CHAPTER IX.
THE INCIDENTS OF A SNOWY NIGHT.
There was a moment's pause, while Dick hastily tore open the silken bagin his queue and took therefrom the miniature. Then he advanced to her,bowing low, his hunting-cap in one hand, the portrait held out in theother. She glanced at the miniature curiously, then uttered a lowexclamation of pleasure, her face suddenly assuming a faint but joyoussmile, and took the portrait, her fingers touching his as she did so.
"When I said I would get it back for you, in New Jersey," quoth Dick,while she looked affectionately at the miniature, "I didn't think totake so long a time."
She now looked from the portrait to him. "Then you are the younggentleman who left the stage-coach, to go after the robbers?" she said,in a tone showing that she had not recognized him at first.
Dick bowed. "I would have returned it to you in New York, but--somethinghindered me." In contemplating the fine lines of her face, and the darklustre of her eyes, Dick heeded not the possibility that his seekersmight even now be on the porch.
"How can I thank you, sir?" she said, her look and tone having, from thecircumstances, a tenderness such as she had not before evinced to anyman. Perhaps this very exception in Dick's favor, though due to theoccasion, separated him at once and forever in her mind from all othermen, and made it natural that he, on whom she had scarcely even looked,should acquire in an instant a first place in her thoughts.
Dick had read enough to be able to make such fine speeches as wereseriously affected and seriously taken in those days. He answered:
"By permitting me to worship you."
She looked at him a moment, at loss for a reply, but not disapprovingly.Before she could speak, there came a loud pounding at the rear door. Theold servant, who had locked it after Dick's entrance, now returned to itto open it again.
"I think that is a party of troops in search of me," said Dick, quietly,to Catherine. "I came to Quebec on a secret mission for the UnitedColonies, and I have been discovered."
"_Mon Dieu!_" exclaimed Catherine, suddenly showing deep concern. "Don'topen the door, Antoine! Do you mean, sir," turning to Dick, "that, ifyou were caught, you would be--"
"Hanged, probably," said Dick, seeing out of the corner of his eye thatthe servant had stepped aside from the door without unlocking it.
The knock was repeated, more loudly. Catherine looked distressed andperplexed.
"They will be let in, eventually," she said, in a whisper, "for my unclewill hear them, and come to see what is the matter. You must hide tillthey go!"
"They will search the house," replied Dick.
She stood thinking, for a few seconds. "There is one room they shall notenter," she said. "Come!"
She went swiftly up the wide staircase, Dick following at her elbow. Atthe first landing, which was visible from the front part of the hall,she pushed back a door, whereupon Dick, obeying her look, stepped into achamber that had a window at the farther end, as could be known by thefaint whiteness there, and by the sound of snowflakes pelting the panes.Dick stopped at the threshold to say, "But the servant?"
"He is faithful to me," she whispered from the landing. At that momentthe knocking again sounded, this time with angry violence. There camefrom the parlor a young gentleman whom Dick, looking through the chamberdoorway and down the first flight of stairs, recognized as Catherine'sbrother, and who said to the servant:
"What is that knocking, Antoine? My uncle wonders why you don't go tothe door."
"I have been busy elsewhere, Monsieur Gerard," said the old servant; andthen he could be heard turning the lock.
A moment later there came the sound of men rushing in, and then thevoice of Lieutenant Blagdon, saying, loudly and angrily:
"What the devil has come over this house, Gerard, that it opens soeasily to rebel spies, and stays closed all night against the King'stroops?"
Before the astonished Gerard could reply, another gentleman appearedfrom the parlor, attracted by the noisy arrival of Blagdon and thetroops. He appeared to be about sixty, but he carried his tall figurestiffly erect, and his eyes were bright and keen. He held a hand ofplaying cards, and his face still wore a smile, which was rather that ofheartless gaiety than of kindly merriment. Behind him, in the doorway,appeared other gentlemen and a few ladies, these last standing on theirtoes to see what was the disturbance.
"What is going on, Lieutenant Blagdon?" demanded the old gentleman.
"A very remarkable thing, Monsieur de St. Valier," replied Blagdon. "Arebel spy, who was discovered at Colonel Maclean's quarters, seems tohave found a refuge in your house."
"What!" cried the old gentleman, whom Dick now understood to beCatherine's uncle. "My house shelter a rebel! You seem to be walking inyour sleep, Lieutenant Blagdon, under the delusion of some ridiculousdream!"
"I implied no knowledge on your part, Monsieur de St. Valier, when Isaid the fellow had got into your house. We followed his track in thesnow, and though we lost it for a moment in a crowd, before the wineshop yonder, we soon came on the same footprint, which led through thesnow to your porch. The same feet left marks of snow on the porch, toyour very door, and there are no marks leading away from it. Moreover, Iknow the man, and have reason to think he would have come to this housewhile in Quebec."
At this point Catherine hastened down the stairs, at first nonchalantly,but, on approaching the foot, assuming a look of wonderment at the scenein the hall.
"Why, what has happened, Gerard? What is it, uncle?" she asked.
"And now," cried Blagdon, excitedly, "I know the man has been here sinceI left Miss de St. Valier an hour ago!" Catherine saw, as did herbrother, that Blagdon's eyes were fixed balefully on the miniature,which she had thoughtlessly retained in her hand.
"What man?" queried Catherine, turning red.
"The man who brought you back that portrait, which you didn't have anhour ago," cried Blagdon, half mad with jealousy. "Sure proof the manmust have entered this house since he left Colonel Maclean's quarters,where he had been all day!"
"You are wrong, Lieutenant Blagdon," said Catherine, quietly. "Thoughyou didn't know it an hour ago, I have had my mother's portrait sinceyesterday, as I meant to tell my uncle when I should see fit. It washanded to Gerard in the street by a man who did not wait for anywords,--is it not so, Gerard?"
Dick, looking down from the darkness of the landing, saw Gerard bow inconfirmation, and knew that the understanding between brother and sisterwas complete. He saw, also, Blagdon shake his head, with a derisivelyincredulous laugh.
"If any one came in by that door," said the elder St. Valier, "theservant should know it. You were here, Antoine. Did you admit any one?"
"Lieutenant Blagdon and the soldiers," replied Antoine.
"But Antoine could not have been minding his business," said Blagdon,"for we had to knock several times before he let us in."
"But," put in Antoine, "the door was locked before I admitted monsieurand the troops. Monsieur must have heard me unlock it. Does not thatshow that no one could have come in before monsieur, even if I were notat my place?"
"It shows merely that the man, after coming in, himself locked thedoor," said Blagdon. "He doubtless found it unlocked when he arrived.I'll wager Antoine will not take oath the door was locked at the timethe man must have entered."
"Well, well," said Monsieur de St. Valier, "the question can be easilysettled. I certainly don't wish to have a rebel spy lodged in my house.Let your troops search the place, lieutenant!"
"Thank you, monsieur," said Blagdon, his eyes flashing triumph; whileDick stepped back into the chamber from his doorway at the landing. Dickdared not close the door after him, lest its creak or the noise of itslatch might attract the attention of the people in the hallway below.Dick had seen that some of these guests were British officers, availingthemselves of a brief relief from duty.
"Neither Lieutenant Blagdon nor any other man shall search _my_chamber!" said Catherine, with a pretence of that capriciousdetermination which
a woman may show without visible reason and yet notexcite suspicion. She ascended the short flight of stairs with dignity,and stood on the landing, her back to the door. She had the superiorsense to leave the door ajar, so that her action seemed the result, notof solicitude regarding some person in the chamber, but of a whimsicalantagonism aroused by the manner in which Blagdon had spoken to her.
Blagdon gave some instructions, in a low voice, to an under officer. Thelatter, whom Antoine accompanied in obedience to a gesture from Monsieurde St. Valier, led four men into the rooms opening on the hall, whileBlagdon and two of the troops remained where they were, as a guard tothe great doors at the hall's either end. The searching party next wentbelow stairs. During these operations Monsieur de St. Valier laughed andchatted with his guests, who stood grouped at either side of the parlordoorway, while Gerard remained at the stair-foot, apart from the others,watching his sister and listening for any sign from the searchingtroops. These presently came empty-handed from the lower regions, andhurried up-stairs, passing Catherine and her doorway as they went. Afterseveral minutes they returned, disappointed of their prey. Every roombut Catherine's had now been looked through, the searchers havingdoubtless been ordered by Blagdon to leave that one exempt. He hadprobably hoped that the fugitive might be found elsewhere, and that hisown duty and inclination might thus be fulfilled without further directconflict with Catherine. He now braced himself for such contest,--acontest doubly difficult from the fact that he was in love with her anddesired her love in return.
"Search that room!" he commanded the under officer, indicatingCatherine's.
Dick, in the darkness beyond the threshold, ran to the window at thechamber's further end, and tried to open it; but it would not yield tohis strongest pressure. Not able in the darkness to learn how it wasfastened, he despaired of finding exit by means of it. So he returned tohis place near the open door, outside of which stood Catherine, whodared not communicate with him in the gaze of the people below.
Meanwhile Catherine had capped Blagdon's order with the words:
"Whoever tries to enter this room must first deal with my brother andmyself!"
"Right, sister!" cried Gerard, at the foot of the stairs. "He will haveto pass over my body!"
Blagdon's men hesitated. Monsieur de St. Valier looked puzzled andannoyed. Little as he loved his niece and nephew, it would not do,before his guests, either to take a stand against Catherine or to riskthe possible disclosure that she was really concealing a rebel in herchamber. So he remained silent and motionless, though manifestly ill atease within. The guests waited curiously for developments.
"Miss de St. Valier betrays the truth," said Blagdon. "Her unwillingnessto have the room examined shows that the man is there."
"Mlle. de St. Valier," replied Gerard, "is not accustomed to having herchamber invaded by men!"
"She has apparently made no difficulty of admitting to it the favoredman!" cried Blagdon, in a voice evidently designed to be heard by Dick.The lieutenant had been suddenly inspired with the thought that such aspirited youth as Dick, being in love with the girl, would himself comeforth to resent an insult offered her. Dick, indeed, now back from thewindow, heard the words, and, grasping his hunting-knife, would havebounded to the landing; but at that instant came Catherine's promptreply, also uttered for his ears:
"If a man were there, Lieutenant Blagdon, he would be wiser than to betricked out, for your purposes, by any insult of yours!"
Dick took the hint, and stayed where he was.
"He would not have to avenge the insult," cried Gerard. "That shall bemy business. I look to you for reparation, Lieutenant Blagdon!"
"As you please," said Blagdon. "I shall have time presently. But now Iam serving the King. The rebel, I perceive, is content to leave suchmatters to other hands. 'Tis what one might expect of a fellow thathides behind petticoats. But petticoats sha'n't protect him any longer.To that room, men,--"
But Catherine's voice rose louder than the lieutenant's, interruptingthe order. "Why, lieutenant," she cried, with pretended irony, "if a spywere in the room, do you think he would not have escaped through thewindow by this time?"
Dick knew these words also were intended for him. She was not aware hehad tried the window in vain. He held his knife the tighter, and awaitedevents.
"That was meant for his hearing!" cried Blagdon. "Saunders, take Jarvisand MacDonald outside and guard the window of that room. Make haste, orthe rascal may drop from it before you get there." The subaltern and twomen hurried out by the rear door. Blagdon, who now had four men left,cast a quick glance at the officers visible among the guests, to see ifthey were commenting on his previous negligence in not having placedguards outside before entering the house, a negligence due to hisimpatience and to his certainty that the fugitive was within. "Now, men,you first two seize any one who attempts to interfere, and you othersfollow me!"
He started for the stairs, but at the foot he encountered Gerard, whoheld the way so well for a few seconds, with body and both arms, that noone could pass him, the rear soldiers being obstructed by the scufflebetween Gerard on one side and Blagdon and one of his men on the other.Catherine saw that this unequal contest must soon end in her brother'sbeing thrown down or dragged aside. She shrank at the thought that,unless she could obtain other interposition, her own person would nexthave to serve as barrier, in which case Dick would certainly appear, forshe had heard no sound of the window being opened.
"Gentlemen," she cried to the officers in the hallway, "you've heardLieutenant Blagdon's accusation against me. Well, if you permit, he mayenter my room to search, provided he enters alone."
"But I don't permit!" cried one of the officers, running to the side ofthe staircase, whence he stepped up to the outer end of a stair and thenleaped with agility over the baluster, landing above the scrimmage atthe foot. "By gad, I won't stand idly by and see such an indignitycommitted against a lady!" And he drew his sword, which, being inuniform and ready for any sudden call to duty, he wore.
"Nor I!" came from three or four more mouths, and in a few moments everyofficer present, having followed the leader's mode of passage, stoodwith drawn weapon on the stairs, between Catherine and Blagdon's party.
"I say, this is not fair play!" cried one of the officers, seeing Gerardat last held down on his back by two of the soldiers. Thereupon therewas a swift charge of the officers down the stairs, each impelled torisk court martial by the desire to stand well in the esteem of abeautiful woman. Those were gallant days! Men were willing to chanceanything for a grateful glance from a pair of lovely eyes,--that is tosay, some men were,--and women were content to be the kind of women forwhom men would take the chance.
The result of this movement was that Blagdon and his men were hurledbackward to the front door, and Gerard, whom the officers leaped over inrescuing him, rose to a sitting posture and regained his breath. Blagdonstood defeated, at a loss. There came a knock on the front door. At St.Valier's gesture, Antoine opened it, and in walked Colonel Maclean and amember of his staff. The colonel, who had come on invitation, to joinMonsieur de St. Valier's guests at dinner, looked around in surprise.
"Colonel," spoke up Blagdon, yet half breathless, "there is resistancehere. The spy has been tracked to this house and to that room. Thesegentlemen have hindered me and my men from going to take him."
"We consider," explained one of the officers, "that Miss de St. Valier'schamber ought not to be entered without her consent, especially when sheherself stands in the way, and when violence would have to be usedagainst her in order to pass."
"Hoot toot!" said the colonel. "Do you mean that the young lady refuses,then? It must be because the matter was gone about in a way displeasingto the sex. I'm sure she won't object to my taking just a peep insideher nest, seeing how matters lie." Maclean did not use Scotch words savewhen speaking to Scotchmen. "I didn't notice the outside of this houseguarded, when I came in," he added, turning to Blagdon.
"There are guards beneath the window of th
at room," replied thelieutenant, "where 'tis certain the man is hid."
"Well," said the colonel, half playfully, "to save the lady's properfeelings, which she has full right to indulge, I'll go alone into theroom. You'll not mind the intrusion of a gray-headed colonel, who comesin the cause of the King and of Quebec, my dear young lady, I'm sure."And he started up the stairs.
"Will you not take my word, colonel?" asked Catherine, in a low,unsteady voice.
"Why, yes," he answered; "but, as a matter of form, duty requires Ishould take a glimpse. You there with the lantern, and the next man,follow me."
Maclean and the two soldiers chosen left all the others--St. Valier andhis guests, Blagdon and the two remaining privates, Maclean's staffofficer and Gerard--huddled well to the front of the hall, in that partwhence they could see the landing before Catherine's door. Catherinesuddenly disappeared into her room. "Go behind the door," she whisperedto Dick as she passed him. He did so. Maclean entered the chamber,followed closely by his two men. By the light of the lantern, thecolonel could see that Catherine was standing before a door that had thelook of communicating with a closet in the side of the room. Herattitude and expression were of a desperate determination to protectthat door from being entered.
"So that's where the spy is?" quoth Maclean, quickly. Dick saw the ruse,and stood ready to profit by the one chance it gave him against ten.
"For God's sake, colonel, don't open this door!" cried Catherine. "Igive you my word, the spy is not behind it!"
"Madam, I must!" said Maclean, gravely. "Your own conduct shows you havesome one concealed there. 'Tis your kind heart makes you wish to savethe life of a hunted man, but perhaps many lives of loyal subjectsdepend on his capture. I beg you, stand aside, madam."
"I will not stand aside! While I have the strength, I will protect thisdoor!" said Catherine.
Completely deceived by her solicitude over the door behind which Dickwas not, the colonel, with as much gentleness as he could use, caughther in his arms and drew her from before that door, she resisting andprotesting with the ejaculations, "For the sake of heaven! Take my word!There's no one there! Believe me! Don't open, I beg!" He then threw widethe door, and peered through the opening.
"Why!" he said, "there's a stairway here. Men, follow me down thesteps!" He strode through the newly opened doorway, the two men at hisheels. Catherine instantly flung the door shut upon them, and locked it.
"Across the landing," she whispered loudly to Dick; "window at the otherside of the house--no guards there!"
"I love you!" he whispered back, having emerged from behind his door."Shall we meet again?"
"God knows! Perhaps! Good night!" she said.
He seized her hand, in the darkness, and pressed it to his lips; thendashed through the doorway, across the landing, up the little flight ofstairs at his left, into the first room ahead whose door he ran against,then to a window, which at once gave way to the force he brought to bearagainst it. He stepped out to the roof of the porch in front of thehouse, slid down a corner-post, ran through the yet open gateway toPalace Street, hastened leftward to the first intersecting street, andturned, again leftward, into that street, which led him towards thewall-crowned precipice that overlooked the St. Lawrence.
Meanwhile, the people in the hallway had caught the momentary view ofhis figure as it leaped across the landing, but they, in their ignoranceof what had passed in Catherine's room, and in the unlikelihood of thefugitive's eluding Maclean without any outcry or pursuit on the latter'spart, had supposed the flying apparition to be that of one of Maclean'smen, despatched by the colonel on some business to them unknown. Dickhad not remained a sufficient time in sight for his rifleman's attire tobe distinguished in the half-darkness of the landing. So they waited forsome appearance from Catherine's chamber.
Catherine remained standing in her room. Very soon a noise at its innerdoor told that Maclean had returned from his false quest, which hadtaken him only to an unused and bolted outer door originally designed togive a side entrance to the room, that apartment having been formerlydevoted to the purposes of an office. She did not heed Maclean's effortsto open the door, which she had locked on her side. These efforts soonbecame extremely violent, and at last resulted in the breaking of thedoor, and in the appearance of the now irate colonel, followed by hismen with the lantern.
"Why, miss," said he, "somebody locked that door behind me!"
"Yes," replied Catherine, lightly, affecting a triumphant smile ofpleased revenge; "I did! You wouldn't take my word that nobody wasbehind it, and I thought I'd punish you!"
With which she left the room and went serenely down-stairs, followed bythe somewhat mystified and crestfallen colonel, who had left his two mento make fast the broken door.
"The young lady was right. No one was there," said Maclean, gruffly, andwent immediately to Monsieur de St. Valier, who gave a deep breath ofrelief and returned to the parlor, whither his guests accompanied him.Blagdon, to be at a distance from Catherine and Gerard, who stoodtalking together at the stair-foot, went with his two men to the rear ofthe hall, to wait for the two who had been up-stairs with Maclean. Thusit happened that, of the people in the hall who had seen the figurecross the landing, none but Gerard saw the two privates reappearpresently from Catherine's room; and, as Blagdon was in no mood forquestions when those two rejoined him, the impression was not correctedthat the flying figure had been one of them. Blagdon forthwith led hisfour men, with the three who had been put on guard beneath the window,to the barracks, dismissed them, and repaired to a drinking-place.Catherine and Gerard went back to their uncle's guests; but the sister,bearing up against the exhaustion caused by the scene she had passedthrough, showed an abstraction not entirely to be attributed tohappiness at the recovery of her mother's portrait.
Dick plodded on through the snow, past near and distant churches,monasteries, seminaries, gardens, fine houses, and mean houses, keepinga frequent lookout behind him, and up and down what streets he crossed,and came eventually to the low rampart near the grand battery, fromwhich the precipice fell steeply to the narrow strip of the lower townthat lay between the cliff's base and the St. Lawrence.
This rampart, which could avail mainly to shield the batteries thatcommanded the shipping in the St. Lawrence, was easy of ascent from theinside, as it could not be expected that any one would attempt leavingthe upper town by the almost perpendicular precipice of more than twohundred feet. Yet such was the wild intention that Dick had formed. Theattempt, on the part of a fugitive, seemed the more preposterous for thefact that, should he accomplish the almost impossible feat of safelydescending the cliff, he would but find himself in the lower town, whichwas defended at either end and closely guarded along its riveredge,--unless, indeed, he should traverse the face of the cliffdiagonally, so as to arrive at the base outside the southern barrier ofthe lower town. As all the world knows, the walls of Quebec encircledthe upper town on its high promontory, while the lower town, lyingagainst that promontory's foot, needed no other defence on one side thanthe promontory itself. It was neither practicable nor necessary that awall should run down the promontory's side; hence a man, finding himselfon the steep declivity between the upper and the lower town, had a wayof exit open to him, provided he could traverse obliquely the face ofthe cliff and could avoid observation from above or below. This way ofescape recommended itself to Dick because the city gates would by thistime be watched for him, and because it would bring him directly to theplace where Arnold's man would be waiting to receive the report that wasto have been brought by Mere Frappeur in her boat.
Dick knew the rampart overlooking the St. Lawrence would be the leastguarded, as the British force was too small for the proper manning ofthe many and large defences. Slinking at a distance past the right flankof the grand battery, whose overworked sentries were shivering in thesnow, he found a place where a platform enabled him to mount easily therampart. Across this rampart he crawled, on hands and knees, making outthrough the falling flakes a sin
gle sentry who paced several rods away.Looking over the outer edge of the rampart, his head turned giddy, for amoment, at sight of the precipice falling sheer almost three hundredfeet to the narrow fringe of houses and the gloomy river below.
But he chose a spot where there was ample footing at the rampart's base,turned about, backed from the rampart, hung for a moment by his fingers,and dropped to the chosen place, his fall softened by what snow hadlodged there. He immediately turned his face towards his distantdestination, and peered through the flake-filled darkness for whatprojections and indentations of the cliff might serve his progress. Hethanked his stars for the evidence soon afforded him that his adoptedmode of escape was within possibility, perilous though it might be; andthen for the falling snow, which shielded him from sight, and for thesnow already fallen, which now and then helped him to adhere to thecliff, for the irregularities of the precipice were such that the snow'slodgment had endured here and there on its steep face. Theseirregularities gave him footing, and so enabled him to proceed.
Many times he slipped, tearing his clothes and scraping his skin, buteach time he kept his wits and availed himself of the firststopping-place that offered. The descent was a work of hours, socautiously did he have to proceed, so carefully to pick out his nextfooting, so often to rest and regain his breath. At last he passed abovethe blockhouse and battery which together constituted the inner barrierof this end of the lower town. In the light from the blockhouse he couldsee a sentry pacing from the cliff's foot towards the wharf by the swiftriver.
Some minutes more of effort brought Dick past the top of a stockade,which formed the outer barrier. The exultation of success almostintoxicated him. He let himself slide down what remained of the cliff,heedless alike of the sharp projections and of the Canadian militiahoused behind the stockade. As he stood, at last, in the narrow waybetween river and cliff, restraining an impulse to shout with glee, hetook the two sheets of paper, containing his report, from beneath hishunting-shirt, and started forward, loudly whistling "Molly, myTreasure."
Suddenly, from over the top of the stockade, a shot was fired. Dick felta sting, in the vicinity of the bayonet-wound received at Bunker Hill,and fell forward on his hands and knees. A gate in the stockade wasthrown open, and two soldiers strode forth, lowering their faces toavoid the falling snow. At the same moment, a tall form sprang out fromthe shadow of a broken rock in front of Dick, completed the whistledpassage of music suddenly cut off by Dick's fall, and said:
"Ye're nae woman in a boat, but ye're a braw whistler, and I'll tak'your papers!"
"IT WAS THE MAN SENT BY ARNOLD."]
It was the man sent by Arnold,--old Tom MacAlister.
"Take them, Tom, and away with them quick, for God's sake!" cried Dick,handing them to him.
"But ye're hurt, lad!" cried Tom, thrusting the papers deep into aninner pocket.
"The devil I am!" lied Dick. "Only slipped on the snow. You save thosepapers, or all my work will go for naught! I'll get my wind and follow!Go, Tom! The papers first, don't you understand? I'll have my breathbefore those fellows can nab me!" And Dick raised one knee, as ifalready about to rise.
"Vera weel, lad!" said old Tom, compliantly, and plunged forward toround the point of Cape Diamond and follow the shore up the river. Thesight of his gaunt figure, swiftly receding in the snow and night,between river and cliffs, was the last glimpse Dick had of Tom, thepiper's son, for many a long day.
Dick was not entirely sure he might not indeed elude the two soldiersfrom the stockade, and overtake Tom. He got up and found he couldproceed limpingly. But the soldiers, only a few yards from him when herose, shortened the intervening distance so speedily that Dick saw theymust catch him in a few seconds. He made to grasp his hunting-knife. Itwas gone, having been displaced from his belt at some contact with thecliff in his descent.
The idea of capture now became intolerable to him. A kind of madnessarose in him, making him determined, at any cost, not to fall into thehands of the two enemies at his heels. When he felt himself almostwithin grasp of the foremost, he wheeled aside, and plunged headforemost into the swift, icy current of the St. Lawrence. While thewater gurgled in his ears, he jubilantly pictured to himself the two menstanding baffled on the shore and cursing the luck that had robbed themof their prey.
Soon rising to the surface, Dick struck out at random, using both armsand the unwounded leg. Whither would this swim in the dark lead him? Hescarcely cared, now that he had accomplished his two missions; his onewish was that it should not diminish his triumph by delivering him upeventually to the foe. All at once something black loomed up beforehim,--a vessel whose lights he had not taken to be so near, and whosesize he could not immediately make out.
As he turned to swim away from it, he heard a voice call out immediatelyover him, "Man in the river!" He pulled away, but with a constantlyweakening stroke. He heard other cries, became vaguely aware that aboat was being sent after him, and presently, when strength and sensewere about deserting him, he felt himself caught by the back of hishunting-shirt and drawn, by several hands, from the water to the boat.
He was too little conscious to answer the few questions that were askedhim on the way back to the vessel. But as they landed him on the deck,he experienced a return of consciousness and of power to plan. He knewthe vessel was a British one, but its people must be unacquainted withhis face; hence he dared raise one last, desperate hope of completinghis escape. As he stood on the deck, surrounded by the crew that hadbrought him from the water, he was approached by two officers, one ofwhom ordered him to stand forward, while the other remained a littlealoof in dignified immovability.
"I beg you will put me ashore, sir," said Dick, somewhat excitedly, tothe officer who had addressed him. "I had just left the stockade yonder,on a mission for Colonel Maclean. I fell in with a reconnoitring partyof rebels, and escaped by taking to the river. May I be landedimmediately on the other shore, to go on my mission without delay?"
"What papers have you, to show for this account of yourself?" demandedthe officer, scrutinizing Dick.
"I had Colonel Maclean's pass in my hand when I was attacked," saidDick, with no outward falter; "but I must have let it go in the river. Ihad no other papers; the message I carry is a verbal one."
"A message? To whom?"
"To General Carleton," said Dick, on the moment's invention.
"Why, this is fortunate," said the officer, turning to the motionlessgentleman. "General Carleton, this man says he has a verbal message foryou."
Dick stood, for a moment, speechless and staring; then, yielding all atonce to the fatigues of the night, sank in a senseless heap to thedeck.