MALBROUCK S'EN VA.
"There is mischief of some sort brewing," said Mr. Smellie, the
Riding Officer.
"You think so?" queried Mr. Pennefather, trimming a quill.
"I'd stake my last shilling on it," said Mr. Smellie, slapping his
right boot with his riding-whip. "You, a family man, now--"
"Eleven."
"Quite so. Then you must know how it is with children; when they
look at you as though there was no such thing as original sin, it's
time to keep your eye lifting. Ten to one they're getting round you
with some new devilry. Well, that's the way with your Cornish."
Mr. Smellie came from Glasgow--he and his colleague, Mr. Lomax, the
Riding Officer of the Mevagissey district which lay next to ours.
The Government, it was understood, had chosen and sent them down to
us on the strength of their sense of humour--so different from any to
be found in the Duchy.
It certainly was different. To Mr. Smellie, we of Troy had been at
first but as children at play by the sea; in earnest over games so
infantile as to excite his wondering disdain. He wondered yet; but
insensibly--as might happen to a man astray in fairyland--his disdain
had taken a tinge of fear. Behind "the children sporting on the
shore," his ear had begun to catch the voice of unknown waters
rolling. They came, so to speak, along the sands, these children;
innocent seeming, hilariously intent on their make-believe; and then,
on a sudden, not once but a dozen times, he had found himself
tricked, duped, tripped up and cast on his back; to rise unhurt,
indeed, but clutching at impalpable air while the empty beach rang
with teasing laughter.
It baffled him the more because, of his own sort, he had a strong
sense of humour. It was told of Mr. Pennefather, for instance, that
during his clerkship at Penzance the Custom House there had been
openly defied by John Carter, the famous smuggler of Prussia Cove;
that once, when Carter was absent on an expedition, the Excise
officers had plucked up heart, ransacked the Cove, carried off a
cargo of illicit goods and locked it up in the Custom House; that
John Carter on his return, furious at the news of his loss, had
marched over to Penzance under cover of darkness, broken in the
Custom House and carried off his goods again; and that Mr.
Pennefather next morning, examining the rifled stores, had declared
the nocturnal visitor to be John Carter beyond a doubt, because
Carter was an honest man and wouldn't take anything that didn't
belong to him. The Riding Officer thought this a highly amusing
story, and would often twit Mr. Pennefather with it. But Mr.
Pennefather could never see the joke, and would plead,--
"Well, but he _was_ an honest man, wasn't he?"
"That's the way with you Cornish," repeated Mr. Smellie; "and after a
time one learns to feel it in the air, so to speak."
The little Collector looked up from his ledger, pushing his
spectacles high on his brow, and glanced vaguely around the office.
"Now, for my part, I detect nothing unusual," said he.
"Furthermore," the Riding Officer went on, still tapping his boot,
"I met a suspicious-looking fellow yesterday on the Falmouth Road; a
deucedly suspicious-looking fellow; a fellow that answered me with a
strong French accent when I spoke to him, as I made it my business to
do. He had Guernsey merchant written all over him."
"Tattooed?" asked Mr. Pennefather, without looking up from the ledger
in which he had buried himself anew. "I had no idea they went to
such lengths . . . in Guernsey . . . and fourteen is twenty-seven,
and five is thirty-two, and thirty-two is two-and-eight. . . . I beg
your pardon? You identified him, then?"
Mr. Smellie frowned. "I shall send up a private note to the
Barracks; and meanwhile, I advise you to keep an eye lifting."
"And ten is three-and-six. . . . An eye lifting, certainly," assented
Mr. Pennefather, without, however, immediately acting on this advice.
"There's that fellow Hymen, now, next door. He's not altogether the
ass he looks, or my name's not Smellie."
"But it is, surely?" Mr. Pennefather looked up in innocent surprise.
"And you really think it justifies calling in the Dragoons?"
"On the face of it, no; I've no evidence. And yet, I repeat, there's
some mischief afoot. This new game of Hymen's, for instance--Before
coming down to these parts"--Mr. Smellie threw a fine condescension
into this phrase--"I should have thought it impossible that anyone in
the shape of a man, let alone of a Major of Artillery, could solemnly
propose to test a neighbouring corps by a night attack, and then as
solemnly give warning on what night he meant to deliver it."
Mr. Pennefather took off his spectacles and polished them with his
silk handkerchief. "But without that precaution he would find nobody
to attack."
"I tell you, it's absurd! And yet," the Riding Officer went on
irritably, "if one could count on its being absurd, I wouldn't mind.
But there's just a chance that, with all this foolery, Hymen and Pond
are covering up a little game. Why have they chosen Talland Cove,
now?"
"I suppose because, for a night attack on Looe, there's no better
spot."
"Nor for running a cargo. I tell you, I shall keep the Dragoons on
the alert."
"You don't suggest that you suspect--"
"Suspect? I suspect everybody. It's the rule of the service; and by
following it I've reached the position I hold to-day."
"True." The Collector readjusted his spectacles and returned to his
figures. There may have been just a hint of condolence in his
accent, for the Riding Officer looked up sharply.
"If you lived in the north, Pennefather, do you know what we should
say about you? We should say that you were no very gleg in the
uptake."
"I once," answered the Collector, gently, without lifting his head
from the ledger, "began to read Burns, but had to give him up on
account of the dialect."
Meanwhile, all unaware of these dark suspicions, the Major and his
Gallants were perfecting their preparations for the great surprise.
And what preparations! In the heat of them we had almost forgotten
the Millennium itself!
For weeks the band had been practising a selection of tunes
appropriate (1) to invasions in general and (2) to this particular
invasion. There was "Britons, Strike Home!" for instance, and
"The Padstow Hobby-horse," and "The Rout it is out for the Blues,"
slightly amended for the occasion:
"As I was a-walking on Downderry sands,
Some dainty fine sport for to view,
The maidens were wailing and wringing their hands--
Oh, the Rout it is out for the Looes,
For the Looes,
Oh, the Rout it is out for the Looes."
The very urchins whistled and sang it about the streets. On the
other hand, the Major's chivalrous proposal to hymn _The George of
Looe_ came to nothing, since Captain Pond could supply him with
neither the words nor the air.
"Notwithstanding all my researches," he wrote, "the utmost I can
discover is the following stanza which Gunner Israel Spettigew--
vulgarly termed Uncle Issy--one of my halest veterans, remembers to
have heard sung in his youth:
"'Oh, the _George of Looe_ sank Number One;
She then sank Number Two;
She finished up with Number Three:
And hooray for the _George of Looe_'!"
"Dammy!" said the Major, "and I dare say that passes for invention
over at Looe."
We in Troy were no paupers of invention, at any rate. Take, for
example, the Major's plan of campaign. First of all you must figure
to yourself a _terrain_ shaped like a triangle--almost an equilateral
triangle--with its base resting on the sea. At the western extremity
of this base stands Troy; at the eastern, Looe, with Talland Cove a
little to this side of it. For western side of the triangle we have
the Troy River; and for apex the peaceful village of Lerryn, set in
apple-orchards, where the tidal waters end by a narrow bridge.
For the eastern side we take, not the Looe River (which doesn't
count), but an ancient earthwork, known as the Devil's Hedge, which
stretches across country from Looe up to Lerryn. Who built this
earthwork, or when he did it, or for what purpose, no one can tell;
but the Looe folk will quote you the following distich,--
"One day the Devil, having nothing to do,
Built a great hedge from Lerryn to Looe."
(Invention again!)
Of these things, then (as Herodotus puts it), let so much be said.
But thus we get our triangle: the sea coast (base), the Troy River
and the Devil's Hedge (sides), meeting at the village of Lerryn
(apex) among the orchards.
Now these orchards, you must know, on May mornings when the tide
served, were the favourite rendezvous for the lads and maidens of
Troy, and even for the middle-aged and married; who would company
thither by water, to wash their faces in the dew, and eat cream,
and see the sun rise, and afterwards return chorussing, their boats
draped with green boughs.
This year the tide, indeed, served for Lerryn: but this year the
maidens of Troy, if they would fare thither to pay their vows, must
fare alone. Their swains would be bent upon a sterner errand.
So their Commander by secret orders had dictated, and all the town
knew of it; also that the landing was to be effected in Talland Cove,
and that, if success waited on their arms, supper would be provided
at the Sloop Inn, Looe. One hundred and fifty fighting men would go
to the assault, in fourteen row-boats, with muffled oars. This
number included the band. The residue of thirty men, making up the
full strength of the corps, had disappeared from Troy some ten days
before, on an errand which will appear hereafter.
But the fair were inconsolable. Almost, for some forty-eight hours--
that is to say, after the news leaked out--our Major was the most
unpopular man in Troy with them who had ever been his warmest
supporters. War was war, no doubt; and women must mourn at home
while men imbrued themselves in the gallant strife. But May-day,
too, was May-day; and the tides served; and, further, there was this
talk about a Millennium, and whatever the Millennium might be (and
nobody but the Mayor and the Vicar, unless it were Dr. Hansombody,
seemed to know), it was certainly not an occasion on which women
ought to be left without their natural protectors. Even the
Ambulance Corps was bound for Looe, in eight additional boats.
There would be scarce a row-boat left in the harbour, or the ladies
might have pulled up to Lerryn on their own account.
The Major suspected these murmurings, yet he kept an unruffled brow:
yes, even though harassed with vexations which these ladies could not
guess--the possible defection of Hansombody, for instance.
It was not Hansombody's fault: but Sir Felix Felix-Williams, who
owned the estate as well as the village of Lerryn, had reason to
expect an addition to his family. Dr. Hansombody could not guarantee
that he might not be summoned to Pentethy, Sir Felix's mansion, at
any moment.
Now, for excellent reasons--which, again, will appear--the Major
could not afford to make Sir Felix an enemy at this moment.
Besides, these domestic events were the little apothecary's bread and
butter.
On the other hand, the absence of a professional man must seriously
discredit the role assigned to the Ambulance Corps in any engagement,
however bloodless.
"You might," the Major suggested, "nominate half a dozen as deputy or
assistant surgeons. You could easily pick out those who have shown
most intelligence at your lectures."
"True," agreed the Doctor; "but as yet we have not, in my lectures,
advanced so far as flesh-wounds. They would know what to do, I hope,
if confronted with frost-bite, snake-bite, sunstroke or incipient
croup--from all of which our little expedition will be (under
Providence) immune, and I have as yet confined myself to directing
them, in all cases which apparently differ from these, to run to the
nearest medical man."
"Well, well!" sighed the Major. "Then, if the worst come to the
worst and you cannot accompany us, we must rely on the good offices
of the enemy. They have no qualified surgeon, I believe: but the
second lieutenant, young Couch of Polperro, is almost out of his
articles and ready to proceed to Guy's. A clever fellow, too, they
tell me."
"You understand that if I fail you, it will be through no want of
zeal?"
"My friend"--the Major turned on him with a smile at once magnanimous
and tender--"I believe you ask nothing better than to accompany me."
"To the death!" said the Doctor, in a low voice and fervently.
Then, after a pause full of emotion, "Your dispositions are all
taken?"
"All, I believe. Chinn has drawn up a new will for me, which I have
signed, and it lies at this moment in my deed-box. I took the
liberty to appoint you an executor."
"You would not ask me to survive you!" (O Friendship! O exemplars
of a sterner age! O Rome! O Cato!) "Not to mention," went on the
Doctor, "that I must be by five or six years your senior, and in the
ordinary course of events--"
Major Hymen dismissed the ordinary course of events with a wave of
the hand.
"I ask it as a personal favour."
"It is an honour then, and I accede."
"For the rest, I am keeping that fellow Smellie on the _qui vive_.
For three days past he has been promenading the cliffs with his
spy-glass. I would not lightly depreciate any man, but Smellie has
one serious fault--he is ambitious."
"Such men are to be found in every walk of life."
"I fear so. Ambition is like to be Smellie's bane. He is jealous of
sharing any credit with the Preventive crews, and is keeping them
without information. On the other hand he delights in ordering about
a military force; which, in a civilian, is preposterous."
"Quite preposterous."
"The Dragoons, of course, hate working under his orders: but I shall
be surprised if he resist the temptation to call them in and dress
himself in a little brief authority. Further, I have word from
Polperro that he is getting together a company of the Sea Fencibles.
In short, he is playing into our hands."
"But the boats?"
"They are here."
"Here?" The Doctor's eyes grew round with wonder.
The Major swept a hand towards the horizon.
"For two days we have been enjoying a steady southerly breeze.
They are yonder, you may be sure--the three of them: and that is
where Smellie makes a mistake in not employing the cutter."
"And the long-boats?"
"The long-boats are lying, as they have lain for three weeks past, in
Runnells' yard, awaiting repairs. Runnells is a dilatory fellow and
has gone no farther than to fill them with water up to the thwarts,
to test their stanchness." Here the Major allowed himself to smile.
"But Runnells, though dilatory, will launch them after dusk, while
the tide suits."
"The tide makes until five o'clock."
"Until five-twenty, to be correct. Before seven o'clock they will be
launched."
"You play a bold game, dear friend. Suppose, now, that Smellie _had_
kept the cutter cruising off the coast?"
The Major smiled again, this time with _finesse_. "The man is
ambitious, I tell you. By employing the cutter he might indeed have
intercepted the cargo. But he flies at higher game." Here the Major
lightly tapped his chest to indicate the quarry. "In generalship, my
dear doctor, to achieve anything like the highest success, you must
fight with two heads--your own and your adversary's. By putting
myself in Smellie's place; by descending (if I may so say) into the
depths of his animal intelligence, by interpreting his hopes, his
ambitions . . . well, in short, I believe we have weathered the risk.
The Mevagissey fleet puts out to the grounds to-night, to anchor and
drop nets as usual. With them our friends from Guernsey--shall we
say?--will mingle as soon as night is fallen, hang out _their_
riding-lights, lower _their_ nets, and generally behave in a fashion
indistinguishable from that of other harvesters of the sea, until the
hour when, with lightened hulls and, I trust, in full regimentals
(for they carry their uniforms on board) they join us for the Grand
Assault."
"But--excuse me--how much does the town know of this programme?"
The Major shrugged his shoulders. "As little as I could manage.
I have incurred some brief unpopularity, no doubt, among the fairer
portion of our community, who deem that I am denying them their
annual May-day jaunt. But never fear. I will explain all to-night,
before embarkation."
"They may murmur," answered Dr. Hansombody, "but in their hearts they
trust you."
The Major's eyes filled with tears.
"The path of duty is strewn with more than roses at times. I thank
you for that assurance, my friend."
They grasped hands in silence.
Troy remembered later--it had reason to remember--through what
halcyon weather April passed, that year, into May. For three days a
gentle breeze had blown from the south; for three more days it
continued, dying down at nightfall and waking again at dawn.
Stolen days they seemed: cloudless, gradual, golden; a theft of
Spring from Harvest-tide. Unnatural weather, many called it: for the
air held the warmth of full summer before the first swallow appeared,
and while as yet the cuckoo, across the harbour, had been heard by
few.
The after-glow of sunset had lingered, but had faded at length,
taking the new moon with it, leaving a night so pale, so clear, so
visibly domed overhead, that almost the eye might trace its curve and
assign to each separate star its degree of magnitude. Beyond the
harbour's mouth the riding-lights of the Mevagissey fishing fleet ran
like a carcanet of faint jewels, marking the unseen horizon of the
Channel. The full spring tide, soundless or scarcely lapping along
shore, fell back on its ebb, not rapidly as yet, but imperceptibly
gathering speed. Below the Town Quay in the dark shadow lay the
boats--themselves a shadowy crowd, ghostly, with a glimmer of white
paint here and there on gunwales, thwarts, stern-sheets. Their
thole-pins had been wrapped with oakum and their crews sat
whispering, ready, with muffled oars. On the Quay, lantern in hand,
the Major moved up and down between his silent ranks, watched by a
shadowy crowd.
In that crowd, as I am credibly informed, were gathered--but none
could distinguish them--gentle and simple, maiden ladies with their
servants or housekeepers, side by side with longshoremen, hovellers,
giglet maids, and urchins; all alike magnetised and drawn thither by
the Man and the Hour. But the Major recognised none of them.
His dispositions had been made and perfected a full week before; how
thoroughly they had been perfected might be read in the mute alacrity
with which man after man, squad after squad, without spoken command
yet in unbroken order, dissolved out of the ranks and passed down to
the boats. You could not see that Gunner Tippet, being an
asthmatical man, wore a comforter and a respirating shield; nor that
Sergeant Sullivan, as notoriously susceptible to the night air,
carried a case-bottle and a small basket of boiled sausages. Yet
these and a hundred other separate and characteristic necessities had
been foreseen and provided for.
Van, mainguard, rearguard, band, ambulance, forlorn hope, all were
embarked at length. Lieutenant Chinn saluted, reported the entire
flotilla ready, saluted again, and descended the steps with the
Doctor (Sir Felix had sent no word, after all). Only the Major
remained on the Quay's edge. Overhead rode the stars; around him in
the penumbra of the lantern's rays the crowd pressed forward timidly.
He turned.
"Fellow-citizens," he said, and his voice trembled on the words, but
in an instant was steady again, "you surmise, no doubt, the purpose
of this expedition. An invader menaces these shores, the defence of
which has been committed to us. Of the ultimate invincibility of
that defence I have no doubt whatever; nevertheless, it may expose
here and there a vulnerable point. It is to test the alertness of
our neighbours of Looe that we abstract ourselves for a few hours
from the comforts of home, the society of the fair, in some instances
the embraces of our loved ones, and embark upon an element which,
to-night propitious, might in other moods have engulfed, if it did
not actually force us to postpone, our temerity--" (Here a voice
said, "Well done, Major; give 'em Troy!")
"Methinks," continued the Major, elevating his lantern and turning to
that part of the crowd whence the interruption had proceeded,
"methinks I hear some fair one sigh, 'But why to-night? Why on the
eve of May-day, when we are wont to seek one or other of those rural
spots, vales, hamlets, remote among our river's lovelier reaches,
where annually the tides have mirrored at sunrise our gala companies
and the green woods responded to our innocent mirth? Why on this
consecrated eve distract our hitherto faithful swains and lead their
steps divergent at an angle of something like thirty degrees?'
I have reason to believe that some such tender complaints have made
themselves audible, and it is painful to me to suffer the imputation
of lack of feeling, even from an Aeolian harp. Yet I have suffered
it, awaiting the moment to reassure you.
"Yes, ladies, be reassured! We depart indeed for Looe; but we hope,
ere dawn, to meet you at Lerryn and be rewarded with your approving
smiles. At nine-thirty precisely the three long-boats, _Naiad_,
_Nautilus_, and _Corona_, which have lain for some weeks under repair
in Mr. Runnells' yard, will pass this Quay and proceed seaward, each
manned by an able, if veteran, crew. After a brief trip outside the
harbour--to test their stanchness--they will return to the Quay to
embark passengers, and start at 2 a.m. on the excursion up the river
to our rendezvous at Lerryn. Nay!" the Major turned at the head of
the steps and lifted a hand--"I will accept of you no thanks but
this, that during the few arduous hours ahead of us we carry your
wishes, ladies, as a prosperous breeze behind our banners!"
"Now isn't he a perfect duck?" demanded Miss Sally Tregentil, turning
in the darkness and addressing Miss Pescod, whose strongly marked and
aquiline features she had recognised in the last far-flung ray of the
Major's lantern.
"My good Sarah! _You_ here?" answered Miss Pescod, divided between
surprise, disapproval and embarrassment.
"At such a period--a crisis, one might almost say--when the fate of
Europe . . . and after all, if it comes to that, so are you."
"For my part--" began Miss Pescod, and ended with a sigh.
"For my part," declared Miss Sally, hardily, "I shall go to Lerryn."
"Sally!"
"It used to be great fun. In later years mamma disapproved, but
there is (may I confess it?) this to be said for war, that beneath
its awful frown--under cover of what I may venture to call the
shaking of its gory locks--you can do a heap of things you wouldn't
dream of under ordinary circumstances. Life, though more precarious,
becomes distinctly less artificial. Two years ago, for instance,
lulled in a false security by the so-called Peace of Amiens, I should
as soon have thought of flying through the air."
"Has it occurred to you," Miss Pescod suggested, "what might happen
if the Corsican, taking advantage to-night of our dear Major's
temporary absence--"
"Don't!" Miss Sally interrupted with a shiver. "Oh, decidedly I
shall go to Lerryn to-night! On second thoughts it would be only
proper."
On the dark waters below them, beyond the Quay, a hoarse military
voice gave the command to "Give way!" One by one on the
fast-dropping tide the boats, keeping good order, headed for the
harbour's mouth. The Major led. _O navis, referent_ . . .
Think, I pray you, of Wolfe dropping down the dark St. Lawrence; of
Wolfe and, ahead of him, the Heights of Abraham!