THE PRINCE OF ORANGE
In a long, low, narrow room in the palace of the stadtholder in the
city of Amersfort, sat Murdo, Lord of Barra and the Small Isles. The
head of a great though isolated western clan, he had detached himself
from the general sentiments of his people with regard to religion and
loyalty. First his father and then he himself had taken the Covenanting
side in the national struggle--his father through interest and
conviction, the son from interest alone. Both, however, had carried
with them the unquestioning loyalty of their clan, so that it became
an important consideration to any claimant for the throne of Britain
who desired quietness in the north to have on his side the McAlisters,
Lords of Barra and the Small Isles.
The Prince of Orange had given to both father and son a welcome and
a place of refuge when the storm of persecution shook even the wild
Highlands and the government was granting to its more zealous adherents
letters of fire and sword for the extirpation of suspected clans, and
especially for the encouragement of the well-affected by the plunder of
rebels and psalm-singers.
Now, in acknowledgment of this timely succor and safe harborage, Barra
had, ever since his father's death, given his counsel to the prince on
many matters concerning Scotland. Yet, though Murdo McAlister had been
used, he had never been fully trusted by William of Orange, nor yet by
those wise and farseeing men who stood closest about him. Something
crafty in Barra's look, something sinister in his eye, kept those who
knew him best from placing complete confidence in him. And there were
those who made no difficulty about declaring that Murdo of Barra had a
foot in either camp, and that, were it not for the importance of the
information sent from Holland to the court of James the Second, my
Lord of Barra could very well return home, and enjoy his long barren
moorlands and wave-fretted heritages in unvexed peace.
It was yet early morning when Wat and John Scarlett stood before my
Lord of Barra in the palace room which he occupied as provost-marshal
of the city and camp. They saluted him civilly, while his cold,
viperish eye took in the details of their attire with a certain chill
and insolent regard, which made Wat quiver from head to foot with
desire to kill him.
To judge by the provost-marshal's reception, he might never have seen
either of them before. Yet Lochinvar was as certain as that he lived
that it was his laugh which had jarred upon him in the passage behind
Haxo in the inn of Brederode, and which had been the means of bringing
the combat to a close. Yet he, too, must have ridden fast and far since
the fight at the inn, if Wat's vivid impression had any basis in fact.
"Your business with me?" inquired Barra, haughtily, looking straight
past them into the blank wall behind.
"You know my business," said Walter, abruptly. "I carried out your
orders in collecting information with regard to the number of the
troops, the position of the regiments, and the defences of the camp and
city. This report I was ordered to deliver to an officer of the prince
privately--in order, as I was informed, not to offend those dignitaries
of the city and others who hated the war and wished ill-success to
the prince's campaigns. I set out, therefore, last evening with three
of your retainers, supplied for the purpose by you, to the inn of
Brederode. There I was met, not by an accredited servant of the prince,
but by an officer of the French king, who endeavored first by promises
and then by force to obtain the papers from me; and now I have brought
back the reports safely to Amersfort, to lay them before the prince
in person, and, at the same time, to tax you with double-dealing and
treachery."
Barra listened with an amused air.
"And pray, whom do you expect to delude with this cock-and-bull story?"
he said. "Not, surely, the prince, in whose company I was till a late
hour last night; and not surely myself, who never in my life either
issued or heard of any such preposterous order."
"I demand to see the prince, to whom I shall speak my mind," reiterated
Walter, still more curtly.
"You shall see the inside of a prison in a few moments," returned
Barra, with vicious emphasis. But ere he could summon an officer the
inner door opened, and there entered a dark, thin, sallow-faced man,
with brilliant, hollow-set eyes, who walked with his head a little
forward, as if he had gone all his life in haste.
It was the Prince of Orange himself, dressed in his general's uniform,
but without decorations or orders of any kind.
Barra rose at his entrance and remained standing.
"Pray sit down," said the prince to him, "and proceed with your
conversation with these gentlemen of your country."
"I was about," said Barra, deferentially, "to commit to prison this
soldier of the Douglas Dragoon regiment for a most insolent slander
concerning myself, and also for collecting information as to the
condition of our forces with intent to communicate it to the enemy.
There is, indeed, an officer of the King of France with the man at
this very moment, but in disguise."
The prince turned his bright keen eyes upon Wat and Scarlett in turn.
"And you, sir! what have you to say?" he asked, quietly.
Whereupon, nothing daunted, Wat told his plain tale, and showed the
order which he had received from Sergeant Davie Dunbar, signed with
Barra's name.
"I never wrote the order, and never heard of it," said Barra, who
stood, calmly contemptuous, at the prince's elbow.
"Call Sergeant David Dunbar!" ordered the prince.
It was a few minutes before that stanch soldier arrived. In the mean
time, the prince turned his attention to Scarlett.
"You are an officer of the King of France?" he said, with an ominous
gleam in his eye as he spoke of his arch-enemy.
"I had that honor," replied Scarlett, "till early this morning, when it
was my fortune to help this ancient friend of mine out of a difficulty
into which I had led him. Moreover, being a gentleman, I could not
remain in such a service nor serve with subordinates who knew not the
sacredness of a soldier's pledge. I am, therefore, once more a free
man, and my sword is at the disposal of any honorable prince who will
accept of it."
"You were a celebrated master-of-arms in Scotland, were you not?" asked
the prince.
"If your highness is good enough to say so," said Scarlett, bowing.
"And also in France, the first in estimation in the army of the Prince
of Condé."
"And you understand the drilling and mustering of raw levies?" asked
the Prince of Orange, with some eagerness in his tone.
"There are a dozen regiments in the French service at this moment
who are exceedingly well aware of that, your highness," replied John
Scarlett, with a somewhat peculiar smile.
"Come to me this day week at the camp," said the prince, abruptly,
after remaining a moment in deep thought.
"Sergeant David Dunbar!" announced an officer of the prince's retinue.
And in a moment that sturdy Scot stood before the stadtholder
exceedingly flustered by his sudden summons, and cudgelling his brains
to think why he should be sent for so early in the day by his general.
"You took an order the night before last to this gentleman's quarters?"
said the prince. "From whom did you receive that order, and what speed
did you make with your mission?"
"I received the letter from one whom I knew as a servant of my Lord of
Barra--one Haxo, a butcher in the camp. 'Make haste,' he bade me, 'this
is from my lord to the Scot who dwells in the street of Zaandpoort,
the dragoon called Walter Gordon of Lochinvar, serving in Douglas's
regiment.' So I went there willingly enough, and eke with speed, the
more by token that I knew Wat Gordon and his cousin well, as also Will
Gordon's wife, who is a wise, sober-like lass of Galloway, and can cook
most excellent suppers."
"That will serve, sergeant," said William of Orange. "There is some
mistake or double-dealing here which I shall doubtless discover in good
time. Come to me both together at the camp this day week at the hour of
noon, and I will have further conference with you in my tent. You are
at liberty to join your regiment, and take your friend with you."
Thereupon Walter went to the prince, and, bending on his knee,
presented him with the despatches which, in the inn of Brederode, he
had guarded with his life.
The prince took them without a word of thanks or commendation, and
thrust them into the breast of his coat as carelessly as though they
had been so much waste paper.
For the soldier-prince, who had never known fear in his life, took
courage in others as a matter of course.
And so my Lord Barra was left alone in the office of the
provost-marshal, looking blackly across his table after Wat and
Scarlett as they followed the prince from the room.