CHAPTER XXIX.

A LESSON IN MILITARY LAW.

Even the charms of Bertha Tempest's company did not cause her husband to neglect his duty.

When he was told that Bob was in trouble, he at once deemed it to be his duty and a privilege to go with Vernon and see in what the boy's danger consisted.

Bob was one of nature's rough gems, and Tempest believed there was a future for him which would repay Scarron for his kindness in adopting the waif.

"Lead on!" commanded Vernon, as the watchman seemed to hesitate.

Perhaps it was the hope of receiving something a little warmer than the cold air of the night which made the officer of the law linger over the blazing logs of wood on the massive andirons.

But Vernon, though he liked the fire's warmth as much as did the watchman, was eager to find Bob.

"Lead on. I must see the powder-monkey without delay."

"Powder-monkey! ha, ha, ha, that's good, it just suits. Eh?"

"What were you saying?" asked Vernon.

"Nothing, your honor."

"But you laughed----"

"Yes, your honor, I laughed--ha, ha, ha!--but at my thoughts."

"If your thoughts were so interesting I would like to laugh with you."

Vernon was in an unusually pleasant humor; perhaps the genial influence of the wine and the sharpness of the winter air combined made him feel bright and cheerful.

"Come now, your thoughts, watchman; what were they like?" added Tempest.

"But your honor may be thinking I'm presuming----"

"No, no. Come, let us hear them."

"Well, your honor did call that harum-scarum boy, whose neck is likely to be lengthened, unless the good Lord forbid, a powder-monkey--ha, ha, ha!"

"Ha, ha, ha! So he is a powder-monkey," laughed Vernon, "and I have several more of them on my ship."

"Audacious monkeys!" said the watchman.

"No, powder-monkeys. Perhaps you do not understand----"

"Never mind, sir. I'd like to remember that name, and have a laugh at it many a time."

It was no use trying to explain to the watchman, so Vernon desisted and walked along by the side of the officer, threading the streets, which were but sparsely built up in those days, to the place where Bob was confined.

The lockup was near the Potomac, and not far from the then new navy yard.

Bob was so great a criminal in the eyes of the watchman that, to prevent his escape, he had been placed in the stocks.

He was seated on a hard bench, his ankles fastened securely through holes in a movable board in front of him.

It was impossible for him to stand up, and as his seat was loose, if he wriggled about much the bench would be overturned, and he would fall on his back, with his feet, still imprisoned, above his head.

"Bob, what means this?" asked Vernon.

"I'm glad your honor came; but, sir, the watch tells me I'm to be hanged at daybreak. Not that I minds death--a powder-monkey ought not to be afeared--but I'd like to meet it on the deck of the _Lively Bee_, sir, and I'd like an English bullet to take me off rather than American rope."

"What are you talking about? What have you been doing?"

"Nothing, sir. Nothing."

Now this was a strange thing. Here was a boy in the stocks, told he was to die at daybreak, and yet declaring that he was guiltless of all crime.

"But with what are you charged?" asked Tempest.

"Lor', your honor, they didn't charge me anything. I'd have paid if they'd let me, but they said I must die."

"But you must have done something wrong."

"If I did I'm tarnation sorry, but I ain't sure I did wrong."

"Tell us all."

"Well, your honor, I was expecting to leave the city to-morrow with the captain"--meaning Tempest--"and I kind o' thought that I'd see the big guns in the yard down there, so as I could tell the boys and Mr. Scarron all about them. So I went, and found the gates all locked; but I climbed the wall and got over. Then, you know, I walked about, looking at the guns, and I didn't see one as good as ours. A man came up to me and looked at my face for a long time before he spoke, and then he said: 'Who are you?' and I said, 'Bob.' 'Bob what?' says he, and I answered kind o' proud-like, 'No, I ain't Bob Watt; I'd more likely be Bob Decatur, or Bob Porter, or Bob Vernon, or Bob Hull,' I answered all in a breath, for I was mad; I thought Watt was English, and I didn't want to be thought anything but American. So he says, 'What's your other name?' and I thought he meant again that my name was Watt, so I swore, asking your honor's pardon----"

"Tell your story shortly," interrupted Vernon.

"It isn't a story, your honor, it's the truth, every word of it."

"Go on."

"With that he struck at me, and I picked up a lanyard and knocked him on the head. He said he'd have me locked up, and I told him to do so, and if he did, Dolly Madison would look after me----"

"Dolly Madison--who is that?"

"Lor', your honor, it's the lady as lives at the White House--the President's wife--they all call her Dolly, and she's a friend of mine."

"You should speak more respectfully of the first lady in the land, Bob," Tempest remarked warmly.

"Now, Bob, that is all, is it?"

"No, your honor."

"What other crime did you commit?"

"The man asked me what I was doing there, and I told him, and I said that the gun on the _Lively Bee_ was better than any they'd got. Then he showed how ignorant he was, for he said as how the _Lively Bee_ was English, or if not, then she was only a private craft. With that I hit him again with the lanyard--I'd been busy while I was a-talking, and had put a good knot in the end, and, oh, my, you should ha' seen him fall! He went kersplash through a window and smashed it all to pieces. Then a chap came out with a gun, and I asked him what the window would cost, for I'd pay for it. He put up his gun, and I said, 'Don't shoot, I'll pay for all the damage.' But some more came running up, and I was tied up with a rope, and brought here, and the chaps talked about treason and murder, though I didn't know what it meant. And that's all."

"Quite enough, too, Bob; I am afraid you are in Queer Street."

"Is that the name of this street, your honor?"

"Don't be a fool, Bob. You've killed a man----"

"Is that wrong, your honor?"

"Wrong? Why, it's murder!"

"But we killed a lot on the _Caroline_ and the _Monarch_ and----"

"But that was different, that was war."

"War? Well, and can't I kill a man as calls me a pirate?"

"No, Bob, or you will get hanged for it. Then you did wrong in going into the navy yard. That was treason; you might have been an enemy."

"I don't understand all your fine lingo, your honor. When I swam to the _Monarch_ and climbed on deck and brought away the flag, you said I was a hero, for you wanted to know the size of the guns and all about the _Monarch_; now, when I climb a wall to look at our own guns--for they are American guns, aren't they?--then I'm to die, for that's wrong."

It was hard to make Bob see the difference between murder and lawful killing.

As the poet Young wrote a hundred and fifty years before, Bob philosophized:

"One to destroy is murder by the law; And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe. To murder thousands, takes a specious name War's glorious art, and gives immortal fame."

No wonder that the poor illiterate powder-monkey was unable to see the difference in the degree of guilt.

"I will see what can be done, Bob, but I am afraid you are in a bad fix."

"See Dolly--I ask pardon, Mrs. Madison--and she will see to me."

"What can we do?" asked Tempest.

"I don't see my way clear. If I were on the deck of my own vessel I could adjudicate, but the laws on land are so confoundedly strange," answered Vernon.

"But no murder was intended----"

"No, but what right had Bob in the place at all?"

"A boyish trick."

"Granted, but he had no right to use force. What does he mean by referring to Mrs. Madison?"

Tempest told him of the scene at the banquet, and though the captain of the _Lively Bee_ was feeling far from cheerful, he was compelled to laugh at the comical adventures of the powder-monkey at the White House.

"We must find out whether the man is alive or dead," said Vernon, as the story of Bob's danger was again thought of.

"How?"

"We must go to the navy yard."

"Will not the morning do?"

"No. Why delay? I am sure Mistress Tempest will excuse you."

"I was not thinking of myself," answered Tempest; "but shall we not appear overanxious?"

"Zounds, man! I'd drag the President from his bed if I could save Bob."

And Tempest could well believe his captain capable of doing so.

The two visited the navy yard, and the officer on duty received them courteously.

He, however, declined to answer the question respecting the man who had been struck by Bob.

"You see, it really makes no difference whether he is alive or dead."

"It does, though."

"To the man and his family, yes, but to 'Bob' as you call him, no."

"How do you reason that out?" asked Tempest.

The man was evidently fond of talking, and crossed his legs with an assumption of comfort as he spoke.

"We are at war, you admit that?"

"Certainly."

"Then, by the military code, for any one to enter an arsenal or navy yard without permission is to incur the fate of a spy. You know what that is?"

"Death."

"Just so; then Bob, climbing the wall and examining our guns, is a spy, and therefore must die."

"But he is a good American, though an ignorant one."

"You think so?"

"I am sure of it."

"Then in that case it is a pity, but we must expect to lose some good Americans in war times."

"But he is not a spy."

"Not now; no, he is in the stocks, but according to the laws of war he was a spy."

"The court must decide that."

"Yes; but it will be after his death."

"After his death?"

"Certainly. He will die at sunrise."

"Explain yourself. Who has adjudged him worthy of death?" asked Vernon earnestly.

"We are at war?"

"Certainly. This is admitted, or I should not have been thanked by the President for the captures I have made on the high seas."

Ignoring the latter part of Vernon's speech, the officer continued:

"Then being at war, an assault on an officer while on duty is an assault on the nation, and that is treason, and the punishment of treason is death."

"But the courts----"

"May say Bob was innocent, and his family will have that gratification, but he will be dead."

"Why so?"

"We are at war--you are impatient--well, you admit that. Now, the officer who was assaulted was a sentry; an attack on a sentry during war time is an offense punishable by death, and the colonel commanding orders it within twenty-four hours."

"Who is the officer in command?"

"I am."

"But you have not ordered Bob's execution?"

"No, fortunately my superior happened to be here at the time. He gave the order, I shall carry it out."

"Where can he be found?"

"That I know not, for he left no word where he was going; but he is not expected home until the morning."

"What is the use of our staying here?" asked Tempest, _sotto voce_.

The officer heard the question, however, and took it upon himself to answer.

"Nothing, unless you like to sit by the fire and await the execution."

"Zounds, man, what do you take us for?" asked Vernon, indignantly.

"Most worthy gentlemen, who have had a most wholesome lesson in military law."