The Accidental Highwayman (32 page)

It was Magda the witch. She was dressed now (beside her rags) in a flowered shawl of the type fashionable during the reign of James II. From beneath her skirts peeked out a familiar friend: Demon the French bulldog. When he saw me, he let out a catcall of delight and sprang against the barrier between us, hopping on his hind legs. I confess tears pricked my eyes when I saw that stout little fellow. Magda gathered him into her lap, whence Demon stared at me for the rest of the interview in the same manner he did when it was time to go for a walk in the countryside.

Magda's stone eye regarded me as intently as the living one. I confess I was happy to see her, although she was in some fashion the author of all my miseries. I imagined her to be what old aunts were like.

“Magda,” said I, and it being the first word I'd spoken in a week, it came out as a rasp, like filing a nutmeg.

“Nowt escapes yer keen eye, boyo,” she muttered. “List! I ain't got time for the chatterin' nor idle talk—and nor does 'ee, for thou art hangin' soon. The darter of me heart, my Princess, she's near to be wed, and not a Faerie but 'as ther courage nor stop the nupterls, for the king is punishin' one and all for the uprisin'. With tharn dear girlie carptured, the rebellion's afeared ter act. Elgeron's bedoubled the punishments and set that narsty bit o' work the Arn-Eyed Duchess uparn the land. Nobbut the wind dast oppose 'er. So it's up ter 'ee to stop it.”

“The Duchess?” I cried, and coughed like a consumptive. “She's working with King Elgeron? Last I saw, their monsters were at war with one another.”

“Yar,” said Magda. “'T'were the Duchess got to Princess first, and made a bargain wi' King to get 'er soul back in return for tharn poor girlie.”

“A ransom. Do you know how we were found out?”

“Two ways, two ways. King's spies was everwhere. They o'erheard tha old madman of yourn tellin' the story of yer journey 'pon the stage. But Duchess, she
already
knowed. She reached through and snartched tharn toroise comb orff table, took it through yon lookin' glarss, and passed it back. Then it were a sigilantum, and ever nor then, she allus knew exactly where you was.”

“So when we thought Lily had merely misplaced the comb, it was … on the other side for a few minutes? Pulled through by the Duchess?”

“If only tha had thourght a wee bit harder!”

I was eager to change the subject away from my ignorance. “And how fares Morgana? The Princess, that is?”

“Miserble,” Magda said. “If ye 'ad any sense, ye'd stop of the weddin' and arsk her how she be yersel'.”

I felt it was time to explain my circumstances.

“As perhaps you know, but cannot see, your sight being limited, I am not at liberty, but barnacled with irons on legs and wrists and confined upon a prison barge, and have an appointment to be hanged tomorrow at Tyburn. So with such sorrow and regret as I cannot express, I am unable to be of help.”

“But ain't you learned of nothing?” the witch protested. “Give you my tooth, did not I? You've all yer needs to be free of this place, but tha' carnventional human mind nor yourn thinks arnly on what you see, not on what be possible, nor what 'ee might
wish
.”

I shook my head. “Even if I did escape, dear Magda, then what? I am a ragged pauper again; I have no means of anything, not even survival. How should I effect a rescue of the Princess? And all your little rebel feyín, I presume, have been captured and turned into moths for their troubles. Allow me to go to my fate, and Morgana to hers, and there's a sad end to the business.”

The witch leaned close to me. Demon stretched his bull's neck to get close, too. We had already been whispering, as there was a guard standing at the door; in my condition I couldn't raise my voice if I tried. But now she pitched her voice so low it was more like a feeling than a sound. Which it may have been. She could have been projecting her voice into my very mind.

“Boyo,” said she. “Narn. Ye knows not the upshot of the capturin' of the Princess. Knows ye the goblings came on their griffs, and with 'em the mantigarns and pixies alike, and fell right among your manling folk. Well, it's one thing for common Faerie ter break the Eldritch Laws. It's anarn for the King to do it, nor that's his privilege. 'Is servants erased all the manling membries and replaced 'em with membries of a fire, norstead.

“But when King done this thing,” she continued, “the Faeries what dwells here in your world, they stopped workin'. They ain't spilin' milk nor poxin' cows, they ain't turnin' leaves brown nor makin' flowern bloom. They refuses to work! The revorlution has begun.”

“That's all very good, but I'm still hanging. Also, I threw away your tooth.”

“Narn!” she fairly shouted. “It's in yer pocket. Stupid boyo. Guards!”

So saying, she demanded to be given release from that pestilent place. I didn't bother to remind her that my present costume was not furnished with a single pocket.

“Spare not the rope nor this one, lads,” said Magda, on her way to the door. “He'll dance a pretty hornpipe on a sunbeam!” The guards escorted her away. Demon whimpered and struggled in her sticklike arms, endeavoring to get back to me. I heard him yowling all the way down the hall beyond my cell. Then the soldiers came for me.

“She your sweetheart?” one of the men asked me, and winked. I had no idea what he meant by that until I saw there was a delicate paper rose in my hand. How it came there I did not know. I'd seen one like it somewhere before.

*   *   *

As they left me to rot away my last hours in the prison ship, I was still trying to recall where I'd seen such a flower. Then I remembered: There had been one in my master's pocket the night he died.

All of a moment, I understood that the plan between Magda and my master had extended well beyond kidnapping Morgana from the enchanted coach. It included provisions for his capture. But what could a paper rose and an old hag's tooth do to spring me from this stinking oubliette, or loose my neck from the rope?

[   
The Paper Rose
   ]

 

Chapter 33

BEING AN ACCOUNT OF MY LAST HOURS

T
HE OTHER
prisoners, those who still had some of their wits, thought I had lost mine. There was a gun-port near my head, through which trickled a modicum of fresh air. A shutter was bolted over it at a slight angle to admit vapors, but not a human form, not even one of the emaciated creatures about me. I spent all of the afternoon of my final day with one arm squeezed through the gap in the shutter, holding the paper flower aloft. Every few minutes, I would retract my arm and inspect the flower, then thrust it back outside the hull again.

After several hours of this, my arm numb with squeezing it through the gap and raw where the splintered wood of the port chafed at it, I withdrew the flower and found upon it the object of my intentions: a single bee.

I knew not if it was the correct kind of bee, but I had no other, so I repeated my message to the little creature thrice, and apologized for the subterfuge of a paper flower, which could be of no profit to the insect. I released the bee through the port, and after it I dropped the paper flower, to drift away on the river. This accomplished, and ignoring my gaol-mates' catcalls, I settled myself to wait.

For a long while, my thoughts revolved around the absurdity of my situation. I'd been servant to a good-natured fellow who turned out to be, as well, a notorious criminal. I had impersonated him, and been mistaken for him, and been given his strange quest to complete. So doing, I became a criminal myself, in two worlds.

Was I, therefore, a criminal? I'd done much wrong upon my journey, but for the right reasons. The law didn't care about anything except the word of Captain Sterne. He thought me guilty and a peckish judge did not wish to waste time in cross-examinations. I was guilty. But I felt no guilt, only sorrow. These reflections went nowhere, but only around in circles. One conclusion I was able to draw: Whatever anyone thought, I was
not
a highwayman, unless by accident.

Then Mr. Ratskalp came with his guards, and I was unlocked and taken up onto the dark top-deck. There, by lantern light, I was mopped once more, and lowered into the boat.

An hour later, I had been transferred to a small, clean cell in a building, I know not where; it was so great an improvement over the prison hulk, which would have broken Jonah's faith, that my spirits lifted a little. Hope was extinguished in my bosom, yet there was something of peace to be had thereby. A man who thinks there is a future must, perforce, be concerned for the future. I had none, and so had nothing to concern me. I'd paid already for my foolishness, and tomorrow I would pay for another's, and there would be an end to me and my broken heart. I lay upon a bench and gazed into the shadows thrown by the sputtering tallow, and thought of little enough, unless it was a single dimple set beside a smiling mouth.

A knock sounded upon the door. “It's open,” said I, and resumed my reverie.

There was a turning of locks and loosing of chains that went on for a good minute, and then Captain Sterne entered the little room, smiling indulgently. There was a large parcel wrapped in muslin and string tucked under his arm.

“Ah, Jack,” said he, “well met. Soon you shall be dead, and my little list of names will all be crossed off, and I shall be promoted for my work to clear the roads. Then you'll be a footnote to my entry in the history books.”

“I congratulate you on your success,” said I. “Now, pray leave me. I'm preoccupied with other matters.”

“Other matters?” said Sterne, looking about him in the bare, empty chamber. “If you don't wish to have one last civilized conversation before you meet your maker, whom I daresay is impatient to mark the occasion with a flaming trident, then so be it. But it occurred to me you might wish to know how you were apprehended.”

“Not particularly,” said I.

Captain Sterne looked well infuriated by this, and so, after he'd sputtered a while and adjusted his periwig to a more martial attitude, he said, “Perhaps you'll not be so flippant when you learn it was none other than your ex-sweetheart?”

Well, as I hadn't an ex-sweetheart, my curiosity was roused. “Who?” I inquired.

“The Duchess of Redsea. She sent me a letter detailing the precise time and location I should find you, correct in every detail. It's a miracle it found me, for I was bent upon your trail in the depths of the countryside. She expressed an interest in meeting me, in fact. I appear to be her sort of man.”

That dreadful Duchess, thought I. It made perfect sense. She could have destroyed me at the time of Morgana's capture, but like the ogre who stole her soul and set her free, the Duchess knew there was no sweeter revenge than to have your vanquished foe survive long enough to drain the bitter cup of defeat down to the dregs.

For a moment I was all in a fury at the cruelty of her. Then it passed, for there was nothing to be done about it, and I was still a practical fellow by nature. Captain Sterne had been watching my face closely, but I think he saw none of the despair he'd hoped for, for his smile of anticipation melted into a frown.

“I see you are not contrite. Truly I have never seen a more hardened criminal than you. Be that as it may, you're in no condition to hang. Make yourself presentable, for I wish my
own
lady to see you at your best.”

With this, he dropped the parcel upon the floor. “There will be washing-water brought up. Then you will, unless you've grown fond of your present stinking rags, change into the fresh attire I have brought. The public will be well pleased with the effect, and I know that the style is much to your taste. Anon.”

With that, he smote his boot-heels together and left the room. A servant entered with a basin of hot water, a flannel, and a shilling's worth of good soap. It took me five basins and most of the soap to get passably clean and free of infestation by biting insects; if only old Fred had been there, he could have picked off every one of the little murderers in ten minutes. By the end of these ablutions my skin stung fiercely, but it felt delightful. Then, with my fetid rags carried away in the flannel by the servant, I was left alone, dressed as the Lord had made me.

I opened the parcel, and within discovered the extent of Captain Sterne's sense of humor. For he had provided me with an excellent replica of Whistling Jack's costume, from the tall red-trimmed boots to the black redingote and cocked hat. He had even provided the mask to go about my eyes, should I wish to meet my death incognito. But he did not furnish me with pistols or sword. Although the barb of his mockery struck home, yet I donned the clothes, for truly had I none other. The pockets were all empty, of course, but for a few copper pennies, and I hardly know why I searched them—until the discovery, in the tail-pocket of the black redingote, of a slender object with which I was now well familiar, for it somehow never left me: Magda's tooth.