THE POWDER-MINE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4878, 17 February 1894, Page 2

THE POWDER-MINE.

\UX H. GBEEHHOUGH SMITH.] (Strand Magazine.) At five o'clock in the evening of March 21, 1814, the English camp before the walls of Bocq was in a state of high excitement. The town, a stronghold of Napoleon, lay on the * French coast not ' far above the mouth of tbe ! Gironde. It was protected on two sides by the i nature of the ground, and at the rear was open to J the sea. In front stood a massive bastion, whick j for ten days had bade defiance to the artillery of ; the English ; but the sappers had been working j day and night, and at last the tunnel of their * mine had reached tho bastion, and had broken i unexpectedly into a : cellar underneath it. I This cellar, belonging to a house which stood j against the wall inside the town, -was j entered from the house above by a flight j of spiral steps ; so that the miners found j themselves, to their dismay, open to discovery ht | any moment by the inmates of tbe house. They j were compelled to trust to speed and silence to accomplish their design without disturbance; and so far all was well. A store of bags of I powder had been conveyed into the cellar, and i everything was now in readiness for the ex- < plosion, which was to blow the wall into the airaud leave a breach for the storming party to rush J into the town. J Inside the mine— that is, inside the cellar of j which wo have been speaking — half-a-dozen j men had just put tho final touches to the pre- ■! parations. The feeble gleam of a dark lantern, j which scarcely served to show their faces in the | ! gloom, glimmered on a ring of bags which 1 j occupied the middle of the floor, on the black ! and shining grain 3 of gunpowder which filled j them to the brim, and on the snake- ! like loops of fuse which linked them each I to each. This fuse, at one point, ran along tho floor and ended in a piece of slow-match, near the spot at which the opening of tho tunnel gaped blackly in the wall, like a gigantic rats-hole. This match lighted by the man selected for the duty, and tho last to leave the mine, would smoulder for about four minutes. Then tho terrific firework would explode. One by one, five of the sappers passed into tho tunnel and disappeared. The sixth, keeping the dark lantern with him, was left to wait until the passage should be clear before ho touched the match and hastened after his companions. The soldier in question was a young officer of seven - and - twenty — Lieutenant Hilary Vane. He wore the uniform of his regiment — short scarlet coat, blue trousers, and peaked cap — and was armed with sword and pistols. Though not exceptionally tall or broad in figure, he was noted among his comrades for his feats of strength, as well as for his coolness and resource in danger — traits of character apparent in his plain, strcmg features and in his grey-blue, fiery eyes. A physiognomist might, perhaps, have detected in his features a sign of his chief failing, which was too great a readiness to act on | impulse, without giving his calmer judgment time j to speak. j On being left alono he leaned his back against J the wall and waited. A minute passed — two I minutes. Then he stooped his ear to the mouth i of the tunnel and listened intently. Presently from the other end came the faint report of a f pistol-shot; it was the signal that the passage! Was clear. He turned to the spot where the fuse , rested, and, with his finger on the fastening of the lantern, was on the point of drawing back the slide in order to ignite the match which he held ready in his hand, when another sound struck upon his ears — a sound which froze tho current of his blood. Someone wa3 coming down the cellar stairs ! The stair, as already mentioned, formed a spiral, so that only five or six of the lowest stopa were visible. The lieutenant, with his linger on tho slide and his eyes fixed upon the steps, remained perfectly motionless, waiting for the intruder to appear ia sight. One thought only f occupied his mind. If he wero discovered ho would do his duty; he would fling the lighted match into the nearest bag, aud blow himself and the intruder into tho air together. Even as tho thought passed through his mind, he saw the twinkle of a candle, as its bearer turned tho corner of • the steps, and came suddenly to view. The lieutenant caught his breath. The new-comer was a girl. She came slowly down the steps, holding the candle low to see whero she was treading, her face, ringed round with darkness, shining out in its full light. She was young—perhaps seventeen — and as lovely as a picture. 2 Every detail of her figure the lieutenant saw, or j rather felt, burnt in a single instant uuforgetably j upon his brain, as he stood., like a man potrified, with his eyes upon her. A terrible dilemma was before him. True, hia duty was as plain as over, • but he could not— ha could not— send this beautiful young creature to a sudden and a dreadful doom. There was only one alternative — she must escape with him. He held himself

i in readiness and waited, silent as a figure cut in j stone. i From Iho ease of her dem-'iiuour as she came j down the atair, it was clear tint ehe had no suspicion of what had happened in ! the vault. At the bottom of the steps she stopped and, with the candle raised above her head, was about to cross the cellar to a bin which stood against the further waH, when her eye alighted on the bags of powder in the middle ; of the floor. Tor a moment she stood still, gazing at them. Then she raised her eyes, and they fell upon tho form of Hilary Vane, standing motionless before her in the gloom. "With a stifled shriek she turned towards tho steps, up which in an another moment she would have vanished, when Hilary, darting past her, placed himself between her and the exit. She shrank back, staring at the sudden apparation with large eyes wide with terror. He laid his finger on hia lips. " Not a sound, or all is lost," he said, rapidly and eagerly, in French ; " this cellar is a mine and we ara going to blow it up. But fear nothing: you are safe." He pointed with his finger to the tunnel. " Escape instantly : that way; quick, quick! your life depends upon it." " She cast a swift glance at the tunnel ; but to his surprise she did not stir. "Quick!" he repeated, quivering with impatience. "There is not a moment to be lost. Quick! Quick! " So far from obeying him, however, the girl, with the sudden rush of a wild creature, endeavoured to dart past him up the steps. With a movement as rapid as hor own he barred the passage. "Listen!" he said, speaking with a sort of fierce impetuosity. " I wish to save you, but by giving an alarm you risk not only my own life, but the lives of my companions, who will return to aecertain what has gone wrong, and will he taken prisoners. Before that happens, I shall throw this light into the powder there, and end us both together. Come; be reasonable. Will you go?" " No," she said. ""No, no ! " " But why?" he asked, astonished. The girl wrung her hands in agony. " I cannot," she cried, wildly. "My lover is lying wounded in tho house above us. If he dies, I will die with him. I have only left him for a moment — the doctor sent me down to fetch a flask of brandy. Oh, sir," she cried, flinging herself suddenly at Hilary's feet, "spare him, spare him ! for the love of Heaven ! " Hilary paused, in trouble and perplexity. "It is impossible," he said. "I cannot save him if I would; I can save you only. If Ido not fire the mine, my comrades will return and fire it." "Buthy that time the cellar will be guarded by our soldiers, and your comrades will be seized as thoy come in." "Yes, as I said; they will be seized! No, I cannot — I will not — betray my own companions. I would rather, as I told you, throw this match into the powder. And you ! — you must not — you s7iall not — sacrifice your life without avail. No; you must come with me." He advanced a step towards her, resolved to bear her through tho tunnel and to save her in her own despite, touching tho fuse with fire as they departed. But as he moved the girl stepped back a pace and raised the candle in her hand abovo a bag of powder. "Stop!" sheemd. "I refuse, I tell you, to bo saved alone. You have taught me what to do. If you try to take me, I witl drop tho candle." Hilary drew back, petrified. The refusal of the girl doomed them both to death ; yet even at that moment he experienced a relief that the act which sent her to destruction had been taken from his hands. But there was now no method of escape; to delay— to parley— would be to risk the lives of his companions, who might return at any instant to see what was the cause of the delay. Drawing himself erect, he crossed his arms upon his chest, and, with his eyes still fixed upoD the girl, said quietly : — . "So be it. Drop the candle." The girl stood motionless a moment, with her hand outstretched. A tremor shook her frame from liond to foot. Then she shut her eyes, unclasped her fingers, and let the candle fall. Had she kept her eyes unclosed, the candle would have fallen, as she intended, on the powder. As it was, it struck the margin of the bag and thence rebounded to the floor, where it was instantly extinguished, leaving the collar in pitchy darkness. Hilary drew back tho slide of his dark lantern. By its gleam the two looked at each other. Both their faces were as while as ashes. " Fortune is against you," said Hilary, after a silence. "You aro the bravest girl I ever heard of, but you are fated to be saved, do what you will." "Then fate must save my lovor, also," she replied. " Come with me," he repeated, urgently. "To refuse is madness. Quick, or it will be too late ; my comrades will' bo coming back to see what is the matter " He stopped abruptly, struck by an idea. j " Unless," he continued, speaking rapidly, as if reflecting, " unless I stop them. Yes — yes; it might be done. And yet ! Well, yes, it will be a breach of duty, and if I were caught, I should bo shot for it, and what is more, I should deserve my fate. But I must do it." He turned quickly to the girl. "Will you obey me ? " he said earnestly. She looked afc him intently. > " Do you mean to save me only ? " \ " No. I shall try to savo you both," j "Tes," she said, "I will obey." j " Then stand here without moving till I return to you." Drawing a olasp-knife from his pocket, he approached the nearest bag, and, with two swift cuts, divided the fuse which linked^t to the ! bags on either side. Then, cutting off a piece of I the slow-match, and sticking it erect into the powder, he lifted up the bag with his left hand, ! and with the lantsrn in his right he disappeared into the entrance of the tunnel. For soms j seconds the girl could hear his movements, grow- j ing fainter as he receded, until he seemed to be ; I about a hundred feet along the shaft, when all j I Bound ceased entirely for perhap3 ten seconds; | then he was heard hastily returning. When he emerged into the cellar he still held the candle, but the bag was gone. "It is alight," he gstsped, seizing the girl's wrists, and drawing her rapidly towards the cellar steps, up which he hastened until the winding of i 1 the spiral shut them from tho vault below. Then ! he stopped, and listened eagerly. j For some seconds— perhaps half a minute — all j was silent. Then all at once there came the • sound of an explosion ; a blast of air rushed fiercely up the cellar steps ; a thick smoke filled the vault. Then all was still. " Wait," lie said, " I shall return directly" ; and he disappeared into the cellar. Almost instantly he was by her side again. . "All is well," ho said. "The explosion, as I hoped, has caused the sandy soil which roofs the tunnel to fall in. The passage is blocked, and no f one can now enter. " Now," he continued, j "how long will it take you to remove your lover j from the hou3e?" i The girl considered. "Five minutes," she ] said, | " I will give you six. Tho dootor, you will, of - course, take with you. Is there anyone else in » the house ?' ' [ "No." j " Anyone in the street outsido?" | " Yes. The street is crowded with soldiers." | "They must take their chance. Now, go. j But if you give an alarm, and if I hear a step j approaching, I shall fire the powder. If you i follow my directions, you and your lover will be j saved. " I The girl caught his hand ia hers and pressed it ! to her lips. j " Heaven will reward and bless you," she j said, fervidly. "You will .never repent what I you have done to-night." ■ Hilary Vane looked after her as she turned away ' and darted up the steps, and laughed a little , bitterly. She took it for granted that he would ; savo himself, and at the worst be taken prisoner, j But he knew that nothing now remained for j him but to do his duty — and to dio in doing it. I If when he fired the fuse, ho should dash up the cellar steps and escape into the street, the secret of tho mine would be endangered. No ; he had >

' given the girl time to save her life and herlovet's, : but. only at the sacriQco of his own. ; lie drew out his watch, plnced it in tho ; light, and stood motionless, with his eyes fastened on the dial, the match ready in his hand, and his ears stretched for any sound of steps upon tho cellar stairs. But nono came ; the girl had kept her part of the agreement. Tho hand crept forward on the dial. One minute passed — two — three — four — five. A faint sound reached his ear from the tunnel of tho mine ; his comrades had returned H3 far us the spot of the explosion, and were striking at tho dtbris with their pick 3. He almost smiled again as he thought of their bewilderment. Then he looked at the dial plate ; the hand touched tho figure for which he had been waiting. Ho raised his hand which held the lighted match, and, setting his teeth hard, lowered tho flame above tho bag until it touched tho powder. The roar and crash of tho explosion shook earth and sky for ten miles around, as tho huge buildings leapt into tho air in fragments, like a spadeful of gravel tossed up by a strong man. The English storming-party rushed in through tho ruins, and five minutes afterwards thoir flag floated from the walls. But why the explosion had been so long delayed, why the tunnel had collapsed so unaccountably, and why Lieutenant Vane had disappeared, were mysteries discussed that night round every soldier's fire, but which found no solution. And it was not till some days later that a story told by a young girl, and passed with thrilling blood from mouth to mouth, showed how one more English soldier had proved himself a hero.