Part 43 (1/2)
”Mike, do you stay near the hut, and if any searching party should come along, which is scarcely likely, for they have all gone farther afield, you can say there is no need to search the hut, as you, with an officer, have already examined it.”
In a few minutes, the earl was completely hidden. Desmond then rode into Badajos, and delivered his report to the marshal. He then went to the stables, took out his spare horse, and, leading it, rode out to the hut again.
”Has anyone been here?” he asked Mike.
”Not a soul, sir.”
”Take the horses into the wood, then, and stay with them for the present. It will not be safe for the earl to move for a couple of hours.
”Now, General,” he went on, as he removed the firewood, ”I fear that you have been very uncomfortable.”
”I can hardly say that I have been comfortable, sir, but that is of no consequence. The pain in my leg has abated, since you cut the boot open.
”And now, how can I express my grat.i.tude to you, for thus sheltering me?”
”It is but a fair return of services, sir. You gave me my liberty, and I am doing my best to restore yours to you.”
”It is all very well to say that, Captain Kennedy. I am the general in command of the British forces in Portugal, and had I chosen to openly release you, none could have questioned me. It was only because some magnified report of the affair might have reached the ears of the Portuguese Government, and given rise to rumours hostile to me, that I thought it best to let it appear to be an accidental escape. You see, I am by no means popular with the Portuguese. In the first place, I am a Protestant; and in the next place, I am constantly bringing pressure to bear upon them, as to the supply of provisions, the making of roads, the proper feeding and arming of their own troops, and other matters of the same kind; and they would be only too glad to have some cause of complaint against me.
”But your case is altogether different, for you are risking even your life in thus aiding me to escape.”
”That may be, General, but it was nevertheless my duty, as a matter of conscience, to endeavour to return the kindness that you showed me; and as, at present, your army will hardly be in a state to take the field against us for a long time, I do not feel that I am seriously injuring our cause.”
”Well, sir, I shall be your debtor for life.
”Do you intend to remain always an exile, Captain Kennedy?” the Earl of Galway went on. ”It seems to me little short of madness that so many gallant gentlemen should cut themselves altogether adrift from their native country, and pa.s.s their lives fighting as mercenaries. I do not use the word offensively, but only in its proper meaning, of foreigners serving in the army of a nation not their own. Nor do I mean to insult Irish gentlemen, by even hinting that they serve simply for pay. They fight for France mainly in the hope that France will some day aid in setting James Stuart on the British throne; a forlorn hope, for although Louis may encourage the hopes of the Stuarts and their followers, by patronizing their cause, which it suits him to do because it gives him the means of striking at England, by effecting a landing in Scotland or Ireland; it is yet a matter upon which he must be indifferent, save in his own interest, and in the advantage it gives him of keeping in his service some dozen or so splendid regiments, on whose valour he can always rely.”
”That is true, sir,” Desmond replied; ”and I own I have no great hope that, by the means of French a.s.sistance, the Stuarts will regain their throne. But what could I do if I were to return to Ireland? Beyond the fact that my name is Kennedy, I am in absolute ignorance as to what branch of that family I belong to, and have practically not a friend in the country. Were I to land in Ireland, I have no means of earning my living, and should doubtless be denounced as one who had served in the Irish Brigade.
I own that I should be glad to return there, for a time, in order to make enquiries as to my family. I was but sixteen when I left, and was kept, as it seems to me, purposely, in total ignorance on the subject. It may be that I was the son of a brave officer of that name, who certainly came over to France soon after I was born, and fell fighting some years before I came out; but I have no proof that it was so, and would give a great deal to be able to ascertain it.
”In Ireland they think a great deal of genealogy, and I am often questioned, by Irishmen of old descent, as to my family; and find it extremely awkward to be obliged to own that I know nothing of it, with any certainty. I have no desire to pa.s.s my life in battles and sieges, and, if I survive the risks and perils, to settle down as a Frenchman with an Irish name.”
”That I can well understand,” the earl said. ”'Tis a life that no man could desire, for it would certainly be a wasted one. I can a.s.sure you that I think the chance of James Stuart, or his descendants, gaining the throne of England is remote in the extreme. When William of Orange came over, there was no standing army, and as James the Second had rendered himself extremely unpopular by his Catholic leanings, he became possessed of England without opposition, and of Ireland by means of his Dutch troops.
The matter is entirely changed, now. England has a strong army, against which a gathering, however strong, of undisciplined men could have but little chance. I conceive it possible that a Catholic Stuart might regain the throne of Ireland, if backed by a French army, and if the people were supplied with French arms and money. But that he would retain the throne, after the French were withdrawn, I regard as next to impossible.”
”I cannot but think the same, sir. However, as I see no chance of my being able to go to Ireland, even to push my enquiries as to my family, there is nothing for it but to remain a soldier of France.”
”In that matter, I might a.s.sist you, Captain Kennedy. I have no doubt that my influence, and that of my friends in England, would without difficulty suffice to gain permission for you to visit Ireland on private business, on my undertaking that you have no political object whatever in desiring to do so, and that you engage yourself to enter into no plots or schemes for a rising.
Furthermore, I think I can promise that, if you succeed in your researches, and find that you have relations and friends there, I could, if you desire it, obtain a revocation of any pains and penalties you may have incurred, and a restoration of all your rights as an Irishman. That is certainly the least I can do, after the vital service that you have rendered me--a service that, in itself, shows you do not share in the bitter enmity so many of your countrymen, unfortunately, feel against England.”
”I have no such enmity, a.s.suredly,” Desmond said. ”The choice of coming out here, to enter the service of France, was not of my own making; but was made, for some reason which I have never been able to understand, by the gentleman who had borne the expenses of my bringing up, but who was himself a strong supporter of the English rule, and therefore would have been expected to place every obstacle in the way of my entering the Irish Brigade.”
Chapter 18: War.
After hearing Desmond's story the earl asked several questions, and obtained further details of his life when a boy, and of his interview with John O'Carroll.
”It is certainly strange,” he said thoughtfully, ”and worth enquiring into, for it would seem that he must have some interest in thus getting you out of the way, and in your entering a service that would render it next to impossible that you should ever return to your native land.”