The Wild Geese. Weyman Stanley John
through a second archway, which appeared to lead to an inner court. The Colonel, nothing intimidated, went after them. Fortune, he thought, had favoured him.
But as he emerged from the tunnel-like passage he raised his head in astonishment. A din of voices, an outbreak of laughter and revelry, burst in a flood of sound upon his ears. He turned his face in the direction whence the sounds came, and saw three open windows, and at each window three or four flushed countenances. His sudden emergence from the tunnel, perhaps his look of surprise, wrought an instant's silence, which was followed by a ruder outburst.
"Cock! cock! cock!" shrieked a tipsy voice, and an orange, hurled at random, missed the Colonel's astonished face by a yard. The mare which had led him so far had disappeared, and instinctively he drew bridle. He stared at the window.
"Mark one!" cried a second roisterer, and a cork, better aimed than the orange, struck the Colonel sharply on the chin. A shout of laughter greeted the hit.
He raised his hat. "Gentlemen," he remonstrated, "gentlemen – "
He could proceed no further. A flight of corks, a renewed cry of "Cock! cock! cock!" a chorus of "Fetch him, Ponto! Dead, good dog! Find him, Ponto!" drowned his remonstrances. Perhaps in the scowling face at his elbow – for William Bale had followed him and was looking very fierce indeed – the wits of the – th found more amusement than in the master's mild astonishment.
"Who the devil is he?" cried one of the seniors, raising his voice above the uproar. "English or Irish?"
"Irish for a dozen!" a voice answered. "Here, Paddy, where's your papers?"
"Ay, be jabers!" in an exaggerated brogue; "it's the broth of a boy he is, and never a face as long as his in ould Ireland!"
"Gentlemen," the Colonel said, getting in a word at last. "Gentlemen, I have been in many companies before this, and – "
"And by G – d, you shall be in ours!" one of the revellers retorted. And "Have him in! Fetch him in!" roared a dozen voices, amid much laughter. In a twinkling half as many young fellows had leapt from the windows, and surrounded him. "Who-whoop!" cried one, "Who-whoop!"
"Steady, gentlemen, steady!" the Colonel said, a note of sternness in his voice. "I've no objection to joining you, or to a little timely frolic, but – "
"Join us you will, whether or no!" replied one, more drunken or more turbulent than the rest. He made as if he would lay hands on the Colonel, and, to avoid violence, the latter suffered himself to be helped from his saddle. In a twinkling he was urged through the doorway, leaving his reins in Bale's hand, whose face, for sheer wrath and vindictiveness, was a picture.
Boisterous cries of "Hallo, sobersides!" and "Cock, cock, cock!" greeted the Colonel, as, partly of his own accord and partly urged by unceremonious hands, he crossed the threshold, and shot forward into the room.
The scene presented by the apartment matched the flushed faces and the wandering eyes which the windows had framed. The long table was strewn with flasks and glasses and half-peeled fruit, the floor with empty bottles. A corner of the table had been cleared for a main at hazard; but to make up for this the sideboard was a wilderness of broken meats and piled-up dishes, and an overturned card-table beside one of the windows had strewn the floor with cards. Here, there, everywhere on chairs, on hooks, were cast sword-belts, neckcloths, neglected wigs.
A peaceful citizen of that day had as soon found himself in a bear-pit; and even the Colonel's face grew a trifle longer as hands, not too gentle, conducted him towards the end of the table. "Gentlemen, gentlemen," he began, "I have been in many companies, as I said before, and – "
"A speech! Old Gravity's speech!" roared a middle-aged, bold-eyed man, who had suggested the sally from the windows, and from the first had set the younger spirits an example of recklessness. "Hear to him!" He filled a glass of wine and waved it perilously near the Colonel's nose. "Old Gravity's speech! Give it tongue!" he cried. "The flure's your own, and we're listening."
Colonel John eyed him with a slight contraction of the features. But the announcement, if ill-meant, availed to procure silence. The more sober had resumed their seats. He raised his head and spoke.
"Gentlemen," he said – and it was strange to note the effect of his look as his eyes fell first on one and then on another, fraught with a dignity which insensibly wrought on them. "Gentlemen, I have been in many companies, and I have found it true, all the world over, that what a man brings he finds. I have the honour to speak to you as a soldier to soldiers – "
"English or Irish?" asked a tall sallow man – sharply, but in a new tone.
"Irish!"
"Oh, be jabers!" from the man with the wineglass.
But the Colonel's eye and manner had had their effect, and "Let him speak!" the sallow man said. "And you, Payton, have done with your fooling, will you?"
"Well, hear to him!"
"I have been in many camps and many companies, gentlemen," the Colonel resumed, "and those of many nations. But wherever I have been I have found that if a man brought courtesy with him, he met with courtesy at the hands of others. And if he brought no offence, he received none. I am a stranger here, for I have been out of my own country for a score of years. On my return you welcome me," he smiled, "a little boisterously perhaps, but I am sure, gentlemen, with a good intent. And as I have fared elsewhere I am sure I shall fare at your hands."
"Well, sure," from the background, "and haven't we made you welcome?"
"Almost too freely," the Colonel replied, smiling good-humouredly. "A peaceable man who had not lived as long as I have might have found himself at a loss in face of so strenuous a welcome. Corks, perhaps, are more in place in bottles – "
"And a dale more in place out of them!" from the background.
"But if you will permit me to explain my errand, I will say no more of that. My name, gentlemen, is Sullivan, Colonel John Sullivan of Skull, formerly of the Swedish service, and much at your service. I shall be still more obliged if any of you will be kind enough to inform me who is the purchaser – "
Payton interrupted him rudely. "Oh, d – n! We have had enough of this!" he cried. "Sink all purchasers, I say!" And with a drunken crow he thrust his neighbour against the speaker, causing both to reel. How it happened no one saw – whether Payton himself staggered in the act, or flung the wine wantonly; but somehow the contents of his glass flew over the Colonel's face and neckcloth.
Half a dozen men rose from their seats. "Shame!" an indignant voice cried.
Among those who had risen was the sallow man. "Payton," he said sharply, "what did you do that for?"
"Because I chose, if you like!" the stout man answered. "What is it to you? I am ready to give him satisfaction when he likes, and where he likes, and no heel-taps! And what more can he want? Do you hear, sir?" he continued in a bullying tone. "Sword or pistols, before breakfast or after dinner, drunk or sober, Jack Payton's your man. D – n me, it shall never be said in my time that the – th suffered a crop-eared Irishman to preach to them in their own mess-room! You can send your friend to me when you please. He'll find me!"
The Colonel was wiping the wine from his chin and neckcloth. He had turned strangely pale at the moment of the insult. More than one of those who watched him curiously – and of such were all in the room, Payton excepted – and who noted the slow preciseness of his movements and the care with which he cleansed himself, albeit his hand shook, expected some extraordinary action.
But no one looked for anything so abnormal or so astonishing as the course he took when he spoke. Nothing in his bearing had prepared them for it; nor anything in his conduct which, so far, had been that of a man of the world not too much at a loss even in the unfavourable circumstances in which he was placed – circumstances which would have unnerved many a one.
"I do not fight," he said. "Your challenge is cheap, sir, as your insult."
Payton stared. He had never been more astonished in his life. "Good L – d!" he cried. "You do not fight? Heaven and earth! and you a soldier!"
"I do not fight."
"After