Dead Men Tell No Tales by E. W. Hornung (ebook reader for comics TXT) 📕
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- Author: E. W. Hornung
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I know now that the battle in the hall was a very brief affair; while it lasted I had no sense of time; minutes or moments, they were (God forgive me!) some of the very happiest in all my life. My joy was as profound as it was also selfish and incongruous. The villains were being routed; of that there could be no doubt or question. I hoped Rattray might escape, but for the others no pity stirred in my heart, and even my sneaking sympathy with the squire could take nothing from the joy that was in my heart. Eva Denison was free. I was free. Our oppressors would trouble us no more. We were both lonely; we were both young; we had suffered together and for each other. And here she lay in my arms, her head upon my shoulder, her soft bosom heaving on my own! My blood ran hot and cold by turns. I forgot everything but our freedom and my love. I forgot my sufferings, as I would have you all forget them. I am not to be pitied. I have been in heaven on earth. I was there that night, in my great bodily weakness, and in the midst of blood-shed, death, and crime.
“They have stopped!” cried Eva suddenly. “It is over! Oh, if he is dead!”
And she sat upright, with bright eyes starting from a deathly face. I do not think she knew that she had been in my arms at all: any more than I knew that the firing had ceased before she told me. Excited voices were still raised overhead; but some sounded distant, yet more distinct, coming through the grating from the garden; and none were voices that we knew. One poor wretch, on the other hand, we heard plainly groaning to his death; and we looked in each other's eyes with the same thought.
“That's Harris,” said I, with, I fear, but little compassion in my tone or in my heart just then.
“Where are the others?” cried Eva piteously.
“God knows,” said I; “they may be done for, too.”
“If they are!”
“It's better than the death they would have lived to die.”
“But only one of them was a wilful murderer! Oh, Mr. Cole—Mr. Cole—go and see what has happened; come back and tell me! I dare not come. I will stay here and pray for strength to bear whatever news you may bring me. Go quickly. I will—wait—and pray!”
So I left the poor child on her knees in that vile cellar, white face and straining hands uplifted to the foul ceiling, sweet lips quivering with prayer, eyelids reverently lowered, and the swift tears flowing from beneath them, all in the yellow light of the lantern that stood burning by her side. How different a picture from that which awaited me overhead!
CHAPTER XIX. MY GREAT HOUR
The library doors were shut, and I closed the secret one behind me before opening the other and peering out through a wrack of bluish smoke; and there lay Captain Harris, sure enough, breathing his last in the arms of one constable, while another was seated on the table with a very wry face, twisting a tourniquet round his arm, from which the blood was dripping like raindrops from the eaves. A third officer stood in the porch, issuing directions to his men without.
“He's over the wall, I tell you! I saw him run up our ladder. After him every man of you—and spread!”
I looked in vain for Rattray and the rest; yet it seemed as if only one of them had escaped. I was still looking when the man in the porch wheeled back into the hall, and instantly caught sight of me at my door.
“Hillo! here's another of them,” cried he. “Out you come, young fellow! Your mates are all dead men.”
“They're not my mates.”
“Never mind; come you out and let's have a look at you.”
I did so, and was confronted by a short, thickset man, who recognized me with a smile, but whom I failed to recognize.
“I might have guessed it was Mr. Cole,” said he. “I knew you were here somewhere, but I couldn't make head or tail of you through the smoke.”
“I'm surprised that you can make head or tail of me at all,” said I.
“Then you've quite forgotten the inquisitive parson you met out fishing? You see I found out your name for myself!”
“So it was a detective!”
“It was and is,” said the little man, nodding. “Detective or Inspector Royds, if you're any the wiser.
“What has happened? Who has escaped?” “Your friend Rattray; but he won't get far.”
“What of the Portuguese and the nigger?”
I forgot that I had crippled Jose, but remembered with my words, and wondered the more where he was.
“I'll show you,” said Royds. “It was the nigger let us in. We heard him groaning round at the back—who smashed his leg? One of our men was at that cellar grating; there was some of them down there; we wanted to find our way down and corner them, but the fat got in the fire too soon. Can you stand something strong? Then come this way.”
He led me out into the garden, and to a tangled heap lying in the moonlight, on the edge of the long grass. The slave had fallen on top of his master; one leg lay swathed and twisted; one black hand had but partially relaxed upon the haft of a knife (the knife) that stood up hilt-deep in a blacker heart. And in the hand of Santos was still the revolver (my Deane and Adams) which had sent its last ball through the nigger's body.
“They slipped out behind us, all but the one inside,” said Royds, ruefully; “I'm hanged if I know yet how it happened—but we were on them next second. Before that the nigger had made us hide him in the grass, but the old devil ran straight into him, and the one fired as the other struck. It's the worst bit of luck in the whole business, and I'm rather disappointed on the whole. I've been nursing the job all this week; had my last look round this very evening, with one of these officers, and only rode back for more to make sure of taking our gentlemen alive. And we've lost three out of four of 'em, and have still to lay hands on the
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