CHAPTER XX
THE SITUATION AT QUEBEC
Immediately after the fall of Quebec, the English resolved to hold the city at any cost, and to that end every defense was strengthened without loss of time.
As Wolfe was dead and Monckton wounded and unable to act, the command fell upon General Murray. Under his directions the soldiers leveled the breastworks erected on the Plains of Abraham, so that they might give no shelter to any advancing French army, and strengthened the defenses of Quebec proper. The men also cut and brought in large quantities of firewood, for use during the winter, which all felt would be long and bitter, and likewise aided in storing the provisions sent ashore from the fleet.
The ships could not winter very well in the river, and it was not long before they left, taking with them also a portion of the grenadiers and rangers. At Quebec were left ten battalions of grenadiers, one company of rangers, a strong force of the artillery, and likewise a sprinkling of Colonial free lances and friendly Indians—the latter to be used chiefly as scouts, spies, and messengers.
The city had suffered much from the bombardment of the artillery. The cathedral was honeycombed with cannon balls, and many public buildings and private houses and shops had been completely wrecked. The people who were left in the place were almost terror-stricken, and it was a long time before quiet, and even a semblance of order, could be restored.
For over a week Henry was kept at work on the outer defenses of the city. It was hard labor, but he did not grumble, having already realized that the path of the soldier is not one simply of glory. The death of Silvers made him unusually sober, and in his heart he was sincerely thankful that an all-powerful Providence had spared his life.
The middle of the winter found Henry on guard at the lower end of the city. Here were a number of stores which had been broken down by the bombardment, and some of the owners were missing. A quantity of goods had been stolen, and Henry and four other soldiers were set at the task of guarding the property.
On the second day that Henry was on guard he noticed something which did not at all please him. Two of the soldiers, named Fenley and Prent, were unusually friendly, and, when they supposed they were not being watched, one or the other would slip into one of the stores. When the fellow would reappear, he would have something concealed under his coat, and this, later on, he would pass over to another soldier, named Harkness, who had charge of a watch-house a square away.
“I believe that those fellows are up to no good,” thought Henry, after he had watched the movements of the three soldiers several times. “They act like a regular pack of sneaks.”
But Henry was too open-hearted and square to suspect the trio of deliberate wrongdoing, until one day Prent accosted him and asked him how he liked his pay as a soldier.
“I think we get mighty little for what we do,” said Prent. “And Fenley and Harkness think the same.”
“It is certainty not much,” answered Henry, totally unsuspicious that he was being “sounded.”
“Wouldn’t you like to have the chance to make a bit more?” went on Prent, in a lower voice, and with an anxious look around.
“What do you mean, Prent?”
“Oh, nothing much, only if you’d like to make some money on the outside, perhaps I can place you in the way of it.”
“I am out to make any money that I can make honestly,” answered the young soldier.
“Oh! Well, this isn’t—well, it isn’t just work, you know. But you can make a neat sum if you want to stand in the game.”
“I’ll stand in no game that isn’t strictly honest,” burst out Henry, and now his suspicion was aroused.
“Oh, all right!”
“What have you in mind to do?”
“Nothing—if that’s the way you feel about it,” retorted Prent, and turning on his heel, he walked rapidly away.
After that the other soldiers were more careful than ever of their movements. But Henry could not get the talk out of his mind, and he at last resolved to play the spy, and see what they were doing, or proposed to do.
One day Henry was on guard, from two in the afternoon until six. At that hour Fenley came to relieve him, while Prent came to relieve another soldier named Groom. Groom at once retired to his quarters, but Henry merely walked around the corner, where he secreted his musket in an out-of-the-way place, and then crawled back in the darkness, for the winter day was now at an end.
From the broken stonework of a house steps, Henry saw Prent walk up and down his beat several times, meeting Fenley at one end. Then Prent gave a low whistle, to which Fenley instantly responded. A moment later Prent disappeared into one of the stores he had been set to guard.
“He is up to no good, that is certain,” reasoned Henry. “I wish I could see just what he is doing.”
Watching his opportunity, he sped quickly across the street, which at this point was not very wide. The store, or shop, stood on a corner, and on the side was a broken window, partly boarded up. A board was loose at its lower end, and, lifting it up, Henry crawled through the window.
All was dark around him, and, standing on the floor, near some boxes, he listened intently. He knew that Prent could not be far away.
Presently he heard a foot bang against a box or barrel. “Hang the luck!” came in Prent’s voice. “It’s as dark as the River Styx! I’ll have to make a light, or I’ll break my neck.” The striking of a flint in a tinder-box followed, and soon Henry saw the faint light of a tallow dip.
Prent was moving toward a stairs leading into a cellar, and this brought him to within a few feet of where Henry was crouching. But the young soldier remained undiscovered, and in a moment more he heard the other soldier shuffle carefully down the stairs and walk across the cellar floor.
Henry’s curiosity was now aroused to a high pitch, and he resolved to see what was taking place in the cellar, no matter what the risk to be run. He tiptoed his way to the stair, and went down step by step on his tiptoes.
The stairs creaked, but the sound was not heard by Prent, who was rummaging around a score of small boxes, all of hard wood, bound with iron. One of the boxes was open and showed that it was filled with surgical and mathematical instruments.
“Bah! I cannot do much with that truck!” Prent muttered, after looking some of the articles over. “The other boxes probably contain things more to my liking.”
The fellow had brought a hatchet and chisel with him, and was soon at work prying open another iron-bound box. Occasionally he paused to listen, as if waiting for a signal from Fenley, but none came, and he continued his work.
When the second box came open, Henry could scarcely repress a cry of amazement. The box was filled with silverware, for the shop was one which had been used by a gold and silver smith. There were silver drinking cups and decanters, and also half a dozen silver trays, and frames for miniatures.
“Ha! Now we have the right thing!” muttered Prent, gazing at the collection with satisfaction. “If we can only get it away without being discovered we will be rich.”
“He has turned thief!” thought Henry. “What a rascal! And I thought he was an honest soldier!”
He watched Prent examine the various silver things, and place some in his pockets and his breast. Then the fellow started to open up another of the iron-bound boxes.
Henry was in a quandary, not knowing what to do. He felt that it was his duty to report Prent, and have the man arrested. But then he remembered the order that had but recently been issued by General Murray—that any man caught plundering in Quebec should be hanged.
“I can’t see the fellow strung up,” thought the young soldier. “That would be too horrible. Perhaps if I talk to him he’d get out and leave the things alone.”
At first Henry decided that he would talk to the would-be thief when he left the building. But then he remembered that it would be best to have Prent put the things back in the boxes and nail the latter up. A few steps took him to the stairs, and once there he called softly:
“Prent!”
Had a gun gone off at his ear the evil-doer would not have been more astonished. He dropped the silver mug he was examining and leaped back a step.
“Wh—who calls?” he gasped.
“Prent, I have caught you fairly and squarely, and I want you to leave those things alone.”
“Ha, so it is you, Henry Morris!” burst from the other soldier’s lips. And then he added quickly: “Are you alone?”
“I am.”
“What brought you here?”
“I came to find out what your little game was. I reckon I know the truth.”
“You don’t know anything,” blustered Prent. The exposure had come so unexpectedly he knew not what to say.
“I know you are here for no good purpose. If it were otherwise you would not come here like a thief in the night.”
“Are you going to expose me?”
“That depends on yourself. I have no desire to see you hanged.”
At these words Prent gave a shiver, for he was at heart a coward.
“I—I—you——” he stammered, and could not go on.
“Listen to me, Prent, and you may save yourself a whole lot of trouble,” went on Henry, as calmly as he could. “I hate to play the spy on a fellow soldier, but I felt that it was necessary, after what you had said to me. You wanted to draw me into this robbery. Now, as I said before, I don’t want to see you hanged, or even sent to prison. But I am not going to allow you to rob this place, either.”
“I haven’t said I was going to rob it yet,” burst out Prent. “I—I haven’t taken a thing.”
“You have. Your pockets and your breast are full of silverware. Now I want you——”
At this moment came a loud whistle from outside, followed by the pounding of a musket butt on an outer cellar door.
“An alarm! Let me get out of here!” yelled Prent and made a leap for the stairs, which were narrow and old.
Before Henry could stand on guard he found himself in the other soldier’s grasp. Then Prent gave him a shove which sent him over the side of the steps head first. Henry tried to save himself, but went down between two barrels with a crash. Before he could extricate himself from the tight position his assailant had fled. Then the tallow dip spluttered up and went out, and the young soldier was left in total darkness.