In another minute, after Mr. Stendhal had read my note, I was skinning
off my clothes in an upper bedroom. Within three minutes I was dressed
like a Dutch boy, in huge baggy striped trousers belonging to Stendhal's
son. In four minutes the swift Mr. Stendhal had walked me across the
wharf in sabots to one of the galliots in the canal, which he ordered
under way at once, to pick up Argyle at sea. So that when my pursuers
rode up to Mr. Stendhal's door in search of me, I was a dirty little
Dutch boy casting off a stern-hawser from a ring bolt. They seemed to
storm at Mr. Stendhal; but I don't know what they said; he acted the
part of surprised indignation to the life. When I looked my last on Mr.
Stendhal he was at the door, begging a search party to enter to see for
themselves that I was not hidden there. The galliot got under way, at
that moment, with a good deal of crying out from her sailors. As she
swung away into the canal, I saw the handsome lady idly looking on. She
was waiting at the door with the other riders. She was the only
woman there. To show her that I was a skilled seaman I cast off the
stern-hawser nimbly, then dropped on to the deck like one bred to the
trade. A moment later I was aloft, casting loose the gaff-topsail. From
that fine height as the barge began to move I saw the horsemen turning
away foiled. I saw the lady's leathered hat, making a little dash of
green among the drab of the riding coats. Then an outhouse hid them all
from sight. I was in a sea-going barge, bound out, under all sail,
along a waterway lined with old reeds, all blowing down with a rattling
shiver.
Now I am not going to tell you much more of my Holland experiences. I
was in that barge for about one whole fortnight, during which I think I
saw the greater part of the Dutch canals. We picked up Argyle at sea on
the first day. After that we went to Amsterdam with a cargo of hides.
Then we wandered about at the wind's will, thinking that it might puzzle
people, if any one should have stumbled on the right scent. All that
fortnight was a long delightful picnic to me. The barge was so like an
Oulton wherry that I was at home in her. I knew what to do, it was not
like being in the schooner. When we were lying up by a wharf, I used
to spend my spare hours in fishing, or in flinging fiat pebbles from
a cleft-stick at the water-rats. When we were under sail I used to sit
aloft in the cross-trees, looking out at the distant sea. At night,
after a supper of strong soup, we all turned in to our bunks in the tiny
cabin, from the scuttle of which I could see a little patch of sky full
of stars.
A boy lives very much in the present. I do not think that I thought much
of the Duke's service, nor of our venture for the crown. If I thought
at all of our adventures, I thought of the handsome woman with the grey,
fierce eyes. In a way, I hoped that might have another tussle with her,
not because I liked adventure, no sane creature does, but because I
thought of her with liking. I felt that she would be such a brave, witty
person to have for a friend. I felt sad somehow at the thought of not
seeing her again. She was quite young, not more than twenty, if her
looks did not belie her. I used to wonder how it was that she had come
to be a secret agent. I believed that the sharp-faced horsey man had
somehow driven her to it against her will. Thinking of her at night,
before I fell asleep, I used to long to help her. It is curious, but I
always thought tenderly of this woman, even though she had twice tried
to kill me. A man's bad angel is only his good angel a little warped.
On the second of May, though I did not know it then, Argyle set sail for
Scotland, to raise the clans for a foray across the Border. On the same
day I was summoned from my quarters in the barge to take up my King's
service. Late one evening, when it was almost dark night, Mr. Jermyn
halted at the wharf-side to call me from my supper. “Mount behind me,
Martin,” he said softly, peering down the hatch. “It's time, now.”
I thought he must mean that it was time to invade England. You must
remember that I knew little of the rights of the case, except that the
Duke's cause was the one favoured by my father, dead such a little while
before. Yet when I heard that sudden summons, it went through me with a
shock that now this England was to be the scene of a bloody civil war,
father fighting son, brother against brother. I would rather have been
anywhere at that moment than where I was, hearing that order. Still, I
had put my hand to the plough. There was no drawing back. I rose up
with my eyes full of tears to say good-bye to the kind Dutch bargemen.
I never saw them again. In a moment I was up the wharf, scrambling into
the big double saddle behind Mr. Jermyn. Before my eyes were accustomed
to the darkness we were trotting off into the night I knew not whither.
“Martin,” said Mr. Jermyn, half turning in his saddle, “talk in a low
voice. There may be spies anywhere.”
“Yes, sir,” I answered, meekly. For a while after that we were silent; I
was waiting for him to tell me more.
“Martin,” he said at length, “we're going to send you to England, with a
message.”
“Yes, sir?” I answered.
“You understand that there's danger, boy?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Life is full of danger. But for his King a Christian man must be
content to run risks. You aren't afraid, Martin?”
“No, sir,” I answered bravely. I was afraid, all the same. I doubt if
any boy my age would have felt very brave, riding in the night like
that, with danger of spies all about.
“That's right, Martin,” he said kindly. “That's the kind of boy I
thought you.” Again we were quiet, till at last he said:
“You're going in a barquentine to Dartmouth. Can you remember Blick of
Kingswear?”
“Blick of Kingswear,” I repeated. “Yes, sir.”
“He's the man you're to go to.”
“Yes, sir. What am I to tell him?”
“Tell him this, Martin. Listen carefully. This, now. King Golden Cap.
After Six One.”
“King Golden Cap. After Six One,” I repeated. “Blick of Kingswear. King
Golden Cap. After Six One.”
“That's right,” he said. “Repeat it over. Don't forget a word of it.
But I know you're too careful a lad to do that.” There was no fear of my
forgetting it. I think that message is burned in into my brain under the
skull-bones.
“There'll be cipher messages, too, Martin. They're also for Mr. Blick.
You'll carry a little leather satchel, with letters sewn into the flap.
You'll carry stockings in the satchel. Or school-books. You are Mr.
Blick's sister's son, left an orphan in Holland. You'll be in mourning.
Your mother died of low-fever, remember, coming over to collect a
debt from her factor. Your mother was an Oulton fish-boat owner. Pay
attention now. I'm going to cross-examine you in your past history.”
As we rode on into the gloom, in the still, flat, misty land, which
gleamed out at whiles with water dykes, he cross-examined me in detail,
in several different ways, just as a magistrate would have done it. I
was soon letter-perfect about my mother. I knew Mr. Blick's past history
as well as I knew my own.
“Martin,” said Mr. Jermyn suddenly. “Do you hear anything?”
“Yes, sir,” I answered. “I think I do, sir.”
“What is it you hear, Martin?”
“I think I hear a horse's hoofs, sir.”
“Behind us?”
“Yes, sir. A long way behind.”
“Hold on then, boy. I'm going to pull up.”
We halted for an instant in the midst of a wide fiat desert, the
loneliest place on God's earth. For an instant in the stillness we
heard the trot trot of a horse's hoofs. Then the unseen rider behind us
halted, too, as though uncertain how to ride, with our hoofs silent.
“There,” said Mr. Jermyn. “You see. Now we'll make him go on again.”
He shook the horse into his trot again, talking to him in a little low
voice that shook with excitement. Sure enough, after a moment the trot
sounded out behind us. It was as though our wraiths were riding behind
us, following us home. “I'll make sure,” said Mr. Jermyn, pulling up
again.
“You're a cunning dog,” he said gently. “You heard that?” Indeed, it
sounded uncanny. The unseen rider had feared to pull up, guessing that
we had guessed his intentions. Instead of pulling up he did a much more
ominous thing, he slowed his pace perceptibly. We could hear the change
in the beat of the horse-hoofs. “Cunning lad,” said Mr. Jermyn. “I've
a good mind to shoot that man, Martin. He's following us. Pity it's so
dark. One can never be sure in the dark like this. But I don't know. I'd
like to see who it is.”
We trotted on again at our usual pace. Presently, something occurred
to me. Mr. Jermyn, I said; “would you like me to see who it is? I could
slip off as we go. I could lie down flat so that he would pass against
the sky. Then you could come back for me.”
He did not like the scheme at first. He said that it would be too dark
for me to see anybody; but that when we were nearer to the town it might
be done. So we rode on at our quick trot for a couple of more, hearing
always behind us a faint beat of
upon the road, like the echo of our own hoofs. After a time they stopped
suddenly, nor did we hear them again.
“D'you know what he's done, Martin?” said Mr. Jermyn.
“No, sir,” I answered.
“He's muffled his horse's hoofs with duffle shoes. A sort of thick felt
slippers. He was in too great a hurry to do that before. There are the
lights of the town.”
“Shall I get down, sir?”
“If you can without my pulling up. Don't speak. But lay your head on the
road. You'll hear the horse, then, if I'm right.”
“Then I'll lie still,” I said, “to see if I can see who it is.”
“Yes. But make no sign. He may shoot. He may take you for a footpad.
I'll ride back to you in a minute.”
He slowed down the horse so that I could slip off unheard on to the turf
by the roadside. When he had gone a little distance, I laid my ear to
the road. Sure enough, the noise of the other horse was faint but plain
in the distance, coming along on the road, avoiding the turf. The turf
vas trenched in many drains, so as to make dangerous riding at night. I
lay down flat on the turf, with my pistol in my hand. I was excited; but
I remember that I enjoyed it. I felt so like an ancient Briton lying in
wait for his enemy. I tried to guess the distance of this strange horse
from me. It is always difficult to judge either distance or location by
sound, when the wind is blowing. The horse hoofs sounded about a quarter
of a mile away. I know not how far they really were. Very soon I could
see the black moving mass coming quietly along the road. The duffle
hoof-wraps made a dull plodding noise near at hand. Nearer the unknown
rider came, suspecting nothing. I could see him bent forward, peering
out ahead. I could even take stock of him, dark though it was. He was a
not very tall man, wearing a full Spanish riding cloak. It seemed to me
that he checked his horse's speed somewhere in the thirty yards before
he passed me. Then, just as he passed, just as I had a full view of him,
blackly outlined against the stars, his horse shied violently at me, on
to the other side of the road. The rider swung him about on the instant
to make him face the danger. I could see him staring down at me, as he
bent forward to pat his horse's neck. I bent my head down so that my
face was hidden in the grass.
The stranger did not see me. I am quite sure that he did not see me. He
turned his horse back along the road for a few snorting paces. Then with
a sounding slap on his shoulder he drove him at a fast pace along the
turf towards me. I heard the brute whinny. He was uneasy; he was trying
to shy; he was twisting away, trying to avoid the strange thing which
lay there. I hid my head no longer. I saw the horse above me. I saw the
rider glaring down. He was going to ride over me. I saw his face, a grey
blur under his hat. The horse seemed to be right on top of me. I started
up to my feet with a cry. The horse shied into the road, with a violence
which made the rider rock. Then, throwing up his head, he bolted towards
the town, half mad with the scare. Fifty yards down the road he tore
past Mr. Jermyn, who was trotting back to pick me up. We heard the
frantic hoofs pass away into the night, growing louder as the duffle
wraps were kicked off. Perhaps you have noticed how the very sound of
the gallop of a scared horse conveys fear. That is what we felt, we two
conspirators, as we talked together, hearing that clattering alarm-note
die away.
“Martin,” said Mr. Jermyn. “That was a woman. She chuckled as she
galloped past me.”
“Are you sure, sir?” I asked, half-hoping that he might be right. I
felt my heart leap at the thought of being in another adventure with the
lady.
“Yes,” he said, “I'm quite sure. Now we must be quick, so as to give
her no time in the town.” When I had mounted, we forced the horse to a
gallop till we were within a quarter of a mile of the walls, where we
pulled up at a cross-roads.
“Get down, Martin,” he said. “We must enter the town by different roads.
Turn off here to the right. Then take the next two turns to the left,
which will bring you into the square. I shall meet you there. Take your
time. There's no hurry.”
About ten minutes later, I was stopped in a dark quiet alley by a hand
on the back of my neck. I saw no one. I heard no noise of breathing. In
the pitch blackness of the night the hand arrested me. It was like my
spine suddenly stiffening to a rod of ice. “Quiet,” said a strange voice
before I could scream. “Off with those Dutch clothes. Put on these. Off
with those sabots.” I was in a suit of English clothes in less than a
minute. “Boots,” the voice said in my ear. “Pull them on.” They were
long leather knee-boots, supple from careful greasing. In one of them I
felt something hard. My heart leapt as I felt it.
It was a long Italian stiletto. I felt myself a seaman indeed, nay,
more than a seaman, a secret agent, with a pair of such boots upon me,
“heeled,” as the sailors call it, with such a weapon. “Go straight on,”
said the voice.
As I started to go straight on, there was a sort of rustling behind me.
Some black figure seemed to vanish from me. Whoever the man was that had
brought me the clothes, he had vanished, just as an Indian will vanish
into grass six inches high. Thinking over my strange adventures, I
think that that changing of my clothes in the night was almost the most
strange of all. It was so eerie, that he should be there at all, a part
of Mr. Jermyn's plan, fitting into it exactly, though undreamed of by
me. Would indeed that all Mr. Jermyn's plans had carried through so
well. But it was not to be. One ought not to grumble.
A few steps farther on, I came to a public square, on one side of which
(quite close to where I stood) was a wharf, crowded with shipping. I had
hardly expected the sea to be so near, somehow, but seeing it like that
I naturally stopped to look for the ship which was to carry me. The only
barquentine among the ships lay apart from the others, pointing towards
the harbour entrance. She seemed to be a fine big vessel, as far as
I could judge in that light. I lingered there for some few minutes,
looking at the ships, wondering why it was that Mr. Jermyn had not met
me. I was nervous about it. My nerves were tense from all the excitement
of the night. One cannot stand much excitement for long. I had had
enough excitement that night to last me through the week. As I stood
looking at the ships, I began to feel a horror of the wharf-side. I felt
as though the very stones of the place were my enemies, lying in wait
for me. I cannot explain the feeling more clearly than that. It was due
probably to the loneliness of the great empty square, dark as a tomb.
Then, expecting Mr. Jermyn, but failing to meet with him, was another
cause for dread. I thought, in my nervousness, that I should be in a
fine pickle if any enemies made away with Mr. Jermyn, leaving me alone,
in a strange land, with only a few silver pieces in my pocket. Still,
Mr. Jermyn was long in coming. My anxiety was almost more than I could
bear.
At last, growing fearful that I had somehow missed him at the mouth of
the dark alley, I walked slowly back in my tracks, wishing that I had a
thicker jacket, since it was beginning to rain rather smartly. There was
a great sort of inn on the side of the square to which I walked. It had
lights on the second floor. The great windows of that story opened on
to balconies, in what is, I believe, the Spanish way of building. I
remember feeling bitterly how cheery the warm lights looked, inside
there, where the people were. I stood underneath the balcony out of the
rain, looking out sharply towards the alley, expecting at each instant
to see Mr. Jermyn. Still he did not come. I dared not move from where I
was lest I should miss him. I racked my brains to try to remember if I
had obeyed orders exactly. I wondered whether I had come to the right
square. I began to imagine all kinds of evil things which might have
happened to him. Perhaps that secret fiend of a woman had been too many
for him. Perhaps some other secret service people had waylaid him as
he entered the town. Perhaps he was even then in bonds in some cellar,
being examined for letters by some of the usurper's men.