Beau Brocade - Baroness Emmuska Orczy (polar express read aloud TXT) 📗

“Indeed?” sneered the Corporal.

“I dare swear that down at Derby,” retorted Mr. Inch, spitefully, “you have not even heard of that personage.”

“Oh! we know well enough that Brassing Moor harbours more miscreants than any corner of the country,” laughed the young soldier, “but methought Beau Brocade only existed in the imagination of your half-witted yokels about here.”

“There you are in grave error, Master Corporal,” remarked the beadle with dignity. “Beau Brocade, permit me to observe, does exist in the flesh. ‘Twas only last night Sir Humphrey Challoner’s coach was stopped not three miles from Hartington, and his Honour robbed of fifty guineas, by that pernicious highwayman.”

“Then you must lay this Beau Brocade by the heels, Master Inch.”

“Aye! that’s easily said. Lay him by the heels forsooth, and who’s going to do that, pray?”

“Nay, that’s your affair. You don’t expect His Grace the Duke of Comberland to lend you a portion of his army, do you?”

“His Grace might do worse. Beau Brocade is a dangerous rascal to the quality.”

“Only to the quality?”

“Aye, he’ll not touch a poor man; ‘tis only the rich he is after, and uses but little of his ill-gotten gain on himself.”

“How so?” asked the Corporal, eagerly, for in spite of the excitement of camp life round about Derby, the fame of the daring highwayman had ere now tickled the fancy of the young soldiers of the Duke of Cumberland’s army.

“Why, I told you Sir Humphrey Challoner was robbed on the Heath last night—robbed of fifty guineas, eh?” said Master Inch, whispering in eager confidence. “Well, this morning, when Squire West arrived at the court-house, he found fifty guineas in the poor box.”

“Well?”

“Well, that’s not the first time nor yet the second that such a matter has occurred. The dolts round about here, the lads from Bassington or Aldwark, or even from Wirksworth, would never willingly lay a hand on Beau Brocade. The rascal knows it well enough, and carries on his shameful trade with impunity.”

“Odd’s fish! but meseems the trade is not so shameful after all. What is the fellow like?”

“Nay, no one has ever seen his face, though his figure on the Moor is familiar to many. He is always dressed in the latest fashion, hence the villagers have called him Beau Brocade. Some say he is a royal prince in disguise—he always wears a mask; some say he is the Pretender, Charles Stuart himself; others declare his face is pitted with smallpox; others that he has the face of a pig, and the ears of a mule, that he is covered with hairs like a spaniel, or has a blue skin like an ape. But no one knows, and with half the villagers on the Heath to aid and abet him, he is not like to be laid by the heels.”

“A fine story, Master Inch,” laughed the Corporal. “And is there no reward for the capture of your pig-faced, hairy, blue-skinned royal prince disguised as a common highwayman?”

“Aye, a reward of a hundred guineas,” said Mr. Inch, in a whisper that was hardly audible above the murmur of the wind. “A hundred guineas for the capture of Beau Brocade.”

The Corporal gave a long significant whistle.

“And no one bold enough to attempt the capture?” he said derisively.

Mr. Inch shook his head sadly.

“No one could do it single-handed; the rascal is cunning as well as bold, and…”

But at this point even Mr. Inch’s voluble tongue was suddenly and summarily silenced. The words died in his throat; his bell, the badge of his important public office, fell with a mighty clatter on the ground.

A laugh, a long, loud, joyous, mirthful laugh, rang clear as a silver gong across the lonely Moor. Such a laugh as would make anyone’s heart glad to hear, the laugh of a free man, of a man who is whole-hearted, of a man who has never ceased to be a boy.

And pompous Mr. Inch slowly turned on his heel, as did also the young Corporal, and both gazed out upon the Heath; the patient little squad of soldiers too, all fixed their eyes upon one spot, just beyond John Stich’s forge and cottage, not fifty yards away.

There, clearly outlined against the could-laden sky, was the graceful figure of a horse and rider; the horse, a sleek chestnut thoroughbred, which filled all the soldiers’ hearts with envy and covetousness; the rider, a youthful, upright figure, whose every movement betokened strength of limb and elasticity of muscle, the very pose a model of ease and grace, the shoulders broad; the head, with a black mask worn over the face, was carried high and erect.

In truth it was a goodly picture to look upon, with that massive band of white clouds, and the little patches of vivid blue as a rich, shimmering dome above it, the gold-tipped bracken, the purple heather all around, and far away as a mist-covered background, the green-clad hills and massive Tors of Derbyshire.

So good a picture was it that the tardy September sun peeped through the clouds and had a look at that fine specimen of eighteenth-century English manhood, then paused awhile, perchance to hear again that mirthful, happy laugh.

Then game a gust of wind, the sun retreated, the soldiers gasped, and lo! before Mr. Inch or Mr. Corporal had realized that the picture was made of flesh and blood, horse and rider has disappeared, there, far out across the Heath, beyond the gorse and bramble and the budding heather, with not a handful of dusk to mark the way they went.

Only once from far, very far, almost from fairyland, there came, like the echo of a sliver bell, the sound of that mad, merry laugh.

“Beau Brocade, as I live!” murmured Mr. Inch, under his breath.

Chapter II

The Forge of John Stich

John Stich too had heard that laugh; for a moment he paused in his work, straightened his broad back and leant his heavy hammer upon the anvil, whilst a pleasant smile lit up his bronzed and rugged countenance.

“There goes the Captain,” he said, “I wonder now what’s tickling him. Ah!” he added with a short sigh, “the soldiers, maybe. He doesn’t like soldiers much, doesn’t the Captain.”

He sighed again and looked across to where, on a rough wooden bench, sat a young man with head resting on his hand, his blue eyes staring moodily before him. The dress this young man wore was a counterpart of that in which John himself was arrayed; rough worsted stockings, thick flannel shirt with sleeves well tucked up over fine, muscular arms, and a large, greasy, well-worn leather apron, denoting the blacksmith’s trade. But though the hands and face were covered with grime, a close observer would soon have noticed that those same hands were slender and shapely, the fingers long, the nails neatly trimmed, whilst the face, anxious and careworn though it was, had a look of habitual command, of pride not yet crushed out of ken.

John Stich gazed at him for a while, whilst a look of pity and anxiety saddened his honest face. The smith was a man of few words; he said nothing then, and presently the sound of his hammer upon the anvil once more filled the forge with its pleasant echo. But though John’s tongue was slow, his ear was quick, and in one moment he had perceived the dull thud made by the Corporal’s squad as, having parted from Mr. Inch at the cross-roads, the soldiers ploughed their way through the mud round the cottage and towards the forge.

“Hist!” said John, in a rapid whisper, pointing to the fire, “the bellows! quick!”

The young man too had started in obvious alarm. His ear—the ear of a fugitive, trained to every sound that betokened danger—was as alert as that of the smith. With a sudden effort he pulled himself together, and quickly seized the heavy bellows with a will. He forced his eyes to glance carelessly at the door and his lips to whistle a lively country tune.

The Corporal paused a moment at the entrance, taking a quick survey of the interior of the forge, his men at attention behind him.

“In the King’s name!” he said loudly, as he unfolded the Proclamation of His Majesty’s Parliament.

His orders were to read it in every hamlet and every homestead in the district; John Stich, the blacksmith, was an important personage all around Brassing Moor, and he had not heard it read from beneath the old gallows at the cross-roads just now.

“Well, Corporal,” said the worthy smith, quietly, as he put down his hammer out of respect for the King’s name. “Well, and what does His Majesty, King George II., desire with John Stich, the blacksmith, eh?”

“Not with you alone, John Stich,” replied the Corporal. “This is an Act of Parliament and concerns all loyal subjects of the King. Who be yon lad?” he asked, carelessly nodding towards the young man at the bellows.

“My nephew Jim, out o’ Nottingham,” replied John Stich, quietly, “my sister Hannah’s child. You recollect her, Corporal? She was in service with my Lord Exeter up at Derby.”

“Oh, aye! Mistress Hannah Stich, to be sure! I didn’t know she had such a fine lad of her own,” commented the Corporal, as the young man straightened his tall figure and looked him fearlessly in the face.

“Lads grow up fast enough, don’t they, Corporal?” laughed honest Stich, pleasantly; “but come, let’s hear His Majesty’s Proclamation since you’ve got to read it. But you see I’m very busy and…”

“Nay, ‘tis my duty, John Stich, ‘in every homestead in Derbyshire’ ‘tis to be read, so says this Act of Parliament. You might have saved this trouble had you come down to the cross-roads just now.”

“I was busy,” remarked John Stich, drily, and the Corporal began to read:—

“It having come to the knowledge of His Majesty’s Parliament that certain subjects of the King have lately raised the standard of rebellion, setting up the Pretender, Charles Edward Stuart, above the King’s most lawful Majesty, it is hereby enacted that these persons are guilty of high treason and by the laws of the kingdom are condemned to death. It is further enacted that it is unlawful for any loyal subject of the King to shelter or harbour, clothe or feed any such persons who are vile traitors and rebels to their King and country: and that any subject of His Majesty who kills such a traitor or rebel doth thereby commit and act of justice and loyalty, for which he may be rewarded by the sum of twenty guineas.”

There was a pause when the Corporal had finished reading. John Stich was leaning upon his hammer, the young man once more busied himself with the bellows. Outside, the clearing shower of September rain began pattering upon the thatched roof of the forge.

“Well,” said John Stich at last, as the Corporal put the heavy parchment away in his wallet. “Well, and are you going to tell us who are those persons, Corporal, whom our village lads are told to murder by Act of Parliament? How shall we know a rebel… and shoot him… when we see one?”

“There were forty persons down on the list a few weeks ago, persons who were known to be in hiding in Derbyshire,” said the young soldier, “but…”

“Well, what’s your ‘but,’ Corporal? There were forty persons whom ‘twas lawful to murder a few weeks ago….What of them?”

“They have been caught and hanged, most of them,” replied the soldier, quietly.

“Jim, lad, mind that fire,” commented John Stich, turning to his