Washed Ashore Part 4

About an hour after Charley Blount had left the Tower, Stephen Ludlow trotted up on his pony, not having met the young sailor on the way. He said that he had come over early, to spend the day, and that if he was asked to sleep he might do so. Of this the captain was very glad as he did not wish him to run the risk of going back alone, and at the same time he had not sufficient confidence in his discretion to tell him what he had learned from Blind Peter; so he said, "I am very glad to receive you, my young friend; but I must exact a promise that you will not go beyond the open beach, or the downs in sight of the windows of the Tower, unless with Tom or me. I have my reasons, which I need not mention now."

Stephen thought this rather odd, but as he wished to stay, he readily gave the required promise. Margery had for some time been wishing to see him, to talk to him about the book he had lent her, and which she had now read completely through.

"Oh, Stephen!" she exclaimed, when she saw him, "it is such a delightful book. I have never read anything I have liked half so much. It has given me an idea--but I cannot talk to you about it here. You must come out on the beach, and we will sit on a rock and look out over the sea, and then I shall be able to say all I wish."

So they went out together, and easily found a spot to suit Margery's taste.

"Well, Margery, what is it that you have to tell me about my old book?"

said Stephen, in a tone which would have told her, had she not been herself so engrossed in her subject, that she was not likely to have a very sympathising hearer.

"Pray do not speak of it in that way, Stephen," she answered. "It's a dear, delightful book, at all events; and since I read it I have been thinking more than ever of dear Jack. You know that he went away in a ship to the Pacific Ocean, and the ship was wrecked, just as Robinson Crusoe's was, and though he was not a supercargo, he was a midshipman, and I don't suppose there is much difference; and at all events, if Robinson Crusoe was saved, and lived on a desert island for many years, though everybody else in the ship was lost, why should not dear Jack have been cast on some island, and be still alive, though not able to get away, or I am sure that he would, and would come home and tell us all about it; for he knows how we all love him and think about him every day."

"What a strange idea!" said Stephen, somewhat coldly. "I thought that it was settled that Jack was dead long ago. Do you really believe that he is alive?"

"Of course I do," answered Margery, with some little impatience in her tone; "it was only those who don't care about him settled that he was dead. I have always, always, been sure that he is alive, over the sea there, a long, long way off; but he will come back when we can send for him."

"Very strange!" muttered Stephen. "But what, Mrs Margery, would you have me do?"

"Stephen, you knew dear Jack well," she answered, fixing her large blue eyes on him; "you used to call him your friend, and friends ought to help each other. If I was a boy, whether or not I was Jack's brother-- if I was his friend,--I know what I would do: I would go out and look for him."

"But where would you look?" asked Stephen. "The Pacific is a very wide place, even on the map; and I have a fancy that in reality it is wider still. There are many, many islands no one knows anything of."

"Ah! that is the very thing I have been thinking of," exclaimed Margery.

"I am certain that Jack is living on one of those very islands."

"How can you, Margery, be certain of any such thing?" said Stephen, in his usual cold tone, which contrasted curiously with the enthusiastic manner of little Margery.

"How can you ask that question, Stephen?" she exclaimed, half angry that he should venture to doubt the correctness of her most cherished belief.

"Robinson Crusoe was wrecked on a desert island and so Jack may be, and I want you to go and look for him, and bring him home! There! I will not be refused! You are old enough and big enough to go,--bigger than Jack was--and you have plenty of money; and your papa always lets you do just what you like, so you say; and besides, you often speak to me of Jack as your old friend; and if he was your friend I ask you to prove it by bringing him home."

When Stephen heard this he first thought that Margery was joking, but the matter was too serious for that; then the idea occurred to him that she had gone out of her mind; but she looked so calm, and quiet, and earnest, that he banished it immediately, and promised to think over her proposal, and speak to his father. He, however, very well knew the answer his father would give, and he himself had no wish to go wandering about the world in search of one for whom he cared but little. Had Margery known what was pa.s.sing in his mind how she would have despised him. But she did not; she fancied that he must be as enthusiastic as she herself was, and that it was only necessary to mention her idea for him to take it up warmly. She therefore was prepared to wait patiently, under the belief that Stephen would soon be able to give a favourable answer to her request.

Margery's belief that Jack was still alive received a very remarkable and curious confirmation that very day, after she had parted from Stephen. She was on her way to the village to carry some food to a sick child, when she encountered a rough sailor-like man, who, taking off his hat, begged for a.s.sistance, as he was on his way to join his ship at Plymouth, and had spent all his money; and if he did not make haste she would sail without him. He had come last from the Pacific, and complained that he had had but very little time on sh.o.r.e to amuse himself. The mention of the Pacific made Margery instantly ask him if he thought it possible that her brother Jack might be living, cast away on one of the numerous islands of that vast ocean.

"It is a very strange question for you to put to me, Miss, for a curious thing happened as we were steering southward from Vancouver's Island, on our way home. What should we see but a small boat floating, all alone, hundreds of miles, for what we knew, from any land. We made towards her and picked her up, for there was a man in her, or what once had been a man, for he was lighter than a baby, and that I found out, for I lifted him upon deck myself. He was still alive, though the life was going fast out of him, and he couldn't speak above a whisper, and only a few words then. He had been living on fish, we guessed, may be for weeks, by the number of scales we saw at the bottom of the boat. Now this is what he told me. His name was David King. He had been shipwrecked with another young man--a gentleman's son, I know he said, and they were the only survivors of all the crew. He had gone out fishing in their boat, and had been blown off the island. I made out this by fits and starts, as it were, for he couldn't speak without pain, it seemed. Poor fellow!

he was far gone, and though the doctor poured all sorts of things down his throat, it was no use, he never lifted up his head, and before the evening he was dead. Maybe if we had seen him a day or two before he'd have lived, and been able to tell us more about himself."

Margery was, of course, deeply interested with this account of the sailor. She imprudently gave him all the money she possessed, and then begged him to come up to the Tower that he might repeat the story to her father. He, however, was in a hurry to proceed on his journey, and declined coming, possibly not aware of the importance which might have been attached to his narrative, and perhaps selfishly indifferent in the matter. Margery at length hurried home and told her father, and he and Tom went down to look for the sailor, but he had disappeared, and notwithstanding all their inquiries they could gain no trace of him.

The captain, indeed, suspected that the man was some begging impostor, who had heard of the loss of his son, and had concocted the tale for the sake of getting money out of the young lady. This was especially Mr Ludlow's opinion of the matter.

Charley Blount stepped boldly out towards Ludlow Hall, singing as he went, not from want of thought, but from joyousness of heart. He reached the hall without interruption. Mr Ludlow was much pleased with his manner and appearance, thanked him warmly for bringing the message, and said that he would accompany him back to the Tower, with a couple of men on horseback. Charley, like most sailors, could ride; that is to say, he could stick on and let his horse go. He did so on the present occasion. They had got within two miles of the Tower, when a number of men, rough-looking fellows, were seen standing in the road before them.

As Mr Ludlow and his party drew near, their gestures became threatening, and it was evident that they meant mischief. The squire was not a man to be turned aside from his purpose. "Charge the fellows, and if they attempt to stop us, fire at them," he exclaimed, putting spurs to his horse. Charley and his men followed his example. Those most frequently succeed who bravely face dangers and difficulties--the timid and hesitating fail. Mr Ludlow dashed on. The smugglers, for such there could be no doubt that they were, had black c.r.a.pe over their faces, and most of them wore carters' smock frocks, which still further a.s.sisted to disguise them. This made it yet more evident that they had collected with evil intentions. There could no longer be any doubt about the matter when two or three of them stretched out their arms to stop the horses, but when they saw the pistols levelled at their heads, most of them sprang hurriedly back again. One, however, more daring than the rest attempted to seize Mr Ludlow's rein. Fortunately for the ruffian the magistrate's pistol missed fire, but he dealt the man's wrist so heavy a blow with the b.u.t.t-end of his weapon that the smuggler was glad to let go his hold lest he should have had another such a blow on his head. Charley laid about him with his thick walking-stick, and in a few seconds the whole party were out of the reach of the smugglers.

They galloped on, however, without pulling rein till they reached the Tower.

"Never in the whole course of my life have I been subject to so daring an outrage, Captain Askew," exclaimed Mr Ludlow, as he dismounted--"It is more like the doings of ancient days than what we have a right to expect in the nineteenth century. I dread to hear what has happened to my boy. Has he reached you safely?"

Stephen, who had just come up from the beach, answered the question for himself.

"So far the smugglers have gained no advantage over us," observed Mr Ludlow, addressing Captain Askew. "But with your leave, my good neighbour, I will take up my abode here with you for a night, that we may the better consult as to the further steps it may be necessary to take to put a stop to these proceedings. I have written to Captain Haultaught, the new inspecting commander of the district, requesting him to meet me here with two or three of his lieutenants, and it will be very strange if we cannot manage to get to windward, as you would say, of these smuggling gentlemen."

Captain Askew could only say that he was happy to put his house at the disposal of Mr Ludlow and those he thought fit to invite, on a public matter of so much importance. He had forgiven, and he believed from his heart, the unfeeling way in which Mr Ludlow had acted towards Jack, under what, he acknowledged, might have been his stern sense of justice; yet he, as a father, could not but remember that he was indirectly the cause of Jack's loss. He felt this, but did not allow his feelings in any way to bias his conduct. Tom and Becky were therefore directed to make all necessary preparations to do honour to the guests present and expected. Mrs Askew and Margery were also not idle in arranging the provisions and the rooms for the guests. Tom was a man of a single idea; that was, that it was his business to obey the captain in all things without questioning. He had learned that lesson at sea and it would have been impossible for any one to persuade him out of it.

Becky, however, not having been under similar discipline, did not consider herself bound to obey in the same way as did Tom.

She therefore grumbled very much when she heard that Mr Ludlow was to remain during the night.

"It's bad enough to have the young cub come prowling about the house, but when the old wolf comes and sits down in the hall, it bodes ill luck to the family," she muttered to herself, though loud enough for her mistress to overhear her.

Mrs Askew made no remark, but of course knew to what she alluded.

"I'd be ashamed to show my face inside the doors, if I were he, after sending the only son of the house away over the sea to die in foreign lands, and then to come up laughing and talking as if he had never done any harm to any one of us."

"We are taught to forgive our enemies not only seven times, but seventy times seven, Becky," observed Mrs Askew, feeling that she ought at length to check her attendant. "Even had Mr Ludlow wantonly or intentionally inflicted an injury on us, it would be for us to receive him as a guest. What he did was under a sense of duty, and we have no right to complain."

"A sense of duty, indeed," muttered Becky, "what would he have said if his precious son had been packed off to sea like poor dear Master Jack?

I should care little if the food I have to cook should choke him. I only hope that he'll not get a wink of sleep in the bed I have to make for him. Towards the boy I have no ill will; but I only hope when he grows bigger that he'll not be thinking he's worthy of our Miss Margery--that's what I have to say."

The last words were addressed to Tom, Mrs Askew having left the room.

"What need have you or I to trouble our heads about the matter, Mistress Becky," he observed. "What the captain thinks fit is fit, that's what I have to say."

"I don't gainsay that, Mister Tom," answered Becky, "but what I ask is, why this Mr Ludlow, who has behaved so shamefully to the captain and the missus, dares to come to the Tower, and why they let him?"

"Why, to my mind, Mistress Becky, it's just this--the captain's a Christian of the right sort, and real Christians don't bear malice, and so, do you see, the captain doesn't bear malice," answered Tom, giving a tug to the waistband of his trousers, a nautical trick he had never lost. "If he was a make-believe Christian, like too many folks, I can't say what he might do. Becky, does you say your prayers? Now I do, since the captain taught me, and I know that I axes G.o.d to forgive me my trespa.s.ses as I forgive others as trespa.s.ses against me; and I'll moreover make bold to declare that the captain says that prayer every night of his life, and has said it too, blow high or blow low, ever since he was a little chap on his mother's knee. There, Mistress Becky you have what I calls the philosophy of the matter, and if I'm not right I don't know no better."

Becky acknowledged that Tom's arguments were unanswerable, though she did not altogether comprehend them. She resolved, however, to dress the dinner as well as she could, and to make up a comfortable bed for the magistrate.

Everything went off as satisfactorily as could have been desired. Mr Ludlow did his best to be agreeable, and Stephen was pleasanter than usual, and listened with interest to the accounts Charley Blount gave of his voyages, and the countries he had visited. The inspecting commander, however, did not arrive. Late in the evening a revenue cutter came off the coast, and put on sh.o.r.e a very stout lieutenant, who came puffing up to the Tower, and announced himself as Lieutenant Dugong, of the Coast Guard. The captain received him cordially, but Becky surveyed him in despair.

"He'd break down the strongest bed in the house if there was one to spare for him," she exclaimed, when she and Tom were next alone. "What can you do with people like him, Mr Tom, at sea? What sort of bedsteads have they got to sleep on?"

"Why, Mistress Becky, that depends whether they are berthed forward or aft," answered Tom. "If forward, they swing in a hammock; and if aft, in a cot. We'll soon sling one or t'other for this here Lieutenant Dugong, and depend on't he'll have no cause to complain."

As may be supposed, every room in the Tower was occupied. Tom took charge of Blind Peter, and Charley Blount was put into the room he had occupied on the ground-floor, and the stout lieutenant had another small room on the same floor, while Stephen was placed in a small one near the first landing, and his father had a room not far off.

The whole family and their inmates retired to rest and to sleep. No one in the old Tower was awake. The hour of midnight had been struck by a clock constructed by the captain. The evening had been calm, but now the wind began to moan and sigh and whistle round the walls, and through any crevice into which it could find an entrance, while the dash of the sea on the beach grew every instant louder and louder, and ever and anon the shriek of some wild fowl startled from its roost was heard, as it flew by to find another resting-place; giving the notion to the ignorant and superst.i.tious that spirits of evil were flying about intent on mischief.

The clock struck one when Stephen Ludlow awoke with a start, and saw standing close to his bed a figure clothed in white, and from it proceeded a curious light, which, while thrown brightly on him, darkened everything else around. His first impulse was to hide his head under the bed-clothes, but then he was afraid that the creature might jump on him, and so he remained staring at it, till his hair stood on end, and yet not daring to scream out. At length it stretched out an arm, with a long thin hand at the end of it, shook a chain, which rattled and clanked on the floor, and growled forth, "Out of this! out of this! out of this!"

Stephen's teeth chattered. He could not speak--he could not move. He thought for a moment, and hoped that the apparition might be merely the phantom of a dream; but he pinched himself, and became too truly convinced that it was a dreadful reality. There it stood glaring at him; he was too frightened to mark very minutely its appearance. "Out of this! out of this! out of this!" again repeated the phantom, slowly retiring towards the door--a movement which would have been greatly to Stephen's relief had he not felt sure that it would come back again.

His eyes followed it till it glided out of the door as noiselessly as it had entered. Poor Stephen kept gazing towards the open door, which he dared not get out of bed to shut, lest he should encounter the phantom coming back again.

About the same time that Stephen saw the phantom, Charley Blount was awakened by a strange noise in his bed-room of clanking of chains and horrible groans; then all was silent, and a voice exclaimed--

"Out of this! out of this! out of this!"

"What do you mean by 'Out of this! out of this! out of this'?" cried Charley, quietly leaning out of his bed, and seizing one of his heavy walking shoes. "Explain yourself, old fellow, whoever you are."