The Pilot: A Tale of the Sea Part 35

It was extremely fortunate for Dillon, that the animation of his aged kinsman kept his head and body in such constant motion, during this apostrophe, as to intercept the aim that the c.o.c.kswain was deliberately taking at his head with one of Borroughcliffe's pistols; and perhaps the sense of shame which induced him to sink his face on his hands was another means of saving his life, by giving the indignant old seaman time for reflection.

"But you have not spoken of the ladies," said Dillon, after a moment's pause; "I should hope they have borne the alarm of the day like kinswomen of the family of Howard."

The colonel glanced his eyes around him, as if to a.s.sure himself they were alone, and dropped his voice, as he answered:

"Ah, Kit! they have come to, since this rebel scoundrel, Griffith, has been brought into the abbey; we were favored with the company of even Miss Howard, in the dining-room, to-day. There was a good deal of 'dear uncleing,' and 'fears that my life might be exposed by the quarrels and skirmishes of these desperadoes who have landed;' as if an old fellow, who served through the whole war, from '56 to '63, was afraid to let his nose smell gunpowder any more than if it were snuff! But it will be a hard matter to wheedle an old soldier out of his allegiance! This Griffith goes to the Tower, at least, Mr. Dillon."

"It would be advisable to commit his person to the civil authority, without delay."

"To the constable of the Tower, the Earl Cornwallis, a good and loyal n.o.bleman, who is, at this moment, fighting the rebels in my own native province, Christopher," interrupted the colonel; "that will be what I call retributive justice; but," continued the veteran, rising with an air of gentlemanly dignity, "it will not do to permit even the constable of the Tower of London to surpa.s.s the master of St. Ruth in hospitality and kindness to his prisoners. I have ordered suitable refreshments to their apartments, and it is inc.u.mbent on me to see that my commands have been properly obeyed. Arrangements must also be made for the reception of this Captain Barnstable, who will, doubtless, soon be here."

"Within the hour, at farthest," said Dillon, looking uneasily at his watch.

"We must be stirring, boy," continued the colonel, moving towards the door that led to the apartments of his prisoners; "but there is a courtesy due to the ladies, as well as to those unfortunate violators of the laws--go, Christopher, convey my kindest wishes to Cecilia; she don't deserve them, the obstinate vixen, but then she is my brother Harry's child! and while there, you arch dog, plead your own cause. Mark Antony was a fool to you at a 'ruse,' and yet Mark was one of your successful suitors, too; there was that Queen of the Pyramids--"

The door closed on the excited veteran, at these words, and Dillon was left standing by himself, at the side of the table, musing, as if in doubt, whether to venture on the step that his kinsman had proposed, or not.

The greater part of the preceding discourse was unintelligible to the c.o.c.kswain, who had waited its termination with extraordinary patience, in hopes he might obtain some information that he could render of service to the captives. Before he had time to decide on what was now best for him to do, Dillon suddenly determined to venture himself in the cloisters; and, swallowing a couple of gla.s.ses of wine in a breath, he pa.s.sed the hesitating c.o.c.kswain, who was concealed by the opening door, so closely as to brush his person, and moved down the gallery with those rapid strides which men who act under the impulse of forced resolutions are very apt to a.s.sume, as if to conceal their weakness from themselves.--Tom hesitated no longer; but aiding the impulse given to the door by Dillon, as he pa.s.sed, so as to darken the pa.s.sage, he followed the sounds of the other's footsteps, while he trod in the manner already described, the stone pavement of the gallery. Dillon paused an instant at the turning that led to the room of Borroughcliffe, but whether irresolute which way to urge his steps, or listening to the incautious and heavy tread of the c.o.c.kswain, is not known; if the latter, he mistook them for the echoes of his own footsteps, and moved forward again without making any discovery.

The light tap which Dillon gave on the door of the withdrawing-room of the cloisters was answered by the soft voice of Cecilia Howard herself, who bid the applicant enter. There was a slight confusion evident in the manner of the gentleman as he complied with the bidding, and in its hesitancy, the door was, for an instant, neglected.

"I come, Miss Howard," said Dillon, "by the commands of your uncle, and, permit me to add, by my own--"

"May Heaven shield us!" exclaimed Cecilia, clasping her hands in affright, and rising involuntarily from her couch, "are we, too, to be imprisoned and murdered?"

"Surely Miss Howard will not impute to me--" Dillon paused, observing that the wild looks, not only of Cecilia, but of Katherine and Alice Duns...o...b.., also, were directed at some other object, and turning, to his manifest terror he beheld the gigantic frame of the c.o.c.kswain, surmounted by an iron visage fixed in settled hostility, in possession of the only pa.s.sage from the apartment.

"If there's murder to be done," said Tom, after surveying the astonished group with a stern eye, "it's as likely this here liar will be the one to do it, as another; but you have nothing to fear from a man who has followed the seas too long, and has grappled with too many monsters, both fish and flesh, not to know how to treat a helpless woman. None, who know him, will say that Thomas Coffin ever used uncivil language, or unseamanlike conduct, to any of his mother's kind."

"Coffin!" exclaimed Katherine, advancing with a more confident air, from the corner into which terror had driven her with her companions.

"Ay, Coffin," continued the old sailor, his grim features gradually relaxing, as he gazed on her bright looks; "'tis a solemn word, but it's a word that pa.s.ses over the shoals, among the islands, and along the cape, oftener than any other. My father was a Coffin, and my mother was a Joy; and the two names can count more flukes than all the rest in the island together; though the Worths, and the Gar'ners, and the Swaines, dart better harpoons, and set truer lances, than any men who come from the weather-side of the Atlantic."

Katherine listened to this digression in honor of the whalers of Nantucket, with marked complacency; and, when he concluded, she repeated slowly:

"Coffin! this, then, is long Tom!"

"Ay, ay, long Tom, and no sham in the name either," returned the c.o.c.kswain, suffering the stern indignation that had lowered around his hard visage to relax into a low laugh as he gazed on her animated features; "the Lord bless your smiling face and bright black eyes, young madam! you have heard of old long Tom, then? Most likely, 'twas something about the blow he strikes at the fish--ah! I'm old and I'm stiff, now, young madam, but afore I was nineteen, I stood at the head of the dance, at a ball on the cape, and that with a partner almost as handsome as yourself--ay! and this was after I had three broad flukes logg'd against my name."

"No," said Katherine, advancing in her eagerness a step or two nigher to the old tar, her cheeks flushing while she spoke, "I had heard of you as an instructor in a seaman's duty, as the faithful c.o.c.kswain, nay, I may say, as the devoted companion and friend, of Mr. Richard Barnstable-- but, perhaps, you come now as the bearer of some message or letter from that gentleman."

The sound of his commander's name suddenly revived the recollection of Coffin, and with it all the fierce sternness of his manner returned.

Bending his eyes keenly on the cowering form of Dillon, he said, in those deep, harsh tones, that seem peculiar to men who have braved the elements, until they appear to have imbided some of their roughest qualities:

"Liar! how now? what brought old Tom Coffin into these shoals and narrow channels? was it a letter? Ha! but by the Lord that maketh the winds to blow, and teacheth the lost mariner how to steer over the wide waters, you shall sleep this night, villain, on the planks of the Ariel; and if it be the will of G.o.d that beautiful piece of handicraft is to sink at her moorings, like a worthless hulk, ye shall still sleep in her; ay, and a sleep that shall not end, till they call all hands, to foot up the day's work of this life, at the close of man's longest voyage."

The extraordinary vehemence, the language, the att.i.tude of the old seaman, commanding in its energy, and the honest indignation that shone in every look of his keen eyes, together with the nature of the address, and its paralyzing effect on Dillon, who quailed before it like the stricken deer, united to keep the female listeners, for many moments, silent through amazement. During this brief period, Tom advanced upon his nerveless victim, and lashing his arms together behind his back, he fastened him, by a strong cord, to the broad canvas belt that he constantly wore around his own body, leaving to himself, by this arrangement, the free use of his arms and weapons of offence, while he secured his captive.

"Surely," said Cecilia, recovering her recollection the first of the astonished group, "Mr. Barnstable has not commissioned you to offer this violence to my uncle's kinsman, under the roof of Colonel Howard?--Miss Plowden, your friend has strangely forgotten himself in this transaction, if this man acts in obedience to his order!"

"My friend, my cousin Howard," returned Katharine, "would never commission his c.o.c.kswain, or any one, to do an unworthy deed. Speak, honest sailor; why do you commit this outrage on the worthy Mr. Dillon, Colonel Howard's kinsman, and a cupboard cousin of St. Ruth's Abbey?"

"Nay, Katherine--"

"Nay, Cecilia, be patient, and let the stranger have utterance; he may solve the difficulty altogether."

The c.o.c.kswain, understanding that an explanation was expected from his lips, addressed himself to the task with an energy suitable both to the subject and to his own feelings. In a very few words, though a little obscured by his peculiar diction, he made his listeners understand the confidence that Barnstable had reposed in Dillon, and the treachery of the latter. They heard him with increased astonishment, and Cecilia hardly allowed him time to conclude, before she exclaimed:

"And did Colonel Howard, could Colonel Howard listen to this treacherous project!"

"Ay, they spliced it together among them," returned Tom; "though one part of this cruise will turn out but badly."

"Even Borroughcliffe, cold and hardened as he appears to be by habit, would spurn at such dishonor," added Miss Howard.

"But Mr. Barnstable?" at length Katherine succeeded in saying, when her feelings permitted her utterance, "said you not that soldiers were in quest of him?"

"Ay, ay, young madam," the c.o.c.kswain replied, smiling with grim ferocity, "they are in chase, but he has shifted his anchorage, and even if they should find him, his long pikes would make short work of a dozen redcoats. The Lord of tempests and calms have mercy, though, on the schooner! Ah, young madam she, is as lovely to the eyes of an old seafaring man as any of your kind can be to human nature!"

"But why this delay?--away then, honest Tom, and reveal the treachery to your commander; you may not yet be too late--why delay a moment?"

"The ship tarries for want of a pilot.--I could carry three fathom over the shoals of Nantucket, the darkest night that ever shut the windows of heaven, but I should be likely to run upon breakers in this navigation.

As it was, I was near getting into company that I should have had to fight my way out of."

"If that be all, follow me," cried the ardent Katherine; "I will conduct you to a path that leads to the ocean, without approaching the sentinels."

Until this moment, Dillon had entertained a secret expectation of a rescue, but when he heard this proposal he felt his blood retreating to his heart, from every part of his agitated frame, and his last hope seemed wrested from him. Raising himself from the abject shrinking att.i.tude, in which both shame and dread had conspired to keep him as though he had been fettered to the spot, he approached Cecilia, and cried, in tones of horror:

"Do not, do not consent, Miss Howard, to abandon me to the fury of this man! Your uncle, your honorable uncle, even now applauded and united with me in my enterprise, which is no more than a common artifice in war."

"My uncle would unite, Mr. Dillon, in no project of deliberate treachery like this," said Cecilia, coldly.

"He did, I swear by----"

"Liar!" interrupted the deep tones of the c.o.c.kswain.

Dillon shivered with agony and terror, while the sounds of this appalling voice sunk into his inmost soul; but as the gloom of the night, the secret ravines of the cliffs, and the turbulence of the ocean flashed across his imagination, he again yielded to a dread of the horrors to which he should be exposed, in encountering them at the mercy of his powerful enemy, and he continued his solicitations:

"Hear me, once more hear me--Miss Howard, I beseech you, hear me! Am I not of your own blood and country? will you see me abandoned to the wild, merciless, malignant fury of this man, who will transfix me with that--oh, G.o.d! if you had but seen the sight I beheld in the Alacrity!

--hear me. Miss Howard; for the love you bear your Maker, intercede for me! Mr. Griffith shall be released----"

"Liar!" again interrupted the c.o.c.kswain.

"What promises he?" asked Cecilia, turning her averted face once more at the miserable captive.

"Nothing at all that will be fulfilled," said Katherine; "follow, honest Tom, and I, at least, will conduct you in good faith."

"Cruel, obdurate Miss Plowden; gentle, kind Miss Alice, you will not refuse to raise your voice in my favor; your heart is not hardened by any imaginary dangers to those you love."

"Nay, address not me," said Alice, bending her meek eyes to the floor; "I trust your life is in no danger; and I pray that he who has the power will have the mercy to see you unharmed."