A roar of delight from John Shakespeare broke the spell. The company echoed it with round upon round of hand-clapping. The music ceased suddenly, and the dancer, dipping low until her knees brushed the floor, stood erect again, dropped her arms, and turned carelessly to the nearest table.
"Bravo! bravissimo!" thundered John Shakespeare. "A cup of wine for her, there!"
The girl had snatched up a crust of bread and was gnawing it ravenously. He thrust his way through the guests and poured out wine for her. She took the glass with a steady hand, scarcely pausing in her meal to thank him.
"But who is your master of ceremonies?" demanded the page's piping voice.
William Shakespeare heard it and turned. "He is my father," said he quietly.
But John Shakespeare had heard also. Wheeling about, wine-flask in hand, he faced the lad with a large and mock-elaborate bow. "That, young Sir, must be my chief title to your notice. For the rest, I am a plain gentleman of Warwickshire, of impaired but (I thank God) bettering fortune; my name John Shakespeare; my coat, or, a bend sable, charged with a lance proper. One of these fine days I may bring it to Court for you to recognise: but, alas! says Skelton—
Age is a pageFor the Court full unmeet,For age cannot rageNor buss her sweet sweet.
I shall bide at home and kiss the Queen's hand, through my son, more like."
"Indeed," said the page, "I hear reports that her Majesty hath already a mind to send for him."
"Is that so, Will?" His father beamed, delighted.
"In some sort it is," answered Herbert, "and in some sort I am her messenger's forerunner. She will have a play of thee, Will."
"The Queen?" Shakespeare turned on him sharply. "This is a fool's trick you play on me, my Lord." Yet his face flushed in spite of himself.
"I tell thee, straight brow and true man, I heard the words fall from her very lips. 'He shall write us a play,' she said; 'and this Falstaff shall be the hero on't, with no foolish royalties to overlay and clog his mirth.'"
"And, you see," put in the page maliciously, "we have come express to the Boar's Head to seek him out."
"That," Herbert added, "is our suit to-night."
"Will, lad, thy fortune's made!" John Shakespeare clapped a hand on his son's shoulder. "I shall see thee Sir William yet afore I die!"
If amid the general laughter two lines of vexation wrote themselves for a moment on Shakespeare's brow they died out swiftly. He stood back a pace, eyed his father awhile with grave and tender humour, and answered the pair of courtiers with a bow.
"Her Majesty's gracious notion of a play," said he, "must needs be her poor subject's pattern. If then I come to Court in motley, you, Sirs, at least will be indulgent, knowing how much a suit may disguise." The page, meeting his eye, laughed uneasily. "'Tis but a frolic——" he began.
"Ay, there's the pity o't," interrupted a deep voice—Kempe's.
The page laughed again, yet more nervously. "I should have said the Queen—God bless her!—desires but a frolic. And I had thought"—here he lifted his chin saucily and looked Kempe in the face—"that on Bankside they took a frolic less seriously."
"Why, no," answered Kempe: "they have to take it seriously, and the cost too,—that being their business."
"'Tis but a frolic, at any rate, that her Majesty proposes, with a trifling pageant or dance to conclude, in which certain of the Court may join."
A harsh laugh capped this explanation. It came from the dancing-girl, who, seated at the disordered table, had been eating like a hungry beast. She laid down her knife, rested her chin on her clasped hands, and, munching slowly, stared at the page from under her sullen, scornful brows.
"Wouldst learn to dance, child?" she demanded.
"With thee for teacher," the page answered modestly. "I have no skill, but a light foot only."
"A light foot!" the woman mimicked and broke into a laugh horrible to hear. "Wouldst achieve such art as mine with a light foot? I tell thee that to dance as I dance thy feet must go deep as hell!" She pushed back her plate, and, rising, nodded to the musicians. "Play, you!" she commanded.
This time she used no wild whirl down the room to give her impetus. She stood in the cleared space of floor, her arms hanging limp, and at the first shrill note of the pipe began to revolve onthe points of her toes, her eyes, each time as they came full circle, meeting the gaze of the page, and slowly fascinating, freezing it. As slowly, deliberately, her hand went up, curved itself to the armpit of her bodice; and lo! as she straightened it aloft, a snake writhed itself around her upper arm, lifting its head to reach the shining bracelets, the jewelled fingers. A curving lift of the left arm, and on that too a snake began to coil and climb. Effortless, rigid as a revolving statue, she brought her finger-tips together overhead and dipped them to her bosom.
A shriek rang out, piercing high above the music.
"Catch her! She faints!" shouted Kempe, darting forward. But it was Shakespeare who caught the page's limp body as it dropped back on his arm. Bearing it to the window, he tore aside the curtain and thrust open a lattice to the dawn. The unconscious head drooped against his shoulder.
"My Lord"—he turned on Herbert as though the touch maddened him—"you are a young fool! God forgive me that I ever took you for better! Go, call a boat and take her out of this."
"Nay, but she revives," stammered Herbert, as the page's lips parted in a long, shuddering sigh.
"Go, fetch a boat, I say!—and make way there, all you by the door!"
VI
"Tut! tut!—the wench will come to fast enough in the fresh air. A dare-devil jade, too, to be sparking it on Bankside at this hour! But it takes more than a woman, they say, to kill a mouse, and with serpents her sex hath an ancient feud. What's her name, I wonder?"
The candles, burning low and guttering in the draught of the open window, showed a banquet-hall deserted, or all but deserted. A small crowd of the guests—our apprentice among them—had trooped downstairs after Shakespeare and his burden. Others, reminded by the grey dawn, had slipped away on their own account to hire a passage home from the sleepy watermen before Paris Garden Stairs.
"Can any one tell me her name, now?" repeated John Shakespeare, rolling to the table and pouring himself yet another glass of wine. But no one answered him. The snake-woman had folded back her pets within her bodice and resumed her meal as though nothing had happened. The burly drummer had chosen a chair beside her and fallen to on the remains of a pasty. Both wereeating voraciously. Francisco, the pipe-player, sat sidesaddle-wise on a form at a little distance and drank and watched them, still with the horror in his eyes. One or two women lingered, and searched the tables, pocketing crusts—searched with faces such as on battlefields, at dawn, go peering among the dead and wounded.
"But hullo!" John Shakespeare swung round, glass in hand, as the apprentice stood panting in the doorway. "Faith, you return before I had well missed you."
The lad's eyes twinkled with mischief.
"An thou hasten not, master, I fear me thou may'st miss higher game; with our hosts—your son amongst 'em—even now departing by boat and, for aught I know, leaving thee to pay the shot."
"Michael and all his angels preserve us! I had forgot——"
John Shakespeare clapped a hand on his empty pocket, and ran for the stairhead. "Will!" he bawled. "Will! My son Will!"
The apprentice laughed and stepped toward the window, tittuping slightly; for (to tell the truth) he had drunk more wine than agreed with him. Standing by the window, he laughed again vacuously, drew a long breath, and so spun round on his heels at the sound of a choking cry and a rush offeet. With that he saw, as in a haze—his head being yet dizzy—the heavy man catch up his drum by its strap and, using it as a shield, with a backward sweep of the arm hurl off the youth Francisco, who had leapt on him knife in hand. Clutching the curtain, he heard the knife rip through the drum's parchment and saw the young man's face of hate as the swift parry flung him back staggering, upsetting a form, against the table's edge. He saw the glasses there leap and totter from the shock, heard their rims jar and ring together like a peal of bells.
The sound seemed to clear his brain. He could not guess what had provoked the brawl; but in one and the same instant he saw the drummer reach back an arm as if to draw the dancing woman on his knee; heard his jeering laugh as he slipped a hand down past her bare shoulder; saw her unmoved face, sullenly watching; saw Francisco, still clutching his knife, gather himself up for another spring. As he sprang the drummer's hand slid round from behind the woman's back, and it too grasped a knife. An overturned chair lay between the two, and the rail of it as Francisco leapt caught his foot, so that with a clutch he fell sideways against the table. Again the glasses jarred and rang, and yet again and more loudly asthe drummer's hand went up and drove the dagger through the neck, pinning it to the board. The youth's legs contracted in a horrible kick, contracted again and fell limp. There was a gush of blood across the cloth, a sound of breath escaping and choked in its escape: and as the killer wrenched out his knife for a second stroke, the body slid with a thud to the floor.
The apprentice had feasted, and feasted well; yet throughout the feast (he bethought himself of this later), no serving-man and but one serving-maid had entered the room. Wines and dishes had come at call to a hatch in the wall at the far end of the room. One serving-maid had done all the rest, moving behind the guests' chairs with a face and mien which reminded him of a tall angel he had seen once borne in a car of triumph at a City show. But now as he left his curtain, twittering, crazed with fear, spreading out both hands toward the stain on the tablecloth, a door beside the hatch opened noiselessly, and swift and prompt as though they had been watching, two men entered, flung a dark coverlet over the body, lifted and bore it off, closing the door behind them. They went as they had come, swiftly, without a word. He had seen it as plainly as he saw now the murderer sheathing his knife, the womansullenly watching him. The other women, too, had vanished—they that had been gleaning among the broken crusts. Had they decamped, scurrying, at the first hint of the brawl? He could not tell: they had been, and were not.
He stretched out both hands towards the man, the woman—would they, too, vanish?—and the damning stain? A cry worked in his throat, but would not come.
"Gone!" a voice called, hearty at once and disconsolate, from the doorway behind him. "Gone—given me the slip, as I am a Christian sinner. What? You three left alone here? But where is our friend the piper?"
The apprentice made a snatch at a flask of wine, and, turning, let its contents spill wildly over the bloodied tablecloth.
"Art drunk, lad—shamefully drunk," said John Shakespeare, lurching forward. "They have given me the slip, I say, and ne'er a groat have I to redeem my promises."
"They paid the score below—I saw them; and this thy son charged me to hand to thee." The apprentice drew a full purse from his pocket and flung it on the table. "I—I played thee a trick, master: but let me forth into fresh air. This room dizzies me...."
"Go thy ways—go thy ways, child. For my part I was ever last at a feast to leave it, and would crack one more cup with these good folk. To your health, Madam!" He reached a hand for the wine-flask as the apprentice set it down and went forth, tottering yet.
VII
Dawn was breaking down the river; a grey dawn as yet, albeit above the mists rolling low upon the tideway a clear sky promised gold to come—a golden Christmas Day. The mist, however, had a chill which searched the bones. The red-eyed waterman pulled as though his arms were numb. Tom Nashe coughed and huddled his cloak about him, as he turned for a last backward glance on Bankside, where a few lights yet gleamed, and the notes of a belated guitar tinkled on, dulled by the vapours, calling like a thin ghost above the deeper baying of the hounds.
"Take care of thyself, lad," said Shakespeare kindly, stretching out a hand to help his friend draw the cloak closer.
"Behoved me think of that sooner, I doubt," Nashe answered, glancing up with a wry, pathetic smile, yet gratefully. He dropped his eyes to the cloak and quoted—
"Sometime it was of cloth-in-grain,'Tis now but a sigh-clout, as you may see;It will hold out neither wind nor rain—
and—and—I thank thee, Will——
But I'll take my old cloak about me.
There's salt in the very warp of it, good Yarmouth salt. Will?"
"Ay, lad?"
"Is't true thou'rt become a landowner, down in thy native shire?"
"In a small way, Tom."
"A man of estate? with coat-of-arms and all?"
"Even that too, with your leave."
"I know—I know.Nescio qua natale solum—those others did not understand: but I understood. Yes, and now I understand that fifth act of thine, which puzzled me afore, and yet had not puzzled me; but I fancied—poor fool!—that the feeling was singular in me. 'Twas a vile life, Will." He jerked a thumb back at Bankside.
"Ay, 'tis vile."
"My cough translates it into the past tense; but—then, or now, or hereafter—'tis vile. Count them up, Will—the lads we have drunk with aforetime. There was Greene, now——"
Shakespeare bent his head for tally.
"—I can see his poor corse staring up at the rafters: there on the shoemaker's bed, with a chaplet of laurel askew on the brow. The woman meant it kindly, poor thing!... She forgot to close his eyes, though. With my own fingers I closed 'em, and borrowed two penny pieces of her for weights. 'Twas the first dead flesh I had touched, and I feel it now.... But George Peele was worse, ten times worse. I forget if you saw him?"
Again Shakespeare bent his head.
"And poor Kit? You saw Kit, I know ... with a hole below the eye, they told me, where the knife went through. And that was our Kit, our hope, pride, paragon, our Daphnis. Damnation, and this is art! Didst hear that blotch-faced youngster, that Scotchman, how he prated of it, laying down the law?"
"That Jonson, Tom, is a tall poet, or will be."
"The devil care I! Tall poet or not, he is no Englishman and understands not the race. Art is not for us. We have dreamed dreams, thou and I: and thy dreams are coming to glory. But the last dream of a true Englishman is to own a few good English acres and die respected in a dear, if narrow, round. Dear Will, there is more in this than greed. There is the call of the land, which is home. For me—thou knowest—I hadne'er the gift of saving. My bolt is shot, or almost: two years at farthest must see the end of me. But when thou rememberest, bethink thee that I understood the call. Wilt guess what I am writing, now at the last? A great book—a sound book—and all of the red-herring! Ay, the red-herring, staple of my own Yarmouth. Canst never, as an inland man, rise to the virtues of that fish nor to the merit of my handling. But I have read some pages of it to my neighbours there and I learn from their approving looks that I shall die respected. Yet I, too, forgot and dreamed of art...."
On the Bankside at the foot of Paris Garden Stairs, deserted now of watermen, a youth sat with his teeth chattering.
Above, while he tried to clench his teeth, a window opened stealthily. There was a heavy splash on the tideway, and the window shut to, softly as it had opened. He watched. He was past fear. The body bobbed once to the surface, half a furlong below the spreading, fading circles thrown to the foot of Paris Garden Stairs. It did not rise again. The Bankside knew its business.
A heavy footfall came down the steps to the landing-stage.
"A glorious night!"
The apprentice watched the river.
"A glorious night! A night to remember! Tell me, lad, have I made good my promises, or have I not?"
"They rise thrice before sinking, I have always heard," twittered the lad.
"What the devil art talking of? Here, take my cloak, if thou feelest the chill. The watermen here ply by shifts, and we shall hail a boat anon to take us over. Meanwhile, if thou hast eyes, boy, look on the river—see the masts there, below bridge, the sun touching them!—see the towers yonder, in the gold of it!
London, thou art the flower of cities all!
—Eh, lad?"
The sun's gold, drifted through the fog, touched the side of a small row-boat nearing the farther shore. Behind, and to right and left along Bankside, a few guitars yet tinkled. Across the tide came wafted the voices of London's Christmas bells.
YE SEXES, GIVE EAR!
A STORY FROM A CHIMNEY-CORNER
A good song, and thank 'ee, Sir, for singing it! Time was, you'd never miss hearing it in these parts, whether 'twas feast or harvest-supper or Saturday night at the public. A virtuous good song, too; and the merry fellow that made it won't need to cast about and excuse himself when the graves open and he turns out with his fiddle under his arm. My own mother taught it to me; the more by token that she came from Saltash, and "Ye sexes, give ear" was a terrible favourite with the Saltash females by reason of Sally Hancock and her turn-to with the press-gang. Hey? You don't tell me, after singing the song, that you never heard tell of Sally Hancock? Well, if——I Here, take and fill my mug, somebody!
'Tis an instructive tale, too.... This Sally was a Saltash fishwoman, and you must have heard ofthemat all events. There was Bess Rablin, too, and Mary Kitty Climo, and Thomasine Oliver, and Long Eliza that married Treleaventhe hoveller, and Pengelly's wife Ann; these made up the crew Sally stroked in the great race. And besides these there was Nan Scantlebury—she took Bess Rablin's oar the second year, Bess being a bit too fond of lifting her elbow, which affected her health—and Phemy Sullivan, an Irishwoman, and Long Eliza's half-sister Charlotte Prowse, and Rebecca Tucker, and Susan Trebilcock, that everybody called "Apern," and a dozen more maybe: powerful women every one, and proud of it. The town called them Sally Hancock's Gang, she being their leader, though they worked separate, shrimping, cockling, digging for lug and long-lining, bawling fish through Plymouth streets, even a hovelling job at times—nothing came amiss to them, and no weather. For a trip to Plymouth they'd put on sea-boots belike, or grey stockings and clogs: but at home they went bare-legged, and if they wore anything 'pon their heads 'twould be a handkerchief, red or yellow, with a man's hat clapped a-top; coats too, and guernseys like men's, and petticoats a short few inches longer; for I'm telling of that back-along time when we fought Boney and while seafaring men still wore petticoats—in these parts at any rate. Well, that's how Sally and her mates looked on week-a-days, and that'show they behaved: but you must understand that, though rough, they were respectable; the most of them Wesleyan Methodists; and on Sundays they'd put on bonnet and sit in chapel, and drink their tea afterwards and pick their neighbours to pieces just like ordinary Christians. Sal herself was a converted woman, and greatly exercised for years about her husband's condition, that kept a tailor's shop half-way down Fore Street and scoffed at the word of Grace; though he attended public worship, partly to please his customers and partly because his wife wouldn't let him off.
The way the fun started was this. In June month of the year 'five (that's the date my mother always gave) the Wesleyans up at the London Foundry sent a man down to preach a revival through Cornwall, starting with Saltash. He had never crossed the Tamar before, but had lived the most of his life near Wolverhampton—a bustious little man, with a round belly and a bald head and high sense of his own importance. He arrived on a Saturday night, and attended service next morning, but not to take part in it: he "wished to look round," he said. So the morning was spent in impressing everyone with his shiny black suit of West-of-England broadcloth and his beautiful neckcloth and bunch of seals. But in the evening he climbed the pulpit, and there Old Nick himself, that lies in wait for preachers, must have tempted the poor fellow to preach on Womanly Perfection, taking his text from St. Paul.
He talked a brave bit about subjection, and how a woman ought to submit herself to her husband, and keep her head covered in places of public worship. And from that he passed on to say that 'twas to this beautiful submissiveness women owed their amazing power for good, and he, for his part, was going through Cornwall to tackle the women-folk and teach 'em this beautiful lesson, and he'd warrant he'd leave the whole county a sight nearer righteousness than he found it. With that he broke out into axtempory prayer for our dear sisters, as he called them, dusted his knees, and gave out the hymn, all as pleased as Punch.
Sal walked home from service alongside of her husband, very thoughtful. Deep down in the bottom of his heart he was afraid of her, and she knew it, though she made it a rule to treat him kindly. But knowing him for a monkey-spirited little man, and spiteful as well as funny, you could never be sure when he wouldn't break out.To-night he no sooner gets inside his own door than says he with a dry sort of a chuckle—
"Powerful fine sermon, this evenin'. A man like that makes youthink."
"Ch't!" says Sally, tossing her bonnet on to the easy-chair and groping about for the tinder-box.
"Sort of doctrine that's badly needed in Saltash," says he. "But I'd ha' bet 'twould be wasted on you. Well, well, if you can't understand logic, fit and fetch supper, that's a good soul!"
"Ch't!" said Sally again, paying no particular attention, but wondering what the dickens had become of the tinder-box. She couldn't find it on the chimney-piece, so went off to fetch the kitchen one.
When she came back, there was my lord seated in the easy-chair—that was hers by custom—and puffing away at his pipe—a thing not allowed until after supper. You see, he had collared the tinder-box when he first came in, and had hidden it from her.
Sal lit the lamp, quiet-like. "I s'pose you know you're sittin' 'pon my best bonnet?" said she.
This took him aback. He jumped up, foundthe bonnet underneath him sure enough, and tossed it on to the table. "Gew-gaws!" said he, settling himself down again and puffing. "Gew-gaws and frippery! That man'll do good in this country; he's badly wanted."
Sal patted the straw of her bonnet into something like shape and smoothed out the ribbons. "If it'll make you feel like a breadwinner," said she, "there's a loaf in the bread-pan. The cold meat and pickles are under lock and key, and we'll talk o' them later." She fitted the bonnet on and began to tie the strings.
"You don't tell me, Sarah, that you mean to go gadding out at this time of the evening?" cries he, a bit chapfallen, for he knew she carried the keys in an under-pocket beneath her skirt.
"And you don't suppose," answers she, "that I can spare the time to watch you play-actin' in my best chair? No, no, my little man! Sit there and amuse yourself: whatyoudo don't make a ha'porth of odds. But there's others to be considered, and I'm going to put an end to this nonsense afore it spreads."
The time of the year, as I've told you, was near about midsummer, when a man can see to read print out-of-doors at nine o'clock. Service over, the preacher had set out for a stroll across thehayfields towards Trematon, to calm himself with a look at the scenery and the war-ships in the Hamoaze and the line of prison-hulks below, where in those days they kept the French prisoners. He was strolling back, with his hands clasped behind him under his coat-tails, when on the knap of the hill, between him and the town, he caught sight of a bevy of women seated among the hay-pooks—staid middle-aged women, all in dark shawls and bonnets, chattering there in the dusk. As he came along they all rose up together and dropped him a curtsey.
"Good evenin', preacher dear," says Sally, acting spokeswoman; "and a very fine night for the time of year."
I reckon that for a moment the preacher took a scare. Monstrous fine women they were to be sure, looming up over him in the dimmety light, and two or three of them tall as Grenadiers. But hearing himself forespoken so pleasantly, he came to a stand and peered at them through his gold-rimmed glasses.
"Ah, good evening, ladies!" says he. "You are, I presoom, members of the society that I've just had the privilege of addressin'?" And thereupon they dropped him another curtsey altogether. "Like me, I dare say you find thescent of the new-mown hay refreshingly grateful. And what a scene! What a beautiful porch, so to speak, to the beauties of Cornwall!—beauties of which I have often heard tell."
"Yes, Sir," answers Sal demurely. "Did you ever hear tell, too, why Old Nick never came into Cornwall?"
"H'm—ha—some proverbial saying, no doubt? But—you will excuse me—I think we should avoid speaking lightly of the great Enemy of Mankind."
"He was afraid," pursued Sal, "of being put into a pie." She paused at that, giving her words time to sink in. The preacher didn't notice yet awhile that Long Eliza Treleaven and Thomasine Oliver had crept round a bit and planted themselves in the footpath behind him.
After a bit Sal let herself go in a comfortable smile, and says she, in a pretty, coaxing voice, "Sit yourself down, preacher, that's a dear: sit yourself down, nice and close, and have a talk!"
The poor fellow fetched a start at this. He didn't know, of course, that everyone's "my dear" in Cornwall, and I'm bound to say I've seen foreigners taken aback by it—folks like commercial travellers, not given to shyness as a rule.
"You'll excuse me, Madam."
"No, I won't: not if you don't come and sit down quiet. Bless the man, I'm not going to eat 'ee—wouldn't harm a hair of your dear little head, if you had any! What? You refuse?"
"How dare you, Madam!" The preacher drew himself up, mighty dignified. "How dare you address me in this fashion!"
"I'm addressin' you for your good," answered Sally. "We've been talkin' over your sermon, me and my friends here—all very respectable women—and we've made up our minds that it won't do. We can't have it 'pon our conscience to let a gentleman with your views go kicking up Jack's delight through the West. We owe something more to our sex. 'Wrestlin'' with 'em—that was one of your expressions—'wrestlin' with our dear Cornish sisters'!"
"In the spirit—a figure of speech," explained the poor man, snappy-like.
Sal shook her head. "They know all about wrestlin' down yonder. I tell you, 'twon't do. You're a well-meaning man, no doubt; but you're terribly wrong on some points. You'd do an amazing amount of mischief if we let you run loose. But we couldn't take no such responsibility—indeed we couldn't: and the long and short of it is, you've got to go."
She spoke these last words very firmly. The preacher flung a glance round and saw he was in a trap.
"Such shameless behaviour——" he began.
"You've got to go back," repeated Sally, nodding her head at him. "Take my advice and go quiet."
"I can only suppose you to be intoxicated," said he, and swung round upon the path where Thomasine Oliver stood guard. "Allow me to pass, Madam, if you please!"
But here the mischief put it into Long Eliza to give his hat a flip by the brim. It dropped over his nose and rolled away in the grass. "Oh, what a dear little bald head!" cried Long Eliza; "I declare I must kiss it or die!" She caught up a handful of hay as he stooped, and—well, well, Sir! Scandalous, as you say! Not a word beyond this would any of them tell: but I do believe the whole gang rolled the poor man in the hay and took a kiss off him—"making sweet hay," as 'tis called. 'Twas only known that he paid the bill for his lodging a little after dawn next morning, took up his bag, and passed down Fore Street towards the quay. Maybe a boat was waiting for him there: at all events, he was never seen again—not on this side of Tamar.
Sal went back, composed as you please, and let herself in by the front-door. In the parlour she found her man still seated in the easy-chair and smoking, but sulky-like, and with most of his monkey-temper leaked out of him.
"What have you been doin', pray?" asks he.
Sal looked at him with a twinkle. "Kissin'," says she, untying her bonnet: and with that down she dropped on a chair and laughed till her sides ached.
Her husband ate humble pie that night before ever he set fork in the cold meat: and for some days after, though she kept a close eye on him, he showed no further sign of wanting to be lord of creation. "Nothing like promptness," thought Sally to herself. "If I hadn't taken that nonsense in hand straight off, there's no telling where it wouldn't have spread." By the end of the week following she had put all uneasiness out of her head.
Next Saturday—as her custom was on Saturdays—she traded in Plymouth, and didn't reach home until an hour or more past nightfall, having waited on the Barbican for the evening fish-auction, to see how prices were ruling. 'Twas near upon ten o'clock before she'd moored herboat, and as she went up the street past the Fish and Anchor she heard something that fetched her to a standstill.
She stood for a minute, listening; then walked in without more ado, set down her baskets in the passage, and pushed open the door of the bar-room. There was a whole crowd of men gathered inside, and the place thick with tobacco-smoke. And in the middle of this crew, with his back to the door, sat her husband piping out a song—
Ye sexes, give ear to my fancy;In the praise of good women I sing,It is not of Doll, Kate, or Nancy,The mate of a clown nor a King—With my fol-de-rol, tooral-i-lay!Old Adam, when he was creyated,Was lord of the Universe round;Yet his happiness was not complatedUntil that a helpmate he'd found.He had all things for food that was wanting,Which give us content in this life;He had horses and foxes for hunting,Which many love more than a wife,—With my fol-de-rol, tooral-i-lay!
He had sung so far and was waving his pipestem for the chorus when the company looked up and saw Sal straddling in the doorway with herfists on her hips. The sight daunted them for a moment: but she held up a finger, signing them to keep the news to themselves, and leaned her shoulder against the door-post with her eyes steady on the back of her husband's scrag neck. His fate was upon him, poor varmint, and on he went, as gleeful as a bird in a bath—
He'd a garden so planted by natur'As man can't produce in this life;But yet the all-wise great CreaytorPerceived that he wanted a wife.With his fol-de-rol, tooral-i-lay!
"You chaps might be a bit heartier with the chorus," he put in. "A man would almost think you was afraid of your wives overhearin'—
Old Adam was laid in a slumber,And there he lost part of his side;And when he awoke in great wonderHe beyeld his beyeautiful bride.
Withmy fol-de-rol, tooral—why, whatever's wrong with 'ee all? You're as melancholy as a passel of gib-cats." [And with that he caught the eye of a man seated opposite, and slewed slowly round to the door.]
I tell you that even Sal was forced to smile, and the rest, as you may suppose, rolled to andfro and laughed till they cried. But when the landlord called for order and they hushed themselves to hear more, the woman had put on a face that made her husband quake.
"Go ahead, Hancock!" cried one or two. "'With transport he gazèd——' Sing away, man!"
"I will not," said the tailor, very sulky. "This here's no fit place for women: and a man has his feelin's. I'm astonished at you, Sarah—I reely am. The wife of a respectable tradesman!" But he couldn't look her straight in the face.
"Why, what's wrong with the company?" she asks, looking around. "Old, young, and middle-aged, I seem to know them all for Saltash men: faults, too, they have to my knowledge: but it passes me what I need to be afeared of. And only a minute since you was singing that your happiness wouldn't be completed until that a helpmate you'd found. Well, you've found her: so sing ahead and be happy."
"I will not," says he, still stubborn.
"Oh, yes you will, my little man," says she in a queer voice, which made him look up and sink his eyes again.
"Well," says he, making the best of it, "to please the missus, naybours, we'll sing the wholerandigal through. And after that, Sarah"—here he pretended to look at her like one in command—"you'll walk home with me straight."
"You may lay to that," Sal promised him: and so, but in no very firm voice, he pitched to the song again—
With transport he gazèd upon her,His happiness then was complate;And he blessèd the marvellous forethoughtThat on him bestowed such a mate—
"I reckon, friends, we'll leave out the chorus!"
They wouldn't hear of this, but ri-tooralled away with a will, Sal watching them the while from the doorway with her eyebrows drawn down, like one lost in thought.
She was not took out of his head,To reign or to triumph o'er man;She was not took out of his feet,By man to be tramped upon.But she was took out of his side,His equal and partner to be:Though they be yunited in one,Still the man is the top of the tree!With my fol-de-rol, tooral-i-lay!
"Well, and what's wrong wi' that?" Hancock wound up, feeling for his courage again.
"Get along with 'ee, you ninth-part-of-a-man!Metook out ofyourside!"
"Be that as it may, the Fish and Anchor is no place for discussing of it," the man answered, very dignified. "Enough said, my dear! We'll be getting along home." He stood up and knocked the ashes out of his pipe.
But Sally was not to be budged. "I knew how 'twould be," she spoke up, facing the company. "I took that preacher-fellow on the ground hop, as I thought, and stopped his nonsense; but something whispered to me that 'twas a false hope. Evil communications corrupt good manners, and now the mischief's done. There's no peace for Saltash till you men learn your place again, and I'm resolved to teach it to 'ee. You want to know how? Well, to start with, by means of a board and a piece o' chalk, same as they teach at school nowadays."
She stepped a pace further into the room, shut home the door behind her, and cast her eye over the ale-scores on the back of it. There were a dozen marks, maybe, set down against her own man's name; but for the moment she offered no remark on this.
"Mr. Oke," says she, turning to the landlord, "I reckon you never go without a piece o' chalkin your pocket. Step this way, if you please, and draw a line for me round what these lords of creation owe ye for drink. Thank'ee. And now be good enough to fetch a chair and stand 'pon it; I want you to reach so high as you can—Ready? Now take your chalk and write, beginning near the top o' the door: 'I, Sarah Hancock——'"
landlord
LANDLORD OKE GAVE A FLOURISH WITH HIS CHALK AND WROTE.
Landlord Oke gave a flourish with his chalk and wrote, Sally dictating,—
'I, Sarah Hancock—do hereby challenge all the men in Saltash Borough—that me and five other females of the said Borough—will row any six of them any distance from one to six statute miles—and will beat their heads off—pulling either single oars or double paddles or in ran-dan—the stakes to be six pound aside. And I do further promise, if beaten, to discharge all scores below.'
"Now the date, please—and hand me the chalk."
She reached up and signed her name bold and free, being a fair scholar. "And now, my little fellow," says she, turning to her husband, "put down that pipe and come'st along home. The man's at the top of the tree, is he? You'll wish you were, if I catch you at any more tricks!"
Well, at first the mankind at the Fish and Anchor allowed that Sal couldn't be in earnest; this challenge of hers was all braggadoshy; and one or two went so far as to say 'twould serve her right if she was taken at her word. In fact, no one treated it seriously until four days later, at highwater, when the folks that happened to be idling 'pon the Quay heard a splash off Runnell's boat-building yard, and, behold! off Runnell's slip there floated a six-oared gig, bright as a pin with fresh paint. 'Twas an old condemned gig, that had lain in his shed ever since he bought it for a song off theIndefatigableman-o'-war, though now she looked almost too smart to be the same boat. Sally had paid him to put in a couple of new strakes and plane out a brand-new set of oars in place of the old ashen ones, and had painted a new name beneath the old one on the sternboard, so that now she was theIndefatigable Womanfor all the world to see. And that very evening Sally and five of her mates paddled her past the Quay on a trial spin, under the eyes of the whole town.
There was a deal of laughing up at the Fish and Anchor that night, the most of the customers still treating the affair as a joke. But Landlord Oke took a more serious view.
"'Tis all very well for you fellows to grin," says he, "but I've been trying to make up in my mind the crew that's going to beat these females, and, by George! I don't find it so easy. There's the boat, too."
"French-built, and leaks like a five-barred gate," said somebody. "The Admiralty condemned her five year' ago."
"A leak can be patched, and the Admiralty's condemning goes for nothing in a case like this. I tell you that boat has handsome lines—handsome as you'd wish to see. You may lay to it that what Sal Hancock doesn't know about a boat isn't worth knowing."
"All the same, I'll warrant she never means to row a race in that condemned old tub. She've dragged it out just for practice, and painted it up to make a show. When the time comes—if ever it do—she'll fit and borrow a new boat off one of the war-ships. We can do the same."
"Granted that you can, there's the question of the crew. Sal has her thwarts manned—or womanned, as you choose to put it—and maybe a dozen reserves to pick from in case of accident. She means business, I tell you. There's Regatta not five weeks away, and pretty fools we shall look if she sends round the crier on Regatta Day'O-yessing' to all the world that Saltash men can't raise a boat's crew to match a passel of females, and two of 'em"—he meant Mary Kitty Climo and Ann Pengelly—"mothers of long families."
They discussed it long and they discussed it close, and this way and that way, until at last Landlord Oke had roughed-out a crew. There was no trouble about a stroke. That thwart wentnem. con.to a fellow called Seth Ede, that worked the ferry and had won prizes in his day all up and down the coast: indeed, the very Plymouth men had been afraid of him for two or three seasons before he gave up racing, which was only four years ago. Some doubted that old Roper Retallack, who farmed the ferry that year, would spare Seth on Regatta-day: but Oke undertook to arrange this. Thwart No. 4 went with no more dispute to a whackin' big waterman by the name of Tremenjous Hosken, very useful for his weight, though a trifle thick in the waist. As for strength, he could break a pint mug with one hand, creaming it between his fingers. Then there was Jago the Preventive man, light but wiry, and a very tricky wrestler: "a proper angle-twitch of a man," said one of the company; "stank[1]'pon both ends of 'en, he'llrise up in the middle and laugh at 'ee." So they picked Jago for boat-oar. For No. 5, after a little dispute, they settled on Tippet Harry, a boat-builder working in Runnell's yard, by reason that he'd often pulled behind Ede in the double-sculling, and might be trusted to set good time to the bow-side. Nos. 2 and 3 were not so easily settled, and they discussed and put aside half a score before offering one of the places to a long-legged youngster whose name I can't properly give you: he was always called Freckly-Faced Joe, and worked as a saddler's apprentice. In the end he rowed 2: but No. 3 they left vacant for the time, while they looked around for likely candidates.