_In Which There Is a Flight by Sea, and a Duel by Moonlight._
It appeared, from Ned Faringfield's account of himself, that after his
encounter with Philip, and his fall from the shock of his wound, he
had awakened to a sense of being still alive, and had made his way to
the house of a farmer, whose wife took pity on him and nursed him in
concealment to recovery. He then travelled through the woods to Staten
Island, where, declaring himself a deserter from the rebel army, he
demanded to be taken before the British commander.
Being conveyed to headquarters in the Kennedy House, near the bottom
of the Broadway, he told his story, whereupon witnesses to his
identity were easily found, and, Captain Falconer having been brought
to confront him, he was released from bodily custody. He must have had
a private interview with Falconer, and, perhaps, obtained money from
him, before he came to the Faringfield house to vent his
disappointment upon Madge. Or else he had got money from some other
source; he may have gambled with what part of his pay he received in
the early campaigns. He may, on some occasion, have safely violated
Washington's orders against private robbery under the cover of war. He
may have had secret dealings with the "Skinners" or other unattached
marauders. In any case, his assured manner of offering Madge a passage
to England with him, showed that he possessed the necessary means.
He had instantly recognised a critical moment of Madge's life, the
moment when she found herself suddenly deprived of all resource but a
friendly hospitality which she was too proud to make long use of, as a
heaven-sent occasion for his ends. At another time, he would not have
thought of making Madge his partner in an enterprise like the
Irishman's--he feared her too much, and was too sensible of her
dislike and contempt.
He set forth his scheme to her the next day, taking her acquiescence
for granted. She listened quietly, without expressing her thoughts;
but she neither consented nor refused. Ned, however, made full
arrangements for their voyage; considering it the crowning godsend of
a providential situation, that a vessel was so soon to make the trip,
notwithstanding the unlikely time of year. When Margaret's things were
brought over to our house, he advised her to begin packing at once,
and he even busied himself in procuring additional trunks from his
mother and mine, that she might be able to take all her gowns to
London. The importance of this, and of leaving none of her jewelry
behind, he most earnestly impressed upon her.
Yet she did not immediately set about packing, Ned probably had
moments of misgiving, and of secret cursing, when he feared he might
be reckoning without his host. The rest of us, at the time, knew
nothing of what passed between the two: he pretended that the extra
trunks were for some mysterious baggage of his own: nor did we then
know what passed between her and Captain Falconer late in the day, and
upon which, indeed, her decision regarding Ned's offer depended.
She had watched at our window for the captain's passing. When at
length he appeared, she was standing so close to the glass, her eyes
so unmistakably met his side-look, that he could not pretend he had
not seen her. As he bowed with most respectful civility, she beckoned
him with a single movement of a finger, and went, herself, to let him
in. When he had followed her into our parlour, his manner was
outwardly of the most delicate consideration, but she thought she saw
beneath it a certain uneasiness. They spoke awhile of her removal from
her father's house; but he avoided question as to its cause, or as to
her intentions. At last, she said directly, with assumed lightness:
"I think of going to London with my brother, on the _Phoebe_."
She was watching him closely: his face brightened wonderfully.
"I vow, you could do nothing better," he said. "_There_ is _your_
world. I've always declared you were a stranger in this far-off land.
'Tis time you found your proper element. I can't help confessing it;
'tis due to you I should confess it--though alas for us whom you leave
in New York!"
She looked at him for a moment, with a slight curling of the lip;
witnessed his recovery from the fear that she might throw herself upon
his care; saw his comfort at being relieved of a possible burden he
was not prepared to assume; and then said, very quietly:
"I think Mrs. Russell is coming. You had best go."
With a look of gallant adoration, he made to kiss her hand first. But
she drew it away, and put her finger to her lip, as if to bid him
depart unheard. When he had left the house, she fell upon the sofa and
wept, but only for wounded vanity, for chagrin that she had exposed
her heart to one of those gentry who will adore a woman until there is
danger of her becoming an embarrassment.
Before long, she arose, and dried her eyes, and went up-stairs to pack
her trunks. Thus ended this very light affair of the heart; which had
so heavy consequences for so many people.
But Captain Falconer's inward serenity was not to escape with this
unexpectedly easy ordeal. When he reached his room, he found me
awaiting him, as the representative of Tom Faringfield. I had, in
obedience to my sense of duty, put forth a few conventional
dissuasions against Tom's fighting the captain; and had presumed to
hint that I was nearer to him in years and experience than Tom was.
But the boy replied with only a short, bitter laugh at the assured
futility of my attempts. Plainly, if there was to be fighting over
this matter, I ought not to seek a usurpation of Tom's right. And
fighting there would be, I knew, whether I said yea or nay. Since Tom
must have a second, that place was mine. And I felt, too, with a young
man's foolish faith in poetic justice, that the right must win; that
his adversary's superiority in age--and therefore undoubtedly in
practice, Falconer being the man he was--would not avail against an
honest lad avenging the probity of a sister. And so I yielded
countenance to the affair, and went, as soon as my duty permitted, to
wait upon Captain Falconer.
"Why," said he, when I had but half told my errand, "I was led to
expect this. The young gentleman called me a harsh name, which I'm
willing to overlook. But he finds himself aggrieved, and, knowing him
as I do, I make no doubt he will not be content till we have a bout or
two. If I refuse, he will dog me, I believe, and make trouble for both
of us, till I grant him what he asks. So the sooner 'tis done, the
better, I suppose. But lookye, Mr. Russell, 'tis sure to be an
embarrassing business. If one or other of us _should_ be hurt, there'd
be the devil to pay, you know. I dare say the General would be quite
obdurate, and go the whole length of the law. There's that to be
thought of. Have a glass of wine, and think of it."
Tom and I had already thought of it. We had been longer in New York
than the captain had, and we knew how the embarrassment to which he
alluded could be provided against.
"'Tis very simple," said I, letting him drink alone, which it was not
easy to do, he was still so likeable a man. "We can go from
Kingsbridge as if we meant to join Captain De Lancey in another of his
raids. And we can find some spot outside the lines; and if any one is
hurt, we can give it out as the work of rebel irregulars who attacked
us."
He regarded me silently a moment, and then said the plan seemed a good
one, and that he would name a second with whom I could arrange
details. Whereupon, dismissing the subject with a civil expression of
regret that Tom should think himself affronted, he went on to speak of
the weather, as if a gentleman ought not to treat a mere duel as a
matter of deep concern.
I came away wishing it were not so hard to hate him. The second with
whom I at length conferred--for our duties permitted not a prompt
despatching of the affair, and moreover Captain Falconer's disposition
was to conduct it with the gentlemanly leisure its pretended
unimportance allowed--was Lieutenant Hugh Campbell, one of several
officers of that name who served in the Highland regiment that had
been stationed earlier at Valentine's Hill; he therefore knew the
debatable country beyond Kingsbridge as well as I. He was a mere
youth, a serious-minded Scot, and of a different sort from Captain
Falconer: 'twas one of the elegant captain's ways, and evidence of his
breadth of mind, to make friends of men of other kinds than his own.
Young Campbell and I, comparing our recollections of the country,
found that we both knew of a little open hollow hidden by thickets,
quite near the Kingsbridge tavern, which would serve the purpose.
Captain Falconer's duties made a daylight meeting difficult to
contrive without exposing his movements to curiosity, and other
considerations of secrecy likewise preferred a nocturnal affair. We
therefore planned that the four of us, and an Irish surgeon named
McLaughlin, should appear at the Kingsbridge tavern at ten o'clock on
a certain night for which the almanac promised moonlight, and should
repair to the meeting-place when the moon should be high enough to
illumine the hollow. The weapons were to be rapiers. The preliminary
appearance at the tavern was to save a useless cold wait in case one
of the participants should, by some freak of duty, be hindered from
the appointment; in which event, or in that of a cloudy sky, the
matter should be postponed to the next night, and so on.
The duel was to occur upon a Wednesday night. On that afternoon I was
in the town, having carried some despatches from our outpost to
General De Lancey, and thence to General Knyphausen; and I was free
for a few minutes to go home and see my mother.
"What do you think?" she began, handing me a cup of tea as soon as I
had strode to the parlour fire-place.
"I think this hot tea is mighty welcome," said I, "and that my left
ear is nigh frozen. What else?"
"Margaret has gone," she replied, beginning to rub my ear vigorously.
"Gone! Where?" I looked around as if to make sure there was no sign of
her in the room.
"With Ned--on the _Phoebe_."
"The deuce! How could you let her do it--you, and her mother, and
Fanny?"
"We didn't know. I took some jelly over to old Miss Watts--she's very
feeble--and Madge and Ned went while I was out; they had their trunks
carted off at the same time. 'Twasn't for an hour or two I became
curious why she kept her room, as I thought; and when I went up to
see, the room was empty. There were two letters there from her, one to
me and one to her mother. She said she left in that way, to save the
pain of farewells, and to avoid our useless persuasions against her
going. Isn't it terrible?--poor child! Why it seems only yesterday--"
And my good mother's lips drew suddenly down at the corners, and she
began to sniff spasmodically.
"But is it too late?" I asked, in a suddenly quieted voice. That the
brightness and beauty of Madge, which had been a part of my world
since I could remember, should have gone from about us, all in a
moment!--'twas a new thought, and a strange one. What a blank she
left, what a dulness!
"Too late, heaven knows!" said my mother, drying her eyes with a
handkerchief, and speaking brokenly. "As soon as Mrs. Faringfield read
the letters, which I had taken over at once, Fanny and Mr. Cornelius
started running for the wharves. But when they got there, the _Phoebe_
wasn't in sight. It had sailed immediately their trunks were aboard, I
suppose. Oh, to think of pretty Madge--what will become of her in that
great, bad London?"
"She has made her plans, no doubt, and knows what she is doing," said
I, with a little bitterness. "Poor Phil! Her father is much to blame."
When I told Tom, as soon as I reached the outpost, he gave a sudden,
ghastly, startled look; then collected himself, and glanced at the
sword with which he meant to fight that night.
"Why, I was afraid she would go," said he, in a strained voice; and
that was all.
Whenever I saw him during the rest of the evening, he was silent,
pale, a little shaky methought. He was not as I had been before my
maiden duel: blustering and gay, in a trance-like recklessness;
assuming self-confidence so well as to deceive even myself and carry
me buoyantly through. He seemed rather in suspense like that of a
lover who has to beg a stern father for a daughter's hand. As a slight
hurt will cause a man the greatest pain, and a severe injury produce
no greater, so will the apprehensions of a trivial ordeal equal in
effect those of a matter of life and death; there being a limit to
possible sensation, beyond which nature leaves us happily numb.
Sometimes, upon occasion, Tom smiled, but with a stiffness of
countenance; when he laughed, it was in a short, jerky, mechanical
manner. As for me, I was in different mood from that preceding my own
first trial of arms: I was now overcast in spirit, tremulous, full of
misgivings.
The moon did not disappoint us as we set out for the tavern. There
were but a few fleecy clouds, and these not of an opaqueness to darken
its beams when they passed across it. The snow was frozen hard in the
fields, and worn down in the road. The frost in the air bit our
nostrils, and we now and again worked our countenances into strange
grimaces, to free them from the sensation of being frozen hard.
"'Tis a beautiful night," said Tom, speaking in more composure than he
had shown during the early evening. The moonlight had a calming
effect, as the clear air had a bracing one. His eyes roamed the sky,
and then the moonlit, snow-clad earth--hillock and valley, wood and
pond, solitary house bespeaking indoor comfort, and a glimpse of the
dark river in the distance--and he added:
"What a fine world it is!"
When we entered the warm tap-room of the tavern--the house above
Kingsbridge, outside the barriers where the passes were examined and
the people searched who were allowed entrance and departure; not
Hyatt's tavern, South of the bridge--we found a number of subalterns
there, some German, some British, some half-drunk, some playing cards.
Our Irish surgeon sat in a corner, reading a book--I think 'twas a
Latin author--by the light of a tallow candle. He nodded to us
indifferently, as if he had no engagement with us, and continued to
read. Tom and I ordered a hot rum punch mixed for us, and stood at the
bar to drink it.
"You look pale and shaky, you two," said the tavern-keeper, who
himself waited upon us.
"'Tis the cold," said I. "We're not all of your constitution, to walk
around in shirt-sleeves this weather."
"Why," says the landlord, "I go by the almanac. 'Tis time for the
January thaw, 'cordin' to that. Something afoot to-night, eh? One o'
them little trips up the river, or out East Chester way, with De
Lancey's men, I reckon?"
We said nothing, but wisely looked significant, and the host grinned.
"More like 'tis a matter of wenches," put in a half-drunken ensign
standing beside us at the bar. "That's the only business to bring a
gentleman out such a cursed night. Damn such a vile country, cold as
hell in winter, and hot as hell in summer! Damn it and sink it! and
fill up my glass, landlord. Roast me dead if _I_ stick _my_ nose
outdoors to-night!"
"A braw, fine nicht, the nicht, gentlemen," said a sober, ruddy-faced
Scot, very gravely, with a lofty contempt for the other's remarks.
"Guid, hamelike weather."
But the feelings and thoughts prevailing in the tap-room were not in
tune with those agitating our hearts, and as soon as Captain Falconer
and his friend came in, we took our leave, exchanging a purposely
careless greeting with the newcomers. We turned in silence from the
road, crossed a little sparsely wooded hill, and arrived in the
thicket-screened hollow.
'Twas in silence we had come. I had felt there was much I would like,
and ought, to say, but something in Tom's mood or mine, or in the
situation, benumbed my thoughts so they would not come forth, or
jumbled them so I knew not where to begin. Arrived upon the ground
with a palpitating sense of the nearness of the event, we found
ourselves still less fit for utterance of the things deepest in our
minds.
"There'll be some danger of slipping on the frozen snow," said I,
trying to assume a natural, even a cheerful, tone.
"'Tis an even danger to both of us," said Tom, speaking quickly to
maintain a steadiness of voice, as a drunken man walks fast to avoid a
crookedness of gait.
While we were tramping about to keep warm, the Irish surgeon came to
us through the bushes, vowing 'twas "the divvle's own weather, shure
enough, barrin' the hivvenly moonlight." Opening his capacious
greatcoat, he brought from concealment a small case, which Tom eyed
askance, and I regarded ominously, though it had but a mere
professional aspect to its owner.
We soon heard the tread, and the low but easy voices, of Captain
Falconer and Lieutenant Campbell; who joined us with salutations,
graceful on Falconer's part, and naturally awkward on that of
Campbell. How I admired the unconcerned, leisurely manner in which
Falconer, having gone a little aloof from Tom and me, removed his
overcoat, laced coat, and waistcoat, giving a playful shiver,
purposely exaggerated, as he stood in his ruffled shirt and
well-fitting boots and breeches. I was awkward in helping Tom off with
his outer clothes. The moonlight, making everything in the hollow
well-nigh as visible as by day, showed Tom's face to be white, his
eyes wide-open and darkly radiant; while in Falconer's case it
revealed a countenance as pleasant and gracious as ever, eyes neither
set nor restless.
Campbell and I perfunctorily compared the swords, gave them a bend or
two, and handed them to the principals. We then stood back. Doctor
McLaughlin looked on with a mild interest. There was a low cry, a ring
of steel, and the two men were at it.
I recall the moonshine upon their faces, the swift dartings of their
faintly luminous blades, their strangely altering shadows on the snow
as they moved, the steady attention of us who looked on, the moan of
the wind among the trees upon the neighbouring heights, the sound of
the men's tramping on the crusted snow, the clear clink of their
weapons, sometimes the noise of their breathing. They eyed each other
steadfastly, seeming to grudge the momentary winks enforced by nature.
Falconer's purpose, I began to see, was but to defend himself and
disarm his opponent. But Tom gave him much to do, making lightning
thrusts with a suddenness and persistence that began at length to try
the elder man. So they kept it up till I should have thought they were
tired out.
Suddenly Tom made a powerful lunge that seemed to find the captain
unready. But the latter, with a sharp involuntary cry, got his blade
up in time to divert the point, by pure accident, with the guard of
his hilt. His own point was thus turned straight toward his
antagonist; and Tom, throwing his weight after his weapon, impaled
himself upon the captain's. For an infinitesimal point of time, till
the sword was drawn out, the lad seemed to stand upon his toes,
leaning forward, looking toward the sky with a strange surprise upon
his face, eyes and mouth alike open. And then he collapsed as if his
legs and body were but empty rags; and fell in a huddle upon the snow:
with a convulsive movement he stretched himself back to the shape of a
man; and lay perfectly still.
The captain bent over him with astonishment. The surgeon ran to him,
and turned him flat upon his back. I was by this time kneeling
opposite the surgeon, who tore open Tom's shirts and examined his
body.
"Bedad, gentlemen," said the Irishman sadly, in a moment, "he's beyont
the need of my profession. 'Tis well ye had that sthory ready, in case
of accident."
I stared incredulously at the surgeon, and then buried my face upon
the dear body of the dead, mingling my wild tears with his blood.
"Oh, Madge, Madge," thought I, "if you could see what your folly has
led to!"