On Board the Esmeralda Part 10

Our old friend seemed quite sorry to part with us; and, knowing our dest.i.tute condition, he kindly presented us with the sum of five shillings, which he said was a joint subscription from all hands, who had "parted freely" when they learnt that we were about to be turned adrift from the brig, but which I believe mainly came out of his own pocket.

"Good-bye, my lads," were his last words. "Keep your p.e.c.k.e.r up, and if you'll take the advice of an old sailor, I'd recommend you to write to your friends and go home."

"Much he knows of my Aunt Matilda!" I said to Tom, as we watched the good-hearted fellow pulling back to the old tub on board of which we had pa.s.sed through so much. "If he were acquainted with all the circ.u.mstances of the case I don't think he'd advise my going home at all events!"

"I'm not quite sure of that, Martin," replied Tom, who was now thoroughly tired of everything connected with the sea, vowing that, after the experience he had gained, he would not go afloat again, to be made "Lord High Admiral of England!"

"Well, we'll deliberate about it," said I, as we turned away from the jetty and walked towards the town, where our immediate intention was to enter a coffee-shop and get a substantial breakfast out of the funds which Jorrocks had so thoughtfully provided us with.

Here, Tom's fate was soon decided; for, we had not long been seated in a small restaurant where we had ordered some coffee and bread-and-b.u.t.ter, which were the viands we specially longed for, than an advertis.e.m.e.nt on the front page of an old copy of the _Times_ caught my eye.

It ran thus:--

"If Tom L---, who ran away from school in company with another boy on the night of November the Fifth and is supposed to have gone to sea, will communicate with his distressed mother, all will be forgiven."

"Why, Tom," said I, reading it aloud, with some further particulars describing him, which I have not quoted--"this must refer to you!"

"So it does," said he.

"And what will you do?" I asked him.

"Well, Martin, I don't like to leave you, but then you know my mother must be so anxious, as I told you before, that I think I'd better write to her."

I suggested a better course, however, as soon as I saw he wished to go home; and that was, that, as his mother lived not very far from Exeter, he should take the balance of the money we had left after paying for our breakfast, and go off thither by train at once.

This, after some demur, he agreed to; so, as soon as we had finished our meal and discharged the bill, which only took eightpence put of our store, we made our way to the railway station.

A train was luckily just about starting, and Tom getting a ticket for half-price, he and I parted, not meeting again until many days had pa.s.sed, and then in a very different place!

When I realised the fact that Tom was gone, and that I was now left alone in that strange place, where I had never been in my life before, I felt so utterly cast down, that instinctively I made my way to the sea, there seeking that comfort and calm which the mere sight of it, somehow or other, always afforded me.

I got down, I recollect, on the Hoe, and, walking along the esplanade, halted right in front of the Breakwater, whence I could command a view of the harbour, with the men-of-war in the Hamoaze on my right hand, and the Catt.w.a.ter, where the _Saucy Sall_ was lying, on my left.

I was very melancholy, and after a bit I sat down on an adjacent seat; when, burying my face in my hands, I gave way to tears.

Presently, I was roused by the sound of a man's voice close at hand, as if of some one speaking to me.

I looked up hastily, ashamed of being caught crying. However, the good- natured, jolly, weather-beaten face I saw looking into mine rea.s.sured me.

"Hullo, young c.o.c.kbird," said the owner of the face--a middle-aged, respectable, nautical-looking sort of man--speaking in a cheery voice, which went to my heart; "what's the row with you, my hearty? Tell old Sam Pengelly all about it!"

CHAPTER NINE.

OLD CALABAR COTTAGE.

I don't know why, excepting that the words had a kindly ring about them, in spite of the almost brusque quaintness of the address, that touched me keenly in the depressed state of mind in which I was; but, instead of answering the speaker's pertinent question as to the reason of my grief, I now bent down my head again on my arm, sobbing away as if my heart would break.

But this only made the good Samaritan prosecute his inquiry further.

"Come, come, stow that, youngster," said he, taking a seat beside me on the bench, where I was curled up in one corner, placing one of his hands gently on my shoulder in a caressing way. "Look up, and tell me what ails you, my lad, and if Sam Pengelly can help you, why, there's his fist on it!"

"You--you--are very k-kind," I stammered out between my long-drawn sobs; "but--but--no--n.o.body can--help me, sir."

"Oh, nonsense, tell that to the marines, for a sailor won't believe you," he replied, briskly. "Why, laddie, anybody can help anybody, the same as the mouse nibbled the lion out of the hunter's net; and, as for Mr n.o.body, I don't know the man! Look here, I can't bear to see a ship in distress, or a comrade in the doldrums; so I tell you what, young c.o.c.kbird, raise your crest and don't look so peaky, for I'm going to help you if it's in my power, as most likely it is--that is, saving as how it ain't a loss by death, which takes us all, and which the good Lord above can only soothe, bringing comfort to you; and even then, why, a friendly word, and a grip o' some un's hand, sometimes softens down the roughest plank we've got to tread.

"I tell you, my hearty," he resumed again, after a brief pause, during which my sobs ceased, "I ain't a going to let you adrift, now I've borne down alongside and boarded you, my hearty--that's not Sam Pengelly's way; so you'd better make a clean breast of your troubles and we'll see what can be done for 'em. To begin with, for there's no use argufying on an empty stomach, are you hungry, eh?"

"No," I said with a smile, his cheery address and quaint language banishing my melancholy feelings in a moment, just as a ray of sunshine or two, penetrating the surface mist, that hangs over the sea and land of a summer morning before the orb of day, causes it to melt away and disappear as if by magic, waking up the scene to life; "I had breakfast in the town about an hour ago."

"Are you hard up?" was his next query.

"No," I answered again, this time bursting into a laugh at the puzzled expression on his face; "I've got a shilling and a sixpence--there!" and I drew the coins from my pocket, showing them to him.

"Well, I'm jiggered!" murmured the old fellow to himself, taking off the straight-peaked blue cloth cap he wore, and scratching his head reflectively--as if in a quandary, and cogitating how best to get out of it. "Neither hard up or hungry! I call this a stiff reckoning to work out. I'd better try the young shaver on another tack. Got any friends?" he added, in a louder key--addressing himself, now, personally to me, not supposing that I had heard his previous soliloquy, for he had merely uttered his thoughts aloud.

This question touched me on the sore point, and I looked grave at once.

"No," I replied, "I've got none left now, since Tom's gone."

"And who's Tom?" he asked, confidentially, to draw me out.

Thereupon, I told him of my being an orphan, brought up by relatives who didn't care about me, and all about my being sent to school. I also detailed, with much gusto, the way in which Tom and I had made our exit from Dr h.e.l.lyer's academy, and our subsequent adventures in the coal brig, down to the moment when I saw the last of my chum as he steamed out of the Plymouth railway station in the Exeter train, leaving me desolate behind.

My new friend did not appear so very much amused by the account of our blowing up the Doctor as I thought he would be. Indeed, he looked quite serious about it, as if it were, no joking matter, as really it was not, but a very bad and mischievous piece of business. What seemed to interest him much more, was, what I told him of my longing for a sea- life, and the determination I had formed of being a sailor--which even the harsh treatment of the _Saucy Sall's_ skipper had in no degree banished from my mind.

"What a pity you weren't sent in the service," he said, meditatively, "I fancy you'd ha' made a good reefer from the cut of your jib. You're just the very spit of one I served under when I was a man-o'-war's-man afore I got pensioned off, now ten year ago!"

"My father was an officer in the Navy," I replied rather proudly. "He lost his life, gallantly, in the service of his country."

"You don't say that now?" exclaimed my questioner, with much warmth, looking me earnestly in the face; "and what may your name be, if I may be so bold? you haven't told it me yet."

"Martin Leigh," I answered, promptly, a faint hope rising in my breast.

"Leigh?--no, never, it can't be!" said the old fellow, now greatly excited. "I once knew an officer of that very name--Gerald Leigh--and he was killed in action up the Niger River on the West Coast, while attacking a slave barrac.o.o.n, ten years ago come next March--"

"That was my father," I here interposed, interrupting his reminiscences.

"Your father? You don't mean that!"

"I do," I said, eagerly, "I was four years old when Uncle George received the news of his death."

"My stunsails!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the old fellow, dashing his cap to the ground in a fever of excitement; and, seizing both my hands in his, he shook them up and down so forcibly that he almost lifted me off the seat.

"Think of that now; but, I could ha' known it from the sort o' feeling that drew me to you when I saw you curled up here, all lonesome, like a c.o.c.k sparrow on a round of beef! And so, Lieutenant Leigh was your father--the bravest, kindest officer I ever sailed under! Why, youngster, do you know who I am?"

He said this quite abruptly, and he looked as if he thought I would recognise him.