The Master of Appleby | Page 8

Hundred; and for the son of
Roger Ireton there was instant vassalage and loyal service. But best of
all, on my first evening before the handful of fire in the great fire-place,
Darius brought me a package swathed in many wrappings of
Indian-tanned deerskin. It contained my father's sword, and, more
precious than this, a message from the dead. My father's farewell was

written upon a leaf torn from his journal, and was but a hasty scrawl. I
here transcribe it.
My Son:
_I know not if this will ever come into your hands, but it and my sword
shall be left in trust with the faithful Darius. We have made our
ill-timed cast for liberty and it has failed, and to-morrow I and five
others are to die at the rope's end. I bequeath you my sword--'tis all the
tyrant hath left me to devise--and my blessing to go with it when you,
or another Ireton, shall once more bare the true old blade in the sacred
cause of liberty._
Thy father, Roger Ireton.

You may be sure I conned these few brave words till I had them well
by heart; and later, when my voice was surer and my eyes less dim, I
summoned Darius and bade him tell me all he knew. And it was thus I
learned what I have here set down of my father's end.
The next day, all indecision gone, I rode to Queensborough to ascertain,
if so I might, how best to throw the weight of the good old Andrea into
the patriot scale, meaning to push on thence to Charlotte when I had got
the bearings of the nearest patriot force.
'Twas none so easy to learn what I needed to know; though, now I
sought for information, a curious thing or two developed. One was that
this light-horse outpost in our hamlet was far in advance of the army of
invasion--so far that it was dangersomely isolated, and beyond support.
Another was the air of secrecy maintained, and the holding of the troop
in instant readiness for fight or flight.
Why this little handful of British regulars should stick and hang so far
from Lord Cornwallis's main, which was then well down upon the
Wateree, I could not guess. But for the secrecy and vigilance there were
good reasons and sufficient. The patriot militia had been called out, and
was embodying under General Rutherford but a few miles distant near

Charlotte.
I had this information in guarded whispers from mine host of the tavern,
and was but a moment free of the tap-room, when I first saw Margery
Stair and so drank of the cup of trembling with madness in its lees. She
was riding, unmasked, down the high road, not on a pillion as most
women rode in that day, but upon her own mount with a black groom
two lengths in the rear. I can picture her for you no better than I could
for Richard Jennifer; but this I know, that even this first sight of her
moved me strangely, though the witching beauty of her face and the
proudness of it were more a challenge than a beckoning.
A blade's length at my right where I was standing in front of the tavern,
three redcoat officers lounged at ease; and to one of them my lady
tossed a nod of recognition, half laughing, half defiant. I turned quickly
to look at the favored one. He stood with his back to me; a man of
about my own bigness, heavy-built and well-muscled. He wore a
bob-wig, as did many of the troop officers, but his uniform was
tailor-fine, and the hand with which he was resettling his hat was
bejeweled--overmuch bejeweled, to my taste.
Something half familiar in the figure of him made me look again. In the
act he turned, and then I saw his face--saw and recognized it though
nine years lay between this and my last seeing of it across the body of
Richard Coverdale.
"So!" thought I. "My time has come at last." And while I was yet
turning over in my mind how best to bait him, the lady passed out of
earshot, and I heard him say to the two, his comrades, that foul thing
which I would not repeat to Jennifer; a vile boast with which I may not
soil my page here for you.
"Oh, come, Sir Frank! that's too bad!" cried the younger of the twain;
and then I took two strides to front him fairly.
"Sir Francis Falconnet, you are a foul-lipped blackguard!" I said; and,
lest that should not be enough, I smote him in the face so that he fell
like an ox in the shambles.

III
IN WHICH MY ENEMY SCORES FIRST
True to his promise,