The Rogues

by Jane Yolen

  “It was all bustle and shouting till we were in formation, then it went deathly quiet. It was in that silence we heard them coming, the drumming of forty thousand hooves, the loudest thunder you ever heard.

  “Then they broke over the ridge, like a giant wave bursting the dams of hell. I swear I gripped my musket so tight I came close to snapping it in two. Down the slope they charged, a flood that looked to sweep us away like driftwood. The sun was flashing on their lance points and on the curved blades of their sabers. The horses were snorting like devils in the fury of their charge, kicking up clods of muddy grass as they bore down on us.”

  I could see it all, even in the dark of the cave, but this time I knew better than to say a word.

  He took a wee sip of the jug to wet his mouth, then shouted: “‘Present arms!’”

  I must have jumped a foot.

  “That’s what the captain bellowed. So, I braced the gun against my shoulder and took aim at the oncoming line of horsemen. ‘Fire!’ came the command.

  “Every man of us pulled the trigger at the same moment, and our volley went off with a roar. Fire and smoke billowed out from our lines, bringing down horses and shooting riders right out of their saddles.

  “Then they burst upon our red-coated squares like a raging sea, a mad tide of horseflesh and iron. The horses shied away from our wall of bayonets and the riders swirled about, stabbing and slashing for all they were worth.

  “All around me was a frenzy of reloading, orders being yelled and curses spat into the dust that was flying about us. A French cuirassier, dreadful to behold, sliced the head clean off one of the lads kneeling in front of me. One stroke of his saber and all I saw was his body toppling to the left.”

  I gasped and looked to my left as if expecting to see a headless body there.

  “Then his horse, a huge, terrible beast, black as midnight, took a bayonet in its flank. It reared up high, kicking its forehooves in the air and whinnying its pain. The cuirassier rider waved his bloody sword above the crest of his helmet and roared his defiance at us.

  “Well, I’d reloaded by this time and took careful aim at the beast’s head—and fired. The musket ball tore right through its skull, spilling out its brains, and the poor beast dropped dead right in front of us. The rider fell clear and scrambled to his feet in a fury, yelling curses at us in his Froggy tongue.

  “Instead of running away, he came at us, blade held high. Whether it was revenge for his horse, I dinna know, but I could see in his eyes that he meant to murder as many of as he could while breath remained. I’d nae time to reload again, so I lunged with my musket, driving the point of my bayonet right through his throat.

  “I yanked it free and the blood spurted out over his shiny armor. His eyes were still wide open as he crumpled to the ground. His gloved hand pawed uselessly at his throat, trying to stanch the wound.”

  Dunbar’s eyes had a faraway look to them, and his left hand drifted to his own throat. Then he muttered the same thing he’d said to me earlier: “The taking of a man’s life is a scar that heals hard.” He went silent for a long moment.

  I let out the breath I was holding. I didn’t know whether to be afraid of this man or warm to him. He was a strange puzzle. “What happened then?”

  “Then?” He shook his head. “I dinna remember much after that. They pulled back and charged again, then again and again till we lost count of how many times they’d come. But we didna break. After the battle was won, I was ordered to walk about the field shooting any wounded horses I found lying on the grass.” He lapsed into another silence. “The men we left to die on their own.”

  “It was a famous victory,” I said lamely.

  “They were brave men, those Frenchies,” Dunbar said, “and I suppose they were dying for something they thought worth the price. I only wish to God I knew what it was.” He raised the jug to his lips and took a gulp, then another and another until I began to fear what it might do to him. When he stopped at last, he smacked his lips and spoke with a hard edge to his voice.

  “I fought for money, for the king’s shilling, lad.” He gave a short, hard laugh. “The king—a half-mad German who didna care if I lived or died so long as I kept fighting. There’s glory for ye!”

  I reached tentatively for the jug, hoping to take it away from him before the drink made his mood worse. He glowered at me.

  “Ye’ve had enough, lad,” he said. “Ye’re no a man yet, let alone a rogue. And never, never—lad—never go for a soldier.”

  He pressed the jug to his chest and started singing to himself in a low crooning voice. The song was something about bloody Waterloo. Gradually his chin sank down onto his chest, then softly he began to snore.

  My own eyelids were growing heavy as well, and when I lay down on the bedding, an odd dizziness overcame me. Too much whisky, I thought. Dunbar was right about that, as he was about everything.

  22 THE BUNDLE

  When I woke up, my mouth felt like it had been scoured with sand. Sometime in the night I had rolled off the bedding and must have slept hunched up on the cave’s cold stone floor. My back and legs creaked as I straightened out. I got to my feet, rubbing my eyes and swaying dizzily.

  Aye, too much whisky. One large swig and a few small ones to follow and I was a roaring drunk.

  Dunbar was still slumbering, his face turned away from me, his breathing deep and heavy. One outstretched hand was clenched tight, as if he were clinging fast to something unseen, maybe some memory out of his past.

  I picked up the water jug, but there were only a few drops left in it, scarcely enough to moisten my lips. The early morning sun cast a round shadow through the cave entrance, and a small breeze carried in the scent of high grass and bluebells. Ah—fresh air! I thought. It would clear my stuffy head better than the cramped confines of the Rogue’s lair.

  Dangling the jug by its handle, I stepped outside and took a deep breath. I felt immediately refreshed, but my tongue still tasted of peat and ashes. So I decided to walk down the crag and to the stream at its bottom to fill the jug.

  I was careful, like a rogue, not striding down but picking my way along so that I couldn’t be seen from below. Overhead a hawk soared, and for a brief moment its outstretched wings blotted out the sun. Then it spotted something in the long grass and fell down on its prey. I watched its long stoop and then tried to see where it ate its breakfast, but the grass hid it from view.

  When I reached the thin wee stream, I plunged in the jug, then brought it to my lips, gulping the cold water as thirstily as Dunbar had downed his whisky the night before. Once I’d sated my thirst, I filled the jug to the brim and headed back up the crag to the cave.

  It occurred to me that I could give Dunbar a rude awakening by dashing the cold water over his face as I used to do with Lachlan on those mornings when he was slow to stir. I laughed at the memory, then felt a pang of loss. What if I never saw my eager, good-hearted brother again? I scrubbed my fist against my right eye. After all, rogues don’t cry. And then it suddenly occurred to me that Dunbar wouldn’t take the joke half as well. A comrade was not a brother, no matter how many lives are saved—he saving me from Willie Rood and me saving him from the laird’s men at the still.

  As I walked toward the cave, I suddenly remembered Dunbar’s suspicious behavior of the evening before last, how careful he’d been to glance about him before opening the hiding place, how furtively he had stashed away a bundle like a miser burying ill-gained loot. Loot he was determined to keep from my sight. With him sleeping off his drink, I now had a chance to uncover what it was he’d hidden.

  The boldness of my decision made me feel strong, stronger than the Rogue himself. Quickly, I headed toward his hiding place, but then felt a prickle at the back of my neck, a kind of warning. I admired Dunbar’s courage and skill and didn’t want to spoil the comradeship that had grown up between us. And I admired his fighting abilities. But suspicion is a hard thing to kill. Surely, I told myself, it would be wise to learn
exactly what he was keeping from me. Once I knew what it was, I could tease him with my knowledge and he would realize what a good rogue I could be.

  And then I had another thought. What if the thing hidden in the rocks is the Blessing?

  That thought made me shiver. After all, Dunbar had readily admitted to being a thief. Might he already have done what I’d only been planning? After all, he’d suspected the laird and Rood had taken something from me. Maybe he’d caught the laird before he’d made it back to Kindarry House and had wrested the Blessing from him, afterward rescuing me from Rood’s grasp. Maybe that was why the laird had mounted such a campaign against him.

  Suddenly I knew I had to learn the truth.

  I found the spot easily, then checked around me to make sure I hadn’t been deceived by the early morning shadows. Setting the jug on a rock, I looked guiltily up at the cave to make sure Dunbar wasn’t up and about.

  A sharp cry startled me, but it was only the hawk that, having finished its meal, had taken to the sky again, screaming out its victory.

  I bent over and took hold of the thick, flat rock that was set on top of the others and pulled at it. It was surprisingly heavy. Dunbar had lifted it with such ease. Once again I was reminded how strong he was.

  Setting the stone aside, I gazed at the rough bundle that lay nestled among the rocks. As I lifted it out, I was as careful as I would have been with a swaddled babe. If this were some honest property of Dunbar’s, I didn’t want to give myself away by breaking or nicking anything.

  Laying it on the ground, I crouched over it, slowly peeling aside the coarse wrappings. I don’t know what I expected. Gold bars? Jewels? Silver coins?

  To my surprise, what lay inside was a silver plate embossed with flowers, a trio of painted statuettes—a shepherd and two dogs—and a necklace decorated with a single clear stone.

  As I examined the treasure, a disturbing suspicion dawned on me: I recognized some of these things. But how? Nothing like them had ever adorned our poor cottage, and I had never been anywhere that would be home to such ornaments.

  Except once.

  When I’d been taken to the Lodge.

  Yes, now recognition hit me with a cold shock. I touched the statues in turn, recalling where I had seen them—on a table at Bonnie Josie’s house.

  How could he? I went hot and then cold with anger. Robbing the laird was one thing. But robbing Bonnie Josie …

  Then I made myself stop and think things out calmly. It made quite a bit of sense, for wouldn’t Dunbar regard Bonnie Josie and her mother as people who had plenty, whose family was stealing from the poor folk all they had? And they were much easier targets than the laird, whose house would be bristling with guards.

  But Dunbar knew nothing. Nothing. Josie had been using her own money to help the crofters. To steal from her meant the Rogue was stealing from all of us.

  Another hot flush rushed across my face; my fingers trembled as they touched the damning evidence. I clenched my fists, my heart pounding with the impulse to hurt Dunbar for this betrayal. And I felt ashamed of myself for admiring him, ashamed that I had ever wanted to be like him. The Rogue’s Apprentice? Well, no longer.

  I wrapped the stolen goods as carefully as my passion would allow, picked up the water jug, and started up the hill at a steady march. A part of me wanted to catch Dunbar still asleep and be revenged on him before he could awake, though I couldn’t think how.

  Striding boldly into the cave, I was pulled up short when I saw that he was already sitting up and rubbing his palms against the sides of his head. Good! I thought. His head aches.

  Giving me a tired grin, he stood, arching his back to work out the kinks. “Morning, lad!” he greeted me. “Been out to fetch me some water, have ye?”

  His friendly air made my anger flare afresh. “It’s not water I’ve fetched.” I set the jug down. “It’s this!”

  Bending down, I unwrapped the bundle and spilled the contents carefully at his feet.

  Dunbar’s body stiffened and he fixed me with a hard, questioning glare. Straightening, I met his eyes without flinching. “What do ye think ye’re doing, lad?” His voice was low and grim.

  I swallowed to keep up my courage. “Showing ye up for the damnable thief ye are.”

  “Those are strong words for such a weak boy,” Dunbar said. “Ye’ve time yet to take them back, if ye’re quick about it.”

  He was leaning toward me, his eyes bright with anger. More anger than he should have had, for hadn’t he boasted about being a thief?

  I knew I was no match for him if it came to a fight, but it was then I spotted his musket leaning against the cave wall by the stone wardrobe. It was loaded, I knew, and ready to fire. He usually slept with it by his side.

  Before Dunbar could make a move, I snatched up the musket and leveled it at his chest. I cocked the weapon and set my finger to the trigger.

  The Rogue drew back and eyed me warily. “Do ye mean to murder me then and take the little I have? Is that all the gratitude ye’re capable of?”

  “I recognize those things,” I said, nodding toward the trove on the floor. “They’re from the Lodge. They belong to Bonnie Josie and her mother.”

  “Do they, now …” He never took his eyes off my face.

  “I’ve heard some bad talk about ye, Alan Dunbar, and now I see it’s all true. Ye’d even steal from a widow and her daughter to line yer own pockets.”

  Dunbar’s face was set hard, his voice as sharp as the edge of a sword. “As much as ye owe me, ye’re still keen to think the worst of me, and that is low.”

  My finger ached on the trigger, and I was wary he’d try something. No—I hoped he’d try something, because then I would be justified in shooting him where he stood. “I was a fool ever to believe ye cared for anything but yer own greed,” I said. I felt tears spring to my eyes but fought them back. I wouldn’t let him see my pain—or my weakness—only my anger. “Tie that bundle back up.”

  “Ye’d turn my own gun on me” Dunbar sneered. “Why, Judas himself would spit on ye.”

  “I’ll take no Bible lessons from ye, ye villainous creature,” I answered. I jabbed the musket barrel at him to show I was serious.

  Keeping his eyes fixed on me, Dunbar crouched and re-wrapped his stolen loot. I motioned him to back off, and he retreated, but only a tiny step.

  “So what do ye intend?” he challenged me. “To take these to the laird and make him yer friend? Maybe ye can be the new factor when Willie Rood is busy with his sheep.”

  “I mean to take them back where they came from,” I said, struggling to keep my voice and the gun both steady. “To the Lodge. If ye’re wise, ye’ll flee this place before the law catches up with ye.”

  “Big words … big words,” Dunbar said through gritted teeth. “They’d be smaller, I think, if ye weren’t holding my own gun on me.”

  “Not half as small as yer thief’s heart.” My voice threatened to break. I steadied it as I steeled my hand on the gun.

  “It’s ye that’s the thief, ye two-faced ingrate!” he roared. “Sneaking around behind my back, betraying my trust! If ye were a man, I’d kill ye for it!”

  “I’m man enough!” I shouted back, though my voice sounded thin after his, my anger only a torch to his bonfire. “If there’s any killing, ye won’t be the one to do it.”

  Suddenly the Rogue took a lightning step forward. In one quick move he grabbed the musket barrel and yanked the gun from my hands. My finger was on the trigger, though, and as it came loose, the gun went off, booming like a cannon in the confines of the cave.

  The shock of it startled Dunbar as much as it did me.

  “Ye damned fool!” he exclaimed, tossing the musket aside. “Did ye want to see murder done?”

  “Tell me ye deserve better!” I answered him. My rage was still red hot, driving me to defiance, but almost at once other feelings settled in: shock, grief, loss—and fear. The heat that had possessed me slowly turned to an icy cold. I started t
o shake. My eyes grew watery, my chest heaved with an unwanted sob. Snatching the bundle up off the ground, I whirled about and ran out of the cave. I rushed down the front of the hillside, stumbling as I went, hardly able to see for the grief of it. I had but a minute or two before Dunbar could reload and fire.

  He strode out of the cave and shouted after me. “Aye, run! Run like a dog that’s bitten its master!”

  Though I knew him now for the dirty thief he was, his words still stung me with shame. But because of all he’d done to keep me alive, I ran all the faster trying to escape.

  23 BONNIE JOSIE

  I stumbled and slid down the rugged slope, my heels cutting troughs in the turf. I cared little that I was leaving a trail even a rogue’s apprentice could follow. Clutching the bundle, I tried desperately not to fall. The weight of it made my movements slow and clumsy, but I would not give Dunbar the satisfaction of dropping his loot.

  Above me swallows seem to laugh in the air, circling and diving. But I felt no such laughter inside. The Rogue’s final words still rang in my ears, their bitter edge cutting as a knife. By now he’d had time to reload, and there was I, exposed on the bare hillside. If Dunbar wanted to stop me, I couldn’t outrun a bullet. And he was, by his own admission, a fine shot.

  I tried to pray but feared God would never listen to such a sinner as I. And if Dunbar fired, I doubted I would even hear the shot before it killed me. Forcing myself not to look back, I kept on running.

  At the bottom of the hill I took a deep breath. Perhaps Dunbar’s villainy had already reached its depth in the robbery and he wouldn’t sink to cold-blooded murder. After all, he’d let the men at the still go free with no more than a fierce warning.

  I had to find Josie and her mother and return their property to them. That and warn them about Dunbar and his thieving ways.

  Wading the stream, I felt a pain in my heart. I knew what it was: I’d lost my only ally.

  Worse, I told myself, I let him charm me into thinking him a better man than he is.