"What is it?" whispered the boy, who was moved by his caller's evident
distress. "Don't say uncle's ill!"
"No, no, my dear, but I am in great trouble. You--you didn't shut the
front door."
"Oh!" ejaculated Rodd.
"And--and, my dear, there have been thieves and robbers in the night.
They have stripped my little larder, and I don't know what they haven't
taken besides. Do, pray, make haste and dress, and come down and help
me! I am in such trouble, I don't know what I shall do."
"All right; I'll make haste and come down," cried Rodd, feeling guilty
all over, and then trying to excuse himself by shuffling the blame on to
the right shoulders. "It was uncle she asked," he muttered, as he ran
round to the other side of the bed for the chair upon which he had hang
his clothes when he undressed. "Why, hallo!"
He stood staring at the chair for a moment or two, and then ran round
the foot of the bed, opened the door two or three inches, and called in
a subdued tone so as not to awaken his uncle, though if he had been
asked why, he could not have told, beyond saying that he felt then that
it was the right thing to do--
"Mrs Champernowne! Mrs Champernowne!"
"Yes, my dear," came from the foot of the stairs. "Oh, you have been
quick!"
"No, no, I haven't," cried Rodd pettishly. "Here, I say, have you taken
away my trousers?"
"Gracious me, no, my dear! What should I want with your trousers?"
"Take them down to brush perhaps," muttered the boy to himself, as he
ran back to the other side of the bed and raised the counterpane.
"Haven't slipped off and gone under," he muttered, and then as a fresh
thought struck him he clapped his hands to his forehead and stood
staring before him. "The thieves!" he exclaimed. "They haven't been in
here and taken all my clothes?"
He was silent for a few minutes, as he stared vacantly about the room.
"They have, though!" he cried. "Here, Mrs Champernowne!--Boots and
all. Oh, I can't tell her. Here, I must get my other suit out of the
portmanteau. I won't wake uncle, because it's so early. Why, it can be
only just sunrise; and he'd sit up and laugh at me. Oh, bother!"
Rodd ran round to the door again, opened it about an inch, and listened.
"She's in the kitchen," he muttered to himself, and slipping out on to
the little landing he raised the latch of his uncle's door, glided in,
and made for the big portmanteau that lay unstrapped beneath the window.
Raising the one half quickly, he twisted the whole round so that the two
halves might lie open upon the whitely-scrubbed boards as silently as he
could; but one corner caught against the leg of the dressing-table,
jarring it so violently that a hair-brush fell on to the floor with a
bang, and Uncle Paul sprang up in bed.
"Hullo, you sir! What are you doing there?" he cried.
"Getting out my other suit, uncle," said the boy quickly.
"What for? Don't do that! We are going over the moor again to-day."
"But I must, uncle," cried Rodd.
"Mush!"
"Yes. Oh, I shall be obliged to tell you. It was all your fault,
uncle; you didn't fasten the door as Mrs Champernowne told you, and
there have been thieves in the night."
"Been grandmothers in the night!" cried Uncle Paul contemptuously.
"It's true, uncle, and they came up into my room while I was asleep and
took away all my clothes--boots and all."
"You don't mean that, Pickle! Here, I say, where are mine?"
Rodd sprang to his feet from where he was kneeling by the portmanteau,
and ran round to the side of the bed, just as his uncle turned and faced
him.
"Every blessed thing gone, boy. Why, Rodney, my lad, we have fallen
into a den of thieves--robbed, and we may thank our stars we haven't
been murdered!"
"Why, it's horrid, uncle! Didn't you hear them, then?"
"Hear them, no! I heard nothing till you knocked something off on to
the floor. Here, stop a moment, boy! My purse! It was in my trousers
pocket."
"Then it's gone, uncle," cried Rodd.
"Ah! Horror! My gold watch and seals!"
"Well, they weren't in your trousers, uncle."
"No, boy; I remember winding it up and laying it on the chimney-piece."
"It isn't there, uncle."
"My gold presentation watch, that I wouldn't have lost for five hundred
pounds! Call up that wretched woman."
"Uncle, I can't!"
"Do as I tell you, sir! She's in league with the thieves."
"But, uncle!"
"Oh yes, I forgot. There, don't stand staring there like a bull calf
that has lost its mother. Turn that portmanteau upside down. Put on
some things yourself, and throw me some more. You can dress quicker
than I can, for you haven't got to shave. Look sharp, and then run for
the village constable."
"Why, there isn't one, uncle," grumbled Rodd, as he began to scramble
into his other clothes.
"No, of course there isn't, sir. A miserable one-eyed place with only
two cottages in it, and I dare say that old woman's in the other,
sharing the plunder? What a fool I was to come!"
"No, you weren't, uncle, and Mrs Champernowne isn't sharing the
plunder, for she came and woke me up to say that the thieves had been
and carried off everything there was down-stairs. I say, uncle, it was
all your fault."
"Don't you dare to say that to me again, sir!" roared Uncle Paul. "It
is insolent and disrespectful. Oh, hang the woman's door! Why didn't
she bolt it herself? Why, I'd got twenty guineas in that purse, besides
a lot of silver. There, there's somebody knocking at the door! Who's
there?"
"Please, sir, it's me. They've taken the bread and the butter, and a
piece of freshly-boiled ham that I meant for you to have cold."
"And pray who's _they_, madam?" shouted Uncle Paul, who was in
difficulties with buttons.
"Well, sir, I was thinking it must be the smugglers. They've been here
several times before, when they have been crossing the moor with cargo;
but it couldn't be them, for they always leave a little box of tea or a
bit of silk, to pay for what they take. It must have been thieves,
sir--thieves."
"Yes, madam; and they have taken my purse and gold watch too, besides
two suits of clothes. There, go on down. We'll join you soon. I want
to think what's to be done."
The stairs creaked as Mrs Champernowne descended, and just then
something caught Rodd's eye--something bright and shiny, against the
leaves of a big old gazetteer lying upon the side-table.
Rodd uttered an ejaculation.
"Oh!" he exclaimed.
"Something more gone?" cried the Doctor.
"No, uncle; there's your watch. And here's your gold pencil-case too,"
continued the boy, as he raised the corner of the book. "Why, they have
been turning the watch-ribbon into a marker, and somebody has been
writing here on the fly-leaf."
"Thank goodness!" grunted Uncle Paul. "That's something saved out of
the fire. Never mind the writing. But they have taken our clothes."
"It's in French, I think, uncle, but I can't quite make it out."
"French!" cried Uncle Paul fiercely. "Why, of course! How stupid! I
might have known. We have been attacked in the night by a gang of old
Napoleon's scum. That man's bound to be the curse of my life. Don't
stand staring there, boy. Can't you see?"
"No, uncle," said the boy sturdily. "What nonsense! Napoleon couldn't
have invaded England in the night to come and steal our clothes."
"Bah! Idiot! Can't you see it's some of those scoundrelly French
prisoners who escaped yesterday? That vagabond of a boy perhaps that
you pampered off and were feeding with our good English provisions. Now
you see the consequences. The ungrateful rapparee--Oh no, but that's
Irish, and he'd be French."
"Yes, uncle," said the boy thoughtfully, for his uncle's fulminations
fell blankly upon his ears as he stood trying to puzzle out some of the
pencilled words upon the fly-leaf of the book.
"Here's _pardon_, uncle, and something else I can't make out, and
_changer_. Why, that means exchange! Yes, and lower down here's _sous_
something, only it's written over `John Champernowne' and `his book';
but that's in ink. What does _oreiller_ mean, uncle?"
"Bolster," said Uncle Paul. "No: pillow," and he turned involuntarily
towards the bed, where, unperceived before, a scrap of something red
peered from beneath the clean white pillow-case. "Under the pillow,"
said Uncle Paul, and stepping to the side of the bed he snatched up the
soft down cushion deeply marked by the pressure of his head.
Catching up what lay beneath, he uttered a loud ejaculation and tapped
it sharply against the bed-post.
"What have you got there, uncle?"
"Pickle, my boy, it's my twenty guineas that we thought they'd stolen.
What in the name of forceps and lancets did they tie them up in this old
silk rag for? It's a bit of a pocket-handkerchief."
"Why, uncle," cried Rodd, laughing, "it isn't going to be so bad, after
all. Somebody's been having a game with us."
"Game, eh? Queer sort of a game, Pickle," cried Uncle Paul; and with
very little effort he tore open the silk envelope and poured out a
little heap of bright gold coins upon the bed. "Napoleons, by all
that's wonderful!" he cried. "Exchange! I begin to see now, boy. He's
taken my good gold money, whoever he is, and left this French trash.
Here, give me that book. Mind--don't drop my watch."
"I have got it safe, uncle," replied the boy, handing the big book to
his uncle.
"Humph!" grunted Uncle Paul. "Not quite such a scoundrel as he might
have been, whoever it is that wrote it. Exchange, eh? But there's been
no exchange about our clothes. Humph! All in French, of course. If he
had been a gentleman, and he couldn't understand plain English, he would
have written it in Latin. Bah! How I do hate that pernicketty French!
Let's see--let's see. Oh yes, here it all is. Ask pardon for two poor
prisoners trying to escape--um, um, um--years of misery. Generous
Englishman--some day--_remerciments_. Ah, it's all scribbled horribly--
in the dark, I suppose. Oh, he's signed it, though, Pickle. `Des Saix,
Comte.' Oh, there are two of them, then. The other's signed his name
too--quite a different hand. `Morny des Saix, Vicomte.' H'm! Well, I
suppose they are gentlemen."
"Noblemen, uncle."
"Bah! Noblemen wouldn't do a thing like that!"
"What are those other words, uncle, under the last name?"
"Um--um--um! `May God bless you for what you did to-day. Your friend
till death.' Why, Pickle, you ought to have been able to read that
yourself."
"I did, uncle, but I wanted to be sure that I was right. Why, that must
have been the boy I helped to escape."
"Yes, and he dodged us home, and as good as robbed us."
"Oh, uncle! Shame!"
"How dare you, sir! What do you mean by it, Rodney? Do you forget who
I am, sir?"
"No."
"And pray who am I then, sir?"
"Dear old Uncle Paul, who has got out of bed the wrong way this
morning!"
"H'm--ha! Well, I suppose you are right, Pickle. I did feel in an
awful temper; but I don't feel quite so bad now that I have found my
watch."
"And pencil-case, uncle."
"Ah, yes, my boy. That was the gift of a very grateful old patient."
"And then there are all those gold napoleons, uncle."
"Bah! Trash! Base counters, good for nothing, like the ugly head
that's upon them," cried Uncle Paul irascibly.
"But I say, uncle; it might have been worse."
"But the clothes, my boy! The scoundrels! They'll go masquerading
about in our things, and escaping, I'll be bound. But stop a minute.
What did he say about exchange?"
"Oh, that meant about the money."
"Hullo! There's that wicked old woman again!--Well, Mrs Champernowne,
what is it now?"
"The wood-shed, sir."
"Well, I don't want the wood-shed. Light the fire yourself."
"You don't understand me, sir. I went round there to get some kindling,
and there's quite a heap of old clothes there that these wicked people
have left behind."
Uncle Paul chuckled, for he was beginning to beam again.
"I say, Pickle, that accounts for the milk in the cocoa-nut. They must
have taken our things down into the old lady's wood-shed, and turned it
into a dressing-room."
"Yes," cried Rodd; "and that young Viscount is quite welcome to mine."
"Most generous, I am sure, sir," cried Uncle Paul sarcastically, "but
would you be kind enough to tell me who pays the bills for your
clothes?"
"Why, you do, uncle, of course. But I say, uncle, I do hope they'll
escape; don't you?"
"Wha-a-at!"
"You do, uncle, only you pretend that you don't."
"Pretend!"
"Yes. Poor fellows! How horrible! To have to stoop to such a scheme
as that to get away! But after all, uncle, it's glorious and brave.
What an escape! Oh, how I should like to meet that poor fellow again!"
"What, to give him up to the soldiers?" said Uncle Paul sarcastically.
"Give him up to the soldiers!" cried the boy indignantly. "Why, I'd
sooner put on his old clothes, and tell them a lie!"
"What!" cried Uncle Paul.
"Well, I'd pretend to be him so as to cheat them, and make them take me
instead."