Part 22 (2/2)

Desmond did not answer, but sat thinking for a few minutes.

”It is not so impossible as you seem to imagine,” he said, at last. ”Doubtless, like everyone else, he goes in a sedan chair to the meeting of the council, and returns in the same manner. There are two ways in which we could manage the matter. Of course, he has his own chair, with his chair men in livery. We might either make these men drunk and a.s.sume their dress, or attack them suddenly on the way; then we should, of course, gag and bind them, and carry him here, or to some other place that we might decide upon, and force him to give us an order for the boatmen to take us across the channel, at once. Of course, we should have horses in readiness, and ride for the coast. We should have a twelve hours'

start, for it would be that time before our landlady came in as usual, with our breakfast, when G.o.dolphin would, of course, be released.”

The two officers looked at each other, astounded at the audacity of the scheme that Desmond had quietly propounded. O'Sullivan was the first to speak.

”Are you really in earnest, Kennedy?”

”Quite in earnest. I do not see why it should not be done.”

”Well, you are certainly the coolest hand I ever came across,”

O'Neil said. ”You are proposing to seize the first minister in England, as if it were merely an affair of carrying off a pretty girl quite willing to be captured. The idea seems monstrous, and yet, as you put it, I do not see why it might not succeed.”

”I hardly think that it could fail,” Desmond said quietly. ”De Tulle managed to carry off the Baron de Pointdexter's daughter from the court of Versailles, and did so without any hitch or difficulty. Surely three Irishmen could arrange an affair of this sort as well as a French vicomte.”

”If it is to be done,” O'Sullivan said, ”I think the second plan is best. You might fail in making the chair men drunk, or at any rate sufficiently drunk to allow them to be despoiled of their clothes; whereas you could have no difficulty in silencing a couple of chair men by a sudden attack--a sharp rap on the head with these bludgeons ought to settle that affair.”

”Quite so,” Desmond agreed; ”and while Mike and one of us were so employed, the other two might throw open the doors of the chair, and gag G.o.dolphin before he was conscious of what was happening.”

”It all seems simple enough, Kennedy, and, if it were a citizen, one would think nothing of the undertaking. But it is nothing short of high treason for us thus to make free with the person of the chief minister of England.”

”That is a matter that does not concern me at all, O'Neil. If we were captured now, we should be executed for high treason with the others; and if we carried off Anne herself, they could not do much more to us.

”Now, it seems to me that if you are both agreed that we should carry out the plan, the first thing to be done is to arrange for horses; or, better still, for a light cart to carry the four of us. I should think that Mike would, among his acquaintances, be able to hear of a man with a couple of fast horses and such a cart as we require, who would agree to drive us to the coast, arranging a change of horses on the way. He could offer ten louis, which would be a sum that a man of that kind would be well satisfied with.”

”I will see to that, your honour. I have no doubt that I can find such a man without difficulty. When would you want him?”

”Tonight, certainly, with the arrangement that, if we do not come to the appointed spot, we shall be there tomorrow night. Recollect ten louis is all we can afford, but if he wants any more, he must have it.

”Well, we will leave that to you.”

Then he went on to the others:

”We had better go down to Saint James's. Mike can go out and buy us three shock wigs, with which we can cover our hair and look our parts better. We had better separate when we get there, and watch the entrances to the palace, gazing about like rustics; then we can get into a conversation with any servant that we see, and try and find out from which door members of the council usually issue, and at about what hour. We could succeed without that, because we should notice the chairs waiting for them. Still, it is as well that we should get all the information we can. There will be, doubtless, personages leaving who have been with the Princess Anne. They might go out by another entrance, and therefore we should miss our man.”

”You will have more than the two chair men to deal with, your honour, for there are sure to be two link men with the chair.”

”Well, it will be as easy to dispose of four men as of two, Mike.”

”Every bit, your honour, and the more of them the more divarsion.”

An hour later they set out, now so well disguised that no one would have dreamt that the three Irishmen were officers in a French regiment; and before noon Desmond succeeded in obtaining, from a scullion employed in the palace, the particulars that he required. On saying that he had but just come to London, and wanted to get a sight of the great people, the present of a s.h.i.+lling sufficed to extract the information from the boy; and Desmond then rejoined his companions, and they at once returned to their lodgings, where they found Mike awaiting them.

”I have managed it, your honour, but it will cost twelve louis. I went to the man from whom I got the saws, and he said at once that the affair could be managed easily, and, sure enough, he took me to the shop of a man who, he said, sometimes acted with cracksmen.

The fellow was sharp enough to see, at once, that it was something special that we wanted the horses for, but after some bargaining he agreed to do it for twelve gold pieces, and, if necessary, to get a change of horses twice on the road. He will be ready with his cart at twelve o'clock, a hundred yards or so outside the last houses on the south side of the Old Kent Road. I could not tell him which port you would go to, but he said from there he could go to Dover, or turn off so as to make for Southampton or Weymouth.

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