The Tavern Knight Part 10

With a report that rang through the room like a pistol shot, it broke off in its socket. Both men caught their breath, and stood for a second crouching, with straining ears. The sentry had stopped at their door.

Galliard was a man of quick action, swift to think, and as swift to execute the thought. To thrust Kenneth into a corner, to extinguish the light, and to fling himself upon the bed was all the work of an instant.

The key grated in the lock, and Crispin answered it with a resounding snore. The door opened, and on the threshold stood the Roundhead trooper, holding aloft a lanthorn whose rays were flashed back by his polished cuira.s.s. He beheld Crispin on the bed with closed eyes and open mouth, and he heard his rea.s.suring and melodious snore. He saw Kenneth seated peacefully upon the floor, with his back against the wall, and for a moment he was puzzled.

"Heard you aught?" he asked.

"Aye," answered Kenneth, in a strangled voice, "I heard something like a shot out there."

The gesture with which he accompanied the words was fatal. Instinctively he had jerked his thumb towards the window, thereby drawing the soldier's eyes in that direction. The fellow's glance fell upon the twisted bar, and a sharp exclamation of surprise escaped him.

Had he been aught but a fool he must have guessed at once how it came so, and having guessed it, he must have thought twice ere he ventured within reach of a man who could so handle iron. But he was a slow-reasoning clod, and so far, thought had not yet taken the place of surprise. He stepped into, the chamber and across to the window, that he might more closely view that broken bar.

With eyes that were full of terror and despair, Kenneth watched him; their last hope had failed them. Then, as he looked, it seemed to him that in one great leap from his rec.u.mbent position on the bed, Crispin had fallen upon the soldier.

The lanthorn was dashed from the fellow's hand, and rolled to Kenneth's feet. The fellow had begun' a cry, which broke off suddenly into a gurgle as Galliard's fingers closed about his windpipe. He was a big fellow, and in his mad struggles he carried: Crispin hither and thither about the room. Together: they hurtled against the table, which would have: gone cras.h.i.+ng over had not Kenneth caught it and drawn it softly to the wall.

Both men were now upon the bed. Crispin had guessed the soldier's intent to fling himself upon the ground so that the ring of his armour might be heard, and perchance bring others to his aid. To avoid this, Galliard had swung him towards the bed, and hurled him on to it. There he pinned him with his knee, and with his fingers he gripped the Roundhead's throat, pressing the apple inwards with his thumb.

"The door, Kenneth!" he commanded, in a whisper. "Close the door!"

Vain were the trooper's struggles to free himself from that throttling grip. Already his efforts grew his face was purple; his veins stood out in ropes upon his brow till they seemed upon the point of bursting; his eyes protruded like a lobster's and there was a horrible grin upon his mouth; still his heels beat the bed, and still he struggled. With his fingers he plucked madly at the throttling hands on his neck, and tore at them with his nails until the blood streamed from them. Still Galliard held him firmly, and with a smile--a diabolical smile it seemed to the poor, half-strangled wretch--he gazed upon his choking victim.

"Someone comes!" gasped Kenneth suddenly. "Someone comes, Sir Crispin!"

he repeated, shaking his hands in a frenzy.

Galliard listened. Steps were approaching. The soldier heard them also, and renewed his efforts. Then Crispin spoke.

"Why stand you there like a fool?" he growled. "Quench the light--stay, we may want it! Cast your cloak over it! Quick, man, quick!"

The steps came nearer. The lad had obeyed him, and they were in darkness.

"Stand by the door," whispered Crispin. "Fall upon him as he enters, and see that no cry escapes him. Take him by the throat, and as you love your life, do not let him get away."

The footsteps halted. Kenneth crawled softly to his post. The soldier's struggles grew of a sudden still, and Crispin released his throat at last. Then calmly drawing the fellow's dagger, he felt for the straps of his cuira.s.s, and these he proceeded to cut. As he did so the door was opened.

By the light of the lamp burning in the pa.s.sage they beheld silhouetted upon the threshold a black figure crowned by a steeple hat. Then the droning voice of the Puritan minister greeted them.

"Your hour is at hand!" he announced.

"Is it time?" asked Galliard from the bed. And as he put the question he softly thrust aside the trooper's breastplate, and set his hand to the fellow's heart. It still beat faintly.

"In another hour they will come for you," answered the minister. And Crispin marvelled anxiously what Kenneth was about. "Repent then, miserable sinners, whilst yet--"

He broke off abruptly, awaking out of his religious zeal to a sense of strangeness at the darkness and the absence of the sentry, which hitherto he had not remarked.

"What hath--" he began. Then Galliard heard a gasp, followed by the noise of a fall, and two struggling men came rolling across the chamber floor.

"Bravely done, boy!" he cried, almost mirthfully. "Cling to him, Kenneth; cling to him a second yet!"

He leapt from the bed, and guided by the faint light coming through the door, he sprang across the intervening s.p.a.ce and softly closed it.

Then he groped his way along the wall to the spot where he had seen the lanthorn stand when Kenneth had flung his cloak over it. As he went, the two striving men came up against him.

"Hold fast, lad," he cried, encouraging Kenneth, "hold him yet a moment, and I will relieve you!"

He reached the lanthorn at last, and pulling aside the cloak, he lifted the light and set it upon the table.

CHAPTER IX. THE BARGAIN

By the lanthorn's yellow glare Crispin beheld the two men-a ma.s.s of writhing bodies and a bunch of waving legs--upon the ground. Kenneth, who was uppermost, clung purposefully to the parson's throat. The faces of both were alike distorted, but whilst the lad's breath came in gasping hisses, the other's came not at all.

Going over to the bed, Crispin drew the unconscious trooper's tuck-sword. He paused for a moment to bend over the man's face; his breath came faintly, and Crispin knew that ere many moments were sped he would regain consciousness. He smiled grimly to see how well he had performed his work of suffocation without yet utterly destroying life.

Sword in hand, he returned to Kenneth and the parson. The Puritan's struggles were already becoming mere spasmodic twitchings; his face was as ghastly as the trooper's had been a while ago.

"Release him, Kenneth," said Crispin shortly.

"He struggles still."

"Release him, I say," Galliard repeated, and stooping he caught the lad's wrist and compelled him to abandon his hold.

"He will cry out," exclaimed Kenneth, in apprehension.

"Not he," laughed Crispin. "Leastways, not yet awhile. Observe the wretch."

With mouth wide agape, the minister lay gasping like a fish newly taken from the water. Even now that his throat was free he appeared to struggle for a moment before he could draw breath. Then he took it in panting gulps until it seemed that he must choke in his gluttony of air.

"Fore George," quoth Crispin, "I was no more than in time. Another second, and we should have had him, too, unconscious. There, he is recovering."

The blood was receding from the swollen veins of the parson's head, and his cheeks were paling to their normal hue. Anon they went yet paler than their wont, as Galliard rested the point of his sword against the fellow's neck.

"Make sound or movement," said Crispin coldly, "and I'll pin you to the floor like a beetle. Obey me, and no harm shall come to you."

"I will obey you," the fellow answered, in a wheezing whisper. "I swear I will. But of your charity, good sir, I beseech you remove your sword.

Your hand might slip, sir," he whined, a wild terror in his eyes.

Where now was the deep ba.s.s of his whilom accents? Where now the grotesque majesty of his bearing, and the impressive gestures that erstwhile had accompanied his words of denunciation?

"Your hand might slip, sir," he whined again.

"It might--and, by Gad, it shall if I hear more from you. So that you are discreet and obedient, have no fear of my hand." Then, still keeping his eye upon the fellow: "Kenneth," he said, "attend to the crop-ear yonder, he will be recovering. Truss him with the bedclothes, and gag him with his scarf. See to it, Kenneth, and do it well, but leave his nostrils free that he may breathe."

Kenneth carried out Galliard's orders swiftly and effectively, what time Crispin remained standing over the rec.u.mbent minister. At length, when Kenneth announced that it was done, he bade the Puritan rise.