Redgauntlet: A Tale of the Eighteenth Century by Walter Scott (books for students to read .txt) 📖

are—and I am sure they agree with my inclination—to make no arrests, nay, to make no further inquiries of any kind, if this good assembly will consider their own interest so far as to give up their immediate purpose, and return quietly home to their own houses.’

‘What!—all?’ exclaimed Sir Richard Glendale—‘all, without exception?’

‘ALL, without one single exception’ said the general; ‘such are my orders. If you accept my terms, say so, and make haste; for things may happen to interfere with his Majesty’s kind purposes towards you all.’

‘Majesty’s kind purposes!’ said the Wanderer. ‘Do I hear you aright, sir?’

‘I speak the king’s very words, from his very lips,’ replied the general. ‘“I will,” said his Majesty, “deserve the confidence of my subjects by reposing my security in the fidelity of the millions who acknowledge my title—in the good sense and prudence of the few who continue, from the errors of education, to disown it.” His Majesty will not even believe that the most zealous Jacobites who yet remain can nourish a thought of exciting a civil war, which must be fatal to their families and themselves, besides spreading bloodshed and ruin through a peaceful land. He cannot even believe of his kinsman, that he would engage brave and generous though mistaken men, in an attempt which must ruin all who have escaped former calamities; and he is convinced, that, did curiosity or any other motive lead that person to visit this country, he would soon see it was his wisest course to return to the continent; and his Majesty compassionates his situation too much to offer any obstacle to his doing so.’

‘Is this real?’ said Redgauntlet. ‘Can you mean this? Am I—are all, are any of these gentlemen at liberty, without interruption, to embark in yonder brig, which, I see, is now again approaching the shore?’

‘You, sir—all—any of the gentlemen present,’ said the general,—‘all whom the vessel can contain, are at liberty to embark uninterrupted by me; but I advise none to go off who have not powerful reasons unconnected with the present meeting, for this will be remembered against no one.’

‘Then, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet, clasping his hands together as the words burst from him, ‘the cause is lost for ever!’

General Campbell turned away to the window, as if to avoid hearing what they said. Their consultation was but momentary; for the door of escape which thus opened was as unexpected as the exigence was threatening.

‘We have your word of honour for our protection,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, ‘if we dissolve our meeting in obedience to your summons?’

‘You have, Sir Richard,’ answered the general.

‘And I also have your promise,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘that I may go on board yonder vessel, with any friend whom I may choose to accompany me?’

Not only that, Mr. Ingoldsby—or I WILL call you Mr. Redgauntlet once more—you may stay in the offing for a tide, until you are joined by any person who may remain at Fairladies. After that, there will be a sloop of war on the station, and I need not say your condition will then become perilous.’

‘Perilous it should not be, General Campbell,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘or more perilous to others than to us, if others thought as I do even in this extremity.’

‘You forget yourself, my friend,’ said the unhappy Adventurer; you forget that the arrival of this gentleman only puts the cope-stone on our already adopted resolution to abandon our bull-fight or by whatever other wild name this headlong enterprise may be termed. I bid you farewell, unfriendly friends—I bid you farewell,’ (bowing to the general) ‘my friendly foe—I leave this strand as I landed upon it, alone and to return no more!’

‘Not alone,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘while there is blood in the veins of my father’s son.’

‘Not alone,’ said the other gentlemen present, stung with feelings which almost overpowered the better reasons under which they had acted. ‘We will not disown our principles, or see your person endangered.’

‘If it be only your purpose to see the gentleman to the beach,’ said General Campbell, ‘I will myself go with you. My presence among you, unarmed, and in your power, will be a pledge of my friendly intentions, and will overawe, should such be offered, any interruption on the part of officious persons.’

‘Be it so,’ said the Adventurer, with the air of a prince to a subject, not of one who complied with the request of an enemy too powerful to be resisted.

They left the apartment—they left the house—an unauthenticated and dubious, but appalling, sensation of terror had already spread itself among the inferior retainers, who had so short time before strutted, and bustled, and thronged the doorway and the passages. A report had arisen, of which the origin could not be traced, of troops advancing towards the spot in considerable numbers; and men who, for one reason or other, were most of them amenable to the arm of power, had either shrunk into stables or corners, or fled the place entirely. There was solitude on the landscape excepting the small party which now moved towards the rude pier, where a boat lay manned, agreeably to Redgauntlet’s orders previously given.

The last heir of the Stuarts leant on Redgauntlet’s arm as they walked towards the beach; for the ground was rough, and he no longer possessed the elasticity of limb and of spirit which had, twenty years before, carried him over many a Highland hill as light as one of their native deer. His adherents followed, looking on the ground, their feelings struggling against the dictates of their reason.

General Campbell accompanied them with an air of apparent ease and indifference, but watching, at the same time, and no doubt with some anxiety, the changing features of those who acted in this extraordinary scene.

Darsie and his sister naturally followed their uncle, whose violence they no longer feared, while his character attracted their respect, and Alan Fairford attended them from interest in their fate, unnoticed in a party where all were too much occupied with their own thoughts and feelings, as well as with the impending crisis, to attend to his presence.

Half-way betwixt the house and the beach, they saw the bodies of Nanty Ewart and Cristal Nixon blackening in the sun.

‘That was your informer?’ said Redgauntlet, looking back to General Campbell, who only nodded his assent.

‘Caitiff wretch!’ exclaimed Redgauntlet;—‘and yet the name were better bestowed on the fool who could be misled by thee.’

‘That sound broadsword cut,’ said the general, ‘has saved us the shame of rewarding a traitor.’

They arrived at the place of embarkation. The prince stood a moment with folded arms, and looked around him in deep silence. A paper was then slipped into his hands—he looked at it, and said, ‘I find the two friends I have left at Fairladies are apprised of my destination, and propose to embark from Bowness. I presume this will not be an infringement of the conditions under which you have acted?’

‘Certainly not,’ answered General Campbell; ‘they shall have all facility to join you.’