CHAPTER XXI--I BECOME THE OWNER OF A CLARET-COLOURED CHAISE
What with packing, signing papers, and partaking of an excellent
cold supper in the lawyer's room, it was past two in the morning
before we were ready for the road. Romaine himself let us out of a
window in a part of the house known to Rowley: it appears it
served as a kind of postern to the servants' hall, by which (when
they were in the mind for a clandestine evening) they would come
regularly in and out; and I remember very well the vinegar aspect
of the lawyer on the receipt of this piece of information--how he
pursed his lips, jutted his eyebrows, and kept repeating, 'This
must be seen to, indeed! this shall be barred to-morrow in the
morning!' In this preoccupation, I believe he took leave of me
without observing it; our things were handed out; we heard the
window shut behind us; and became instantly lost in a horrid
intricacy of blackness and the shadow of woods.
A little wet snow kept sleepily falling, pausing, and falling
again; it seemed perpetually beginning to snow and perpetually
leaving off; and the darkness was intense. Time and again we
walked into trees; time and again found ourselves adrift among
garden borders or stuck like a ram in the thicket. Rowley had
possessed himself of the matches, and he was neither to be
terrified nor softened. 'No, I will not, Mr. Anne, sir,' he would
reply. 'You know he tell me to wait till we were over the 'ill.
It's only a little way now. Why, and I thought you was a soldier,
too!' I was at least a very glad soldier when my valet consented
at last to kindle a thieves' match. From this, we easily lit the
lantern; and thenceforward, through a labyrinth of woodland paths,
were conducted by its uneasy glimmer. Both booted and great-
coated, with tall hats much of a shape, and laden with booty in the
form of a despatch-box, a case of pistols, and two plump valises, I
thought we had very much the look of a pair of brothers returning
from the sack of Amersham Place.
We issued at last upon a country by-road where we might walk
abreast and without precaution. It was nine miles to Aylesbury,
our immediate destination; by a watch, which formed part of my new
outfit, it should be about half-past three in the morning; and as
we did not choose to arrive before daylight, time could not be said
to press. I gave the order to march at ease.
'Now, Rowley,' said I, 'so far so good. You have come, in the most
obliging manner in the world, to carry these valises. The question
is, what next? What are we to do at Aylesbury? or, more
particularly, what are you? Thence, I go on a journey. Are you to
accompany me?'
He gave a little chuckle. 'That's all settled already, Mr. Anne,
sir,' he replied. 'Why, I've got my things here in the valise--a
half a dozen shirts and what not; I'm all ready, sir: just you
lead on: YOU'LL see.'
'The devil you have!' said I. 'You made pretty sure of your
welcome.'
'If you please, sir,' said Rowley.
He looked up at me, in the light of the lantern, with a boyish
shyness and triumph that awoke my conscience. I could never let
this innocent involve himself in the perils and difficulties that
beset my course, without some hint of warning, which it was a
matter of extreme delicacy to make plain enough and not too plain.
'No, no,' said I; 'you may think you have made a choice, but it was
blindfold, and you must make it over again. The Count's service is
a good one; what are you leaving it for? Are you not throwing away
the substance for the shadow? No, do not answer me yet. You
imagine that I am a prosperous nobleman, just declared my uncle's
heir, on the threshold of the best of good fortune, and, from the
point of view of a judicious servant, a jewel of a master to serve
and stick to? Well, my boy, I am nothing of the kind, nothing of
the kind.'
As I said the words, I came to a full stop and held up the lantern
to his face. He stood before me, brilliantly illuminated on the
background of impenetrable night and falling snow, stricken to
stone between his double burden like an ass between two panniers,
and gaping at me like a blunderbuss. I had never seen a face so
predestined to be astonished, or so susceptible of rendering the
emotion of surprise; and it tempted me as an open piano tempts the
musician.
'Nothing of the sort, Rowley,' I continued, in a churchyard voice.
'These are appearances, petty appearances. I am in peril,
homeless, hunted. I count scarce any one in England who is not my
enemy. From this hour I drop my name, my title; I become nameless;
my name is proscribed. My liberty, my life, hang by a hair. The
destiny which you will accept, if you go forth with me, is to be
tracked by spies, to hide yourself under a false name, to follow
the desperate pretences and perhaps share the fate of a murderer
with a price upon his head.'
His face had been hitherto beyond expectation, passing from one
depth to another of tragic astonishment, and really worth paying to
see; but at this it suddenly cleared. 'Oh, I ain't afraid!' he
said; and then, choking into laughter, 'why, I see it from the
first!'
I could have beaten him. But I had so grossly overshot the mark
that I suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour
of elocution to persuade him I had been in earnest. In the course
of which I became so interested in demonstrating my present danger
that I forgot all about my future safety, and not only told him the
story of Goguelat, but threw in the business of the drovers as
well, and ended by blurting out that I was a soldier of Napoleon's
and a prisoner of war.
This was far from my views when I began; and it is a common
complaint of me that I have a long tongue. I believe it is a fault
beloved by fortune. Which of you considerate fellows would have
done a thing at once so foolhardy and so wise as to make a
confidant of a boy in his teens, and positively smelling of the
nursery? And when had I cause to repent it? There is none so apt
as a boy to be the adviser of any man in difficulties such as mine.
To the beginnings of virile common sense he adds the last lights of
the child's imagination; and he can fling himself into business
with that superior earnestness that properly belongs to play. And
Rowley was a boy made to my hand. He had a high sense of romance,
and a secret cultus for all soldiers and criminals. His travelling
library consisted of a chap-book life of Wallace and some sixpenny
parts of the 'Old Bailey Sessions Papers' by Gurney the shorthand
writer; and the choice depicts his character to a hair. You can
imagine how his new prospects brightened on a boy of this
disposition. To be the servant and companion of a fugitive, a
soldier, and a murderer, rolled in one--to live by stratagems,
disguises, and false names, in an atmosphere of midnight and
mystery so thick that you could cut it with a knife--was really, I
believe, more dear to him than his meals, though he was a great
trencherman, and something of a glutton besides. For myself, as
the peg by which all this romantic business hung, I was simply
idolised from that moment; and he would rather have sacrificed his
hand than surrendered the privilege of serving me.
We arranged the terms of our campaign, trudging amicably in the
snow, which now, with the approach of morning, began to fall to
purpose. I chose the name of Ramornie, I imagine from its likeness
to Romaine; Rowley, from an irresistible conversion of ideas, I
dubbed Gammon. His distress was laughable to witness: his own
choice of an unassuming nickname had been Claude Duval! We settled
our procedure at the various inns where we should alight, rehearsed
our little manners like a piece of drill until it seemed impossible
we should ever be taken unprepared; and in all these dispositions,
you maybe sure the despatch-box was not forgotten. Who was to pick
it up, who was to set it down, who was to remain beside it, who was
to sleep with it--there was no contingency omitted, all was gone
into with the thoroughness of a drill-sergeant on the one hand and
a child with a new plaything on the other.
'I say, wouldn't it look queer if you and me was to come to the
post-house with all this luggage?' said Rowley.
'I dare say,' I replied. 'But what else is to be done?'
'Well, now, sir--you hear me,' says Rowley. 'I think it would look
more natural-like if you was to come to the post-house alone, and
with nothing in your 'ands--more like a gentleman, you know. And
you might say that your servant and baggage was a-waiting for you
up the road. I think I could manage, somehow, to make a shift with
all them dratted things--leastways if you was to give me a 'and up
with them at the start.'
'And I would see you far enough before I allowed you to try, Mr.
Rowley!' I cried. 'Why, you would be quite defenceless! A footpad
that was an infant child could rob you. And I should probably come
driving by to find you in a ditch with your throat cut. But there
is something in your idea, for all that; and I propose we put it in
execution no farther forward than the next corner of a lane.'
Accordingly, instead of continuing to aim for Aylesbury, we headed
by cross-roads for some point to the northward of it, whither I
might assist Rowley with the baggage, and where I might leave him
to await my return in the post-chaise.
It was snowing to purpose, the country all white, and ourselves
walking snowdrifts, when the first glimmer of the morning showed us
an inn upon the highwayside. Some distance off, under the shelter
of a corner of the road and a clump of trees, I loaded Rowley with
the whole of our possessions, and watched him till he staggered in
safety into the doors of the Green Dragon, which was the sign of
the house. Thence I walked briskly into Aylesbury, rejoicing in my
freedom and the causeless good spirits that belong to a snowy
morning; though, to be sure, long before I had arrived the snow had
again ceased to fall, and the eaves of Aylesbury were smoking in
the level sun. There was an accumulation of gigs and chaises in
the yard, and a great bustle going forward in the coffee-room and
about the doors of the inn. At these evidences of so much travel
on the road I was seized with a misgiving lest it should be
impossible to get horses, and I should be detained in the
precarious neighbourhood of my cousin. Hungry as I was, I made my
way first of all to the postmaster, where he stood--a big,
athletic, horsey-looking man, blowing into a key in the corner of
the yard.
On my making my modest request, he awoke from his indifference into
what seemed passion.
'A po'-shay and 'osses!' he cried. 'Do I look as if I 'ad a po'-
shay and 'osses? Damn me, if I 'ave such a thing on the premises.
I don't MAKE 'osses and chaises--I 'IRE 'em. You might be God
Almighty!' said he; and instantly, as if he had observed me for the
first time, he broke off, and lowered his voice into the
confidential. 'Why, now that I see you are a gentleman,' said he,
'I'll tell you what! If you like to BUY, I have the article to fit
you. Second-'and shay by Lycett, of London. Latest style; good as
new. Superior fittin's, net on the roof, baggage platform, pistol
'olsters--the most com-plete and the most gen-teel turn-out I ever
see! The 'ole for seventy-five pound! It's as good as givin' her
away!'
'Do you propose I should trundle it myself, like a hawker's
barrow?' said I. 'Why, my good man, if I had to stop here, anyway,
I should prefer to buy a house and garden!'
'Come and look at her!' he cried; and, with the word, links his arm
in mine and carries me to the outhouse where the chaise was on
view.
It was just the sort of chaise that I had dreamed of for my
purpose: eminently rich, inconspicuous, and genteel; for, though I
thought the postmaster no great authority, I was bound to agree
with him so far. The body was painted a dark claret, and the
wheels an invisible green. The lamp and glasses were bright as
silver; and the whole equipage had an air of privacy and reserve
that seemed to repel inquiry and disarm suspicion. With a servant
like Rowley, and a chaise like this, I felt that I could go from
the Land's End to John o' Groat's House amid a population of bowing
ostlers. And I suppose I betrayed in my manner the degree in which
the bargain tempted me.
'Come,' cried the postmaster--'I'll make it seventy, to oblige a
friend!'
'The point is: the horses,' said I.
'Well,' said he, consulting his watch, 'it's now gone the 'alf
after eight. What time do you want her at the door?'
'Horses and all?' said I.
''Osses and all!' says he. 'One good turn deserves another. You
give me seventy pound for the shay, and I'll 'oss it for you. I
told you I didn't MAKE 'osses; but I CAN make 'em, to oblige a
friend.'
What would you have? It was not the wisest thing in the world to
buy a chaise within a dozen miles of my uncle's house; but in this
way I got my horses for the next stage. And by any other it
appeared that I should have to wait. Accordingly I paid the money
down--perhaps twenty pounds too much, though it was certainly a
well-made and well-appointed vehicle--ordered it round in half an
hour, and proceeded to refresh myself with breakfast.
The table to which I sat down occupied the recess of a bay-window,
and commanded a view of the front of the inn, where I continued to
be amused by the successive departures of travellers--the fussy and
the offhand, the niggardly and the lavish--all exhibiting their
different characters in that diagnostic moment of the farewell:
some escorted to the stirrup or the chaise door by the chamberlain,
the chambermaids and the waiters almost in a body, others moving
off under a cloud, without human countenance. In the course of
this I became interested in one for whom this ovation began to
assume the proportions of a triumph; not only the under-servants,
but the barmaid, the landlady, and my friend the postmaster
himself, crowding about the steps to speed his departure. I was
aware, at the same time, of a good deal of merriment, as though the
traveller were a man of a ready wit, and not too dignified to air
it in that society. I leaned forward with a lively curiosity; and
the next moment I had blotted myself behind the teapot. The
popular traveller had turned to wave a farewell; and behold! he was
no other than my cousin Alain. It was a change of the sharpest
from the angry, pallid man I had seen at Amersham Place. Ruddy to
a fault, illuminated with vintages, crowned with his curls like
Bacchus, he now stood before me for an instant, the perfect master
of himself, smiling with airs of conscious popularity and
insufferable condescension. He reminded me at once of a royal
duke, or an actor turned a little elderly, and of a blatant bagman
who should have been the illegitimate son of a gentleman. A moment
after he was gliding noiselessly on the road to London.
I breathed again. I recognised, with heartfelt gratitude, how
lucky I had been to go in by the stable-yard instead of the
hostelry door, and what a fine occasion of meeting my cousin I had
lost by the purchase of the claret-coloured chaise! The next
moment I remembered that there was a waiter present. No doubt but
he must have observed me when I crouched behind the breakfast
equipage; no doubt but he must have commented on this unusual and
undignified behaviour; and it was essential that I should do
something to remove the impression.
'Waiter!' said I, 'that was the nephew of Count Carwell that just
drove off, wasn't it?'
'Yes, sir: Viscount Carwell we calls him,' he replied.
'Ah, I thought as much,' said I. 'Well, well, damn all these
Frenchmen, say I!'
'You may say so indeed, sir,' said the waiter. 'They ain't not to
say in the same field with our 'ome-raised gentry.'
'Nasty tempers?' I suggested.
'Beas'ly temper, sir, the Viscount 'ave,' said the waiter with
feeling. 'Why, no longer agone than this morning, he was sitting
breakfasting and reading in his paper. I suppose, sir, he come on
some pilitical information, or it might be about 'orses, but he
raps his 'and upon the table sudden and calls for curacoa. It gave
me quite a turn, it did; he did it that sudden and 'ard. Now, sir,
that may be manners in France, but hall I can say is, that I'm not
used to it.'
'Reading the paper, was he?' said I. 'What paper, eh?'
'Here it is, sir,' exclaimed the waiter. 'Seems like as if he'd
dropped it.'
And picking it off the floor he presented it to me.
I may say that I was quite prepared, that I already knew what to
expect; but at sight of the cold print my heart stopped beating.
There it was: the fulfilment of Romaine's apprehension was before
me; the paper was laid open at the capture of Clausel. I felt as
if I could take a little curacoa myself, but on second thoughts
called for brandy. It was badly wanted; and suddenly I observed
the waiter's eye to sparkle, as it were, with some recognition;
made certain he had remarked the resemblance between me and Alain;
and became aware--as by a revelation--of the fool's part I had been
playing. For I had now managed to put my identification beyond a
doubt, if Alain should choose to make his inquiries at Aylesbury;
and, as if that were not enough, I had added, at an expense of
seventy pounds, a clue by which he might follow me through the
length and breadth of England, in the shape of the claret-coloured
chaise! That elegant equipage (which I began to regard as little
better than a claret-coloured ante-room to the hangman's cart)
coming presently to the door, I left my breakfast in the middle and
departed; posting to the north as diligently as my cousin Alain was
posting to the south, and putting my trust (such as it was) in an
opposite direction and equal speed.
