THE apparition of a file of soldiers ringing down the butt-ends
of their loaded muskets on our door-step, caused the dinner-party to rise from
table in confusion, and caused Mrs Joe re-entering the kitchen empty-handed, to
stop short and stare, in her wondering lament of `Gracious goodness gracious me,
what's gone - with the - pie!'
The sergeant and I were in the kitchen when Mrs Joe stood staring; at which
crisis I partially recovered the use of my senses. It was the sergeant who had
spoken to me, and he was now looking round at the company, with his handcuffs
invitingly extended towards them in his right hand, and his left on my shoulder.
`Excuse me, ladies and gentleman,' said the sergeant, `but as I have
mentioned at the door to this smart young shaver' (which he hadn't), `I am on a
chase in the name of the king, and I want the blacksmith.'
`And pray what might you want with him?' retorted my sister, quick to resent
his being wanted at all.
`Missis,' returned the gallant sergeant, `speaking for myself, I should
reply, the honour and pleasure of his fine wife's acquaintance; speaking for the
king, I answer, a little job done.'
This was received as rather neat in the sergeant; insomuch that Mr
Pumblechook cried audibly, `Good again!'
`You see, blacksmith,' said the sergeant, who had by this time picked out Joe
with his eye, `we have had an accident with these, and I find the lock of one of
'em goes wrong, and the coupling don't act pretty. As they are wanted for
immediate service, will you throw your eye over them?'
Joe threw his eye over them, and pronounced that the job would necessitate
the lighting of his forge fire, and would take nearer two hours than one, `Will
it? Then will you set about it at once, blacksmith?' said the off-hand sergeant,
`as it's on his Majesty's service. And if my men can beat a hand anywhere,
they'll make themselves useful.' With that, he called to his men, who came
trooping into the kitchen one after another, and piled their arms in a corner.
And then they stood about, as soldiers do; now, with their hands loosely clasped
before them; now, resting a knee or a shoulder; now, easing a belt or a pouch;
now, opening the door to spit stiffly over their high stocks, out into the yard.
All these things I saw without then knowing that I saw them, for I was in an
agony of apprehension. But, beginning to perceive that the handcuffs were not
for me, and that the military had so far got the better of the pie as to put it
in the background, I collected a little more of my scattered wits.
`Would you give me the Time?' said the sergeant, addressing himself to Mr
Pumblechook, as to a man whose appreciative powers justified the inference that
he was equal to the time.
`It's just gone half-past two.'
`That's not so bad,' said the sergeant, reflecting; `even if I was forced to
halt here nigh two hours, that'll do. How far might you call yourselves from the
marshes, hereabouts? Not above a mile, I reckon?'
`Just a mile,' said Mrs Joe.
`That'll do. We begin to close in upon 'em about dusk. A little before dusk,
my orders are. That'll do.'
`Convicts, sergeant?' asked Mr Wopsle, in a matter-of-course way.
`Ay!' returned the sergeant, `two. They're pretty well known to be out on the
marshes still, and they won't try to get clear of 'em before dusk. Anybody here
seen anything of any such game?'
Everybody, myself excepted, said no, with confidence. Nobody thought of me.
`Well!' said the sergeant, `they'll find themselves trapped in a circle, I
expect, sooner than they count on. Now, blacksmith! If you're ready, his Majesty
the King is.'
Joe had got his coat and waistcoat and cravat off, and his leather apron on,
and passed into the forge. One of the soldiers opened its wooden windows,
another lightened the fire, another turned to at the bellows, the rest stood
round the blaze, which was soon roaring. Then Joe began to hammer and clink,
hammer and clink, and we all looked on.
The interest of the impending pursuit not only absorbed the general
attention, but even made my sister liberal. She drew a pitcher of beer from the
cask, for the soldiers, and invited the sergeant to take a glass of brandy. But
Mr Pumblechook said, sharply, `Give him wine, Mum. I'll engage there's no Tar in
that:' so, the sergeant thanked him and said that as he preferred his drink
without tar, he would take wine, if it was equally convenient. When it was given
him, he drank his Majesty's health and Compliments of the Season, and took it
all at a mouthful and smacked his lips.
`Good stuff, eh, sergeant?' said Mr Pumblechook.
`I'll tell you something,' returned the sergeant; `I suspect that stuff's of
your providing.'
Mr. Pumblechook, with a fat sort of laugh, said, `Ay, ay? Why?'
`Because,' returned the sergeant, clapping him on the shoulder, `you're a man
that knows what's what.'
`D'ye think so?' said Mr Pumblechook, with his former laugh. `Have another
glass!'
`With you. Hob and nob,' returned the sergeant. `The top of mine to the foot
of yours - the foot of yours to the top of mine - Ring once, ring twice - the
best tune on the Musical Glasses! Your health. May you live a thousand years,
and never be a worse judge of the right sort than you are at the present moment
of your life!'
The sergeant tossed off his glass again and seemed quite ready for another
glass. I noticed that Mr Pumblechook in his hospitality appeared to forget that
he had made a present of the wine, but took the bottle from Mrs Joe and had all
the credit of handing it about in a gush of joviality. Even I got some. And he
was so very free of the wine that he even called for the other bottle, and
handed that about with the same liberality, when the first was gone.
As I watched them while they all stood clustering about the forge, enjoying
themselves so much, I thought what terrible good sauce for a dinner my fugitive
friend on the marshes was. They had not enjoyed themselves a quarter so much,
before the entertainment was brightened with the excitement he furnished. And
now, when they were all in lively anticipation of `the two villains' being
taken, and when the bellows seemed to roar for the fugitives, the fire to flare
for them, the smoke to hurry away in pursuit of them, Joe to hammer and clink
for them, and all the murky shadows on the wall to shake at them in menace as
the blaze rose and sank and the red-hot sparks dropped and died, the pale
after-noon outside, almost seemed in my pitying young fancy to have turned pale
on their account, poor wretches.
At last, Joe's job was done, and the ringing and roaring stopped. As Joe got
on his coat, he mustered courage to propose that some of us should go down with
the soldiers and see what came of the hunt. Mr Pumblechook and Mr Hubble
declined, on the plea of a pipe and ladies' society; but Mr Wopsle said he would
go, if Joe would. Joe said he was agreeable, and would take me, if Mrs Joe
approved. We never should have got leave to go, I am sure, but for Mrs Joe's
curiosity to know all about it and how it ended. As it was, she merely
stipulated, `If you bring the boy back with his head blown to bits by a musket,
don't look to me to put it together again.'
The sergeant took a polite leave of the ladies, and parted from Mr
Pumblechook as from a comrade; though I doubt if he were quite as fully sensible
of that gentleman's merits under arid conditions, as when something moist was
going. His men resumed their muskets and fell in. Mr Wopsle, Joe, and I,
received strict charge to keep in the rear, and to speak no word after we
reached the marshes. When we were all out in the raw air and were steadily
moving towards our business, I treasonably whispered to Joe, `I hope, Joe, we
shan't find them.' and Joe whispered to me, `I'd give a shilling if they had cut
and run, Pip.'
We were joined by no stragglers from the village, for the weather was cold
and threatening, the way dreary, the footing had, darkness coming on, and the
people had good fires in-doors and were keeping the day. A few faces hurried to
glowing windows and looked after us, but none came out. We passed the
finger-post, and held straight on to the churchyard. There, we were stopped a
few minutes by a signal from the sergeant's hand, while two or three of his men
dispersed themselves among the graves, and also examined the porch. They came in
again without finding anything, and then we struck out on the open marshes,
through the gate at the side of the churchyard. A bitter sleet came rattling
against us here on the east wind, and Joe took me on his back.
Now that we are out upon the dismal wilderness where they little thought I
had been within eight or nine hours and had seen both men hiding, I considered
for the first time, with great dread, if we should come upon them, would my
particular convict suppose that it was I who had brought the soldiers there? He
had asked me if I was a deceiving imp, and he had said I should be a fierce
young hound if I joined the hunt against him. Would he believe that I was both
imp and hound in treacherous earnest, and had betrayed him?
It was of no use asking myself this question now. There I was, on Joe's back,
and there was Joe beneath me, charging at the ditches like a hunter, and
stimulating Mr Wopsle not to tumble on his Roman nose, and to keep up with us.
The soldiers were in front of us, extending into a pretty wide line with an
interval between man and man. We were taking the course I had begun with, and
from which I had diverged in the mist. Either the mist was not out again yet, or
the wind had dispelled it. Under the low red glare of sunset, the beacon, and
the gibbet, and the mound of the Battery, and the opposite shore of the river,
were plain, though all of a watery lead colour.
With my heart thumping like a blacksmith at Joe's broad shoulder, I looked
all about for any sign of the convicts. I could see none, I could hear none. Mr
Wopsle had greatly alarmed me more than once, by his blowing and hard breathing;
but I knew the sounds by this time, and could dissociate them from the object of
pursuit. I got a dreadful start, when I thought I heard the file still going;
but it was only a sheep bell. The sheep stopped in their eating and looked
timidly at us; and the cattle, their heads turned from the wind and sleet,
stared angrily as if they held us responsible for both annoyances; but, except
these things, and the shudder of the dying day in every blade of grass, there
was no break in the bleak stillness of the marshes.
The soldiers were moving on in the direction of the old Battery, and we were
moving on a little way behind them, when, all of a sudden, we all stopped. For,
there had reached us on the wings of the wind and rain, a long shout. It was
repeated. It was at a distance towards the east, but it was long and loud. Nay,
there seemed to be two or more shouts raised together - if one might judge from
a confusion in the sound.
To this effect the sergeant and the nearest men were speaking under their
breath, when Joe and I came up. After another moment's listening, Joe (who was a
good judge) agreed, and Mr Wopsle (who was a bad judge) agreed. The sergeant, a
decisive man, ordered that the sound should not be answered, but that the course
should be changed, and that his men should make towards it `at the double.' So
we slanted to the right (where the East was), and Joe pounded away so
wonderfully, that I had to hold on tight to keep my seat.
It was a run indeed now, and what Joe called, in the only two words he spoke
all the time, `a Winder.' Down banks and up banks, and over gates, and splashing
into dykes, and breaking among coarse rushes: no man cared where he went. As we
came nearer to the shouting, it became more and more apparent that it was made
by more than one voice. Sometimes, it seemed to stop altogether, and then the
soldiers stopped. When it broke out again, the soldiers made for it at a greater
rate than ever, and we after them. After a while, we had so run it down, that we
could hear one voice calling `Murder!' and another voice, `Convicts! Runaways!
Guard!This way for the runaway convicts!' Then both voices would seem to be
stifled in a struggle, and then would break out again. And when it had come to
this, the soldiers ran like deer, and Joe too.
The sergeant ran in first, when we had run the noise quite down, and two of
his men ran in close upon him. Their pieces were cocked and levelled when we all
ran in.
`Here are both men!' panted the sergeant, struggling at the bottom of a
ditch. `Surrender, you two! and confound you for two wild beasts! Come asunder!'
Water was splashing, and mud was flying, and oaths were being sworn, and
blows were being struck, when some more men went down into the ditch to help the
sergeant, and dragged out, separately, my convict and the other one. Both were
bleeding and panting and execrating and struggling; but of course I knew them
both directly.
`Mind!' said my convict, wiping blood from his face with his ragged sleeves,
and shaking torn hair from his fingers: `I took him!I give him up to you! Mind
that!'
`It's not much to be particular about,' aid the sergeant; `it'll do you small
good, my man, being in the same plight yourself. Handcuffs there!'
`I don't expect it to do me any good. I don't want it to do me more good than
it does now,' said my convict, with a greedy laugh. `I took him. He knows it.
That's enough for me.'
The other convict was livid to look at, and, in addition to the old bruised
left side of his face, seemed to be bruised and torn all over. He could not so
much as get his breath to speak, until they were both separately handcuffed, but
leaned upon a soldier to keep himself from falling.
`Take notice, guard - he tried to murder me,' were his first words.
`Tried to murder him?' said my convict, disdainfully. `Try, and not do it? I
took him, and giv' him up; that's what I done. I not only prevented him getting
off the marshes, but I dragged him here - dragged him this far on his way back.
He's a gentleman, if you please, this villain. Now, the Hulks has got its
gentleman again, through me. Murder him? Worth my while, too, to murder him,
when I could do worse and drag him back!'
The other one still gasped, `He tried - he tried - to - murder me. Bear -
bear witness.'
`Lookee here!' said my convict to the sergeant. `Single-handed I got clear of
the prison-ship; I made a dash and I done it. I could ha' got clear of these
death-cold flats likewise - look at my leg: you won't find much iron on it - if
I hadn't made discovery that he was here. Let him go free? Let him profit by the
means as I found out? Let him make a tool of me afresh and again? Once more? No,
no, no. If I had died at the bottom there;' and he made an emphatic swing at the
ditch with his manacled hands; `I'd have held to him with that grip, that you
should have been safe to find him in my hold.'
The other fugitive, who was evidently in extreme horror of his companion,
repeated, `He tried to murder me. I should have been a dead man if you had not
come up.'
`He lies!' said my convict, with fierce energy. `He's a liar born, and he'll
die a liar. Look at his face; ain't it written there? Let him turn those eyes of
his on me. I defy him to do it.'
The other, with an effort at a scornful smile - which could not, however,
collect the nervous working of his mouth into any set expression - looked at the
soldiers, and looked about at the marshes and at the sky, but certainly did not
look at the speaker.
`Do you see him?' pursued my convict. `Do you see what a villain he is? Do
you see those grovelling and wandering eyes? That's how he looked when we were
tried together. He never looked at me.'
The other, always working and working his dry lips and turning his eyes
restlessly about him far and near, did at last turn them for a moment on the
speaker, with the words, `You are not much to look at,' and with a half-taunting
glance at the bound hands. At that point, my convict became so frantically
exasperated, that he would have rushed upon him but for the interposition of the
soldiers. `Didn't I tell you,' said the other convict then, `that he would
murder me, if he could?' And any one could see that he shook with fear, and that
there broke out upon his lips, curious white flakes, like thin snow.
`Enough of this parley,' said the sergeant. `Light those torches.'
As one of the soldiers, who carried a basket in lieu of a gun, went down on
his knee to open it, my convict looked round him for the first time, and saw me.
I had alighted from Joe's back on the brink of the ditch when we came up, and
had not moved since. I looked at him eagerly when he looked at me, and slightly
moved my hands and shook my head. I had been waiting for him to see me, that I
might try to assure him of my innocence. It was not at all expressed to me that
he even comprehended my intention, for he gave me a look that I did not
understand, and it all passed in a moment. But if he had looked at me for an
hour or for a day, I could not have remembered his face ever afterwards, as
having been more attentive.
The soldier with the basket soon got a light, and lighted three or four
torches, and took one himself and distributed the others. It had been almost
dark before, but now it seemed quite dark, and soon afterwards very dark. Before
we departed from that spot, four soldiers standing in a ring, fired twice into
the air. Presently we saw other torches kindled at some distance behind us, and
others on the marshes on the opposite bank of the river. `All right,' said the
sergeant. `March.'
We had not gone far when three cannon were fired ahead of us with a sound
that seemed to burst something inside my ear. `You are expected on board,' said
the sergeant to my convict; `they know you are coming. Don't straggle, my man.
Close up here.'
The two were kept apart, and each walked surrounded by a separate guard. I
had hold of Joe's hand now, and Joe carried one of the torches. Mr Wopsle had
been for going back, but Joe was resolved to see it out, so we went on with the
party. There was a reasonably good path now, mostly on the edge of the river,
with a divergence here and there where a dyke came, with a miniature windmill on
it and a muddy sluice-gate. When I looked round, I could see the other lights
coming in after us. The torches we carried, dropped great blotches of the upon
the track, and I could see those, too, lying smoking and flaring. I could see
nothing else but black darkness. Our lights warmed the air about us with their
pitchy blaze, and the two prisoners seemed rather to like that, as they limped
along in the midst of the muskets. We could not go fast, because of their
lameness; and they were so spent, that two or three times we had to halt while
they rested.
After an hour or so of this travelling, we came to a rough wooden hut and a
landing-place. There was a guard in the hut, and they challenged, and the
sergeant answered. Then, we went into the hut where there was a smell of tobacco
and whitewash, and a bright fire, and a lamp, and a stand of muskets, and a
drum, and a low wooden bedstead, like an overgrown mangle without the machinery,
capable of holding about a dozen soldiers all at once. Three or four soldiers
who lay upon it in their great-coats, were not much interested in us, but just
lifted their heads and took a sleepy stare, and then lay down again. The
sergeant made some kind of report, and some entry in a book, and then the
convict whom I call the other convict was drafted off with his guard, to go on
board first.
My convict never looked at me, except that once. While we stood in the hut,
he stood before the fire looking thoughtfully at it, or putting up his feet by
turns upon the hob, and looking thoughtfully at them as if he pitied them for
their recent adventures. Suddenly, he turned to the sergeant, and remarked:
`I wish to say something respecting this escape. It may prevent some persons
laying under suspicion alonger me.'
`You can say what you like,' returned the sergeant, standing coolly looking
at him with his arms folded, `but you have no call to say it here. You'll have
opportunity enough to say about it, and hear about it, before it's done with,
you know.'
`I know, but this is another pint, a separate matter. A man can't starve; at
least I can't. I took some wittles, up at the willage over yonder - where the
church stands a'most out on the marshes.'
`You mean stole,' said the sergeant.
`And I'll tell you where from. From the blacksmith's.'
`Halloa!' said the sergeant, staring at Joe.
`Halloa, Pip!' said Joe, staring at me.
`It was some broken wittles - that's what it was - and a dram of liquor, and
a pie.'
`Have you happened to miss such an articles as a pie, blacksmith?' asked the
sergeant, confidentially.
`My wife did, at the very moment when you came in. Don't you know, Pip?'
`So,' said my convict, turning his eyes on Joe in a moody manner, and without
the least glance at me; `so you're the blacksmith, are you? Than I'm sorry to
say, I've eat your pie.'
`God knows you're welcome to it - so far as it was ever mine,' returned Joe,
with a saving remembrance of Mrs Joe. `We don't know what you have done, but we
wouldn't have you starved to death for it, poor miserable fellow-creatur. -
Would us, Pip?'
The something that I had noticed before, clicked in the man's throat again,
and he turned his back. The boat had returned, and his guard were ready, so we
followed him to the landing-place made of rough stakes and stones, and saw him
put into the boat, which was rowed by a crew of convicts like himself. No one
seemed surprised to see him, or interested in seeing him, or glad to see him, or
sorry to see him, or spoke a word, except that somebody in the boat growled as
if to dogs, `Give way, you!' which was the signal for the dip of the oars. By
the light of torches, we was the black Hulk lying out a little way from the mud
of the shore, like a wicked Noah's ark. Cribbed and barred and moored by massive
rusty chains, the prison-ship seemed in my young eyes to be ironed like the
prisoners. We saw the boat go alongside, and we saw him taken up the side and
disappear. Then, the ends of the torches were flung hissing into the water, and
went out, as if it were all over with him.
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