Part 24 (1/2)
”You have confessed,” he said. Then to the others: ”This fellow is one of Malbrouck's pack. He has been nosing in the Scotch westlands. Here are the numbers of Kenmure and Nithsdale to enable the great Duke to make up his halting mind. See, he has been with Roxburghe too.... We have a spy before us, gentlemen, delivered to our hands by a happy incident. Whig among the sectaries and with Stair and Roxburghe, and Jacobite among our poor honest folk, and wheedling the secrets out of both sides to sell to one who disposes of them at a profit in higher quarters. Faug! I know the vermin. An honest Whig like John Argyll I can respect and fight, but for such rats as this--What shall we do with it now that we have trapped it?”
”Let it go,” said the boy, Nick Wogan. ”The land crawls with them and we cannot go rat-hunting when we are aiming at a throne.” He picked up Lovel's ring and spun it on a finger tip. ”The gentleman has found more than news in the north. He has acquired a solid lump of gold.”
The implication roused Mr. Lovel out of his embarra.s.sment. ”I wear the ring by right. I had it from my father.” His voice was tearful with offended pride
”The creature claims gentility,” said Talbot, as he examined the trinket.
”Lovel you call yourself. But Lovel bears barry nebuly or chevronels.
This coat has three plain charges. Can you read them, Nick, for my eyes are weak! I am curious to know from whom he stole it.”
The boy scanned it closely. ”Three of something I think they are fleur-de-lys, which would spell Montgomery. Or lions' heads, maybe, for Buchan?”
He pa.s.sed it to Lord Charles, who held it to a candle's light. ”Nay, I think they are c.u.mmin garbs. Some poor fellow dirked and spoiled.”
Mr. Lovel was outraged and forgot his fears. He forgot, indeed, most things which he should have remembered. He longed only to establish his gentility in the eyes of those three proud gentlemen. The liquor was ebbing in him and with it had flown all his complacence. He felt small and mean and despised, and the talents he had been pluming himself on an hour before had now shrunk to windlestraws.
”I do a.s.sure you, sirs,” he faltered, ”the ring is mine own. I had it from my father, who had it from his. I am of an ancient house, though somewhat decayed.”
His eyes sought those of his inquisitors with the pathos of a dog.
But he saw only hostile faces--Talbot's grave and grim, Lord Charles'
contemptuous, the boy's smiling ironically.
”Decayed, indeed,” said the dark man, ”pitifully decayed. If you be gentle the more shame on you.”
Mr. Lovel was almost whining. ”I swear I am honest. I do my master's commissions and report what I learn.”
”Aye, sir, but how do you learn it? By playing the imposter and winning your way into an unsuspecting confidence. To you friends.h.i.+p is a tool and honour a convenience. You cheat in every breath you draw. And what a man gives you in his innocence may bring him to the gallows. By G.o.d! I'd rather slit throats on a highway for a purse or two than cozen men to their death by such arts as yours.”
In other circ.u.mstances Mr. Lovel might have put up a brazen defence, but now he seemed to have lost a.s.surance. ”I do no ill,” was all he could stammer, ”for I have no bias. I am for no side in politics.”
”So much the worse. A man who spies for a cause in which he believes may redeem by that faith a dirty trade. But in cold blood you practise infamy.”
The night was growing wilder, and even in that sheltered room its echoes were felt. Wind shook the curtains and blew gusts of ashes from the fire. The place had become bleak and tragic and Mr. Lovel felt the forlornness in his bones. Something had woke in him which s.h.i.+vered the fabric of a lifetime. The three faces, worn, anxious, yet of a n.o.ble hardihood, stirred in him a strange emotion. Hopes and dreams, long forgotten, flitted like spectres across his memory. He had something to say, something which demanded utterance, and his voice grew bold.
”What do you know of my straits?” he cried. ”Men of fortune like you! My race is old, but I never had the benefit of it. I was bred in a garret and have all my days been on nodding terms with starvation.... What should I know about your parties? What should I care for Whig and Tory or what king has his hinderend on the throne? Tell me in G.o.d's name how should such as I learn loyalty except to the man who gives me gold to buy food and shelter? Heaven knows I have never betrayed a master while I served him.”
The shabby man with the lean face had secured an advantage. For a moment the pa.s.sion in his voice dominated the room.
”Cursed if this does not sound like truth,” said the boy, and his eyes were almost friendly.
But Talbot did not relax.
”By your own confession you are outside the pale of gentility. I do not trouble to blame you, but I take leave to despise you. By your grace, sir, we will dispense with your company.”
The ice of his scorn did not chill the strange emotion which seemed to have entered the air. The scarecrow by the fire had won a kind of dignity.
”I am going,” he said. ”Will you have the goodness to send for my horse?... If you care to know, gentleman, you have cut short a promising career.... To much of what you say I submit. You have spoken truth--not all the truth, but sufficient to unman me. I am a rogue by your reckoning, for I think only of my wages. Pray tell me what moves you to ride out on what at the best is a desperate venture?”