Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts Part 23

But on the second day a party of wood-rangers attacked them with guns and captured them; and back they went, and were condemned to six years in irons.

This, as it turned out, didn't amount to much; for, while they were waiting to be marched off to the galleys, their jailor came with news that a son was born to the Emperor, and they were pardoned in honour of it. But instead of putting them back in their old quarters, he fixed them up for a fortnight in a room by themselves, being fearful that such bad characters would contaminate the other prisoners. This room was an upstairs one in a building on the edge of the ramparts, and after a few nights they broke through the ceiling into an empty chamber, which had a window looking on the roof. With a rope made of their bedclothes they lowered themselves clean over the ramparts on to the edge of the precipice over the river; and along this they pa.s.sed--having no daylight to make them giddy--and took their way northwards across the fields.

Well, it doesn't come into my tale to tell you what they went through.

Bosistow wrote out an account of it years after, and you shall read it for yourself. At one place they had to cross a river, and Billy being, like the most of our fishermen, no swimmer, his mates stuck him on a hurdle and pushed him over while they swam behind. They steered by the Pole Star (for, you understand, they could only travel by night) and also by a fine comet which they guessed to be in the north-west quarter.

You see the difference between these two fellows, and how little Providence made of it. Back in Jivvy, Abe c.u.mmins was staring at this same comet out of his prison windows, and doing his sums and thinking of Selina Johns. And here was Bosistow following it up for freedom--with the upshot that he made the coast and was taken like a lamb in the attempt to hire a pa.s.sage, and marched in irons from one jail to another, and then clean back the whole length of France, pretty well to the Mediterranean Sea. And then he was shut up in a prison on the very top of the Alps [2] and twice as far from home as he had been in Jivvy.

That's a moral against folks in a hurry if ever there was one.

Well, let alone that while he was here he received a free pardon from the Emperor, which his persecutors took no notice of, he broke out of prison again, and was caught and brought back half-starving.

And 'twasn't till Christmas of the year 'thirteen that orders came to march him right away north again, with all the prisoners, to a place in the Netherlands; and no sooner arrived than away to go again three hundred and fifty miles west-sou'-west for Tours, on the Loire river.

I've figured it out on the map, and even that is enough to make a man feel sore in his feet. But what made Bosistow glad at the time, and vicious after, was that on his way he fell in with a draft of prisoners, and, among them, with Abe c.u.mmins, who, so to say, had reached the same place by walking a tenth part of the distance. And, what's more, though a man couldn't very well get sleek in Jivvy, Abe had kept his bones filled out somehow, and knew enough navigation by this time to set a course to the Channel Fleet. 'Deed, that's what he began talking about on the first day's journey he and Billy trudged together after their meeting. And he began it after a spell of silence by asking, quiet like, "Have you been happening to think much about Selina Johns this last year or two?"

"Most every day," answered Billy.

"So have I," said Abe, and seemed to be pondering to himself. "She'll be a woman growed by this time," he went on.

"Turnin' twenty-seven," Billy agreed.

"That's of it," said Abe. "I've been thinking about her, constant."

"Well, look'ee here," spoke up Billy, "our little agreement holds, don't it?--that is, if we ever get out of this here mess, and Selina hasn't gone and taken a husband. Play fair, leave it to the maid, and let the best man win; that's what we shook hands over. If that holds, seemin'

to me the rest can wait."

"True, true," says Abe; but after a bit he asks rather sly-like: "And s'posin' you're the lucky one, how do'ee reckon you're going to maintain her?"

"Why, on seaman's wages, I suppose; or else at the shoe-mending.

I learnt a little of that trade in Jivvy, as you d'know."

"Well," says Abe, "I was reckonin' to set up school and teach navigation. Back in Ardevora I can make between seventy and eighty pounds a year at that game easy."

Bosistow scratched his head. "You've been making the most of your time.

Now I've been busy in my way, too, but seemin' to me the only trade I've learned is prison-breakin'. Not much to keep a wife on, as you say.

Still, a bargain's a bargain."

"Oh, sutt'nly," says Abe; "that is if your conscience allows it."

"I reckon I'll risk that," answers Billy, and no more pa.s.sed.

From Tours the prisoners tramped south-east again, to a town called Riou, in the middle of France, and reached it in a snowstorm on March 1.

Here they were billeted for five weeks or so, and here, one night, they were waked up and told that Bonaparty had gone scat, and they must come forth and dance with the townspeople in honour of it. You may be sure they heeled and toed it that night, and no girl satisfied unless she had an Englishman for a partner. But the next day it all turned out to be lies, and off they were marched again. To be short, 'twasn't till the end of April that they came to the river opposite Bordeaux, and were taken in charge by English red-coats, who told them they were free men.

On the 28th of that month Abe and Billy, with forty others, were put on board a sloop and dropped down the river to the _Dartmouth_ frigate, from which they were drafted on to the _Lord Wellington_, and again on to the _Suffolk_ transport. And on May 4 the _Suffolk_, with six other transports, having about fifteen hundred released prisoners on board, weighed anchor under convoy for Plymouth before a fine breeze, S.E. by S.

On Monday, May 9, at half-past two in the afternoon--the wind still steady in the same quarter, and blowing fresh--the _Suffolk_ sighted land, making out St. Michael's Mount; and fetching up to Mousehole Island, the captain hailed a mackerel boat to come alongside and take ash.o.r.e some officers with despatches.

Abe c.u.mmins and Billy Bosistow were both on deck, you may be sure, watching the boat as the fishermen brought her alongside. Not a word had been said between them on the matter that lay closest to their minds, but while they waited Billy fetched a look at the boat and another at Abe. "The best man wins," he said to himself, and edged away towards the ladder.

The breeze, as I said, was a fresh one, with a sea in the bay that kept the _Suffolk_ rolling like a porpoise. A heavier lurch than ordinary sent her main channels grinding down on the mackerel boat's gunwale, smashing her upper strakes and springing her mizzen mast as she recovered herself.

"Be dashed," said one of the officers, "if I trust myself in a boat that'll go down under us between this and land!"

The rest seemed to be of his mind, too. But Billy, being quick as well as eager, saw in a moment that the damaged strakes would be to windward on the reach into Mousehole, and well out of harm's way in the wind then blowing, and also that her mainsail alone would do the job easy.

So just as she fell off and her crew ran aft to get the mizzen lug stowed he took a run past the officer and jumped aboard, with two fellows close on his heels--one a Penzance fellow whose name I've forgot, and the t'other a chap from Ludgvan, Harry Cornish by name.

I reckon the sight of the old sh.o.r.es just made them mazed as sheep, and like sheep they followed his lead. The officers ran to stop any more from copying such foolishness; and if they hadn't, I believe the boat would have been swamped there and then. As 'twas, she re-hoisted her big lug and away-to-go for Mousehole, the three pa.s.sengers sitting down to leeward with their sterns in and out of the water to help keep her damaged side above mischief.

So on Mousehole Quay these three stepped ash.o.r.e, and the first man to shake hands with them was Capen Josiah Penny, of the _Perseverance_ trading ketch, then lying snug in Mousehole Harbour. Being a hearty man he invited them down to his cabin to take a drop of rum. The Penzance fellow, having only a short way to trudge, said "No, thank'ee," and started for home with a small crowd after him. But Bosistow and Cornish agreed 'twould be more neighbourly to accept, and, to tell the truth, they didn't quite know how to behave with so many eyes upon them.

Cornish had on a soldier's red jacket with white facings, and a pair of blue trousers out at the knees, while Bosistow's trousers were of white cloth, and he carried a j.a.panned knapsack at the back of his red shirt: and with a white-painted straw hat apiece, you may guess they felt themselves looking like two figures of fun.

So down they went to the _Perseverance's_ cabin, and Capen Penny mixed them a stiff gla.s.s of rum and called them fine fellows, and mixed them two more gla.s.ses while they talked; and when the time came to say "so long," Billy was quite sure he didn't care for appearances one snap of his fingers.

They linked arms on the quay, where they found a crowd waiting for them, and many with questions to ask about absent friends, so that from Mousehole to Penzance it was a regular procession. And then they had to go to the hotel and tell the whole story over again, and answer a thousand and one questions about Penzance boys imprisoned at Jivvy.

And all this meant more rum, of course.

It was seven in the evening, and day closing in, before they took the road again. Billy had fallen into a boastful mood, and felt his heart so warm towards Cornish that nothing would do but they must tramp it together so far as Nancledrea, which was a goodish bit out of Cornish's road to Ludgvan. By the time they reached Nancledrea Billy was shedding tears and begging Cornish to come along to Ardevora. "I'll make a man of 'ee there," he promised: "I will sure 'nough!" But Cornish weighed the offer, and decided that his mother at Ludgvan would be going to bed before long. So coming to a house with red blinds and lights within they determined to have a drink before parting.

In the tap-room they found a dozen fellows or so drinking their beer and smoking solemn, and an upstanding woman in a black gown attending on them. "Hullo!" says one of the men looking up, "What's this?

Geezy-dancers?" [3]

"I'll soon tell 'ee about Geezy-dancers," says Billy. "Here, Missus--a pot of ale all round, and let 'em drink to two Cornish boys home from festerin' in French war prisons, while they've a'been diggin' taties!"

There was no resisting a sociable offer like this, and in two two's, as you might say, Billy was boasting ahead for all he was worth, and the company with their mouths open--all but the landlady, who was opening her eyes instead, and wider and wider.

"There isn' none present that remembers me, I dare say. My name's Bosistow--Billy Bosistow--from Ardevora parish. And back there I'm going this very night, and why? you ask. I ben't one of your taty-diggin' slowheads--_I_ ben't. I've broke out of prison three times, and now--" He nodded at the company, whose faces by this time he couldn't very well pick out of a heap--"do any of 'ee know a maid there called Selina Johns? Because if so I warn 'ee of her. 'Why?' says you.

Because that's the maid I'm goin' to marry, and I'm off to Ardevora to do it straight. Another pot of beer, please, missus."

"You've had a plenty, sir, seemin' to me," answered up the landlady, while the company t.i.ttered.

"And is this the way"--Billy stood up very dignified--"is this the way to welcome home a man who bled for his country? Is this your grat.i.tude to a man who's spent ten o' the best years of his life in slavery while you've been diggin' taties?" I can't tell you why potatoes ran so much in the poor fellow's head; but they did, and he seemed to see the hoeing of them almost in the light of a personal injury. He spat on the floor. "And as for you, madam, these here boots of mine have tramped thousands of miles, and I shake off their dust upon you," he says.

"I wish you'd confine yourself to that, with your dirty habits!" the landlady answered up again, but Billy marched out with great dignity which was only spoiled by his mistaking the shadow across the doorway for a raised step. He didn't forget to slam the door after him; but he did forget to take leave of Harry Cornish, who had walked so far out of his way in pure friendliness.

For the first mile or so, what with his anger and the fresh air, Billy had a to-do to keep his pins and fix his mind on the road.

But by-and-by his brain cleared a bit, and when he reached the hill over Ardevora, and saw the lights of the town below him, his mood changed, and he sat down on the turf of the slope with tears in his eyes.

"There you be," said he, talking to the lights, "and here be I; and somewheres down amongst you is the dear maid I've come to marry.

Not much welcome for me in Ardevora, I b'law, though I do love every stone of her streets. But there's one there that didn' forget me in my captivity, and won't despise me in these here rags. I wish I'd seen Abe's face when I jumped aboard the boat. Poor old Abe!--but all's fair in love and war, I reckon. He can't be here till to-morrow at earliest, so let's have a pipe o' baccy on it."

He lit up and sucked away at his pipe, still considering the lights in the valley. Somehow they put him in mind of Abe, and how in the old days he and Abe used to come on them shining just so on their way home on Sat.u.r.day nights from Bessie's Cove. Poor old mate!--first of all he pictured Abe's chap-fallen face, and chuckled; then he began to wonder if Abe would call it fair play. But all was fair in love and war: he kept saying this over to himself, and then lit another pipe to think it out.

Well, he couldn't; and so, after a third pipe, he pulled an old French cloak out of his knapsack and wrapped himself in it and huddled himself to sleep there on the slope of the hillside.

When he woke up the sun was shining and the smoke coming up towards him from the chimneys, and all about him the larks a-singing just as they'd carried on every fine morning since he'd left Ardevora. And somehow, though he had dropped asleep in a puzzle of mind, he woke up with not a doubt to trouble him. He hunted out a crust from his knapsack and made his breakfast, and then he lit his pipe again and turned towards Penzance. He was going to play fair.

On he went in this frame of mind, feeling like a man almost too virtuous to go to church, until by-and-by he came in sight of Nancledrea and the inn he'd left in such a hurry over night. And who should be sitting in the porchway, and looking into the bottom of a pint pot, but Abe c.u.mmins!

"Why, however on earth did you come here?" asked Billy.

"Cap'en landed us between four and five this morning," said Abe.