BY THE BELEAGUERED CITY.
"Peace; come away; the song of woe
Is after all an earthy song:
Peace; come away; we do him wrong
To sing so wildly: let us go."
--TENNYSON.
The summer seemed interminable, lit all along though it was with the
glimmer of lilies and iridescent gleams of parti-coloured roses. It was
the season of the year which Joscelyn loved best; but now the ceaseless
sunshine, the mosaic marvels of the turf, the kaleidoscopic changes of
earth and sky wearied her, so that she longed for the coming of autumn.
It came at last, unfurling its red and yellow banners in the woodlands,
and setting its russet seal upon the meadows. And with it came the news
of the siege of Yorktown; and the town of Hillsboro' waked to new
enthusiasm and thrilled or shuddered at every alternating rumour.
And in each of those far-away armies on the York was a man who watched
the sun go westward every eve, and sent a silent message to a girl with
dark hair and sea-blue eyes who pruned her roses in a new garden of the
Hesperides beside the Eno. Unknown to each other, their thoughts had
yet a common Mecca. But fate was not content that they should stand
thus forever apart.
In Yorktown, Cornwallis had thought to be safe either to escape to
Clinton or be rescued by that general's fleet sailing down the Atlantic
from New York. But instead to the east, in Lynn Haven Bay, De Grasse's
ships held the passes to the sea; while on the land side--one wing on
York and one on Wormley creek--in two great crescents stretched the
lines of the allied armies, with Warwick creek running darkly between.
Over the tents that gleamed in the autumn sunshine there flew, side by
side, the stars and stripes of the Republic and the _fleur-de-lys_ of
France. And there were sallies and repulses, and daily encroachments and
skirmishes between the allies without and the British within.
It so happened one day that Richard's company was detailed to guard the
ditchers who were making a new trench, and throwing up a fresh line of
breastworks that would enable them to draw yet nearer to the red-coated
pickets. Already these latter had been forced--by the horns of that ever
encroaching crescent--to withdraw twice, and now a third retreat seemed
imminent. But not without a struggle would they yield their posts; and
so presently, on that mellow autumn day, a flash of scarlet came in the
sun as an assaulting column swept out toward the projected line where
the shovels were at work; and the Continental guard, after discharging
their guns with signal success, waited with fixed bayonets to receive
the advancing column. It was a fierce contest fought almost hand to
hand; then the Redcoats began to fall back, and with a quick rush the
Continentals turned their retreat to a rout.
Returning from that fierce charge with the flush of the fight upon him,
Richard came upon a man lying prone upon his face in the stubble--the
gallant English captain who had led the sally. He had seen him as he
fell far in advance of his column. There the retreat had left him inside
the new lines of the Continentals, and finding him still alive, Richard
turned him over softly so as not to start his wound afresh; and as he
did so he caught one word from the pale lips:--
"_Joscelyn._"
The name unlocked the floodgates of the young Continental's sympathies.
"Dunn," he said to the man in front of him, "give me a hand, that I may
get this poor fellow to my tent."
"The surgeon will find him here directly and have him moved to the field
hospital."
"He could not stand so long a trip; see how near he is already gone with
this bullet hole in his side. Come, I have a fancy not to see him die
here in the wet grass."
So Dunn lent his aid, and the wounded man was put down in Richard's
tent, murmuring again that talismanic name.
"He may possibly live till morning," the surgeon said, when at last he
came from attending to his own men, "but he cannot be moved. I will try
and send some one to look after him."
Richard touched his cap, "If you please, I am off duty to-night; I will
willingly nurse him, if so you give me directions."
And the man was left in his care; and during the slow hours, word by
word and sentence by sentence, he patched together the fevered ramblings
of his patient, until he knew that the Joscelyn of his own hopes and
fears and dreams was identical with the girl of this other man's
thoughts.
With the knowledge something seemed to catch at his throat, to tighten
about his heart; and he went out and stood awhile at the tent door,
gazing up into the clear heavens whose steadfast stars were shining also
on the distant Carolina hills, watching a window behind which a girl lay
sleeping--dreaming perhaps of the man yonder on the pallet. Had he lost
her through this other one? Was his life to miss its one strong purpose,
in missing her?
By and by, when he was calmer, he came again to the pallet where the
dying man lay, and picked up the sword which, along with his own, was
propped against the canvas wall of the tent. It was of beautiful
workmanship with a crest on the jewelled scabbard, and below a graven
name which, by the light of the tallow dip, Richard at last spelled
out:--
"Barry."
He stood thinking for a moment. Why, this then was the man for whom
Ellen Singleton had mistaken him that night he played the squire to her
in a borrowed military cloak at the fete in Philadelphia. What strange
fate had brought them thus together? "The finest officer who wears the
red, and a lady-killer," Dunn had said. And that tightness gathered
again at Richard's heart, for where else had he heard of the man?
Stay, was not Barry the name--Yes, it was the very name he had heard
coupled with Joscelyn's that night while he lay hiding in the freezing
attic. "She is sitting on the stair with Captain Barry." The very tones
of the speaker came back to him, bringing again that thirsty desire to
open the door and look for her which he had not been able to resist,
though life itself might pay the forfeit.
He went back to the pallet, and bent down that he might see the face of
his patient. So this was the man who had won her away from the rest of
her company, the man to whom she had bent down so low that from the rear
only the dark crown of her hair could be seen as she sat on her
steps--this was the man to whose love tale she had listened smilingly,
while he himself was a prisoner hiding for his very life. A lady-killer,
Dunn had said; and well he could believe it from the traces of manly
beauty still lingering in the suffering face. A fierce jealousy tore at
his heart. Evidently, from his ramblings, Joscelyn had listened to this
other's wooing, and had written him letters, while she mocked him and
sent him never so much as one little line in answer to all the pages he
wrote her. He had always known that other men would love her,--it could
not be otherwise with her sweetness and her beauty,--but always in his
thoughts she had kept herself for him. Had it been a false hope; had she
loved this brave Briton who called upon her with such pathos of
tenderness? If so, then was his own dream-castle in ruins.
By and by, just before the end, there came a lucid hour. The wounded man
turned his eyes questioningly upon his nurse.
"I found you after the fight, so far in our lines that your own men had
missed you in their retreat, and the surgeon left you in my care,"
Richard said gently.
"To die? Yes, I see it in your eyes."
"You fell at the head of your men, as a soldier wishes death to find
him."
The other smiled faintly, "My mother will perchance be a little
comforted by that. You will write her?"
"Yes--And Joscelyn?"
"Joscelyn?--how do you happen--?"
"You talked of her in your delirium. She lives in the Carolina hill
country. I, too, know her and--love her."
And then each told something of his story to the other; and they clasped
hands as brave men can when enmity and prejudice and jealousy are
swallowed up in the wide sympathy that lurks forever in the precincts of
the Great Shadow.
"And when the war is over, and I tell her again of my love," said
Richard, with that impulsive generosity that was ever one of his
characteristics, "I will tell her also of yours--and mayhap she will
choose rather to cherish your memory than to give herself to me."
And Barry turned his face to the wall and died, whispering his love for
her to the last. It was a strange scene, this midnight confessional
between two men who, all unknown to each other, had striven for the same
heart-goal--who in life would have been bitter and unrelenting rivals,
but who met and parted amid the shadows of death as friends and
brothers. Richard wrote it all to Joscelyn, eloquently, passionately;
portraying faithfully every emotion of the dying man.
"He loved you, Joscelyn, even as I do; only not so much, for
methinks no man could do that. But he was brave and manly, and to
have won his heart is proof of your sweetness and worth. He told me
many things of that fearful night when I lay up in your garret, and
downstairs you held your guests from all suspicion by your tact and
courage. He hated Tarleton for his distrust of you, and I let him
go to the far Shore in ignorance of how you saved me, fearing that
he would not understand, and that his last moments would be
imbittered by a useless jealousy.
"Did you love him? Am I breaking your heart with this news, my
best beloved? If so, remember, I beseech you, how my own would
break to know it."
And Joscelyn read the letter by the fading sunset, and then sat with wet
eyes through the star-haunted gloaming, thinking of the young life that
had gone out in the red trail of war. She missed him as it did not seem
possible she could have missed any one who had been so short a while in
her consciousness.
And sitting thus alone with her sorrow, she felt a hand on hers and an
arm slip around her neck.
"Joscelyn, I could not stay away any longer," whispered Betty's voice in
the dark. "I had both of your notes; I know you are sorry, and I miss
you so much!"
"Dear Betty, dear Betty, how glad I am you are come! I cannot tell you
how lonely and wretched my life is, and now my--my true friend is gone!"
and with her head on the girl's bosom, she gave way to a nervous
sobbing.
"Did you love him?" Betty asked, when at last she understood.
"I--I do not know; but I have so few friends, and he loved me and
trusted me, and I shall miss him."
"Did you wish to marry him?"
"I cannot say. Sometimes when I have been very lonely, and you all
turned from me, I have thought I did. To marry him and go away to a new
place and new friends seemed best. He was strong and brave, but he was
gentle and considerate, and he never hectored me--a girl likes not to
be hectored and quarrelled with in her courting."
"No," answered Betty, sadly, understanding she had Richard in mind.
Often, with a woman's instinct, she had pleaded with her brother to
humour Joscelyn more in her way of looking at things; but he had chosen
to attempt to set her right, or, at least, right as he saw it.
"I must be going; mother is at Mistress Strudwick's and will be angry if
she knows I came here," Betty said at last, rising with a sigh. But
Joscelyn held her back with both hands.
"Not yet, Betty, not yet; we can see her far down the street by the
lights from the windows. Stay a little longer; it is such a comfort to
have you."
"I wish I could come without this deception."
"I, too, with all my heart."
"You had a letter to-day; was it from Master Singleton?"
"No; it was this sad one from Richard, by the same messenger that
brought yours. The last letter I had from Eustace was the one I sent you
some two weeks ago. Since he was then on the eve of going to New York to
carry letters to General Clinton, it is not likely he is among those in
the beleaguered city of Yorktown."
"I have been so glad to think this," Betty answered, sighing. "Do you
know, Joscelyn, I saw him in the parlour yonder for a few minutes the
day the British marched?"
"Yes; I told mother to have you here, and then I sent him back from
headquarters."
Betty kissed her gratefully. "I might have guessed it. It was such a
happy ten minutes! But, Joscelyn, mother never mentions his name except
to remind me that his father and mine were bitter enemies."
"Wait until Richard comes home; he doubtless will look at matters
differently; and as he says, so will your mother do."
"Not unless you plead for me; and even that may not now avail, for he
may share mother's anger against you."
"Richard will not be angry with me when he returns," Joscelyn answered
confidently; and Betty kissed her softly.
"Oh, Joscelyn, if it could only have been Richard instead of Captain
Barry to win even this much of your heart! But there, I must be going;
some one is coming down the street."
"You will come again sometime?"
"Yes, for I have wanted you so much."
"And I you."
They held each other close for a moment, and then Betty ran across the
street and dodged into the shadow of her own door. Her visit helped
Joscelyn immeasurably, in that it gave her a sense of sympathy. But she
could not shake off the depression of Richard's news; it was a
culmination of the long strain upon her nervous system. In the
succeeding days she had fits of silent brooding which sometimes, in the
sombre twilights, ended in tears. For the first time since the news of
Lexington, her neighbours found her grave and preoccupied. The fearless
badinage with which she had met every attack upon her partisan creed was
suddenly stayed, as though she heard not their thrusts and innuendoes.
And Mistress Strudwick watched her with a vague uneasiness, longing to
see the old, quick passion flame up now and then.
But this frame of mind was rudely broken by the thrilling news of the
fall of Yorktown. She had expected it for days, but the reality roused
all of her former spirit, and put her once more upon the defensive.
"Lord Cornwallis has surrendered?" she said calmly to Amanda Bryce and
the two gossips, who had run in to tell her the news and to gloat over
her discomfiture. "'Tis most courteous of you to bring me the
information so swiftly; you are quite out of breath with your race. I
shall immediately write my sincere condolences to his lordship that
wrong has triumphed over right. Will you not have a cup of tea with me,
ladies?--there is no longer any tax. No? Then I have the honour to wish
you a very good morning. Pray come again when you have further tidings."
She set the door open for them with the air of a sovereign condescending
to her subjects; and they went away humiliated and furious.
"From the airs she gives herself, one would think Joscelyn Cheshire had
royal blood in her veins," they said angrily. But when Mistress
Strudwick heard of the scene, she laughed long and heartily.
"They deserved it, the carping crones! Would I had been there to see
them routed. Thank Heaven her spirit has come back; how I love her for
it, unreconstructed Tory as she is!"
Never again was Joscelyn to deck herself in her scarlet bodice in honour
of an English victory; never again to tease her neighbours with her
taunting Tory ballads. The war was over; she had lost her cause; and
with her life all out of attune with her surroundings she must face the
inevitable. Seeing the relief in her mother's face, she could not be
sorry that peace had come, though the terms were bitter; and so even in
her loss was there something of compensation.