The Spy by James Fenimore Cooper (english reading book .txt) 📗
- Author: James Fenimore Cooper
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“What safeguard?” asked the sergeant, with awakened curiosity.
“’Tis nothing,” replied the peddler, recovering his natural manner, and lowering his face to avoid the earnest looks of his companion.
“And who is he?”
“No one,” added Harvey, anxious to say no more.
“Nothing and no one can avail but little now,” said the sergeant, rising to go. “Lay yourself on the blanket of Mrs. Flanagan, and get a little sleep; I will call you betimes in the morning; and from the bottom of my soul I wish I could be of some service to you, for I dislike greatly to see a man hung up like a dog.”
“Then you might save me from this ignominious death,” said Birch, springing to his feet, and catching the dragoon by the arm. “And, oh! what will I not give you in reward!”
“In what manner?” asked the sergeant, looking at him in surprise.
“See,” said the peddler, producing several guineas from his person; “these are nothing to what I will give you, if you will assist me to escape.”
“Were you the man whose picture is on the gold, I would not listen to such a crime,” said the trooper, throwing the money on the floor with contempt. “Go—go, poor wretch, and make your peace with God; for it is He only that can be of service to you now.”
The sergeant took up the lantern, and, with some indignation in his manner, he left the peddler to sorrowful meditations on his approaching fate. Birch sank, in momentary despair, on the pallet of Betty, while his guardian proceeded to give the necessary instructions to the sentinels for his safe-keeping.
Hollister concluded his injunctions to the man in the shed, by saying, “Your life will depend on his not escaping. Let none enter or quit the room till morning.”
“But,” said the trooper, “my orders are, to let the washerwoman pass in and out, as she pleases.”
“Well, let her then; but be careful that this wily peddler does not get out in the folds of her petticoats.” He then continued his walk, giving similar orders to each of the sentinels near the spot.
For some time after the departure of the sergeant, silence prevailed within the solitary prison of the peddler, until the dragoon at his door heard his loud breathings, which soon rose into the regular cadence of one in a deep sleep. The man continued walking his post, musing on an indifference to life which could allow nature its customary rest, even on the threshold of the grave. Harvey Birch had, however, been a name too long held in detestation by every man in the corps, to suffer any feelings of commiseration to mingle with these reflections of the sentinel; for, notwithstanding the consideration and kindness manifested by the sergeant, there probably was not another man of his rank in the whole party who would have discovered equal benevolence to the prisoner, or who would not have imitated the veteran in rejecting the bribe, although probably from a less worthy motive. There was something of disappointed vengeance in the feelings of the man who watched the door of the room on finding his prisoner enjoying a sleep of which he himself was deprived, and at his exhibiting such obvious indifference to the utmost penalty that military rigor could inflict on all his treason to the cause of liberty and America. More than once he felt prompted to disturb the repose of the peddler by taunts and revilings; but the discipline he was under, and a secret sense of shame at the brutality of the act, held him in subjection.
His meditations were, however, soon interrupted by the appearance of the washerwoman, who came staggering through the door that communicated with the kitchen, muttering execrations against the servants of the officers, who, by their waggery, had disturbed her slumbers before the fire. The sentinel understood enough of her maledictions to comprehend the case; but all his efforts to enter into conversation with the enraged woman were useless, and he suffered her to enter her room without explaining that it contained another inmate. The noise of her huge frame falling on the bed was succeeded by a silence that was soon interrupted by the renewed respiration of the peddler, and within a few minutes Harvey continued to breathe aloud, as if no interruption had occurred. The relief arrived at this moment.
The sentinel, who felt nettled at the contempt of the peddler, after communicating his orders, while he was retiring, exclaimed to his successor,—
“You may keep yourself warm by dancing, John; the peddler spy has tuned his fiddle, you hear, and it will not be long before Betty will strike up, in her turn.”
The joke was followed by a general laugh from the party, who marched on in performance of their duty. At this instant the door of the prison was opened, and Betty reappeared, staggering back again toward her former quarters.
“Stop,” said the sentinel, catching her by her clothes; “are you sure the spy is not in your pocket?”
“Can’t you hear the rascal snoring in my room, you dirty blackguard?” sputtered Betty, her whole frame shaking with rage. “And is it so ye would sarve a dacent famale, that a man must be put to sleep in the room wid her, ye rapscallion?”
“Pooh! Do you mind a fellow who’s to be hanged in the morning? You see he sleeps already; to-morrow he’ll take a longer nap.”
“Hands off, ye villain,” cried the washerwoman, relinquishing a small bottle that the trooper had succeeded in wresting from her. “But I’ll go to Captain Jack, and know if it’s orders to put a hang-gallows spy in my room; aye, even in my widowed bed, you tief!”
“Silence, old Jezebel!” said the fellow with a laugh, taking the bottle from his mouth to breathe, “or you will wake the gentleman. Would you disturb a man in his last sleep?”
“I’ll awake Captain Jack, you reprobate villain, and bring him here to see me righted; he will punish ye all, for imposing on a dacent widowed body, you marauder!”
With these words, which only extorted a laugh from the sentinel, Betty staggered round the end of the building, and made the best of her way towards the quarters of her favorite, Captain John Lawton, in search of redress. Neither the officer nor the woman, however, appeared during the night, and nothing further occurred to disturb the repose of the peddler, who, to the astonishment of the different sentinels, continued by his breathing to manifest how little the gallows could affect his slumbers.
A Daniel come to judgment; yea, a Daniel!
O wise young judge, how I do honor thee!
—Merchant of Venice.
The Skinners followed Captain Lawton with alacrity, towards the quarters occupied by the troop of that gentleman. The captain of dragoons had on all occasions manifested so much zeal for the cause in which he was engaged, was so regardless of personal danger when opposed to the enemy, and his stature and stern countenance contributed so much to render him terrific, that these qualities had, in some measure, procured him a reputation distinct from the corps in which he served. His intrepidity was mistaken for ferocity; and his hasty zeal, for the natural love of cruelty. On the other hand, a few acts of clemency, or, more properly speaking, of discriminating justice, had, with one portion of the community, acquired for Dunwoodie the character of undue forbearance. It is seldom that either popular condemnation or popular applause falls, exactly in the quantities earned, where it is merited.
While in the presence of the major the leader of the gang had felt himself under that restraint which vice must ever experience in the company of acknowledged virtue; but having left the house, he at once conceived that he was under the protection of a congenial spirit. There was a gravity in the manner of Lawton that deceived most of those who did not know him intimately; and it was a common saying in his troop, that “when the captain laughed, he was sure to punish.” Drawing near his conductor, therefore, the leader commenced a confidential dialogue.
“’Tis always well for a man to know his friends from his enemies,” said the half-licensed freebooter.
To this prefatory observation the captain made no other reply than a sound which the other interpreted into assent.
“I suppose Major Dunwoodie has the good opinion of Washington?” continued the Skinner, in a tone that rather expressed a doubt than asked a question.
“There are some who think so.”
“Many of the friends of Congress in this county,” the man proceeded, “wish the horse was led by some other officer. For my part, if I could only be covered by a troop now and then, I could do many an important piece of service to the cause, to which this capture of the peddler would be a trifle.”
“Indeed! such as what?”
“For the matter of that, it could be made as profitable to the officer as it would be to us who did it,” said the Skinner, with a look of the most significant meaning.
“But how?” asked Lawton, a little impatiently, and quickening his step to get out of the hearing of the rest of the party.
“Why, near the royal lines, even under the very guns of the heights, might be good picking if we had a force to guard us from De Lancey’s[8] men, and to cover our retreat from being cut off by the way of King’s Bridge.”
“I thought the Refugees took all that game to themselves.”
“They do a little at it; but they are obliged to be sparing among their own people. I have been down twice, under an agreement with them: the first time they acted with honor; but the second they came upon us and drove us off, and took the plunder to themselves.”
“That was a very dishonorable act, indeed; I wonder that an honorable man will associate with such rascals.”
“It is necessary to have an understanding with some of them, or we might be taken; but a man without honor is worse than a brute. Do you think Major Dunwoodie is to be trusted?”
“You mean on honorable principles?”
“Certainly; you know Arnold was thought well of until the royal major was taken.”
“Why, I do not believe Dunwoodie would sell his command as Arnold wished to do; neither do I think him exactly trustworthy in a delicate business like this of yours.”
“That’s just my notion,” rejoined the Skinner, with a self-approving manner that showed how much he was satisfied with his own estimate of character.
By this time they had arrived at a better sort of farmhouse, the very extensive outbuildings of which were in tolerable repair, for the times. The barns were occupied by the men of the troop, while the horses were arranged under the long sheds which protected the yard from the cold north wind. The latter were quietly eating, with saddles on their backs and bridles thrown on their necks, ready to be bitted and mounted at the shortest warning. Lawton excused himself for a moment, and entered his quarters. He soon returned, holding in his hand one of the common, stable lanterns, and led the way towards a large orchard that surrounded the buildings on three sides. The gang followed the trooper in silence, believing his object to be facility of communicating further on this interesting topic, without the danger of being overheard.
Approaching the captain, the Skinner renewed the discourse, with a view of establishing further confidence, and of giving his companion a more favorable opinion of his own intellects.
“Do you think the colonies will finally get the better of the king?” he inquired, with a little of the importance of a politician.
“Get the better!” echoed the captain with impetuosity. Then checking himself, he continued, “No doubt they will. If the French will give us arms and money, we will drive out the royal troops in six months.”
“Well, so I hope we shall soon; and then we shall have a free government, and we, who fight for it, will get our reward.”
“Oh!” cried Lawton, “your claims will be indisputable; while all these vile Tories who live at home peaceably, to take care of their farms, will be held in the contempt they merit. You have no farm, I suppose?”
“Not yet—but it will go hard if I do not find one before the peace is made.”
“Right; study your own interests, and you study the interests of your country; press the point of your own services, and rail at the Tories, and I’ll bet my spurs against a rusty nail that you get to be a county clerk at least.”
“Don’t you think Paulding’s[9] party were fools in not letting the royal adjutant general escape?” said the man, thrown off his guard by the freedom of the captain’s manner.
“Fools!” cried Lawton, with a bitter
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