Chapter Ten.How we sailed with a Poet of the First Water.Ludar told me, when presently I had revived enough to hear his story, that when the tide turned and I did not appear, the Frenchman laughed and bade them haul the anchor and thank Heaven they were rid of a thief. “Whereat,” said Ludar, “we came to words, and the maiden took your part and besought the fellow to wait a half-hour. But he would hear none of it. He said he was master here, and, if we liked not the ship, we might go out of it. Indeed,” added he, “he had a mind, he said, to put us all out and be rid of so ill a company. Then there was nothing left but to let him have his will, and we sailed. Yet I was not surprised to see you back.”“And she—she did not deem me a traitor?” I asked.“That maiden,” said Ludar, gravely, “knows not what traitor means.”Whereat I felt partly humbled, partly comforted.“Yes,” said Ludar, “I am glad to have you back, Humphrey, for this voyage bodes uneasily.”“How do you mean?” I asked.“Our messmates,” said he (and then I noticed that he wore a sailor’s jacket), “are a scurvy crew, as you will presently discover. The captain already repents that he has taken us. The old nurse is hard to please.” Here he sighed. “The serving man is a fool. And the stranger—”“Ay, what of him? Who is he?”“He is a half-witted spark, a fugitive from justice, and, to boot, an impudent coxcomb whom I have had ten minds already to pitch over the ship’s side. He was hidden here on board before we came, having killed a man at Court, he brags, and seeking shelter in Scotland till the storm be past. But here he is.”The stranger was a slim, well-shaped youth, with a simpering lip, and dainty ringlets descending to his shoulders. He was dressed extravagantly even for the land, and for the sea ridiculously. His doublet was of satin, bravely slashed and laced, and puffed to the size of a globe on either thigh. His hose were of crimson silk, gaily tied with points and knots. His shirt was of the same hue, with a short taffeta cloak over, bound at the neck by a monstrous ruff, out of which his face looked like a calf’s head from a dish of trimmings. To crown all, a white plume waved in his hat, while the rapier at his waist was caught up jauntily behind him, so that the point and the hilt lay on a level at either hip. His face was both cheerful and weak; and, as he strutted up to where Ludar and I stood, his gait reminded me much of a chanticleer amidst his spouses.He was delivering himself of some poetic rapture, addressed, as it seemed, to the mud banks of the Essex shore, and feigned to perceive neither Ludar nor me till he came upon us.“So,” said he then, eyeing me, “here is our Flying Dutchman, our bolt out of the blue, our dragon’s tooth turned to man. And, by my sword, a pretty fellow too. Count me as thy patron, my Hollander, and if, as I judge by thy face, thou hast a tooth for the honey of Parnassus his garden, and the dainty apples of the Muses’ orchard, thou shalt not starve verily. To be brief, I favour thee therefore, thy fortune is made.”I was bewildered enough by this speech, not a tithe of which could I understand. I took it ill to be called Dutchman, and dragon’s tooth; nor, albeit I was a printer’s ’prentice, did I know what he meant by Parnassus. Still, as he seemed friendly disposed, I answered:“I thank you.”“Thank not me,” said he, raising his hand. “Let not the groping man thank the lamp, nor the briar the brook. Thank the sun whence the lamp hath his light, and the ocean to whom the brook oweth his waters. Thank that incomparable paragon, that consummate swan, that pearl of all perfection, my mistress, of whose brightness I am but the mirror and medium.”“Pardon me, sir,” said I, feeling very foolish to comprehend not a word of his fine talk, “if you have anything to tell me, pray, say so; but, for the life of me, I cannot discover what you mean by all this.”“I mean,” said he, “that she, my lady, the Aphrodite who rules these waves, the star who guides our course, the nymph who suns her locks on this poor ship, the same condescends to call you her servant; wherefore, owe it to her, that thou mayest also call me thy master.”I began to weary of this jargon. Moreover, the fellow now seemed to be talking about matters which he had better leave to Ludar and me. So I said:“You are none of my master. I have a better.”He looked a little hurt at this, I thought, and said:“Can an ass call the horse its master when a man claimeth both? Who is this mortal, sirrah, that I may scorn him?”“This gentleman is my master,” said I, growing very hot, and laying my hand on Ludar’s arm.The gallant laughed.“Pretty, on my life! The dog hath its parasites, the scullion his menial, the earthen pot his mug, and each puffeth himself into a gentleman thereby. And who may you be, forsooth?”“Ludar McSomhairle Buidhe McDonnell of the Glyns,” said Ludar, solemnly.The fellow laughed outright.“I do remember,” said he, “a pretty jest of Dan Aesopus about a jackdaw who thought himself a peacock because he had a monstrous long feather to his tail. Prithee, thou silly son of Neptune, knowest thou not that if I did bid thee carry me my box from the fore-deck there to the poop, thou must crawl with it like my jack-porter? And, by my soul, I have named the very service that brought me hither. Therefore, my lord Sir Ludar McSorley Boy McNeptune McMalapert McDonnell of the Glyns, fetch my box below. And should the burden be too heavy for thy dainty fingers, pray thy serving gentleman here to lend thee a hand.”Ludar, who was leaning against the mast, yawned; whereat, the gallant dropping his fine speeches, turned as red as a lobster, and with a loud French oath, drew out his rapier and flourished it.Ludar watched him contemptuously for a while, until the blade, getting courage at every pass, ventured a modest prick. Then he leapt out like a cat on a mouse, and caught the silly fellow such a grip of the wrist as sent his sword spinning on the deck. Picking it up, he quietly broke it over his knee into three pieces, which he pitched one after the other overboard.“Now, master jackanapes,” said he, returning to his adversary, and catching him by his starched ruff. “You shall follow your sword.”Then the poor fellow, scared out of his wits, let go a string of oaths, and vowed to heaven he did but jest, and loved us both like his own brothers, and, would Ludar but unhand him, he might count on him as a friend for life, and so forth. Even Ludar could not help laughing at the figure he made; and having lifted him a little on to the gunwale, let him down again with a “get you gone then.”’Twas wonderful how the gallant’s courage came back as soon as he stood free.“By my soul,” said he, with a gay laugh, “thou’rt a brave lad, and I like thee for ’t. A jest is like marrow in a dog’s bone, and life without sport is a camel’s track. Come, thou and I shall be friends, I see; and crack more jokes than one ere this voyage be over. And, in sooth, Achilles doth well to make proof now and again of the strength of Hercules. Why, my Hercules, I warrant thou couldest lift that box of mine with thy finger and thumb. I pray thee, for my admiration, see if thou couldest so carry it from where it now lies to my cabin in the poop; and our flying Dutchman here shall be judge that the feat be fairly done.”Ludar, with a grim smile, owned that he had the worst of this encounter, and made the fellow happy by carrying his box in one hand; although he alarmed him not a little by offering to carry him in the other.When this little jest was over, the captain came to us with orders to join the crew in making all things ready for presently meeting the sea breezes at the river’s mouth; so we had no more time just then to think of Master Coxcomb.It moved my admiration to see with what a will Ludar worked at his task. He made no question of the Frenchman’s right to order his services; and methought, as he hauled away cheerily among his ill-favoured messmates, he looked as noble as had he been marching at the head of an army. The ship’s crew was, to tell the truth, a scurvy company. Not counting us, there were but eleven of them, mostly French, who talked and cursed while they worked and three English, who sulked and grumbled. They stared in no friendly way at Ludar and me when we joined them; nor did they like us the better that, without much knowledge or seamanship, we yet put our backs into what we did, and bade them do the same. Ludar, indeed, born to command, was not sparing in his abuse of their laziness; and it vexed me a little to see how he thereby made himself an enemy of every man among them.Towards nightfall we were all ship-shape, and the watch being set—of which Ludar was one—I had leisure to go below to seek the sleep I sorely needed. I would fain, before doing so, have visited the maiden to satisfy myself that all went well with her. But I durst hardly venture so far without her bidding. I sought my berth below, therefore—and a vile, foul corner of the hold it was—and laid myself down, wondering what would be the end of all this journeying.There was a sailor—one of the Frenchmen—down beside me, who, when he saw who I was, sat up and began to talk. In a foolish moment I betrayed that I understood some of his French lingo, whereat he—being more than half drunken—waxed civil, and his tongue loosed itself still more.“Who is she?” he whispered presently, in his foreign tongue.“A lady,” said I, shortly.“So! and monstrous rich, by our lady! Comrade,” said he, “I helped carry her box on board. Do you take me for a fool? There is something weighs more in that than a maiden’s frocks—eh, my friend?”“You are a fool,” said I.“A fool? Ha! ha! ’Tis well. And I am fool enough to— you be her man, they say? and an honest fellow? Ha! ha!”“Ay, ay,” said I, drowsily enough, “let me go to sleep.”“Ay, ay,” said he, “even if it be silver pieces and not gold, ’twill be enough to make men of thee and me. Dost hear, sluggard? Thee and me, and no more planks and ropes, and—”I had ceased to hear his maunderings, and was sound asleep.When I awoke, it was to hear the thundering crash of a wave on the deck overhead, and I knew we were at last on the open sea. Alas! when I turned over to recover my sleep, I fell into so horrible a fit of shuddering and sickness that I believed the hour of my departure was come. The ship rolled heavily through the uneasy water, and at every lurch my heart sunk—I know not whither. I could hear the shuffling of steps overhead, and the dash of the waves against the ship’s side, and the voice of the sailors at their posts. Little recked they of the comrade who was dying below!Presently a call came for the new watch to turn up on deck. I was helpless to obey, and lay groaning there, not caring if the next lurch took us down to the bottom. At last, after much shouting, the captain himself came down and shook me roughly.“Leave me,” said I, “to die in peace.”“Die!” cried he, “thou sickly lubber. If you rise not in a minute’s time, we will see what a rope’s end can do to ’liven thee. Come, get up.”I struggled to my feet, but in that posture my sickness came back with double violence, so that I tumbled again to the floor, and vowed he might use every rope in the ship to me, but up I could not get.I do not well recall what happened those next few days. I believe I staggered upon deck and went miserably through the form of work, jeered at by my fellow sailors, despised by my captain, and wondered at by Ludar. But when, after the sickness gave way, I one day found myself in a fever, with my strength all gone, I was let go below and lie there without more to do. I know not how it came to pass, but ill I was for a day or two; perhaps it was the vexations of the last few weeks, or the weakness left by the sickness, or a visitation of the colic from heaven; however it was, I lay there, humbled and ashamed of my weakness, and wishing myself safe back outside Temple Bar.At these times, Ludar was a brother to me. He came often to see me, and talked so cheerily, that I almost forgot how solemn his looks used to be. More than that, he fetched me dainties to eat, without which I might have starved; for, while the fever lasted, I could not stomach the strong ship’s fare. And I suspected more than once that he had secured my peace from the captain by offering himself to do a good piece of my work as well as his own.He spoke little enough about the maiden, though I longed to hear of her. Once, when I asked him, his face grew overcast.“That maiden,” said he, “is never so merry as when the waves are breaking over the deck. Yet I see her little, for, in sooth, the old nurse has been nearer death than you, and will allow no one to go near her but her young mistress. Nor dare I offer myself where I am not bidden. Humphrey,” added he, “I prefer to talk of something else.”Now, I must tell you that, to my surprise, I found I had another friend in these dark days; I mean the poet. Contemptible as was my plight, and mean as was the cabin I hid in, when he heard I was ill, he came more than once to see me. It suited him to make a mighty to do about it, as if his condescension must heal me on the spot. Yet the kindness that was in him, and the wonder he afforded me, made up for all these airs and graces.“Alack and well a day!” exclaimed he, when he first came. “Vulcan hath fallen from the clouds and lieth halting below. The apple which was rosy is become green, and the Dutchman who of late flew is now become ship’s ballast. Nay, my poor ruin, thank me not for coming; ’tis the common debt the high oweth to the low, the sound to the broken, the poem to the prose; nay, ’tis the duty a knight oweth to his lady’s humblest menial.”“And how is the lady?” said I; for I wearied to hear of her, even from any lips.“Hast thou seen the swan with wings new dressed float on the summer tide? Hast thou heard the thrush, full-throated, call his mate across the lea? Hast thou watched the moon soar up the heavens, sweeping aside the clouds, and defying the mists of earth? Hast thou marked, my Dutchman, the summer laughter on a field of golden corn? Hast thou tracked the merry breeze along the ripples of a dazzled ocean?—”“Yes, yes,” said I, “but what has that to do with the maiden we speak of?”He smiled on me pityingly.“Such, poor youth, is she; and such, methinks, am I become, who sit at her feet and sun myself in her light—”“’Tis dark down here,” I said, “but you seem to me neither swan, nor thrush, nor moon, nor a corn field, nor an ocean. But I thank you, even as you are, for coming.”“’Tis a sign of a sound mind,” said he, “when gratitude answereth to graciousness. And now, prithee, how do you do?”I told him I was better, and that I might not have mended so far, but for my dear master, Sir Ludar.Then he bridled up and his cheeks coloured.“Ah, Hercules is a good sailor, and a strong animal. ’Tis fit he should wait upon you, since you be in my present favour. Moreover, like cureth like, as it is said; therefore he is better here tending you, than casting sheep’s eyes on one who is as the sun above his head. I have had a mind to admonish him to remove the offence of his visage from her purview, for I perceived, by my own mislike of it, that it was a weariness to her. The pure glass is dimmed by the breath of the beholder, and a face at the window darkeneth a chamber.”“Sir Ludar will be here soon,” said I; “I pray you stay and tell him this.”“No,” said he, looking, I thought, a little alarmed. “If the cloud withdraw not from the sun’s path of his own motion, neither will he scatter for our bidding. Therefore, let him be. And, indeed, I stay here too long, my Dutchman. Who shall say but the dove sigheth already for her truant mate? So farewell; and count me thy patron.”He came often after this, always with the same brave talk.One day, however, he seemed more like a plain man and said: “’Tis time thou wert up, my Hollander. There is thunder in the air, the horizon is big with clouds, the dull sea rustleth with the coming storm, and I smell the wind afar off.”“Why,” said I, starting up, “Ludar told me but just now the weather was fair and settled, and that the breeze was shifting to the south.”“I spoke not of the weather,” said he. “Let it be. The thunder may hide beneath a brow, the lightning may flash from out two eyelids, and the storm may break in a man’s breast.”“For Heaven’s sake, speak plain,” said I. “What do you mean?”“Wait and see,” said he, “I like not these French dogs. Only let thy eye be keen, thy ear quick, and thy hand ready, my Hollander, and stand by me when I call on thee.”More I could not get out of him. When I spoke of it to Ludar afterwards, he said:“Maybe the little antic is right. Yet they are too sorry a crew, and too small to do mischief. They suspect us of carrying treasure aboard, and your friend the captain, I take it, is the roundest villain of them all.”I vowed the captain was no friend of mine; yet I believed him honest. But as for the crew, it came to my mind then what the drunken fellow had blabbed out the first night; and I said it was like enough to be true.That afternoon I rose from my sick-bed and came on deck. I remember to this hour the joy of that afternoon.The day was bright and fair; land was nowhere to be seen; only a stretch of blue-green water through which theMiséricordespanked with a light breeze at her stern. The white sails shone out in the sunlight, and the happy gulls called to one another above our heads. As I faced round and drank in mouthful after mouthful of the fresh salt air, my life seemed to revive within me, and I felt the strength rush back into my thews. But the greatest joy of all was that the maiden, seeing me stand there, came up and bade me a joyous welcome to the upper air once more.“Alas,” said she, laughing, “it has been dull times while you have been below, Humphrey. My good old nurse has not ceased to cry out that she was dying since we took our first lurch into the free sea. Your Knight of the Rueful Countenance flies from me whenever he sees me afar; your French captain might be an Englishman, he is so sulky; and as for your English paragon there,”—and she pointed to the gallant who was strutting on the forward deck—“he frightens me with his frenzies and raptures. Do you all make love that way in England?”“No,” said I, “I think not.”“Why, Humphrey, you talk as if you knew not; I would have vowed you had a sweetheart of your own, with the rest of them.”“Maybe I have,” said I.Just then to my relief, Ludar came up.“Sir Ludar,” I said, “this lady complains that you, who are so brave, run away whenever she looks your way.”Neither the maiden nor Ludar liked my clumsy speech.“Nay, Sir Malapert,” said she, “I complain not of what contents me. Besides, Sir Ludar has been better employed in nursing you.”“If I be a coward,” said Ludar, “it’s because I dread a frown more than a battle-axe.”The maiden looked up at him, with the gentle light in her eyes which I had marked before now.“If you dread frowns,” said she, laughing, “never look in your mirror, Sir Ludar; for, by my faith, you glare at me now as if I were an English poet, such as now approacheth.” We looked up and there was our gallant at our elbows.“As the loadstone to his star, as the compass to the pole, as the river to the sea, so come I, fair tyrant of my heart. For thy sake, I even salute these thy satellites, O moon of my vision! who derive from thee their lustre.”“Witness Sir Ludar’s countenance,” said the maiden. “But now that the sun has come on the horizon, Sir Poet, shall not we lesser lights all pale? Pray, did you catch any fish to-day?”“Nay, mistress mine, how should the silly fish, dazzled by thy heavenly brightness, see the humble bait of a mortal?”“I know not,” said the maiden, “but I saw one sailor, an hour ago, catch three.”“Is it a wonder, since you watched the quivering line? Mark you, my humble friends,” said he, turning to Ludar and me. “I relieve you of your further attendance on me and this lady. I thank you, and so farewell, till we summon you further.”“Nay, Sir Poet,” said the maiden, “if you must be gone, adieu. As for me, Sir Ludar is about to teach me the mystery of the angle, and Humphrey waits on Sir Ludar. Therefore, concern yourself not for me; I am well attended.”“Oh,” said he, rather chapfallen, “your condescension is a lesson for angels. When the planet deigns to shine into the humble pool, shall the star not do the same? I will even abide at your side, and be gracious too.”But his brave intention was thwarted. For a call came just then from the old nurse, which carried the maiden off to her side; while Ludar and I, receiving a summons from the captain, went forward, and so left the poet to his own devices.A sterner summons was not far off, as you shall hear.
Ludar told me, when presently I had revived enough to hear his story, that when the tide turned and I did not appear, the Frenchman laughed and bade them haul the anchor and thank Heaven they were rid of a thief. “Whereat,” said Ludar, “we came to words, and the maiden took your part and besought the fellow to wait a half-hour. But he would hear none of it. He said he was master here, and, if we liked not the ship, we might go out of it. Indeed,” added he, “he had a mind, he said, to put us all out and be rid of so ill a company. Then there was nothing left but to let him have his will, and we sailed. Yet I was not surprised to see you back.”
“And she—she did not deem me a traitor?” I asked.
“That maiden,” said Ludar, gravely, “knows not what traitor means.”
Whereat I felt partly humbled, partly comforted.
“Yes,” said Ludar, “I am glad to have you back, Humphrey, for this voyage bodes uneasily.”
“How do you mean?” I asked.
“Our messmates,” said he (and then I noticed that he wore a sailor’s jacket), “are a scurvy crew, as you will presently discover. The captain already repents that he has taken us. The old nurse is hard to please.” Here he sighed. “The serving man is a fool. And the stranger—”
“Ay, what of him? Who is he?”
“He is a half-witted spark, a fugitive from justice, and, to boot, an impudent coxcomb whom I have had ten minds already to pitch over the ship’s side. He was hidden here on board before we came, having killed a man at Court, he brags, and seeking shelter in Scotland till the storm be past. But here he is.”
The stranger was a slim, well-shaped youth, with a simpering lip, and dainty ringlets descending to his shoulders. He was dressed extravagantly even for the land, and for the sea ridiculously. His doublet was of satin, bravely slashed and laced, and puffed to the size of a globe on either thigh. His hose were of crimson silk, gaily tied with points and knots. His shirt was of the same hue, with a short taffeta cloak over, bound at the neck by a monstrous ruff, out of which his face looked like a calf’s head from a dish of trimmings. To crown all, a white plume waved in his hat, while the rapier at his waist was caught up jauntily behind him, so that the point and the hilt lay on a level at either hip. His face was both cheerful and weak; and, as he strutted up to where Ludar and I stood, his gait reminded me much of a chanticleer amidst his spouses.
He was delivering himself of some poetic rapture, addressed, as it seemed, to the mud banks of the Essex shore, and feigned to perceive neither Ludar nor me till he came upon us.
“So,” said he then, eyeing me, “here is our Flying Dutchman, our bolt out of the blue, our dragon’s tooth turned to man. And, by my sword, a pretty fellow too. Count me as thy patron, my Hollander, and if, as I judge by thy face, thou hast a tooth for the honey of Parnassus his garden, and the dainty apples of the Muses’ orchard, thou shalt not starve verily. To be brief, I favour thee therefore, thy fortune is made.”
I was bewildered enough by this speech, not a tithe of which could I understand. I took it ill to be called Dutchman, and dragon’s tooth; nor, albeit I was a printer’s ’prentice, did I know what he meant by Parnassus. Still, as he seemed friendly disposed, I answered:
“I thank you.”
“Thank not me,” said he, raising his hand. “Let not the groping man thank the lamp, nor the briar the brook. Thank the sun whence the lamp hath his light, and the ocean to whom the brook oweth his waters. Thank that incomparable paragon, that consummate swan, that pearl of all perfection, my mistress, of whose brightness I am but the mirror and medium.”
“Pardon me, sir,” said I, feeling very foolish to comprehend not a word of his fine talk, “if you have anything to tell me, pray, say so; but, for the life of me, I cannot discover what you mean by all this.”
“I mean,” said he, “that she, my lady, the Aphrodite who rules these waves, the star who guides our course, the nymph who suns her locks on this poor ship, the same condescends to call you her servant; wherefore, owe it to her, that thou mayest also call me thy master.”
I began to weary of this jargon. Moreover, the fellow now seemed to be talking about matters which he had better leave to Ludar and me. So I said:
“You are none of my master. I have a better.”
He looked a little hurt at this, I thought, and said:
“Can an ass call the horse its master when a man claimeth both? Who is this mortal, sirrah, that I may scorn him?”
“This gentleman is my master,” said I, growing very hot, and laying my hand on Ludar’s arm.
The gallant laughed.
“Pretty, on my life! The dog hath its parasites, the scullion his menial, the earthen pot his mug, and each puffeth himself into a gentleman thereby. And who may you be, forsooth?”
“Ludar McSomhairle Buidhe McDonnell of the Glyns,” said Ludar, solemnly.
The fellow laughed outright.
“I do remember,” said he, “a pretty jest of Dan Aesopus about a jackdaw who thought himself a peacock because he had a monstrous long feather to his tail. Prithee, thou silly son of Neptune, knowest thou not that if I did bid thee carry me my box from the fore-deck there to the poop, thou must crawl with it like my jack-porter? And, by my soul, I have named the very service that brought me hither. Therefore, my lord Sir Ludar McSorley Boy McNeptune McMalapert McDonnell of the Glyns, fetch my box below. And should the burden be too heavy for thy dainty fingers, pray thy serving gentleman here to lend thee a hand.”
Ludar, who was leaning against the mast, yawned; whereat, the gallant dropping his fine speeches, turned as red as a lobster, and with a loud French oath, drew out his rapier and flourished it.
Ludar watched him contemptuously for a while, until the blade, getting courage at every pass, ventured a modest prick. Then he leapt out like a cat on a mouse, and caught the silly fellow such a grip of the wrist as sent his sword spinning on the deck. Picking it up, he quietly broke it over his knee into three pieces, which he pitched one after the other overboard.
“Now, master jackanapes,” said he, returning to his adversary, and catching him by his starched ruff. “You shall follow your sword.”
Then the poor fellow, scared out of his wits, let go a string of oaths, and vowed to heaven he did but jest, and loved us both like his own brothers, and, would Ludar but unhand him, he might count on him as a friend for life, and so forth. Even Ludar could not help laughing at the figure he made; and having lifted him a little on to the gunwale, let him down again with a “get you gone then.”
’Twas wonderful how the gallant’s courage came back as soon as he stood free.
“By my soul,” said he, with a gay laugh, “thou’rt a brave lad, and I like thee for ’t. A jest is like marrow in a dog’s bone, and life without sport is a camel’s track. Come, thou and I shall be friends, I see; and crack more jokes than one ere this voyage be over. And, in sooth, Achilles doth well to make proof now and again of the strength of Hercules. Why, my Hercules, I warrant thou couldest lift that box of mine with thy finger and thumb. I pray thee, for my admiration, see if thou couldest so carry it from where it now lies to my cabin in the poop; and our flying Dutchman here shall be judge that the feat be fairly done.”
Ludar, with a grim smile, owned that he had the worst of this encounter, and made the fellow happy by carrying his box in one hand; although he alarmed him not a little by offering to carry him in the other.
When this little jest was over, the captain came to us with orders to join the crew in making all things ready for presently meeting the sea breezes at the river’s mouth; so we had no more time just then to think of Master Coxcomb.
It moved my admiration to see with what a will Ludar worked at his task. He made no question of the Frenchman’s right to order his services; and methought, as he hauled away cheerily among his ill-favoured messmates, he looked as noble as had he been marching at the head of an army. The ship’s crew was, to tell the truth, a scurvy company. Not counting us, there were but eleven of them, mostly French, who talked and cursed while they worked and three English, who sulked and grumbled. They stared in no friendly way at Ludar and me when we joined them; nor did they like us the better that, without much knowledge or seamanship, we yet put our backs into what we did, and bade them do the same. Ludar, indeed, born to command, was not sparing in his abuse of their laziness; and it vexed me a little to see how he thereby made himself an enemy of every man among them.
Towards nightfall we were all ship-shape, and the watch being set—of which Ludar was one—I had leisure to go below to seek the sleep I sorely needed. I would fain, before doing so, have visited the maiden to satisfy myself that all went well with her. But I durst hardly venture so far without her bidding. I sought my berth below, therefore—and a vile, foul corner of the hold it was—and laid myself down, wondering what would be the end of all this journeying.
There was a sailor—one of the Frenchmen—down beside me, who, when he saw who I was, sat up and began to talk. In a foolish moment I betrayed that I understood some of his French lingo, whereat he—being more than half drunken—waxed civil, and his tongue loosed itself still more.
“Who is she?” he whispered presently, in his foreign tongue.
“A lady,” said I, shortly.
“So! and monstrous rich, by our lady! Comrade,” said he, “I helped carry her box on board. Do you take me for a fool? There is something weighs more in that than a maiden’s frocks—eh, my friend?”
“You are a fool,” said I.
“A fool? Ha! ha! ’Tis well. And I am fool enough to— you be her man, they say? and an honest fellow? Ha! ha!”
“Ay, ay,” said I, drowsily enough, “let me go to sleep.”
“Ay, ay,” said he, “even if it be silver pieces and not gold, ’twill be enough to make men of thee and me. Dost hear, sluggard? Thee and me, and no more planks and ropes, and—”
I had ceased to hear his maunderings, and was sound asleep.
When I awoke, it was to hear the thundering crash of a wave on the deck overhead, and I knew we were at last on the open sea. Alas! when I turned over to recover my sleep, I fell into so horrible a fit of shuddering and sickness that I believed the hour of my departure was come. The ship rolled heavily through the uneasy water, and at every lurch my heart sunk—I know not whither. I could hear the shuffling of steps overhead, and the dash of the waves against the ship’s side, and the voice of the sailors at their posts. Little recked they of the comrade who was dying below!
Presently a call came for the new watch to turn up on deck. I was helpless to obey, and lay groaning there, not caring if the next lurch took us down to the bottom. At last, after much shouting, the captain himself came down and shook me roughly.
“Leave me,” said I, “to die in peace.”
“Die!” cried he, “thou sickly lubber. If you rise not in a minute’s time, we will see what a rope’s end can do to ’liven thee. Come, get up.”
I struggled to my feet, but in that posture my sickness came back with double violence, so that I tumbled again to the floor, and vowed he might use every rope in the ship to me, but up I could not get.
I do not well recall what happened those next few days. I believe I staggered upon deck and went miserably through the form of work, jeered at by my fellow sailors, despised by my captain, and wondered at by Ludar. But when, after the sickness gave way, I one day found myself in a fever, with my strength all gone, I was let go below and lie there without more to do. I know not how it came to pass, but ill I was for a day or two; perhaps it was the vexations of the last few weeks, or the weakness left by the sickness, or a visitation of the colic from heaven; however it was, I lay there, humbled and ashamed of my weakness, and wishing myself safe back outside Temple Bar.
At these times, Ludar was a brother to me. He came often to see me, and talked so cheerily, that I almost forgot how solemn his looks used to be. More than that, he fetched me dainties to eat, without which I might have starved; for, while the fever lasted, I could not stomach the strong ship’s fare. And I suspected more than once that he had secured my peace from the captain by offering himself to do a good piece of my work as well as his own.
He spoke little enough about the maiden, though I longed to hear of her. Once, when I asked him, his face grew overcast.
“That maiden,” said he, “is never so merry as when the waves are breaking over the deck. Yet I see her little, for, in sooth, the old nurse has been nearer death than you, and will allow no one to go near her but her young mistress. Nor dare I offer myself where I am not bidden. Humphrey,” added he, “I prefer to talk of something else.”
Now, I must tell you that, to my surprise, I found I had another friend in these dark days; I mean the poet. Contemptible as was my plight, and mean as was the cabin I hid in, when he heard I was ill, he came more than once to see me. It suited him to make a mighty to do about it, as if his condescension must heal me on the spot. Yet the kindness that was in him, and the wonder he afforded me, made up for all these airs and graces.
“Alack and well a day!” exclaimed he, when he first came. “Vulcan hath fallen from the clouds and lieth halting below. The apple which was rosy is become green, and the Dutchman who of late flew is now become ship’s ballast. Nay, my poor ruin, thank me not for coming; ’tis the common debt the high oweth to the low, the sound to the broken, the poem to the prose; nay, ’tis the duty a knight oweth to his lady’s humblest menial.”
“And how is the lady?” said I; for I wearied to hear of her, even from any lips.
“Hast thou seen the swan with wings new dressed float on the summer tide? Hast thou heard the thrush, full-throated, call his mate across the lea? Hast thou watched the moon soar up the heavens, sweeping aside the clouds, and defying the mists of earth? Hast thou marked, my Dutchman, the summer laughter on a field of golden corn? Hast thou tracked the merry breeze along the ripples of a dazzled ocean?—”
“Yes, yes,” said I, “but what has that to do with the maiden we speak of?”
He smiled on me pityingly.
“Such, poor youth, is she; and such, methinks, am I become, who sit at her feet and sun myself in her light—”
“’Tis dark down here,” I said, “but you seem to me neither swan, nor thrush, nor moon, nor a corn field, nor an ocean. But I thank you, even as you are, for coming.”
“’Tis a sign of a sound mind,” said he, “when gratitude answereth to graciousness. And now, prithee, how do you do?”
I told him I was better, and that I might not have mended so far, but for my dear master, Sir Ludar.
Then he bridled up and his cheeks coloured.
“Ah, Hercules is a good sailor, and a strong animal. ’Tis fit he should wait upon you, since you be in my present favour. Moreover, like cureth like, as it is said; therefore he is better here tending you, than casting sheep’s eyes on one who is as the sun above his head. I have had a mind to admonish him to remove the offence of his visage from her purview, for I perceived, by my own mislike of it, that it was a weariness to her. The pure glass is dimmed by the breath of the beholder, and a face at the window darkeneth a chamber.”
“Sir Ludar will be here soon,” said I; “I pray you stay and tell him this.”
“No,” said he, looking, I thought, a little alarmed. “If the cloud withdraw not from the sun’s path of his own motion, neither will he scatter for our bidding. Therefore, let him be. And, indeed, I stay here too long, my Dutchman. Who shall say but the dove sigheth already for her truant mate? So farewell; and count me thy patron.”
He came often after this, always with the same brave talk.
One day, however, he seemed more like a plain man and said: “’Tis time thou wert up, my Hollander. There is thunder in the air, the horizon is big with clouds, the dull sea rustleth with the coming storm, and I smell the wind afar off.”
“Why,” said I, starting up, “Ludar told me but just now the weather was fair and settled, and that the breeze was shifting to the south.”
“I spoke not of the weather,” said he. “Let it be. The thunder may hide beneath a brow, the lightning may flash from out two eyelids, and the storm may break in a man’s breast.”
“For Heaven’s sake, speak plain,” said I. “What do you mean?”
“Wait and see,” said he, “I like not these French dogs. Only let thy eye be keen, thy ear quick, and thy hand ready, my Hollander, and stand by me when I call on thee.”
More I could not get out of him. When I spoke of it to Ludar afterwards, he said:
“Maybe the little antic is right. Yet they are too sorry a crew, and too small to do mischief. They suspect us of carrying treasure aboard, and your friend the captain, I take it, is the roundest villain of them all.”
I vowed the captain was no friend of mine; yet I believed him honest. But as for the crew, it came to my mind then what the drunken fellow had blabbed out the first night; and I said it was like enough to be true.
That afternoon I rose from my sick-bed and came on deck. I remember to this hour the joy of that afternoon.
The day was bright and fair; land was nowhere to be seen; only a stretch of blue-green water through which theMiséricordespanked with a light breeze at her stern. The white sails shone out in the sunlight, and the happy gulls called to one another above our heads. As I faced round and drank in mouthful after mouthful of the fresh salt air, my life seemed to revive within me, and I felt the strength rush back into my thews. But the greatest joy of all was that the maiden, seeing me stand there, came up and bade me a joyous welcome to the upper air once more.
“Alas,” said she, laughing, “it has been dull times while you have been below, Humphrey. My good old nurse has not ceased to cry out that she was dying since we took our first lurch into the free sea. Your Knight of the Rueful Countenance flies from me whenever he sees me afar; your French captain might be an Englishman, he is so sulky; and as for your English paragon there,”—and she pointed to the gallant who was strutting on the forward deck—“he frightens me with his frenzies and raptures. Do you all make love that way in England?”
“No,” said I, “I think not.”
“Why, Humphrey, you talk as if you knew not; I would have vowed you had a sweetheart of your own, with the rest of them.”
“Maybe I have,” said I.
Just then to my relief, Ludar came up.
“Sir Ludar,” I said, “this lady complains that you, who are so brave, run away whenever she looks your way.”
Neither the maiden nor Ludar liked my clumsy speech.
“Nay, Sir Malapert,” said she, “I complain not of what contents me. Besides, Sir Ludar has been better employed in nursing you.”
“If I be a coward,” said Ludar, “it’s because I dread a frown more than a battle-axe.”
The maiden looked up at him, with the gentle light in her eyes which I had marked before now.
“If you dread frowns,” said she, laughing, “never look in your mirror, Sir Ludar; for, by my faith, you glare at me now as if I were an English poet, such as now approacheth.” We looked up and there was our gallant at our elbows.
“As the loadstone to his star, as the compass to the pole, as the river to the sea, so come I, fair tyrant of my heart. For thy sake, I even salute these thy satellites, O moon of my vision! who derive from thee their lustre.”
“Witness Sir Ludar’s countenance,” said the maiden. “But now that the sun has come on the horizon, Sir Poet, shall not we lesser lights all pale? Pray, did you catch any fish to-day?”
“Nay, mistress mine, how should the silly fish, dazzled by thy heavenly brightness, see the humble bait of a mortal?”
“I know not,” said the maiden, “but I saw one sailor, an hour ago, catch three.”
“Is it a wonder, since you watched the quivering line? Mark you, my humble friends,” said he, turning to Ludar and me. “I relieve you of your further attendance on me and this lady. I thank you, and so farewell, till we summon you further.”
“Nay, Sir Poet,” said the maiden, “if you must be gone, adieu. As for me, Sir Ludar is about to teach me the mystery of the angle, and Humphrey waits on Sir Ludar. Therefore, concern yourself not for me; I am well attended.”
“Oh,” said he, rather chapfallen, “your condescension is a lesson for angels. When the planet deigns to shine into the humble pool, shall the star not do the same? I will even abide at your side, and be gracious too.”
But his brave intention was thwarted. For a call came just then from the old nurse, which carried the maiden off to her side; while Ludar and I, receiving a summons from the captain, went forward, and so left the poet to his own devices.
A sterner summons was not far off, as you shall hear.
Chapter Eleven.How the Miséricorde changed her Crew.We were, I reckon, somewhere off the Yorkshire coast; for we had been sailing a week, for the most part against foul winds. To-night, as I said, the light breeze had backed to the south and was sending us forward quietly at some six or seven knots an hour. All seemed to promise a speedy end to our voyage; and yet, as I stood there, drinking in the beauty of the evening, and rejoicing in my recovered strength, I would as soon we had been bound on a voyage ten times as long.I was standing idly near the foremast. On the high poop behind sat the maiden, singing beside her old nurse, who, like me, was enjoying the air for the first time to-night. Ludar lolled near me, on a coil of rope, watching the sun dip as he listened to the singing, and betwixt whiles unravelling the tangles of a fishing line. On the forecastle, the French seamen sat and whispered, scowling sometimes our way, and sometimes laughing at the poet who strutted near them, intent on the sunset and big with some notable verses thereupon, which were hatching in his brain. An English fellow was at the helm, half asleep; while the captain, grumbling at the slackness of the breeze, paced to and fro, with an oath betwixt his lips and an ugly frown on his brow.Suddenly I seemed to detect among the Frenchmen a stir, as if something had just been said or resolved upon in their whisperings. The captain at that instant was near them, turning in his walk; when, without warning, two of their number sprang out upon him. There was a shout, a struggle, the gleam of a knife, and then a dead man lay on the deck. All was so quick and sudden that the murder was done under my very eyes before I knew what was happening. Then, in a twinkling, the whole ship became the scene of a deadly fight. Three of the traitors threw themselves on Ludar; the poet reeled in the grip of another; two others made for me.“Back, back!” shouted Ludar, in a voice of thunder, as he began his struggle.’Twas well I obeyed him; for the two who had made an end of the captain were already rushing in the direction of the women, and had I reached the ladder a moment later, all might have been lost.The men, I think, in laying their wicked plan, had scarcely taken me (who late was so weak), into account as a fighting man. They had reckoned to carry the poop, where lay the supposed treasure and the arms, without a blow; and once there, the ship would be theirs. It staggered them, therefore, to find me standing in the way and laying about me. The two women, as I said, were on the upper deck which formed the roof of the poop house. To that there was no access save by the small ladder, which I accordingly wrenched from its place and swung round with all my might at my assailants. The blow knocked over two of them; and before they could regain their feet, I had struck another a blow with my fist, which needed no second. The fourth varlet did not wait for me, but closed on me with his knife. Luckily the blade missed its mark, grazing only my ribs, and before he could strike again I had him by the wrist, and the blow he meant for me went home in his own neck. After that, ’twas easy work to hold off the other two, one of whom was the drunken fool who had blabbed his secret days ago, had I only heeded it, in my sick cabin. Finding me stubborn, and further passage barred, they sheered off with a curse and hastened forward. I durst not follow them; for it might be a feint to decoy me from my post. So, with all the haste I could, I threw up an out-work of lumber, sails, spars, and boxes across the deck some distance in front of the poop, and, relieving my two fallen assailants of their knives, I stood ready for whatever next might betide.“Humphrey,” called the maiden from above, “put up the ladder quickly and let me down.”“Nay,” said I, “’tis no place for you, maiden. You are safe there. Stay.”“Obey me, Humphrey,” said she in so commanding a voice that I fetched the ladder at once.She looked pale and stern; but otherwise was cool and collected as she descended.“Now,” said she, as she stood beside me, “go and bring down my nurse. Give me that knife; I will mount guard here till you are done.”I durst not waste time by arguing; she took the knife from me and motioned me to my task. The poor old lady, more dead than alive, was hard to move; nor was it till I wickedly threatened to cast her overboard, that she consented to come at all. As I was catching her in my arms, the man at the helm, whom I had all this time clean forgotten, sprang suddenly on me from behind with a pole which, had it been better aimed, would have ended my troubles then and there. As it was, the timber fell on my shoulder, almost cracking the blade. But I was in with him in a twinkling, and had him by the throat before he could strike again. Next moment, the wretch (woe to us that he was an Englishman!) was over the board, and the Lord have mercy on his soul!The delay was pitiable for the old woman, whom, when I came to her again, I found to have swooned away. It was all I could do with my bruised arm to lift her and bring her to the ladder. How I got her down and into her cabin I know not; but when I came out again to my lady’s side, the ship seemed to swim before my eyes. I remember a vision of Ludar, bloody and gasping, reeling across the deck towards us, fighting his way, foot by foot, with four or five savage devils who followed yelling at his back.Then for a time all seemed dim and horrible. I knew that we were fighting desperately for our lives; that men fell heavily and with a groan on to the deck; that the maiden stood by us, undaunted; that presently there was a report of a pistol, followed by a hideous shouting and shrieking. After that, all seemed to grow still of a sudden, and Ludar shouted, “Look to Humphrey.”When I came to, we were still on the deck. The maiden was bathing my brow with water. Ludar, pale and blood-stained, stood gloomily by. Of the enemy not a man stirred. My swoon could not have lasted long, for the hues of the sunset lingered yet in the sky. I tried to gather myself together, but the maiden gently restrained me. “No, Humphrey,” said she, “lie still. There is no more work to be done. Thank God you are safe, as we are.”’Twas sorely tempting to lie thus, so sweetly tended; but the sight of Ludar shamed me into energy. I struggled to my feet. My arm hung limp at my side and my head throbbed; but for that, I was sound and able to stand upright.Ludar, when I came to look at him, was in a worse plight than I. He was bleeding from a gash on his face, and another on his leg; while the jacket he wore was torn in shreds on his back. He came and took my arm, and then motioned with his head to the ghastly heap of dead men on the deck.“Take her within,” said he, “and then come and help me.”“Maiden,” said I, “thank Heaven you are safe, and that we are alive to guard you. Your old nurse I fear is more in need of help than we. I left her senseless. Will you not go to her?”I think she guessed what we meant; for she said nothing, but went quickly within.Then Ludar and I went out to our task. Of the seven Frenchmen who had set on us, not one lived. Beside these lay the captain, the maiden’s waiting man (who, Ludar said, had taken side with the traitors), and one other of the English sailors who had fought for us.“What of the poet?” said I, when after much labour the ship had been lightened of all that was not living.“He is safe at the mast-head,” said Ludar.There, sure enough, when I looked up, clung the poor gallant; peering down at us with pasty face, and hugging the mast with arms and legs.“Let him bide there a while,” said Ludar. “He is safe and out of the way. He skipped up at the first assault, and wisely cut the rope ladder behind him, so that no man could pursue him. But tell me, how do you fare?”“I am less hurt than you,” said I. “Only my arm is numbed by the whack the English knave gave me; while you, Ludar, are bleeding, head and foot.”“I was scratched,” said he. “The villains who set on me were too quick, as you saw, and had me down before I could shut my fist. Why they did not despatch me then and there I know not; but in seizing me they carried their blades in their teeth, the better to use their hands, so that I was able to snatch one for my own use as I fell. It served only to rid me of one of the company. Yet I got my feet again under me, when the other two made at me, as well as the two who had fled from you. Among them all I got these scratches. When the fifth came, who had seen the poet aloft, I knew I could hold ground no longer; so I gave way, as you saw, and made for your barrier. After that you know, and how the maiden stood by us all through, and in the end fetched the pistol which finished the business. Had these villains but been armed, it is they who would have buried us. But come in now, Humphrey, and take counsel.”’Twas a strange ship’s company that met that evening in the dead captain’s cabin. The maiden, Ludar, I, and one of the English fellows, who had been sleeping below and knew naught of the fight till all was over. As for the poet, Ludar still refused to have him down till our conference was over.Of all our party the maiden was, I think, the most hopeful. “God and His saints,” said she, “have ordered this to try us, and see of what mettle we be. Shall we despair, Sir Ludar, when He has proved His goodness to us? The past is done, the future is all before us. You are our captain now, and Humphrey and I and this brave sailor here, ay and our poor poet aloft there, are your crew to follow where you lead. I can man a gun and haul a rope, as you shall see. Come, Humphrey, what say you?”“I have vowed,” said I, “to follow my master to the death. Nor can I think heaven will desert us while you who belong there, are aboard.”She blushed at this and turned it off.“Nay, my friend, it depends on how we do the duty that lies to our hand whether we belong there or not.”Here Ludar broke in abruptly.“Seaman, where be we now?”The sailor got up and went out to ascertain our bearings.“Maiden,” said Ludar, then, more grave than I had ever seen him, “I can make no fine speeches, such as Humphrey here or yonder monkey at the mast-head; but I accept you as one of this crew with a prouder heart than if I were offered my father’s castle.”Then he held out his great hand, and she lay her little hand in it, and her true eyes flashed up to meet his. And I who stood by knew that the compact I witnessed then was for a longer voyage than from here to Leith.I was glad when presently the man came in and reported.“By your leave, captain, we be eight leagues east of Flamboro’ with a southerly breeze falling fast. The ship lies in the wind and the tiller is swinging.”“Take the helm, master, and keep her head straight. Humphrey, fetch down the poet. He and I will mount the first watch to-night. Maiden, do you get what rest you may, ere your turn comes in the morning.”“Ay, ay, my captain,” said she cheerily, and went.“Humphrey,” said Ludar, calling me back, when she had gone, “do you wonder that I love that maiden?”“I do not,” said I.“Is she you love as fair, as brave, as noble?”“She is,” I answered, “every whit as fair, every whit as brave, every whit as noble.”“Then why,” he asked, looking hard at me, “are you sad when you speak of her?”“Alas,” said I, “she loves me not. Ludar, talk not to me of her; I will go fetch the poet.”The poor fellow was by this time well-nigh at the end of his patience. For, though he had fixed himself cunningly in the rigging of the foremast, seating himself on the royal yard, and hugging the mast lovingly with his arms and legs, he found himself unable to budge, or even see what was going on below, by reason of the dizziness which afflicted him. How he had got up so far, and managed to cut the ropes behind him, he never could explain. But a man will do desperate feats for his life’s sake.It was no light task to dislodge him. With my maimed arm I could not haul myself up the rigging even to the lower top-yard, much less carry up to him his dangling ladder. All I could do was to hail him and bid him be of good cheer till we had him down.“Cheer,” he cried, “cometh not in a voice from the void, neither is there help in empty breath. Come up, for I am weary of my perch; and verily, if the mountain come not to Mahomet, the prophet must abase himself to the mountain. In short, my man, I am near tumbling.”“Hold on,” cried I. “I shall fetch help and all will be safe.”“Oh, that the giants would pile Pelion on Ossa and get me out of this heaven!” I heard him say. Methought, however, the fellow could not yet be in desperate straits to talk thus.At last the seaman scrambled up and fetched him down, not without many protestations and caveats by the way. Once down, however, he shook his fluttered plumes, and crowed like any chanticleer.“Facilis descensus Averni, as our Maro hath it. As the muse droppeth from the heights, and the golden shower descendeth, so visit I once more the Arcadian plains. Which remindeth me, where is my Danae, and how fareth she? Apprise her, I pray you, of my return. And, by the way,” added he, puffing himself valiantly, “where is the varlet that late sought my life. He and I must settle scores before this night be an hour older. Fetch him hither and by my—”“See here, Sir Popinjay,” said Ludar, coming forward impatiently, and cutting the speech in twain, “the time is gone past for this fooling. If you be a man, you may prove it now. If not, on my soul, you shall go aloft again. Come, you share this watch with me. Put some food into your body, and then keep sharp look-out ahead. You see the entire crew of this vessel, save the two women; therefore, cease to be half a man and make yourself two.”The fellow turned pale at this news, and cast a glance up and down the empty ship. Then, without a word, he took up half a loaf and a mug of beer from the cabin table and walked forward.“Humphrey,” said Ludar, “get to bed, your turn will come.”But to bed I could not go; and Ludar for once, I found, was not hard to persuade.There was in truth much to be done before we could think of rest. Together we overhauled the ship’s rations, and found what would last us for long enough yet. We examined, too, our ordnance, which was but meagre and ill-fashioned; we had three pieces on either side, besides a small swivel gun on poop and forecastle. The ammunition was sufficient for these and for the few pistols and muskets which we found in the Frenchman’s cabin. Further, we looked long and hard at our charts, which seemed well marked for the passage we were bound on. The English fellow, we discovered, had been several times that way; and, though he was no pilot, he said he yet knew the Bass Rock from a mud bank, and, provided we fell in with neither pirates, tempest, nor the Spaniard, could put us into Leith Roads right side uppermost as well as any man. Whereat we felt easier in our minds than we had been.By the time all these consultations were ended, the watch was half spent. Ludar therefore ordered me below, whether I would or no, to rest. In truth I was ready for it, and fell asleep almost before my head touched my pillow.When I awoke, Ludar stood beside me.“Up!” said he, “all goes well, and your watch-partner awaits you.”“Ludar,” said I, springing up. “Why do you give me the partner who belongs of right to you?”“’Tis a time for work,” said he, with a smile, “not for play. Am I not captain here? To your watch, Humphrey.”I went on board. There stood she on the forecastle, looking ahead and singing softly to herself.I left her and went aft. The sailor was still at the helm, having volunteered a double watch to see us through the night. All behind was ship-shape and trim. Ludar had been busy, clearing the decks and bringing back to order the confusion left by the late battle. There was nothing for me to do. Therefore, with beating heart I walked forward once more.She turned at my coming and greeted me frankly.“Welcome, messmate,” said she. “Is all well?”“All is well,” said I. “The Captain has done the work of ten men, and nought is left for me and you but to look ahead.”“And he is resting?” asked she. “Think you his wounds were dressed?”“I helped him tend them before I went below,” said I. “They were but scratches.”“And your arm,” said she; “it still hangs heavy. May I not bind it for you, Humphrey?”I wished I was the heathen Briareus then, with an hundred arms. There was magic in her touch; and no charm of witch or fairy could have mended my bruised limb as did she.After that, we sat silent awhile, looking out to sea. The soft light was spreading on the east, heralding the coming day. The slack breeze flapped lazily in the sails overhead and scarce ruffled the drowsy ocean. The stars one by one put out their little lights and vanished into the blue. There was no sound but the creaking of the yards and the gentle plash of the water on the hull; only these and the music of a maiden’s song. It went hard with me, that night. For a while, as I sat there, gazing into her face and listening to her music and feeling the touch of her hand on my arm, I was fool enough to think all this—all this peace, all this beauty of the ocean dawn, all this lulling of the breeze, all this music, this gentle smile, this tender touch, spelt love; and there came a voice from the tempter that I should tell her as much then and there. What hindered me, I know not. ’Twas not alone the thought of Ludar, or the remembrance of my own honour, or the fear of her contempt. Be it what it may, I was helped by Heaven that night to be a man, and with a mighty effort to shake off the spell that was on me. So I rose to my feet and walked abaft. Many a time I paced to and fro cooling my fevered brow ere I ventured to return. But when at last I did, I was safe. She stood there motionless, radiant with the first beams of the royal sun as he leapt up from the sea.“Look, Humphrey,” she cried. “Is not that worth keeping watch for?” Then she broke again into song.“Is that an Irish song you sing?” I asked.“It is. How knew you that?”“I guessed it. What does it mean?”She blushed.“’Tis a song the maidens sing at home—an old, old song,” said she, “that I learned from my nurse.”“I pray you, sing it again,” said I.She turned her face to the rising sun, and sang, in English words, as follows:Who cometh from the mountain like the sun for brightness?Whose voice ringeth like the wave on the shingle?Who runneth from the east like the roe?Who cometh?Is it the wind that kisses my tresses?Or is it the harp of Innis thrilling my ear?Or is it the dawn on Ramore that dims my eyes?Who cometh?Is he far? Is he near? Whence comes he riding?Dazzling in armour and white of brow?Is it for me that he filleth the mountains with music?Who waiteth?Who cometh?“’Tis a wild song, full of riddles,” said I. “Maybe there is a song somewhere which has the answers.”“I know it not,” said she.“Not yet,” said I.She looked up at me quickly as if she doubted my meaning. But I looked out seaward and asked:“Where in Ireland is your home, maiden? Is it near Ludar’s castle on the sea?”“Hard by,” said she. “The McDonnells and O’Neills are neighbours and foes.” And her brow clouded. “My father, Humphrey, is the bravest of the O’Neills as Ludar’s father is the bravest of the McDonnells.”“And does your father hold Dunluce?” asked I.“I know not,” said she. “I have never seen my father, Turlogh Luinech O’Neill, though I love him as my life. At two years I was sent away to England with my English mother, who was but a hand-fast bride to the O’Neill.”“And what may that be?” I asked.“’Tis a custom with us,” said she, “for the chiefs to take wives who are theirs only so long as a better does not present herself. My mother, Alice Syngleton, the daughter of my father’s English ally and preserver, Captain Syngleton, was thus wedded, and when I was two years old—so my old nurse tells me—he married the great Lady Cantire of the Isles. Wherefore my mother was sent home to England with me, and there we lived till she died three years ago; since when I have pined in a convent, and am now, in obedience to my father’s summons, on my way to my unknown home. My father, being, as I understand, allied to the English, who have dispossessed the McDonnells, I was to come over under the escort of an English officer of Sir William Carleton’s choosing, who was my mother’s kinsman. You know what peril that brought me to, and how, thanks to you, I am now making a safer journey, and a happier. Humphrey,” said she, “till I met you and Sir Ludar, I had thought all men base; ’twas the one lesson they taught us at the convent. I have unlearned the lesson since.”“Pray Heaven you never have to relearn it,” said I, groaning inwardly to think how near I had been to giving her cause.Thus we talked that morning. At every word, what little hope I had once had of her love faded like the stars above our heads. Yet, instead of it came the promise of an almost sisterly friendship, which at the time seemed poor enough exchange, but which was yet a prize worth any man’s having. She bade me tell her about myself, and heard me so gently, and concerned herself so honestly in all that touched me, and praised and chid me so prettily for what I had done well and ill, that I would my story had been twice as long and twice as pitiful. The only secret I did not tell her, you may guess. She did not. But she heard me greedily when I came to tell of my meeting with Ludar and of our adventures near Oxford; and for his sake, as much as for my own, she thought kindly of me and promised me her friendship.Our watch was ended, and we were in the act of quitting our post, when the maiden, taking one last look seaward, cried: “Is not that a sail away there?”Sure enough it was, sparkling on the westward horizon, some two leagues to the larboard.“Who cometh?” said I to myself, echoing the maiden’s song.
We were, I reckon, somewhere off the Yorkshire coast; for we had been sailing a week, for the most part against foul winds. To-night, as I said, the light breeze had backed to the south and was sending us forward quietly at some six or seven knots an hour. All seemed to promise a speedy end to our voyage; and yet, as I stood there, drinking in the beauty of the evening, and rejoicing in my recovered strength, I would as soon we had been bound on a voyage ten times as long.
I was standing idly near the foremast. On the high poop behind sat the maiden, singing beside her old nurse, who, like me, was enjoying the air for the first time to-night. Ludar lolled near me, on a coil of rope, watching the sun dip as he listened to the singing, and betwixt whiles unravelling the tangles of a fishing line. On the forecastle, the French seamen sat and whispered, scowling sometimes our way, and sometimes laughing at the poet who strutted near them, intent on the sunset and big with some notable verses thereupon, which were hatching in his brain. An English fellow was at the helm, half asleep; while the captain, grumbling at the slackness of the breeze, paced to and fro, with an oath betwixt his lips and an ugly frown on his brow.
Suddenly I seemed to detect among the Frenchmen a stir, as if something had just been said or resolved upon in their whisperings. The captain at that instant was near them, turning in his walk; when, without warning, two of their number sprang out upon him. There was a shout, a struggle, the gleam of a knife, and then a dead man lay on the deck. All was so quick and sudden that the murder was done under my very eyes before I knew what was happening. Then, in a twinkling, the whole ship became the scene of a deadly fight. Three of the traitors threw themselves on Ludar; the poet reeled in the grip of another; two others made for me.
“Back, back!” shouted Ludar, in a voice of thunder, as he began his struggle.
’Twas well I obeyed him; for the two who had made an end of the captain were already rushing in the direction of the women, and had I reached the ladder a moment later, all might have been lost.
The men, I think, in laying their wicked plan, had scarcely taken me (who late was so weak), into account as a fighting man. They had reckoned to carry the poop, where lay the supposed treasure and the arms, without a blow; and once there, the ship would be theirs. It staggered them, therefore, to find me standing in the way and laying about me. The two women, as I said, were on the upper deck which formed the roof of the poop house. To that there was no access save by the small ladder, which I accordingly wrenched from its place and swung round with all my might at my assailants. The blow knocked over two of them; and before they could regain their feet, I had struck another a blow with my fist, which needed no second. The fourth varlet did not wait for me, but closed on me with his knife. Luckily the blade missed its mark, grazing only my ribs, and before he could strike again I had him by the wrist, and the blow he meant for me went home in his own neck. After that, ’twas easy work to hold off the other two, one of whom was the drunken fool who had blabbed his secret days ago, had I only heeded it, in my sick cabin. Finding me stubborn, and further passage barred, they sheered off with a curse and hastened forward. I durst not follow them; for it might be a feint to decoy me from my post. So, with all the haste I could, I threw up an out-work of lumber, sails, spars, and boxes across the deck some distance in front of the poop, and, relieving my two fallen assailants of their knives, I stood ready for whatever next might betide.
“Humphrey,” called the maiden from above, “put up the ladder quickly and let me down.”
“Nay,” said I, “’tis no place for you, maiden. You are safe there. Stay.”
“Obey me, Humphrey,” said she in so commanding a voice that I fetched the ladder at once.
She looked pale and stern; but otherwise was cool and collected as she descended.
“Now,” said she, as she stood beside me, “go and bring down my nurse. Give me that knife; I will mount guard here till you are done.”
I durst not waste time by arguing; she took the knife from me and motioned me to my task. The poor old lady, more dead than alive, was hard to move; nor was it till I wickedly threatened to cast her overboard, that she consented to come at all. As I was catching her in my arms, the man at the helm, whom I had all this time clean forgotten, sprang suddenly on me from behind with a pole which, had it been better aimed, would have ended my troubles then and there. As it was, the timber fell on my shoulder, almost cracking the blade. But I was in with him in a twinkling, and had him by the throat before he could strike again. Next moment, the wretch (woe to us that he was an Englishman!) was over the board, and the Lord have mercy on his soul!
The delay was pitiable for the old woman, whom, when I came to her again, I found to have swooned away. It was all I could do with my bruised arm to lift her and bring her to the ladder. How I got her down and into her cabin I know not; but when I came out again to my lady’s side, the ship seemed to swim before my eyes. I remember a vision of Ludar, bloody and gasping, reeling across the deck towards us, fighting his way, foot by foot, with four or five savage devils who followed yelling at his back.
Then for a time all seemed dim and horrible. I knew that we were fighting desperately for our lives; that men fell heavily and with a groan on to the deck; that the maiden stood by us, undaunted; that presently there was a report of a pistol, followed by a hideous shouting and shrieking. After that, all seemed to grow still of a sudden, and Ludar shouted, “Look to Humphrey.”
When I came to, we were still on the deck. The maiden was bathing my brow with water. Ludar, pale and blood-stained, stood gloomily by. Of the enemy not a man stirred. My swoon could not have lasted long, for the hues of the sunset lingered yet in the sky. I tried to gather myself together, but the maiden gently restrained me. “No, Humphrey,” said she, “lie still. There is no more work to be done. Thank God you are safe, as we are.”
’Twas sorely tempting to lie thus, so sweetly tended; but the sight of Ludar shamed me into energy. I struggled to my feet. My arm hung limp at my side and my head throbbed; but for that, I was sound and able to stand upright.
Ludar, when I came to look at him, was in a worse plight than I. He was bleeding from a gash on his face, and another on his leg; while the jacket he wore was torn in shreds on his back. He came and took my arm, and then motioned with his head to the ghastly heap of dead men on the deck.
“Take her within,” said he, “and then come and help me.”
“Maiden,” said I, “thank Heaven you are safe, and that we are alive to guard you. Your old nurse I fear is more in need of help than we. I left her senseless. Will you not go to her?”
I think she guessed what we meant; for she said nothing, but went quickly within.
Then Ludar and I went out to our task. Of the seven Frenchmen who had set on us, not one lived. Beside these lay the captain, the maiden’s waiting man (who, Ludar said, had taken side with the traitors), and one other of the English sailors who had fought for us.
“What of the poet?” said I, when after much labour the ship had been lightened of all that was not living.
“He is safe at the mast-head,” said Ludar.
There, sure enough, when I looked up, clung the poor gallant; peering down at us with pasty face, and hugging the mast with arms and legs.
“Let him bide there a while,” said Ludar. “He is safe and out of the way. He skipped up at the first assault, and wisely cut the rope ladder behind him, so that no man could pursue him. But tell me, how do you fare?”
“I am less hurt than you,” said I. “Only my arm is numbed by the whack the English knave gave me; while you, Ludar, are bleeding, head and foot.”
“I was scratched,” said he. “The villains who set on me were too quick, as you saw, and had me down before I could shut my fist. Why they did not despatch me then and there I know not; but in seizing me they carried their blades in their teeth, the better to use their hands, so that I was able to snatch one for my own use as I fell. It served only to rid me of one of the company. Yet I got my feet again under me, when the other two made at me, as well as the two who had fled from you. Among them all I got these scratches. When the fifth came, who had seen the poet aloft, I knew I could hold ground no longer; so I gave way, as you saw, and made for your barrier. After that you know, and how the maiden stood by us all through, and in the end fetched the pistol which finished the business. Had these villains but been armed, it is they who would have buried us. But come in now, Humphrey, and take counsel.”
’Twas a strange ship’s company that met that evening in the dead captain’s cabin. The maiden, Ludar, I, and one of the English fellows, who had been sleeping below and knew naught of the fight till all was over. As for the poet, Ludar still refused to have him down till our conference was over.
Of all our party the maiden was, I think, the most hopeful. “God and His saints,” said she, “have ordered this to try us, and see of what mettle we be. Shall we despair, Sir Ludar, when He has proved His goodness to us? The past is done, the future is all before us. You are our captain now, and Humphrey and I and this brave sailor here, ay and our poor poet aloft there, are your crew to follow where you lead. I can man a gun and haul a rope, as you shall see. Come, Humphrey, what say you?”
“I have vowed,” said I, “to follow my master to the death. Nor can I think heaven will desert us while you who belong there, are aboard.”
She blushed at this and turned it off.
“Nay, my friend, it depends on how we do the duty that lies to our hand whether we belong there or not.”
Here Ludar broke in abruptly.
“Seaman, where be we now?”
The sailor got up and went out to ascertain our bearings.
“Maiden,” said Ludar, then, more grave than I had ever seen him, “I can make no fine speeches, such as Humphrey here or yonder monkey at the mast-head; but I accept you as one of this crew with a prouder heart than if I were offered my father’s castle.”
Then he held out his great hand, and she lay her little hand in it, and her true eyes flashed up to meet his. And I who stood by knew that the compact I witnessed then was for a longer voyage than from here to Leith.
I was glad when presently the man came in and reported.
“By your leave, captain, we be eight leagues east of Flamboro’ with a southerly breeze falling fast. The ship lies in the wind and the tiller is swinging.”
“Take the helm, master, and keep her head straight. Humphrey, fetch down the poet. He and I will mount the first watch to-night. Maiden, do you get what rest you may, ere your turn comes in the morning.”
“Ay, ay, my captain,” said she cheerily, and went.
“Humphrey,” said Ludar, calling me back, when she had gone, “do you wonder that I love that maiden?”
“I do not,” said I.
“Is she you love as fair, as brave, as noble?”
“She is,” I answered, “every whit as fair, every whit as brave, every whit as noble.”
“Then why,” he asked, looking hard at me, “are you sad when you speak of her?”
“Alas,” said I, “she loves me not. Ludar, talk not to me of her; I will go fetch the poet.”
The poor fellow was by this time well-nigh at the end of his patience. For, though he had fixed himself cunningly in the rigging of the foremast, seating himself on the royal yard, and hugging the mast lovingly with his arms and legs, he found himself unable to budge, or even see what was going on below, by reason of the dizziness which afflicted him. How he had got up so far, and managed to cut the ropes behind him, he never could explain. But a man will do desperate feats for his life’s sake.
It was no light task to dislodge him. With my maimed arm I could not haul myself up the rigging even to the lower top-yard, much less carry up to him his dangling ladder. All I could do was to hail him and bid him be of good cheer till we had him down.
“Cheer,” he cried, “cometh not in a voice from the void, neither is there help in empty breath. Come up, for I am weary of my perch; and verily, if the mountain come not to Mahomet, the prophet must abase himself to the mountain. In short, my man, I am near tumbling.”
“Hold on,” cried I. “I shall fetch help and all will be safe.”
“Oh, that the giants would pile Pelion on Ossa and get me out of this heaven!” I heard him say. Methought, however, the fellow could not yet be in desperate straits to talk thus.
At last the seaman scrambled up and fetched him down, not without many protestations and caveats by the way. Once down, however, he shook his fluttered plumes, and crowed like any chanticleer.
“Facilis descensus Averni, as our Maro hath it. As the muse droppeth from the heights, and the golden shower descendeth, so visit I once more the Arcadian plains. Which remindeth me, where is my Danae, and how fareth she? Apprise her, I pray you, of my return. And, by the way,” added he, puffing himself valiantly, “where is the varlet that late sought my life. He and I must settle scores before this night be an hour older. Fetch him hither and by my—”
“See here, Sir Popinjay,” said Ludar, coming forward impatiently, and cutting the speech in twain, “the time is gone past for this fooling. If you be a man, you may prove it now. If not, on my soul, you shall go aloft again. Come, you share this watch with me. Put some food into your body, and then keep sharp look-out ahead. You see the entire crew of this vessel, save the two women; therefore, cease to be half a man and make yourself two.”
The fellow turned pale at this news, and cast a glance up and down the empty ship. Then, without a word, he took up half a loaf and a mug of beer from the cabin table and walked forward.
“Humphrey,” said Ludar, “get to bed, your turn will come.”
But to bed I could not go; and Ludar for once, I found, was not hard to persuade.
There was in truth much to be done before we could think of rest. Together we overhauled the ship’s rations, and found what would last us for long enough yet. We examined, too, our ordnance, which was but meagre and ill-fashioned; we had three pieces on either side, besides a small swivel gun on poop and forecastle. The ammunition was sufficient for these and for the few pistols and muskets which we found in the Frenchman’s cabin. Further, we looked long and hard at our charts, which seemed well marked for the passage we were bound on. The English fellow, we discovered, had been several times that way; and, though he was no pilot, he said he yet knew the Bass Rock from a mud bank, and, provided we fell in with neither pirates, tempest, nor the Spaniard, could put us into Leith Roads right side uppermost as well as any man. Whereat we felt easier in our minds than we had been.
By the time all these consultations were ended, the watch was half spent. Ludar therefore ordered me below, whether I would or no, to rest. In truth I was ready for it, and fell asleep almost before my head touched my pillow.
When I awoke, Ludar stood beside me.
“Up!” said he, “all goes well, and your watch-partner awaits you.”
“Ludar,” said I, springing up. “Why do you give me the partner who belongs of right to you?”
“’Tis a time for work,” said he, with a smile, “not for play. Am I not captain here? To your watch, Humphrey.”
I went on board. There stood she on the forecastle, looking ahead and singing softly to herself.
I left her and went aft. The sailor was still at the helm, having volunteered a double watch to see us through the night. All behind was ship-shape and trim. Ludar had been busy, clearing the decks and bringing back to order the confusion left by the late battle. There was nothing for me to do. Therefore, with beating heart I walked forward once more.
She turned at my coming and greeted me frankly.
“Welcome, messmate,” said she. “Is all well?”
“All is well,” said I. “The Captain has done the work of ten men, and nought is left for me and you but to look ahead.”
“And he is resting?” asked she. “Think you his wounds were dressed?”
“I helped him tend them before I went below,” said I. “They were but scratches.”
“And your arm,” said she; “it still hangs heavy. May I not bind it for you, Humphrey?”
I wished I was the heathen Briareus then, with an hundred arms. There was magic in her touch; and no charm of witch or fairy could have mended my bruised limb as did she.
After that, we sat silent awhile, looking out to sea. The soft light was spreading on the east, heralding the coming day. The slack breeze flapped lazily in the sails overhead and scarce ruffled the drowsy ocean. The stars one by one put out their little lights and vanished into the blue. There was no sound but the creaking of the yards and the gentle plash of the water on the hull; only these and the music of a maiden’s song. It went hard with me, that night. For a while, as I sat there, gazing into her face and listening to her music and feeling the touch of her hand on my arm, I was fool enough to think all this—all this peace, all this beauty of the ocean dawn, all this lulling of the breeze, all this music, this gentle smile, this tender touch, spelt love; and there came a voice from the tempter that I should tell her as much then and there. What hindered me, I know not. ’Twas not alone the thought of Ludar, or the remembrance of my own honour, or the fear of her contempt. Be it what it may, I was helped by Heaven that night to be a man, and with a mighty effort to shake off the spell that was on me. So I rose to my feet and walked abaft. Many a time I paced to and fro cooling my fevered brow ere I ventured to return. But when at last I did, I was safe. She stood there motionless, radiant with the first beams of the royal sun as he leapt up from the sea.
“Look, Humphrey,” she cried. “Is not that worth keeping watch for?” Then she broke again into song.
“Is that an Irish song you sing?” I asked.
“It is. How knew you that?”
“I guessed it. What does it mean?”
She blushed.
“’Tis a song the maidens sing at home—an old, old song,” said she, “that I learned from my nurse.”
“I pray you, sing it again,” said I.
She turned her face to the rising sun, and sang, in English words, as follows:
Who cometh from the mountain like the sun for brightness?Whose voice ringeth like the wave on the shingle?Who runneth from the east like the roe?Who cometh?Is it the wind that kisses my tresses?Or is it the harp of Innis thrilling my ear?Or is it the dawn on Ramore that dims my eyes?Who cometh?Is he far? Is he near? Whence comes he riding?Dazzling in armour and white of brow?Is it for me that he filleth the mountains with music?Who waiteth?Who cometh?
Who cometh from the mountain like the sun for brightness?Whose voice ringeth like the wave on the shingle?Who runneth from the east like the roe?Who cometh?Is it the wind that kisses my tresses?Or is it the harp of Innis thrilling my ear?Or is it the dawn on Ramore that dims my eyes?Who cometh?Is he far? Is he near? Whence comes he riding?Dazzling in armour and white of brow?Is it for me that he filleth the mountains with music?Who waiteth?Who cometh?
“’Tis a wild song, full of riddles,” said I. “Maybe there is a song somewhere which has the answers.”
“I know it not,” said she.
“Not yet,” said I.
She looked up at me quickly as if she doubted my meaning. But I looked out seaward and asked:
“Where in Ireland is your home, maiden? Is it near Ludar’s castle on the sea?”
“Hard by,” said she. “The McDonnells and O’Neills are neighbours and foes.” And her brow clouded. “My father, Humphrey, is the bravest of the O’Neills as Ludar’s father is the bravest of the McDonnells.”
“And does your father hold Dunluce?” asked I.
“I know not,” said she. “I have never seen my father, Turlogh Luinech O’Neill, though I love him as my life. At two years I was sent away to England with my English mother, who was but a hand-fast bride to the O’Neill.”
“And what may that be?” I asked.
“’Tis a custom with us,” said she, “for the chiefs to take wives who are theirs only so long as a better does not present herself. My mother, Alice Syngleton, the daughter of my father’s English ally and preserver, Captain Syngleton, was thus wedded, and when I was two years old—so my old nurse tells me—he married the great Lady Cantire of the Isles. Wherefore my mother was sent home to England with me, and there we lived till she died three years ago; since when I have pined in a convent, and am now, in obedience to my father’s summons, on my way to my unknown home. My father, being, as I understand, allied to the English, who have dispossessed the McDonnells, I was to come over under the escort of an English officer of Sir William Carleton’s choosing, who was my mother’s kinsman. You know what peril that brought me to, and how, thanks to you, I am now making a safer journey, and a happier. Humphrey,” said she, “till I met you and Sir Ludar, I had thought all men base; ’twas the one lesson they taught us at the convent. I have unlearned the lesson since.”
“Pray Heaven you never have to relearn it,” said I, groaning inwardly to think how near I had been to giving her cause.
Thus we talked that morning. At every word, what little hope I had once had of her love faded like the stars above our heads. Yet, instead of it came the promise of an almost sisterly friendship, which at the time seemed poor enough exchange, but which was yet a prize worth any man’s having. She bade me tell her about myself, and heard me so gently, and concerned herself so honestly in all that touched me, and praised and chid me so prettily for what I had done well and ill, that I would my story had been twice as long and twice as pitiful. The only secret I did not tell her, you may guess. She did not. But she heard me greedily when I came to tell of my meeting with Ludar and of our adventures near Oxford; and for his sake, as much as for my own, she thought kindly of me and promised me her friendship.
Our watch was ended, and we were in the act of quitting our post, when the maiden, taking one last look seaward, cried: “Is not that a sail away there?”
Sure enough it was, sparkling on the westward horizon, some two leagues to the larboard.
“Who cometh?” said I to myself, echoing the maiden’s song.
Chapter Twelve.How we sailed into Leith.A strange joy seized me as I sighted the unknown ship. For my heart told me she was no friend, and I was just in the humour for a fight. I was one too many on board theMiséricorde; and a brush with the Queen’s foes just now would comfort me amazingly. And yet, when I came to think of it, she lay in nearer the English coast than we, and was like enough to be no Queen’s enemy after all, but a Queen’s cruiser on the look-out for suspicious craft like ours. For we floated no colours aloft. After the late fight Ludar had hauled down the Frenchman’s flag; but it was in vain I begged him to hoist that of her royal Majesty in its place. He would not hear of it.“No,” said he, “I sail under no false colours. This is a voyage for safety, not for glory, else I know the flag would fly there. As it is, Humphrey, ’tis best for us all to fly nothing. The masts shall go bare. The blue of a maiden’s eyes is colour enough for you and me to fight under.”I could not gainsay him. We were in no trim for receiving broadsides, or grappling with sea-dogs, however merry the ports might be for a man in my plight. Our business was to bring theMiséricordesafe into Leith Roads, and to that venture we stood pledged.Ludar ordered the maiden to her quarters and me to my cabin.“In this calm,” said he, “’twill be hours before we foregather if foregather we may. So below, while the poet and I whistle for a breeze.”Towards afternoon we lay much as we were, drifting a little westward. But then came some clouds up from the south-east and with them a puff into our canvas.“We may be glad to take in a reef on her before daybreak, Captain,” said the seaman.“Time, enough till then,” said Ludar. “Take all you can now.”We had not long to wait before theMiséricordehad way on once more. Then Ludar called his crew to him and said:“To-night, be yonder stranger who she may, we run a race. Maiden, you have the keenest eyes; keep the watch forward. Humphrey, do you and the poet see to the guns and have all ready in case we need to show our teeth. Pilot, budge not one point out of the wind; but let her run. We may slip past in the dark, and then we are light-heeled enough to keep ahead. Old nurse, I warrant you have loaded a piece before now—we may need you to do it again. Meanwhile, to bed with you.”Then the race began. The wind behind us freshened fast, so that in an hour’s time our timbers were creaking under stress of canvas. Before that, the stranger ship, though still a league and a half to larboard, had caught the breeze and was going too, canvas crowded, with her nose a point out of the wind into our course. For a long while it seemed as if we were never to come nearer, so anxious was she to give us no more advantage than she could help. But towards sundown we may have been a league asunder running neck and neck.“She’s an English cruiser, Captain,” cried the helmsman, “and takes us for a Spaniard—that’s flat.”“Then run as if we were so,” said Ludar. “Budge not an inch from your course even if we scrape her bows as we pass.”So we held on straight down the wind, while the Englishman, closing in at every mile, held on too; and no one was to say which of us gained an inch on the other.The sun tumbled into the sea and the brief twilight grew deeper, while behind us the wind gathered itself into a squall. Just before daylight failed, we could perceive the cruiser, not two miles away, leaning forward on her course, with the Queen’s flag on her poop, and a row of portholes gaping our way. Then we lost her in the dusk.The poet, who stood near me at the gun, said:“Night is as a cave of which none seeth the end from the beginning; and a man hooded feeleth what he before saw. My Hollander, I bargained not for this when I took passage here. I wish it were to-morrow. Why do we not, under cover of night, change our course?”“Because, since that is what our pursuers will expect of us, it will delude them the more if we keep straight on.”“O truth, many are thy arts!” said he. “But if, my Soothsayer, the wolf’s cunning be a match for that of the lamb? What then?”“Then you may want your match, and your knife too,” said I.He shivered a little.“My Hollander,” said he, “if I fall, say to my lady ’twas for her; and I pray you give her the gem in my bonnet. Say to her its brightness was dimmer than the remembrance of her eyes; and its price meaner than the dewdrop on her lip. Bring her to see me where I lie; and compose my face to greet her. Tell me, my Dutchman, doth a cannon ball give short shrift, or were it easier to die by the steel?”“A peace to your nonsense,” said I. “You have more sonnets to write before we need think of laying you out.”He was comforted at this, and we resumed our watch in silence.The night grew very dark, and at every gust our masts stooped further before the wind. TheMiséricordehissed her way through the water, and still our pilot turned not his helm an inch right or left.Presently, Ludar came up to where we stood. I could see his eyes flash even in the dark.“Go forward now,” said he to me. “Should we both be running as we were, and as I think we are our courses ought to meet not far hence. Send the maiden to me—I need her to take the helm while we three stand to the guns. Pray Heaven we win clear; if not, it will go hard with you, friend, in the prow. Let go your pistol at first sight of them, and, if you can, come abaft to join us before we strike.”I could tell by the tone in which he spoke that he took in every inch of our peril, and trembled, not for himself, but for some one else.The maiden was loth to quit her post; for she, too, knew the risk of it and claimed it as her right. But when I told her the Captain had so ordered, and required her at the helm, she obeyed without another word.Then followed a quarter of an hour that seemed like a lifetime. As I stood craning my neck forward, gazing under my hands seaward, there crowded into my memory visions of all my past life. I seemed to see the home of my boyhood, and looked again into my mother’s face. And I stood once more before my case in the shop outside Temple Bar, and listened to Peter Stoupe humming his psalm-tune, and heard my types click into the stick. I marched once more at the head of my clubs to Finsbury Fields, and there I saw Captain Merriman—drat him!—with his vile lips at a maiden’s ear. And I passed, too, along the village street at Kingston where met me my mistress and her sweet daughter; and as I looked back, Jeannette turned too and—What was that? Surely in the darkness I saw something! No. All was pitch black. The wind roared through the rigging, and the water seethed up at the plunging prow. But though I saw nothing, I felt the pursuer near; so near, I wondered not to hear the swish of her keel through the waves. On we went and nearer and nearer we seemed together. Oh for one sign of them, were it even a gun across our path! But sign there came none. The darkness seemed blacker than ever and—All of a sudden I seemed to detect something—a spark, or a glow, or the luminous break of a wave. So swiftly it came and went, that it was gone before I could look. A trick of my vision, thought I. No! there it was again, this time nothing but a spark, close by, on a level, perhaps, with our mizzen. So near was it, I wondered whether it might not be the lighting of a match at our own guns. It went again: and as it did so, my finger, almost without my knowing it, tightened on the trigger of my pistol and it went off.At the same moment, there was a blaze, a roar, a crash, and a shout. For an instant theMiséricordereeled in her course and quivered from stern to stern. Then, another shout and a wild irregular roar astern. Then our good ship gathered herself together and leapt forward once more into the darkness, and the peril was passed.All was over so suddenly that the pistol was still smoking in my hand as I leapt from the forecastle and rushed aft.“Is all well?” I shouted.“All well,” said Ludar, quietly. “She grazed our poop and no more.”“And the maiden?” said I.“All well,” cried she, cheerily from the helm, “and fair in the wind.”“Stand at your posts still,” cried Ludar.So for another half-hour yet we stood at our posts, just as we had stood before the crisis came; and not a word said any one.Then in the stormy east came a faint flush of dawn, and we knew that this perilous night was over.“Seaman,” said Ludar, “relieve the maiden at the helm, and bid her come hither.”She came, radiant and triumphant.“Sir Ludar,” she said, “I thank you for letting me hold the helm this night. You gave it me as the place of safety; but I had my revenge, since it proved the post of honour.”“It was indeed the post of danger,” said Ludar. “Had you swerved and not held straight on, we might not have been here to honour you for it. But say, did none of the Englishman’s shot reach the poop?”“Some of it. Witness the sail there and the rail and the stern windows; but it spared me.”“I think,” said Ludar, “we maimed them in one of their masts in passing, and their bowsprit broke short when it touched our stern. I doubt if we shall find them following us.”“As for our Hollander,” said the poet, who had been wondrous silent thus far, “he hath this night proved himself twice a prophet. He said we should win this race; he said, moreover, I should live to write another ode. And lo! he spoke true. By your leave, Captain, I will go celebrate this notable occasion in a strain worthy of it and to the glory of my fair Amazon who—”“Go below and cook this company some pottage,” said Ludar, “and see you be not long over it.”Whereat the poet, with the muse taken out of him, departed. We stood watching the dawn till there was light enough to look back on our night’s work. There was the Englishman with her main-mast gone, and draggled about the bows, beating up under reefed sails for the coast. It was plain to see, although we were two long leagues away, that she had had enough for one night and was going to leave us in peace. For myself, as I looked, I could not wholly glory in having thus flouted her Majesty’s flag; but I considered that we had run that night for our lives, so I hoped the sin would be forgiven me.And now, when we come to look round us, we found the wind still running high, and shifting a point or so to the eastward, promising a stormy day. So Ludar bade us shorten our canvas and put out our ship’s head a bit, so as to give the coast a wide berth.And, in truth, as the day wore on, the wind freshened into a gale, and the gale into a tempest, so that if we had promised ourselves relief after the perils of last night, our hopes were dashed. The sea, which so far had been easy, ran now high, and washed over our prow as we stood across the wind, and it was plain we were going to find out before long of what mettle our brave timbers were.’Twas no light thing to face a night like this, even with a good crew—how much less with but four men and a maid? Yet I never saw Ludar more at his ease. In the danger of last night his face had been troubled and his manner excited. Now he gave his orders as if this were a pleasure trip on a quiet lake.“What is there to mind,” said he, “in a capful of wind? ’Tis sent to help us on our way; whereas, had we been taken last night where should we be now? Come, my men, help me shorten sail, for a little will go a long way a night like this. Maiden, to you I trust the helm with a light heart. ’Twill tax your strength more to keep her head thus than to run, as you did last night, clean before the wind; but you are strong and brave, and teach us to be the same.”The subtlest courtier’s speech could not have won her as did these blunt words. She said no more than “I go, my Captain.” But the look of her eyes as they met his spoke volumes of joy and gratitude, a tithe of which would have gladdened me for a lifetime.Then we fell to shortening our canvas—a perilous task. When that was done, leaving only the topsails spread, Ludar bade us make good the hatches, and fall to and eat. Which we did, all but the poet, who, being either big with his ode, or misliking the wildness of the night, sat idle.“Come, Sir Popinjay,” said Ludar. “Eat, for no man can work on an empty stomach, and even poetry will not help haul a rope.”“We avoid Scylla, my Captain, only to fall into Charybdis. Methinks Scylla were the better fate. At least I might have passed this night recumbent. The eagle, at the day’s end, flieth to his nest, and the lion hath his den; to all toil cometh an evensong, save to the shuttlecocks of Aeolus.”“Nay, Sir Poet, you did bravely last night. Fall to and eat now, and we shall see you do more bravely to-night.”“Orpheus, his weapon, is a harp, not a gun. Nevertheless, I am one of five, and shall yield me to a man’s bidding for the sake of her, my mistress, to whose glory I have this day indited my ode, and into whose sweet ear I will even now go recite it.”“No, no,” said Ludar, “stay here and eat, and then go make a better one on the starboard bow, with your hand on the forestays, and your eye seaward.”He obeyed at length and swallowed his supper. Then, lamenting the maiden’s fate at being deprived of his ode, he went gallantly forward.“There goes a brave man in the garb of a fool,” said Ludar. “Humphrey, in this wind, the maiden will be hard put to it to keep her post on the poop. ’Twould help her to lash her to her helm. Will you go and do it?”“That task belongs to the Captain,” said I. “She will suffer it from you.” He smiled at me grimly and went astern. And, as I said, the maiden let him have his way; and there she stood, as night closed, erect and steadfast, with her hands on the tiller and her brave face set seaward.’Twas a fearful night of shrieking wind and thundering wave. Often and often as the braveMiséricordereared and hung suspended on a wave’s crest, we knew none of us if she would ever reach the next. Lucky for us we were a flush-decked ship and our hatches sound, for the seas that poured over us would have filled us to the brim in an hour. Lucky, too, the Frenchman’s cargo had been snugly stowed, or we should have been on our beam-ends before midnight. Half-way through the night, there was a loud crack and over went our main top-mast with her sails in ribbons. We had scarce time, at great peril, to cut her away, when another burst snapped our mizzen almost at the deck.“That lightens us still more,” said Ludar. “Let go all the forward canvas, and cut away. We must put her into the wind and let her drive under bare poles.”With that he went to the helm, where indeed the maiden must have needed succour. And there he stayed beside her till the night passed.Afterwards he told me that he found her there, half stunned by the wind, but never flinching, or yielding a point out of the course. “I know not if she was pleased to see me there,” said he. “She said little enough, and hardly surrendered me the tiller. But when we put the ship into the wind, there was little to do, save to stand and watch the sea, and shield ourselves as best we might from the force of the waves that leapt over the poop.”And fierce enough they were, in truth. But what was worse was that our course now lay due west, bringing us every league nearer the coast. Should the tempest last much longer we might have a sterner peril to face on the iron Northumbrian shore than ever we had escaped in the open sea.The night passed and morning saw us driving headlong, with but one mast standing and not a sail to bless it. The maiden who had stood at her post since sundown yielded at last and came down, pale and drenched, to her quarters. The poet too, who had clung all night to the halyards, looking faithfully ahead and polishing his ode inwardly at the same time, also crawled abaft, half frozen and stupid with drowsiness. Indeed, there was little any of us could do, and one by one Ludar ordered us to rest, while he, whom no labour seemed to daunt, clung doggedly to the helm.Thus half that day the wind flung us forward, till presently, far on the horizon, we could discern the sullen outline of a cliff.“We are lost!” said I.“Humphrey, you are a fool,” said Ludar. “See you not the wind is backing fast?”So it was, and as we drove on, ever nearer the fatal coast, it swung round again to the southerly, and the sun above us blazed out fitfully from among the breaking clouds.“Heaven fights for us,” said Ludar. “Quick, rig up a sail forward and fly a yard; and do you, seaman, look to your charts and say where we are.”“That I have done long since,” said the sailor. “We are scarce a league from the Holy Island, and ’tis full time we put her head out, sir.”“Come and take the helm then.”For a while it seemed as if we were to expect as wild a tempest from the south as ever we had met from the east. But towards evening, the wind slackened a bit, and, veering south-east, enabled us to stand clear of the coast, and make, battered and ill canvassed as we were, straight for the Scotch Forth.The maiden slept all through that night, and when at dawn she came on deck, fresh and singing, we were tumbling merrily through a slackening sea, with the Bass Rock looming on the horizon.“Methinks the jaded Greek felt not otherwise when, leaving behind him the blood-stained plains of Troy, he espied the cloud-topped mountains of Hellas,” said the poet, who joined us as we stood.“Which means,” said the maiden, “you are glad?”“Shall Pyramus rejoice to see the wall that hides him from his Thisbe? or Hector leap at the trumpet which parts him from his Andromache? Mistress mine, in yonder rock shall I read my doom?”“Rather read us your ode, Sir Poet,” said she. “It has had a stormy hatching, and should be a tempestuous outburst.”“As indeed you shall find it, if I have your leave to rehearse it,” said he.“I beg no greater favour,” said she.Then the poet poured out this brave sonnet:—“Go, grievous gales, your heads that heave,Ye foam-flaked furies of the wasty deep.Ye loud-tongued Tritons, wind and wave.Go fan my love where she doth sleep,And tell her, tell her in her earHer Corydon sits sighing here.“The tempest stalks the stormy sea,The lightning leaps with lurid light,The glad gull calls from lea to lea,The whistling whirlwind fills the night;Bears each a message to my love,Whose stony heart I faint to move.”“’Tis too short,” said the maiden, “we shall be friends, I hope, long enough to hear more of it.”“Meanwhile, Sir Poet,” said Ludar, who chafed at these civilities, “go forward again, and keep the watch. Call if you spy aught, and keep your eyes well open.”Fortune favoured us that day, as she had handled us roughly in the days before. The wind held good, and filled our slender canvas. The pilot’s charts deceived not; nor did friend or enemy stand across our path. Before night we had swept round the rock and found the channel of the Forth, up which, on a favouring tide, we dropped quietly that evening; and at nightfall let go our anchor with grateful hearts, albeit weary bodies, in Leith Roads, where for a season theMiséricordeand we had rest from our labours.
A strange joy seized me as I sighted the unknown ship. For my heart told me she was no friend, and I was just in the humour for a fight. I was one too many on board theMiséricorde; and a brush with the Queen’s foes just now would comfort me amazingly. And yet, when I came to think of it, she lay in nearer the English coast than we, and was like enough to be no Queen’s enemy after all, but a Queen’s cruiser on the look-out for suspicious craft like ours. For we floated no colours aloft. After the late fight Ludar had hauled down the Frenchman’s flag; but it was in vain I begged him to hoist that of her royal Majesty in its place. He would not hear of it.
“No,” said he, “I sail under no false colours. This is a voyage for safety, not for glory, else I know the flag would fly there. As it is, Humphrey, ’tis best for us all to fly nothing. The masts shall go bare. The blue of a maiden’s eyes is colour enough for you and me to fight under.”
I could not gainsay him. We were in no trim for receiving broadsides, or grappling with sea-dogs, however merry the ports might be for a man in my plight. Our business was to bring theMiséricordesafe into Leith Roads, and to that venture we stood pledged.
Ludar ordered the maiden to her quarters and me to my cabin.
“In this calm,” said he, “’twill be hours before we foregather if foregather we may. So below, while the poet and I whistle for a breeze.”
Towards afternoon we lay much as we were, drifting a little westward. But then came some clouds up from the south-east and with them a puff into our canvas.
“We may be glad to take in a reef on her before daybreak, Captain,” said the seaman.
“Time, enough till then,” said Ludar. “Take all you can now.”
We had not long to wait before theMiséricordehad way on once more. Then Ludar called his crew to him and said:
“To-night, be yonder stranger who she may, we run a race. Maiden, you have the keenest eyes; keep the watch forward. Humphrey, do you and the poet see to the guns and have all ready in case we need to show our teeth. Pilot, budge not one point out of the wind; but let her run. We may slip past in the dark, and then we are light-heeled enough to keep ahead. Old nurse, I warrant you have loaded a piece before now—we may need you to do it again. Meanwhile, to bed with you.”
Then the race began. The wind behind us freshened fast, so that in an hour’s time our timbers were creaking under stress of canvas. Before that, the stranger ship, though still a league and a half to larboard, had caught the breeze and was going too, canvas crowded, with her nose a point out of the wind into our course. For a long while it seemed as if we were never to come nearer, so anxious was she to give us no more advantage than she could help. But towards sundown we may have been a league asunder running neck and neck.
“She’s an English cruiser, Captain,” cried the helmsman, “and takes us for a Spaniard—that’s flat.”
“Then run as if we were so,” said Ludar. “Budge not an inch from your course even if we scrape her bows as we pass.”
So we held on straight down the wind, while the Englishman, closing in at every mile, held on too; and no one was to say which of us gained an inch on the other.
The sun tumbled into the sea and the brief twilight grew deeper, while behind us the wind gathered itself into a squall. Just before daylight failed, we could perceive the cruiser, not two miles away, leaning forward on her course, with the Queen’s flag on her poop, and a row of portholes gaping our way. Then we lost her in the dusk.
The poet, who stood near me at the gun, said:
“Night is as a cave of which none seeth the end from the beginning; and a man hooded feeleth what he before saw. My Hollander, I bargained not for this when I took passage here. I wish it were to-morrow. Why do we not, under cover of night, change our course?”
“Because, since that is what our pursuers will expect of us, it will delude them the more if we keep straight on.”
“O truth, many are thy arts!” said he. “But if, my Soothsayer, the wolf’s cunning be a match for that of the lamb? What then?”
“Then you may want your match, and your knife too,” said I.
He shivered a little.
“My Hollander,” said he, “if I fall, say to my lady ’twas for her; and I pray you give her the gem in my bonnet. Say to her its brightness was dimmer than the remembrance of her eyes; and its price meaner than the dewdrop on her lip. Bring her to see me where I lie; and compose my face to greet her. Tell me, my Dutchman, doth a cannon ball give short shrift, or were it easier to die by the steel?”
“A peace to your nonsense,” said I. “You have more sonnets to write before we need think of laying you out.”
He was comforted at this, and we resumed our watch in silence.
The night grew very dark, and at every gust our masts stooped further before the wind. TheMiséricordehissed her way through the water, and still our pilot turned not his helm an inch right or left.
Presently, Ludar came up to where we stood. I could see his eyes flash even in the dark.
“Go forward now,” said he to me. “Should we both be running as we were, and as I think we are our courses ought to meet not far hence. Send the maiden to me—I need her to take the helm while we three stand to the guns. Pray Heaven we win clear; if not, it will go hard with you, friend, in the prow. Let go your pistol at first sight of them, and, if you can, come abaft to join us before we strike.”
I could tell by the tone in which he spoke that he took in every inch of our peril, and trembled, not for himself, but for some one else.
The maiden was loth to quit her post; for she, too, knew the risk of it and claimed it as her right. But when I told her the Captain had so ordered, and required her at the helm, she obeyed without another word.
Then followed a quarter of an hour that seemed like a lifetime. As I stood craning my neck forward, gazing under my hands seaward, there crowded into my memory visions of all my past life. I seemed to see the home of my boyhood, and looked again into my mother’s face. And I stood once more before my case in the shop outside Temple Bar, and listened to Peter Stoupe humming his psalm-tune, and heard my types click into the stick. I marched once more at the head of my clubs to Finsbury Fields, and there I saw Captain Merriman—drat him!—with his vile lips at a maiden’s ear. And I passed, too, along the village street at Kingston where met me my mistress and her sweet daughter; and as I looked back, Jeannette turned too and—
What was that? Surely in the darkness I saw something! No. All was pitch black. The wind roared through the rigging, and the water seethed up at the plunging prow. But though I saw nothing, I felt the pursuer near; so near, I wondered not to hear the swish of her keel through the waves. On we went and nearer and nearer we seemed together. Oh for one sign of them, were it even a gun across our path! But sign there came none. The darkness seemed blacker than ever and—
All of a sudden I seemed to detect something—a spark, or a glow, or the luminous break of a wave. So swiftly it came and went, that it was gone before I could look. A trick of my vision, thought I. No! there it was again, this time nothing but a spark, close by, on a level, perhaps, with our mizzen. So near was it, I wondered whether it might not be the lighting of a match at our own guns. It went again: and as it did so, my finger, almost without my knowing it, tightened on the trigger of my pistol and it went off.
At the same moment, there was a blaze, a roar, a crash, and a shout. For an instant theMiséricordereeled in her course and quivered from stern to stern. Then, another shout and a wild irregular roar astern. Then our good ship gathered herself together and leapt forward once more into the darkness, and the peril was passed.
All was over so suddenly that the pistol was still smoking in my hand as I leapt from the forecastle and rushed aft.
“Is all well?” I shouted.
“All well,” said Ludar, quietly. “She grazed our poop and no more.”
“And the maiden?” said I.
“All well,” cried she, cheerily from the helm, “and fair in the wind.”
“Stand at your posts still,” cried Ludar.
So for another half-hour yet we stood at our posts, just as we had stood before the crisis came; and not a word said any one.
Then in the stormy east came a faint flush of dawn, and we knew that this perilous night was over.
“Seaman,” said Ludar, “relieve the maiden at the helm, and bid her come hither.”
She came, radiant and triumphant.
“Sir Ludar,” she said, “I thank you for letting me hold the helm this night. You gave it me as the place of safety; but I had my revenge, since it proved the post of honour.”
“It was indeed the post of danger,” said Ludar. “Had you swerved and not held straight on, we might not have been here to honour you for it. But say, did none of the Englishman’s shot reach the poop?”
“Some of it. Witness the sail there and the rail and the stern windows; but it spared me.”
“I think,” said Ludar, “we maimed them in one of their masts in passing, and their bowsprit broke short when it touched our stern. I doubt if we shall find them following us.”
“As for our Hollander,” said the poet, who had been wondrous silent thus far, “he hath this night proved himself twice a prophet. He said we should win this race; he said, moreover, I should live to write another ode. And lo! he spoke true. By your leave, Captain, I will go celebrate this notable occasion in a strain worthy of it and to the glory of my fair Amazon who—”
“Go below and cook this company some pottage,” said Ludar, “and see you be not long over it.”
Whereat the poet, with the muse taken out of him, departed. We stood watching the dawn till there was light enough to look back on our night’s work. There was the Englishman with her main-mast gone, and draggled about the bows, beating up under reefed sails for the coast. It was plain to see, although we were two long leagues away, that she had had enough for one night and was going to leave us in peace. For myself, as I looked, I could not wholly glory in having thus flouted her Majesty’s flag; but I considered that we had run that night for our lives, so I hoped the sin would be forgiven me.
And now, when we come to look round us, we found the wind still running high, and shifting a point or so to the eastward, promising a stormy day. So Ludar bade us shorten our canvas and put out our ship’s head a bit, so as to give the coast a wide berth.
And, in truth, as the day wore on, the wind freshened into a gale, and the gale into a tempest, so that if we had promised ourselves relief after the perils of last night, our hopes were dashed. The sea, which so far had been easy, ran now high, and washed over our prow as we stood across the wind, and it was plain we were going to find out before long of what mettle our brave timbers were.
’Twas no light thing to face a night like this, even with a good crew—how much less with but four men and a maid? Yet I never saw Ludar more at his ease. In the danger of last night his face had been troubled and his manner excited. Now he gave his orders as if this were a pleasure trip on a quiet lake.
“What is there to mind,” said he, “in a capful of wind? ’Tis sent to help us on our way; whereas, had we been taken last night where should we be now? Come, my men, help me shorten sail, for a little will go a long way a night like this. Maiden, to you I trust the helm with a light heart. ’Twill tax your strength more to keep her head thus than to run, as you did last night, clean before the wind; but you are strong and brave, and teach us to be the same.”
The subtlest courtier’s speech could not have won her as did these blunt words. She said no more than “I go, my Captain.” But the look of her eyes as they met his spoke volumes of joy and gratitude, a tithe of which would have gladdened me for a lifetime.
Then we fell to shortening our canvas—a perilous task. When that was done, leaving only the topsails spread, Ludar bade us make good the hatches, and fall to and eat. Which we did, all but the poet, who, being either big with his ode, or misliking the wildness of the night, sat idle.
“Come, Sir Popinjay,” said Ludar. “Eat, for no man can work on an empty stomach, and even poetry will not help haul a rope.”
“We avoid Scylla, my Captain, only to fall into Charybdis. Methinks Scylla were the better fate. At least I might have passed this night recumbent. The eagle, at the day’s end, flieth to his nest, and the lion hath his den; to all toil cometh an evensong, save to the shuttlecocks of Aeolus.”
“Nay, Sir Poet, you did bravely last night. Fall to and eat now, and we shall see you do more bravely to-night.”
“Orpheus, his weapon, is a harp, not a gun. Nevertheless, I am one of five, and shall yield me to a man’s bidding for the sake of her, my mistress, to whose glory I have this day indited my ode, and into whose sweet ear I will even now go recite it.”
“No, no,” said Ludar, “stay here and eat, and then go make a better one on the starboard bow, with your hand on the forestays, and your eye seaward.”
He obeyed at length and swallowed his supper. Then, lamenting the maiden’s fate at being deprived of his ode, he went gallantly forward.
“There goes a brave man in the garb of a fool,” said Ludar. “Humphrey, in this wind, the maiden will be hard put to it to keep her post on the poop. ’Twould help her to lash her to her helm. Will you go and do it?”
“That task belongs to the Captain,” said I. “She will suffer it from you.” He smiled at me grimly and went astern. And, as I said, the maiden let him have his way; and there she stood, as night closed, erect and steadfast, with her hands on the tiller and her brave face set seaward.
’Twas a fearful night of shrieking wind and thundering wave. Often and often as the braveMiséricordereared and hung suspended on a wave’s crest, we knew none of us if she would ever reach the next. Lucky for us we were a flush-decked ship and our hatches sound, for the seas that poured over us would have filled us to the brim in an hour. Lucky, too, the Frenchman’s cargo had been snugly stowed, or we should have been on our beam-ends before midnight. Half-way through the night, there was a loud crack and over went our main top-mast with her sails in ribbons. We had scarce time, at great peril, to cut her away, when another burst snapped our mizzen almost at the deck.
“That lightens us still more,” said Ludar. “Let go all the forward canvas, and cut away. We must put her into the wind and let her drive under bare poles.”
With that he went to the helm, where indeed the maiden must have needed succour. And there he stayed beside her till the night passed.
Afterwards he told me that he found her there, half stunned by the wind, but never flinching, or yielding a point out of the course. “I know not if she was pleased to see me there,” said he. “She said little enough, and hardly surrendered me the tiller. But when we put the ship into the wind, there was little to do, save to stand and watch the sea, and shield ourselves as best we might from the force of the waves that leapt over the poop.”
And fierce enough they were, in truth. But what was worse was that our course now lay due west, bringing us every league nearer the coast. Should the tempest last much longer we might have a sterner peril to face on the iron Northumbrian shore than ever we had escaped in the open sea.
The night passed and morning saw us driving headlong, with but one mast standing and not a sail to bless it. The maiden who had stood at her post since sundown yielded at last and came down, pale and drenched, to her quarters. The poet too, who had clung all night to the halyards, looking faithfully ahead and polishing his ode inwardly at the same time, also crawled abaft, half frozen and stupid with drowsiness. Indeed, there was little any of us could do, and one by one Ludar ordered us to rest, while he, whom no labour seemed to daunt, clung doggedly to the helm.
Thus half that day the wind flung us forward, till presently, far on the horizon, we could discern the sullen outline of a cliff.
“We are lost!” said I.
“Humphrey, you are a fool,” said Ludar. “See you not the wind is backing fast?”
So it was, and as we drove on, ever nearer the fatal coast, it swung round again to the southerly, and the sun above us blazed out fitfully from among the breaking clouds.
“Heaven fights for us,” said Ludar. “Quick, rig up a sail forward and fly a yard; and do you, seaman, look to your charts and say where we are.”
“That I have done long since,” said the sailor. “We are scarce a league from the Holy Island, and ’tis full time we put her head out, sir.”
“Come and take the helm then.”
For a while it seemed as if we were to expect as wild a tempest from the south as ever we had met from the east. But towards evening, the wind slackened a bit, and, veering south-east, enabled us to stand clear of the coast, and make, battered and ill canvassed as we were, straight for the Scotch Forth.
The maiden slept all through that night, and when at dawn she came on deck, fresh and singing, we were tumbling merrily through a slackening sea, with the Bass Rock looming on the horizon.
“Methinks the jaded Greek felt not otherwise when, leaving behind him the blood-stained plains of Troy, he espied the cloud-topped mountains of Hellas,” said the poet, who joined us as we stood.
“Which means,” said the maiden, “you are glad?”
“Shall Pyramus rejoice to see the wall that hides him from his Thisbe? or Hector leap at the trumpet which parts him from his Andromache? Mistress mine, in yonder rock shall I read my doom?”
“Rather read us your ode, Sir Poet,” said she. “It has had a stormy hatching, and should be a tempestuous outburst.”
“As indeed you shall find it, if I have your leave to rehearse it,” said he.
“I beg no greater favour,” said she.
Then the poet poured out this brave sonnet:—
“Go, grievous gales, your heads that heave,Ye foam-flaked furies of the wasty deep.Ye loud-tongued Tritons, wind and wave.Go fan my love where she doth sleep,And tell her, tell her in her earHer Corydon sits sighing here.“The tempest stalks the stormy sea,The lightning leaps with lurid light,The glad gull calls from lea to lea,The whistling whirlwind fills the night;Bears each a message to my love,Whose stony heart I faint to move.”
“Go, grievous gales, your heads that heave,Ye foam-flaked furies of the wasty deep.Ye loud-tongued Tritons, wind and wave.Go fan my love where she doth sleep,And tell her, tell her in her earHer Corydon sits sighing here.“The tempest stalks the stormy sea,The lightning leaps with lurid light,The glad gull calls from lea to lea,The whistling whirlwind fills the night;Bears each a message to my love,Whose stony heart I faint to move.”
“’Tis too short,” said the maiden, “we shall be friends, I hope, long enough to hear more of it.”
“Meanwhile, Sir Poet,” said Ludar, who chafed at these civilities, “go forward again, and keep the watch. Call if you spy aught, and keep your eyes well open.”
Fortune favoured us that day, as she had handled us roughly in the days before. The wind held good, and filled our slender canvas. The pilot’s charts deceived not; nor did friend or enemy stand across our path. Before night we had swept round the rock and found the channel of the Forth, up which, on a favouring tide, we dropped quietly that evening; and at nightfall let go our anchor with grateful hearts, albeit weary bodies, in Leith Roads, where for a season theMiséricordeand we had rest from our labours.