Black Bess; or, The Knight of the Road — A Tale of the Good Old Times — page 85: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

LL Te Rene oh en BLUESKIN: ** Fire!’ he yelled, as he drew a pistol from his holster. “Fire! Down withthem! Shoot them both! Fire, I say!” A succession-of reports followed his words. But no execution was done. All were too much flurried to take a correct aim. And now the men who had been perceived by Bess crossing the meadow reached the high road, and they tore along with all the speed they could mduce their horses to make. Wild and the other three men made a desperate but abortive attempt to check our friends. Blueskin and Jack, as if by common consent, pointed their pistols at the thief-taker, and, as they swept by him, both fired. The two pistols made but one report. A hideous shriek came from Jonathan’s lps, and his horse, rearing at the unusual sound, threw him heavily into the roadway. : This was an event that produced the utmost conster- nation in the minds of his men, and they rode their horses against one another at a loss how to act. But when the others came up they dismounted, and went in a body to where he lay. He was quite insensible, or else dead; which of the two it was they could not take upon themselves to say. Levee was the first to recover himself, and take the responsibilty of action. un fact he had something of a personal feeling against Blake, which may go a long way towards accounting for it. ‘Mount, four of you, and follow me. The remainder had better attend to Mr. Wild, and convey him to New- gate-street. Now, then, off and away.” But the time that had elapsed since Jonathan fell from his horse was sufficient to permit the fugitives to get both out of sight and hearing. CHAPTER LVI. JACK SHEPPARD IS ALARMED AT FINDING ED@QWORTH BESS HAS BEEN WOUNDED BY A PISTOL SHOT. THE appearance of Jonathan Wild in the road in advance of the fugitives looks a little mysterious, and lest the reader should fall into the mistake of supposing him whiquitous, we will proceed to account for that rather peculiar state of affairs. After the little cross accident at the turnpike he felt that his prey had got too good a start for him to be able to come up with them without a very long chase into the country, which was a thing he by no means desired. They must be intercepted. But how ? The strategic brain of the great thief-taker was not long in devising a means. — We have before had occasion to remark on the intimate knowledge he possessed of London and its environs. It had been acquired at the expense of a great deal of time and trouble, but its value to him was immense. In the present instance he knew that the road curved very considerably round to the left, being, in fact, bow- hke in shape. But this was scarcely apparent to any one upon the road itself. The radius of the curve was too great for it to be appreciated unless by some one viewing the country from above. The idea, then, at once entered Wild’s mind that if he took to the fields and pushed forward 1n a direct hne at a good speed, he would be able to steal a march, so to speak, upon those of whom he was in chase, by getting in advance of them. To be sure he ran the risk of losing them altogether, if they happened to take to the fields or any one of the cross-roads diverging from the main one, but a mode of preventing their escape by this means quickly occurred to a 0 5 0 Ta ea I ay gunn. Np” GE LEER ET RS ID im. Taking three of the men with him, he directed four others to keep in the meadows on the north side ot the road, and four more on the south, for by the time the alter- cation with the pikeman was over the remainder of the band had arrived. Having made these dispositions, then, and in an in- credibly short space of time, Jonathan set off at full speed over the epen country, quite heedless of the damage he '{ might do. ey Cr ay RO eer Pee eters: [0 . SSS eee A ROMANCE. 83 Jonathan calculated, too, that hearing no sounds of pursuit might lull the fugitives into false security, and cause them to proceed at an easy rate. In this, as the reader is aware, he would have been perfectly right, had it not been that Blueskin felt the safest course was to get as far from London in as small a space of time as he possibly could. Jonathan Wild, followed by his men, took his course most undeviatingly across the open country, with appa- rently nothing whatever to guide him. At last he reached the cross-roads just above Kaling turnpike, and there he drew up. His joy was great when the faint trampling of horses’ hoofs reached his ears. He was in time. The eight men in the meadows, he caléulated, would be very close mdeed behind them. So far all had gone well, when a little circumstance occurred which he had omitted to take into account, though, if he had, it would have amounted to much the same thing. The moon broke forth. Yes, that was the contingency that had been overlooked. The moon rose above the clouds, and he was discovered sometime before he intended to be. He was in hopes that his sudden appearance right before their very faces would fill them with a momentary panic, of which he would take advantage. The men in the rear would have prevented all retreat. Had things turned out just as he wished, the position of our friends would have been perilous indeed; but, as it so happened, they saw him in time to save themselves. Any ordinary man, one would have thought, would in Wild’s place have even then dashed forward and attempted to capture them, but this he felt would be most impolitic until his men were behind then. Then the affair would have been easy. It would have so turned out had not Edgworth Bess happened to see the mien crossing the fields on both sides of the road. A bold action now alone could save them, and what could be bolder than attempting to force a passage over Wild and his three men ? The very audacity of the proceeding went a long way towards crowning it with success, for certainly nothivy was further from Wild’s expectations. | We have seen how it succeeded, and how, by a pistol bullet, he had been laid low. Having thus far explained matters, we will return to the fugitives, whose perils were by no means over. Speak!” said Jack Sheppard, anxiously urning round towards his companion. ‘Speak, dearest, are you un- hurt ?” * Tt is nothing.” “You were hit, then?” said Jack, as he brought his horse to a stand-still. ‘What are you pulling up for?” asked Blueskin, turn- ing towards them. ‘‘ You must be mad! On—on!” ‘* Bess is wounded,” said Jack. ‘“No—no! I hope not!” said Blueskin in toues of alarm, and reaching the side of Jack’s horse with a bound. “No--no! Ihope not! At least, not seriously.” ‘It is nothing, believe me,” said Edgworth Bess. “ Do not stay. Oh! donot. Fly—fly!” “But not if you are wounded. A trifling wound is made a dangerous one by inattention. Where were you hit? Speak quickly, in order that there may be no more delay.” “On my neck.” Blueskin leaved forward, and then saw that the back of the young girl’s neck and her shoulder were quite covered with blood. ‘* This is a serious hurt, I fear,”’ said Blueskin. rere) cried Jack; “do not say that—do not say that.”’ With great speed now Blueskin took from his pocket a handkerchief, and with it wiped away the blood as well as he could, in order to discover the nature of the wound. He trembled, in spite of himself, as he did so. To his intense relief he found, however, that the wound was nothing more than a scratch along the back of her neck, and scarcely more than skin deep. Po This would account for the profuse manner in which 1b bled, it being the characteristic of such wounds. — ORS EE Se ee” TES. SESE eee OF ee ee eee 7 Sa Ap OR a A RN Pte PETE SE TE a Te ei TT I I TID BAIS PES EMT NARS ah he CRD STEARNS S| - 6-2 _ aa SEN cD AE ST RS CI eC, TD aD VHA Ra PAP SORA ft Et AOS ite |! COMmMICDOokKkS.C© 5}