It sometimes happened that at those hours when the guard was being changed, seconds and even minutes passed, during which a sentry-box might be empty and a section of the inner wall remain unguarded. It was proposed by the Seven to avail themselves of such a moment in the dusky evening hour before all prisoners were called upon to leave the exercise yard and pass behind locked doors. Between the inner and outer walls of the prison extended a space or patrol ground of ten yards in breadth; but while the inner wall offered no special difficulties, as the sentries\' staircases were built into the side of it, the second wall presented a harder problem. By climbing upon each other\'s shoulders like acrobats it was hoped to scale it, but since the message from the miser, this plan was abandoned in favour of mechanical means.
For necessary apparatus the conspirators looked to Lovey Lee. Her businesslike reply to Stark promised well.
"We must give her more to help us out than the authorities would give her to reveal our plans," explained Commodore Miller. "She would get but three pounds a head for us if she turned traitor. Let her have ten pounds a head to free us and all will probably be done that she can do. Lovey Lee sells herself to the highest bidder. Her only steadfast principle is dollars."
"Suppose I was ter give her a tarnation fright, and let on as her life wouldn\'t be worth a chip if she rounded on us?" suggested David Leverett.
But Stark and Miller protested at such short-sighted policy.
"She won\'t be driven, and she won\'t be frightened," declared the Commodore. "Her friendship is vital now. We\'ve got to submit terms, and they will need to be high."
"Best to offer a hundred pounds right off," said Burnham.
"The difficulty will be to get her to help us without the money in advance," declared Stark.
Then came the great business of the communication to Mrs. Lee. It was duly written and anon reached Lovey tight packed in a huge piece of tobacco. Knapps apparently cut the quid from a roll and handed it to her in exchange for a bundle of watercresses. The woman put it into her cheek at once, and kept it there until opportunity offered to hide it in her pocket. Then, as before, she hastened home upon the completion of market, locked her door, covered her window, and set to work to read.
"We want
Item. A map or picture of the road from Prince Town to the town of Ashburton.
Item. A letter to be delivered to the first prisoner on parole, who shall be seen walking by you along that road, within the measured mile from Ashburton.
Item. An answer to that letter acknowledging its receipt.
Item. A map or picture of the road from Prince Town to your Cottage, so that if one escapes he may lie hid with you, and thus be of service to his friends.
Item. Three hundred yards of thin copper wire in lengths that can be wound up inside a fowl or other bird.
Item. Twenty very large iron nails that may be driven between the stones of masonry.
We offer
One hundred English pounds. Ten will reach you from time to time on market days during the next three weeks. This will be placed between other moneys when we buy and you sell. Ten will reach you on the day that the last of the stipulated articles are received. Ten will reach you on the day that the first man of us gets clear of Prince Town. The balance will reach you when we are all free. There are seven of us. We can only promise by the God of Heaven to keep this contract. We place ourselves in your power, and you must trust us as we trust you."
Lovey Lee reflected long upon this communication. Then she put it aside and ate a meal of black bread and pickled snails. The snails were salted down in a barrel, and she forked them out of their shells and ate them with indifference. Her senses of taste and smell were alike faulty. She cared nothing for food and only drank tea made of wild herbs.
"\'Tis a dreadful risk—an\' me as never trusted a human soul since I was short-coated!" reflected the miser. "Yet nothing venture nothing have. A hundred would make up the thousand down along to Hangman\'s Hollow. An\' it might fall out that after I\'d got their money, \'twould be in my power to give \'em up to the prison people again. Seven of \'em. That would add up to twenty-one pound at three pound a head. There\'ll be ten pound anyway—clean profit afore I do anything. Then I\'ll make a journey, for I\'ve got a bag full of small money waiting to go."
She referred to her secret treasure-house in the Moor. Money she never kept beside her, but conveyed to her hoard at such times as the moon shone after midnight and she could count upon creeping over the wilderness unseen.
Lovey Lee\'s answer was practical. Three days later she tramped to Ashburton and walked ten miles to that town and ten miles back again without weariness. Thus she killed two birds with one stone, for she purchased a hundred yards of thin copper wire, and she refreshed her mind as to the road and its nature. Mile by mile the old woman set down the track upon a sheet of paper bought at Ashburton for that purpose. She marked the features of the land upon it, wrote the names of the adjacent tors, and indicated bridges and rivers across which the highway passed. As for the wire, she purchased it ostensibly to make rabbit-snares, for which purpose it was chiefly sold. A few of the prisoners upon parole she also saw taking exercise, and knew them by their speech.
Upon the following market day, Lovey appeared at the Prison with full baskets, and her big teeth closed tightly under her lips as the turnkey, from some unusual prick of conscience or accession of zeal, stopped her and overhauled her basket.
"Hullo, missis, what\'s this, then?" he inquired, looking at a fine goose.
"Your brother," said Mrs. Lee promptly.
"Then best give him to me to bury decently, though \'twill be a cannibal act. You shall have a shilling for him."
"A shilling! Look at the market rates? Geese be paid according to weight—an\' this ere bird\'s nine pound if it\'s a grain. But ban\'t for you. I promised young Cecil Stark as............