The Golden Galleon Part 11

"That will I most gladly do," returned Gilbert. "Although, for the matter of that, Timothy Trollope here would prove a likelier and a skilfuller teacher than I, for I am still but his pupil."

"I thank you," said Philip, with a curious lift of his eyebrows as he glanced across at Timothy. "But so please you, I had rather take my lessons from a gentleman."

Timothy winced under the reproach to his lowly birth, and moved away, busying himself by putting aside some books that his young master had left lying on the window-shelf.

"Was not I right, Tim?" remarked Gilbert, some few minutes afterwards, when Drusilla with her uncle and cousin had departed. "Are not they good worthy folk, these relatives of mine?"

"It would ill become me to differ from you, Master Gilbert," answered Timothy. "My instincts may be at fault."

CHAPTER VIII.

THE OLD BUCCANEER.

The sun shone brightly that morning in a clear blue sky, shedding a glistening light upon the bare wet branches of the trees, and upon the little pools of water that lay in the hollows of the land and between the deep long furrows of the ploughed fields. The sleety snow of the previous night had not rested, but had left the ground soft and slushy, and as Timothy Trollope strode down one of the narrow lanes in the direction of the home-farm his great boots sank deep into the mud at every stride.

"'Tis true enough. G.o.d wot 'tis true I am no gentleman," he said to himself as he went along, regardless of the mire. "Nevertheless, I like not the lad's manner of telling me so. 'Twas ill-bred, at the least; and doubly hurtful in that 'twas true. Haply he knew by my raiment, or by my speech, or my ungainly movements, that I am lowly born. 'Tis pa.s.sing strange how these gentlefolks do know their own cla.s.s. They will recognize a man of good breeding from across the street, and tell him from a churl though he have not so much as opened his lips. And yet 'tis not the fashion of his coat that doth proclaim him a gentleman, else would Philip Oglander himself be writ down the veriest varlet, for a more ill-favoured fashion than his I have not seen upon a gentleman these many days. Nay, I like him not, despite Master Gilbert. And his words do rankle in me like the sting of a wasp. '_I thank you; but so please you, I had rather take my lessons from a gentleman._' A gentleman, forsooth! Marry, I have taught a better gentleman than him to use the rapier. Howbeit, there is a medicine for every malady, and it may be that yon simpering fool shall some day take from me a lesson that he wots not of."

At the end of the lane Timothy came upon some men who were at work thatching the roof of one of the farm cottages. The man at the foot of the ladder was Jake Thew, the same who had ridden in pursuit of the robbers.

"What ho there, Jake!" cried Timothy, as he clambered up to the gate.

"Didst catch a sight of those rascally Egyptians yesternight?"

"More than a sight, Master Trollope; I catched themselves," came the ready answer. "That is to say, Thomas Lee and I did catch 'em. Thomas rid round by the highroad with William his son. They doubled at the corner of Beddington Lane with intent to meet us in the dingle. We met nigh upon half a mile from the spot where Master Gilbert was wounded, sir. The three of us did scour the country-side, now this way, now that, until well upon midnight; and at last we came upon the vagabonds lying hidden in a place that we'd pa.s.sed a good half-dozen times--Beddington Dingle to wit. Thomas Lee let fire his pistol upon them, though purposely aiming above their heads, lest he should kill one of them and so be brought up for murder; and the rascals surrendered. So we carried them off and lodged them in Plymouth gaol, sir, where they both now are."

"Both?" echoed Timothy. "And were there not three of them in all?"

Jake left the foot of the ladder, his companions being now on the cottage roof, and waded through the mud to where Timothy was.

"Nay, sir, there were but two; we sought for three, but the third had made good his escape. And well for him that he did so, for 'twas he--so Robert Harvey avers--who ran his rapier into Master Gilbert's arm."

"Plague on the man!" cried Timothy, in vexation. "But we shall catch him yet, I promise you. Prithee, did the constable search the men ere you came away?"

"There was small need to search 'em, my master. The booty they took was scarce so portable as to be stowed away beneath their jerkins. We found it all in two great meal-sacks that they carried off from the barn. And a pretty catalogue it was withal--_item_, three young capons; _item_, one fat hen; _item_, a sucking pig, divers farm implements, and a lordly goose that Dame Trevenen the hen-wife was feeding up for Christmas."

"Ay, a goodly haul, o' my conscience," agreed Timothy. "But found ye nought of what the rogues stole from the old man?"

"Nay," answered Jake with a shake of his head. "Although 'tis true that young Robin Redfern pa.s.sing through the dingle early this morning, did come upon an old and worthless wallet, which might indeed have belonged to the man you speak of. 'Twas empty, though--empty as a hatched egg,--and Robin left it where it lay among last year's brambles."

"Ah! he had better have brought it with him," said Timothy, "for it will serve as evidence to convict the thieves alike of the stealing of the poultry and the wounding of Master Gilbert. And now," he added, "what canst tell me touching this same old man? Didst see him yesternight after I left him on the road?"

Jake Thew nodded and smiled.

"That we did, my master," said he. "We encountered him nigh unto Modbury Bridge. He was tramping along full contented and jovial, singing l.u.s.tily enough to wake the very birds in the trees. 'Twas the ballad of _The Beggar's Daughter of Bednall Green_ that he sang. And in truth he might well have been that same beggar himself, so ill-favoured was he, and so poorly clad withal."

"Ay," rejoined Trollope, "but, if I mind aright, your beggar man of Bednall Green did turn out in the end to be a man of substance, and more wealthy than any one of his daughter's wooers. Whereas this Jacob Hartop hath not a groat in the world to call his own, saving what he may claim, by virtue of his calling, from the seamen's chest at Chatham, which Sir Francis Drake hath made for the relief of aged mariners."

"He will not want for friendly help in these parts, howsoever," remarked Thew, "for it seemeth he was born in Modbury village, and there be many there still living who have some remembrance of him as a young man ere he went upon the sea, and who will gladly give him both food and shelter. There is the widow Frampton for one, who took him into her cottage yesternight and gave him a supper and a bed, by reason that he sailed in the same ship with her goodman to the Spanish Main. You will find him there even now, sir, if so be you would see him."

Timothy waited only to make certain further inquiries concerning the ident.i.ty of the two men who had been taken to the gaol, and then set off on his way down to the village.

He went first to the widow Frampton's cottage, a clean little thatched dwelling, with the dry and faded stalks of honeysuckle about the trellised porch and a tiny garden in front. He asked for Jacob Hartop, and was told that the old man had wandered out to enjoy the fresh morning air. Timothy inquired which way he had gone, and was told that he would perhaps find him down beside the sign of the Champernoun Arms, as he had said before going out that he had a mind to have a gossip with some of the villagers over a pot of home-brewed ale.

Timothy made his way along the street past many whitewashed cottages, all curiously striped with cross beams of black oak, and looking very sweet and cosy with their thatched roofs and their smoking chimneys. A turn in the road brought him within a few yards of the village well.

About a dozen curly-headed boys and girls stood round it, and in their midst, sitting on the stone parapet that encircled the fountain, was Jacob Hartop. He was easily known by the fact that he still wore Gilbert Oglander's cloak, with its badge of the Oglanders on the shoulder. The old man's back was towards Timothy, and the lad went quietly up behind him until he came within sound of his voice. Jacob was holding forth to his juvenile audience on the precious virtues of pure water, a cup of which liquid he held in his right hand, resting on his knee.

"Ay," he was saying as Timothy drew near, "I told ye but a little while ago of all the gold and precious stones that I possessed--enough and more in value, as I say, to buy up all Plymouth and Modbury. Well, I would, at times, willingly have given the whole of that treasure for one such little cup of water as this. Ah! 'tis a terrible thing to be dying of thirst, my boys, as many of our brave men were a-dying at that time aboard the _Golden Galleon_. 'Tis to be compared only with the tortures of the Inquisition. But there, bairns, methinks I have talked enough about myself and my ship. What would ye next--a song--a fairy tale?"

Timothy was about to break into the circle, but the voice of a yellow-haired little maid of some ten or eleven years old checked him.

"You did say you would tell us of Captain Drake," she said.

"Yes," chimed in a boy at her elbow, "thou didst say we should hear how it was that Sir Francis was crippled. I have oft wondered, when I have seen him going up to my lord's great house yonder, how it was that he came to walk lame."

Hartop laid his cup of water aside on the parapet of the well, and took the yellow-haired maid in his arms and perched her upon his knee. The other children gathered closer round him.

"You must know, then," he began, looking from one to the other of the rosy faces, "that our great enemies the Spaniards have long been famous for the vast wealth that they have gathered out yonder in the islands that we name the West Indies. Every year King Philip doth send out a fleet of his galleons to bring home to Spain their cargoes of silver and gold. 'Tis that same vast wealth that hath made him able to fit out his armadas and pay his armies of soldiers to fight against your fathers.

Now Queen Elizabeth (G.o.d bless her!) hath ever been anxious to stop those treasures from crossing over to Spain, and she hath allowed Captain Drake and others of her great seamen, as well as such more humble buccaneers as myself, to rove the Spanish Main and capture such treasure-ships as came in their way, also to land their forces on the Spanish islands and strip King Philip's treasure-houses of the gold and silver therein stored."

At this point Timothy Trollope, being somewhat interested in the narrative, sat down on the edge of the well with his back against one of the pillars of the winch.

"One such treasure-house was at a place which the Spaniards called Nombre de Dios," continued Hartop, "a town of the same size as Plymouth.

The great building in which all the gold and silver was stored was named the Treasure House of the World, and I promise you it well merited the name. If all the cottages in Modbury village were made of solid silver and the church there of solid gold, there would yet be less than was contained in the place I speak of. All the ships now lying in Plymouth harbour would not have been able to carry it away, though they had gone all together and made two voyages over their work.

"Now Captain Drake made up his mind to have that treasure and carry it off, even though he should cast it all into the deep sea before he came home again to England; for he well knew that if it should ever reach Spain King Philip would thus be made so rich that he could build more ships of war than any other monarch in all the world. So to Nombre de Dios did Drake take his ships. Their crews were made up of the best young men of Devon."

"And were you also with Drake at that time, Master Hartop?" asked one of the elder boys, whose name was Robin Redfern.

"I had that honour; yes," said Hartop. "And well I mind the night that we landed. 'Twas a stormy night. The clouds were as black as my cloak, and the rain was such as you never saw in dear old England. By misfortune the Spaniards got wind of our coming, and we had but reached the main street of the town when they sounded the alarm. They blew their trumpets, they rang their great bells, their soldiers appeared in vast numbers at every corner, firing their muskets and their arrows into our midst. Many of our best men fell. But Captain Drake still urged us on, and we gladly followed his lead, for we knew that, despite the greater number of our enemies, we were more than equal to them in bravery, and that the gold was still within our reach--that, indeed, Master Oxenham and Captain Drake's brother John had already gone round with their men to break open the treasure-house doors. While these our comrades were thus occupied, Captain Drake meant to return to the middle of the town and engage our enemies in a wide, open market-place. Be called to us to follow him thither. He stepped briskly forward to lead the way, and then with a cheery cry on his lips he suddenly rolled over in the wet sand, with his face as white as this little lady's frock.

"'Twas daylight by that time, and I had myself seen that with every step he had taken, for the distance of it may be half a mile, he had left the imprint of his foot in blood. Ever since our first encounter with the Spaniards he had been secretly struggling against a desperate wound in his leg, saying never a word about it, but hiding it lest the knowledge of it might dishearten us. He had gone bravely on until he could no longer stand. There, lying well-nigh dead upon the sand, he beseeched us to proceed with our work. We refused, and he grew angry. Again and again he entreated us, but we told him--which was no more than the truth--that his life was dearer to us than all the wealth of the Indies. We carried him down to our boats and took him aboard his ship, leaving the Spaniards and their wealth behind. And that was the end of our attempt upon the Treasure House of the World.

"'Twas long ere Captain Drake was well enough to leave his bed, but ever since that time he hath walked with a limp in his gait. May he walk through this life for many and many a year yet to come, say I!"

"Amen to that!" chimed in Timothy Trollope, rising and walking round to the other side of the well and greeting Jacob Hartop.

The old man looked very different now from the weary and storm-tossed wanderer of the night before. His weather-beaten face had been newly washed, and was of a clear ruddy brown, albeit wrinkled with many lines that were as the river courses upon a map. His silvery hair and beard had been trimmed and combed, and he wore a small white ruff that covered from view his thin and scraggy neck. Some kindly villagers had given him a shepherd's jacket of russet frieze with red sleeves, a pair of thick start-up boots, and a pair of rough cloth stockings. He lifted the yellow-haired maid from his knee and stood up, taking Timothy's hand.

"How fares your young master?" he inquired; and when Timothy had told him, he bade farewell to the children and walked by the tall young fellow's side towards the bridge that crossed the little river. There he paused as if about to turn back, but Timothy drew him on, telling him that Lord Champernoun had ordered that if he could be found he was to be brought up to the manor-house.

"My lord was ill pleased that you came not yesternight," said Tim. "And it seemeth that Sir Walter Raleigh, hearing that you had been in the Indies, hath also expressed a wish to have speech with you."

"Sir Walter Raleigh?" repeated Hartop in a tone of surprise. "Ah! then 'tis my bounden duty to go with you. I knew not that he was within a hundred miles of this place. And I have news for him. But I gave you my reasons for avoiding Modbury Manor at this present time. I wanted not to meet again with Master Jasper Oglander, of whom, G.o.d wot, I have already seen more than pleaseth me. I wot well that he did intend to go thither yesternight. Didst find him there when ye went in, prithee?"

Timothy nodded. "We found him and his son at the table when we carried Master Gilbert into the dining-hall," he said.