Long slants of sunlight came through the trees as Jasper rode into Darvel's Wood. The place was a smother of leaves, for the underwood had not been cut for five years or more, and the hazel tops were up among the lower boughs of the oaks. A broad ride ran through the wood from north to south like a gallery tunnelling through the green gloom.
A jay screamed raucously in the distance, but save for the bird's cry the silence was complete. The very sunlight stealing through shone upon leaves that did not quiver. There was an eeriness about the stillness that suggested treachery and secret threats.
For the first time Jasper felt something that was akin to fear. It was a vast uneasiness; a primitive, physical distrust of his surroundings. The wood threw deep shadows, and the shadows lay across his confidence. Was he trusting De Rothan too much by meeting him alone in the middle of this wood? The man might have been warned, and be tempted by his own danger. Their meeting was avowedly for polite and gentlemanly murder, but it was possible that De Rothan might put his honour in his pocket and pull the trigger of his pistol ten seconds too soon. Jasper shivered with a kind of chilly alertness. He found himself favouring swords rather than pistols. There was less chance of trickery with cold steel.
He was not sorry when he came to the clearing in the centre of Darvel's Wood. A horse tied to a tree, and a tall figure walking up and down in the sunlight gave him something real to look at. De Rothan was waiting for him, and he was alone.
The clearing had been used by charcoal-burners years ago, and it was marked in the centre by a circle of sleek and vivid grass that did not look unlike a great fairy-ring. Half of the clearing lay in shadow, the other half in sunlight. The boles of the oak-trees rose like grey-green pillars round it, curtained in between by the foliage of the hazels.
De Rothan swept off his hat and bowed. His grandiose courtesy made Jasper keep a keener eye on him, for he would not have trusted this child of St. Patrick and St. Louis behind his back. A case of pistols and a sword lay on a black cloak at the foot of a tree.
"The very best health to you, Mr. Benham."
His politeness was ironical. The man appeared to be his conceited and condescending self, cynically amused, and not in the least flurried.
Jasper rolled out of the saddle and fastened Devil Dick to a tree. The vague sense of apprehension had left him. He felt hard, and grim, and steady now that he and De Rothan were face to face.
"I am at your service, Chevalier."
"I am charmed, sir. Please choose your weapon. It is immaterial to me whether we fight with sword or pistol."
He swaggered finely, throwing off an air of aristocratic nonchalance.
"I prefer cold steel."
"Excellent, Mr. Benham, excellent. You have given me my own desire. Let it be cold steel. I would rather kill my man with a sword than with a pistol."
He went to the oak-tree, picked up his sword, and came back to Jasper with the most condescending of smiles.
"I see no reason why we should delay, Mr. Benham."
"None at all."
"Very good. We had better fight here in the shade."
They went apart, stripped off coats and waistcoats, and rolled up the sleeves of their sword-arms. De Rothan posed, and made a series of rapid passes and parries, ending the display with a whirl of the sword. He felt the muscles of his right shoulder, and smiled. His forearm was thin and white, and shaded with black hairs.
"More supple than most young men's! You have a fine arm, sir, the arm of a ploughboy. Come—I am at your service."
They took ground, saluted, and crossed swords, De Rothan resting his weight on his left foot, and holding his head with a kind of high fierceness. His eyes looked dangerous yet amused.
Jasper called to mind Jeremy's advice. De Rothan was a man whose vanity might be played with, and who might be lured into despising his opponent. It takes a subtle swordsman to ape clumsiness, and yet to keep a clever adversary out. Jasper tried it, and was nearly run through the shoulder for his pains. The Frenchman's point tore his shirt.
De Rothan's face with its fierce and arrogant eyes was like a foul word flung in Jasper's mouth. His hatred aimed for a body thrust. His swordsmanship caught a sudden flash of brilliance. He had his chance and took it, and saw blood on the Frenchman's shirt.
It was a skin wound, but De Rothan leapt back with a cry of savage surprise. His eyes looked beyond Jasper for the moment to where the head and shoulders of a man showed from behind a tree trunk.
Jasper caught the look, but had to keep face foremost and meet the return rush of De Rothan's sword. The man Gaston had come out from behind the tree, and had his fist raised, whirling a stone. It did no more than strike Jasper between the shoulders, but it staggered him sufficiently to let in De Rothan's sword.
Run through the sword-arm, he was seized from behind, thrown down, with De Rothan, Gaston, and another man on top of him. Grim, silent, yet violent figures, they wasted no words. Jasper's sword was kicked away. He was rolled over on his face, his arms tied behind his back, and his ankles lashed together. Then they lifted him between them, carried him into the thick of the underwood, and threw him down at the foot of a clump of hazels.
De Rothan spoke to Gaston.
"Get the horses. Don't let Benham's beast break away."
He went out into the clearing, put on his coat and waistcoat, and, returning, stood by Jasper, looking down at him with amused contempt.
"Well, Mr. Benham—well, you are no fool with a sword."
Jasper lay in a dumb rage. The lust to resist was still strong in him, and he was savage over the roughness the men had used. The dastardly nature of the whole thing maddened him; also the knowledge that he had been tricked.
"You damned cur!"
Their brevity was expressive, but the words did not appear to hurt De Rothan.
"Mr. Benham, we are playing a critical hand in a great game—that is all. If there is any gratitude in you, you should be grateful to me for not having killed you. Meddlers must not complain if they are treated without ceremony."
His complacency scourged Jasper's sense of savage humiliation.
"This comes of trusting the word of a scoundrel. I was a fool not to have you arrested and shot."
De Rothan took out his snuff-box, and helped himself with finger and thumb.
"So you confess to that, Mr. Benham. It is a relief to me to know that you have been a fool. Now, if you will pardon me, we will have that packet of cipher you stole from my friend last night."
So De Rothan had been warned! Jasper cursed his own self-confidence that had persuaded him to try and carry the adventure through alone. No wonder De Rothan had laid a trap. The bitterest thing of all was that the packet of cipher lay in the breast pocket of his coat.
"Give me the gentleman's coat, François."
A wonderful smile spread over his face as he felt in the pocket and drew out Jerome's packet.
"Mr. Benham, I am obliged to you for being so simple. This may save a great deal of trouble. At all events, you will be spared the vexation of deciphering it."
He put it in his pocket, looking down at Jasper with whimsical self-satisfaction.
"You will have to be my guest for a time, Mr. Benham, and we will have that arm of yours seen to. It may inconvenience you, but that cannot be helped. I must keep you from meddling in my affairs."
Jasper said nothing. He was thinking quickly and angrily, and not greatly to his own content.
"Gaston, I think you have a silk handkerchief there. We had better tie up Mr. Benham's mouth, or he may be too talkative."
They gagged Jasper and bandaged his eyes. Dusk was falling, and De Rothan went back to the clearing to see that the man François had taken up Jasper's sword and pistols.
The wood grew darker each minute. De Rothan, returning, sat down at the foot of a tree with his sword across his knees. He had sent Gaston ahead along the ride to see that no one was loitering there.
It was nearly dark when Gaston returned. De Rothan and he spoke together in undertones. Jasper heard them coming back through the undergrowth. They came close, and he felt himself lifted and carried some yards further into the wood. They placed him on the back of a horse, passed a strap and ropes round him, and lashed him firmly to the beast's back.
Then they started out through the darkness, passed northward along the ride, and halted awhile on the edge of Darvel's Wood. Jasper felt half smothered by the gag, and saliva clogged his throat. The long silence seemed threatening. He wondered what they were going to do.
Then he heard De Rothan's voice.
"Forward. François, go ahead, and keep your eyes and ears open."
They set out along a dark lane, Gaston hanging back awhile with Devil Dick. He gave the horse a stab with a knife, and started him galloping back into the wood. Then he hurried on, and rejoined De Rothan.
Meanwhile, at Stonehanger, Nance sat at her window, listening. Suspense hung in the silent hush of the June night. She was waiting for Jasper to ride back and to tell her that all was well.