Walladmor Volume I Part 3

"But what would you have me do, my good hostess? Have _you_ any work for me?"

The old woman shook her head.

"Well then, give me the means of going where I _have_ something to do."

"And where is that?"

"The coast of Wales, for which I was bound when I met with my misfortune."

"The coast of Wales? Never trouble it: they've rogues enough already."

Then, fixing her eyes steadily on Bertram, she looked thoughtfully; and shook her head: "Were you ever in Wales before?"

"Never."

"Look well to yourself then."

"And why?"

"The gallows is high, my bonny lad; and they don't stand much upon ceremony."

"What is it then you take me for? Am I like a thief or a robber?"

"I know not: but you've a wicked look of one that I know well; and he's doomed to the gallows, if there's a gallows in England."

The old woman now relapsed into her moody silence, or answered only by peevish monosyllables: and, despairing of gaining any further information from her, Bertram contented himself with requesting that she would acquaint him with the first opportunity which might offer for quitting his present abode; upon which his hostess muttered something in no very cordial or acquiescing tone; and Bertram, drawing the blankets about him, resigned himself to the consideration of his present prospects. He was now so much recovered from his late suffering and exhaustion, that he felt prepared to set his hostess and her wolf-dog at defiance: but the scene, which he had just witnessed, suggested another kind of dangers. He feared that he had been thrown on a nest of smugglers, or worse: some piratical attempts had recently been made on the Belgian flag off Antwerp: the parties concerned were said to be smugglers occupying some rock or islet off the coast of Wales: and into their hands Bertram began to fear that he had fallen.

Closing his eyes, he continued to ruminate on these possibilities, until at length he dropped into a slumber.

From this he was awakened in the middle of the night by a hand laid roughly on his shoulder. He stared up and beheld the old woman at his bed-side.

"Get up," said she, "or it will be too late. Yonder's a French captain taking water aboard: make haste, and he'll give you a pa.s.sage."

Bertram sprang from his couch; recompensed his hostess; and hastily prepared for departure. In the midst of this hurry however his thoughts had leisure to revert to those anxieties which had occupied him as he was falling asleep. Who was this French captain? Whither bound? What was his connexion with those in whose hands he now found himself? On what terms, and with what motives, had they treated for his pa.s.sage?

When all is darkness however, the benighted traveller surrenders himself to the guidance of any light--though possibly no more than a wildering ignis fatuus--in the hope that it may lead him out of his perplexities. And fortunately Bertram had little time to pursue any train of anxious deliberations: for at this moment two seamen appeared at the door with a summons to follow them; the French captain having taken his water aboard, and being on the point of weighing his anchor.

Having made up his mind to take his chance, Bertram prepared cheerfully to follow his conductors; first offering his acknowledgments however, in few words, to his ancient hostess, who on her part muttered some indistinct reply--without raising her eyes, or quitting her usual posture at the spinning-wheel. The night was profoundly dark, even after they had cleared the brush-wood and tangled thickets which smothered up the rocky vault: the weather however was calm; a star or two gleamed out from the thick pall of clouds; and the sea broke upon the coast with no more than its ordinary thunders. Supported by his two guides, Bertram easily contrived to slide down the shingly precipice; and on reaching the bottom, crossed the beach and stepped on board a very large twelve-oared boat heavily laden. In the bottom were lying a number of casks and bales: and she was full of men. But what particularly struck Bertram was the gloomy silence which prevailed--so opposite to the spirit of life and gaiety which usually attend the embarkation of sailors.

Whilst the boat was now cutting her way through the waves, and the monotonous stroke of the oars broke upon the silence of the night, Bertram had leisure to renew his speculations upon the nature of his immediate prospects. A slight circ.u.mstance gave them a favourable color:--at this moment a night-breeze was sweeping pretty freshly over the water; and Bertram, who had preserved but a slender wardrobe from his shipwreck, felt its influence so much that he shivered from head to foot. This was not un.o.bserved: and one of the men drew out a large woollen boat-cloak, and wrapped it about him with an air of surly good-nature. This was a trifle, but it indicated that he had fallen amongst human hearts: and it is benignly arranged by Providence that, as in this life "trifles light as air" furnish the food of our fears, our jealousies, and unhappy suspicions,--so also oftentimes from trifles of no higher character we draw much of our comfort, our hopes, and a.s.surance.

Although the boat was rowed stoutly, yet--being very deeply laden--nearly an hour elapsed before she fell alongside the French captain. A solitary lanthorn or two were twinkling from the sides; and they were hailed by the party who had the watch, with a--"_Qui va la?_"

uttered however, as Bertram remarked, in a cautious and subdued tone.

To this challenge the boat returned for answer--"_Pecheurs du Roi et de la Sainte Vierge_:" upon which rope-ladders were dropped; the boat's company ascended; and the barrels, &c. were hoisted up by pullies to the deck. Bertram admired the activity, address, and perfect orderliness, with which so many heavy casks were raised above the decks and then lowered into their several stations; at the same time that he could not but suspect, from their number and appearance, that the business of "watering" was not the only one which had induced the French captain to drop his anchor at this point. It tended however somewhat to abate these suspicions--that, by the flashes of the lanthorns, as they played unsteadily upon the guns, anchors, and tackling of the vessel, he could distinguish the lilies of France: and upon inquiry from the helmsman, who spoke to him however in English, he learned that he was on board a French corvette--_Les trois fleurs de lys_.

At this moment the wind veered a point; and instantly a voice of thunder was heard exclaiming

"_Mort de ma vie!_ look sharp: by the three names of Satan, I'll send you a message else from this little brace of bulldogs: you there at the foresheet,--be handy, will you? Or by our lady I'll nail you to the mast, until the cormorants have made their breakfast."

All was now life and activity: the sails were bent and furled: men and boys were crawling about every part of the rigging: the helmsman took his quiet station: and just as day began to break, the "Trois fleurs de lys," with all sails set, was running gaily before a fresh breeze of wind. She had made a good deal of way before there was light enough for Bertram to examine the coast he was leaving; and, by the time he became able to use his eyes with effect, all the details by which it was possible to have identified the exact situation of his late confinement were obliterated and melted into indistinct haze which preserved only the great outlines of the coast: in these the princ.i.p.al feature was a bold headland; and within _that_ a pretty deep bay.

"What is that promontory called?" said Bertram, addressing an old sailor who was pa.s.sing him at the moment.

"What--_that_ right a helm?" said the sailor.

"Yes."

"They call _that_ Lubber's Point."

"And what do you call the bay beyond?"

"The bay? Why b.u.t.termilk bay: and t'other horn to leward is Cape Sugarcandy."

So saying, the old sailor hitched his trowsers; and with perfect gravity pa.s.sed on--leaving Bertram not much in his debt for any accessions to his geographical knowledge. He had no leisure however to ruminate on this little specimen of nautical gaiety; for just at this moment up rolled a brawny thick-set figure, and without any ceremonies of introduction or salutation spoke to him--or rather spoke _at_ him--thus:

"So!--This is the son of a gun that was asking for a pa.s.sage?"

The lordly step and gay confidence of eye sufficiently announced to Bertram that he who addressed him was the captain of the ship: apart from which claims of rank, he was striking enough by mere personal appearance to have commanded the homage of very particular attention from any judicious spectator. His figure was short, broad, and prodigiously muscular; his limbs, though stunted, appearing knotty and (in woodman's language) gnarled; at the same time that the trunk of his body was l.u.s.ty--and, for a seaman, somewhat unwieldy. In age he seemed nearer to seventy than sixty; but still manifested an unusual strength hardened to the temper of steel by constant exposure to the elements and by a life of activity. The colour of his hair was probably white; that is, _per se_, and with reference to its absolute or fundamental base; but by smoke and neglect it had been tarnished into grim upper strata of rusty grey and sullen yellow--which, contrasted with a broad fiery disk of face--harsh bushy eyebrows--and a Bardolph nose, effectually extinguished all ideas of the _venerable_ which might else have been suggested by his age. A pair of keen grey eyes looked out from a ma.s.s of flesh in which they were sunk; and by their cat-like glances showed pretty clearly that in the hour of danger and conflict they could awaken into another sort of expression more characteristic of the man; an expression however, which, in this "piping time of peace" and in the hours of his gentle morning potations, was content habitually to slumber. The Captain's gait we have described as "rolling;" which in fact it was; but without meaning at all, by that expression, to derogate from its firmness: for firm it also was as the tread of a hippopotamus; and wheresoever the sole of his vast splay foot was planted, _there_ a man would have sworn it had taken root like a young oak: but a figure as broad as his could do no other than roll when treading the deck of a vessel that was ploughing through a gay tumbling sea. As to dress, the Captain wore long slops of striped linen; stout shoes; and immense shoe-buckles: but for the upper part of his costume, in spite of his official dignity, he chose to sport--instead of the long uniform coat of a French captain, a short blue jacket worn over a red waistcoat; to which last was attached a broad leathern belt bearing a brace of pistols; and depending from the belt by a short chain he carried a Turkish scymeter in a silver scabbard. Upon his head only could he be said to wear any mark of distinction that proclaimed his rank; for upon his hat--which was a round one like that of all the crew, and slouched like theirs, but a little higher,--he advanced, by way of c.o.c.kade (and as a badge at once of the national flag he hoisted and of his own rank), a very conspicuous white lily.

Such was the portly personage that now came up to Bertram, or rather shouldered him in pa.s.sing, and summoned him as it seemed to face about by demanding in the voice of a Stentor:--

"So!--this is the son of a gun that was asking for a pa.s.sage?"

Bertram turned to face the Captain's side, made his bow, and modestly replied that he _was_ the person who had been a candidate for that honour.

Without altering his oblique position, the Captain slightly turned his head, carelessly glanced his eye over Bertram's person, and replied thus:

"So!--Humph!--d.a.m.n!--And where do you want to go ash.o.r.e?"

"At Bristol," said Bertram, "or any place on the coast of Wales."

"Bristol?--the devil! Coast of Wales? The devil's grandmother! Was the like ever heard?--Captain le Harnois to alter his course, the _Trois fleurs de lys_ to tack and wear--drop her anchor and weigh her anchor, for a smock-faced vagabond?"

"But I thought, Sir,--that is, I understood,--that the _Fleurs de lys_ was expressly purposing to cruize off the Welch coast?

"Expressly purposing a tobacco-box!--I tell you what, Tom Drum: there's a d---d deal too many rogues running about these seas--a d---d deal; and the English police is no great shakes of a police that doesn't look more sharply after them:--Who the devil are you?"

Bertram was preparing to answer this unceremonious question; but the Captain interrupted him--

"Aye: I can see with half an eye: an Abram man; a mumper; a knight of the post; that jumps up behind coaches, and cuts the straps of portmanteaus: steals into houses in the dusk: waylays poor old people and women, to rob them of their rags and their halfpence. For as to the highway, and cutting throats, I think he has hardly metal for that. Or may be he's a juggler; a rope-dancer; and plays off his _hocus pocus_ on people's pockets?"

"Upon my word, Captain, you put unspeakable wrong upon me."

"With all my heart: G.o.d give you health to wear it!"

Touched to the quick by these affronts, Bertram drew out his pocket-book; and taking out some papers, he presented them with all the _hauteur_ he could a.s.sume to the Captain; saying, at the same time----

"If, Sir, you will do me the honour to run your eye over my pa.s.sport and the certificates annexed, I am disposed to think that I shall not need any further vindication from the suspicions you are pleased to intimate."

"Toll-de-roll-loll!" said Captain le Harnois: "what's this trumpery?

Whose pot-hooks are these?" At the same time negligently unfolding the papers, and tearing several by his coa.r.s.e way of handling them. He threw a hasty glance over one or two: but it struck Bertram that he was holding them upside down. Be that as it might,--after tumbling, mumbling, and tearing one doc.u.ment after another,--the n.o.ble Captain tossed them all on the deck, advanced the broad extinguisher of his foot upon--them--blew out a cloud of breath into the morning air, and exclaimed--