foolishness, after all. But, in a measure, it may be considered logically
also. For instance, there seems to be a “vein of reason” running through
it all, and if the reader is on the watch, he will see that this “vein
of reason” crops out frequently. After this preamble it opens _very_
rationally.
“Considered logically,” says the reader, “how could this Henry, a
veritable lover, stoop to play the fool, as he did? How could he do this,
if he had any respect for his passion, or for the one whom he loved?”
Considered logically, gentle reader, Henry was a _boy_; his heart was
sore from fancied slights; he was desperate; it occurred to him that,
placed as he was, he might “view the question from the other side!”
Furthermore, although he and Stephen had conspired to torment Marmaduke,
it is plain that almost everything he said, he said _extempore_.
As for Marmaduke, he had no sisters, was scarcely ever in the society of
young ladies, and knew nothing of their ways.
“These are but sorry excuses,” sighs the reader, “unworthy of even a
school-boy!”
Very true. But they are the best that we can trump up, and therefore
it would be better for you to consider this chapter as founded on the
opposite of reason and logic.
Marmaduke was anxious that he alone should be recognized as the
liberator, for he wished to receive all the glory of rescuing the
captive. With that intent he pressed nearer Sauterelle, directing his
followers, by an imperious wave of the hand, to disperse in search of the
enemy, and, when found, to give them battle.
Interpreted into language, that command would have run: Hound down the
mercenary crew, and spare them not! Their evil deeds have brought this
fate upon their heads!
The avenging party understood this, and, thirsting for blood and glory,
they hurled themselves out of the apartment, whilst Marmaduke turned
his attention to the captive. He saw gratitude, admiration, even
reverence, in the two blue eyes that looked at him. No fear of not being
acknowledged as the rescuer-in-chief: Henry would acknowledge him, and
him only.
“Ah, my deliverer!” he cried, in so-called French; “you have come to
rescue me, to restore me to freedom! You have found my appeal for help,
and these brave men are your followers?”
Marmaduke tried hard to understand this, but was obliged to ask if the
conversation could not be carried on in English.
“Yes, yes, I can speak English,” came the reply. “The good priest has
taught me English.”
At that instant a fierce combat was heard in an adjoining room, and
horrisonous cries of rage and terror filled the whole building. The hero
knew at once that his followers had encountered, and were waging deadly
contest with, the wicked jailers, and his heart swelled with emotion.
He was right; his followers had drawn their home-made weapons, and while
Charles, Steve, and Jim, personated these wicked jailers, Will and
George personated the gallant liberators. Having had a rehearsal a few
days previous, they now fought easily and systematically, and with such
heroism and fury that victory must inevitably perch upon their standard.
But, after all (and in this they were quite right), they fought as much
with their lungs as with their arms, so that the din was tremendous. For
full five minutes the combat raged without abatement. The gray light
coming in through the open doorway cast a greenish and peculiar hue over
our hero’s grand face, and he stood stock-still, collected but voiceless;
while the other, wholly unprepared for such an uproar, longed to thrust
his fingers into his ears, and pitied himself with all his heart as he
thought of the racking headache that must soon seize him.
But finally they vanquished the enemy, and all except Stephen, who had
not yet turned priest, rushed into the presence of the hero and heroine,
shouting wildly: “Routed! Worsted! Slain!”
“All? Are all slain? And is the battle past?”
“All; one and all; and we have won.”
“And so my freedom comes to me again!” cried Sauterelle. “And I am free,
free as the birds, for all his evil schemes are baffled now!”
Then, as was right on such an occasion, Sauterelle sank at our hero’s
feet, and began in the “bursting heart” style, without which no such
scene ought to be drawn: “Oh, my deliverer, accept my thanks! Through you
I thus am freed! through you I once again shall see dear France,--dear
France, that land of heroes!--Heroes? Ah! all are heroes here, in this,
the land of liberty! Oh, gallant men, you have done well!”
“Ah, yes, ’tis for the brave to battle for the fair in every land,” our
hero said, as though he, too, had fought.
Sauterelle still kneeled before our hero, expecting to be lifted up. But
an immense, pyramidal head-dress, many inches high, which only Steve
could construct, towered upwards till almost on a level with our hero’s
eyes, bewildering him.
“Noble American, this is a rescue worthy of a prince!” Sauterelle cried,
suddenly rising and grasping our hero’s hands in a bear-like grip.
“Your ladyship--”
“No, no! My title here is but an empty sound, so call me simply
Sauterelle.”
“Sau-ter-elle Hi-ron-delle. What sweet and pretty names!” our hero
murmured softly, as Sauterelle let go his hands.
“What is the name of him who sets me free?”
“Fitz-Williams is my name; my first name, Marmaduke.”
Our hero’s followers, still hot, exhausted, and bruised, but not
particularly blood-stained, now rose and stole away, and presently
another great uproar was heard from them. They had seized the impostor
and were carrying it, or him, roughly along.
“Here is the great chief villain and arch-plotter of them all! Here is
Bélître Scélérat himself!” they roared.
“Bélître Scélérat? How comes he here? I understood that he was far away,”
our hero said, much puzzled.
They paused in doubt and consternation. Then a flash of reason penetrated
to their darkened intellect, and dimly conscious that some one had
plotted too much, or not enough, they started into action and pressed
tumultuously on with their captive.
“Oh, for a sword, that I might pierce the monster’s heart!” our hero
sighed, but sighed in vain.
At that instant, Steve, now the priest, passed pompously through the
room, and catching our hero’s last words, replied: “No, no! Soil not thy
hands with such a perjured wretch, nor soil thy sword. These soldiers
here should pierce his ears, not thee,” wilfully mistaking the word
_heart_ for _ears_--or perhaps he did not understand English so well as
his pupil. “Brave men, go forth and hang this captured knave from some
great height, and leave him there to crumble into dust.”
Our hero’s blood-thirsty followers lugged Bélître Scélérat out of the
room and up the stairs with a haste that proved how well and strongly he
was made, and remorselessly prepared to consign him to his ignominious
fate.
Then our hero and heroine again broke out into their poetry, the latter
saying, “And now, my freedom is achieved. Ah me! I almost now regret that
we should leave these shores, this land of blessèd liberty, and travel
back alone to our loved France! Ah, in my hour of triumph am I sad? Yes,
woe is me, I am!--Oh, Marmaduke, there is no need of this! The priest is
here, the bridegroom and the bride! Oh Marmaduke, there is no cause why I
should go alone. Ah, thou wilt soon be mine, and I shall soon be thine!
Thy husband,--_wife_, I mean. Oh, Marmaduke, dear Marmaduke!”
As Sauterelle ran on in this strain our hero grew pale and sick with
dismay. Was he to be made a sacrifice of thus? Must the rescue of
necessity lead to this? Oh, it was too awful!
“A beauty here that would befit a queen; and, yes, I feel love springing
in my heart! But should _I_ marry? _I_, a boy, and _this_, the daughter
of a duke? Oh, that it might be so! As I have said, the French are more
excitable than we. But am I not the rescuer-in-chief? In such a case as
this, what should I do?”
A triumphant shout of sated vengeance now rang through the building.
Bélître Scélérat was securely fastened, not exactly hanged, out of an
upper window. A minute later the executioners came clattering noisily
down stairs, then filed respectfully past our hero and heroine into
another room, and took up a position where they were screened, but from
which they could see and hear all that was going on. This action on their
part was more conformable to human nature than to the laws of romance or
the dignity of heroes.
A sidelong glance disclosed the fact that our hero’s face was of the
hue of polished marble, and that large tears of heartfelt emotion were
starting from his eyes, while other tears were welling from the pores of
his neck and forehead.
“Père Tortenson, Père Tortenson,” cried Sauterelle. “Is he not here? Then
go, some one, to look for him, and bring him here to me. The marriage may
take place without delay.”
“Dear Sauterelle,” our hero said, “I feel I love thee well indeed, but
yet I may not marry thee. Thy friend, thy humble servant, guide, and
helper, I will ever be; thy husband--ah!”
Our hero’s grammar says _mine_ and _thine_ are used only in solemn style.
Our hero and heroine were aware of this--they were but paying tribute to
the solemnity of the occasion.
“No! say not that! You own that you love me as I love thee. What is there
then to come between us and our happiness? Is it, alas! my title and my
rank? Think not of them; they shall be nought to us. My Marmaduke, I’d
lay them all aside for thee. Or what is it? Speak, Marmaduke; I wait to
hear thee speak.”
“Alas, dear Sauterelle,--if really I may call thee so,--I am not worthy
thee. It is indeed thy title and thy rank. How couldst thou wed a
non-commissioned officer like me?”
“Perhaps you are the kidnapped heir of some great English lord.”
“Oh, _could_ it be? Oh, would it were! Then I thy equal--Oh, say not
that! No; do not torture me.”
“I understand it now,--my love is not returned,--you do not care for me.”
“Love thee! Indeed I love thee well--love thee, as boy never loved
before--love thee, as I ne’er can love again!”
“Oh, Marmaduke! dear Marmaduke! you cause me joy. My Marmaduke, I’ll call
again the priest.”
“Thy father!--No, no! I dare not meet thy father!”
“Dread not my father’s ire. He loves his child; his child loves thee. Ah,
thou art all mine own, for all that thou hast urged is but a paper wall.”
“Dear Sauterelle, I must admit I love thee well. To be thine own--oh,
joy! But no; it cannot be. I have no wealth, no heritage at all. A wife
is far from me.”
“Wealth? What is wealth to me? Wealth is an idle word--non-entity--a
gin--a snare--a clap-trap. How should we live? Let no such thoughts occur
to thee. Though wealth is nought, ’tis true, my father hath it, and thou
couldst have enough to live as princes live.”
“‘Alas,’ you said, ‘perhaps my father lives no more.’”
“Ah, then am I his heir, and all his riches ours. Oh, Marmaduke, why
should you longer hesitate to take this step, or longer pause for foolish
whims? Then call again the priest. Why loiters he?”
But our hero was not yet sensible of the duty that devolved upon him--he
did not yet fully realize his position--he still hung back--and his
poetical objections having been one by one confuted, he now had the
excess of baseness to offer another.
“Alas, I know not well thy foreign tongue. How couldst thou hear me
always in my rough tongue, when thine, so sweet, so soft, so beautiful--”
“No! speak not so!” cried Sauterelle. “I will not hear thee speak so! Oh,
slander not the language that is thine. And, ah!--thou art a ready youth,
I see it in thine eye,--how sweet the task of teaching thee my polished
mode of thought and speech! But yet, even as it is, we can converse quite
easily! Père Tortenson, the time for marrying is here.”
“Ah, that is truth!” our hero cried. “You speak my English quite as well
as I!”
Then, in a rational moment, he said rationally, “As you have said, dear
Sauterelle, we love each other well; but being still so young, so very
young, we must not think of marriage yet a while. ’Tis hard to part with
thee,--our lot is doubly hard,--but fate is ever merciless. Farewell, my
love, we part.”
He tore himself away, as though he would have fled.
“’Tis true that we are young,” said Sauterelle. “Our hearts are warm and
young, not chilled and seared with age and woe. To leave me? No! it shall
not be! Thou must not go!”
“To love is either happiness or pain; to love, and to be loved
again,--oh, this is ecstasy!”
“Oh, Marmaduke, you thrill my heart with joy!”
“Alas, dear Sauterelle, that love and duty should thus clash! But, oh,
I must not marry thee; I am so far beneath thee. Dear Sauterelle, thou
wilt return to France and be the wife of some great prince, while I,
alas! shall wear my life away in hopelessness and grief. And yet, oh
Sauterelle, I love thee so! I love thee so! I fear I yet shall yield to
love, forgetting duty.”
Then Charles stepped out of his lurking-place, and said respectfully:
“Forgive me, sir, that I should speak to you, but duty is not always what
it seems. How can this helpless one return to France alone! A priest
at hand, a marriage, sir, is duty in this case. Your father’s house
is near--live there till Duke Chaloupe hears of this rescue and this
marriage. Then Duke Chaloupe will send us funds for all to go to France.”
“Oh, would that I could think that you are right! I should no longer
hesitate.”
Then, forgetting himself and his position, he fell back on prose. “Why
should not Lady Sauterelle and the priest return? Are there no hoards of
jewels and treasure here in this building, that would pay the passage, at
least? Scélérat, perhaps, has millions buried here, which can be found.”
“No he hasn’t,” said Will, thrusting his head into the room. “Not a cent.
What did you expect the captive to do after the rescue? What were your
ideas on that point?”
“Alas,” groaned Marmaduke, “I had none! I never thought what any of us
would do immediately after the rescue; my thoughts were far ahead in the
future. Oh, if I had only sent that letter to the Government!”
At that moment a person with majestic mien strode into the room, saying,
“I come, I come; who calls Père Tortenson? Is it a marriage, lovely
Sauterelle? If so, quite right. Who is the honored bridegroom?”
As Marmaduke’s chivalric notions of right and wrong still admonished
him not to enter into marriage with a person of noble birth, he had the
uprightness to resist the feelings of his heart once more, though it
cost him a hard struggle to do so.
Then the other, casting on a tragic air, said, “Alas for the decay of
chivalry! In the old days it was not thus. Then no weak whim of fancied
right e’er came between two loving hearts.”
Charles whispered to our hero’s followers, and then, having stepped into
the room, they chorused, their voices, attuned by war and conquest,
filling the place with harmony: “Your duty, sir, is very plain, and we
are grieved that we should have to point it out: a marriage, as you are.
A few years hence, and you will be the mighty king of some great land.”
Then Marmaduke shone forth in all his native nobleness. He reverently
took Sauterelle’s hand in his own, but before giving the word to the
priest he chanted: “In rank, in ti-tle, and in birth; in rich-es, age,
and clime; in all things, thou surpassest me, O lovely Sauterelle.”
“Yea, even in height!” chimed in Père Tortenson.
“Proceed, sir priest,” said Marmaduke.
* * * * *
The plot was now, they supposed, at an end. It would be as well to
consider its framers as boys again.
Henry did not wish to prolong the scene, and he whispered to Will: “This
is as far as I dare go; but try to think of something--_anything_--to
keep up the fun a little longer.”
Stephen pretended to be fumbling in the pockets of his robe. Turning
to the Sage, he whispered imploringly, “Oh, George, can’t you
‘ventriloquism’ a little--_ever_ so little?”
“The ghost!” George muttered. “Let us bring in the ghost!”
“The ghost? My stars! we never settled how that was to be done!” Steve
said blankly.
“Oh, Steve, I wish you were free to play the spectre!” Will sighed. “What
was it that we intended the ghost to do, anyway?”
“Oh, my gracious, I don’t know; I’m all a muddle!”
But the moments were slipping away very fast. Marmaduke heard their
mutterings, though he did not understand them, and he was becoming uneasy.
“Proceed with the ceremony,” he repeated.
_Chapter XXXVIII._
THE STARTLERS THEMSELVES ARE STARTLED.
But the tables were to be turned in a startling and wholly unlooked-for
manner. The boys had had their day of imposing on simple Marmaduke; and
now, in their turn, they were destined to suffer acutely from uneasiness
and remorse for several hours.
Such a sentence always finds a place in romances at certain conjunctures,
and, if judiciously worded, reflects great credit on the romancer. But
the reader cannot always perceive the beauty of such a sentence, and
therefore it would be showing more respect for his feelings to follow our
Jim.
This hero had slipped away from his companions shortly before Stephen
at last appeared as priest. Being only a figure-head on this occasion,
his absence or presence did not concern them in the least, and he was
suffered to slip out of the backdoor without comment.
He wished to make his way into the upper story without going up the
stairs, as to do that it would be necessary to pass the hero and heroine.
However, being well-acquainted with the building, and knowing how to
climb, he easily made his way into the upper story from the rear. Then
he stole noiselessly across the gloomy chamber, and felt his way to the
window, where the “imposter,” Bélître Scélérat, hung in state.
It is a fundamental principle that villains, when about to perpetrate
their dark crimes, should express their wicked thoughts in “hurried
whispers.” This is very foolish on the part of the villains; but it is
not easy to see how novels could be written if it were otherwise. Of
course the romancers do not always overhear these “hurried whispers,” but
the walls in the vicinity have ears, and probably the romancers get at
them in that way.
“Now, then,” muttered Jim, “I’ll teach ’em better than to leave me out of
their plots till they have to let me in. Charley and Steve intend to come
along for this to-morrow, do they, and take it away, and float it burning
down the river? I’ll bet they won’t! I’ll burn it all to smoke and ashes
now, as it hangs on its pins, and serve ’em right!”
“Hum, _this_ is Jim’s treachery!” sneers the reader. “I was led to expect
something better; I am disappointed.”
Gentle reader, if you are a faithful peruser of novels, you must have
a great fund of patience. Draw, then, on that fund, and more of Jim’s
designs will presently be unfolded. Draw on your imagination, also; for
his treachery was never fully made known.
Suiting the action to the word, Jim fumbled in his pocket and took out a
bunch of matches, which he had put there for this very purpose. He knew
he was doing wrong, and his hand trembled as he struck a light. He knew
that his terrible disease might seize him at any moment; and so, fearing
to stay longer where he was, he hastily applied the light to the spectral
figure, and turned to steal away.
The inflammable material of Bélître Scélérat’s clothes instantly caught
fire, and he himself was soon ablaze.
“Now to run and tell Marmaduke he is fooled,” Jim muttered.
In this way, poor simpleton, he thought to ease his conscience! But the
“still small voice” will be deceived by no such flimsy excuses.
“Then to yell ‘Fire!’--Oh, if any ghost _should_ be up here, now,--if
there _are_ such things as ghosts,--this is the place for them! Now, to
get away.----Ow! Ow! Ouowh!”
The cause of these unmusical yells from Jim was that he heard hasty
footsteps issuing from a room to the left, and then a ghost-like figure
appeared in the flaring light of the burning impostor.
Jim had almost expected to encounter something horrible, and when this
apparition hove in sight his terror was all the more intense.
Setting up horrisonous howls, that would have been a credit to Bob
Herriman himself, he forgot all about the dangerous place in the
floor,--which, as has been said, the explorers discovered, carefully
marked out, and avoided,--and rushed blindly upon it. A groan, a
trembling, and it gave way beneath him with the crash of an earthquake.
Marmaduke had just given the word to the priest for the second time, when
a succession of frightful howls and yells of agony struck their ears, and
a moment later a blinding cloud of dust, plaster, and splinters, pervaded
the apartment.
Jim, a scratched and woe-begone object, also fell.
Thus the plotters’ little difficulty was obviated; thus a ghost came to
them.
But that was not all. It so happened (rather, _of course_ it happened)
that Sauterelle and the general were in the course of the faller.
Before any of the demoralized plotters could think what was the matter,
or even think at all, Jim dropped heavily downward, and his feet caught
in the rescued one’s outlandish headdress. It was rudely torn off, and
Henry’s aching head received so violent a wrench that he could have
roared with the pain.
Although Jim’s fall was not stopped, its course was deflected, and his
head and body were thrown furiously into Marmaduke’s and Stephen’s arms.
He thus escaped with sundry painful bruises, owing perhaps his life
to the accident of striking Henry’s headdress and being thrown upon
Marmaduke and Stephen.
These two, also, were stunned and slightly hurt; and a pair of unique
goggles, that Steve wore as a partial disguise, went the way of the
hammer, the axe, and the band-box full of rusty tools.
Confusion reigned for a few moments; but as soon as the general could
think at all, his thoughts reverted to Sauterelle.
“Oh, where is Lady Sauterelle?” he cried.
He flew to Henry’s side, to behold--oh what?
Henry had seized his opportunity to strip off his disguise, and now
stood revealed in coat, vest, and pants--a very boy-like boy.
The plotters, somewhat recovered from their surprise, and seeing that no
one was much the worse for the fright, saw the dupe’s look of horror and
consternation, and could restrain themselves no longer. The long pent-up
laughter burst from each mouth in one deafening roar. This was what they
had plotted for, and it had come.
With a tragic and truly pathetic air, Marmaduke threw up his hands,
cried, in piteous tones, that the plotters will remember till their last
hour, “I am betrayed!” and fled out of the house like a madman.
For the first time the boys felt heartily ashamed of themselves. They all
ran out to call him back and beg his forgiveness, and discovered what
they would have known before, if they had not been so engrossed with
Jim’s fall and Henry’s unmasking.
The building was on fire and burning furiously! Though it was not five
minutes since Jim struck his match, the fire had gained too great a hold
to be extinguished.
Jim was appalled. Nothing was further from his thoughts than the burning
of the prison-house; though a little reflection would have shown him
that a figure fashioned of greasy clothes, and stuffed with rags, straw,
shavings, and sundry valuables that slipped in unawares, could not burn
within a few inches of a wooden building without setting it on fire.
“Fire! fire!” yelled the heroes, hardly knowing whether to be delighted
or otherwise at the prospect of such a bon-fire.
In the excitement of the moment the search after Marmaduke was given up.
“Are--are we all out, or is somebody burnt up?” Will asked, wildly, but
with rare presence of mind.
“Oh, boys, I did it, but I didn’t mean to burn the house,” Jim confessed.
“All I wanted was to burn your impostor, and tell Marmaduke the truth,
and--Ou! ou! ou! ou!” he shrieked. “There it is again! ou, ou!” and the
boy with the chills took to his heels.
Jim practised running: on this occasion he was soon out of sight.
The rest looked in the direction pointed out by Jim, and beheld a figure
in white gliding towards them. Was it a ghost, or some one wrapped up in
a sheet, so foolish as to play the part of a ghost?
“Oh, dear;” gasped Steve, “what is going to happen next?”
All the boys were wrought up to a pitch of great excitement, and were
more terrified than they cared to acknowledge. Henry’s thoughts reverted
to his Greek history and Nemesis.