The Spy: Condensed for use in schools

“Corporal of the guard! corporal of the guard!” shouted the sentinel in the passage to the chambers, “corporal of the guard! corporal of the guard!”

The subaltern flew up the narrow stairway that led to the room of the prisoner, and demanded the meaning of the outcry.

The soldier was standing at the open door of the apartment, looking in with a suspicious eye on the supposed British officer. On observing his lieutenant, he fell back with habitual respect; and replied, with an air of puzzled thought:

“I don’t know, sir, but just now the prisoner looked queer. Ever since the preacher has left him, he don’t look as he used to do – but,” gazing intently over the shoulder of his officer, “it must be him, too! There is the same powdered head, and the darn in the coat, where he was hit the day we had the last brush with the enemy.”

“And then all this noise is occasioned by your doubting whether that poor gentleman is your prisoner or not, is it, sirrah? Who do you think it can be else?”

“I don’t know who else it can be,” returned the fellow, sullenly; “but he has grown thicker and shorter, if it is he; and see for yourself, sir, he shakes all over, like a man in an ague.”

This was but too true. Cæsar was an alarmed auditor of this short conversation, and, from congratulating himself upon the dexterous escape of his young master, his thoughts were very naturally beginning to dwell upon the probable consequences to his own person. The pause that succeeded the last remark of the sentinel in no degree contributed to the restoration of the faculties. Lieutenant Mason was busied in examining with his own eyes the suspected person of the black, and Cæsar was aware of the fact by stealing a look through a passage under one of his arms, that he had left expressly for the purpose of reconnoitering.[117 - surveying the situation with his eye.]

Captain Lawton would have discovered the fraud immediately, but Mason was by no means so quick-sighted as his commander. He therefore turned rather contemptuously to the soldier, and, speaking in an undertone, observed:

“That anabaptist, methodistical, Quaker, psalm-singing rascal has frightened the boy with his farrago[118 - medley.] about flames and brimstone. I’ll step in and cheer him with a little rational conversation.”

“I have heard of fear making a man white,” said the soldier, drawing back, and staring as if his eyes would start from their sockets, “but it has changed the royal captain to a black!”

The truth was that Cæsar, unable to hear what Mason uttered in a low voice, and having every fear aroused in him by what had already passed, incautiously removed the wig a little from one of his ears, in order to hear the better, without in the least remembering that the color might prove fatal to his disguise. The sentinel had kept his eyes fastened on his prisoner, and noticed the action. The attention of Mason was instantly drawn to the same object; and, forgetting all delicacy for a brother officer in distress, or, in short, forgetting everything but the censure that might alight on his corps, the lieutenant sprang forward and seized the terrified African by the throat; for no sooner had Cæsar heard his color named than he knew that his discovery was certain, and, at the first sound of Mason’s heavy boot on the floor, he arose from his seat and retreated precipitately[119 - with haste.] to a corner of the room.

“Who are you?” cried Mason, dashing the head of the man against the angle of the wall at each interrogatory. “Who are you, and where is the Englishman? Speak, thou thunder-cloud! Answer me, you jackdaw, or I’ll hang you on the gallows of the spy!”

Cæsar continued firm. Neither the threats nor the blows could extract any reply, until the lieutenant, by a very natural transition in the attack, sent his heavy boot forward in a direction that brought it in direct contact with the most sensitive part of the negro – his shin. The most obdurate heart could not have exacted further patience, and Cæsar instantly gave in. The first words he spoke were:

“Golly! Massa, you t’ink I got no feelin’?”

“By heavens!” shouted the lieutenant, “it is the negro himself! Scoundrel! where is your master, and who was the priest?”

While he was speaking as if about to renew the attack, Cæsar cried aloud for mercy, promising to tell all he knew.

“Who was the priest?” repeated the dragoon, drawing back his formidable[120 - exciting fear.] leg and holding it in threatening suspense.

“Harvey, Harvey!” cried Cæsar, dancing from one leg to the other, as he thought each member in turn might be assailed.

“Harvey who, you black villain?” cried the impatient lieutenant, as he executed a full measure of vengeance by letting his leg fly.

“Birch!” shrieked Cæsar, falling on his knees, the tears rolling in large drops over his face.

“Harvey Birch!” echoed the trooper, hurling the black from him and rushing from the room. “To arms! To arms! Fifty guineas for the life of the peddler spy – give no quarter to either. Mount! Mount! To arms! To horse!”

The first impulse of Henry was, certainly, to urge the beast he rode to his greatest speed at once. But the forward movement that the youth made for this purpose was instantly checked by the peddler. Henry reluctantly restrained his impatience and followed the direction of the peddler. His imagination, however, continually alarmed him with the fancied sounds of pursuit.

“What see you, Harvey?” he cried, observing the peddler to gaze towards the building they had left with ominous interest; “what see you at the house?”

“That which bodes us no good,” returned the peddler. “Throw aside the mask and wig; you will need all your senses without much delay. Throw them in the road. There are none before us that I dread, but there are those behind who will give us a fearful race! Now ride, Captain Wharton, for your life, and keep at my heels.”

The instant that Harvey put his horse to his speed, Captain Wharton was at his heels urging the miserable animal he rode to the utmost. A very few jumps convinced the captain that his companion was fast leaving him, and a fearful glance thrown behind informed him that his enemies were as speedily approaching.

“Had we not better leave our horses?” said Henry, “and make for the hills across the fields on our left? The fence will stop our pursuers.”

“That way lies the gallows,” returned the peddler; “these fellows go three feet to our two, and would mind the fences no more than we do these ruts; but it is a short quarter to the turn, and there are two roads behind the wood. They may stand to choose until they can take the track, and we shall gain a little upon them there.”

“But this miserable horse is blown already,” cried Henry, urging his beast with the aid of the bridle, at the same time that Harvey aided his efforts by applying the lash of a heavy riding-whip he carried; “he will never stand it for half a mile farther.”

“A quarter will do; a quarter will do,” said the peddler; “a single quarter will save us, if you follow my directions.”

Somewhat cheered by the cool and confident manner of his companion, Henry continued silently urging his horse forward. Soon the captain again proposed to leave their horses and dash into the thicket.

“Not yet, not yet,” said Birch in a low voice; “the road falls from the top of this hill as steep as it rises; first let us gain the top.” While speaking, they reached the desired summit, and both threw themselves from their horses, Henry plunging into the thick underwood, which covered the side of the mountain for some distance above them. Harvey stopped to give each of their beasts a few severe blows of his whip, that drove them headlong down the path on the other side of the eminence, and then followed his example.

The peddler entered the thicket with a little caution, and avoided, as much as possible, rustling or breaking the branches in his way. There was but time only to shelter his person from view, when a dragoon led up the ascent, and on reaching the height, he cried aloud:

“I saw one of their horses turning the hill this minute!”

“Drive on; spur forward, my lads,” shouted Mason; “give the Englishman quarter, but cut the peddler down, and make an end of him.”

“Now,” said the peddler, rising from the cover to reconnoitre, and standing for a moment in suspense, “all that we gain is clear gain; for, as we go up, they go down. Let us be stirring.”

“But will they not follow us, and surround the mountain?” said Henry rising, and imitating the labored but rapid progress of his companion; “remember they have foot as well as horse, and, at any rate, we shall starve in the hills.”

“Fear nothing, Captain Wharton,” returned the peddler with confidence; “this is not the mountain that I would be on, but necessity has made me a dexterous pilot among these hills. I will lead you where no man will dare to follow.”

CHAPTER XXI.

FRANCES REMINDS MR. HARPER OF HIS PROMISE

Frances could no longer doubt that the figure she had seen on the hill was Birch, and she felt certain that, instead of flying to the friendly forces below, her brother would be taken to the mysterious hut to pass the night. Therefore she held a long and animated discussion with her aunt; when the good spinster reluctantly yielded to the representation of her niece, and folding her in her arms, she kissed the cold cheek and fervently blessing her allowed her to depart on an errand of fraternal love.

The night had set in dark and chilling as Frances Wharton, with a beating heart but light step, moved through the little garden that lay behind the farm-house which had been her brother’s prison, and took her way to the foot of the mountain, where she had seen the figure of him she supposed to be the peddler.

Without pausing to reflect, however, she flew over the ground with a rapidity that seemed to bid defiance to all impediments, nor stopped even to breathe, until she had gone half the distance to the rock that she had marked as the spot where Birch made his appearance on that very morning.

When she heard the footsteps of a horse moving slowly up the road, she shrank timidly into a little thicket of wood which grew around the spring that bubbled from the side of a hillock near her. Frances listened anxiously to the retreating footsteps of the horse; and, as they died upon her ear, she ventured from her place of secrecy and advanced a short distance into the field, where, startled at the gloom and appalled with the dreariness of the prospect, she paused to reflect on what she had undertaken.

Throwing back the hood of her cardinal,[121 - a woman’s short cloak.] she sought the support of a tree and gazed towards the summit of the mountain that was to be the goal of her enterprise. It rose from the plain like a huge pyramid, giving nothing to the eye but its outlines.

Frances turned her looks towards the east, in earnest gaze at the clouds which constantly threatened to involve her again in comparative darkness. Had an adder stung her, she could not have sprung with greater celerity than she recoiled from the object against which she was leaning, and which she had for the first time noticed. The two upright posts, with a cross-beam on their tops and a rude platform beneath, told but too plainly the nature of the structure; even the cord was suspended from an iron staple, and was swinging to and fro in the night air. Frances hesitated no longer, but rather flew than ran across the meadow, and was soon at the base of the rock, where she hoped to find something like a path to the summit of the mountain. She soon found a sheep-path that wound round the shelving rocks and among the trees.

Nearly an hour did she struggle with the numerous difficulties that she was obliged to overcome; when, having been repeatedly exhausted with her efforts, and, in several instances, in great danger from falls, she succeeded in gaining the small piece of table-land on the summit.

No hut nor any vestige of human being could she trace. The idea of her solitude struck on the terrified mind of the affrighted girl, and approaching to the edge of a shelving rock she bent forward to gaze on the signs of life in the vale; when a ray of keen light dazzled her eyes, and a warm ray diffused itself over her whole frame. Recovering from her surprise, Frances looked on the ledge beneath her, and at once perceived that she stood directly over the object of her search. A hole through its roof afforded a passage to the smoke which, as it blew aside, showed her a clear and cheerful fire crackling and snapping on a rude hearth of stone. The approach to the front of the hut was by a winding path around the point of the rock on which she stood, and by this she advanced to its door.

Three sides of this singular edifice were composed of logs laid alternately on each other, to a little more than the height of a man, and the fourth was formed by the rock against which it leaned. The roof was made of the bark of trees, laid in long strips from the rock to its eaves; the fissures[122 - clefts or openings.] between the logs had been stuffed with clay, which in many places had fallen out, and dried leaves were made use of as a substitute to keep out the wind. A single window of four panes of glass was in front, but a board carefully closed it in such a manner as to emit no light from the fire within. After pausing some time to view this singularly constructed hiding-place, for such Frances knew it to be, she applied her eye to a crevice to examine the inside.

There was no lamp or candle, but the blazing fire of dry wood made the interior of the hut light enough to read by. In one corner lay a bed of straw with a pair of blankets thrown carelessly over it, as if left where they had last been used.

In an angle against the rock and opposite to the fire which was burning in the other corner, was an open cupboard, that held a plate or two, a mug, and the remains of some broken meat.