_Jaff_. Ha!
_Pierre_. Speak; is't fitting?
_Jaff_. Fitting!
_Pierre_. Yes; is't fitting?
_Jaff_. What's to be done?
_Pierre_. I'd have thee undertake
Something that's noble to preserve my memory
From the disgrace that's ready to attaint it.
OTWAY.
The attorney's sleep was long and sound; and, by and by,
notwithstanding the exciting nature of the midnight events, sleep
visited the eyes of all others in the prison, even those of the
hapless Hyland. The misery of his situation was complete. His hopes
of escape, confirmed almost to certainty by Affidavy in his last
visit, in which the whole plan was explained to him by this honest
gentleman, threw him into a frenzy of joy; and it was with
unspeakable agitation that he listened to the subdued murmurs below,
which told him the first and most critical scene of the conspiracy
had already begun. How the attempt of Affidavy upon the head of the
jailer terminated has been already seen; how the scheme might have
eventuated, had this rapacious wretch followed out the plan he had
proposed to the others, which was to bribe the jailer into
connivance, it is not so easy to say, Lingo being perhaps too much of
a philosopher in his way, to refuse a good price for his honesty. But
Affidavy, while he held the bone in his mouth, hungered exceedingly
for the shadow, or, to speak more strictly, for that smaller morsel
destined for the jaws of his friend; and, in consequence, adopted the
foolish device of the 'hocussed' cup, in which he encountered so
signal a failure. While Hyland sat in his cell, devoured by
expectation, the door was opened, and the jailer's assistant entered,
bearing a heavy set of fetters, which he forthwith proceeded to
fasten upon his limbs. This was the first moment they were ever thus
dishonoured; but the unhappy youth thought not of the disgrace; he
saw at once that the scheme of flight was defeated, and that his
hopes had been encouraged, only to be blasted. The agitation of his
spirits threw him into a swoon; rousing from which, he gave himself
up to despair, until his thoughts were diverted into a new channel by
an unexpected commotion below, which was indeed caused by nothing
less than the entrance into the prison of the five men whom Hanschen
had secretly summoned to his assistance. He heard them pass into the
yard, and inferred at once that the scheme for his escape was
intended to be turned against his unsuspecting friends. For this
reason, he gave the alarm, the instant he heard the gate swinging on
its hinges, and would have done so sooner, had he been able to
approach the window, so as to look out upon the proceedings of the
jailer. Let his sufferings be imagined, when he heard the sudden din
of pistols and voices, followed by execrations and groans, without
knowing aught of the result of the rencounter, except that it had
been fatal to his own hopes. He saw the jailer look into the
apartment, his visage stained with blood, and then depart without
satisfying his painful curiosity; and then followed a long period of
silence, equally oppressive and distracting. Great as was his
distress, however, it contributed in the end to stupify his mind; and
towards morning, he fell into an uneasy slumber, to add the tortures
of the ideal to those of the material world. From this he was aroused
by a noise, as it seemed, at his window; and starting up, he
distinctly heard a voice pronounce his name. It was but a whisper,
and that fainter than the lowest chirping of the insects; but he
recognized at once the tones of Oran; and, scarce repressing a cry of
joy, he rushed towards the window. The chain was still upon his body,
and its clash, with the rattling of the ring by which it was attached
to the floor, told to Oran, as well as to his own spirit, how vain
was the effort. The cell which he inhabited was in a corner of the
building, and the wall of the yard was perhaps within six or seven
feet of the window, which was more elevated, and therefore overlooked
it. It was possible for a man, standing on the top of the wall, and
of sufficient strength of body to support himself, lizard-like, while
leaning towards the window, almost to reach it with his arms; and
Hyland, who had noted these circumstances before, easily understood
the situation of his visiter, which besides being extremely
dangerous, was also exposed to observation.
"I cannot approach, Oran," he cried in the same whispering tones; "I
am chained to the floor."
"Hold forth your hand," muttered the refugee, "and cast me the end of
your neckcloth. You shall have files and aquafortis; and to-morrow
night you shall be free. Cast out the neckcloth."
"I cannot," replied the prisoner, with a voice of despair; "I cannot
reach the bars, even if I had files to cut them. What shall I do? Oh,
brother, brother! why did you leave me? Speak, brother, for Heaven's
sake, speak! Can you help me?"
The refugee remained silent, apparently struck dumb, either by the
reproach of his brother, or by the discovery of his inability to help
himself; and Hyland, imagining that his silence was owing to some
sudden alarm, held his own peace, awaiting the event. In a short
time, however, the refugee spoke again: the whisper was as low as
before, but it was broken by some strong tumult of feeling.
"I can _not_ help you, Hyland," he said,--"unless, unless----But
hold; I will fling a file through the bars, and you can saw yourself
free. Throw your bed on the floor under the window, that it may make
no noise. Are you ready?"
"I am," said Hyland; and the next instant he heard the steel
instrument strike upon the bars of the grating, whence it fell
ringing among the stones in the yard. A second was cast with better
effect, and entering the window, fell upon the couch. But as if fate
now designed to tantalize the unhappy youth into distraction, he no
sooner sought to obtain it by dragging the bed towards him, than he
heard it fall off upon the floor, where it remained beyond his reach,
and must remain until discovered by the jailer. This mishap being
communicated to Oran, drew from him an exclamation, in which Hyland
was made aware of his hopeless situation:
"God help you!" he cried, "I can do no more."
"Yes, Oran, yes!" exclaimed the prisoner, "you can help me yet. Throw
me a knife"----
"Hah!" said Oran, "and you will use it on the jailer? ay! as he bears
you to the court house, in the morning! Strike him in the throat--I
will be by, and, perhaps--Well, well, you will at least die like a
man, not like a dog. Will you kill him?"
"No!" said the youth; "God pardon me the blood I have shed already: I
will never more harm a human being--no, not even to save my wretched
body from shame. Yet throw it to me, throw it to me!"
"And for what?" muttered Oran, in tones scarce audible.
"For what?" replied the prisoner. "Oh God, do you ask me, brother?"
"For your own bosom then? Ay, can we do no more? And the lawyers,
then, can give you no hope, not even for money?"
"None, none: I am condemned already--The knife, the knife!"
"The dream's out!" said Oran, with what seemed a laugh. "When I was a
little boy, and the rest were but babes about me, I dreamed, one
night, that there were seven of us together, though there were but
four of them born, and that I killed them. And so they say _I have_
indeed! Well, boy, I have killed you, as well as the rest, and now I
am alone. You shall have the knife--yet be not in a hurry. Something
may turn up: Sir Guy may demand a military trial--But no, I am lying
to my own heart: you must die, Hyland, you must die! for even I
cannot help you."
"The knife will help me."
"Take it!" said the refugee, with a voice so loud as to show his
feelings had got the better of his caution,--and indeed his accents
betrayed the most vehement agitation; "take it!" he cried, flinging
it against the window with a motion so reckless or perturbed, that it
did not even strike the bars, but coming in contact with the stone
framework, it rebounded and fell, like the file, to the ground below.
"Ha ha! you see, brother! there is no hope for you,--no, not even in
the knife!"
"Brother!" cried Hyland, "you can help me yet."
"It is false!" said the other: "my band is broken, my body bleeding,
and now, if they would send a boy against me, why a boy might take
me."
"Listen, brother--it is my dying prayer," said Hyland, "and nothing
else can be done. Before midnight of the coming day--perhaps
earlier--I shall be a doomed man--doomed to death--doomed to the
gallows? Brother, don't let me die on the gallows! Where is Staples?
He can send a bullet through the eye of a leaping buck; I have seen
him kill a night-hawk on the wing. Brother, you will be my heir--give
him what you will, give him _all_, and let him come to-morrow night
on the square, and when he sees a candle held at this window, let him
fire at it,--let him aim well,--at the candle, brother, at the
candle! Oh heaven! do you not hear me?"
"I hear," said Oran. "A wild freak that, but good! ay, boy, good,
good, good! But Staples--ha, ha! Choose another: take the whole band;
one will be as ready to serve you as another."
Had not the prisoner been prevented by his own feelings from giving
note to any thing save the mere words of the refugee, he might have
detected the traces of some extraordinary emotion in the unusual
abruptness of his expressions. He even failed to observe the
incongruity between Oran's invitation to choose an executioner from
his whole band, and the late declaration he had made, that the band
was broken up. He repeated the name of Staples, adding, "Let it be
Staples, brother, for he is the boldest and truest: he fears nothing,
and he misses nothing."
"Call him out of the yard then," said Oran; "he lies there cold as a
stone."
"Ashburn then, Tom Ashburn!" cried Hyland, after an exclamation of
dismay at the intelligence; "he is the next boldest, and a true
shot."
"Another, another! They fished him out of the river at the Foul Rift,
yoked fast to the carcass of his horse."
"Bettson, then!"
"He lies, with Staples, dead in the yard here."
"Good God! is there none left then to save me from this horror. Oh
brother, send any one. Is there not one?"
"There is _one_," said Oran, and his teeth chattered as he spoke;
"there is one, and only one; but he shoots well too, and is as bold
as any. Farewell, young brother--the streaks are in the sky: we will
never see one another more. Reach forth your hand, brother, and let
me touch it."
"Alas, Oran, I am chained to the floor."
"Ay,--I forget: 'tis all one. Say that you beg God to forgive me, and
that you forgive me yourself--let me hear you say it."
"Wherefore, Oran? Alas, wherefore?"
"For what I have done to you; for what--But it is nothing. But say
it, though; say it, or hope for no friend in the thing you speak of."
"God forgive you then, Oran," muttered the brother, almost
mechanically; "I forgive you myself."
"It is enough," said Oran--"Farewell." And these were the last words
Hyland ever heard him utter. He descended from the wall--_how_ the
prisoner knew no more than how he had climbed it,--and that so
suddenly, that although Hyland called to him again, the moment the
farewell had past his lips, he was already beyond hearing. Finding
that he was really gone, the prisoner fell upon his knees, and strove
to invoke forgiveness of the act he meditated: for he rightly felt
that it must be but a form of self-murder.
He then threw himself on his couch, looked back upon the events that
had marked his existence in the valley, and wept over the misery they
had entailed upon one whom his love had wrapped in the same
destruction with himself.