The Red Rover Part 42

"I know not. You little understand the nature of man, if you are now to learn that he has pride in maintaining a reputation for even vice, when he has once purchased notoriety by its exhibition. Besides, I am not fitted for the world, as it is found among your dependant colonists."

"You claim your birth, perhaps, in the mother country?"

"I am no better than a poor provincial, sir; an humble satellite of the mighty sun. You have seen my flags, Mr Wilder:--but there was one wanting among them all; ay, and one which, had it existed, it would have been my pride, my glory, to have upheld with my heart's best blood!"

"I know not what you mean."

"I need not tell a seaman, like you, how many n.o.ble rivers pour their waters into the sea along this coast of which we have been speaking--how many wide and commodious havens abound there--or how many sails whiten the ocean, that are manned by men who first drew breath on that s.p.a.cious and peaceful soil."

"Surely I know the advantages of the country you mean."

"I fear not!" quickly returned the Rover. "Were they known, as they should be, by you and others like you, the flag I mentioned would soon be found in every sea; nor would the natives of our country have to succ.u.mb to the hirelings of a foreign prince.

"I will not affect to misunderstand your meaning for I have known others as visionary as yourself in fancying that such an event may arrive."

"May!--As certain as that star will settle in the ocean, or that day is to succeed to night, it _must._ Had that flag been abroad, Mr Wilder, no man would have ever heard the name of the Red Rover."

"The King has a service of his own, and it is open to all his subjects alike."

"I could be a subject of a King; but to be the subject of a subject, Wilder, exceeds the bounds of my poor patience. I was educated, I might almost have said born, in one of his vessels; and how often have I been made to feel, in bitterness, that an ocean separated my birth-place from the footstool of his throne! Would you think it, sir? one of his Commanders dared to couple the name of my country with an epithet I will not wound your ear by repeating!"

"I hope you taught the scoundrel manners."

The Rover faced his companion, and there was a ghastly smile on his speaking features, as he answered--

"He never repeated the offence! 'Twas his blood or mine; and dearly did he pay the forfeit of his brutality!"

"You fought like men, and fortune favoured the injured party?"

"We fought, sir.--But I had dared to raise my hand against a native of the holy isle!--It is enough, Mr Wilder; the King rendered a faithful subject desperate, and he has had reason to repent it. Enough for the present; another time I may say more.--Good night."

Wilder saw the figure of his companion descend the ladder to the quarter-deck; and then was he left to pursue the current of his thoughts, alone, during the remainder of a watch which to his impatience seemed without an end.

Chapter XXII.

"She made good view of me; indeed so much, That sure, methought, her eyes had lost her tongue, For she did speak in starts, distractedly."

_Twelfth Night._

Though most of the crew of the "Dolphin" slept, either in their hammocks or among the guns, there were bright and anxious eyes still open in a different part of the vessel. The Rover had relinquished his cabin to Mrs Wyllys and Gertrude, from the moment they entered the ship; and we shall shift the scene to that apartment, (already sufficiently described to render the reader familiar with the objects it contained), resuming the action of the tale at an early part of the discourse just related in the preceding chapter.

It will not be necessary to dwell upon the feelings with which the female inmates of the vessel had witnessed the disturbances of that day; the conjectures and suspicions to which they gave rise may be apparent in what is about to follow. A mild, soft light fell from the lamp of wrought and ma.s.sive silver that was suspended from the upper deck, obliquely upon the painfully pensive countenance of the governess, while a few of its strongest rays lighted the youthful bloom, though less expressive because less meditative lineaments, of her companion. The background was occupied, like a dark shadow in a picture, by the dusky form of the slumbering Ca.s.sandra. At the moment when we see fit to lift the curtain on this quiet scene of our drama, the pupil was speaking, seeking, in the averted eyes of her instructress, that answer to her question which the tongue of the latter appeared reluctant to accord.

"I repeat, my dearest Madam," said Gertrude, "that the fashion of these ornaments, no less than their materials, is extraordinary in a ship."

"And what would you infer from the same?"

"I know not. Still I would that we were safe in the house of my father."

"G.o.d grant it! It may be imprudent to be longer silent.--Gertrude, frightful, horrible suspicions have been engendered in my mind by what we have this day witnessed."

The cheek of the maiden blanched, and the pupil of her soft eye contracted, with alarm, while she seemed to demand an explanation with every disturbed lineament of her countenance.

"I have long been familiar with the usages of a vessel of war," continued the governess, who had only paused in order to review the causes of her suspicions in her own mind; "but never have I seen such customs as, each hour, unfold themselves in this vessel."

"Of what do you suspect her?"

The look of deep, engrossing, maternal anxiety, that the lovely interrogator received in reply to this question, might have startled one whose mind had been more accustomed to muse on the depravity of human nature than the spotless being who received it; but to Gertrude it conveyed no more than a general and vague sensation of alarm.

"Why do you thus regard me, my governess--my mother?" she exclaimed, bending forward, and laying a hand imploringly on the arm of the other, as if she would arouse her from a trance.

"Yes, I will speak: It is safer that you know the worst, than that your innocence should be liable to be abused. I distrust the character of this ship, and of all that belong to her."

"All!" repeated her pupil, gazing fearfully, and a little wildly, around.

"Yes; of all"

"There may be wicked and evil-intentioned men n his Majesty's fleet; but we are surely safe from them, since fear of punishment, if not fear of disgrace will be our protector."

"I dread lest we find that the lawless spirits, who harbour here, submit to no laws except those of their own enacting, nor acknowledge any authority but that which exists among themselves."

"This would make them pirates!"

"And pirates, I fear, we shall find them."

"Pirates? What! all?"

"Even all. Where one is guilty of such a crime, it is clear that the a.s.sociates cannot be free from suspicion."

"But, dear Madam, we know that one among them, at least, is innocent; since he came with ourselves and under circ.u.mstances that will not admit of deception."

"I know not. There are different degrees of turpitude, as there are different tempers to commit it! I fear that all who may lay claim to be honest, in this vessel, are here a.s.sembled."

The eyes of Gertrude sunk to the floor, and her lips quivered, partly in a tremour she could not control and perhaps in part through an emotion that she found inexplicable to herself.

"Since we know whence our late companion came," she said, in an under tone, "I think you do him wrong, however right your suspicions may prove as to the rest."

"I may be wrong as to him, but it is important that we know the worst.

Command yourself, my love; our attendant ascends; some knowledge of the truth may be gained from him."

Mrs Wyllys gave her pupil an expressive sign to compose her features, while she herself resumed her usual, pensive air, with a calmness of mien that might have deceived one far more practised than the boy, who now came slowly into the cabin. Gertrude buried her face in a part of her attire, while the former addressed the individual who had just entered in a tone equally divided between kindness and concern.

"Roderick, child," she commenced, "your eyelids are getting heavy. This service of a ship must be new to you?"