Heralds of Empire Read online

  CHAPTER II

  I RESCUE AND AM RESCUED

  So the happy childhood days sped on, a swift stream past floweredbanks. Ben went off to sail the north sea in Captain Gillam's ship.M. Picot, the French doctor, brought a governess from Paris forHortense, so that we saw little of our playmate, and Jack Battlecontinued to live like a hunted rat at the docks.

  My uncle and Rebecca's father, who were beginning to dabble in the furtrade, had jointly hired a peripatetic dominie to give us youngsterslessons in Bible history and the three R's. At noon hour I initiatedRebecca into all the thrilling dangers of Indian warfare, and many atime have we had wild escapes from imaginary savages by scaling a ropeladder of my own making up to the high nursery window. By-and-bye,when school was in and the dominie dozed, I would lower that timidlittle whiffet of a Puritan maid out through the window to theturnstile. Then I would ride her round till our heads whirled. IfJack Battle came along, Rebecca would jump down primly and run in, forJack was unknown in the meeting-house, and the meeting-house wasRebecca's measure of the whole world.

  One day Jack lingered. He was carrying something tenderly in a redcambric handkerchief.

  "Where is Mistress Hortense?" he asked sheepishly.

  "That silly French woman keeps her caged like a squirrel."

  Little Jack began tittering and giggling.

  "Why--that's what I have here," he explained, slipping a bundle of softfur in my hand.

  "It's tame! It's for Hortense," said he.

  "Why don't you take it to her, Jack?"

  "Take it to her?" reiterated he in a daze. "As long as she gets it,what does it matter who takes it?"

  With that, he was off across the marshy commons, leaving the squirrelin my hand.

  Forgetting lessons, I ran to M. Picot's house. That governess answeredthe knocker.

  "From Jack Battle to Mistress Hortense!"

  And I proffered the squirrel.

  Though she smirked a world of thanks, she would not take it. ThenHortense came dancing down the hall.

  "Am I not grown tall?" she asked, mischievously shaking her curls.

  "No," said I, looking down to her feet cased in those high slippersFrench ladies then wore, "'tis your heels!"

  And we all laughed. Catching sight of the squirrel, Hortense snatchedit up with caresses against her neck, and the French governesssputtered out something of which I knew only the word "beau."

  "Jack is no beau, mademoiselle," said I loftily. "Pah! He's a wharflad."

  I had thought Hortense would die in fits.

  "Mademoiselle means the squirrel, Ramsay," she said, choking, herhandkerchief to her lips. "Tell Jack thanks, with my love," shecalled, floating back up the stairs.

  And the governess set to laughing in the pleasant French way thatshakes all over and has no spite. Emboldened, I asked why Hortensecould not play with us any more. Hortense, she explained, was becometoo big to prank on the commons.

  "Faith, mademoiselle," said I ruefully, "an she mayn't play war on thecommons, what may she play?"

  "Beau!" teases mademoiselle, perking her lips saucily; and she shut thedoor in my face.

  It seemed a silly answer enough, but it put a notion in a lad's head.I would try it on Rebecca.

  When I re-entered the window, the dominie still slept. Rebecca, thedemure monkey, bent over her lesson book as innocently as though therewere no turnstiles.

  "Rebecca," I whispered, leaning across the bench, "you are big enoughto have a--what? Guess."

  "Go away, Ramsay Stanhope!" snapped Rebecca, grown mighty good of asudden, with glance fast on her white stomacher.

  "O-ho! Crosspatch," thought I; and from no other motive thantransgressing the forbidden, I reached across to distract the attentivegoodness of the prim little baggage; but--an iron grip lifted me bodilyfrom the bench.

  It was Eli Kirke, wry-faced, tight-lipped. He had seen all! This wasthe secret of Mistress Rebecca's new-found diligence. No syllable wasuttered, but it was the awfullest silence that ever a lad heard. I waslifted rather than led upstairs and left a prisoner in locked room withnaught to do but gnaw my conscience and gaze at the woods skirting thecrests of the inland hills.

  Those rats in the attic grew noisier, and presently sounds a mightyhallooing outside, with a blowing of hunting-horns and baying ofhounds. What ado was this in Boston, where men were only hunters ofsouls and chasers of devils? The rats fell to sudden quiet, and fromthe yells of the rabble crowd I could make out only "King-killers!King-killers!" These were no Puritans shouting, but the blackguardsailors and hirelings of the English squadron set loose to hunt downthe refugees. The shouting became a roar. Then in burst Eli Kirke'sfront door. The house was suddenly filled with swearings enough tocram his blasphemy box to the brim. There was a trampling of feet onthe stairs, followed by the crashing of overturned furniture, and therabble had rushed up with neither let nor hindrance and were searchingevery room.

  Who had turned informer on my uncle? Was I not the only royalist inthe house? Would suspicion fall on me? But questions were put toflight by a thunderous rapping on the door. It gave as it had beencardboard, and in tumbled a dozen ruffians with gold-lace doublets,cockades and clanking swords.

  Behind peered Eli Kirke, pale with fear, his eyes asking mine if Iknew. True as eyes can speak, mine told him that I knew as well as he.

  "Body o' me! What-a-deuce? Only a little fighting sparrow of aroyalist!" cried a swaggering colt of a fellow in officer's uniform.

  "No one here, lad?" demanded a second.

  And I saw Eli Kirke close his eyes as in prayer.

  "Sir," said I, drawing myself up on my heels, "I don't understand you.I--am here."

  They bellowed a laugh and were tumbling over one another in their hasteup the attic stairs. Then my blood went cold with fear, for the memoryof that poor old man going to the shambles of London flashed back.

  A window lifted and fell in the attic gable. With a rush I had slammedthe door and was craning out full length from the window-sill. Againstthe lattice timber-work of the plastered wall below the attic windowclung a figure in Geneva cloak, with portmanteau under arm. It was theman who had supped so late with Eli Kirke.

  "Sir," I whispered, fearing to startle him from perilous footing, "letme hold your portmanteau. Jump to the slant roof below."

  For a second his face went ashy, but he tossed me the bag, gained theshed roof at a leap, snatched back the case, and with a "Lord blessthee, child!" was down and away.

  The spurred boots of the searchers clanked on the stairs. A blowing ofhorns! They were all to horse and off as fast as the hounds coursedaway. The deep, far baying of the dogs, now loud, now low, as thetrail ran away or the wind blew clear, told where the chase led inland.If the fugitive but hid till the dogs passed he was safe enough; but ofa sudden came the hoarse, furious barkings that signal hot scent.

  What had happened was plain.

  The poor wretch had crossed the road and given the hounds clew. Thebaying came nearer. He had discovered his mistake and was trying toregain the house.

  Balaam stood saddled to carry Eli Kirke to the docks. 'Twas a wanhope, but in a twinkling I was riding like wind for the barking behindthe hill. A white-faced man broke from the brush at crazy pace.

  "God ha' mercy, sir," I cried, leaping off; "to horse and away! Rideup the brook bed to throw the hounds off."

  I saw him in saddle, struck Balaam's flank a blow that set pace for agallop, turned, and--for a second time that day was lifted from theground.

  "Pardieu! Clean done!" says a low voice. "'Tis a pretty trick!"

  And I felt myself set up before a rider.

  "To save thee from the hounds," says the voice.

  Scarce knowing whether I dreamed, I looked over my shoulder to see onewho was neither royalist nor Puritan--a thin, swarth man, tall andstraight as an Indian, bare-shaven and scarred from war, with long,wiry hair and black eyes full of sparks.

  The pack cam
e on in a whirl to lose scent at the stream, and my rescuerheaded our horse away from the rabble, doffing his beaver familiarly tothe officers galloping past.

  "Ha!" called one, reining his horse to its haunches, "did thatsnivelling knave pass this way?"

  "Do you mean this little gentleman?"

  The officer galloped off. "Keep an eye open, Radisson," he shoutedover his shoulder.

  "'Twere better shut," says M. Radisson softly; and at his name my bloodpricked to a jump.

  Here was he of whom Ben Gillam told, the half-wild Frenchman, who hadmarried the royalist kinswoman of Eli Kirke; the hero of Spanish fightsand Turkish wars; the bold explorer of the north sea, who brought backsuch wealth from an unknown land, governors and merchant princes werespying his heels like pirates a treasure ship.

  "'Tis more sport hunting than being hunted," he remarked, with an airof quiet reminiscence.

  His suit was fine-tanned, cream buckskin, garnished with gold braidlike any courtier's, with a deep collar of otter. Unmindful ofmanners, I would have turned again to stare, but he bade me guide thehorse back to my home.

  "Lest the hunters ask questions," he explained. "And what," hedemanded, "what doth a little cavalier in a Puritan hotbed?"

  "I am even where God hath been pleased to set me, sir."

  "'Twas a ticklish place he set thee when I came up."

  "By your leave, sir, 'tis a higher place than I ever thought to know."

  M. Radisson laughed a low, mellow laugh, and, vowing I should be acourt gallant, put me down before Eli Kirke's turnstile.

  My uncle came stalking forth, his lips pale with rage. He had blazedout ere I could explain one word.

  "Have I put bread in thy mouth, Ramsay Stanhope, that thou shouldstturn traitor? Viper and imp of Satan!" he shouted, shaking hisclinched fist in my face. "Was it not enough that thou wert utterlybound in iniquity without persecuting the Lord's anointed?"

  I took a breath.

  "Where is Balaam?" he demanded, seizing me roughly.

  "Sir," said I, "for leaving the room without leave, I pray you to flogme as I deserve. As for the horse, he is safe and I hope far awayunder the gentleman I helped down from the attic."

  His face fell a-blank. M. Radisson dismounted laughing.

  "Nay, nay, Eli Kirke, I protest 'twas to the lad's credit. 'Twas thisway, kinsman," and he told all, with many a strange-sounding, foreignexpression that must have put the Puritan's nose out of joint, for EliKirke began blowing like a trumpet.

  Then out comes Aunt Ruth to insist that M. Radisson share a haunch ofvenison at our noonday meal.

  And how I wish I could tell you of that dinner, and of all that M.Radisson talked; of captivity among Iroquois and imprisonment in Spainand wars in Turkey; of his voyage over land and lake to a far northsea, and of the conspiracy among merchant princes of Quebec to ruinhim. By-and-bye Rebecca Stocking's father came in, and the three sattalking plans for the northern trade till M. Radisson let drop that theEnglish commissioners were keen to join the enterprise. Then the twoPuritans would have naught to do with it.

  Long ago, as you know, we dined at midday; but so swiftly had the hourflown with M. Radisson's tales of daring that Tibbie was alreadylighting candles when we rose from the dinner table.

  "And now," cried M. Radisson, lifting a stirrup-cup of home-brewedOctober, "health to the little gentleman who saved a life to-day!Health to mine host! And a cup fathoms deep to his luck when Ramsaysails yon sea!"

  "He might do worse," said Eli Kirke grimly.

  And the words come back like the echo of a prophecy.

  I would have escaped my uncle, but he waylaid me in the dark at thefoot of the stairs.

  "Ramsay," said he gently.

  "Sir?" said I, wondering if flint could melt.

  "'The Lord bless thee, and keep thee: the Lord make his face shine uponthee, and be gracious unto thee: the Lord lift up his countenance uponthee, and give thee peace!'"