Chapter Twenty Nine.
A Watch Night.
“What is it—an attack?”
“Quick, gentlemen!” cried the colonel; “every man to his quarters.”
He had hardly spoken before a bugle rang out; and as Frank was hurried out with the rest into the courtyard, it was to see, by the dim light of the clouded moon and the feeble oil lamps, that the guard had turned out, and the tramp of feet announced that the rest of the men gathered for the defence of the Palace and its occupants were rapidly hurrying out of their quarters, to form up in one or other of the yards.
Frank felt that he was out of place; but in his interest and excitement he followed Captain Murray like his shadow, and in very few minutes knew that no attack had been made upon the Palace, but that the cause of the alarm was from within, and his heart sank like lead as the captain said to him:
“Poor lad! He must be half crazy to do such a thing. Come with me.”
Frank followed him, and the next minute they met, coming from the gate on the Park side, a group of soldiers, marching with fixed bayonets toward the guardroom, two of the men within bearing a stretcher, on which lay Andrew Forbes, apparently lifeless. For the lad had been mad enough to make a dash for his liberty, in spite of knowing what would follow, the result being that the sentry by the guardroom had challenged him to stop, and as he ran on fired. This spread the alarm, and the second sentry toward the gate had followed his comrade’s example as he caught a glimpse of the flying figure, while the third sentry outside the gate, standing in full readiness, also caught sight of the lad as he dashed out and was running to reach the trees of the Park.
This shot was either better aimed, or the unfortunate youth literally leaped into the line of fire, for as the sentry drew trigger, just as the lad passed between two of the trees, Drew uttered a sharp cry of agony and fell headlong to the earth.
“Poor lad! poor lad!” muttered Captain Murray; and he made a sign to the soldiers not to interfere, as Frank pressed forward to catch his friend’s hand. Then aloud, “Where is the doctor?”
“Here, of course,” said that gentleman sharply from just behind them. “Always am where I’m wanted, eh? Look sharp, and take him to the guardroom.”
“No, no—to my quarters,” said Captain Murray quickly. “Tut—tut—tut! What were they about to let him go?”
In a few minutes the wounded lad was lying on Captain Murray’s bed, with the colonel, Captain Murray, and two or three more of the officers present, and Frank by the bedside, for when the colonel said to the lad, “You had better go,” the doctor interfered, giving Frank a peculiar cock of the eye as he said, “No, don’t send him away; he can help.”
Frank darted a grateful look at the surgeon, and prepared to busy himself in undressing the sufferer.
“No, no; don’t do that now—only worry him. I can see what’s wrong, and get at it.”
The position of the injury was plain enough to see from the blood on the lad’s sleeve, and the doctor did not hesitate for a moment; but, taking out a keen knife from a little case in his pocket, he slit the sleeve from cuff to shoulder, and then served the deeply stained shirt sleeve the same.
“Dangerous?” said the colonel anxiously. “Pooh! no,” said the doctor contemptuously. “Nice clean cut. Just as if it had been done with a knife,” as he examined the boy’s thin, white left arm. “You ought to give that sentry a stripe, colonel, for his clever shooting. Hah! yes, clean cut for two inches, and then buried itself below the skin. Not enough powder, or it would have gone through instead of stopping in here. No need for any probing or searching. Here we are.”
As he spoke he made a slight cut with his keen knife through the white skin, where a little lump of a bluish tint could be seen, pressed with his thumbs on either side, and the bullet came out like a round button through a button-hole, and rolled on to the bed.
“Better save that for him, Gowan,” said the doctor cheerfully. “He’ll like to keep it as a curiosity. Stopped its chance of festering and worrying him and making him feverish. Now we’ll have just a stitch here and a stitch there, and keep the lips of the wound together.”
As he spoke he took a needle and silk from his case, just as if he had brought them expecting that they would be wanted, took some lint from one pocket, a roll of bandage from another, and in an incredibly short time had the wound bound up.
“Likely to be serious?” said Captain Murray.
“What, this, sir? Pooh! not much worse than a cut finger. Smart a bit. Poor, weak, girlish sort of a fellow; feeble pulse. Good thing he had fainted, and didn’t know what I was doing. Well, squire, how are you?”
Andrew Forbes lay perfectly still, ghastly pale, and with his eyes closely shut, till the doctor pressed up first one lid and then the other, frowning slightly the while.
“Can I get anything for you, doctor?” said Captain Murray.
“Eh? Oh no! He’ll be all right. Feels sick, and in a bit of pain. Let him lie there and go to sleep.”
“But he is fainting. Oughtn’t you to give him something, or to bathe his face?”
“Look here!” cried the doctor testily, “I don’t come interfering and crying ‘Fours about,’ or ‘By your right,’ or anything of that kind, when you are at the head of your company, do I?”
“Of course not.”
“Then don’t you interfere when I’m in command over one of my gang. I’ve told you he’s all right. I ought to know.”
“Oh yes; let the doctor alone, Murray,” said the colonel. “There, I’m heartily glad that matters are no worse. Foolish fellow to attempt such a wild trick. You will want a nurse for him, doctor.”
“Nurse! for that? Pooh! nonsense! I’m very glad he was so considerate as not to disturb me over my dinner. I shouldn’t have liked that, Squire Gowan. Didn’t do it out of spite because he was not asked to dinner, did he?”
“Pish! no; he was asked,” said Captain Murray. “Yes; you wanted to say something, Gowan?”
“Only that I will have a mattress on the floor, sir, and stay with him.”
“Not necessary, boy,” said the doctor sharply.
“Let him be with his friend, doctor,” said Captain Murray.
“Friend, sir? I thought they were deadly enemies, trying hard to give me a job this morning to fit their pieces together again. I don’t want to stop him from spoiling his night’s rest if he likes; but if he stays, won’t they begin barking and biting again?”
“Not much fear of that—eh, Frank? There, stay with your friend. I’m in hopes that you will do him more good than the doctor.”
“Oh, very well,” said that gentleman.
“Then you don’t think there is anything to be alarmed about?” said Frank anxiously.
“Pooh! no; not a bit more than if you had cut your finger with a sharp knife. Now, if the bullet had gone in there, or there, or there, or into his thick young head,” said the doctor, making pokes at the lad’s body as he lay on the bed, “we should have some excuse for being anxious; but a boy who has had his arm scratched by a bullet! The idea is absurd. I say, colonel, are boys of any good whatever in the world?”
“Oh yes, some of them,” said the colonel, smiling and giving Frank a kindly nod. “Good night, my lad. There will be no need for you to sit up, I think.”
“Not a bit, Gowan,” said the doctor quietly. “Don’t fidget, boy. He’ll be all right.”
Frank looked at him dubiously.
“I mean it, my lad,” he said, in quite a different tone of voice. “You may trust me. Good night.”
He shook hands warmly with the boy, and all but Captain Murray left the chamber, talking about the scare that the shots had created in the Palace.
“I hear they thought the Pretender had dropped in,” said the doctor jocosely. Then the door was shut, and the sound cut off.
“I’ll leave you now, Frank, my lad,” said Captain Murray. “Take one of the pillows, and lie down in the next room on the couch. There’s an extra blanket at the foot of the bed. I will speak to my servant to be on the alert, and to come if you ring. Don’t scruple to do so, if you think there is the slightest need, and he will fetch the doctor at once. You will lie down?”
“If you think I may,” said Frank, as he walked with him to the door of the sitting-room, beyond earshot of the occupant of the bed.
“I am sure you may, my boy. The doctor only confirmed my own impression, and I feel sure he would know at a glance.”
“But Drew seems quite insensible, sir.”
“Yes—seems,” said Captain Murray. “There, trust the doctor. I do implicitly. I think he proved his knowledge in the way he saved Baron Steinberg’s life. Good night. You will have to be locked in; but the sentry will have the key, and you can communicate with him as well as ring, so you need not feel lonely. There, once more, good night.”
The captain passed out, and Frank caught sight of a tall sentinel on the landing before the door was closed and locked, the boy standing pale and thoughtful for some moments, listening to the retiring steps of his father’s old friend, before crossing the room, and entering the chamber, which looked dim and solemn by the light of the two candles upon the dressing table. He took up one of these, and went to the bedside, to stand gazing down at Andrew’s drawn face and bandaged arm, his brown hair lying loose upon the pillow, and making his face look the whiter by contrast.
“In much pain, Drew?” he said softly; but there was no reply.
“Can I do anything for you?”
Still no reply, and the impression gathered strength in the boy’s mind that his companion could hear what he said but felt too bitter to reply.
This idea grew so strong, that at last he said gently:
“Don’t be angry with me, Drew. It is very sad and unfortunate, and I want to try and help you bear it patiently. Would you like me to do anything for you? Talk to you—read to you; or would you like me to write to your father, and tell him of what has happened?”
But, say what he would, Andrew Forbes made no sign, and lay perfectly still—so still, that in his anxiety Frank stretched out his hand to touch the boy’s forehead and hands, which were of a pleasant temperature.
“He is too much put out to speak,” thought Frank; “and I don’t wonder. He must feel cruelly disappointed at his failure to escape; but I’m glad he has not got away; for it would have been horrible for him to have gone and joined the poor foolish enthusiasts who have landed in the north.”
He stood gazing sadly down at the wounded lad for some minutes, and then softly took the extra pillow and blanket from the bed, carried them to the little couch in the next room, returned for the candles, and, after holding them over the patient for a few minutes, he went back quietly to the sitting-room, placed them on the table, took a book, and sat down to read.
He sat down to read, but he hardly read a line, for the scenes of the past twenty-four hours came between his eyes and the print, and at the end of a quarter of an hour he wearily pushed the book aside, took up one of the candles, and looked in the chamber to see how Andrew appeared to be.
Apparently he had not moved; but now, as the boy was going to ask him again if he could do anything for him, he heard the breath coming and going as if he were sleeping calmly; and feeling that this was the very best thing that could happen to him, he went softly back to his seat, and once more drew the book to his side.
But no; the most interesting work ever written would not have taken his attention, and he sat listening for the breathing in the next room, then to the movements of the sentry outside as he moved from time to time, changing feet, or taking a step or two up and down as far as the size of the landing would allow. Then came a weary yawn, and the clock chimed and struck twelve, while, before it had finished, the sounds of other clocks striking became mingled with it, and Frank listened to the strange jangle, one which he might have heard hundreds of times, but which had never impressed him so before.
At last silence, broken only by the pacings of other sentries; and once more came from the landing a weary yawn, which was infectious, for in spite of his troubles Frank yawned too, and felt startled.
“I can’t be sleepy,” he said to himself; “who could at such a time?” And to prove to himself that such a thing was impossible, and show his thorough wakefulness, he rose, and once more walked into the chamber, looked at the wounded lad, apparently sleeping calmly, and returned to his seat to read.
And now it suddenly dawned upon him that, in spite of his desire to be thoroughly wakeful, nature was showing him that he could not go through all the past excitement without feeling the effects, for, as he bent firmly over his book to read, he found himself suddenly reading something else—some strange, confused matter about the house in Queen Anne Street, and the broken door.
Then he started up perfectly wakeful, after nodding so low that his face touched the book.
“How absurd!” he muttered; and he rose and walked up and down the room. The sentry heard him, and began to pace the landing.
Frank returned to his seat, looked at the book, and went off instantly fast asleep, and almost immediately woke up again with a start.
“Oh, this won’t do,” he muttered. “I can’t—I won’t sleep.”
The next minute he was fast, but again he woke up with a start.
“It’s of no use,” he muttered; “I must give way to it for a few minutes. I’ll lie down, and perhaps that will take it off, and I shall be quite right for the rest of the night.”
Very unwillingly, but of necessity, for he felt that he was almost asleep as he moved about, he rose, took up the blanket from the couch, threw it round him like a cloak, punched up the pillow, and lay down.
“There!” he said to himself; “that’s it. I don’t feel so sleepy this way; it’s resting oneself by lying down. I believe I could read now, and know what I am reading. How ridiculous it makes one feel to be so horribly sleepy! Some people, they say, can lie down and determine to wake up in an hour, or two hours, or just when they like. Well, I’d do that—I mean I’d try to do that—if I were going to sleep; but I won’t sleep. I’ll lie here resting for a bit, and then get up again, and go and see how Drew is. It would be brutal to go off soundly, with him lying in that state. How quiet it all seems when one is lying down! It’s as if one could hear better. Yes, I can hear Drew breathing quite plain; and how that sentry does keep on yawning! Sentries must get very sleepy sometimes when on duty in the night, and it’s a terribly severe punishment for one who does sleep at his post. Well, I’m a sentry at my post to watch over poor Drew, and I should deserve to be very severely punished if I slept; not that I should be punished, except by my own conscience.”
He lay perfectly wakeful now, looking at the candles, which both wanted snuffing badly, and making up his mind to snuff them; but he began thinking of his father, then wondering once more where he could be, and feeling proud of the way in which the officers talked about him.
“If the King would only pardon him!” he thought, “how— I must get up and snuff those candles; if I don’t, that great black, mushroom-like bit of burnt wick will be tumbling off and burning in the grease, and be what they call a thief in the candle. How it does grow bigger and bigger!”
And it did grow bigger and bigger, and fell into the tiny cup of molten grease—for in those days the King’s officers were not supplied with wax candles for their rooms—and it did form a thief, and made the candle gutter down, while the other slowly burned away into the socket, and made a very unpleasant odour in the room, as first one and then the other rose and fell with a wanton-looking, dancing flame, which finally dropped down and rose no more, sending up a tiny column of smoke instead.
Then the sentry was relieved, and so was Frank, for, utterly worn out, he was sleeping heavily, with nature hard at work repairing the waste of the day, and so soundly that he did not know of the reverse of circumstances, and that Andrew Forbes had risen to enter the outer room, and look in, even coming close to his side, as if to see why it was he did not keep watch over him and come and see him from time to time.
History perhaps was repeating itself: the mountain would not go to Mahomet, so Mahomet had to go to the mountain.
Chapter Thirty.
A Strange Awakening.
There is not much room in a bird’s head for brains; but it has plenty of thinking power all the same, and one of the first things a bird thinks out is when he is safe or when he is in danger. As a consequence of this, we have at the present day quite a colony of that shyest of wild birds, the one which will puzzle the owner of a gun to get within range—the wood-pigeon, calmly settled down in Saint James’s Park, and feeding upon the grass, not many yards away from the thousands of busy or loitering Londoners going to and fro across the enclosure, which the birds have found out is sacred to bird-dom, a place where no gun is ever fired save on festival days, and though the guns then are big and manipulated by artillerymen, the charges fired are only blank.
But Saint James’s Park from its earliest enclosure was always a place for birds—even the name survives on one side of the walk devoted by Charles the Second to his birdcages, where choice specimens were kept; so that a hundred and eighty years ago, when the country was much closer to the old Palace than it is now, there was nothing surprising in the chink, chink of the blackbird and the loud musical song of thrush and lark awakening a sleeper there somewhere about sunrise. And to a boy who loved the country sights and sounds, and whose happiest days had been spent in sunny Hampshire, it was very pleasant to lie there in a half-roused, half-dreamy state listening to the bird notes floating in upon the cool air through an open window, even if the lark’s note did come from a cage whose occupant fluttered its wings and pretended to fly as it gazed upward from where it rested upon a freshly cut turf.
The sweet notes set Frank Gowan thinking of the broad marshy fields down by the river, bordered with sedge, reed, and butter-bur, where the clear waters raced along, and the trout could be seen waiting for the breakfast swept down by the stream—where the marsh marigolds studded the banks with their golden chalices, the purple loosestrife grew in brilliant beds of colour, and the creamy meadow-sweet perfumed the morning air. Far more delightful to him than any palace, more musical than the choicest military band, it all sent a restful sense of joy through his frame, the more invigorating that the window was wide, and the odour of the burned-down candles had passed away.
He lay imbibing the sweet sounds and freshness through ear and nostril; but for a time his eyes remained fast closed. Then, at a loud thrilling burst from the lark’s cage in the courtyard, both eyes opened, and he lay staring up at the whitewashed ceiling, covered with cracks, and looking like the map of Nowhere in Wonderland. For the lark sang very sweetly to charm the wished-for mate, which never came, and Frank smiled and gradually lowered his eyes so that they were fixed upon the uncurtained window till the lark finished its lay.
Then, and then only, did he begin to think in the way a boy muses when his senses grow more and more awake. First of all he began to wonder why it was that the window was wide-open—not that it mattered, for the air was very cool and sweet; then why it was his bedroom looked so strange; then why it was that the blanket was close up to his face without the sheet; and, lastly, he sat up feeling that horrible sense of depression which comes over us like a cloud when there has been trouble on the previous day—trouble which has been forgotten.
For a moment or two he felt that he must be dreaming. But no, he was dressed, this was Captain Murray’s room, there was the door open leading into the chamber where Andrew Forbes lay, and yes— Then it all came with crushing force—he lay wounded after that mad attempt to escape, while the friend who had offered to sit with him and watch had calmly lain down and gone to sleep.
“Oh, it is monstrous!” panted the boy, as he threw the blanket aside, and stepped softly, and trembling with excitement, toward the chamber. For now the dread came that something might have happened during the night, in despite of the doctor’s calm way of treating the injury.
The idea was so terrible that, as he reached the door, he stopped short, and turned a ghastly white, not daring to look in. But recalling now that he had heard his friend’s breathing quite plainly over-night, he listened with every nerve on the strain. Not a sound, till the lark burst forth again.
He hesitated no longer, but, full of shame and self-reproach for that which he could not help, he stepped softly into the room, and then stood still, staring hard at the bed, and at a blood-stained handkerchief lying where it had been thrown upon the floor.
For a few moments the lad did not stir—he was perfectly stunned; and then he began to look slowly round the room for an explanation.
The bed was without tenant. Had Captain Murray, or some other officer, come with a guard while he slept and taken the prisoner away?
Then the truth came like a flash:—
The window in the next room—it was open!
He darted back and ran to the window to thrust out his head and look down. Yes, it was easy enough; he could himself have got out, hung by his hands, and dropped upon the pavement, which would not have been above eight feet from the soles of his boots as he hung.
But the wound! How could a lad who was badly wounded in the arm manage to perform such a feat?
He must have been half wild, delirious from fever, to have done such a thing. No.
Fresh thoughts came fast now. It stood to reason that if Drew had been half wild with delirium he must have been roused; and he now recalled how coolly the doctor had taken the injury, and Captain Murray’s half-contemptuous manner, which he had thought unfeeling. Then, too, it was strange that Drew should have lain as he did, with his eyes tightly closed, just as if he were perfectly insensible, and never making the slightest sign when he had spoken to him.
For a few minutes Frank battled with the notion; but it grew stronger and stronger, and at last he was convinced.
“Then he was shamming,” he muttered indignantly, “pretending to be worse than he really was, so as to throw people off their guard, and then try again to escape.”
Once more he tried to prove himself to be in the wrong and thoroughly unjust to the wounded lad; but facts are stubborn things, and one after the other they rose up, trifles in themselves, but gaining strength as the array increased, and at last a bitter feeling of anger filled the boy’s breast, as he felt perfectly convinced of the truth that Drew had lain there waiting till he was asleep, and then, in spite of his wound, had crept out of the window, dropped, and gone.
But how could he? The sentries had stopped him before; why did they not do so at the second attempt?
And besides, there was the sentry just outside the door. Why had not he heard?
Frank went to the window again, and looked out, to find that it was not deemed necessary to place a guard over the guardroom and the officers’ quarters, save that there was one man at the main doorway, and this was beyond an angle from where he stood, while the next sentries were in the courtyard to his left, and the stable-yard, to his right. So that, covered by the darkness, it was comparatively an easy task to drop down unnoticed, though afterwards it was quite a different thing.
“Then he has gone!” said Frank softly; and he shrank away from the window, to stand thinking about how the lad could have managed to get away unseen by the sentries.
Thoughts came faster than ever; and he, as it were, put himself in his companion’s position, and unconsciously enacted almost exactly what had taken place. For Frank mentally went through what he would have done under the circumstances if he had been a prisoner who wished to get away.
He would have waited till all was still, and when the sentry at the door was pacing up and down, and his footsteps on the stone landing would help to dull any noise he made, he would slip out of the window, drop on to his toes, and then go down on all fours, and creep along close to the wall beneath the windows, right for the piazza-like place, and along beneath the arches, making not for either of the entrance gates, but for the private garden. There he would be stopped by the wall; but there was a corner there with a set of iron spikes pointing downward to keep people from climbing over, but which to an active lad offered good foot-and hand-hold, by means of which he felt that he could easily get to the top. From there he could drop down, go right across the garden to the outer wall, which divided it from the Park, and get on that somewhere by the help of one of the trees. Once on the top, he could choose his place, and crawl to it like a cat. Then all he had to do was to lower himself by his hands, and drop down, to be free to walk straight away, and take refuge with his friends.
“Oh, I could get out as easily as possible, if I wanted to,” muttered Frank. “Poor Drew! what’s to become of him now?”
Frank stood thinking still, and saw it all more and more plainly. Drew would know where his father was, and go and join him. And then?
Frank shuddered, for he seemed to see ruin and misery, and the destruction of all prospects for his friend; and, in spite of the indignation he felt against him for his deceit, his heart softened, and he muttered, as he turned to go once more into the bed-chamber:
“Poor old Drew! I did like him so much, after all.”
As the boy entered the bedroom something caught his eye on the dressing table, and he looked at it wonderingly. It was the book he had been reading in the other room; the book, he knew, was there on the table when he lay down. Could he have taken it into the bed-chamber? No, he was sure he had not. Besides, there was a pen laid upon it, and it was open at the fly-leaf. Frank panted with excitement, for there, written in his friend’s hand, were the words:
“Good-bye, old Frank. We’ll shake hands some day, when I come back in triumph. I can’t forget you, though we did fall out so much. You’ll be wiser some day. I can’t write more; my wound hurts so much. I’m going to escape. If they shoot me, never mind; I shall have died like a man, crying, ‘God save King James!’
“Drew F.”
The tears rose to Frank’s eyes, and he did not feel ashamed of them, as he closed the book and thrust it into his pocket.
“Poor old Drew!” he said softly; “he believes he is doing right, and it is, after all, what his father taught him. My father taught me differently, so we can’t agree.”
What should he do? He must speak out, and it could make no difference now, for Drew must be safe away. He did not like to summon the sentry, and he shrank too, for he felt that he might be accused of aiding in the escape; but while he was thinking he heard steps crossing the open space in front, and glancing through the chamber window, he saw Captain Murray and the doctor coming toward the place.
The next minute their steps were on the stairs, the sentry challenged, the key rattled in the door, and the doctor entered first, to say jocularly as Frank advanced from the chamber:
“Morning, Gowan. Wounded man’s not dead, I hope.”
Chapter Thirty One.
In more Hot Water.
Frank gazed sharply at the doctor, but remained silent, his countenance being so fixed and strange that Captain Murray took alarm.
“Hang it, Frank lad, what’s the matter? Why don’t you speak?”
He did not wait to hear the boy’s answer, but rushed at once into his bed-chamber and returned directly.
“Here, what is the meaning of this?” he cried. “Where is young Forbes?”
“Gone, sir,” said Frank, finding his voice.
“Gone? What do you mean?”
“I sat up watching him till I could not keep my eyes open. Then I lay down, and when I awoke this morning the window was open, and he had escaped.”
“Impossible!” cried Captain Murray angrily.
“Humph! I don’t know so much about that, Murray,” said the doctor, after indulging in a grunt. “The young rascal was gammoning us last night, pretending to be so bad.”
“But there was no deceit about the wound.”
“Not a bit, man; but he was making far more fuss about it than was real. It was only a clean cut, especially where I divided the skin and let out the ball. By George! though, the young rascal could bear a bit of pain.”
“But do you mean to tell me that he could escape alone with a wound like that to disable his arm?”
“Oh yes. It would hurt him terribly; but a lad with plenty of courage would grin and bear that, and get away all the same. I’m glad of it.”
“What! Glad the prisoner has escaped?”
“Oh, I don’t mean that,” said the doctor. “I mean glad he had so much stuff in him. It was a clever bit of acting, and shows that he must have the nerve of a strong man. I beg his pardon, for last night I thought him as weak as a girl for making so much fuss over a mere scratch. It was all sham, that insensibility. I knew in a moment—you remember I said so to you when we went away.”
The captain nodded.
“But I thought it was the weak, vain, young coxcomb making believe so as to pose as a hero who was suffering horribly.”
“But once more,” cried Captain Murray warmly, “do you mean to tell me that, with one arm disabled, that boy could have managed to escape from the window without help?”
“To be sure I do. Give him a pretty good sharp, cutting pain while he was using his arm. Did you hear him cry out, Gowan?”
“No, sir,” said Frank sharply; and he turned angrily upon the captain: “You said something very harsh about Drew Forbes not being able to get away without help. You don’t think I helped him to get away?”
“Yes, I do, boy,” said the captain, with soldierly bluntness. “I think you must have known he wanted to escape, and that you helped him to get out of the window; and I consider it a miserably contemptible return for the kindness of your father’s old friend.”
“It is not true, Captain Murray,” cried Frank hotly. “You have no right to doubt my word. Doctor, I assure you I did not know till I woke this morning, when I was utterly astonished.”
“And ran to the door, and gave notice to the sentry,” said Captain Murray coldly.
“No, I did not do that. I see now that I ought to have done so, and I was hesitating about it when you both came. But I had only just found it out then.”
“And I suppose I shall be called to account for letting him go,” said the captain bitterly. “Why didn’t you go with him? Were you afraid?”
“Oh, come, come, Murray,” cried the doctor reproachfully; “don’t talk so to the boy. He’s speaking the truth, I’ll vouch for it. Afraid? Rob Gowan’s boy afraid? Pooh! he’s made of the wrong sort of stuff.”
“Yes, sir,” cried the boy, in a voice hoarse with emotion, “I was afraid,—not last night, for I did not know he was going; but when he begged and prayed of me to run away with him, and join the people rising for the Pretender, I was afraid to go and disgrace my mother and father—and myself.”
“Well done! well said, Frank, my lad!” cried the doctor, taking him by one hand to begin patting him on the back. “That’s a knock down for you, Murray. Now, sir, you’ve got to apologise to our young friend here—beg his pardon like a man.”
“If I have misjudged him, I beg his pardon humbly—like a man,” said Captain Murray coldly. “I hope I have; but I cannot help thinking that he must have been aware of his companion’s flight. Mr Gowan, your parole is at an end, sir. You will keep closely to these rooms.”
“Bah!” cried the doctor; “why don’t you say you are going to have him locked up in the black hole. Murray, I’m ashamed of you. It’s bile, sir, bile, and I must give you a dose.”
“I am going now, doctor,” said the captain coldly.
“Which means I am to come away, if I don’t want to be locked up too. Very well, I have nothing to do here. There, shake hands, Frank. Don’t you mind all this. He believes this now; but he’ll soon see that he is wrong, and come back and shake hands. Your father knew how to choose his friends when he chose Captain Murray. He’s angry, and, more than that, he’s hurt, because he thinks you have deceived him; but you have not, my lad. Doctors can see much farther into a fellow than a soldier can, and both of your windows are as wide-open and clear as crystal. There, it will be all right.”
He gave the boy’s shoulder a good, warm, friendly grip, and followed the captain out of the room. The door was locked, some orders were given to the sentry, Frank heard the descending steps, and after standing gazing hard at the closed door for some minutes he dropped into the chair by the table, the one in which he had had such a struggle to keep awake. Then he placed his arms before him, and let his head go down upon them, feeling hot, bitter, and indignant against Captain Murray, and as if he were the most unhappy personage in the whole world.
A quarter of an hour must have passed before he started up again with a proud look in his eyes.
“Let him—let everybody think so if they like,” he said aloud. “I don’t care. She’ll believe me, I know she will. Oh! if I could only go to her and tell her; but I can’t. No,” he cried, in an exultant tone; “she knows me better and I know she’ll come to me.”
Chapter Thirty Two.
A Big Wigging.
“I won’t show that I mind,” thought Frank; and in a matter-of-fact way he went into the bedroom, and made quite a spiteful use of the captain’s dressing table and washstand, removing all traces of having passed the night in his clothes, and he had just ended and changed his shoes, which had been brought there, when the outer door was unlocked, and the captain’s servant came in to tidy up the place.
The servant was ready to talk; but Frank was in no talking humour, and went and stood looking out of the window till the man had gone, when the boy came away, and began to imitate Andrew Forbes’s caged-animal-like walk up and down the room, in which health-giving exercise to a prisoner he was still occupied when there were more steps below—the tramp of soldiers, the guard was changed, and Frank felt a strong desire to look out of the window to see if another sentry was placed there; but he felt too proud. It would be weak and boyish, he thought; so he began walking up and down again, till once more the door was unlocked, and the captain’s servant entered, bearing a breakfast tray, and left again.
“Just as if I could eat breakfast after going through all this!” he said sadly. “I’m sure I can’t eat a bit.” But after a few minutes, when he tried, he found that he could, and became so absorbed in the meal and his thoughts that he blushed like a girl with shame to see what a clearance he had made.
The tray was fetched away, and the morning passed slowly in the expectation that Lady Gowan would come; but midday had arrived without so much as a message, and Frank’s heart was sinking again, when he once more heard steps, and upon the door being opened, Captain Murray appeared.
“He has come to say he believes me,” thought the boy, as his heart leapt; but it sank again upon his meeting his visitor’s eyes, for the captain looked more stern and cold than ever, and his manner communicated itself to the boy.
“You will come with me, Gowan,” said the captain sternly.
“Where to?” was upon the boy’s lips; but he bit the words back, and swallowed them. He would not have spoken them and humbled himself then for anything, and rising and taking his hat, he walked out and across the courtyard, wondering where he was being taken, for he had half expected that it was to the guardroom to be imprisoned more closely. But a minute showed him that the growing resentment was unnecessary, for he was not apparently to submit to that indignity; and now the blood began to flush up into his temples, for he grasped without having had to ask where his destination was to be.
In fact, the captain marched him to the foot of the great staircase, past the guard, and into the long anteroom, where he spoke to one of the attendants, who went straight to the door at the end leading into the Prince’s audience chamber.
And now for a few moments the captain’s manner changed, and he bent his head down to whisper hastily:
“The Prince has sent for you, boy, to question you himself. For Heaven’s sake speak out frankly the simple truth. I cannot tell you how much depends upon it. Recollect this: your mother’s future is at stake, and—”
The attendant reappeared, came to him, and said respectfully:
“His Royal Highness will see you at once.”
There was no time for the captain to say more—no opportunity offered for Frank to make any indignant retort concerning the truth. For the curtain was held back, the door opened, and Captain Murray led the way in, slowly followed by his prisoner, who advanced firmly enough toward where the Prince sat, his Royal Highness turning his eyes upon him at once with a most portentous frown.
“Well, sir,” he said at once, “so I find that I have fresh bad news of you. You are beginning early in life. Not content with what has passed, you have now turned traitor.”
The Prince’s looks, if correctly read, seemed to intimate that he expected the boy to drop on his knees and piteously cry for pardon; but to the surprise of both present he cried indignantly:
“It is not true, your Royal Highness.”
“Eh? What, sir? How dare you speak to me like this?” cried the Prince. “I have heard everything about this morning’s and last night’s business, and I find that I have been showing kindness to a young viper of a traitor, who is in direct communication with the enemy, and playing the spy on all my movements so as to send news.”
“It is not true, your Highness!” cried the boy warmly. “You have been deceived. Just as if I would do such a thing as that!”
“Do you mean to pretend that this young Forbes, your friend and companion, is not in correspondence with the enemy?”
“No, your Royal Highness,” said the lad sadly.
“You knew it?”
“Yes.”
“Then, as my servant, why did you not inform me, sir?”
“Because I was your servant, sir, and not a spy,” said the boy proudly.
“Very fine language, upon my honour!” cried the Prince. “But you are friends with him; and last night, after his first failure, you helped him to escape.”
“I did not, sir!” cried the boy passionately.
“Words, words, sir,” said the Prince; “even your friend here, Captain Murray, feels that you did.”
“And it is most unjust of him, sir!” cried the boy.
“Don’t speak so bluntly to me,” said the Prince sternly. “Now attend. You say you did not help him?”
“Yes, your Royal Highness.”
“Mind this. I know all the circumstances. Give me some proof that you knew nothing of his escape.”
“I can’t, sir,” cried the boy passionately. “I was asleep, and when I woke he was gone.”
“Weak, weak, sir. Now look here; you say you are my servant, and want me to believe in you. Be quite open with me; tell me all you know, and for your mother’s sake I will deal leniently with you. What do you know about this rising and the enemy’s plans?”
“Nothing, your Highness.”
“What! and you were hand and glove with these people. That wretched boy must have escaped to go straight to his father and acquaint him with everything he knows. What reason have I to think you would not do the same?”
“I!” cried the boy indignantly; “I could not do such a thing. Ah!” he cried, with a look of joy, making his white face flush and grow animated. “Your Royal Highness asked me for some proof;” and he lugged at something in his pocket, with which, as he let his hands fall, one had come in contact.
“What have you there, sir?”
“A book, your Highness,” panted the boy; “but it won’t come out. Hah! that’s it. Look, look! I found that on the table when I woke this morning. See what he has written here.”
Frank was thinking nothing about royalty or court etiquette in his excitement. He dragged out the book, opened the cover, went close up to the Prince, and banged it down before him, pointing to the words, which the Prince took and read before turning his fierce gaze upon the lad’s glowing face.
“There!” cried the boy, “that proves it. You must see now, sir. He cheated me. I thought he was very bad. But you see he was well enough to go. That shows how he wanted me to join him, and I wouldn’t. Oh, don’t say you can’t see!”
“Yes, I can see,” said the Prince, without taking his eyes off him. “Did you know of this, Captain Murray?”
“I? No, your Royal Highness. It is fresh to me.”
“Read.”
Captain Murray took the book, read the scrap of writing, and, forgetting the Prince’s presence, he held out his hands to his brother-officer’s son.
“Oh, Frank, my boy!” he cried, “forgive me for doubting your word.”
“Oh yes, I forgive you!” cried the lad, seizing and clinging to his hands. “I knew you’d find out the truth. I don’t mind now.”
“Humph!” ejaculated the Prince, looking on gravely, but with his face softening a little. “The boy’s honest enough, sir. But you occupy a very curious position, young gentleman, a very curious position, and everything naturally looked very black against you.”
“Did it, your Highness? Yes, I suppose so.”
“Then you had been quarrelling with that wretched young traitor about joining the—the enemy?” said the Prince.
Frank winced at “wretched young traitor”; but he answered firmly:
“Yes, sir; we were always quarrelling about it, but I hoped to get him to think right at last.”
“And failed, eh?” said the Prince, with a smile.
“Yes, sir.”
“And pray, was it about this business that you fought out yonder?”
“It had something to do with it, sir,” said Frank, flushing up. “He said—”
Frank stopped short, looking sadly confused, and grew more so as he found the questioner had fixed his eyes, full now of suspicion, upon him.
“Well, what did he say, sir?”
Frank was silent, and hung his head.
“Do you hear me, sir?”
“Must I speak, Captain Murray?” said the boy appealingly.
“Yes, the simple truth.”
“He said, your Royal Highness, that my father had joined the enemy, and was a general in the rebel army, and I struck him for daring to utter such a lie—and then we fought.”
“Why?” said the Prince sternly, “for telling you the truth?”
“The truth, sir!” cried the boy indignantly. “Don’t say you believe that of my father, sir. There is not a more faithful officer in the King’s service.”
“Your father is not in the King’s service, but holds a high command with the rebels, boy.”
“No, sir, no!” cried the lad passionately; “it is not true.” At that moment, when he had not heard the rustling of a dress, a soft hand was laid upon Frank’s shoulder, and, turning sharply, he saw that it was the Princess who had approached and now looked pityingly in his face, and then turned to the Prince.
“Don’t be angry with him,” she said gently; “it is very brave of him to speak like this, and terrible for him, poor boy, to know the truth.”
“No, no, your Highness, it is not true!” cried Frank wildly; and he caught and kissed, and then clung to the Princess’s hand.
“My poor boy!” she said tenderly.
“No, no; don’t you believe it, madam!” he cried. “It is not—it can’t be true. Some enemy has told you this.”
“No,” said the Princess gently, “no enemy, my boy. It was told me by one who knows too well. I had it from your mother’s lips.”
Frank gazed at her blankly, and his eyes then grew full of reproach, as they seemed to say, “How can you, who are her friend, believe such a thing?”
“There boy,” said the Prince, interposing; “come here.”
Frank turned to him, and his eyes flashed.
“Don’t look like that,” continued the Prince. “I am not angry with you now. I believe you, and I like your brave, honest way in defending your father. But you see how all this is true.”
“No!” cried the boy firmly. “Your Royal Highness and the Princess have been deceived. Some one has brought a lying report to my poor mother, who ought to have been the last to believe it. I cannot and will not think it is true.”
“Very well,” said the Prince quietly. “You can go on believing that it is not. I wish, my boy, I could. There, you can go back to your duties. You will not go over to the enemy, I see.”
The boy looked at the speaker as if about to make some angry speech; but his emotions strangled him, and, forgetting all etiquette, he turned and hurried from the room.
“Look after him, Captain Murray,” said the Prince quietly; “true gold is too valuable to be lost.”
The captain bowed, and hurried into the antechamber; but Frank had gone, one of the gentlemen in attendance saying that he had rushed through the chamber as if he had been half mad, and leaped down the stairs three or four at a time.
“Gone straight to his mother,” thought the captain; and he went on down the staircase, frowning and sad, for he was sick at heart about the news he had that morning learned of his old friend.
Chapter Thirty Three.
Frank’s Faith.
Frank went straight to his mother’s apartments.
“I don’t think my lady is well enough to see you to-day, sir,” said her woman.
“Tell her I must see her,” cried the boy passionately; and a few minutes after, looking very white and strange, Lady Gowan entered the room.
She looked inquiringly in the boy’s eyes, and a faint sob escaped her lips as she caught him in her arms, kissed him passionately, and then laid her head upon his shoulder, while for some minutes she sobbed so violently that the boy dared not speak, but tried to caress her into calmness once more.
“Oh, Frank, Frank!” she sighed at last; and he held her more tightly to his breast.
“I was obliged to come, mother,” he said; “and now that I have come I dare not speak.”
“Yes, speak, dear, speak; say anything to me now,” she sighed.
“But it seems so cruel, mother, while you are ill like this!”
“Speak, dear, speak. I ought to have sent to you before; but I was so heart-broken, so cowardly and weak, that I dared not confess it even to my own child.”
“Mother,” cried the boy passionately, “it is not true.”
Lady Gowan heaved a piteous sigh.
“The Prince sent for me, thinking I helped Drew Forbes to escape.”
“Ah! He has escaped?”
“Yes, gone to join his father with the rebels; but the Prince believes me now. He asked me first if I were going to join my father with the rebels too.”
“And—and—what did you say?” faltered Lady Gowan.
“I?” cried the boy proudly. “I told him that he had no more faithful servant living than my father, though he was dismissed from the Guards.”
Lady Gowan uttered a weary sigh once more.
“Oh, mother!” cried Frank, “shame on you to believe this miserable lie! How can you be so weak!”
“Ah, Frank, Frank, Frank!” she sighed wearily.
“It seems too horrible to imagine that you could so readily think such a thing. The Prince believes it, and the Princess too, and she said the news came from you.”
“Yes, dear, I was obliged to tell her. Frank, my boy, I knew it when I saw you last—when I was in such trouble, and spoke so angrily to you. I could not, oh, I could not tell you then.”
“No. I am very glad you could not, mother,” said the boy firmly. “You cannot, and you shall not, believe it. Can’t you see that it is impossible? There, don’t speak to me; don’t think about it any more. You are weak and ill, and that makes you ready to think things which you would laugh at as absurd at another time. Oh, I wish I had said what I ought to have said to the Prince,” he cried excitedly. “I did not think of it then.”
“What—what would you have said?” cried Lady Gowan, raising her pale, drawn face to gaze in her son’s eyes.
“That he could soon prove my father’s truth by sending him orders to come back and take his place in the regiment.”
“Ah!” sighed Lady Gowan; and she let her head fall once more upon her son’s shoulder.
Frank started impatiently.
“Oh!” he cried, “and you will go on believing it. There, I can’t be angry with you now, you are so ill; but try and believe the truth, mother. Father is the King’s servant, and he would not—he could not break his oaths. There, you will see the truth when you get better; and you must, you must get better now. It was this news which made you so ill?”
“Yes, my boy, yes,” she said, in a faint whisper; “and I blame myself for not going with him. If I had been by his side, he would not have changed.”
“He has not changed, mother,” said the lad firmly. “But how did you get the news?”
“It came through Andrew Forbes’s father—Mr George Selby, as he calls himself now. He sent it to—to one of the gentlemen in the Palace. I must not mention names.”
“Ha—ha—ha!” laughed Frank scornfully. “I thought it was some miserable, hatched-up lie. Mr George Selby has been playing a contemptible, spy-like part, trying to gain over people in the Palace. He and his party tried to get me to join them.”
“You, my boy?” cried Lady Gowan, in wonder; “and you did not tell me.”
“No; conspiracies are not for women to know anything about,” said the boy, talking grandly. “But I did tell my father.”
“Yes; and what did he say?”
“Almost nothing. I forget now, mother. Treated it with contempt. There, I must go now.”
“Back under arrest?”
“Arrest? No, dear. I am the Prince’s page, and he knows now that I am no rebel. I am to go back to my duties as if nothing had happened.”
Lady Gowan uttered a sigh full of relief.
“But I’m going to prove first of all how terribly wrong you have been, mother, in believing this miserable scandal. It is because my poor father is down, and everybody is ready to trample upon him. But we’ll show them yet. You must be brave, mother, and look and speak as if now you did not believe a word about the story. Do as I will do: go back to your place with the Princess, and hold up your head proudly.”
“No, no, no, my boy; I have been praying the Princess to let us both go away from the court, for that our position here was horrible.”
“Ah! and what did she say?” cried Frank excitedly.
“That it was impossible; that we were not to blame, and that I was more her friend than ever.”
“Oh, I do love the Princess!” cried the boy enthusiastically. “There, you see, she does not at heart believe the miserable tale. No, you shall not go away, mother; it would be like owning that it was true. Be brave and good and full of faith. Father said I was to defend you while he was away, and I’m going to—against yourself while you are weak and ill. Oh, what lots of things you’ve taught me about trying to be brave and upright and true; now I’m going to try and show you that I will. We cannot leave the court; it would be dishonouring father. Good-bye till to-morrow. Oh, mother, how old all this makes me feel.”
“My own boy!”
“Yes, but I don’t feel a bit like a boy now, mother. It’s just as if I had been here for years. There, once more kiss me—good-bye!”
“My darling! But what are you going to do?”
“Something to show you that father has been slandered. Good-bye! To-morrow I shall make you laugh for joy.”
And tearing himself away from his mother’s clinging arms, the boy hurried out, down the stairs, and out into the courtyard, full of the plan now in his mind.