doubts about 'em, for they're a hair-triggered lot, the Troy Gallants. No fear of their goin' off; but 'tis a matter o' doubt in what direction."

"Your master," said Miss Marty, severely, addressing Cai across Scipio (who for some reason seldom or never spoke in Cai's company)— "your master has the heart of a lion. He would die rather than acknowledge defeat."

"A heart of a lion, miss, if you'll excuse my saying it, is an uncomfortable thing in a man's stomach; an' more especially when 'tis fed up on the wind o' vanity. I've a-read my Bible plumb down to the forbidden books thereof, and there's a story in it called Bel and the Dragon, which I mind keeping to the last, thinkin' 'twas the name of a public-house. 'Tis a terrible warnin' against swollen vittles."

"You are a dreadful cynic, Cai."

"Nothin' of the sort, miss," said Cai, stoutly. "I thinks badly o' most men—that's all."

His talk was always cross-grained, but its volume betrayed a quite unwonted geniality to-night. And half a mile farther, where the dark river bent around Wiseman's Stone, he so far relaxed as to rest on his oars and challenge the famous echo from the wooded cliffs. Somewhat to Miss Marty's astonishment it responded.

"And by night, too! I had no idea!"

"Night?" repeated Mr. Tamblyn, after rowing on for another fifty strokes. He paused as if he had that moment heard, and glanced upward. "'Tis much as ever. The sky's palin' already, and we'll not reach Lerryn by sunrise. I think, miss, if you'll step ashore, this here's as good a place as any. Scipio and me'll keep the boat and turn our backs."

Miss Marty understood. The boat's nose having been brought alongside a ridge of rock, she landed in silence, climbed the foreshore, up by a hazel-choked path to a meadow above, and there, solemnly thrusting her hands into the lush grass, turned to the east and bathed her face in the dew. It is a rite which must be performed alone, in silence; and the morning sun must not surprise it.

"You've been terrible quick," remarked Cai, as she stepped down to the foreshore again in the ghostly light. "You can't have stayed to dabble your feet. Didn't think it wise, I s'pose? And I dare say you're right."

From far ahead of them as they started again, the voices of the singers came borne down the river; and again Miss Marty's memory supplied the words of the song:

"The young men of our town, they might if they wo'ld—For summer is a-comin' in to-day—They might have built a ship and have gilded her with goldIn the merry merry morning of May."

"The young men… the young men… they might if they wo'ld." Ah, Miss Marty, was it only the edge of the morning that heightened the rose on your cheek by a little—a very little—as the sky paled? And now the kingfishers were awake, and the woodlands nigh, and the tide began to gather force as it neared the narrower winding channel. To enter this they skirted a mud-flat, where the day, breaking over the tree-tops and through the river mists, shone on scores upon scores of birds gathered to await it—curlews, sandpipers, gulls in rows like strings of jewels, here and there a heron standing sentry. The assembly paid no heed to the passing boat.

Miss Marty gazed up at the last star fading in the blue. How clear the morning was! How freshly scented beneath the shadow of the woods! Her gaze descended upon the incongruous top-hat and gold-laced livery of Scipio, touched with the morning sunshine. She glanced around her and motioned to Cai Tamblyn to bring the boat to shore by a grassy spit whence (as she knew) a cart-track led alongshore through the young oak coppices to the village.

"And Scipio," she said, turning as she stepped out on the turf, "will like a run in the woods."

She had walked on, maybe a hundred paces, before the absurdity of it struck her. She had been thinking of Mr. Pope's line:

"When wild in woods the noble savage ran."

And at the notion of Scipio, in gilt-laced hat and livery, tearing wildly through the undergrowth in the joy of liberty, she halted and laughed aloud.

She was smiling yet when, at a turning of the leafy lane, she came upon the prettiest innocent sight. On a cushion of moss beside the path, two small children—a boy and a girl—lay fast asleep. The boy's arm was flung around his sister's shoulders, and across his thighs rested a wand or thin pole topped with a May-garland of wild hyacinths, red-robin and painted birds' eggs. A tin cup, brought to collect pence for the garland, glittered in the cart-rut at their feet. It had rolled down the mossy bank as the girl's fingers relaxed in sleep.

They were two little ones of Troy, strayed hither from the merrymaking; and at first Miss Marty had a mind to wake them, seeing how near they lay to the river's brink. But noting that a fallen log safeguarded them from this peril, she fumbled for the pocket beneath her skirt, dropped a sixpence with as little noise as might be into the tin cup, and tiptoed upon her way.

About three hundred yards from the village she met another pair of children; and, soon after, a score or so in a cluster, who took toll of her in pence; for almost everyone carried a garland. And then the trees opened, and she saw before her the village with its cottages, grey and whitewashed, its gardens and orchards, mirrored in the brimming tide, all trembling in the morning light and yet exquisitely still. Far up the river, beyond the village and the bridge, a level green meadow ran out, narrowing the channel; and here beneath the apple-trees—for the meadow was half an orchard—had been set out many lines of white-covered tables, at which the Mayers made innocently merry.

Innocently, did I say? Well, I have known up-country folk before now to be scandalised by some things which we in the Duchy think innocent enough. So let me admit that the three long-boats conveyed something more than the youth and beauty of Troy to that morning's Maying; that when launched from Mr. Runnells' yard they were not entirely what they seemed: that from their trial spin across the bay they returned some inches deeper in the water, and yet they did not leak. Had you perchance been standing by the shore in the half-light as they came up over the shallows, you might have wondered at the number of times they took ground, and at the slowness of the tide to lift and float them. You might have wondered again why, after they emerged from the deep shadow of Sir Felix Felix-Williams' woods upon the southern shore, albeit in shallow water, they seemed to feel their hindrances no longer.

Have you ever, my reader, caught hold of a lizard and been left with his tail in your hands?

Even so easily did these three long-boats shed their false keels, which half an hour later were but harmless-looking stacks of timber among Sir Felix's undergrowth. Half an hour later, had your unwary feet led you to a certain corner of Sir Felix's well-timbered demesne, you might have scratched your head and wondered what magic carpet had transported you into the heart of the Cognac District. And all this was the work of the men of Troy (not being volunteers) who had come either in the long-boats or in the many boats escorting these.

But the women of Troy, being deft with the oar one and all, took the places of the men left behind in the woods, and, singing yet, brought both the long-boats and these other boats safely to Lerryn on the full flood of the tide, and disembarking upon the meadow there, gathered around the tables under the apple-trees to eat bread and cream in honour of May-day, looking all the while as if butter would not melt in their mouths. Between their feasting they laughed a great deal; but either they laughed demurely, being constrained by the unwonted presence of Miss Pescod and other ladies of Troy's acknowledgedelite, or Miss Marty as yet stood too far off to hear their voices.

Let us return to Scipio, who, on receiving Miss Marty's permission to wander, had made his way up through the woods in search of the Devil's Hedge, along which, as he knew, his master would be leading back the triumphant Gallants.

Fidelity was ever the first spring of Scipio's conduct. He adored the Major with a canine devotion, and by an instinct almost canine he found his way up to the earthwork and chose a position which commanded the farthest prospect in the direction of Looe. From where he sat the broad hedge dipped to a narrow valley, climbed the steep slope opposite, and vanished, to reappear upon a second and farther ridge two miles away. As yet he could discern no sign of the returning heroes; but his ear caught the throb of a drum beaten afar to the eastward.

Of the Major's two body-servants it might be said that the one spoke seldom and the other never; and again that Cai, who spoke seldom, was taciturn, while Scipio, who spoke never, was almost affable. In truth, the negro's was the habitual silence of one who, loving his fellows, spends all his unoccupied time in an inward brooding, a continual haze of day-dreams.

Scipio's day-dreams were of a piece with his loyalty, a reflection in some sort of his master's glory. He could never—he with his black skin—be such a man; but he passionately desired to be honoured, respected, though but posthumously. And the emblazoned board in the church, appealing as it did to his negro sense of colour, had suggested a way. It is not too much to say that a great part of Scipio's time was lived by him in a future when, released from this present livery, his spirit should take on a more gorgeous one, as "Scipio Johnson, Esquire, late of this Parish," in scarlet twiddles on a buff ground.

He seated himself on the earthwork, and the better to commune with this vision, tilted his gold-laced hat forward over his eyes, shutting out the dazzle of the morning sun. Once or twice he shook himself, being heavy with broken sleep, and gazed across the ridges, then drew up his knees, clasped them, and let his heavy, woolly head drop forward, nodding.

Let us not pursue those stages of conviviality through which the Looe Diehards, having been seen home by the Troy Gallants, arrived at an obligation to return the compliment. Suffice it to say that Major Hymen and Captain Pond, within five minutes of bidding one another a public tearful farewell, found themselves climbing the first hill towards Lerryn with linked arms. But the Devil's Hedge is a wide one and luckily could not be mistaken, even in the uncertain light of dawn.

And, to pass over the minor incidents of that march, I will maintain in fairness (though the men of Troy choose to laugh) that the sudden apparition of a black man seated in the morning light upon the Devil's Hedge was enough to daunt even the tried valour of the Looe Diehards.

"The De'il's awa', the De'il's awa',The De'il's awa' wi' th' exciseman."

The eye notoriously magnifies an object seen upon a high ridge against the skyline; and when Scipio stood erect in all his gigantic proportions and waved both arms to welcome his beloved master, the Diehards turned with a yell and fled. Vainly their comrades of Troy called after them. Back and down the hill they streamed pell-mell, one on another's heels; down to the marshy bottom known as Trebant Water, nor paused to catch breath until they had placed a running brook between them and the Power of Darkness.

For the second time that night the Gallants rolled about and clung one to another in throes of Homeric laughter; laughter which, reverberating, shout on shout, along the ridge and down among the tree-tops, reached even to the meadow far below, where in the sudden hush of the lark's singing the merrymakers paused and looked up to listen.

But wait awhile! They laugh best who laugh last.

"O will you accept of the mus-e-lin so blue,To wear in the morning and to dabble in the dew?"Old Song.

Miss Marty had duly visited the meadow and eaten and paid for her breakfast of bread and cream. But she had eaten it in some constraint, sitting alone. She had never asserted her position as the Major's kinswoman in the eyes of Miss Pescod and the ladies of Miss Pescod's clan, who were inclined to regard her as a poor relation, a mere housekeeper, and to treat her as a person of no great account. On the other hand, the majority of the merrymakers deemed her, no doubt, a stiff stuck-up thing; whereas she would in fact have given much to break through her shyness and accost them. For these reasons, the meal over, she was glad to pay her sixpence and escape from the throng back to the woodland paths and solitude.

The children by this time had grown tired of straying, and were trooping back to the village. Fewer and fewer met her as she followed the shore; the two slumberers were gone from the mossy bank; by and by the procession dried up, so to speak, altogether. She understood the reason when a drum began to bang overhead behind the woods and passed along the ridge, still banging. The Gallants were returning; and apparently flushed with victory, since between the strokes she could hear their distant shouts of laughter.

At one moment she fancied they must be descending through the woods: for a crackling of the undergrowth, some way up the slope, startled and brought her to a halt. But no; the noise passed along the ridge towards the village. The crackling sound must have come from some woodland beast disturbed in his night's lair.

She retraced her way slowly to the spot where she had disembarked; but when she reached it, Cai and the boat had vanished. No matter; Cai was a trustworthy fellow, and doubtless would be back ere long. Likely enough he had pulled across to the farther shore to bear a hand in what Troy euphemistically called the "salvage" of the long-boats' cargoes. Happy in her solitude, rejoicing in her extended liberty, Miss Marty strolled on, now gazing up into the green dappled shadows, now pausing on the brink to watch the water as it swirled by her feet, smooth and deep and flawed in its depths with arrow-lights of sunshine.

She came by and by to a point where the cart-track turned inland to climb the woods and a foot-path branched off from it, skirting a small recess in the shore. A streamlet of clear water, hurrying down from the upland by the Devil's Hedge, here leapt the low cliff and fell on a pebbly beach, driving the pebbles before it and by their attrition wearing out for itself a natural basin. Encountering a low ridge of rock on the edge of the tideway, the stones heaped themselves along it and formed a bar, with one tiny outlet through which the pool trickled continually, except at high spring tides when the river overflowed it.

Now Miss Marty, fetching a compass around this miniature creek, came in due course to the stream and seated herself on a fallen log, to consider. For the ground on the farther side appeared green and plashy, and she disliked wetting her shoes.

Overhead a finch piped. Below her, hidden by a screen of hazel, chattered the fall. Why should she wend farther? She must be greedy of solitude indeed if this sylvan corner did not content her.

And yet.… High on the opposite bank there grew a cluster of columbine, purple and rosy pink, blown thither and seeded perhaps from some near garden, though she had heard that the flower grew wild in these woods. Miss Marty gazed at the flowers, which seem to nod and beckon; then at the stream; then at the plashy shore; lastly at her shoes. Her hand went down to her right foot.

She drew off her shoes. Then she drew off her stockings.

By this time she was in a nervous flurry. Almost you may say that she raced across the stream and clutched at a handful of the columbines. In less than a minute she was back again, gazing timorously about her.

No one had seen; nobody, that is to say, except the finch, and he piped on cavalierly. Miss Marty glanced up at him, then at a clearing of green turf underneath his bough, a little to her left. Why not? Why should she omit any of May morning's rites?

Miss Marty picked up her skirts again, stepped on to the green turf, and began to dabble her feet in the dew.

"The morn that May began,I dabbled in the dew;And I wished for me a proper young manIn coat-tails of the blue.…"

"Whoop! Whoo-oop!"

The cry came from afar; indeed, from the woods across the river. Yet as the hare pricks up her ears at the sound of a distant horn and darts away to the covert, so did Miss Marty pause, and, after listening for a second or two, hurry back to the log to resume her shoes and stockings.

Her shoes she found where she had left them, and one stocking on the rank grass close beside them.But where was the other?

She looked to right, to left, and all around her in a panic. Could she have dropped it into the stream in her hurry? And had the stream carried it down the fall?

She drew on one stocking and shoe, and catching up the other shoe in her hand, crept down to explore. The stream leapt out of sight through a screen of hazels. Parting these, she peered through them, to judge the distance between her and the pool and see if any track led down to it. A something flashed in her eyes, and she drew back. Then, peering forward again, she let a faint cry escape her.

On the pebbly bank beside the pool stood a man—Dr. Hansombody—in regimentals. In one hand he held a razor (this it was that had flashed so brightly in the sunlight), in the other her lost stocking. Apparently he had been shaving, kneeling beside the pool and using it for a mirror; for one half of his face was yet lathered, and his haversack lay open on the stones by the water's edge beside his shako and a tin cup under which he had lit a small spirit-lamp; and doubtless, while he knelt, the stream had swept Miss Marty's stocking down to him. He was studying it in bewilderment; which changed to glad surprise as he caught sight of her, aloft between the hazels.

"Hallo!" he challenged. "A happy month to you!"

"Oh, please!" Miss Marty covered her face.

"I'll spread it out to dry on the stones here."

"Please give it back to me. Yes, please, I beg of you!"

"I don't see the sense of that," answered the Doctor. "You can't possibly wear it until it's dry, you know."

"But I'drather."

"Are you anchored up there? Very well; then I'll bring it up to you in a minute or so. But just wait a little; for you wouldn't ask me to come with half my face unshaven, would you?"

"I can go back.… No, I can't. The bank is too slippery.… But I can look the other way," added Miss Marty, heroically.

"I really don't see why you should," answered the Doctor, as he resumed his kneeling posture. "Now, to my mind," he went on in the intervals of finishing his toilet, "there's no harm in it, and, speaking as a man, it gives one a pleasant sociable feeling."

"I—have often wondered how it was done," confessed Miss Marty. "It looks horribly dangerous."

"The fact is," said the Doctor, wiping his blade, "I cannot endure to feel unshaven, even when campaigning."

He restored the razor to his haversack, blew out the spirit-lamp, emptied the tin cup on the stones, packed up, resumed his shako, and stood erect.

"My stocking, please!" Miss Marty pleaded.

"It is by no means dry yet," he answered, stooping and examining it. "Let me help you down, that you may see for yourself."

"Oh, Icouldn't!"

"Meaning your foot and ankle? Believe me you have no cause to be ashamed ofthem, Miss Marty," the Doctor assured her gallantly, climbing the slope and extending an arm for her to lean upon.

"Those people—across the water," she protested, with a slight blush and a nod in the direction of the shouting, which for some minutes had been growing louder.

"Our brave fellows—if, as I imagine, the uproar proceeds from them— are pardonably flushed with their victory. They are certainly incapable, at this distance, of the nice observation with which your modesty credits them. Good Lord!—now you mention it—what a racket! I sincerely trust they will not arouse Sir Felix, whose temper—experto crede—is seldom at its best in the small hours. There, if you will lean your weight on me and advance your foot—the uncovered one—to this ledge—Nay, now!"

"But it hurts," said Miss Marty, wincing, with a catch of her breath. "I fear I must have run a thorn into it."

"A thorn?" The Doctor seized the professional opportunity, lifted her bodily off the slope, and lowered her to the beach. "There, now, if you will sit absolutely still… for one minute. I command you! Yes, as I suspected—a gorse-prickle!"

He ran to his haversack, and, returning with a pair of tweezers, took the hurt foot between both hands.

"Pray remain still… for one moment. There—it is out!" He held up the prickle triumphantly between the tweezers. "You have heard, Miss Marty, of the slave Andrew Something-or-other and the lion? Though it couldn't have been Andrew really, because there are no lions in Scotland—except, I believe, on their shield. He was hiding for some reason in a cave, and a lion came along, and—well, it doesn't seem complimentary even if you turn a lion into a lioness, but it came into my head and seemed all right to start with."

"When I was a governess," said Miss Marty, "I used often to set it for dictation. I had, I remember, the same difficulty you experience with the name of the hero."

"Did you?" the Doctor exclaimed, delightedly. "Thatisa coincidence, isn't it? I sometimes think that when two minds are, as one might say, attuned—"

"They are making a most dreadful noise," said Miss Marty, with a glance across the river. "Did I hear you say that you were victorious to-night?"

"Completely."

"The Major is a wonderful man."

"Wonderful! As I was saying, when two minds are, as one might say, attuned—"

"He succeeds in everything he touches."

"It is a rare talent."

"I sometimes wonder how, with his greatness—for he cannot but be conscious of it—he endures the restrictions of our narrow sphere. I mean," Miss Marty went on, as the Doctor lifted his eyebrows in some surprise, "the petty business of a country town such as ours."

"Oh," said the Doctor. "Ah, to be sure!… I supposed for a moment that you were referring to the—er—terrestrial globe."

He sighed. Miss Marty sighed likewise. Across in the covert of the woods someone had begun to beat a tattoo on the drum. Presently a cornet joined in, shattering the echoes with wild ululations.

"Those fellows will be sorry if Sir Felix catches them," observed the Doctor, anxiously. "I can't think what Hymen's about, to allow it. The noise comes from right under the home-park, too."

"You depreciate the Major!" Miss Marty tapped her bare foot impatiently on the pebbles; but, recollecting herself, drew it back with a blush.

"I do not," answered the Doctor, hotly. "I merely say that he is allowing his men yonder to get out of hand."

"Perhapsyouhad better go, and, as the poet puts it, 'ride on the whirlwind and direct the storm,'" she suggested, with gentle sarcasm.

The Doctor rose stiffly. "Perhaps, on the whole, I had. Your stocking"—he lifted and felt it carefully—"will be dry in five minutes or so. Shall I direct Cai Tamblyn to bring the boat hither if I pass him on my way?"

She glanced up with a quivering lip.

"Isn't—isn't that a Sulphur Yellow?" she asked, pointing to a butterfly which wavered past them and poised itself for an instant on a pebble by the brink of the pool.

"Eh? By George! so it is." The Doctor caught up his shako and raced off in pursuit. "Steady now!… Is he gone?… Yes.… No, I have him!" he called, as with a swift wave of his arm he brought the shako down smartly on the pebbles and, kneeling, held it down with both hands.

"Where?" panted Miss Marty.

"Here… if you will stoop while I lift the brim.… Carefully, please. Now!"

Miss Marty stooped, but could not reach low enough to peer under the shako. She dropped on her knees. The Doctor was kneeling already. He showed her how to look, and this brought their cheeks close together.…

"Oh!" cried Miss Marty, suddenly.

"I couldn't help it," said the Doctor.

"And—and you have let him escape!" She buried her face in both hands, and broke into a fit of weeping.

"I don't care.… Yes, I do!" He caught her hands away from her face and, their hiding being denied her, she leant her brow against his shoulder. With that, his arm crept around her waist.

For a while he let her sob out her emotion. Then, taking her firmly by both wrists, he looked once into her eyes, led her to a seat upon the pebble ridge, and sat himself down beside her.

For a long while they rested there in silence, hand clasped in hand. The uproar across the river had ceased. They heard only the splash of the small waterfall and, in its pauses, the call of bird to bird, mating amid the hazels and the oaks.

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