THE ATTACK ON THE STOCKADE
Daylight revealed the _Walrus_ heading in toward the mouth of the
Anchorage; but the smoke from our cooking-fires obviously puzzled
her, and she heaved to and lowered a boat which pulled up the channel
to investigate. ’Twas impossible from our hill-top to see what the
boat’s crew did; apparently they turned back so soon as they had
convinced themselves the _James_ was not lurking in ambush. And the
_Walrus_ took the boat in tow and bore off to the northward under
full sail.
“She is bound for the North Inlet,” commented Murray, pocketing his
glass. “Flint will find the _James_ and be with us again by
mid-afternoon.”
“When his battery will make short work of this gimcrack fortress,” I
said disagreeably.
“You are unduly pessimistic, Robert,” he reproved me. “’Tis
impossible for a vessel of the _Walrus’_ draft to lie so that she can
bring a full broadside to bear.”
“Why not make terms with them?” I argued. “You have the eight
hundred thousand pounds safe.”
“I stated my opposing reasons last night to Mistress O’Donnell.”
“But you had not then been compelled to flog five knaves to death,” I
objected. “This is no crew to fight a forlorn hope.”
“They and their like have fought for me these thirty years,” he
replied placidly. “Nor do I consider the approaching struggle a
forlorn hope. Let me involve Flint in an attack upon us here, and I
promise you he’ll not bring off enough men to work his ship. Also,
you err in your first assertion, Robert. Only three of last night’s
mutineers have died. The other two are yet alive--albeit
uncomfortable, I fancy; exceeding uncomfortable.”
“And how they must love you!” I sneered.
“Fear me, you should say,” he corrected. “As I have told you, I have
developed my opportunities in life rather by stimulating men’s fears
than by angling for their affections. Affection, Robert--and the
argument is applicable alike to that tender sentiment which arises
periodically betwixt the sexes--is a most unchancy emotion. Fear, on
the contrary, once aroused, is never forgotten.”
“_Ja_,” said Peters, “andt from fear grows hate.”
My great-uncle smiled.
“I find myself, as always, moved to admiration of the philosophy you
have distilled from your wide range of experience, friend Peter,” he
answered. “But suffer me to remind you that, in the language of the
alchemists, fear and hate are mutually reactive principles, the one
consuming and neutralizing the other.”
Peter chewed a grass-stem without replying, and after a courteous
pause to allow him ample opportunity, Murray inquired:
“Shall we ascertain if Mistress O’Donnell hath completed her toilet?
I own to a normal morning hunger.”
“Your mention of her is the mightiest argument for a settlement with
Flint,” I protested. “What hope is there for her, if you----”
“Robert,” he interrupted gently, “you speak to no purpose. The
maid’s entire future is entangled with my success--and of my success
there can be no reasonable doubt. What? Shall I bow the knee to
that misbegotten crew of gallowscheats aboard the _Walrus_? You have
seen them!”
His voice rose.
“You know how much of discipline there is amongst them. Do you think
that men of their stamp can overcome me? ’Tis incredible, I say! I
can not fail.”
“_Ja_,” said Peter, spitting out his grass-stem. “Once you failed.”
“Failure is a word of relative significance,” retorted my
great-uncle. “By that which you term failure, Peter, I was impelled
to adopt the career which hath nourished me to this pitch, that I am
the center of a conspiracy which shall overturn kingdoms. Failure!
You will be telling me next that I am lacking in godliness!”
“_Ja_,” said Peter, unperturbed.
“I concede the point!” exclaimed my great-uncle, chuckling. “And
seeing that we are at last in agreement upon one point, let us sink
our other differences in a pot of chocolate.”
There was no more to be said, and however unwillingly, Peter and I
were constrained to do all that we could to aid in strengthening the
position. ’Twas Peter’s idea that the men be set to digging shallow
pits behind the stockade to provide additional shelter against
musketry fire from the border of woods and undergrowth at the base of
the hill. ’Twas likewise Peter who suggested, vastly to her
indignation, that we construct for Moira a shot-proof cubby-hole of
treasure chests and kegs in one corner of the blockhouse.
We had scarce finished these preparations when the _Walrus_
reappeared and tacked up the Anchorage to the elbow where it bends
sharply around the larger island which covers the entrance. Farther
she was unable to go because of shoal water, and for the same reason
she was obliged to anchor practically bow on to us, which meant that,
as Murray had predicted, she could train on the hilltop only her
chase-guns and two or three of the carronades mounted for’ard on her
gundeck. But she showed no immediate disposition to use her battery.
Her people seemed to be concerned entirely with the task of
disembarkation, and in the space of a glass we reckoned that all of a
hundred and fifty men were landed and straggled irregularly into the
forest.
Then there was a lull in Flint’s activities, and we made our final
dispositions for the anticipated attack. Murray stationed his men
all around the circuit of the stockade, except for those included in
what I have termed the after-guard. These fellows, about twenty in
number, were held in the blockhouse as a reserve to be thrown to the
support of any part of our line which might require assistance.
Murray himself with Coupeau, Peter and me stood in the center of the
enclosure where he could keep watch upon all that went on.
The afternoon was warm and drowsy. The _Walrus_ looked like a toy
ship on the oily-smooth surface of the inlet. There was not a sign
of life aboard her, and the forest that spread betwixt us and the
shore hugged silently whatever secrets it covered.
My great-uncle frowned thoughtfully.
“This is not like Flint,” he remarked. “He must always fly
bull-headed to the attack.”
The words were hardly out of his mouth when a shout came from the
side of the stockade fronting the inlet.
“Here be Flint’s Redhead!”
And conflicting cries:
“Shoot mun!”
“’Tis flag o’ truce!”
“Ta lucky lad!”
We ran forward to the stockade, bidding the men withhold their fire,
and Peter boosted me up on the cross-bar that bound the logs
together. From this height I could survey the denuded slopes of the
hill and the jungle growth of scrub trees and bush that cinctured it.
And forth from the forest wall projected the unmistakable flaming
locks of Darby McGraw, with one arm which flourished diligently what
once had been a white shirt. At the first glimpse of me he scrambled
into the open.
“Will ye be letting me come in, Master Bob?” he called.
“Why, that depends,” I answered him. “Are you for spying upon us?”
“Sure, the thought was never in me mind. I ha’ a message for
himself.”
“Who?”
“Himself--him that’s uncle to ye.”
“Well, seeing that we hear each other excellently as we are, suppose
you speak your message from the spot you stand on,” I said.
“Troth, that will suit me fine,” he replied with alacrity. “And ’tis
easy said. Flint will ha’ Cap’n Murray shift the treasure to the
foot of the hill, and that done, the _Walrus_ will take it and go.
If he won’t, we’ll be takin’ it anyways--or if by chance we don’t,
we’ll blow the _James_ out o’ the water and leave ye all marooned.”
He waxed confidential.
“Aye, and he means that same, Master Bob. Ye may take me word for
it. We’re a wild, angry crew for the surprize ye give us in the
dark.”
“’Twas a fit reward for your treachery, Darby,” I returned with some
heat.
He hung his head, digging with his toe in the sand.
“Ah, but that’s what pirates will be doing,” he said. “And what way
will there be kindness betwixt men if they do be fighting? Or
wanting, the one, what the other has?”
“Maybe we haven’t the treasure here at all,” I suggested.
“We know dif’rent. The wounded men in the _James_ were afther
tellin’ us.”
I looked down inquiringly at my great-uncle.
“If they seek terms, they are uncertain of success,” he said. “Send
the boy away.”
“But if they destroy the _James_?”
“First they will attack--and after that we will deal with the problem
of protecting the ship.”
And as I hesitated----
“Be so good as to answer him at once, Robert, or I shall have him
shot as he stands.”
“Go back, Darby,” I called. “Captain Murray will have none of your
offer.”
“God save us!” he exclaimed involuntarily. “I’m thinkin’ that will
be the death of many a tall feller, Master Bob. Well, good luck to
ye and to Master Peter and the elegant young maid. If we all come
out safe----”
My great-uncle leaped upon a tree-stump and fired a pistol over
Darby’s head. The boy stood motionless a moment, mouth agape.
“The old devil!” he howled then, and fled down the hillside for all
he was worth.
Flint did not wait to receive Murray’s verbal answer; that
pistol-shot was sufficiently explicit. Three musket-shots echoed it
from the foot of the hill, and at once there was a renewed bustle of
men on the fo’csle of the _Walrus_. A puff of white smoke blew up
from the deck, and the crack of a long twelve started myriads of
seabirds from the seaward marshes. The shot sang over us and crashed
into the forest beyond. The other chase-gun bowled a shot into the
enclosure, where it simply buried itself in the soft sand. Two
carronades, with lower mounts and shorter range, discharged missiles
that fell short of the stockade. And that first salvo might pass for
a chronology of the bombardment to which we were subjected until
sunset.
One man was killed, and no material damage was done. The carronades
were unable to reach the blockhouse with their heavier shot, and the
Long Toms lacked the power to penetrate the green wood of the walls.
Most of the round-shot plumped into the sand. Three posts of the
stockade were knocked over and promptly set up again. That was all.
The noise was most impressive, with the echoes reverberating across
the island from the sounding-board of the Spyglass, but the net
result was to imbue me with a confidence I had not previously
entertained. When darkness intervened and the firing ceased we felt
that we had been the winners of the first bout of the struggle.
In the mean time we had not seen a trace of the landing-party from
the _Walrus_, and as the night shut down we all peered curiously
through the posts of the stockade, expecting momentarily to discover
a rush of crouching figures. But hour after hour passed without a
sound to disturb the silence, and even Murray, whose nerves were of
forged steel, became uneasy as he up-ended the hour-glass for the
third time since sunset and decided to inspect the circuit of the
defenses.
“There is another hand than Flint’s behind these Fabian tactics,” he
observed. “Perhaps John Silver’s. ’Tis a clever rogue, and a
cunning. We can not be too vigilant.”
Moira, poor lass, was asleep beneath the stack of gold and silver
inside the blockhouse. Ben Gunn and black Scipio, equally
frightened, were huddled on the doorstep; and the men of the
after-guard were sprawled in the sand, some of them asleep, some of
them gambling--the pirates of both crews were inveterate gamblers--at
pitch-penny or with pebbles and shells or at a kind of mumbletypeg
with their clasp-knives.
Coupeau joined us on the southern arc of the stockade. He reported
dim flittings and shadowy movements on the lower hillside, but naught
in the nature of an advance or a threat of one. Elsewhere the men
rose from their burrows and sullenly or stupidly, according to their
dispositions, affirmed they had seen no enemies. On the north side
we came to a pit which was empty, and in the one next to it a man lay
on his stomach as if asleep.
Murray prodded him with his sword, and the fellow groaned, but did
not stir.
“What is the matter with this man?” demanded my great-uncle.
“Please, zur, ’tis Job Pytchens,” answered the man next beyond.
“I asked what was the matter with him,” said my great-uncle coldly.
“He’m wur one o’ they as had a hun’erd ’n’ fufty lashes, cap’n, zur.”
I shuddered. My great-uncle took snuff.
“And who is gone from this vacant place?” he pressed.
“Tom Morphew, zur. He’m dead, zur.”
“Was he shot?”
“No, zur, cap’n. He’m had a hun’erd ’n’ fufty lashes, too.”
“Where is he?”
There was a barely appreciable pause.
“Please, zur, us buried him,” the man answered.
“Where?”
The man waved an arm vaguely over the sandy top of the hill.
“Ah! Well, you will leave unburied the next man who dies, be he Job
or another--else I shall have the cat administered to all of you who
have abandoned your posts without permission.”
“’Iss, zur. Thank ’ee, zur,” replied the man--but there was no
thanks in his snarling voice; his face was masked by the darkness.
“Stap me,” said Murray, turning away, “but these rascals are becoming
as slack as Flint’s tattertails!”
Across the clearing a musket exploded. Then another and another. A
volley crackled from the lower slopes, and our men replied. A hoarse
yelling underscored the firing.
“At last!”
Murray’s voice vibrated with exultation.
“Now we shall scoop the rogues like so many grains of sand. The
fools! A night attack is fatal with undisciplined men.”
We ran past the blockhouse, where the after-guard were scrambling to
their feet and Moira was wringing her hands in the doorway.
“Ye won’t be leaving me!” she cried to us.
“You must remain under cover, my dear,” said my uncle kindly.
“’Twould distress all of us had we to be concerned for your safety.”
“’Tis not lead or steel I will be fearful of,” says she, “but the
cruel memories that do be creeping from the treasure boxes. My
troth, I’d liefer be here in the open than within.”
My great-uncle hesitated, plainly exasperated by her persistence in
remaining outside.
“Where is Gunn?” he asked.
“Oh, him!”
Moira’s laughter trilled as lightly as if there were no messengers of
death in the air.
“He’s where ye would have put me first--under the treasure. And he’s
welcome to it.”
“Be that as it may,” he snapped, giving rein to his exasperation,
“here you shall not stay, my lass, and we are pressed----”
A great roar of firing burst out upon the northern front of the
stockade, and mingled with the reports of the muskets were shouts of:
“Down arms, _Jameses_!”
“Step aside, _James_ lads!”
“All we want is old Murray!”
And a wailing voice cried over and over again--
“Here be Tom Morphew ’n’ his bloody back, mates!”
The firing sputtered and dwindled and was succeeded by a prodigious
scuffling and clatter of cutlasses.
“We’ll do ’ee no harm, _Jameses_!”
And now I recognized Silver’s voice.
“Strike arms, _Jameses_!”
Three men, one of them with a broken arm, raced up to us.
“Long John’s in,” sobbed one.
“Tom Morphew let ’em in,” panted a second.
“Excellently planned,” drawled Murray.
I heard the click of his snuffbox.
“Yet observe how fate hath tricked our opponents,” he went on. “They
timed their second attack to catch me on the southern side of the
stockade, whereas, thanks to the perversity of womankind, I am
strategically disposed to exploit the disorder which attends their
success. I think we shall teach the clever Master Silver a lesson.”
“Yes, if your men are loyal,” I said angrily.
“Any crew are loyal in victory, Robert,” he answered.
“_Ja_,” spoke Peter, “but you better not let dot feller talk about
his bloody back.”
“You are squeamish, it seems, Peter,” murmured my great-uncle.
“Well, I shall even seek to humor you. Coupeau!”
His voice hardened.
“_Oui, m’sieu_.”
The gunner stepped from the huddled ranks of the after-guard.
“We attack.”
But indeed the attack was made upon us. We had not advanced four
paces from the shelter of the blockhouse when fifty or sixty of the
invaders stormed out of the night, howling and waving their
cutlasses. We fired one smashing volley that dropped a fourth of
them, and charged. A few pistol-shots met us, but most of the
_Walrus’_ men had discarded their muskets, preferring to fight
sailor-fashion with the cutlass, and they were utterly disheartened
by the unexpectedness of the reception we gave them.
Murray’s slender dress-sword was a bodkin of death which pricked a
path through the densest ranks. On one side of him Peter swung a
clubbed musket which shattered heads and limbs at every step. On his
other side Coupeau wielded a cutlass with equal effect.
A yellow crescent moon was riding over the treetops, and we halted in
the gap the attackers had torn in the stockade to survey our
situation by its light. Half-way down the hill a group of the
_Walrus’_ men rallied and commenced to fire up at us; and Coupeau was
for pushing after them, but my great-uncle checked him.
“No, no, Coupeau! Yonder is John Silver, astraddle of the stockade.
See, he is helping up another fellow. They have been cut off by our
charge, and if you please, we’ll deal with them first.”
I will admit a pang of sympathy for Silver. He was not more than
twenty yards from us, and by dint of well-nigh incredible efforts,
with the other man to boost him, he had succeeded in scaling the
stockade and was sitting there, with his one leg dangling inside.
When we discovered him he started to swing his leg over the top,
evidently intending to abandon his companion. But whether because of
something the other man said or because he feared he must injure
himself in dropping the eight feet to the ground without any one to
check his fall, he abruptly changed his mind and faced about toward
us very resolutely, seizing hold of the crutch which hung from his
neck by its thong.
The man at the foot of the stockade gathered himself together like a
coiling serpent and plucked a long knife from his belt. He had been
in the shadow until then, but now the moonlight shone over his torso
and we recognized him for the blind man, Pew. He had lost his green
eyeshade, and his pockmarked face was cadaverous in the yellow glow.
His eyes were open, and they seemed to smolder dully as they strained
at us. His knife glinted in his hand.
“Will you be assisted down and be hanged whole, or must we cut you
down, Silver?” hailed Murray.
He, like the rest of us, ignored the blind man. Our attention was
fixed upon Silver, his broad face very calm in the moonlight.
“Them there ain’t exackly tempting terms, Cap’n Murray, sir,” Silver
answered temperately. “Couldn’t ye be a mite more generous?”
“I am serving you a dish no more highly sauced than that you intended
for me,” returned my great-uncle dryly.
“Now, sir; now, sir,” remonstrated Silver. “How can ye say that?
All we done was to try and persuade ye to give us our share o’ the
treasure--you havin’ eight hundred thousand pound stowed away
special, accordin’ to your own story. And if we come in by the back
door a’ter it, why that was so’s we’d hurt ye least.”
“You’d argue yourself to a block of ice in Hell, Silver,” rejoined my
great-uncle amusedly. “Throw down that crutch! Drop that knife,
you, sirrah, Pew--or whatever your name is!”
Sword in hand, he advanced ahead of the rest of us, who were strung
out all the way from the gap in the stockade. Coupeau was at his
elbow, and Peter and I close behind.
“Come,” he adjured them a second time. “I’m in no mood to talk
terms, and if you delay ’twill make your end the more painful.”
Silver’s face went livid in the moonlight.
“Aye,” rasped the one-legged man, “ye’ll lash us bloody-raw like the
lads as let us in tonight.”
And as Murray continued to advance, he struck out with his crutch.
“Keep off,” he shrieked. “Keep off!” And then: “I can’t reach him,
Ezra. Let him have it!”
Pew crouched with his knife-hand drawn back.
“Aye, it takes blind Pew to let him have it,” he croaked in his
hateful voice.
His hand jerked forward. There was a flash in the moonlight, and my
great-uncle staggered, the flung knife buried to the hilt in his side.
“I am stabbed,” he gasped.
Silver brandished his crutch over his head.
“Pew’s stabbed Murray!” he shouted. “Come on, _Walruses_! Lay off,
ye _James_ lads--we’ll not harm ye, mates. Treasure for all, and no
more tyranny!”
Peter and I caught my great-uncle as he fell. Coupeau jumped at the
blind man with a bellow of rage, cutlass raised to strike; but as he
came within reach Silver poised his crutch like a spear, leaned over
and drove the sharp spike of the ferrule through the gunner’s eye
into the brain. Coupeau dropped in his tracks.
“I ha’ done for Coupeau,” Silver shouted again. “Don’t make Long
John do it all, lads!”
There was such a rush of enemies, such a howl of exultation, as took
my breath away.
“Do you hold Murray, Peter,” I said. “I’ll finish that precious
pair.”
And I ran in at Pew, albeit more warily than Coupeau; but the blind
man--and certes, if he was blind his hearing was so marvelous as to
make up for it--retained a clubbed pistol, which was a serviceable
weapon at close quarters, and Silver covered him overhead with that
deadly crutch. I shouted to the after-guard to shoot them, but our
people had not reloaded their pieces, and many were already engaged
with the party we had just driven out, who swarmed in again through
the same gap. Those of the _James’_ men who were nearest were
palpably lukewarm, and Silver, atop of the stockade, perceiving his
advantage, thrust his crutch at me and continued trumpeting his
rallying-cries.
“Murray’s a goner, mates! Coupeau’s shark-bait! There’s only the
two Buckskins left. Go easy wi’ they _Jameses_. Naught for ye to
fight about, _James_ lads! We’ll divide square with ye.”
Men swirled toward us from all sides of the stockade, the _James’_
crew mingled with the _Walrus_, and where our people fought at all
’twas faint-heartedly and to no purpose. We were pressed back, and
presently were put to it to avoid being surrounded.
“We go to der house, Bob,” squeaked Peter. “Der _James_ men don’t
fight for us no more.”
He had Murray’s limp body slung over one shoulder and still retained
the iron barrel of his musket--the stock had been demolished; but he
ran easily beside me through the sand.
There was tremendous confusion within the stockade enclosure, and but
for this and a considerate cloud which draped the new-risen moon we
should never have gained the blockhouse. Our men disappeared at
every yard. Two were slain in the beginning of the retreat, and the
continuous cries of “stand off, _Jameses_--us won’t hurt ’ee,” sapped
the remainder of such loyalty as had survived the vicissitudes of the
last few days.
We reached the blockhouse alone on the side opposite the door, and
circled it cautiously, no little concerned for Moira’s safety, for
pistols were popping and cutlasses clashing in several directions
close at hand. With the moon obscured we could not see a musket’s
length ahead, and as I turned in toward the black oblong of the
doorway I tripped over a corpse.
“’Tis on your own head your death will be, my man,” said a cool
voice. “I can hear you fine, and if you’re not after----”
“Moira!” I exclaimed.
“And is it you, Bob? Oh, blessed saints, but I’m that glad. I
thought you were-- Is that Peter?”
“_Ja_,” said Peter.
“And what will ye have on your shoulder? A dead man? Is it him I
shot a few minutes back?”
“’Tis Captain Murray,” I answered, making way for Peter.
“Oh, Queen of Heaven! Sure, we’re in bad case.”
“We are,” I assented grimly as I followed Peter inside. “Have you a
light?”
She took a lanthorn from under a cloth, and its scanty rays played
hide-and-seek with the shadows over the rude log walls and the piles
of rum barrels and kegs of hard-tack and the clumsy stack of treasure.
“Where are Ben Gunn and Scipio?” I asked.
“They made off after I shot him that lies outside. They were
mightily feared of what Captain Flint would be doing to them did he
find them here, and one of his men dead at the door.”
Peter laid my great-uncle gently upon the earthen floor--there was no
softer bed--and began cutting away the garments from around the hilt
of the knife, which was still fixed in his right side.
“And why didn’t you go with them?” I asked. She gave me an indignant
look.
“And be leaving the two of ye! I am not that kind of friend, Bob.”
Peter looked up from his task.
“You got to watch dot door, Bob. Andt, Moira, you bring me some rum.
Maybe Murray gets back his sense before----”
I suddenly found myself unwilling to believe it could be so.
“He can’t, Peter!”
“_Ja_,” replied the Dutchman patiently. “Pretty soon he goes. He
bleeds inside.”
I stumbled to the doorway with my head in a whirl. Murray dying?
’Twas incredible! That tremendous personality, so masterful, so
aloof, dominating all with whom he came in contact, saltily
compounded of wickedness, greatness, wisdom and naive vanity! And
explain it how you will, I suddenly discovered an admiration for him
which had been growing for months beneath my surface resentment. Up
to this moment I had detested him. But I choked now at the thought
of his death. Whatever he was, he was no coward. And there was
about his end in this sordid, haphazard fashion, stabbed by a blind
man in the dark, a redeeming touch of high tragedy. He, whose
ambitions had vaulted the stars, to perish by the hand of Pew! And
in a moment when apparently he had snatched victory from defeat!
Mechanically I carried chests of gold and silver ingots from the heap
of treasure and built a barricade across the doorway. There were
several spare muskets and pistols, and I loaded these and placed them
handy, then knelt behind the barricade and waited for what was to
come. But nothing came. Feet shush-shushed in the sand all around
the blockhouse; voices called, questioned and argued; an occasional
shot was fired--no more. Flint’s triumph had been too amazingly
complete for him to grasp, and evidently there were dissensions in
the pirates’ ranks as to what the next step should be.
The hour-glass we had fetched from the _Royal James_ stood by the
door, and I remember that I turned it twice before Peter tapped my
shoulder.
“He wants you,” he said.
Murray lay with his head in Moira’s lap. On his face was stamped a
waxy pallor. His nostrils were sunken and pinched in. A crimson
froth showed at the corner of his mouth. But his tawny eyes blazed
with the unconquerable fire of his spirit. As I stooped over him a
mocking gleam radiated from their black depths, and his lips moved in
almost voiceless speech.
“Sorry, eh?” I nodded, and the mockery became more pronounced.
“Would have--won you--boy--in--time.” Moira wiped the dreadful
bubbles from his lips.
“You--won’t--carry--out--plot?” he asked.
“’Twould be dishonest to promise,” I answered. “And I doubt if we
are like to live much longer than you.” The fingers of one hand
fluttered strangely.
“Tut, boy--never--lose hope. Win--yet--myself.”
His colorless lips parted in a ghastly smile at the shocked disbelief
in my face.
“This--will be--end--of Flint. Kill me--kill himself.” His fingers
fluttered again, and Moira whispered----
“’Twill be his snuffbox he’s after wanting, Bob.”
And as I fumbled for it in the wreck of his coat she added----
“But ’twill be his death does he use it the once.”
I hesitated, but the look in his eyes impelled me to give it to him.
“Good lad!”
And his fingers closed lovingly on the jeweled trinket, picking at
the lid he was wont to click open and shut in moments of perplexity.
The tawny eyes flirted toward Moira.
“Take care--maid--good blood--in--her. Family,
Robert--breeding--landmarks in--mad world.”
“I’ll do what I can,” I promised, seeing he expected an answer.
“Might do--worse--or more,” he replied with the shadow of a smile.
“Pew’s knife--kept you--being--duke--Moira----”
A pause whilst Moira wiped his mouth.
“A mad world,” he repeated. “What will--Prince Charles--say?”
His eyes clouded, and he murmured a snatch of song, one of those
ranting Jacobite ballads that spread like wildfire after the ’45--
“Cope sent a challenge frae Dunbar,
‘Charlie, meet me an ye daur’----”
A coughing fit interrupted him, weakened him so I thought he was
sped; but the ghostly voice went on with a hint of the gay, reckless
tune:
“Hey, Johnnie Cope, are ye waukin’ yet?
Or are your drums a-beatin’ yet?
If ye waur waukin’ I wad----”
His voice strengthened.
“Ah, your Royal Highness! The procession is ordered--the
heralds--waiting--my Lords--Commons----”
He struggled so to rise that to save him I propped him against my
shoulder.
“A glad day--this--and long coming. Do you use snuff--sir? ’Tis
Rip-Rap--a sound brand.”
He open the box and raised a pinch to his nostrils.
“A glad day--sir--but a mad world.”
And so he died.