The Argosy, April 1912 — page 28: what you’re looking at

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

14 the clutch of my stout lads. So come quietly or it will be the worse for you.” As he spoke, he and his men had been rushing me down the passageway toward the door and down the steps into the street. I think they half-feared Errol’s com- rades in the room behind might attempt some rescue. For, at the noise of the tur- moil in the passageway, the door had opened and excited, questioning voices had been raised. Amid the babel as I was dragged down the steps onto the street, I had heard Dor- cas Errol’s voice raised in a cry of won- dering ecstasy at sight of her father safe and sound. And the memory of that joyous cry kept up my heart as I was propelled along the dark streets toward the Tower. It was my one comfort in a sea of self-contempt at my rash folly. CHAPTER VI. OUT OF TROUBLE AND IN AGAIN. Lest any should doubt the ease where- with I had performed the ruse substituting myself for Mark Errol, let me say it was the very simplest sort of feat. Self-injuring maneuvers generally are, I find. It had required but one instant of a swift action there in the utter darkness of the passageway, during which I _ had snatched and donned Errol’s hat and cloak. "Twas my futile rush for escape that had assured the success of my trick. For, when men are struggling in the half light with an escaping prisoner, they waste litle time in scanning his features or in debating whether or no they have caught the right man. Errol’s long, old-fashioned cloak and his tall, parsonlike sugar-loaf hat were unlike most garments worn in that day. There had been none others like them in the room. Thus, when a man thus attired had made a break for freedom, he had very naturally been seized. Once out in the street, whose pitchy blackness was relieved only by the flare of the single torch borne by a man who walked ahead, the deception was. still easier to maintain. I uttered no sound as I moved along among my rough captors. I could see nothing, for Errol’s hat, as I have said, was jammed down to my very mouth. THE ARGOSY. One thing only did I fear. I dreaded lest the fellow who was gripping my left arm should chance to feel my sword-hilt rubbing against his side. Errol had been unarmed. I had seen the officer’s quick glance stray to his side, to make sure of that. So, with my elbow I managed to keep my left-hand captor’s body from pressing too closely to me. When one cannot see his surroundings, a journey is ever doubly long. And our march to the Tower of London seemed in- terminable. Also, when one cannot see, the mind turns inward with added in- tensity. And I, perspiring and half-stifled inside that miserable sugar-loaf hat, had ample time to review my situation and to rail at my folly in rushing into such a predica- ment. Twice that day had I thrust my neck into the noose. First, by my attack on Geottrey Whitson, favorite courtier to King James. That assault alone, as I now full well knew, was enough to send me to the Tower for life or even to cause my behead- ing. Having won free from that peril, through Will Shakespeare’s help, and hav- ing been on the eve of showing a clean pair of heels to England and the law, I must now, forsooth, involve myself in a far worse dilemma and impersonate an old treason-hatcher with whom I had _ abso- lutely no acquaintance. And all because a girl had chanced to look like a frightened child when she wept! What were Dorcas Errol or her tears to me? How the miserable adventure was to come out, I did not know. Of course, the first official who knew Errol by sight would see that I was not he. But what fate would the law be likely to mete out to the man who had helped a traitor to escape? We came to a halt, in answer to a chal- lenge from a sentry. And I gathered that we had reached one of the Tower gates. There was a brief colloquy between the watch-officer and a guard-captain. Then we marched on a few yards (apparently into a courtyard, from the way our steps reechoed from high-surrounding walls), and thence up one or two steps. I was pushed through a narrow doorway. A high, nasal voice in front of me de- manded: “Well, what’s officer ? well, here, comicoool. (CO