By Conduct and Courage Part 24

"Yes, no one could fight better. If he had had as much learning as I had he would have been made an officer too; but, you see, he can hardly read or write, and, fight as he may, he will always remain as he is. A finer fellow never stepped; but because he has no learning he must always remain before the mast."

"And you have lost some fingers I see, Will."

"Yes, they were shot off by a musket-ball in the West Indies. Luckily it was my left hand; so I manage very well without them."

"I hope you blew off the fingers of the fellow that shot you."

"No, I can't say who did it, and indeed I never felt anything at all until some little time after."

"I wish I had been there," John said, "I would have had a slap at him with a musket. That was an unlucky shot, Will."

"Well, I have always considered it a lucky one, for if it had gone a few inches on one side it would have probably finished me altogether."

"Well, well, it is wonderful to me. Here am I, an old man, and never, so far as I can remember, been a couple of miles from Scarcombe, and you, quite a young chap, have been wandering and fighting all over the world."

"Not quite so much as that, John, though I have certainly seen a good deal. But here is mother."

Mrs. Hammond entered with a face beaming with delight.

"You never saw anyone so astonished as Mrs. Smith when I went in and ordered all those things. Her eyes opened wider and wider as I went on, and when I offered her the gold I thought she would have a fit. She took it and bit it to make sure that it was good, and then said: 'Have you found it, Mrs. Hammond, or what good fortune have you had?'

" 'The best of fortunes, Mrs. Smith,' says I. 'My boy Will has come back from the wars a grand officer, with his pocket lined with gold, so you will find I'll be a better customer to you than I have been.'

" 'You don't say so, Mrs. Hammond!' says she. 'I always thought he was a nice boy, well spoken and civil. And so he is an officer, is he? Only to think of it! Well, I am mighty pleased to hear it,' and with that I came off with my basket full of provisions. The whole village will be talking of it before nightfall. Mrs. Smith is a good soul, but she is an arrant gossip, and you may be sure that the tale will gain by the telling, and before night people will believe that you have become one of the royal family."

In half an hour a meal was ready-tea, crisp slices of fried bacon, and some boiled eggs-and never did three people sit down to table in a more delighted state of mind.

"My life," the old woman said, when at last the meal was finished, "just to think that we'll be able to feed every day of the year like this! Why, we'll grow quite young again, John; we sha'n't know ourselves. We had five shillings a week before, and now we'll have six-and-twenty. I don't know what we'll do with it. Why, we didn't get that on an average, not when you were a young man and as good a fisherman as there was in the village. We did get more sometimes when you made a great haul, or when a cargo was run, but then, more often, when times were bad, we had to live on fish for weeks together."

"Now, missis, clear away the things and reach me down my pipe from the mantel, and we'll hear Will's tales. I'll warrant me they will be worth listening to."

When the table was cleared the old woman put some more coal on the fire and they sat round it, the old folk one on each side, with Will in the middle. Then Will told his adventures, the fight with the French frigate, the battle with the three Moorish pirates, how he had had the luck to save the first lieutenant's life and so obtained his promotion, and how the next prize they took was recaptured, but that he and a portion of the crew again overcame the Moors. Then he related how he had had the good fortune to obtain the command of a prize, with forty men and another midshipman under him, and gave a vivid account of the adventures he had gone through while cruising about in her.

"Well, well!" John Hammond said, when he brought his story to a conclusion, "you have had goings-on. To think that a boy like you should command a vessel and forty men, and should take three pirates."

"But the most awful part of it all," the old woman said, "is about them black negroes that carried you off and were going to burn you alive. Lor', I'll dream of it at nights."

"I hope not, missis," John said. "You dream more than enough now, and wake me up with your jumps and starts, and give me a lot of trouble to pacify you and convince you that you have only been dreaming. I am sorry, Will, that you told us about those n.i.g.g.e.rs. I know I'll have lots of trouble over it. Generally all she has had to dream about has been that my boat was sinking, or that the revenue officers had taken me and were going to hang me; but that will be nothing to this 'ere negro business."

"They are terrible creatures these negroes, ain't they?" the old woman said. "I have heard tell that they have horns and hoofs like the devil."

"No, no, mother, they are not so bad as that, and they don't have tails, either. They are not good-looking men for all that, and they look specially ugly when they are gathering firewood to make a bonfire of you."

"For goodness sake don't say more about them; it makes me all come over in a sweat to think about them."

Just at this moment Tom Stevens came in and sat and chatted for some time.

Will asked him to come in again later and to bring with him a bottle of the best spirits he could find in the village.

"I'll warrant I will get some good stuff," Tom said. "There are plenty of kegs of the best hidden away in the village, and I think I know where to lay my hand on one of them."

Will then went to the rectory and had a chat with Mr. Warden, who was unaffectedly glad to see him.

"I never quite approved," he said, "of my daughter's hobby of educating you, but I now see that she was perfectly right. I thought myself that at best you would obtain some small clerkship, and that your life would be a happier one as a fisherman. It has, however, turned out admirably well, and she has a right to be proud of her pupil. After the way you have begun there is nothing in your own line to which you may not attain."

"I wanted to ask you, Mr. Warden, what you could remember about my father.

My own recollection of him is very dim. I am going to sea again in a week, but next time I return I'll have a longer spell on sh.o.r.e, and I am resolved to make an effort to discover who he was."

"I fear that is quite hopeless, but I will certainly tell you all I know about him. I saw him, of course, many times in the village. He was a tall thin man with what I might call a devil-may-care, and at the same time a mournful expression. I have no doubt that had his death not been so sudden he would have told you something about himself. I have his effects tied up in a bundle. I examined them at the time, but there was nothing of any value in them except a signet-ring. It bore a coat-of-arms with a falcon at the top. I intended to hand this to you when you grew up, but of course you left so suddenly that I had no opportunity to do so. I will give you the bundle now."

"Thank you very much, sir! That ring may be the means of discovering my ident.i.ty. Of course I have no time to make enquiries now, but when I next return I will advertise largely and offer a reward for information. It is not that I want to thrust myself on any family, or to raise any claim, but I should like, for my own satisfaction, to know that I come of a decent family."

"That is very natural," the clergyman said; "but were I you I should not hope to be successful. You see, nearly thirteen years have elapsed since his death, and he may have been wandering about for three or four years before. That is a long time to elapse before making any enquiries."

"That may be so, but if these arms belong, as I suppose, to a good family, there must be others bearing them, and an advertis.e.m.e.nt of a lost member of it might at once catch their eye, and might very possibly bring a reply. Besides, surely there must be some place where a record is kept of these things."

"I do not know that, but I am sure I wish you success in your search, and can well understand that, now you are an officer in His Majesty's navy, you would like to claim relationship with some big family."

"Quite so, sir. Of course I cannot imagine how it was my father came to be in such reduced circ.u.mstances."

"I should say, Will, that he quarrelled with his father, perhaps over his marriage, and left home in a pa.s.sion. He was a man who, I could well imagine, when he once quarrelled, would not be likely to take the first step to make it up."

"Perhaps that was it, sir. Well, I am exceedingly obliged to you, and will, you may be sure, investigate the contents of the bundle carefully."

Returning to the cottage, Will found Tom Stevens already there with a small keg of brandy.

"This is good stuff, Will," he said; "it has been lying hidden for eight years, and was some of the choicest landed. I got it as a favour, and had to pay pretty high for it; but I knew you would not stick at the price."

"Certainly not, I wanted the best that could be got. Now, mother, mix us three good stiff tumblers, and take a gla.s.s for yourself."

"It is twenty year since I tasted spirits," the old woman said, "though John has often got a drop after a successful run; but this afternoon I don't mind if I do try a little, if it is only to put the thought of them bonfiring negroes out of my mind."

"I hope it will have that effect," Will laughed.

"Now, John, I told you about my adventures; let me hear a little village gossip."

John's tale was not a very long, nor, it must be owned, a very interesting one. Mary Johnson, Elizabeth Cruikshank, Mary Leaper, and Susie Thurston had all had boys, while there had been five girls born. It was not necessary, however, to specify the names of their mothers, as girls were considered quite secondary persons in Scarcombe. One small cargo had been run, but the revenue people were so sharp that the French lugger had given up making the village a landing-place. John Mugby and his two sons had been drowned, and John Hawkins's boat had been smashed up. As a result of the decline of smuggling there had been a revulsion of the feeling against Will, and the four men who had been the ringleaders in the movement had made themselves so generally obnoxious that they had had to leave the village.

At seven o'clock Will said:

"Now, father, I must be moving. Here are fifty guineas. They will last you for nearly a year. I'll hand another fifty to Mr. Archer, and ask him to send you twenty pounds at a time. I'll probably be back in England before it has all gone, and if not I will manage to find a means of sending more over to you."

"I sha'n't sleep," the old woman said; "I never shall sleep with all that money in the house. It is sure to get known about, and I should never feel safe."

"Very well, mother, take the money up to Mr. Warden, and ask him to hand you a guinea every Monday."

"Tom Stevens," said the old woman, "I will ask you to go up to the rectory with me this very evening. I daren't keep it here, and I daren't carry it through the village, for there might be a pedlar about, and everybody knows that pedlars are apt to be thieves."

"Very well," Tom said with a smile, "I will go with you, missis, when Will has left. I am big enough to tackle a pedlar if we meet one on the way."