Beau Brocade | Page 2

of
high treason and by the laws of the kingdom are condemned to death. It
is further enacted that it is unlawful for any loyal subject of the King to
shelter or harbour, clothe or feed any such persons who are vile traitors
and rebels to their King and country: and that any subject of His
Majesty who kills such a traitor or rebel doth thereby commit and act of
justice and loyalty, for which he may be rewarded by the sum of twenty
guineas."
It was this last paragraph that made the gaffers shake their heads and
say "Lordy! Lordy! to think on it! to think on it!" For it seemed but
yesterday that the old Moor, aye, and the hamlets and villages of
Derbyshire, were ringing with the wild shouts of Prince Charlie's
Highland Brigade, but yesterday that his handsome face, his green
bonnet laced with gold, his Highland plaid and rich accoutrements, had
seemed to proclaim victory to the Stuart cause from one end of the
country to the other.
To be sure, that glorious, mad, merry time had not lasted very long. All
the wiseacres had foretold disaster when the Prince's standard broke,
just as it was taken into my Lord Exeter's house in Full Street. The
shaft had snapped clean in half. What could that portend but
humiliation and defeat?
The retreat from Derby was still fresh in everyone's memory, and there
were those from Wirksworth who remembered the rear-guard of Prince
Charlie's army, the hussars with their half-starved horses and
bedraggled finery, who had swept down on the villages and homesteads
round about Ashbourne and had pillaged and plundered to their heart's
content.

But then those were the fortunes of war; fighting, rushing, running,
plundering, wild huzzars, mad cavalcades, noise, bustle, excitement,
joy of victory, and sorrow of defeat;--but this!!... this Proclamation
which the Corporal had brought all the way from Derby, and which had
been signed by King George himself, this meant silence, hushed
footsteps, a hidden figure perhaps, pallid and gaunt, hiding behind the
boulders, or amidst the gorse on the Moor, or perishing mayhap at night,
lost in the bog-land up Stretton way, whilst Judas-like treads crept
stealthily on the track. It meant treachery too, the price of blood, a
fellow-creature's life to be sold for twenty guineas.
No wonder the gaffers could think of nothing to say; no wonder the
young men looked at one another shamefaced, and in fear.
Who knows? Any Derbyshire lad now might become a human
bloodhound, a tracker of his fellow-creatures, a hunter of men. There
were twenty guineas to be earned, and out there on the Heath, in the hut
of the shepherd or the forge of the smith, many a pale wan face had
been seen of late, which...
It was terrible to think on; for even out here, on Brassing Moor, there
existed some knowledge of Tyburn Gate, and of Tower Hill.
At last the groups began to break up, the Corporal's work was done. His
Majesty's Proclamation would flutter there in the cool September wind
for awhile; then presently the crows would peck at it, the rain would
dash it down, the last bit of dirty rag would be torn away by an October
gale, but in the meanwhile the few inhabitants of Brassington and those
of Aldwark would know that they might deny a starving
fellow-creature bread and shelter, aye! and shoot him too, like a wild
beast in a ditch, and have twenty guineas reward to boot.
"I've seen nought of John Stich, Master Inch," said the Corporal at last.
"Be he from home?"
And he turned to where, just in the fork of the road, the thatched
cottage, with a glimpse of the shed beyond it, stood solitary and still.

"Nay, I have not observated that fact, Master Corporal," replied Master
Inch, clearing his throat for some of those words which had gained for
him wide-spread admiration for miles around. "I had not observated
that John Stich was from home. Though in verity it behooves me to say
that I do not hear the sound of Master Stich's hammer upon his anvil."
"Then I'll go across at once," said the Coporal. "Forward, my men!
John Stich might have saved me the trouble," he added, groping in his
wallet for another copy of His Majesty's Proclamation.
"Nay, Master Corporal, do not give yourself the futile trouble of
traversing the muddy road," said Mr. Inch, sententiously. "John Stich is
a loyal subject of King George, and by my faith! he would not
harbourgate a rebel, take my word for it. Although, mind you, Mr.
Corporal, I have oft suspicionated..."
Mr. Inch, the beadle, looked cautiously round; all the pompousness of
his manner had vanished in a trice. His broad face beneath the