The Buccaneer Part 47

Several large men-of-war, with reefed sails and floating pennons, lay at the entrance of the Nore, while a still greater number blotted the waters of the sluggish Medway;--still the sun shone over all; and what is it that the sun does not deck with a portion of its own cheerfulness and beauty?

"Mount up the tower, Maud," said Lady Frances, "the tower of the old church; it commands a greater range than I can see; and tell me when any cross the ferry; thy eyes, if not brighter, are quicker far than mine."

"Will ye'r ladyship sit?" replied the sapient waiting-maid; "I'll spread a kercher on this fragment of antiquity: ye'r ladyship can sit there free from any disturbance. I can see as well from this high mound as from the castle, or church-steeple, my lady; it is so hard to climb."

"Maud, if you like not to mount, say so, and I will go myself. You are dainty, young mistress."

Maud obeyed instantly, though with sundry mutterings, which, well for her, her lady heard not; for the Lady Frances was somewhat shrewishly given, and could scold as if she had not been a princess, the rank and bearing of which she was most anxious to a.s.sume, and carry as highly as the n.o.blest born in Europe.

"See you aught?" she inquired, at last looking up to Mistress Maud, whose head, surmounted by its black hood, overlooking the parapet wall, showed very like a well-grown crow.

"A shepherd on yonder hill, lady, waving his arm to a dog down in the dingle, and the beast is driving up the fold as if he were a man."

Lady Frances bent over a tombstone near her and read the inscription. It described in quaint, but touching language, the death of a young woman, about her own age, the day before her intended bridal. There had been a white rose-tree planted close to the rude monument, but its growth was impeded by a ma.s.s of long gra.s.s and wild herbage, so that there was but one rose on its branches, and that was discoloured by a foul canker, whose green body could be seen under the froth it cast around to conceal its misdeeds. Lady Frances took it out, destroyed it, and began pulling up the coa.r.s.e weeds.

"Such a tomb as this I should have liked for Barbara," she said aloud, sighing heavily as the words escaped her lips.

"She will not need it," replied a voice from under an old archway, close beside where she sat.

Lady Frances started.

"Will you tell your friend, Mistress Cecil," continued the same voice--Lady Frances could not see the speaker, although, as may be readily believed, she looked around her with an anxiety not divested of terror--"Will you tell your friend, Mistress Cecil, that old Mother Hays, of the Gull's Nest Crag, is dying, and that she has something to communicate which it concerns her to know, and that the sooner she comes to the Gull's Nest the better; for the woman's spirit is only waiting to tell her secret, and go forth."

"Methinks," replied Lady Frances, "that her own child--I know she has one--would be a fitter depositary for her secret than a lady of gentle blood. But why come ye not forth? I hate all jugglery."

"Her own child, Robin, is away, the Lord knows where; and those who are not of gentle blood are as eager after secrets as other folk. Your father has had rare hunting after the Cavaliers and their secrets, though his blood has more beer than Rhenish in it, to my thinking."

Lady Frances stamped her little foot with rage at the insult, and called, in no gentle tone, "Maud! Maud!" then raising her voice, which she imagined could be heard below, as the garden of Cecil Place joined the ruins of Minster, she shouted, in a way that would have done no discredit to any officer in the Commonwealth service, "Below there!--turn out the guard, and encircle the ruins!"

"Turn out the guard, and encircle the ruins!" mimicked the voice, which was evidently receding; "the little Roundhead's in a pa.s.sion!--'Turn out the guard!' ah! ah! ah!" and the laugh appeared to die away beneath her feet.

Maud had hastened down right joyfully at the summons, and stood beside her mistress, whose temper had by no means cooled at the term "Roundhead," as applied to herself; and broke forth in good earnest, when noting a smile that elongated her woman's lip, as she said,--

"Law! daisy me, my lady! I thought you were run away with, seeing I have just seen two ravens come out o' the glen--the Fox-glen, as we call it."

"Run away with!" repeated Lady Frances, bridling; "have the goodness to remember to whom it is you speak--woman--Here has been a--a--voice--Why turns not out that coward guard? we are too long peaceful, methinks, and need a stir to keep our soldiers to their duty."

"A voice, my lady!" repeated Maud, creeping to Lady Frances, and remembering the legends they had talked of in the hall--"Did it speak, my lady?"

"Fool! how could I know it a voice if it had not spoken?" replied Lady Frances, who, as her temper subsided, felt that she was making herself ridiculous, as it would not be in keeping with her dignity to repeat the words she had heard.

"Shall I go down and call up the guard, and the servants, my lady, to see after this voice?" persisted Maud, with the stupid obstinacy of a person who can only see one thing at a time.

"Go up to the steeple, and look out--But--no--follow me to the house; and remember," she added, with all the asperity of a person who is conscious of having permitted temper to overcome judgment, "that we are in the house of mourning, and ought not to indulge in any thing like jest--say nothing of my alarm--I mean of what I heard, to your companions: it is not worth recording----"

"My lady!"

"Silence, I say!" returned Lady Frances, folding her robe round her with the dignity of a queen. The woman certainly obeyed; but she could not resist muttering to herself, "She never will let a body speak when she takes to those stormy fits. Marry, come up! I wonder who she is!--Well, she's punishing herself; for I could have told her that out by East-Church I saw two soldiers and another, who seem to have taken the wrong instead of the right road; and, after still staying a little at the Cross, turned back on their steps, so as to come to Cecil Place."

How many bars and pitfalls are in the way of those who would climb highly, even if they wish to climb honestly and holily! If they stand as the mark for a mult.i.tude's praise, they have also to encounter a mult.i.tude's blame--the rabble will hoot an eagle; and the higher he soars, the louder will they mock--yet what would they not give for his wings!

Lady Frances's woman found within her narrow bosom an echo to the sneer of the mysterious voice; yet, could she have become as Frances Cromwell, how great would have been her triumph! How curious are the workings of good and evil in the human heart! How necessary to study them, that so we may arrive at the knowledge of ourselves.

Yet Maud loved her mistress; and had not Lady Frances reproved her harshly and unjustly, she would never have thought, "Marry, come up! I wonder who she is!" The spirit of evil worked at the moment in both--in the lady, as a triumphant tyrant--in the woman, as an insolent slave.

We leave it to our philosophical readers to determine which of the two manifestations was the most dangerous: we hope their displeasure against either will not be very violent; for we have but too frequently observed the self-same dispositions animate bright eyes and open coral lips.

Women are frequently greater tyrants than men, because of their weakness: they are anxious for power as the means of strength; and therefore they more often abuse it than use it properly; and men are better slaves than women; because an innate consciousness of their strength, which they are apt to believe they can employ whenever a fitting opportunity occurs, keeps them tranquil. It has been often noted, that in popular tumults women are frequently the most busy, and the least easy to be controlled.

No one would have supposed that Lady Frances's temper had been ruffled, when she crept into the room where Constantia was watching her still sleeping father, and communicated the news of the antic.i.p.ated death of Mother Hays, with her strange request, in so low a whisper, that happily he was not disturbed.

She quitted the apartment when her father's physician was announced; but not until he had informed her that his Highness was about to visit the Island, inquire personally after the health of Sir Robert Cecil, investigate the strange murder that had occurred, inspect the fortress of Queenborough, and ascertain if useful fortifications might not be erected at Sheerness; thus mingling public with private business.

CHAPTER VI.

This deadly night did last But for a little s.p.a.ce, And heavenly day, now night is past, Doth shew his pleasant face: * * * * * * *

The mystie clouds that fall sometime, And overcast the skies, Are like to troubles of our time, Which do but dimme our eyes; But as such dewes are dried up quite When Phoebus shewes his face, So are such fancies put to flighte Where G.o.d doth guide by grace.

GASCOIGNE.

It would be an act of positive inhumanity to leave the unfortunate preacher any longer to his solitude, without taking some note, however brief it may be, of his feelings and his sufferings. After consigning his packet (which, as we have seen, was not only received, but appreciated by--the Protector) to the rocks and breezes of the Gull's Nest Crag, he sat him down patiently, with his Bible in his hand, to await whatever fate was to befall him, or, as he more reverently and more properly termed it, "whatever the Almighty might have in store for him, whether it seemed of good or of evil." The day pa.s.sed slowly and heavily; but before its close he had the satisfaction of ascertaining that the parcel had disappeared. Again and again he climbed to the small opening: at one time he saw that the fierce sunbeams danced on the waves, and at another that they were succeeded by the rich and glowing hues of the setting sun; then came the sober grey of twilight--the sea-birds screamed their last good-night to the waters--one by one the stars came out, gemming the sky with brilliancy, and sparkling along their appointed path. The preacher watched their progress and meditated on their mysteries; though his meditations would have been more cheerful could he have partaken of any of the "creature comforts" appertaining to Cecil Place, and under the special jurisdiction of Solomon Grundy. It was in vain that he had recourse to the crushed oranges--they merely kept his lips from parching and his tongue from cleaving to the roof of his mouth, and by the dawning of the Sabbath morn he was "verily an hungered"--not suffering from the puny and sickly faintness of temporary abstinence, but literally starving for want of food. He paced his narrow cell--called loudly from the window--exhausted his strength in fruitless endeavours to shake the door which the treacherous Burrell had so securely fastened, until, as the day again approached to its termination, he threw himself on the ground in an agony of despair.

"To die such a death--to die without a witness or a cause! If the Lord had willed that I should suffer as a martyr for his holy word, Jonas Fleetword would not have been the man to repine, but gladly would have sacrificed his body as a proof of his exceeding faith, and as an example to encourage others; but to be starved for Sir Willmott Burrell's pastime--to starve in this horrid cell--to feel nature decaying within me, while not even the ravens can bring me food! O G.o.d! O G.o.d! pa.s.s thou this cup from me, or implant a deep spirit of patience and resignation within my soul!"

The unfortunate man continued praying and exclaiming, until nature became almost exhausted, and he sat opposite the aperture, his eyes fixed on the heavens, from which the light was once more rapidly receding.

"If the villain willed my death, why not exterminate me at once?" he thought; and then he prayed again; and as his fervour increased, the door opened, and, by the dim light that entered his cell, he discovered the figure of a tall stalwart man, who was in the middle of the chamber before he perceived that a living being occupied any portion of it.

"The Lord has heard!--the Lord has answered! the Lord has delivered!"

exclaimed the preacher, springing on his feet with astonishing agility; then going up closely to his deliverer, he scanned his features with an earnest eye, and continued, "It is not the chief of cunning, art, and bloodshed, albeit one who appears skilled in the habits of warlike people. Friend, my inward man doth greatly suffer from long abstinence, seeing I have not tasted any thing but a fragment of bitter orange in a state of decomposition, to which I should soon have been reduced myself but for thy timely arrival! Behold, I have been compelled to tarry here a prisoner for the s.p.a.ce of thirty-six hours, computing by the rising of the sun and the setting thereof.--Art thou a friend to Sir Willmott Burrell?"

"D--n him!" replied the stranger with a startling earnestness that left no doubt of his sincerity, at the same time returning to his belt the pistol he had drawn forth at the sight of a stranger in one of the most secret apartments of the Crag.

"Friend!" exclaimed the poor preacher, greatly offended, despite his hunger, at the man's unblushing profaneness, "I cannot commune with thee if thou art of the household of evil-speakers: it is not in thy power to set the mark of destruction on any, though, doubtless, that evil man is in danger of h.e.l.l-fire. I like not to seem as caring for the creature, but the Creator hath given the things of earth for man's support--hast thou food?"

"Follow me," was the brief reply; and Fleetword did follow as quickly as his exhausted state permitted, to the large vaulted room in which we have heretofore encountered the Buccaneer.

Hugh Dalton, for he it was who had so unexpectedly, but so fortunately, broken in upon the dreary solitude of the preacher, pointed to a rude table, upon which stood fragments of a substantial meal: these Fleetword immediately attacked, while the Skipper re-ascended the stairs, down which he had conducted his unlooked-for guest, and disappeared. When the worthy man had satisfied his hunger, he glanced from flagon to flagon, piled one over another upon the floor.

"They are, of a truth, dangerous; yet here is no water, and I am, of a verity, much athirst."

He seized one that had been opened, and drank so eagerly, that, unused as he was to such potations, his head in a very short s.p.a.ce of time became incapable of directing his motions; and when Dalton returned, the simple-minded man was sleeping soundly, his forehead resting on his arms, that were crossed on the table. Dalton looked upon him for a few moments, and a curse--one of those to which he was unhappily familiar--burst from his lips.

"I cannot learn how he came there," he said; "the thing will sleep till morning:--a pretty nursery my Crag has become!" He moved towards the portion of the wall we have formerly mentioned as being covered with the skins of various animals, and holding them out from the side of the cave, discovered a very small arched chamber, which, as well as the one where Fleetword had just partaken of "the creatures comforts," was lighted by a small iron sconce, carefully guarded by a horn shade.

Directly opposite the entrance a female was seated after the Eastern fashion, cross-legged, upon a pile of cushions. She placed her finger on her lip in token of silence, and the Buccaneer returned the signal by beckoning her forward; she rose, though with some difficulty, and as a rich shawl, in which she had been enveloped, fell from her shoulders, her appearance denoted her a married woman. Dalton pointed to Fleetword, and the instant she saw him, she clasped her hands, and would have rushed towards him; but this the Skipper prevented, and they exchanged a few sentences in a strange language, the apparent result of which was, that Dalton proceeded to examine the pockets of the sleeper, and even thrust his hand into his bosom, without, however, it would seem, finding what he sought. There was the small Bible, a handkerchief, a reading-gla.s.s, some fragments of orange-peel, which, perhaps, he had unwittingly thrust there, one or two old religious pamphlets, a newspaper--and a strip of parchment. The foreign lady shook her head, as Dalton laid each upon the table. After a few more words, both the Buccaneer and the stranger were secreted in the arched chamber, and the curtain of skins again fell over the entrance.