CHAPTER VII.IN HIDING.
It is impossible for me to describe of my own knowledge all that took place during five minutes or more after I grappled with the Britisher.
There had been no thought in my mind, when I leaped upon the enemy, of gaining a victory; I was conscious only of the fact that if we were taken prisoners again our lives would pay the forfeit, because it must be apparent to all that we were spies, else why had we ventured there the second time; and I acted upon the impulse of the moment.
Had my companions been told in advance of what I proposed to do, they could not have followed my example more promptly.
It seemed as if almost at the very second that I seized the redcoat’s musket, they made an attack, each upon the man nearest him, and so unexpected was the onslaught that the Britishers gave no outcry.
I remember that during what seemed to me like many moments I struck out, or parried blows, givingno heed to the weapon I had first seized, and that we fought desperately in silence until my opponent suddenly fell when I was some distance from him.
Then I realized dimly that he had been stricken down from behind, and an instant later Alec whispered hoarsely, as he grasped me by the hand:—
“Come, now! In ten seconds more it will be too late!”
I failed to understand all his meaning; but, fortunately, had sufficient sense to obey the strain upon my arm, and immediately we were in full flight, plunging through the underbrush without any idea, on my part at least, of where the course might lead.
Then as we ran I became conscious of the fact that Leon was leading the way, and for the first time since we stumbled upon the soldiers I had hopes that we might finally escape.
We ran at full speed, stumbling here over fallen trees, or floundering there through bogs and swamps, holding the pace until it became impossible for Alec to advance another yard.
“I am done up!” he panted, sinking down at the foot of a huge pine tree. “Do not stop; but leave me here to take my chances!”
“Can you go no further?” I asked stupidly, forit was plain to be seen that the lad’s strength was entirely spent.
“Not a step; but neither you nor Leon can afford to loiter. You two should be able to give them the slip.”
“I have no idea of leaving a comrade,” I said, flinging myself down by Alec’s side to show the dear lad that I was not minded to desert him, and Leon followed my example, saying as he did so:—
“The English may as well have three prisoners as one, and I will remain with those who rescued me from the lake.”
“But you are to do nothing of the kind!” I cried in alarm, thinking of the lad’s mother, whose only support he was. “You can contrive to gain home secretly, knowing the country as you do, and in the morning no one will be able to say you were with us. Go, Leon! You must not sacrifice yourself!”
“That is what I should be doing if I deserted a friend. We will remain here, and it may be the soldiers will fail to find us.”
It was possible they might pass us by in the darkness, unless we betrayed our whereabouts by thus wrangling as to who should go or stay, and I fell silent at once, understanding at the same time that words were of no avail in the effort to persuade the French lad into deserting us.
We three remained motionless as statues, and quite as silent, save for our heavy breathing, which could not at once be stilled, until, as the moments passed, we understood that the pursuit was either abandoned, or the soldiers had gone in the wrong direction.
We had escaped, for the time being at least, and my surprise was very nearly akin to fear as I realized this, for it seemed little short of miraculous that such good fortune could come to us.
“They must be hiding near by, ready to leap upon us the instant we leave this thicket,” I said half to myself, and then I knew that Alec was laughing heartily, although silently.
“Do you suppose the Britishers would be willing to sit down and wait patiently until we were rested?” he asked, pressing my hand warmly. “We have given them the slip, Dicky Dobbins, and you shall have the full credit of it, because save for your bravery it might never have been brought about. I should have been clapped into that same pen where we nearly froze to death, before having the courage to engage half a dozen soldiers in a hand-to-hand fight!”
“Nor would I have shown so much bravery had there been time in which to think of the danger. The fit came upon me quite by accident, and even at this moment I cannot tell what took place.”
“Well, I can,” Alec replied, still laughing silently. “You leaped like a tiger upon one of the men, wresting his musket from him, and Leon and I could do no less than follow the example. The soldier was twice your size, and yet you floored him with a single blow—”
“One of you did that, striking the fellow from behind,” I interrupted. “But for your assistance I should speedily have been worsted.”
“It was your third opponent that Leon felled with a blow from the butt end of a musket. You had tumbled two over, and was engaged with the third when I had an opportunity of seeing what was being done. I always believed you a courageous lad, Dicky Dobbins, but never have I supposed it was in your power to handle your fists with such skill.”
Now although it may appear like boasting to repeat what I did all unconsciously on that night, it seems necessary to set down what Alec and Leon claim were my acts while in a frenzy of fear.
There were six soldiers in the squad we had run upon so unwittingly, and two of those I bowled over much as a skilful pugilist would have done, tackling the third just as my companions came to the rescue.
Leon had seized the musket I wrested from the first redcoat, and with it felled one man unaided;then he knocked over the fellow who was trying to best Alec, and afterward aided me as I have said.
Even then, as we sat in the forest listening in vain for sounds of pursuit, it seemed incredible that we had won the day so easily, and during a full half hour we gloated over the victory.
Then, when it seemed certain the Britishers had not succeeded in keeping upon our trail, we began to realize that the danger, instead of having passed, was hardly more than begun.
We were on that long, narrow neck of land known as the North Foreland, and, as Leon said, the enemy had a line of sentinels stretched across the narrowest portion, nearest the main shore, to prevent desertions and keep the curious at a proper distance.
In other words, we were penned up with no means of escape save by water, and the lad upon whom we depended as a guide had entirely lost his bearings in the darkness.
“It is only a question of time before we will be captured,” I said gloomily, when coming fully to understand the situation, “and we cannot live in the thicket many days without food!”
To this dispiriting remark Alec made no reply, and I believed the lad was disheartened until he said cheerily,and in much the same tone he might have used when discussing some excursion for pleasure:—
“We are captured to a certainty if we make up our minds to such a fact; but I have the idea that by a show of half as much pluck as you displayed when we were confronted by the soldiers, we can leave this point of land in due season.”
“Perhaps you already see your way clear to get out of the snarl,” I said, with a fine tinge of sarcasm in my tones.
“Ay, that I do,” he replied, giving no heed to my ill temper. “In case you two are minded to follow my instructions, it will go hard indeed if we fail of setting sail in our boat between now and sunset to-morrow.”
He spoke so confidently that I pricked up my ears at once, a new hope coming into my heart, and Leon said quietly, much as if he was safe from all harm, and we the only ones who had anything to fear from the Britishers:—
“I stand ready to do whatever you shall say.”
“Then set about finding your home, leaving us here—”
“I cannot play so cowardly a part,” he interrupted. “Anything else, and you have only to command me.”
“It was not a part of my plan that you should desert us, my bold Frenchman; but in order that we get off you must be free to act. Suppose you succeed in reaching your home before daylight, what will be more easy than to provide us with food in case we are forced to remain some time in hiding? Then, again, should our boat be seized, you could do something toward procuring another. My only hope of escaping depends upon your being at liberty to go and come.”
Now it was that I, as well as Leon, began to understand what Alec had in mind, and both of us caught eagerly at the chance, slight though it was.
“I could find my way even in the night if we stood on either shore of the point,” the French lad said, half to himself, and Oliver Perry’s brother made answer, as if it was a simple thing to walk out of the thicket:—
“Tell me in which direction you wish to go, and I will lay out the course.”
I should have made no reply to such a remark, believing my comrade was in jest; but Leon, whose faith in Alec seemed perfect, said quietly:—
“If we could gain the northern shore of the Foreland it would not be far to my home.”
Alec stepped out from the thicket where he might gain a view of the sky, and after searching withhis eyes as if hunting for some particular star, said in the tone of one who defies contradiction:—
“In that direction is the north; but, unfortunately, I cannot tell you how far we may be from the shore.”
“It makes little difference; even though we were on the very southern edge I could gain my home before daylight. That which troubles me now is, where I am to find you again.”
“We can easily settle the question. Dicky Dobbins and I will follow till we are come near to your mother’s home, and then hide at some convenient place for a time.”
“Why should you not enter my home?”
“For many good reasons, my friend. In the first place there is no question whatsoever but that the Britishers will make careful search for us as soon as sunrise, if not before, and most likely your home will be visited. In such a case there is little fear of your getting into serious trouble, because in the darkness I guarantee those soldiers did not see who made the attack upon them, and thus you will be free to wait upon us.”
Now I began to understand more of what Alec would do, and straightway, after an unfortunate habit of mine, I at once believed it would be possible to better the plan.
“If we can make our way so far as Leon’s home, what prevents us from going directly on board our boat? I have no desire to linger on the North Foreland, and surely there is nothing more to be learned regarding the movements of the enemy.”
“Nothing would please me better than to set sail within the hour; but according to my thinking we had best keep away from the shore during this night at least, for if the Britishers have sentinels near to the mainland to prevent any one from coming upon the point, they know beyond a question we arrived in a boat of some kind, and most likely men are searching for our craft, if they have not already found her. After sunrise Leon can easily learn the condition of affairs, and thus we shall avoid running unnecessarily into danger.”
I was not thoroughly convinced that this would be the wisest course, for it seemed to me better that we take some chances with the hope of getting away speedily, than to linger where there was so much of danger.
However, I said nothing, luckily, else would I have been put to shame two or three hours later, when we were come near to where Leon lived.
Alec gave the lad the proper course, as I have said, and held him to it so truly by observing thestars from time to time, that considerably before midnight we were standing where we could distinguish the outlines of the coast at a point, as the French lad declared, within three miles of his home, and so far from the encampment that there was little fear of coming upon the redcoats, unless, peradventure, squads of them were out in search of us.
From this point our advance was a reasonably rapid one, the guide striking a path through the thicket which he knew full well, and when we had come within five hundred yards, as he declared, of the dwelling, Alec said, coming to a halt:—
“We two will stop hereabout, and do you go ahead, Leon, to learn if the soldiers have visited the house.”
All this seemed to me like an excess of precaution, for there was nothing to be heard save the ordinary noises of the night in the forest, and I could see no reason why we should not make ourselves as comfortable as possible, at least until daybreak.
Leon, having every faith in Alec’s judgment, did not delay; but went on swiftly, leaving us alone, and there we remained until it seemed positive to me the French lad had abandoned us.
More than once I would have spoken with my comrade, urging some such possibility, but that he, pressing his hand over my mouth whenever I madethe attempt, thus ensured silence, and the darkness of night was beginning to give way slightly to the coming day when Leon finally returned.
He had in his arms a bulky package, and when I sprang up to meet him intimated by gestures that I should remain quiet.
Then cautiously, and in the most careful whispers, he told what proved to me once more that I was in no wise fit to direct the movements of even myself while in an enemy’s country.
The soldiers came to his home within half an hour after he arrived, while his mother was making ready the provisions for us which he had just brought.
They demanded to know why the household was astir at such an unseasonable hour, and she, without absolutely telling an untruth, gave them to understand it was because her son, who had been forcibly taken from her the night previous, had but just returned.
Then Leon was forced to submit to the most searching questioning as to how he had escaped from the bateau, and who had brought him to the North Foreland.
He told only the truth in replying to these questions, but did not tell it all.
Two young men, he said, had found him at the mercy of the wind and waves, and yielding to his earnestentreaties, set him ashore near the easternmost end of the point.
When the men asked concerning the two strangers, Leon professed to know nothing, believing it was right to speak an untruth rather than give up to their enemies those who had befriended him.
From what was said during the three hours this searching party remained in Leon’s home, the lad and his mother understood that every effort would be made to prevent those who had assaulted the soldiers from leaving the point, and to that end sentinels were stationed along the shore.
It was believed by the Britishers that those who had brought Leon home were spies, and threats were freely indulged in as to what fate would overtake them once they were captured.
Whether our boat had as yet been discovered we had no means of knowing; but it did not seem probable that those who visited Mrs. Marchand’s home had found the craft, otherwise some mention would have been made of the fact.
Now it was that I realized how wise Alec had been in preventing me from going directly to the farmhouse, and what would have been our fate had I carried out my purpose of attempting to embark without first making certain where the Britishers might be.
Taking it all in all our position was as disagreeable as it well could be.
From what Leon had heard we knew that the North Foreland would be rigorously searched next morning, and also that there was little opportunity of our being able to take to a boat, at least within the next four-and-twenty hours, while the chances were decidedly against our having a craft which we could call our own after the sun had risen.
The French lad, repeating again and again that he was ready to do whatsoever we might desire of him, said that his mother advised he should not linger with us many moments, lest the Britishers, suspecting him of knowing more than he admitted, might have sent some one on his trail.
Therefore it was that he seemed eager to be gone, and when he had led us to a sort of cave, and yet which was hardly more than an excavation under an overhanging rock, Alec said to him:—
“It is well that you leave us; and remember, Leon, we don’t expect to see you again until the danger is well-nigh past. With such an amount of food as you have brought, and the possibility of getting water during the hours of darkness, there is little likelihood of our suffering while we remain in hiding. Therefore go back; stay around home as you would under ordinarycircumstances, and keep your eye out now and then to see if the enemy discover our boat.”
“I will return at midnight to-morrow,” Leon said, moving slowly away; and I understood that had the lad consulted his own inclination he would not have left us.
“Do not come unless it seems certain the redcoats believe we two have given them the slip. No good can be effected by your visiting us more often than is absolutely necessary.”
“But the time will drag heavily on your hands,” he suggested; and Alec replied, with a laugh:—
“It will pass a deal more swiftly than if we were confined in such a prison as the Britishers have on this point of land, and that both Dicky and I know by painful experience. Go now; keep your ears open for any information which may be of importance to our purpose. After what you have suffered, the king’s soldiers can be no friends of yours. Then, when your mother believes it is safe to venture out, come with what will be cheerful tidings.”
Leon clasped each of us by the hand, and then, as if fearing to trust himself to further speech, walked rapidly away, and we were alone in hiding; with no friends on all the North Foreland save the French lad and his mother.
By this time we were needing both food and sleep, therefore we did not at first realize how tedious might be the confinement in our narrow hiding-place.
It was, as I have said, little more than an excavation under an overhanging rock; but the opening was so small that it had the appearance of being a veritable cave, and was partially screened from view of those who might pass, by a few small shrubs. The interior was hardly more than large enough to admit of our lying at full length, and in no place could we stand upright.
All these things were noted in a general way, and it was not until after many hours had passed that we realized to the full how cramped a prison it might prove.
The shore of the lake—that is to say, such portion of the Foreland as was washed by the narrow strip of water which lay between the point and the main—was not above three hundred yards distant, and Alec proposed that we hurry down and drink our fill while it was yet dark, for after the day dawned it would not be safe to venture forth.
This we did, and having returned, made a hearty meal from the provisions Leon brought.
Before the repast was come to a close the shadows of night had been dispelled by the rising sun, and wewere prisoners until darkness should screen us once more.
I proposed that, having plenty of time at our disposal, we both indulge in slumber, but to this my comrade would not listen.
It was necessary, he believed, that one of us keep constant watch, lest the enemy should come while we were unconscious, and the sound of our heavy breathing might betray the secret of the hiding-place.
He insisted that it should be his duty to stand guard, as he termed it, during the early part of the day, and held to this point so stoutly that I could do no less than take my first turn at sleeping.
Now, although we knew full well how great was the danger, and realized that at any moment we might find ourselves in the hands of the enemy, who would surely put us to death as spies, fatigue bore so heavily upon me that my eyes were no more than closed before sleep came, and during a certain time I rested as sweetly and profoundly as if safe in my father’s house at Presque Isle.
When I awakened the sun was riding high in the heavens, and Alec, sitting near the opening of the cave just behind the clump of bushes, was keeping careful watch.
“Do not reproach yourself for having slept whilethere was an opportunity,” he said, when I would have made excuses for taking my ease so long, leaving to him all the labor. “When the moment comes that we make a dash for liberty, it may be necessary to keep our eyes open many hours on a stretch, and by dividing the watches, if it so be we have the inclination, one or the other can sleep all the time.”
It was good proof that the dear lad needed rest when, having once stretched out at full length, his eyes closed almost immediately in slumber, and during at least an hour I do not believe he so much as moved hand or foot.
At the end of that time I ceased to watch my sleeping comrade, for the tramp of footsteps and the hum of voices could be heard just outside the cave, and I knew beyond a peradventure that the Britishers were searching for us.
Unless they were doing their work most carelessly, it did not seem possible they could pass the aperture without discovering it, for of a verity, if I had been searching for a fugitive, I would have taken good care to know what might be under such an overhanging rock as marked the entrance to our place of refuge.
For an instant there came into my mind the thought that it was necessary Alec be awakened in case themen came upon us, and I stretched forth my hand to touch him; but drew it back immediately when the sound of voices told that they had halted directly in front of where I sat, not more than ten paces away.
I STRETCHED FORTH MY HAND TO TOUCH HIM.
“I STRETCHED FORTH MY HAND TO TOUCH HIM.”