“Now, what's amiss? Oddslife, what ails you?” he cried.
“Is there no way, Sir Crispin? Is there naught you can do?” wailed the youth.
Instantly Galliard sat up.
“Poor lad, does the thought of the rope affright you?”
Kenneth bowed his head in silence.
“Tis a scurvy death, I own. Look you, Kenneth, there is a dagger in my boot. If you would rather have cold steel, 'tis done. It is the last service I may render you, and I'll be as gentle as a mistress. Just there, over the heart, and you'll know no more until you are in Paradise.”
Turning down the leather of his right boot, he thrust his hand down the side of his leg. But Kenneth sprang back with a cry.
“No, no,” he cried, covering his face with his hands. “Not that! You don't understand. It is death itself I would cheat. What odds to exchange one form for another? Is there no way out of this? Is there no way, Sir Crispin?” he demanded with clenched hands.
“The approach of death makes you maudlin, sir,” quoth the other, in whom this pitiful show of fear produced a profound disgust. “Is there no way; say you? There is the window, but 'tis seventy feet above the river; and there is the door, but it is locked, and there is a sentry on the other side.”
“I might have known it. I might have known that you would mock me. What is death to you, to whom life offers nothing? For you the prospect of it has no terrors. But for me—bethink you, sir, I am scarce eighteen years of age,” he added brokenly, “and life was full of promise for me. O God, pity me!”
“True, lad, true,” the knight returned in softened tones. “I had forgotten that death is not to you the blessed release that it is to me. And yet, and yet,” he mused, “do I not die leaving a task unfulfilled—a task of vengeance? And by my soul, I know no greater spur to make a man cling to life. Ah,” he sighed wistfully, “if indeed I could find a way.”
“Think, Sir Crispin, think,” cried the boy feverishly.
“To what purpose? There is the window. But even if the bars were moved, which I see no manner of accomplishing, the drop to the river is seventy feet at least. I measured it with my eyes when first we entered here. We have no rope. Your cloak rent in two and the pieces tied together would scarce yield us ten feet. Would you care to jump the remaining sixty?”
At the very thought of it the lad trembled, noting which Sir Crispin laughed softly.
“There. And yet, boy, it would be taking a risk which if successful would mean life—if otherwise, a speedier end than even the rope will afford you. Oddslife,” he cried, suddenly springing to his feet, and seizing the lanthorn. “Let us look at these bars.”
He stepped across to the window, and held the light so that its rays fell full upon the base of the vertical iron that barred the square.
“It is much worn by rust, Kenneth,” he muttered. “The removal of this single piece of iron,” and he touched the lower arm of the cross, “should afford us passage. Who knows? Hum!”
He walked back to the table and set the lanthorn down. In a tremble, Kenneth watched his every movement, but spoke no word.
“He who throws a main,” said Galliard, “must set a stake upon the board. I set my life—a stake that is already forfeit—and I throw for liberty. If I win, I win all; if I lose, I lose naught. 'Slife, I have thrown many a main with Fate, but never one wherein the odds were more generous. Come, Kenneth, it is the only way, and we will attempt it if we can but move the bar.”
“You mean to leap?” gasped the lad.
“Into the river. It is the only way.”
“O God, I dare not. It is a fearsome drop.”
“Longer, I confess, than they'll give you in an hour's time, if you remain; but it may lead elsewhere.”
The boy's mouth was parched. His eyes burned in their sockets, and yet his limbs shook with cold—but not the cold of that September night.
“I'll try it,” he muttered with a gulp. Then suddenly clutching Galliard's arm, he pointed to the window.
“What ails you now?” quoth Crispin testily.
“The dawn, Sir Crispin. The dawn.”
Crispin looked, and there, like a gash in the blackness of the heavens, he beheld a streak of grey.
“Quick, Sir Crispin; there is no time to lose. The minister said he would return at daybreak.”
“Let him come,” answered Galliard grimly, as he moved towards the casement.
He gripped the lower bar with his lean, sinewy hands, and setting his knee against the masonry beneath it, he exerted the whole of his huge strength—that awful strength acquired during those years of toil as a galley-slave, which even his debaucheries had not undermined. He felt his sinews straining until it seemed that they must crack; the sweat stood out upon his brow; his breathing grew stertorous.
“It gives,” he panted at last. “It gives.”
He paused in his efforts, and withdrew his hands.
“I must breathe a while. One other effort such as that, and it is done. 'Fore George,” he laughed, “it is the first time water has stood my friend, for the rains have sadly rusted that iron.”
Without, their sentry was pacing before the door; his steps came nearer, passed, and receded; turned, came nigh again, and again passed on. As once more they grew faint, Crispin seized the bar and renewed his attempt. This time it was easier. Gradually it ceded to the strain Galliard set upon it.
Nearer came the sentry's footsteps, but they went unheeded by him who toiled, and by him who watched with bated breath and beating heart. He felt it giving—giving—giving. Crack!
With a report that rang through the room like a pistol shot, it broke off in its socket. Both men caught their breath, and stood for a second crouching, with straining ears. The sentry had stopped at their door.
Galliard was a man of quick action, swift to think, and as swift to execute the thought. To thrust Kenneth into a corner, to extinguish the light, and to fling himself upon the bed was all the work of an instant.
The key grated in the lock, and Crispin answered it with a resounding snore. The door opened, and on the threshold stood the Roundhead trooper, holding aloft a lanthorn whose rays were flashed back by his polished cuirass. He beheld Crispin on the bed with closed eyes and open mouth, and he heard his reassuring and melodious snore. He saw Kenneth seated peacefully upon the floor, with his back against the wall, and for a moment he was puzzled.
“Heard you aught?” he asked.
“Aye,” answered Kenneth, in a strangled voice, “I heard something like a shot out there.”
The gesture with which he accompanied the words was fatal. Instinctively he had jerked his thumb towards the window, thereby drawing the soldier's eyes in that direction. The fellow's glance fell upon the twisted bar, and a sharp exclamation of surprise escaped him.
Had he been aught but a fool he must have guessed at once how it came so, and having guessed it, he must have thought twice ere he ventured within reach of a man who could so handle iron. But he was a slow-reasoning clod, and so far, thought had not yet taken the place of surprise. He stepped into, the chamber and across to the window, that he might more closely view that broken bar.
With eyes that were full of terror and despair, Kenneth watched him; their last hope had failed them. Then, as he looked, it seemed to him that in one great leap from his recumbent position on the bed, Crispin had fallen upon the soldier.
The lanthorn was dashed from the fellow's hand, and rolled to Kenneth's feet. The fellow had begun' a cry, which broke off suddenly into a gurgle as