“Was it—oh, was it a man, if you please? Captain Carroway, don’t say so.”
“A man? Is it likely that we shot at a woman? You are trifling. It will be the worse for you. Forgive me—but we are in such a hurry. Whoa! whoa! pony.”
“You always used to be so polite, Sir, that you quite surprise me. And those guns look so dreadful! My father would be quite astonished to see me not even allowed to go down to the sea, but hurried back here, as if the French had landed.”
“How can I help it, if your pony runs away so?” For Mary all this time had been cleverly contriving to increase and exaggerate her pony’s fear, and so brought the gunners for a long way up the Dike, without giving them any time to spy at all about. She knew that this was wicked from a loyal point of view; not a bit the less she did it. “What a troublesome little horse it is!” she cried. “Oh, Captain Carroway, hold him just a moment. I will jump down, and then you can jump up, and ride after all his Majesty’s enemies.”
“The Lord forbid! He slews all out of gear, like a carronade with rotten lashings. If I boarded him, how could I get out of his way? No, no, my dear, brace him up sharp, and bear clear.”
“But you wanted to know about some enemy, captain. An enemy as bad as my poor Lord Keppel?”
“Mary, my dear, the very biggest villain! A hundred golden guineas on his head, and half for you. Think of your father, my dear, and Sunday gowns. And you must have a young man by-and-by, you know—such a beautiful maid as you are. And you might get a leather purse, and give it to him. Mary, on your duty, now?”
“Captain, you drive me so, what can I say? I can not bear the thought of betraying any body.”
“Of course not, Mary dear; nobody asks you. He must be half a mile off by this time. You could never hurt him now; and you can tell your father that you have done your duty to the king.”
“Well, Captain Carroway, if you are quite sure that it is too late to catch him, I can tell you all about him. But remember your word about the fifty guineas.”
“Every farthing, every farthing, Mary, whatever my wife may say to it. Quick! quick! Which way did he run, my dear?”
“He really did not seem to me to be running at all; he was too tired.”
“To be sure, to be sure, a worn-out fox! We have been two hours after him; he could not run; no more can we. But which way did he go, I mean?”
“I will not say any thing for certain, Sir; even for fifty guineas. But he may have come up here—mind, I say not that he did—and if so, he might have set off again for Sewerby. Slowly, very slowly, because of being tired. But perhaps, after all, he was not the man you mean.”
“Forward, double-quick! We are sure to have him!” shouted the lieutenant—for his true rank was that—flourishing his cutlass again, and setting off at a wonderful pace, considering his limp. “Five guineas every man Jack of you. Thank you, young mistress—most heartily thank you. Dead or alive, five guineas!”
With gun and sword in readiness, they all rushed off; but one of the party, named John Cadman, shook his head and looked back with great mistrust at Mary, having no better judgment of women than this, that he never could believe even his own wife. And he knew that it was mainly by the grace of womankind that so much contraband work was going on. Nevertheless, it was out of his power to act upon his own low opinions now.
The maiden, blushing deeply with the sense of her deceit, was informed by her guilty conscience of that nasty man’s suspicions, and therefore gave a smack with her fern whip to Lord Keppel, impelling him to join, like a loyal little horse, the pursuit of his Majesty’s enemies. But no sooner did she see all the men dispersed, and scouring the distance with trustful ardor, than she turned her pony’s head toward the sea again, and rode back round the bend of the hollow. What would her mother say if she lost the murrey skirt, which had cost six shillings at Bridlington fair? And ten times that money might be lost much better than for her father to discover how she lost it. For Master Stephen Anerley was a straight-backed man, and took three weeks of training in the Land Defense Yeomanry, at periods not more than a year apart, so that many people called him “Captain” now; and the loss of his suppleness at knee and elbow had turned his mind largely to politics, making him stiffly patriotic, and especially hot against all free-traders putting bad bargains to his wife, at the cost of the king and his revenue. If the bargain were a good one, that was no concern of his.
Not that Mary, however, could believe, or would even have such a bad mind as to imagine, that any one, after being helped by her, would be mean enough to run off with her property. And now she came to think of it, there was something high and noble, she might almost say something downright honest, in the face of that poor persecuted man. And in spite of all his panting, how brave he must have been, what a runner, and how clever, to escape from all those cowardly coast-riders shooting right and left at him! Such a man steal that paltry skirt that her mother made such a fuss about! She was much more likely to find it in her clothes-press filled with golden guineas.
Before she was as certain as she wished to be of this (by reason of shrewd nativity), and while she believed that the fugitive must have seized such a chance and made good his escape toward North Sea or Flamborough, a quick shadow glanced across the long shafts of the sun, and a bodily form sped after it. To the middle of the Dike leaped a young man, smiling, and forth from the gully which had saved his life. To look at him, nobody ever could have guessed how fast he had fled, and how close he had lain hid. For he stood there as clean and spruce and careless as even a sailor can be wished to be. Limber yet stalwart, agile though substantial, and as quick as a dart while as strong as a pike, he seemed cut out by nature for a true blue-jacket; but condition had made him a smuggler, or, to put it more gently, a free-trader. Britannia, being then at war with all the world, and alone in the right (as usual), had need of such lads, and produced them accordingly, and sometimes one too many. But Mary did not understand these laws.
This made her look at him with great surprise, and almost doubt whether he could be the man, until she saw her skirt neatly folded in his hand, and then she said, “How do you do, Sir?”
The free-trader looked at her with equal surprise. He had been in such a hurry, and his breath so short, and the chance of a fatal bullet after him so sharp, that his mind had been astray from any sense of beauty, and of every thing else except the safety of the body. But now he looked at Mary, and his breath again went from him.
“You can run again now; I am sure of it,” said she; “and if you would like to do any thing to please me, run as fast as possible.”
“What have I to run away from now?” he answered, in a deep sweet voice. “I run from enemies, but not from friends.”
“That is very wise. But your enemies are still almost within call of you. They will come back worse than ever when they find you are not there.”
“I am not afraid, fair lady, for I understand their ways. I have led them a good many dances before this; though it would have been my last, without your help. They will go on, all the morning, in the wrong direction, even while they know it. Carroway is the most stubborn of men. He never turns back; and the further he goes, the better his bad leg is. They will scatter about, among the fields and hedges, and call one another like partridges. And when they can not take another step, they will come back to Anerley for breakfast.”
“I dare say they will; and we shall be glad to see them. My father is a soldier, and his duty is to nourish and comfort the forces of the king.”
“Then you are young Mistress Anerley? I was sure of it before. There are no two such. And you have saved my life. It is something to owe it so fairly.”
The young sailor wanted to kiss Mary’s hand; but not being used to any gallantry, she held out her hand in the simplest manner to take back her riding skirt; and he, though longing in his heart to keep it, for a token or pretext for another meeting, found no excuse for doing so. And yet he was not without some