sure? I was at the prison this afternoon, and saw no signal. You
remember, if everything was ready, he was to place two crusts of bread
outside the door of his cell. Only one was there. That meant to-morrow."
"Nevertheless, I saw him and talked with him not two hours agone,"
answered Abel.
"The boat--" began the schoolmaster, excitedly.
"They will meet him at Striker's wharf at eleven o'clock. The last
patrol goes down at half past ten."
"You have done good work; but one more question, and then, we will
resume the rules. How was he dressed?"
"In the uniform of a British officer," answered Abel.
"Whew!" whistled Mr. Anderson. "There may be some mistake."
"No chance of it," said Abel. "I talked with him."
Mr. Anderson had arisen and taken off his spectacles. He reached down
from a hook a fine fur-lined coat, and was stretching it across his
shoulders. "You had best home and to bed, good friend," he said. "We'll
say no more upon the subject. It's a fine night."
"Aye, for in-doors," coughed Abel Norton; and both conspirators passed
out into the cold air. They parted on the door-step. It had stopped
snowing.
A wise plan for plotters to follow is that of never referring, even
amongst themselves, by word of mouth to the matter they wish kept
secret. If each receives his instructions from one source, and acts
accordingly, there is a better chance for success and less danger of
detection.
The friends of American liberty that had remained banded together in the
city for the purpose of supplying Washington with information had
adopted this wise plan. Their orders were received from Number One, who
was none other than that trusted servant of the King, Rivington, printer
by special appointment to his Majesty. This worthy had come to the
patriot cause early in the fall. But he was the last man to suspect.
The conspirators were seldom or never seen in one another's company, and
some were not even supposed to know the others. The action and
discoveries of each, however, were made understood by their system of
cipher correspondence. As an instance of the relation, the captain and
lieutenant (Rivington and Anderson) were supposed to be on terms of
bitter enmity.
The latter was now making all haste to gain the lower part of town. A
suspicion had seized him that perhaps everything was not right. When he
came to the City Arms he hurried into the coffee-room.
A young officer with a deep bass voice was singing a song full of sighs
and apostrophes to some distant fair one.
Mr. Anderson slid into an empty chair and joined in the noise and
applause that followed the musical effort. He then turned to his
neighbor.
"Ah, Captain Markham," he said, "have you seen our handsome young
friend, Lieutenant Frothingham, to-night?"
"I was talking to him less than an hour ago," replied the Captain, who,
strange to say, was not in his cups. "He was to return, I take it, from
what he said."
Hardly had bespoken the words when the subject of them entered.
William's face wore a preoccupied expression, and seeing one of the inn
servants, he beckoned him to one side. Mr. Anderson caught the gesture,
and noticed that the servant had followed the Lieutenant into the
hallway.
If by chance he could have seen what occurred he would have been
surprised, for, after a short conversation, the servant departed with
three gold pieces clinking in his palm. He had then made his way to the
stables and aroused one of the tall young grooms. From the stables he
had walked to William's lodgings with a complete suit of the groom's
clothing over his arm. It comprised a short jacket and leather gaiters
like those worn by the young prisoner at the sugar-house, a good costume
for facing the snow.
William entered the room a second time, and seeing Mr. Anderson, dragged
a chair across and sat down close to him.
The little schoolmaster drew a secret from a simple nature with as much
delight as a keen terrier would draw a badger from his hiding-place.
"What do you think has happened?" he inquired, to see how much the young
man knew.
"Concerning what?" answered William, on his guard.
"Concerning the person uppermost in your mind," returned the
schoolmaster.
"I hope nothing ill," was William's anxious interruption.
"No, no, perhaps not ill. 'Twas good you warned me."
"It has caused me many sleepless hours," said William. "Let us draw
apart, for I must talk freely with you."
They pushed back their chairs, and sought a deserted corner by the open
fireplace.
"As a lad," remarked Mr. Anderson, "your brother was not prone to waste
words. You are like him. Talk quickly."
"I am betwixt two fires," said the young man--"my duty and my
affections, Mr. Anderson. You know me. I love my brother as I love my
life, but I serve my--"
"King," suggested the schoolmaster.
"King," repeated William, wondering why he had found it so difficult to
say country, as he had intended. "I would die to save my brother's life,
I think most honestly," went on the young Lieutenant. "I would that he
was free, but I cannot, any more than you, connive at the escape of a
prisoner who might bear important news to the enemy. There is nothing
wrong in feigning to know naught of his existence, but to aid in his
escape I could not. Therefore I told you, and left the matter in your
hands, knowing your interest. You think not harshly of me? Pray think
how you would feel were you in my position. I feel sometime as if I were
not young at all, as if the separation from the brother who is in my
heart had aged me far beyond my years, so deeply do I feel it."
"You said that you could trust me with his welfare. Now, prithee, what
has brought the subject up in this new light?" asked Schoolmaster
Anderson. "Remember that should it be known who he was, and the
authorities should find out what a dangerous person had been amongst
them, his life would not be worth the dregs in that wine-glass."
William shuddered. "There's a plot to aid in his escape."
"That I know well," returned the schoolmaster. "If it were frustrated
and he kept safe, you would rejoice--hey?"
"'Twould be my duty," returned William.
"Have you aught against the calling of a spy?" inquired Schoolmaster
Anderson.
William reflected. "If it were base to be one," he replied, "my brother
George would have been far from it, that I promise you. A spy risks his
life to serve his king--"
"Or country," put in Mr. Anderson. "Ay, he is usually a brave, fearless
man, and should not be condemned. He can harm no one but his enemy."
"The stake he plays for is his life," continued William.
"Now the one who spoke to you to-night--" said Mr. Anderson, as if
carrying on a train of thought of his own.
"Spoke to me, sir? I said naught concerning that," answered the young
man, hastily.
"If he had knowledge who you were--"
"But he mistook me," again interrupted William. "What are you driving
at? To whom do you refer?"
"His name has slipped me," replied the schoolmaster. "You may be able to
jog my memory. I saw you talking with him a short while ago. I can find
out easily."
"No; listen," said William. And then he told of his meeting with Abel
Norton, and the conversation in the doorway, omitting, however, entirely
the reference to the boat.
When he had finished Mr. Anderson replied. "This is interesting news to
me," he said; "but it was not to this strange person that I referred. It
was to your neighbor at the table, Captain--what's his name?--over
there, who had been talking to you before you left. So that was an
adventure on the street? What are you going to do?"
William saw that he had been trapped into telling what he had better,
perhaps, have kept quiet. "I have been ordered to the forces at the
north," he said, confused.
"Indeed?" replied Schoolmaster Anderson. "Success to you. I judged that
you were not a kind to idle in tavern parlors, or your regiment one to
grow stale in barracks."
"But I am going alone," said William, entrapped again.
"Ah!" said the schoolmaster; "much better, mayhap; changes are oft for
the best." A roar of laughter from the table attracted his attention.
"Come, we are missing all the gayety," he said. And slipping his arm
through William's, he strolled up and joined the group, who were
listening to a red-faced adjutant relating a story of being lost in an
Irish bog.
When William looked around a moment or so later the schoolmaster had
disappeared.
He had slipped away unnoticed, and his nimble feet were flying up the
road. He swung about the corner into Vine Street. The sentry at the door
of the prison was fast asleep, his heavy head resting on his folded
arms. The schoolmaster ducked adroitly underneath him and opened the
door; he crossed the court-yard to the prison entrance, and pulled the
bell. There was a stirring within, and the jailer stood there
unsteadily, half asleep, with a blanket thrown about his shoulders.
"What want you now?" he asked.
"The prisoner on the second floor," said Schoolmaster Anderson. "His
Lordship would have him examined. Know you whether he has a birth-mark
on his cheek?"
"I don't know or care," answered the jailer.
"'Tis to decide a wager," said the little man, clicking his heels
together, "and if he has not one, half of it is for yourself. You
remember the inspection the other day?"
"Ay," said the jailer. "Is the bet for a large amount?"
"Wait until you hear," laughed the schoolmaster. "I saw it plainly.
Come, let us up, I say."
But now the jailer took a sudden turn. "I would not have him disturbed.
I have a kindly feeling for the lad."
"What, turning soft-hearted?" answered the schoolmaster, who had already
pushed half up the stairway. He picked up a lantern from the wall.
"Leave the poor lad alone," said the jailer, gruffly.
By this time the sound of Mr. Anderson's heels was echoing down the
corridor. He held the lantern above his head, and a look of astonishment
spread over his features.
He retraced his steps to where the jailer stood, leaning against the
wall, his hands outstretched for support.
"You may save your pity and your solicitude," said Mr. Anderson, banging
up the lantern. "There will be some reckoning made for this condition of
affairs to-night."
"What? What?" stammered the jailer.
"Mark what I say," went on the schoolmaster, looking the other squarely
in the face with his twinkling ferretlike eyes. "Your prisoner has
escaped. You careless sluggard!"
Of course all this requires an explanation.
It had been a momentous day for the prisoner in the little cell. The
signal, as agreed upon in another cipher letter which had been smuggled
in to him, was this: If the bars were ready to be misplaced he would put
two crusts of bread outside the doorway of his cell; if for any reason
the time should be postponed, only one would be placed on the flagging.
Some one on an ostensible visit to another part of the jail would be on
the lookout for this simple sign. It happened that just before this
visit was paid, the under jailer, unseen, swept away one of the crusts
of bread, so the signal appeared to read for the following night.
The bars, however, were ready to be removed. It would take but a slight
exertion to make a hole large enough for him to draw his body through.
But how to escape from the door below or to pass the sentry at the
gateway?
When the second jailer appeared early in the evening, George stopped him
and handed him five golden guineas. "Have a feast at my expense," he
said. "Share it with the people here who have been so good to me; to-day
is my birthday." (This was a fact, and, for that reason, William's as
well.) "Listen, also; go you to Fraunce's Tavern and buy four bottles of
the best Lone Star Madeira. Present them to the head prison-keeper with
the compliments of an officer. Pretend you do not know from whom they
come. He might not accept them from a prisoner in his care."
Probably the man had never held so much gold in the grasp of his dirty
fingers before. He fairly grovelled. "Lord bless you, sir, leave me to
do the lying," he said.
George's last generous offer had almost proved his undoing, for shortly
after dark he had heard the sounds of carousing and some merriment from
the jailer's quarters. The sentry at the head of the stairs had
disappeared, and the sound of the file biting away the last remaining
bits of steel would have been audible were it not for the clamor below.
He was about to push the loosened iron out when a wheezy voice humming a
snatch of a song was heard coming down the corridor. It was the head
jailer.
"Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage,"
he chanted thickly. "I can be generous as well as other folk. I am not a
hard man. My guest of honor must drink with me." In an instant he was
before the doorway. "Here's a good health to you, my unknown friend.
Long live the King!" With that the jailer wavered unsteadily and tossed
off a glass of Madeira.
George feared that he was about to be discovered, and pretended sleep;
but this was all the visit amounted to, for soon he heard the heavy
footsteps lumber down the stairway, still protesting that it was not "a
flint heart."
Now was the time. George pushed the bars gently, and they came off
without much trouble. He laid them on the quilt, and drew himself
through the aperture, then he tiptoed carefully down the steps.
A ray of light from a room to the right showed that the door was partly
ajar. He looked inside. The jailer was fast asleep. Before him on the
table wore three empty bottles of Madeira. A heavy military cloak hung
from a peg at one side, and a huge three-cornered hat above it. George
throw the cloak about his shoulders and placed the hat upon his head. It
came down over his ears. He drew the bolt of the big front door and
stepped out under the stars--for it had ceased snowing--and into the
court-yard. The only entrance was guarded by a man leaning on his
musket.
How to pass him was the question. But as the young fugitive drew nearer
he perceived that the tall soldier was fast asleep. He was leaning on
one side of the door with his foot propped against a post on the other.
His leg made a barrier.
Making his body as small as possible, George essayed to stoop under the
outstretched leg; but his shoulder jostled the sentry, and he awoke.
George recognized the ex-corporal.
"Well, well, McCune," he said, shaking the man roughly; "asleep at your
post, man! It will never do!"
The sentry drew himself up as best he could, and his musket snapped to a
present. "Pardon me, Lieutenant," he said. "Do not report me, or I will
get the lash." The poor fellow trembled as he spoke.
"Let it not occur again," said George, "and I will see."
"May the saints bless you, sir!" said the sentry thickly, as he watched
the figure of his supposed officer disappearing about the corner. It was
at this moment that Anderson and William were holding their talk at the
tavern.
At eleven o'clock a small boat jumped about under the rafters at the end
of Striker's wharf. A man with a boat-hook held it securely against the
pier head.
"'Tis time he were coming," he said to another behind.
[Illustration: IN AN INSTANT THE BOAT SWEPT OUT INTO THE SWIRLING TIDE.]
At that moment a soft hail was heard, and a young man bent over the edge
of the timbers. In an instant he had lowered himself into the boat, the
oars were manned, and it had swept out into the swirling tide of the
river.
Hardly had it disappeared when another figure of the same size and
general appearance came on a quick walk to the water's edge. He hailed
softly, looking under the pier.
There was no answer, or no boat in sight. The cloaked figure then turned
about and hurried back to the eastward.
Had something gone amiss?
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
MYSTERIES OF STAGE SCENERY.
BY W. J. HENDERSON.
You have taken off your overcoat and made yourself as comfortable as
possible in an angular little folding-chair that never was intended to
give any human being a minute's comfort. The orchestra has crashed
through the last measures of the overture. The footlights are turned up;
the auditorium lights are turned down; the curtain rises. You see a
beautiful valley, winding away among very purple mountains till it loses
itself in the crimson of the glowing sunset. The sky is as luminous as
if it were nature itself, and you are almost tempted to believe that the
rear wall of the theatre has been removed, and that you are looking out
at something real. Presently you notice a few soft fleecy clouds
drifting across the sky. The crimson fades gradually, and the pale gray
of a brief twilight follows. The sky grows darker and darker, and
presently you see the twinkle of a single star, then another and
another. And now a gentle greenish glow begins to pervade the scene. It
increases in power till the stage is flooded with the bright refulgence
of a summer moon. The whole thing is beautifully managed, and is most
realistic.
[Illustration: MAKING THE FIRE IN THE LAST SCENE OF "DIE WALKÜRE."
Calciums, Cloud-machine, Lycopodium Torch, Red Fire, and Steam-box in
Operation.]
But after a time the moonlight fades out, and leaves behind it a
threatening gloom. A dull distant peal of thunder proclaims the approach
of a storm. There is a flash of lightning. The storm breaks. Peal upon
peal of crashing thunder rends the sky. The wind howls and shrieks, and
the sharp cut of the driving rain is distinctly heard. The curtain falls
at the end of the act, and you rub your eyes and wonder if you have been
dreaming or have really seen these things on a wooden stage.
The next act shows a scene in the forest, and as the sunlight filters
through the rustling leaves, the dancing shadows on rock and trunk are
plainly seen. Again the scene changes. This time it is a fire. The stage
is filled with flames and smoke and the crash of falling timbers. You
are almost tempted to believe that the house is really afire. But the
same old curtain comes down at the end, and only a strong smell of
powder reminds you of what you have seen. In the last act of this
surprising play the hero and heroine, converted into disembodied
spirits, go to the heavenly regions on a winged horse; and you see them,
glowing with supernatural light, go flying across the deep blue sky. You
leave the theatre in a state of wonder.
How is it all done?
Of course I have been imagining a play in which many different effects
were combined; but nevertheless you have seen these illusions, though
not all in the same play.
Spectral appearances are often managed nowadays with a stereopticon. For
instance, in _Siegfried_ there is a scene in the forest in which the
music of the opera is supposed to depict the rustling of the leaves. In
order to heighten the effect of this scene it is customary to produce
the illusion of the flickering of the sunlight caused by the waving
foliage. This is done by means of movable glasses, something like the
arrangement of a kaleidoscope without the variety of colors. The white
light is thrown through these moving glasses, and the audience sees the
waving shadows, as if caused by sunlight filtering through wind-shaken
leaves. In the last act of _Die Walküre_ the sisters of Brünnhilde are
heard coming through the air to their customary place of assembly to the
wild measures of the "Ride of the Valkyries." It is also necessary that
they should be seen. This necessity is fulfilled by the stereopticon. A
picture of a Valkyr maid mounted on her steed is thrown on the dark
drop-curtain at the back of the stage, and is made to pass from the
upper left-hand corner down to the lower right-hand corner. By keeping
the power of the light at a moderate pitch, the picture is prevented
from being too hard and definite. Again, when the sisters, fleeing
before the angry Wotan, depart in a body, a picture representing the
group passes from the lower right-hand corner to the upper left-hand
corner, while the stormy music of the "Ride" dies away. The effect is
very fine indeed.
In the _Flying Dutchman_ there is a view of the sea in the first scene,
and a gale of wind is supposed to be blowing. The audience sees thin,
gray, filmy scud scurrying across the sky from the beginning of the
scene until the gale ends. This is also a stereopticon effect, and is
produced by passing properly painted glasses across the opening of the
lens. These few instances will give the reader some idea of the part
which the stereopticon now plays in the illusions of the stage. It
cannot be said that the results are always satisfactory, and, no doubt,
in the course of time a better plan will be introduced.
One of the most familiar and beautiful effects produced upon the stage
is the change from day to night or from night to day. The former, owing
to the conditions surrounding stage illusions, is the more striking, and
is that most frequently seen. In order to produce this effect the
rearmost piece of scenery is a "drop," which is made about double the
height of the ordinary scenes. This drop is painted to represent sky.
The lower half is colored with the bright tints of the sunset, and these
gradually blend in the middle of the drop into the subdued shades of a
moonlit night. Sometimes the setting sun itself is shown, and this is
effected by cutting a circular hole in the drop, pasting a piece of red
muslin over the back of it, and putting a light behind it. The drop is
now hung so that the lower half alone is visible. Now the scenery of the
distance is painted upon a separate piece, which is "profiled"--that is,
the irregular line made by trees, houses, mountains, etc., is cut out
with a circular saw. This profile piece is set about four feet in front
of the sky drop. Some six or eight feet further toward the front is hung
what is called a cut-gauze drop, though this is sometimes omitted,
especially if the view at the rear embraces an expanse of water. If it
is woods, however, the cut-gauze drop is always used. This drop has
sides and a top of canvas, painted as the case requires. The open
central part is filled with stout gauze netting, which gives a charming
aerial effect to the distance.
Now all is ready for the sunset except the lights, which are arranged
thus: Behind the profile a row runs across the stage to throw its light
on the lower part of the sky drop. The top part is illuminated by the
border lights. A similar arrangement is made in front of the profile,
while the foreground depends for its light on the borders and
footlights. In all new theatres these are electric lights in three
circuits. One circuit consists of lights with white globes, another red,
and the third green. For broad daylight effects the white are used. In
the scene we are describing, beginning with sunset, the red circuit is
turned on. Calcium-lights with red glasses are stationed at the sides of
the stage, and thus the whole scene is suffused with a glow of red
light. The change from sunset to moonlight is effected by slowly and
imperceptibly lowering the sky drop. As the sun disappears behind the
distant hills the red "mediums," as they are called, are turned off and
the green ones gradually turned on. When the night sky has fairly got
down to its place the green mediums are all turned on at full force, and
green glasses are placed in front of the calciums. The stage appears now
to be flooded with moonlight. Of course the moon cannot be shown, for it
would naturally be too far toward the audience. I was once in a theatre
where the sun went down behind a mountain, and in half a minute the moon
rose in the very same place. And the strangest part of it was that the
audience did not pay any attention to this astounding freak of nature.
[Illustration: BEHIND THE SCENES.
Man up in the Flies producing flickering Sunlight.]