At that cottage, lonely in a sea of turf, the boy stared long and earnestly.
It was flying a flag out of the chimney.
And that flag--yes--no--yes--was the Union Jack.
CHAPTER x.x.x
AN OLD SONG
I
He was off the rim and rushing down through the gorse with thumping heart.
True, Ding-dong had ordered him with his last breath to steer clear of human habitation--"They"re all in it," the old man had said. But then he possessed the scent-bottle. Now he had nothing but his skin to lose, and as things were he could afford to lose that. Here at any rate was a straw to catch at. Moreover he was in no hurry to get to Lewes to be called a liar.
Of course it might only prove to be some loyal old lady, flying her colours dauntlessly in the face of the Frenchman. Just such a thing his mother might do; and there were thousands of her like up and down the country--thank heaven for it!
On the other hand it might be a temporary signal-station. After the sacking of the station on Beachy Head, what more likely than that this cottage should be seized for Government purposes and garrisoned?--his own chaps too, sailors--not those swaggering sn.o.bs in red coats.
If so, he saw his course clear as day.
There was the privateer. Somewhere among these huge smooth hills lurked the Gentleman, primed with his fatal message. Between the two was one boat, and so far as he knew one only--the long-boat of the smugglers.
If his surmise were correct, and this should prove a blockade-house, he would take the garrison, though it consisted of only half-a-dozen men, attack the Gang, and smash the boat at all costs.
II
The boy plunged down the hill.
The sun beat fiercely on his head, but he hardly felt it.
Along a track that snaked through the gorse, he pushed his way, flies buzzing about him. A shining gossamer lay across his path, bosom-high.
From it a web swung in the wind. At the centre, where the threads met, a black and yellow spider, marked like a man of war, waited its prey.
The lad brushed through it with a pang. The spider"s work fell about him in ruins: he rushed for the gorse, and hung there topsy-turvy, as though heart-broken. Hard lines certainly! He had upset the spider"s apple-cart, as the Almighty had upset his. But he had _had_ to-- and so no doubt had the Almighty.
He turned as he ran.
"Cheer up, old chap!" he hollaed back to his friend, crouching among the ruins of his home. "It"ll all come out in the washing."
III
Fluffy thistle-heads, reminding him of Gwen"s young chickens, stood up out of the gorse all about him. The bunched blackberries were ripening now: he almost expected to see Gwen"s face, purple-mouthed, peering at him from a bramble. All about him the silver-downed gorse-pods were snapping like pistols. A stone-chat with ruddy breast spurted out of the gorse, and flirted upwards.
The path broadened; the gorse grew scantier. His feet crushed sweetness out of the thyme. Here and there a young ash thrust up feathery.
Of a sudden he found himself again at the top of one of those almost sheer descents to which he was becoming used.
At its foot grew a hanger of beeches, already bronzing to autumn.
Down he went, slithering on hands and tail, picked himself up towards the bottom, and ran away into the shade of the wood to find himself among silver-grey beech-stems.
How refreshing it was after the glare, how rich, how dark!
Till he was out of it, he had not known how hot it had been on the bare hill-side. Now he was aware of the sweat on his forehead, and a dripping shirt.
Beech-stems rose in stately columns all about him. The floor was red and brown mosaic, the roof a tracery of leaves intertwined with light.
Eastward the sun flashed as through a window. Close by a wood-pigeon was praying.
Out of the aisle once again into the glare.
Now the Downs lay behind him, barren and dun. On his left-front the rounded bosom of another beech-wood rose, in its midst a single chestnut already rusting. Across the valley, behind a ridge, a blunt church-tower and yellow-lichened roofs peeped. On the hill beyond, a windmill c.o.c.ked up against the sky.
He paid little attention, making straight for the flag of his country.
The cottage stood about a quarter of a mile away, conspicuously solitary in the greensward, the Union Jack brave above it.
The boy approached, wary but swift. Out here on the open plain there was no cover. He was exposed as a fly on a sheet of paper. Still things couldn"t be worse--he comforted himself with that most comfortable of thoughts.
Some two hundred yards from the cottage a ruined wall ran across the greensward. Behind it the boy took cover and spied.
The cottage was very small; yet, small as it was it was grim to a degree. The flint in rows, tier upon tier, grinned at him fiercely, reminding him of a dog showing its teeth. The colour of steel, the rows of set teeth, the s.h.a.ggy roof of thatch, the flag ruffling it from the chimney, all bespoke the same st.u.r.dy fighting character.
Indeed it was so small, and yet so truculent, that Kit laughed to see it.
Chained there a dumb watch-dog on the threshold of its country, it seemed to be saying as it crouched--
"You can all go to sleep: I"m watching."
Kit crossed the wall, and almost expected to hear the cottage growl.
Warily he approached. As he did so, the warrior aspect of the cottage grew upon him. It was less a cottage than a tiny fort. There were only three windows, one on each side the door, and a dormer. The lower windows though latticed were cross-barred; and the door of ma.s.sive oak, iron-studded, was heavy enough for a castle. Through it, ajar, he caught the gleam of arms.
Certainly this was no peasant"s cottage. What was it then?--a signal- station?--
There was no flag-staff, no signal-tackle.
Some lonely smuggler"s hold?--not likely: for there was the flag.
Could the flag be a decoy?