"Let me go wif you, please," pleaded Toady Lion; "I'll kill you unless!--Kill you every one!" And his voice was full of bloodshed.

"Last time 'twas me that d'livered Donald, when they all runned away or got took prisoner; and now they won't even take me wif them!"

Billy regretfully shook his head. It would not do to be c.u.mbered with small boys in the desperate mission on which they were going. The hope was forlorn enough as it was.

"Wait till we come back, little 'un," he said kindly; "run away and play with your sister."

Toady Lion stamped on the ground more fiercely than ever.

"Shan't stop and play wif a girl. If you don't let me come, I shall kill you."

And with sentiments even more discreditable, he pursued their boat as long as he could reach it with volleys of stones, to the great delight of the gipsy boys, who stimulated him to yet more desperate exertions with cries of "Well fielded!" "Chuck her in hard!" "Hit him with a big one!" While some of those in the stern pretended to stand shaking in deadly fear, and implored Toady Lion to spare them because they were orphans.

"Shan't spare none--shall kill 'oo every one!" cried the angry Toady Lion, lugging at a bigger stone than all, which he could not lift above three inches from the ground.

"Will sma.s.s 'oo with this, Billy Blythe--bad Billy!" he exclaimed, as he wrestled with the boulder.

"Oh, spare me--think of my family, Toady Lion, my pore wife and childer," pleaded Billy hypocritically.

"'Oo should have finked of 'oo fambly sooner!" cried Toady Lion, staggering to the water's edge with the great stone.

But at this moment the noise of the crying of those warring for the mastery came faintly up from the castle island. The rope that had been pa.s.sed through the ring on the landing-stage and held ready in the hand of Billy Blythe, was loosened, and the second part of the besieging expedition went down with the rushing spate which reddened Edam Water. And as they fell away Billy stood up and called for three cheers for "little Toady Lion, the best man of the lot."

But Toady Lion stood on the sh.o.r.e and fairly bellowed with impotent rage, and the sound of his crying, "I'll kill 'oo! I'll kill 'oo dead!" roused Janet Sheepshanks, who was taking advantage of her master's absence to carry out a complete house-cleaning. She left the blanket-washing to see what was the matter. But Toady Lion, angry as he was, had sense enough to know that if Janet got him, he would be superintended all the morning. So with real alacrity he slipped aside into the "scrubbery," and there lay hidden till Janet, anxious that her maids should not scamp their house-work, was compelled to hurry back to the laundry to see that the blankets were properly washed.

After this there was but one thing to do, and so the second division, under Sir Toady Lion, did it. He resolved to turn the enemy's flank, and attack him with reinforcements from an entirely unexpected quarter. So, leaving Prissy to her own devices, he took to his heels, and his fat legs carried him rapidly in the direction of the town of Edam. Difficulties there were of course, such as the barrier of the white lodge gate, where old Betty lay in wait for him.

But Toady Lion circ.u.mnavigated Betty by going to the lodge-door and shouting with all his might, "Betty, come quick, p'raps they's some soldiers comin' down the road--maybe Tom's comin', 'oo come and look."

"Sodjers--where?--what?" cried old Betty, waking up hastily from her doze, and fumbling in her pocket for the gate-key.

Toady Lion was at her elbow when she undid the latch. Toady Lion charged past her with a yell. Toady Lion it was who from the safe middle of the highway made the preposterous explanation, "Oh no, they isn't no soldiers. 'Tis only a silly old fish-man wif a tin trumpet."

"Come back, sir, or I'll tell your father! Come back at once!" cried old Betty.

But she might shake her head and nod with her nut-cracker chin till the black beads on her lace "kep" tinkled. All was in vain. Toady Lion was out of reach far down the dusty main road along which the Scots Greys had come the day that Hugh John became a soldier. Toady Lion was a born pioneer, and usually got what he wanted, first of all by dint of knowing exactly what he did want, and then "fighting it out on that line if it took all summer"--or even winter too.

The road to the town of Edam wound underneath trees great and tall, which hummed with bees and gnats that day as Toady Lion sped along, his bare feet "plapping" pleasantly in the white hot dust. He was furtively crying all the time--not from sorrow but with sheer indignation. He hated all his kind. He was going to desert to the Smoutchies. He would be a Comanche Cowboy if they would have him, since his brother and Cissy Carter had turned against him. n.o.body loved him, and he was glad of it. Prissy--oh! yes, but Prissy did not count. She loved everybody and everything, even st.i.tching and dollies, and putting on white thread gloves when you went into town. So he ran on, evading the hay waggons and red farm-carts without looking at them, till in a trice he had crossed Edam Bridge and entered the town--in the glaring streets and upon the hot pavement of which the sunshine was sleeping, and which on Sat.u.r.day forenoon had more than its usual aspect of enjoying a perpetual siesta.

The leading chemist was standing at his door, wondering if the rustic who pa.s.sed in such a hurry could actually be on the point of entering the shop of his hated rival. The linen-draper at the corner under the town clock was divided between keeping an eye on his apprentices to see that they did not spar with yard sticks, and mentally criticising the ludicrous and meretricious window-dressing of his next-door neighbour.

None of them cared at all for the small dusty boy with the tear-furrowed countenance who kept on trotting so steadily through the town, turned confidently up the High Street, and finally dodged into the path which led past the Black Sheds to the wooden bridge which joined the castle island to the butcher's parks. As he crossed the gra.s.s Toady Lion heard a wrathful voice from somewhere calling loudly, "Nipper! Nipper-r-r-r! Oh, wait till I catch you!"

For it chanced that this day the leading butcher in Edam was without the services of both his younger a.s.sistants--his son Nipper and his message boy, Tommy Pratt. Mr. Donnan had a new cane in his hand, and he was making it whistle through the air in a most unpleasant and suggestive manner.

"Get away out of my field, little boy--where are you going? What are you doing there?"

The question was put at short range now, for all unwittingly Sir Toady Lion had almost run into butcher Donnan's arms.

"Please I finks I'se going to Mist'r Burnham's house," explained Toady Lion readily but somewhat unaccurately; "I'se keepin' off the gra.s.s--and I didn't know it was your gra.s.s anyway, please, sir."

At the same time Toady Lion saluted because he also was a soldier, and Mr. Donnan, who in his untempered youth had pa.s.sed several years in the ranks of Her Majesty's line, mechanically returned the courtesy.

"Why, little shaver," he said not unkindly, "this isn't the way to Mr. Burnham's house. There it is over among the trees. But, h.e.l.lo, talk of the--ahem--why, here comes Mr. Burnham himself."

Toady Lion clapped his hands and ran as fast as he could in the direction of the clergyman. Mr. Burnham was very tall, very soldierly, very stiff, and his well-fitting black coat and corded silk waistcoat were the admiration of the ladies of the neighbourhood. He was never seen out of doors without the glossiest of tall hats, and it was whispered that he had his trousers made tight about the calves on purpose to look like a dean. It was also understood in well-informed circles that he was writing a book on the eastward position--after which there would be no such thing as the Low Church. Nevertheless an upright, good, and, above all, kindly heart beat under the immaculate silk M. B. waistcoat; also strong capable arms were attached to the armholes of the coat which fitted its owner without a wrinkle. Indeed, Mr. Burnham had a blue jacket of a dark shade in which he had once upon a time rowed a famous race. It hung now in a gla.s.s cabinet, and was to the clergyman what Sambo Soulis was to General-Field-Marshal Smith.

But as we know, the fear of man dwelt not in Sir Toady Lion, and certainly not fear of his clergyman. He trotted up to him and said, "I wants to go to the castle. You come."

Now hitherto Mr. Burnham had always seen Sir Toady Lion as he came, with shining face and liberally plastered hair, from under the tender mercies of Janet Sheepshanks--with her parting monition to behave (and perhaps something else) still ringing in his ear.

So that it is no wonder that he did not for the moment recognise in the tear-stained, dust-caked face of the barefooted imp who addressed him so unceremoniously, the features of the son of his most prominent parishioner. He gazed down in mildly bewildered surprise, whereupon Toady Lion took him familiarly by the hand and reiterated his request, with an aplomb which had all the finality of a royal invitation.

"Take me to the castle on the island. I 'ants to go there!"

"And who may you be, little boy?"

"Don't 'oo know? 'Oo knows me when 'oo comes to tea at our house!"

cried Toady Lion reproachfully. "I'se Mist'r Smiff's little boy; and I 'ants to go to the castle."

"Why do you want to go to the castle island?" asked Mr. Burnham.

"To find my bruvver Hugh John," said Toady Lion instantly.

The butcher had come up and stood listening silently, after having, with a certain hereditary respect for the cloth, respectfully saluted Mr. Burnham.

"This little boy wants to go on the island to find his brother," said the clergyman; "I suppose I may pa.s.s through your field with him?"

"Certainly! The path is over at the other side of the field. But I don't know but what I'll come along with you. I've lost my son and my message-boy too. It is possible they may be at the castle.

"There is some dust being kicked up among the boys. I can't get my rascals to attend to business at all this last week or two."

And Mr. Donnan again caused his cane to whistle through the air in a way that turned Toady Lion cold, and made him glad that he was "Mr.

Smift's little boy," and neither the son nor yet the errand-boy of the butcher of Edam.

Presently the three came to the wooden bridge, and from it they could see the flag flying over the battlements of the castle, and a swarming press of black figures swaying this way and that across the bright green turf in front.

"Hurrah--yonder they'se fightin'. Come on, Mist'r Burnham, we'll be in time yet!" shouted Toady Lion. "They saided that I couldn't come; and I've comed!"

Suddenly a far-off burst of cheering came to them down the wind. Black dots swarmed on the perilous battlements of the castle. Other black dots were unceremoniously pitched off the lower ramparts into the ditch below. The red and white flag of jacobin rebellion was pulled under, and a clamorous crowd of disturbed jackdaws rose from the turrets and hung squalling and circling over the ancient and lofty walls.

The conflict had indeed joined in earnest. The embattled foes were in the death grips; and, fearful lest he should arrive too late, Toady Lion hurried forward his reinforcements, crying, "Come on both of you!

Come on, quick!" Butcher Donnan broke into a run, while Mr. Burnham, forgetting all about his silk waistcoat, clapped his tall hat on the back of his head and started forward at his best speed, Toady Lion hanging manfully on to the long skirts of his coat, as the Highlanders had clung to the cavalry stirrups at Balaclava till they were borne into the very floodtide of battle.

There were now two trump-cards in the lone hand.