Chapter 17

I have been many a time surprised to observe the strange volatility of sailormen. They will pass in an instant from jollity to woe, and, when just snatched from the jaws of death, will give the rein to jests and sportiveness as if life were nothing but a perpetual holiday. Some of my comrades were perfectly hilarious, and began to talk and laugh as freely as they might in the forecastle, far from a hostile shore. I had to warn them very earnestly against so imperiling the safety of us all; but Joe Punchard's admonitions were more effective than mine, for in a harsh whisper he roundly abused them, threatening with many offensive terms to leave them to their fate if they did not instantly cease and obey me as their captain.

Their intelligence being penetrated with some notion of the exceeding danger of our situation, the noisy ones kept silence and agreed to follow my behests. This threw on me a task of great hazard and responsibility, for we were strangers in a strange land, and I had no knowledge of our whereabouts, nor a clearly defined plan of action. Gathering them in a knot about me, so that all could hear my lowest whisper, I put to them the situation as I conceived it.

"By God's mercy we have succeeded thus far," I said, "but the greatest of our dangers lie still before us. I know nothing of this country, nor does any of us, and in a few hours day will dawn, our escape will be discovered, and there will be a hue and cry after us for miles around. What we want to do is to make the coast and borrow a boat in which we may set sail for England."

"Ay, ay," was the general grunt.

"Ay, indeed," I went on, "but we know not in what direction the coast lies, nor would it be safe for us to attempt to reach it yet. When our absence is known, the Frenchmen will assuredly suspect that the coast will be our aim, and they will have it watched for miles, so that even if we found a boat and got to sea (in which we might fail), we should certainly be espied and chased and caught. What we must do, as it seems to me, is to strike into the country and find a hiding place where we may lie until the first alarm has passed, and then endeavor by some means to learn of a secluded fishing hamlet whither we may steal our way by night. Can you suggest a better plan?"

For a brief space there was silence; then the bosun said:

"If we can not tell the way to the coast, neither can we know if we be going inland, and so we may stumble into the very danger we ought to avoid."

"There is the north star above us," I replied, "and by going south it would appear that we shall go away from the sea. I propose, then, that we turn our backs on the star and march southward, trusting to find some wood or perchance some ruin where we may lurk a day or two."

"And our bellies empty," groaned Tolliday.

"Let us hope not," I said. "We may come upon some fruit gardens where we can find enough to keep us from starvation. But if we must fast, then I warrant we, being Englishmen, can endure our pangs for a day. Time is passing; 'tis gone midnight, if I guess right, and since move we must, I speak for moving at once."

No other course suggesting itself, we set off, and, having the good luck to strike a road, we marched along in dogged silence for what must have been a couple of hours. We passed but one house, and that was in total darkness, and if any person in it had been awake, our passage would not have been heard, for we were all barefooted but three, myself and two others.

After pausing a while to rest, we set off again, and tramped on until there was a hint of daybreak in the sky. Then, being utterly weary (for none of us had enjoyed a full night's sleep for months), we looked about for some spot where we might rest without danger. We found ourselves between open fields, somewhat cut up by low stone dykes, but with no buildings or copses that offered even a temporary shelter. We had perforce to continue on our way, and about half a mile farther on our eyes were gladdened by the sight of a large, low, dismantled farmhouse lying somewhat back from the road. It appeared at first to be a total ruin, and bore the marks of fire upon its blackened walls: but on entering we discovered one room that had some portion of a roof over it, and, better still, a quantity of straw spread about the floor. We were gathering this up to make rough beds of it, when we perceived a trap door in the floor, and it occurred to me that if it led down to a dry cellar, such as were not uncommon in farmhouses in England, this would prove a more secure refuge than the room on a level with the road.

Lifting the trap door, I found that it was even as I hoped. The cellar beneath was large, and dimly illuminated through a grating let into the wall just above the level of the ground. I perceived, too, that it had a door, so that in the unlikely event of our re-entrance by the trap door being prevented, we could still escape into the open. There was straw also in the cellar, and it did not take us many seconds to decide that here we would lay down our tired bodies and gain some sleep. My purpose was, after resting, to go exploring alone, trusting to my knowledge of the French tongue to procure some food and also to learn something of the lie of the land, for there must assuredly be a habitation somewhere in the neighborhood.

We all descended into the cellar, closing the trap door after us, and gladly stretched our limbs upon the straw. It did not appear necessary to keep a watch. The farm had clearly not been inhabited for many years, and there was no reason to fear that our rest would be disturbed. Even when the pursuit of us should be begun, it was in the highest degree unlikely that it would tend in this direction. The road was hard after a period of dry weather, and we had left no foot tracks to betray us. But as a precaution I went out by the cellar door, ascended a short flight of steps and made my way to the upper room again, where I spread some straw on the trap door, to hide it from any chance visitor. Then I returned to the cellar. Our fatigue was so great that in a few moments we were all asleep.

I was awakened by a touch on my arm. I sat bolt upright in an instant. Runnles was leaning over me, with his finger at his lips. The other men were already awake, and seeing, I suppose, a look of inquiry on my face, Runnles whispered:

"I wakened them first, 'cos they was snoring."

And then I became aware that it was precisely the unexpected that had happened. There were people in the room above. I heard footsteps and voices, and then felt no little alarm when another sound reached my ears--a sound that I could not mistake. It was the sound of muskets being stacked.

We looked at one another in mute dismay. Had our pursuers hit upon our tracks at once? It seemed scarcely credible. Yet for a minute or two I waited in a kind of paralysis, expecting the trap door to open and a posse of armed soldiers to descend. My anxiety on this score soon vanished, however, for I heard a heavy thump on the trap door above, and guessed that either something had been thrown upon it or that one of the intruders had unwittingly chosen it for his seat. This, with the previous stacking of the arms, seeming to indicate that the visitors intended to make some stay, and had no suspicion of our presence.

I determined to set my fears finally at rest (and, I must own, also to satisfy my curiosity) by stealing out and taking a peep at them, if they had left the door open. Whispering my comrades to remain perfectly silent, I slipped off my boots, quickly opened the door, and went very cautiously round to the front part of the house.

The first object that caught my eyes was a horse standing tethered in what had been the ruins of a barn adjoining the farmhouse. Creeping up to the door, which had been left ajar, I peeped in, and saw a party of French soldiers seated on the floor, eating bread and sausages, and drinking from little tin cans. My mouth watered at the sight of this food after more than twelve hours of fasting, but I was not conscious of this till afterwards. The party consisted of seven men. One, somewhat apart from the rest (it was he who had sat himself on the trap door), was clearly an officer. He was a tall, lean man of some forty years; he had unbuttoned his coat and laid his hat, in which there was a white cockade, beside him. At a respectful distance from him sat the others of the party.

For some time they ate their meal in silence, the men, I suppose, not daring to converse in the presence of their captain. But by and by the officer, his hunger being some whit appeased, unbent a little from his dignity and addressed a stout little sergeant among the party.

"It is twelve years since I was here before, Jules," he said, and there was a noticeable air of condescension in his tone; it was as though he did the sergeant a mighty favor in speaking at all.

"Yes, monsieur," said the sergeant, as if humbly inviting him to continue.

"Yes, twelve years ago," the officer repeated. "I have reason, truly, to know it again. Those were the days of the Conversions, Jules. You don't know what the Conversions were? I will tell you. There were cursed Huguenots in the country then, Jules, bad citizens, unruly rascals every one of them, and our good king commanded that they should instantly return to the true faith. Some of them were obstinate, and they, see you, had to be converted. We called it conversion by lodgings, and, my faith, it was excellent sport. They quartered some of us on any household that was unwilling to obey the king, and there we remained until they saw the error of their ways.

"My faith! some were hard to convert. The owner of this place, for instance. We were here for a month, and never lived better in our lives. The fool! He had a pretty daughter, too, and I fell in love with her. The farmer objected, and one day had the insolence to strike me. That was treason, of course, and the least we could do, especially as he was so obstinate in the matter of his conversion, was to burn his farm. He shot one of my men while we were at the work, and--well, we hanged him. That was twelve years ago."

The sergeant laughed. I, who had heard something from my father of King Lewis' treatment of his Huguenot subjects--of the Dragonnade, as it was called, and the sufferings of the poor people at the hands of the brutal soldiery--I, who knew of this, was shocked at the callous levity of the captain's speech; and I could have struck the fat, foolish face of the sergeant for his chuckle.

"What fools men are!" the captain went on. "Who would have supposed that these rascals of deserters would make for the very place where they would most readily be discovered! But all these peasants are simpletons. If you, now, were to desert, Jules, you would not return to Meaux, would you? You are a townsman, and have more sense. But these peasants--bah! cattle, no more."

I thought the sergeant's laugh at this rang a trifle hollow. He was not a soft-hearted man in appearance, but perhaps he had some fellow feeling for poor men dragged from their work at the plough to serve in the army of the Grand Monarque. His next words surprised me, for I had not understood the captain's reference to deserters.

"Shall we give them something to eat, mon capitaine?" he asked.

"Decidedly not," said the officer with an oath. "They have led us a pretty dance, and what's the good of food to men about to be shot!"

"But they may fall from exhaustion before we reach Rennes," suggested the sergeant, "and that may cause delay. They have had nothing for near twelve hours, mon capitaine, and marching best part of the time."

"Well, give them a crust," said the captain, lazily throwing himself back on the straw; "but it is waste, sheer waste."

The sergeant rose and, taking some scraps of food, crossed the room and disappeared from my sight. I knew now that the deserters of whom they had spoken were actually in the place with them, and found myself pitying the fate of men who had had the ill luck to fall into the hands of so coldly brutal an officer as this captain.

Then I turned about with a start, having the strange feeling--for I heard nothing--that someone was moving behind me. It was Runnles. He came towards me stealthily, wearing that meek, shy look of his, and told me in a whisper that Joe Punchard had sent him to see what had become of me. At the sight of him a fantastic notion buzzed into my head. I caught him by the sleeve and whispered eagerly in his ear, his eyes becoming two round O's with excitement as he listened. He stole away again, and I turned once more to my business of eavesdropping.

"They eat like pigs," I heard the captain say to the sergeant, who had returned to his lair on the straw. "These peasants never lose the ill manners bred in them. And those English dogs who have escaped from prison--how do I know they are peasants, too, Jules?"

"I can not tell, mon capitaine," says the sergeant.

"Why, because you may be sure they have done a foolish thing, like these deserters of ours. They are seamen; depend upon it, they have made straight for the coast, and we shall soon hear that they have been taken."

I could not help smiling at the ingenuousness of the captain's reasoning.

"My faith!" he went on, "I wish we were going from Rennes to St. Malo instead of from St. Malo to Rennes. I should have loved to join in the hunt for the rascals, and I doubt not you, Jules, would be glad enough to get some portion of the reward offered for their capture. Ah, well! the others will have the luck; but I would give something to see those English dogs when--"

And here I pushed wide the door.

"Am I permitted to enter, messieurs?" I said in my best French, and giving the captain a pleasant smile. Lying at full length with his head on his arms, he could not clearly see me. The men stared at me, but did not move nor speak, waiting dutifully for their officer. He raised himself on his elbow.

"Who are you?" he asks, looking me up and down from my bare feet to my unkempt head.

"I, monsieur," said I steadily, though my heart was thumping at a furious rate--"I, monsieur, am one of the English dogs--at your service."

This announcement was sufficiently startling to account for the temporary paralysis that seemed to have fallen on the party. They stared at me, speechless. During that moment I had thrown a rapid glance to my left. The three deserters were lying against the wall; between them and me were the stacked muskets of the soldiers.

While the men were still fixed in their astonishment, I sprang three paces to the left, caught up the muskets in both arms, and dashed towards the door. That released them from the spell; the men jumped to their feet and rushed after me. What happened to the captain I learned afterwards from Joe. He suddenly found himself heaved up into the air: four brawny arms had shoved up the trap door on which he was lying, my dash for the door having been the signal I had communicated to them through Runnles. When the officer came sprawling down on the straw again, some feet away from his former position, he was pounced on by Joe and the bosun, who made short work of tying him up with his own sword strap.

Meanwhile the rest of my comrades had run out of the cellar door, and joined me just in time to receive the charge of the six Frenchmen who had followed me from the house. Fortunately for us, what with surprise and haste, the Frenchmen had not drawn their swords, so that the fight that ensued beneath the ruined wall of the farm was waged on fairly even terms. And when it comes to a contest in which nature's weapons are employed, I never yet met combatants to match sturdy English tars. There were six Frenchmen, and my comrades (Joe and the bosun being busy with the captain) numbered seven, but of these Dilly was old and Runnles was small, and, coming up in the rear of the rest, they two had no part in the fight. Nor had I, for when they engaged my arms were full of the muskets; and when I had laid these on the ground I saw that one of the Frenchmen, evidently foreseeing how the matter must end, left his fellows and ran fleetly towards the horse, which was looking with serene indifference at the scene. I sprinted after him; he had only a few yards' start, and knew that he was pursued, for he swerved out of the direction in which he was running, seeing, no doubt, that he would not have time to untether the horse before I was upon him. He turned aside, leapt a low dyke into a field, and picked up his heels so nimbly that, though I was pretty quick of foot, I was by no means sure of my power to overtake him.

But he had left me the horse. Quickly untethering it, I mounted, and set off after the runaway. And then my practice in cross-country riding about Shrewsbury served me well; I did not hesitate to set the beast at the dykes that divided the fields; he took them gamely, and after five minutes of as mad a steeplechase as I ever enjoyed I came up with the fugitive. He sprang aside, drew his sword, and seemed to be for showing fight: but when I wheeled the horse and threatened to ride him down he saw that the game was up, and, sullenly surrendering his sword, marched back before me to the farm.

Then I found that my comrades had already finished the business. They had hauled the Frenchmen back into the room where their captain lay, screeching abuse at Joe and the bosun, who smiled at him encouragingly. The Frenchmen's faces bore marks of punishment; several of them had signs of war upon their sleeves, which they had used to stanch their noses. So loudly did the captain vituperate me that I had to ask Joe to silence him; it was necessary for us to hold a council of war, and quiet discourse was impossible while the Frenchman raved.

Joe chose a way as effective as it was simple. He caught up a handful of straw and stuffed it between the officer's teeth.

And now some of the circumstances reminded me of the similar mischance that had befallen me on the Bristowe road. There also the scene had passed in a ruined building strewn with straw. And the recollection of the indignity I had suffered at the hands of Topper and his fellows, coupled with the sight of the three deserters lying manacled and open-mouthed against the wall, gave me an idea that pleased me mightily. I had once changed clothes against my will; why should not Monsieur le Capitaine learn humility in the same way? He was about my height: his clothes would certainly fit me better than Job the poacher's had done; and whereas my former change had been for the worse, the change I contemplated should turn out very much for the better, and so the whirligig of time would have his revenges.

I told my comrades what I had in mind.

"All very well for you, sir," said the bosun bluntly, "but what about us tars?"

"Why, some of you can slip into the Frenchmen's clothes," I replied. "You won't get a fit, I fear, bosun; you are overgrown" (I smiled as the words others had used about me came unbidden to my lips); "but the sergeant there is very much Joe Punchard's figure, and five of you can make shift, I daresay. You would make quite a pretty squad of Frenchmen, and show a little more brawn."

"But what's the good, sir?" objected Tolliday. "We can't talk a word of the lingo, and if your idea be to march through the country till we can find a boat, bless my buttons if we can do it, 'cos the first cuss I say will be the ruin of us."

"I haven't told you all my plan yet," I said. "But first I must speak to these poor fellows here: they are deserters and were on the way to Rennes to be shot.

"Take 'em outside, Joe."

The plan I had in mind when seizing the Frenchmen was somewhat hazy, but it was becoming clearer every moment, and, being spiced with hazard, it appealed to all that was adventurous in my nature.

When I had the deserters out of earshot of their late guards, I asked them if they wished to regain their freedom, knowing well what their answer would be.

"Well," said I, "if I set you free now it may do you no good. You have been caught once and may be caught again. But if you throw in your lot with us there is a chance for you. We are English prisoners who have escaped: join us, and we will try to take you to England."

They demurred to this. They did not want to go to England, where they would be friendless and might starve. They would rather remain in their own country, among their own kin.

"But there is a France overseas," I said. "From England you may perhaps sail by and by for Quebec, where you would be among your own countrymen, and run little risk of being recognized. If you stay here you will sooner or later be captured again and shot. A new land is the place for you."

They discussed this suggestion among themselves, and at length agreed to make the attempt. I then returned to my comrades, and explained to them more fully my design. It was nothing less than to personate the French captain, and to lead my party across country just as he had been doing. The three deserters would exchange their peasant rags for the uniforms of three of the French soldiers, and three of my comrades would wear the uniforms of the rest. I hoped that with courage and address and circumspection we might contrive to keep up the imposture long enough to accomplish our ends.

My comrades, however, looked at the matter in a different light.

"'Tis all very fine," said the bosun gloomily, "but what about the lingo, sir? We may dress up as much as you like, but nohow can we twist our tongues to the jabber of these Frenchies, and I could no more march a score of miles without using my clapper than I could steer without a rudder."

"Then you will have to be wounded in the jaw," I said, "and Joe will tie it up so that you can't open your mouth. We must pretend that we had a desperate fight before we captured the deserters. We must be very careful; I don't make light of the difficulties before us, but we shouldn't be worth the name of English tars if we didn't make the best use of this opportunity that Providence has offered us."

"But what about the rest of us?" said Tolliday. "There bean't enough uniforms to go round."

"Why," I said, with a sudden inspiration, "you shall be just what you are, English seamen who have escaped prison. I shall give out that as we were escorting our deserters we discovered you skulking in a barn, and brought you along with us."

My comrades were aghast at this, but I pointed out that my plan would solve the language difficulty, and that if it succeeded in one part it might succeed in all, whereas if it failed they would be none the worse off. They admitted that this was reasonable, and the humor of the situation suddenly striking them, they began to enjoy it as an excellent joke.

And then Runnles suggested a difficulty which had not occurred to me: it may seem a mark of self-conceit, but it was really mere thoughtlessness. He pointed out that though I spoke French well (little Runnles was a man of tact!), yet it would not deceive a native. He was undoubtedly right, and the suggestion staggered me. Hoping to be reassured, I asked one of the deserters whether I might pass as a Frenchman, and I own I felt deeply chagrined when, with a shrug, he confessed that I would not. But one of his comrades here broke in.

"Pardon, monsieur," he said, "what matters it? That brute of a captain is only a German Swiss; there are plenty such in the king's army; and your French is as good as his."

My spirits rose at this, and having told my comrades what he had said, I determined to lose no more time in putting my plan into execution. The changes of clothes were quickly made, not without some struggles on the part of our victims, and a vast deal of violent language from the captain, whom Joe again half choked with straw. We soon had him and his men rigged up, gagged and manacled as deserters; we borrowed (without leave) kerchiefs of various colors which the Frenchmen had about them, and of them made bandages for those who were to pass as wounded. Joe donned the sergeant's clothes, and the bosun those of the largest of the company, though they were a sad misfit.

It struck us that we should make the imposture more complete if we got a cart in which to convey our wounded men, so when the preparations were otherwise complete I, attired as the French captain, mounted his horse and, accompanied by two of the quondam deserters (now appearing quite respectable infantrymen), set off to find a farm where in the name of King Lewis I might demand what we needed. We had to go some three miles before we came to a likely looking farmhouse, and there, assuming an authoritative and hectoring manner quite foreign to my amiable disposition, I secured a wagon and two horses, for which I gave the farmer a formal receipt.

The sight of his dairy reminded me that I was hungry, and I added to my requisition a good store of food, for which I knew my comrades would bless me. For driver I picked out the stupidest looking yokel I could find among the farmer's men, and then we returned to the ruined farmhouse in triumph and not a little haste, for I was eager to set my teeth in the bread and cheese we were conveying.