Sir Ludar Part 18

Ludar, with a grim smile, owned that he had the worst of this encounter, and made the fellow happy by carrying his box in one hand; although he alarmed him not a little by offering to carry him in the other.

When this little jest was over, the captain came to us with orders to join the crew in making all things ready for presently meeting the sea breezes at the river's mouth; so we had no more time just then to think of Master c.o.xcomb.

It moved my admiration to see with what a will Ludar worked at his task.

He made no question of the Frenchman's right to order his services; and methought, as he hauled away cheerily among his ill-favoured messmates, he looked as n.o.ble as had he been marching at the head of an army. The ship's crew was, to tell the truth, a scurvy company. Not counting us, there were but eleven of them, mostly French, who talked and cursed while they worked and three English, who sulked and grumbled. They stared in no friendly way at Ludar and me when we joined them; nor did they like us the better that, without much knowledge or seamanship, we yet put our backs into what we did, and bade them do the same. Ludar, indeed, born to command, was not sparing in his abuse of their laziness; and it vexed me a little to see how he thereby made himself an enemy of every man among them.

Towards nightfall we were all ship-shape, and the watch being set--of which Ludar was one--I had leisure to go below to seek the sleep I sorely needed. I would fain, before doing so, have visited the maiden to satisfy myself that all went well with her. But I durst hardly venture so far without her bidding. I sought my berth below, therefore--and a vile, foul corner of the hold it was--and laid myself down, wondering what would be the end of all this journeying.

There was a sailor--one of the Frenchmen--down beside me, who, when he saw who I was, sat up and began to talk. In a foolish moment I betrayed that I understood some of his French lingo, whereat he--being more than half drunken--waxed civil, and his tongue loosed itself still more.

"Who is she?" he whispered presently, in his foreign tongue.

"A lady," said I, shortly.

"So! and monstrous rich, by our lady! Comrade," said he, "I helped carry her box on board. Do you take me for a fool? There is something weighs more in that than a maiden's frocks--eh, my friend?"

"You are a fool," said I.

"A fool? Ha! ha! 'Tis well. And I am fool enough to-- you be her man, they say? and an honest fellow? Ha! ha!"

"Ay, ay," said I, drowsily enough, "let me go to sleep."

"Ay, ay," said he, "even if it be silver pieces and not gold, 'twill be enough to make men of thee and me. Dost hear, sluggard? Thee and me, and no more planks and ropes, and--"

I had ceased to hear his maunderings, and was sound asleep.

When I awoke, it was to hear the thundering crash of a wave on the deck overhead, and I knew we were at last on the open sea. Alas! when I turned over to recover my sleep, I fell into so horrible a fit of shuddering and sickness that I believed the hour of my departure was come. The ship rolled heavily through the uneasy water, and at every lurch my heart sunk--I know not whither. I could hear the shuffling of steps overhead, and the dash of the waves against the ship's side, and the voice of the sailors at their posts. Little recked they of the comrade who was dying below!

Presently a call came for the new watch to turn up on deck. I was helpless to obey, and lay groaning there, not caring if the next lurch took us down to the bottom. At last, after much shouting, the captain himself came down and shook me roughly.

"Leave me," said I, "to die in peace."

"Die!" cried he, "thou sickly lubber. If you rise not in a minute's time, we will see what a rope's end can do to 'liven thee. Come, get up."

I struggled to my feet, but in that posture my sickness came back with double violence, so that I tumbled again to the floor, and vowed he might use every rope in the ship to me, but up I could not get.

I do not well recall what happened those next few days. I believe I staggered upon deck and went miserably through the form of work, jeered at by my fellow sailors, despised by my captain, and wondered at by Ludar. But when, after the sickness gave way, I one day found myself in a fever, with my strength all gone, I was let go below and lie there without more to do. I know not how it came to pa.s.s, but ill I was for a day or two; perhaps it was the vexations of the last few weeks, or the weakness left by the sickness, or a visitation of the colic from heaven; however it was, I lay there, humbled and ashamed of my weakness, and wishing myself safe back outside Temple Bar.

At these times, Ludar was a brother to me. He came often to see me, and talked so cheerily, that I almost forgot how solemn his looks used to be. More than that, he fetched me dainties to eat, without which I might have starved; for, while the fever lasted, I could not stomach the strong ship's fare. And I suspected more than once that he had secured my peace from the captain by offering himself to do a good piece of my work as well as his own.

He spoke little enough about the maiden, though I longed to hear of her.

Once, when I asked him, his face grew overcast.

"That maiden," said he, "is never so merry as when the waves are breaking over the deck. Yet I see her little, for, in sooth, the old nurse has been nearer death than you, and will allow no one to go near her but her young mistress. Nor dare I offer myself where I am not bidden. Humphrey," added he, "I prefer to talk of something else."

Now, I must tell you that, to my surprise, I found I had another friend in these dark days; I mean the poet. Contemptible as was my plight, and mean as was the cabin I hid in, when he heard I was ill, he came more than once to see me. It suited him to make a mighty to do about it, as if his condescension must heal me on the spot. Yet the kindness that was in him, and the wonder he afforded me, made up for all these airs and graces.

"Alack and well a day!" exclaimed he, when he first came. "Vulcan hath fallen from the clouds and lieth halting below. The apple which was rosy is become green, and the Dutchman who of late flew is now become ship's ballast. Nay, my poor ruin, thank me not for coming; 'tis the common debt the high oweth to the low, the sound to the broken, the poem to the prose; nay, 'tis the duty a knight oweth to his lady's humblest menial."

"And how is the lady?" said I; for I wearied to hear of her, even from any lips.

"Hast thou seen the swan with wings new dressed float on the summer tide? Hast thou heard the thrush, full-throated, call his mate across the lea? Hast thou watched the moon soar up the heavens, sweeping aside the clouds, and defying the mists of earth? Hast thou marked, my Dutchman, the summer laughter on a field of golden corn? Hast thou tracked the merry breeze along the ripples of a dazzled ocean?--"

"Yes, yes," said I, "but what has that to do with the maiden we speak of?"

He smiled on me pityingly.

"Such, poor youth, is she; and such, methinks, am I become, who sit at her feet and sun myself in her light--"

"'Tis dark down here," I said, "but you seem to me neither swan, nor thrush, nor moon, nor a corn field, nor an ocean. But I thank you, even as you are, for coming."

"'Tis a sign of a sound mind," said he, "when grat.i.tude answereth to graciousness. And now, prithee, how do you do?"

I told him I was better, and that I might not have mended so far, but for my dear master, Sir Ludar.

Then he bridled up and his cheeks coloured.

"Ah, Hercules is a good sailor, and a strong animal. 'Tis fit he should wait upon you, since you be in my present favour. Moreover, like cureth like, as it is said; therefore he is better here tending you, than casting sheep's eyes on one who is as the sun above his head. I have had a mind to admonish him to remove the offence of his visage from her purview, for I perceived, by my own mislike of it, that it was a weariness to her. The pure gla.s.s is dimmed by the breath of the beholder, and a face at the window darkeneth a chamber."

"Sir Ludar will be here soon," said I; "I pray you stay and tell him this."

"No," said he, looking, I thought, a little alarmed. "If the cloud withdraw not from the sun's path of his own motion, neither will he scatter for our bidding. Therefore, let him be. And, indeed, I stay here too long, my Dutchman. Who shall say but the dove sigheth already for her truant mate? So farewell; and count me thy patron."

He came often after this, always with the same brave talk.

One day, however, he seemed more like a plain man and said: "'Tis time thou wert up, my Hollander. There is thunder in the air, the horizon is big with clouds, the dull sea rustleth with the coming storm, and I smell the wind afar off."

"Why," said I, starting up, "Ludar told me but just now the weather was fair and settled, and that the breeze was shifting to the south."

"I spoke not of the weather," said he. "Let it be. The thunder may hide beneath a brow, the lightning may flash from out two eyelids, and the storm may break in a man's breast."

"For Heaven's sake, speak plain," said I. "What do you mean?"

"Wait and see," said he, "I like not these French dogs. Only let thy eye be keen, thy ear quick, and thy hand ready, my Hollander, and stand by me when I call on thee."

More I could not get out of him. When I spoke of it to Ludar afterwards, he said:

"Maybe the little antic is right. Yet they are too sorry a crew, and too small to do mischief. They suspect us of carrying treasure aboard, and your friend the captain, I take it, is the roundest villain of them all."

I vowed the captain was no friend of mine; yet I believed him honest.

But as for the crew, it came to my mind then what the drunken fellow had blabbed out the first night; and I said it was like enough to be true.

That afternoon I rose from my sick-bed and came on deck. I remember to this hour the joy of that afternoon.

The day was bright and fair; land was nowhere to be seen; only a stretch of blue-green water through which the _Misericorde_ spanked with a light breeze at her stern. The white sails shone out in the sunlight, and the happy gulls called to one another above our heads. As I faced round and drank in mouthful after mouthful of the fresh salt air, my life seemed to revive within me, and I felt the strength rush back into my thews.

But the greatest joy of all was that the maiden, seeing me stand there, came up and bade me a joyous welcome to the upper air once more.

"Alas," said she, laughing, "it has been dull times while you have been below, Humphrey. My good old nurse has not ceased to cry out that she was dying since we took our first lurch into the free sea. Your Knight of the Rueful Countenance flies from me whenever he sees me afar; your French captain might be an Englishman, he is so sulky; and as for your English paragon there,"--and she pointed to the gallant who was strutting on the forward deck--"he frightens me with his frenzies and raptures. Do you all make love that way in England?"