Sir Mortimer Part 17

"Where is the _Sea Wraith_, Robin-a-dale? Answer me!" Nevil's voice rose, cold and commanding, questioning this as any other derelict haled before him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'LAD, LAD,' HE WHISPERED, 'WHERE IS THY MASTER?'"]

Instinctively Robin brought his wits somewhat together. "The _Sea Wraith_," he echoed. "Why, that was long ago ... Sixscore men, we left her hidden between the islet and the land until we should return.... Her mariners were willing to be left--ay, and when I'm a knight I'll maintain it!--their blood is not upon his hands.... But when six men from that sixscore came again to the coast there was no s.h.i.+p,--so I think that she sank some night, or maybe the Spaniards took her, or maybe she grew tired and sailed away,--we were so long in winning back from Panama."

There was a deep exclamation from his listeners. "From Panama!"

Robin regarded them anxiously, for to Nevil at least he had always spoken truth, and now he dimly wondered within himself if he were lying.

"The nest at Nueva Cordoba was empty," he explained. "The hawk had killed the sparrows and flown far away to Panama."

"And the eagle followed the hawk," muttered Arden. "Was there not one sparrow left alive, Robin?"

Robin mournfully shook his head. "The commoner sort went to the galleys; others were burned.... Is this city named Cartagena? Then 'twas in this city Captain Robert Baldry and Ralph Walter and more than they, dressed in _sanbenitos_, burning in the market-place.... We learned this at Margarita, so my master would go to Panama to wring the hawk's neck....

But the _Sea Wraith_ was heavy with gold and silver, and all the scoundrels upon her wished to turn homewards. But he bore them down, and there was a compact made and signed. For them all the treasure that we had gotten or should get, and for him their help to Panama that he might take his private vengeance.... And so we put on all sail and we coasted a many days, sometimes fighting and sometimes not, until we drew in towards the land and found a little harbor masked by an islet and near to a river. And a third of our men we left with the _Sea Wraith_. But Sir Mortimer Ferne and I--my name is Robin-a-dale--we took all the boats to go as far as we might by way of the river. And my master rowed strongly in the first boat, and I rowed strongly in the second, for we rowed for hate and love; but the other boats came on feebly, for they were rowed by ghosts--"

Arden moved beneath the emaciated form he held, and Powell uttered an e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n. But John Nevil used command.

"Back, sirrah! to the truth," and the crowding fancies gave ground again.

"It was the Indians who shot at us poisoned arrows. They made ghosts of many rowers. Ha! in all my nineteen years I have not seen an uglier death! That was why we must leave the river, hiding the boats against the time that we returned that way ... returned that way."

"You went on through the woods towards Panama. And then--" Nevil's voice rose again.

"The wrath of G.o.d!" answered the boy, and turning within Arden's clasp, began to babble of London streets and the Triple Tun. The claw-like hands had dragged themselves from Nevil's hold, and the spirit could be no longer caught by the voice of authority, but wandered where it would.

The men about him waited long and vainly for some turn of the tide. It drew towards midnight, and Robin yet babbled of all things under the sun saving only of a man that had left England now three years agone. At last Nevil arose, spoke a few words to Arden, who nodded a.s.sent; then, with Powell, moved to the door.

"When will this friar return?" he asked, as they crossed the threshold.

"I do not know," Powell answered. "With the dawn, perhaps. He will not be long gone."

"Perhaps he will not come at all," said the other. "You say that the boy is out of danger. Perhaps he hath returned to the Indians whom you say he teacheth."

Powell shook his head. "Here are too many sick and dying," he said, simply. "He will come back. I swear to you, Sir John Nevil, that in this pestilent camp between the city and the sea we do think of this man not as a Spaniard--if he be Spaniard--nor as monk--if he be monk! He hath power over this fever, and those whom he cannot cure yet cry out for him to help them die!"

There was a silence, followed by Sir John's slow speech. "When he returns send him at once under guard to my quarters--I will make good the matter with Sir Francis. Speak the man fair, good Powell, give him gentle treatment, but see to it that he escape you not.... Here are my men. Good-night."

Three hours later to Nevil, yet dressed, yet sitting deep in thought within his starlit chamber, came a messenger from the captain of the watch. "The man whom Sir John Nevil wot of was below. What disposition until the morning--"

"Bring him to me here," was the answer. "Stay!--there are candles upon the table. Light one."

The soldier, drawing from his pouch flint, steel, and tinder-box, obeyed, then saluted and withdrew. There was a short silence, followed by the sound of feet upon the stone stairs and a knock at the door, and upon Nevil's "Enter!" by the appearance of a sergeant and several soldiers--in the midst of them a figure erect, composed, gowned, and cowled.

The one candle dimly lit the room. "Will you stand aside, sir?" said Nevil to his captive. "Now, sergeant--"

The sergeant made a brief report.

"Await, you and your men, in the hall below," ordered Nevil. "You have not bound your prisoner? That is well. Now go, leaving him here alone."

The heavy door closed to. Upon the table stood two great gilt candelabra bearing many candles, a fragment of the spoil of Cartagena.

Nevil, taking from its socket the one lighted taper, began to apply the flame to its waxen fellows. As the chamber grew more and more brilliant, the friar, standing with folded arms, made no motion to break the profound stillness, but with the lighting of the last candle he thrust far back the cowl that partly hid his countenance, then moved with an even step to the table, and raising with both hands the great candelabrum, held it aloft. The radiance that flooded him, showing every line and lineament, was not more silvery white than the hair upon his head; but brows and lashes were as deeply brown as the somewhat sunken eyes, nor was the face an old man's face. It was lined, quiet, beautiful, with lips somewhat too sternly patient and eyes too sad, for all their kindly wisdom. The friar's gown could not disguise the form beneath; the friar's sleeve, backfallen from the arm which held on high the branching lights, disclosed deep scars.... Down-streaming light, the hour, the stillness--a soul unsteadfast would have shrunk as from an apparition. Nevil stood his ground, the table between him and his guest of three years' burial from English ken. Both men were pale, but their gaze did not waver. So earnestly did they regard each other, eyes looking into eyes, that without words much knowledge of inner things pa.s.sed between them. At last, "Greet you well, Mortimer Ferne," came from one, and from the other, "Greet you well, John Nevil."

The speaker lowered the candelabrum and set it upon the table. "You might have spared the sergeant his pains. To-day I should have sought you out."

"Why not before to-day?"

"I have been busy," said the other, simply. "Long ago the Indians taught me a sure remedy for this fever. There was need down yonder for the cure.... Moreover, pride and I have battled once again. To-night, in the darkness, by G.o.d's grace, I won.... It is good to see thy face, to hear thy voice, John Nevil."

The tall tapers gave so great and clear a light that there was no shadow for either countenance. In Nevil's agitation had begun to gather, but his opposite showed as yet only a certain worn majesty of peace.

Neither man had moved; each stood erect, with the heavy wood like a judgment bar between them. Perhaps some noise among the soldiers below, some memory that the other had entered the room as a prisoner, brought such a fancy to Nevil's mind, for now he hastily left his position and crossed to the bench beneath the wide window. The man from the grave of the South-American forest followed. Sir John stretched out his hand and touched the heavy woollen robe that swept from bared throat to rudely sandalled feet.

"This?" he questioned.

The other faintly smiled. "I found it many months agone in a village of the Chaymas. I was nigh to nakedness, and it has served me well. It is only a gown. This"--he touched the knotted girdle--"but a piece of rope."

"I have seen the boy, Robin-a-dale," said Nevil.

The other inclined his head. "Captain Powell told me as much an hour ago, and also that by some slip my poor knave slept not, as I had meant he should, but babbled of old things which have wellnigh turned his wits. He must not stay in this land, but back to England to feel the snow in his face, to hear the cuckoo and the lark, to serve you or Arden or Philip Sidney. What ancient news hath he given you?"

"You went overland to Panama."

"Ay,--a dreadful journey--a most dreadful return ... Don Luiz de Guardiola was not at Panama. With a strong escort he had gone three days before to San Juan de Ulloa, whence he sailed for Spain."

A long silence; then said Nevil: "There is no pa.s.sion in your face, and your voice is grave and sweet. I thank G.o.d that he was gone, and that your soul has turned from vengeance."

"Ay, my soul hath turned from vengeance," echoed the other. "It is now a long time that, save for Robin, I have dwelt alone with G.o.d His beauty and G.o.d His terror. I have taught a savage people, and in teaching I have learned." He moved, and with his knee upon the window-seat, looked out upon the fading stars. "But the blood," he said,--"the blood upon my hands! I know not if one man who sailed with me upon the _Sea Wraith_ be alive. Certes, all are dead who went with me a fearful way to find that Spaniard who is safe in Spain. Six men we reached again the seash.o.r.e, but the s.h.i.+p was gone. One by one, as we wandered, the four men died....

Then Robin and I went upward and onward to the mountains."

"When you left England your cause was just," said Nevil, with emotion.

"Ay, I think it was so," Sir Mortimer replied. "At home I was forever naught; on these seas I might yet serve my Queen, though with a shrunken arm. And Robert Baldry with many another whom I had betrayed might yet languish in miserable life. G.o.d knows! perhaps I thought that G.o.d might work a miracle.... But at Margarita--"

"I know--I know," interrupted Nevil. "Robin told us."

"Then at Margarita," continued the other, "I forgot all else but my revenge upon the man who had wrought disaster to my soul, who had dashed from my hand even that poor salve which might and might not have somewhat eased my mortal wound. Was he at Panama? Then to Panama would I go. In Ultima Thule? Then in Ultima Thule he should not escape me.... I bent the mariners and soldiers of the _Sea Wraith_ to my will. I promised them gold; I promised them joyous life and an easy task--I know not what I promised them, for my heart was a hot coal within my breast, and there seemed no desirable thing under the sun other than a shortened sword and my hand upon the throat of Don Luiz de Guardiola. They went with me upon my private quarrel, and they died. Ah, well! It has been long ago!" His breath came in a heavy sigh. "I am not now so keen a hunter for my own. In G.o.d's hands is justice as well as mercy, and when death throws down the warder I shall understand. In the mean while I await--I that speak to you now and I that betrayed you four years agone."

He turned from the window, and the two again stood face to face.

"I am a child at school," said Ferne. "There was a time when I thought to keep for bed-fellow pride as well as shame; when I said, 'I am coward, I am traitor,' and put to my lips the cup of gall, but yet I drank it not with humility and a bowed heart.... I do not think, John, that I ever asked you to forgive me.... Forgive me!"

On the part of each man there was an involuntary movement, ending in a long and mute embrace. Each touched with his lips the other's cheek, then they sat with clasped hands in eloquent silence, while the candles paled in the approaching dawn. At last Sir Mortimer spoke:

"You will let me go now, John? There are many sick men down by the sea, and Robin will grow restless--perhaps will call my name aloud."

Arising from the window-seat, Nevil paced the room, then returned to the sometime Captain of the _Cygnet_. "Two things and I will let you go where you do the Queen and Francis Drake yeoman service. You will not slip a silken leash, but will abide with us in this town?"

"Ay," was the answer, "until your sick are recovered and your mariners are making sail I will stay."

Nevil hesitated. "For the present I accept your 'until.' And now I ask you to throw off this disguise. We are men of a like height and make.