“Well, well,” said Roughwood, smilingly resigning himself to the other’s sense of security, “I hope your confidence will be justified to the end of the journey. But when we come to my own county, where I am well known, there indeed we must needs go warily.”
“Why, then, of course, we shall stir only by night,” said Everell. “And we shall not tarry long, if all goes well.”
“Only till I can see her,” replied his friend, in a voice low with sadness and tenderness. A brief silence fell between the two young men, till Roughwood added, “One last meeting! And then to part,—for how long, God knows!”
“Oh, you may come back to England safely in two or three years. When the government has made examples enough, there will be a general pardon; or at worst a Jacobite may slink back and his presence be winked at. So much if our cause be never revived; if it _be_ revived, we may be able to come back openly enough.”
Roughwood shook his head. “’Twill never be revived to any purpose. We can never rally a larger force than we had this time; yet one can see plainly now how vain our hopes were from the first. No, ’twas a dream, a dream. The house of Hanover is firmly established in these kingdoms: the star of the Stuarts is set. If a general pardon is ever granted us, it will be for that reason,—because we can do no harm. But, meanwhile, ’tis the day of punishment, and we must look to our necks. After I have seen her, we have only to find Budge, and lie hid till he happens to be sailing.”
The arrival of a maid with their dinner put a stop for the time to this kind of conversation, in which they but reviewed their situation as they had done a score of times within the past few days. They had ordered frugally, out of respect to the state of their common purse, which they counted upon to carry them to the place near which lived both Roughwood’s affianced wife—with whom it was his hope to exchange assurances of faith and devotion ere he fled his native country—and the master of a certain vessel, upon whom he relied for their conveyance across the channel. Roughwood had relations at this place, but, as they sympathized not with his Jacobitism, which he had acquired through his Scottish kin, he considered it imprudent to seek a further supply of money from them. Once in France, however, he could communicate in safety with his sources of maintenance. As for Everell, the modest but sufficient fortune he inherited from his Jacobite father had long been placed in France, and would be at his command as soon as he reached Paris. The young men were now travelling upon the remainder of the gold with which both had fortunately been supplied a few days before the battle of Culloden. They had not had occasion to spend money during the months of concealment immediately following upon the total defeat of their cause at that contest, their hiding-place—first a “bothy” and afterwards a cave—having been on the estate of a Highland gentleman who shared in their seclusion, and by whose adherents he and they were fed.