Page 201 - A Jacobite Exile

Nor had any of the others.

"Then it will be no use to pursue. He has had more than half an hour's start,
and long before this he will have mounted Ben Soloman's horse, and have

ridden off.

"Well, comrade," he said, turning to Charlie, "this settles your movements.

I was but half in earnest before as to your joining us; but it is clear now that
there's nothing else for you to do, for the present. This fellow will, directly

he gets to Warsaw, denounce you as the murderer of his master. That he is
sure to do to avert suspicion from himself, and, if you were to return there,
it would go hard with you. So, for a time, you must throw in your lot with

us."

When this was translated to Charlie, he saw at once the force of the
argument. He could not have denied that the Jew had fallen in a
hand-to-hand struggle with himself, and, were he to appear in Warsaw, he

might be killed by the co-religionists of Ben Soloman; or, if he escaped
this, might lie in a dungeon for months awaiting his trial, and perhaps be

finally executed. There was nothing for him now but to rejoin the Swedes,
and it would be some time, yet, before he would be sufficiently recovered
to undertake such a journey.

"I should not mind, if I could send a letter to Allan Ramsay, to tell him

what has befallen me. He will be thinking I am dead, and will, at any rate,
be in great anxiety about me."

"I have taken a liking to you, young fellow," the leader said, "and will send
in one of my men to Warsaw with a letter; that is, if you can write one."

"Yes, I can write. Fortunately there are paper, pen, and an ink horn on that
shelf. Ben Soloman brought them the last time he came, to write down the

lies he wanted me to testify to. I am greatly obliged to you, and will do it at
once."