The Splendid Spur Part 22

We went back to our casks with lighter hearts. Howbeit 'twas near five in the morning, I dare say, before my narrow bedchamber allow'd me to drop asleep.

I woke to spy through my bunghole the faint light of day struggling down the hatches. Above, I heard a clanking noise, and the voices of the men hiccoughing a dismal chant. They were lifting anchor. I crawl'd forth and woke Delia, who was yet sleeping: and together we ate the breakfast that lay ready set for us on the head of a barrel.

Presently the sailors broke off their song, and we heard their feet shuffling to and fro on deck.

"Sure," cried Delia, "we are moving!"

And surely we were, as could be told by the alter'd sound of the water beneath us, and the many creakings that the _G.o.dsend_ began to keep. Once more I tasted freedom again, and the joy of living, and could have sung for the mirth that lifted my heart. "Let us but gain open sea," said I, "and I'll have t.i.t-for-tat with these rebels!"

But alas! before we had left Avon mouth twenty minutes, 'twas another tale. For I lay on my side in that dark hold and long'd to die: and Delia sat up beside me, her hands in her lap, and her great eyes fix'd most dolefully. And when Captain Billy came down with news that we were safe and free to go on deck, we turn'd our faces from him, and said we thank'd him kindly, but had no longer any wish that way--too wretched, even, to remember his deafness.

Let me avoid, then, some miserable hours, and come to the evening, when, faint with fasting and nausea, we struggled up to the deck for air, and look'd about us.

'Twas grey--grey everywhere: the sky lead-colored, with deeper shades toward the east, where a bank of cloud blotted the coast line: the thick rain descending straight, with hardly wind enough to set the sails flapping; the sea spread like a plate of lead, save only where, to leeward, a streak of curded white crawled away from under the _G.o.dsend's_ keel.

On deck, a few sailors mov'd about, red eyed and heavy. They show'd no surprise to see us, but nodded very friendly, with a smile for our strange complexions. Here again, as ever, did adversity mock her own image.

But what more took our attention was to see a row of men stretch'd on the starboard side, like corpses, their heads in the scuppers, their legs pointed inboard, and very orderly arranged. They were a dozen and two in all, and over them bent Captain Billy with a mop in his hand, and a bucket by his side: who beckon'd that we should approach.

"Array'd in order o' merit," said he, pointing with his mop like a showman to the line of figures before him.

We drew near.

"This here is Matt. Soames, master o' this vessel--an' he's dead."

"Dead?"

"Dead-drunk, that is. O the gifted man! Come up!" He thrust the mop in the fellow's heavy face. "There now! Did he move, did he wink?

'No,' says you. O an accomplished drunkard!"

He paus'd a moment; then stirr'd up No. 2, who open'd one eye lazily, and shut it again in slumber.

"You saw? Open'd one eye, hey? That's Benjamin Halliday. The next is a black man, as you see: a man of dismal color, and hath other drawbacks natural to such. Can the Aethiop s.h.i.+ft his skin? No, but he'll open both eyes. See there--a perfect Christian, in so far as drink can make him."

With like comments he ran down the line till he came to the last man, in front of whom he stepp'd back.

"About this last--he's a puzzler. Times I put him top o' the list, an' times at the tail. That's Ned Masters, an' was once the Reverend Edward Masters, Bachelor o' Divinity in Cambridge College; but in a tavern there fell a-talking with a certain Pelagian about Adam an'

Eve, an' because the fellow turn'd stubborn, put a knife into his waistband, an' had to run away to sea: a middling drinker only, but after a quart or so to hear him tackle Predestination! So there be times after all when I sets'n apart, and says, 'Drunk, you'm no good, but half-drunk, you'm priceless.' Now there's a man--" He dropp'd his mop, and, leading us aft, pointed with admiring finger to the helmsman--a thin, wizen'd fellow, with a face like a crab apple, and a pair of piercing grey eyes half hidden by the droop of his wrinkled lids. "Gabriel Hutchins, how old be you?"

"Sixty-four, come next Martinmas," pip'd the helmsman.

"In what state o' life?"

"Drunk."

"How drunk?"

"As a lord!"

"Canst stand upright?"

"Hee-hee! Now could I iver do other?--a miserable ould worms to whom the sweet effects o' quantums be denied. When was I iver wholesomely maz'd? Or when did I lay my grey hairs on the floor, saying, 'Tis enough, an' 'tis good'? Answer me that, Cap'n Bill."

"But you hopes for the best, Gabriel."

"Aye, I hopes--I hopes."

The old man sigh'd as he brought the _G.o.dsend_ a point nearer the wind; and, as we turn'd away with the Captain, was still muttering, his sharp grey eyes fix'd on the vessel's prow.

"He's my best," said Captain Billy Pottery.

With this crew we pa.s.s'd four days; and I write this much of them because they afterward, when sober, did me a notable good turn, as you shall read toward the end of this history. But lest you should judge them hardly, let me say here that when they recovered of their stupor--as happen'd to the worst after thirty-six hours--there was no brisker, handier set of fellows on the seas. And this Captain Billy well understood: "but" (said he) "I be a collector an' a man o' conscience both, which is uncommon. Doubtless there be good sots that are not good seamen, but from such I turn my face, drink they never so prettily."

'Twas necessary I should impart some notion of my errand to Captain Billy, tho' I confin'd myself to hints, telling him only 'twas urgent I should be put ash.o.r.e somewhere on the Cornish coast, for that I carried intelligence which would not keep till we reached Plymouth, a town that, besides, was held by the rebels. And he agreed readily to land me in Bude Bay: "and also thy comrade, if (as I guess) she be so minded," he added, glancing up at Delia from the paper whereon I had written my request.

She had been silent of late, beyond her wont, avoiding (I thought) to meet my eye: but answer'd simply,

"I go with Jack."

Captain Billy, whose eyes rested on her as she spoke, beckon'd me, very mysterious, outside the cabin, and winking slily, whisper'd loud enough to stun one----

"Ply her, Jack"--he had call'd me "Jack" from the first--"ply her briskly! Womankind is but yielding flesh: 'am an amorous man mysel', an' speak but that I have prov'd."

On this--for the whole s.h.i.+p could hear it--there certainly came the sound of a stifled laugh from the other side of the cabin door: but it did not mend my comrade's shy humor, that lasted throughout the voyage.

To be brief, 'twas not till the fourth afternoon (by reason of baffling head winds) that we stepped out of the _G.o.dsend's_ boat upon a small beach of s.h.i.+ngle, whence, between a rift in the black cliffs, wound up the road that was to lead us inland. The _G.o.dsend_, as we turn'd to wave our hands, lay at half a mile's distance, and made a pretty sight: for the day, that had begun with a white frost, was now turn'd sunny and still, so that looking north we saw the sea all spread with pink and lilac and hyacinth, and upon it the s.h.i.+p lit up, her masts and sails glowing like a gold piece. And there was Billy, leaning over the bulwarks and waving his trumpet for "Good-bye!"

Thought I, for I little dream'd to see these good fellows again, "what a witless game is this life! to seek ever in fresh conjunctions what we leave behind in a hand shake." 'Twas a cheap reflection, yet it vex'd me that as we turn'd to mount the road Delia should break out singing---

"Hey! nonni--nonni--no! Is't not fine to laugh and sing When the h.e.l.ls of death do ring!--"

"Why, no," said I, "I don't think it": and capp'd her verse with another--

"Silly man, the cost to find Is to leave as good behind--"

"Jack, for pity's sake, stop!" She put her fingers to her ears.

"What a nasty, creaking voice thou hast, to be sure!"

"That's as a man may hold," said I, nettled.

"No, indeed: yours is a very poor voice, but mine is beautiful. So listen."

She went on to sing as she went, "Green as gra.s.s is my kirtle,"

"Tire me in tiffany," "Come ye bearded men-at-arms," and "The Bending Rush." All these she sang, as I must confess, most delicately well, and then fac'd me, with a happy smile---

"Now, have not I a sweet voice? Why, Jack--art still glum?"

"Delia," answer'd I, "you have first to give me a reply to what, four days agone, I ask'd you. Dear girl--nay then, dear comrade--"