The Pilot (32 page)

A short conference took place between he two officers, apart from the
men, at the close of which, as they rejoined the party, Manual might be
heard urging his plans on the reluctant ears of Griffith in the
following words:

"I could carry the old dungeon without waking one of the snorers; and
consider, sir, we might get a stock of as rich cordial from its cellars
as ever oiled the throat of a gentleman!"

"'Tis idle, 'tis idle," said Griffith impatiently; "we are not robbers
of hen-roosts, nor wine-gaugers, to be prying into the vaults of the
English gentry, Captain Manual; but honorable men, employed in the
sacred cause of liberty and our country. Lead your party into the ruin,
and let them seek their rest; we may have work for them with the dawn."

"Evil was the hour when I quitted the line of the army, to place a
soldier under the orders of an awkward squad of tarry jackets!" muttered
Manual, as he proceeded to execute an order that was delivered with an
air of authority that he knew must be obeyed. "As pretty an opportunity
for a surprise and a forage thrown away, as ever crossed the path of a
partisan! but, by all the rights of man! I'll have an encampment in some
order. Here, you sergeant, detail a corporal and three men for a picket,
and station them ii the skirts of this wood. We shall have a sentinel in
advance of our position, and things shall be conducted with some air of
discipline."

Griffith heard this order with great inward disgust; but as he
anticipated the return of the Pilot before the light could arrive to
render his weak exposure of their situation apparent, he forbore
exercising his power to alter the arrangement. Manual had, therefore,
the satisfaction of seeing his little party quartered, as he thought, in
military manner, before he retired with Griffith and his men into one of
the vaulted apartments of the ruin, which, by its open and broken doors,
invited their entrance. Here the marines disposed themselves to rest,
while the two officers succeeded in passing the tedious hours, without
losing their characters for watchfulness by conversing with each other,
or, at whiles, suffering their thoughts to roam in the very different
fields which fancy would exhibit to men of such differing characters. In
this manner hour after hour passed, in listless quiet or sullen
expectation, until the day had gradually advanced, and it became
dangerous to keep the sentinels and picket in a situation where they
were liable to be seen by any straggler who might be passing near the
wood. Manual remonstrated against any alteration, as being entirely
unmilitary, for he was apt to carry his notions of tactics to extremes
whenever he came in collision with a sea officer: but in this instance
his superior was firm, and the only concession the captain could obtain
was the permission to place a solitary sentinel within a few feet of the
vault, though under the cover of the crumbling walls of the building
itself. With this slight deviation in their arrangements, the uneasy
party remained for several hours longer, impatiently awaiting the period
when they should be required to move.

The guns first fired from the Alacrity had been distinctly audible and
were pronounced by Griffith, whose practised ear detected the metal of
the piece that was used, as not proceeding from the schooner. When the
rapid though distant rumbling of the spirited cannonade became audible,
it was with difficulty that Griffith could restrain either his own
feelings or the conduct of his companions within those bounds that
prudence and their situation required. The last gun was, however, fired,
and not a man had left the vault, and conjectures as to the result of
the fight succeeded to those which had been made on the character of the
combatants during the action. Some of the marines would raise their
heads from the fragments which served them as the pillows on which they
were seeking disturbed and stolen slumbers, and after listening to the
cannon would again compose themselves to sleep, like men who felt no
concern in a contest in which they did not participate. Others, more
alive to events and less drowsy, lavishly expended their rude jokes on
those who were engaged in the struggle, or listened with a curious
interest to mark the progress of the battle, by the uncertain index of
its noise. When the fight had been some time concluded, Manual indulged
his ill-humor more at length:

"There has been a party of pleasure within a league of us, Mr.
Griffith," he said, "at which, but for our present subterraneous
quarters, we might have been guests, and thus laid some claim to the
honor of sharing in the victory. But it is not too late to push the
party on as far as the cliffs, where we shall be in sight of the
vessels, and we may possibly establish a claim to our share of the
prize-money."

"There is but little wealth to be gleaned from the capture of a king's
cutter," returned Griffith; "and there would be less honor were
Barnstable encumbered with our additional and useless numbers."

"Useless!" repeated Manual; "there is much good service to be got out of
twenty-three well-drilled and well-chosen marines: look at those
fellows, Mr. Griffith, and then tell me if you think them an encumbrance
in the hour of need."

Griffith smiled, and glanced his eye over the sleeping group,—for when
the firing had ceased the whole party had again sought their repose,—
and he could not help admiring the athletic and sinewy limbs that lay
scattered around the gloomy vault, in every posture that ease or whim
dictated. From the stout frames of the men, his glance was directed to
the stack of firearms, from whose glittering tubes and polished bayonets
strong rays of light were reflected, even in that dark apartment. Manual
followed the direction of his eyes, and watched the expression of his
countenance with inward exultation; but he had the forbearance to await
his reply before he manifested his feeling more openly.

"I know them to be true men," said Griffith, "when needed, but—hark!
what says he?"

"Who goes there? what noise is that?" repeated the sentinel who was
placed at the entrance of the vault.

Manual and Griffith sprang at the same instant from their places of
rest, and stood, unwilling to create the slightest sounds, listening
with the most intense anxiety to catch the next indications of the cause
of their guardian's alarm. A short stillness, like that of death,
succeeded, during which Griffith whispered:

"'Tis the Pilot! his hour has been long passed."

The words were hardly spoken, when the clashing of steel in fierce and
sudden contact was heard, and at the next instant the body of the
sentinel fell heavily along the stone steps that led to the open air,
and rolled lifelessly to their feet, with the bayonet that had caused
his death projecting from a deep wound in his breast.

"Away, away! sleepers away!" shouted Griffith.

"To arms!" cried Manual in a voice of thunder.

The alarmed marines, suddenly aroused from their slumbers at these
thrilling cries, sprang on their feet in a confused cluster, and at that
fatal moment a body of living fire darted into the vault, which re-
echoed with the reports of twenty muskets. The uproar, the smoke, and
the groans which escaped from many of his party, could not restrain
Griffith another instant: his pistol was fired through the cloud which
concealed the entrance of the vault, and he followed the leaden
messenger, trailing a half-pike, and shouting to his men:

"Come on! follow, my lads; they are nothing but soldiers."

Even while he spoke, the ardent young seaman was rushing up the narrow
passage; but as he gained the open space, his foot struck the writhing
body of the victim of his shot, and he was precipitated headlong into a
group of armed men.

"Fire! Manual, fire!" shouted the infuriated prisoner; "fire, while you
have them in a cluster."

"Ay, fire, Mr. Manual," said Borroughcliffe, with great coolness, "and
shoot your own officer: hold him up, boys! hold him up in front; the
safest place is nighest to him."

"Fire!" repeated Griffith, making desperate efforts to release himself
from the grasp of five or six men; "fire, and disregard me."

"If he do, he deserves to be hung," said Borroughcliffe; "such fine
fellows are not sufficiently plenty to be shot at like wild beasts in
chains. Take him from before the mouth of the vault, boys, and spread
yourselves to your duty."

At the time Griffith issued from the cover, Manual was mechanically
employed in placing his men in order; and the marines, accustomed to do
everything in concert and array, lost the moment to advance. The
soldiers of Borroughcliffe reloaded their muskets, and fell back behind
different portions of the wall, where they could command the entrance to
the vault with their fire, without much exposure to themselves. This
disposition was very coolly reconnoitered by Manual in person, through
some of the crevices in the wall, and he hesitated to advance against
the force he beheld while so advantageously posted. In this situation
several shots were fired by either party, without effect, until
Borroughcliffe, perceiving the inefficacy of that mode of attack,
summoned the garrison of the vault to a parley.

"Surrender to the forces of his majesty, King George the Third," he
cried, "and I promise you quarter."

"Will you release your prisoner, and give us free passage to our
vessels?" asked Manual; "the garrison to march out with all the honors
of war, and officers to retain their side-arms?"

"Inadmissible," returned Borroughcliffe, with great gravity; "the honor
of his majesty's arms, and the welfare of the realm, forbid such a
treaty: but I offer you safe quarters and honorable treatment."

"Officers to retain their side-arms, your prisoner to be released, and
the whole party to return to America, on parole, not to serve until
exchanged?"

"Not granted," said Borroughcliffe. "The most that I can yield is a good
potation of the generous south-side; and if you are the man I take you
for, you will know how to prize such an offer."

"In what capacity do you summon us to yield? as men entitled to the
benefit of the laws of arms, or as rebels to your king?"

"Ye are rebels all, gentlemen," returned the deliberate Borroughcliffe,
"and as such ye must yield; though so far as good treatment and good
fare goes, you are sure of it while in my power; in all other respects
you lie at the mercy of his most gracious majesty."

"Then let his majesty show his gracious face, and come and take us, for
I'll be—"

The asseveration of the marine was interrupted by Griffith, whose blood
had sensibly cooled, and whose generous feelings were awakened in behalf
of his comrades, now that his own fate seemed decided.

"Hold, Manual," he cried, "make no rash oaths: Captain Borroughcliffe, I
am Edward Griffith, a lieutenant in the navy of the United American
States, and I pledge you my honor to a parole—"

"Release him," said Borroughcliffe.

Griffith advanced between the two parties, and spoke so as to be heard
by both:

I propose to descend to the vault, and ascertain the loss and present
strength of Captain Manual's party: if the latter be not greater than I
apprehend, I shall advise him to a surrender on the usual conditions of
civilized nations."

"Go," said the soldier; "but stay; is he a half-and-half—an
amphibious—pshaw! I mean a marine?"

"He is, sir, a captain in that corps—"

"The very man," interrupted Borroughcliffe; "I thought I recollected the
liquid sounds of his voice. It will be well to speak to him of the good
fare of St. Ruth; and you may add, that I know my man: I shall besiege,
instead of storming him, with the certainty of a surrender when his
canteen is empty. The vault he is in holds no such beverage as the
cellars of the Abbey."

Griffith smiled, in spite of the occasion and his vexation; and making a
slight inclination of his head he passed into the vault, giving notice
to his friends, by his voice, in order to apprise them who approached.

He found six of the marines, including the sentinel, lying dead on the
ragged pavement, and four others wounded, but stifling their groans, by
the order of their commander, that they might not inform the enemy of
his weakness. With the remainder of his command Manual had entrenched
himself behind the fragment of a wall that intersected the vault, and,
regardless of the dismaying objects before him, maintained as bold a
front, and as momentous an air, as if the fate of a walled town depended
on his resolution and ingenuity.

"You see, Mr. Griffith," he cried, when the young sailor approached this
gloomy but really formidable arrangement, "that nothing short of
artillery can dislodge me: as for that drinking Englishman above, let
him send down his men by platoons of eight or ten, and I'll pile them up
on those steps, four and five deep."

"But artillery can and will be brought, if it should be necessary," said
Griffith; "and there is not the least chance of your eventual escape: it
may be possible for you to destroy a few of the enemy, but you are too
humane to wish to do it unnecessarily."

"No doubt," returned Manual with a grim smile; "and yet methinks I could
find present pleasure in shooting seven of them—yes, just seven, which
is one more than they have struck off my roster."

"Remember your own wounded," added Griffith; "they suffer for want of
aid, while you protract a useless defence."

A few smothered groans from the sufferers seconded this appeal, and
Manual yielded, though with a very ill grace, to the necessity of the
case.

"Go, then, and tell him that we will surrender as prisoners of war," he
said, "on the conditions that he grants me my side-arms, and that
suitable care shall be taken of the sick—be particular to call them
sick—for some lucky accident may yet occur before the compact is
ratified, and I would not have him learn our loss."