for avoiding our company than we had for avoiding his. We had but to
tell our history to Pomfrett’s uncle, the great Brandon Pomfrett, and
Mr Murch would be laid by the heels as a common pirate--for his device
of changing the ship’s name and papers would never have availed him
here--with a fair prospect of Execution Dock to occupy his mind in
gaol; while Mr Pomfrett sent to rescue the _Blessed Endeavour_; and
although Murch might suppose that Pomfrett the younger would hesitate
to follow this direct course, out of regard to Morgan Leroux, he could
not reckon upon the youngster’s forbearance; especially as it was
undoubtedly the way Murch would himself have taken, in his adversary’s
place. Murch was a man of remarkable penetration; but, he could never
understand the solemn young agent’s boyish and romantic vanity. He
could never have believed that Pomfrett would risk all on the least
chance of getting back his ship by his private enterprise, sailing
her triumphantly into Bristol docks, and walking into his uncle’s
office with an elaborate affectation of unconcern. “Good-day, sir, I
hope you are well. Yes, we fetched up this morning; a bit of dirt in
the Channel, but nothing to speak of,” etc., etc. If I read Brandon
Pomfrett the younger aright, he clung with all his might to the hope of
some such ending of all his troubles.
Morgan Leroux was awaiting me, at the cheek of a brisk fire, with
something hot on the hob. She was as grateful to me for bringing her
the news of the sailing of the _Willing Mind_, as though I had brought
the thing to pass by myself. But when I told her of the apparition of
Mr Murch, quietly watching his own schooner cast off, she looked very
grave. “I don’t like that,” said she, shaking her head, her level brows
drawn down. “Mr Murch is never so dangerous as when he’s quiet. And he
let them put off without lifting a finger? This wears an ill look, it
does, indeed.”
She sat frowning at the fire and biting her underlip, while I set
forth the reasons which should undoubtedly influence Mr Murch to keep
himself very private.
“All very true, Harry,” says she, “but hardly sufficient. At the
same time, I am sure Murch must have come too late to find them at
Gamaliel’s house--and he might have seen them from outside, you
know--for if he had, there would have been a fight. Oh, yes,” says
Morgan, shaking her head, “Brandon and Dawkins and all--you don’t know
Murch. He had the name of the strongest man in all the Brotherhood
of the Sea, and brave as a lion. No, no. Murch must have missed the
party at the tavern, learned all from Gamaliel, and gone straightway
to the water-side. And then, I suppose, he did not care to tackle the
ship’s company, or risk a great disturbance--and they might have thrown
him into the dock. But I don’t know.... The more I think of Mr Murch
standing there with his cloak about his face, the less I like it. He’s
got something else in his mind. Something else. Now, what can it be?”
We learned, later, that Morgan’s hypothesis was correct. And what was
in Mr Murch’s mind, as he stood there watching the _Willing Mind_
casting loose, we were to learn immediately. There came a loud ringing
at the bell in the inn-yard, which was used to summon the ostler.
The window of the room opened upon the yard, and, drawing aside the
curtain, I beheld Mr Murch standing on the stones without. He was
bawling for the ostler as though shouting on his quarterdeck in a gale
of wind. When the man appeared, Murch ordered a horse to be saddled
immediately. Hidden in the curtain, we watched Mr Murch pacing up and
down the yard; saw the horse led forth, and Murch inspecting the animal
minutely; saw him pay the ostler, mount, and clatter out of the yard;
and turned to each other with the same thought in our faces, the same
words on our lips.
“He’s riding down to Morte Bay.”
“Where’s the wind?” asks Morgan, quick as light.
“Dead ahead. The schooner must tack all down the Channel.”
“She won’t make four knots an hour.”
“And the distance is the same by sea and land.”
“If Murch gets there first----” Morgan broke off and stared at me in
white dismay. “Harry,” says she, “you must follow him.”
XX
THE LONGEST LIVER TAKES ALL
There was no help for it. The poor, guileless clerk must take the road
and chase the formidable old captain of buccaneers; and where was the
use of such an enterprise, was more than he knew. But, as he may have
indicated once or twice in the course of these memoirs, what Mistress
Morgan Leroux commanded had to be done. Of course, if Mr Murch won this
singular race, and came aboard his ship before Brandon Pomfrett in the
_Willing Mind_ could make Morte Bay, our game was lost. Murch would
fight the ship or sink her, rather than yield; a single lucky shot
would disable the unarmed schooner, and her boats would be helpless
under fire of small-arms. Moreover, in a place where none knew him, Mr
Murch would have the civil power at his back; his papers were in order;
to all appearance, the ship was his; he was the honest shipmaster,
and Captain Pomfrett the picaroon. Pomfrett might sheer off, it is
true, and invoke the law himself, or appeal for help to a ship of Her
Majesty’s, if he could find one. But his chances of either succour on
the desolate coast of North Devon were small; moreover, if he came
within range of Mr Murch’s artillery, he was like to leave his bones in
Morte Bay--a name in itself of unpleasant import--and, in Mr Murch’s
favourite phrase, the longest liver would take all. Pomfrett might,
again, return as a last resource to Bristol, if he found Mr Murch in
possession, and contrived to escape from him. But, by the time he
had made the voyage, and his uncle had taken measures to recover the
_Blessed Endeavour_, it was hard but Mr Murch would have found a way to
put to sea again; and, once on blue water, it was long odds, indeed, if
any of our company ever again saw so much as the lift of his topsails.
No: there was little room for doubt that the issue lay with the winner
of the race between mounted man and sailing ship. But, even so, how was
Henry Winter to help? He was no Milanion, goddess-favoured; he had no
golden apples to strew in Mr Murch’s path. Indeed, ’tis doubtful if a
whole orchard of such fruit would have given pause to this desperate
Atalanta. Besides, Murch knew of my presence in Bristol, and he would
be on his guard against any surprisal. Altogether, I had as lief give
chase unarmed to a bear robbed of her whelps.
I should be better employed (I said) in laying the case before Mr
Brandon Pomfrett the elder. It was hard if that magnate, with all
Bristol city at his back, could not devise a scheme to reinforce his
luckless nephew. But Morgan Leroux scorned the notion.
“What!” says she. “Go whining to that pot-bellied burgess, asking
for help for his poor little nephew? I had thought better of your
understanding, Henry. I thought you knew Brandon better than that!”
“I know him so well,” said I, “that I know he would forfeit all in the
world rather than a scruple of childish vanity.”
Morgan struck her fist upon the table, and I was sorry I had spoken.
“Vanity or not,” says she, very angry, “he’s set himself to play a
match, and it’s not you shall spoil the sport, Mr Henry Winter, I can
tell you. And vanity or none, there’s courage as well, at any rate.
And that’s a quality useful at a pinch, Mr Winter,” says Morgan, with
great meaning.
“You think I don’t want to go?” I said.
“La, Mr Winter,” Morgan interrupted, looking at me with a highly
disagreeable expression, “you are so quick, you quite take my breath
away. However could you guess that, now?”
“It’s kind of you, at any rate, to make the parting easier,” I said.
For I saw that I must go; although it did not stand in my code of
honourable obligation to fling myself, without sufficient reason,
adrift in mid-winter on the wild hills of Somerset and Devon, at the
risk of being shot by a bloody and reckless pirate. But, after all,
there was a faint possibility that I might prove of service; although,
unless I shot Mr Murch from behind a hedge--which was unfortunately
impossible, even for a gentleman of fortune--I could not for the life
of me see what I should be doing.
“Do you think I would not go myself, if I had not promised to stay
here?” demanded Morgan.
“God forbid!” I said. “Only absolve me of the same promise, and you
shall be rid of me at once!”
“Bless you, Harry, I don’t want to be rid of you!” cried this singular
lady, changing from wrath to kindness in a moment. “I’m short of
temper, I know. You must forget what I said. Only it went to my heart
to see you stand there prating like a sea-lawyer, and Murch doing his
eight knots over the hills.”
The sun was rising behind Dundry Hill, with the old tower a-top that
keeps vigil over Bristol city, as horse and man ploughed through the
melting snow; the sky was clearing to seaward, and a space of blue was
lifting about the horizon. Murch was out of sight, and the schooner was
hidden in the deep gorge of the river behind me. No more solitary atom
in all the bleak world than Henry Winter, riding on a fool’s errand,
to meet a fool’s end very likely. In the thawing drift and the deep
mire the going was very heavy; at present the odds were in favour of
the ship, despite the contrary wind. It was noon before a black spot
appeared far in front, crawling up the hillside all ribbed with brown
amid the white.
We were climbing the spurs of the Mendips by this time; and when
the road began to descend on the farther side into the flat country
of the Brent Marshes, I let Mr Murch forge still further ahead. At
Weare, where one crosses the River Ax, I learned from the people of
the ale-house that a solitary traveller had passed an hour since. We
had covered some twenty miles in five or six hours. I could not tell
how the schooner did, for the road lay too deep inland. But all across
the marshes the road slants towards the coast, and the sea rose again
into view upon the right hand. The dim, blue plain was studded here
and there with sails, but whether the schooner were in sight or not I
could not determine. Then the road turned due south to Bridgwater. The
dusk was thickening fast, and horse and man were pretty well jaded when
we clattered into the little town. The red firelight beaconed from the
windows, and I had more urgent desire for a bed than ever in my life.
But there was no rest for this miserable adventurer. He must press on,
and when he could bear the saddle-chafe no longer, he must even pad the
hoof himself. The horse was near foundered already, and when I made
request at the inn for a fresh mount, behold, Mr Murch, for no doubt
but it was he, had already departed astride the only nag available. I
stayed in that house an hour, had a meal while the horse was baiting,
gave the wretched beast a drench of wine after the manner of the
highwaymen, and started anew.
The next stage was Watchett, and with good luck we might make it in
three hours. You are to remember that no man fresh from the sea feels
easy on a horse, though he be an experienced rider, which I never was;
conceive, then, the misery of Henry Winter. The saddle was no better
than red-hot iron to him, every bone ached, and he had a dreadful pain
in his belly. As the darkness gathered, a thick, soft rain began to
fall. The horse stumbled and plashed and floundered onward, now and
again coming to a dead stop, hanging his head and blowing heavily.
Every minute the rider thought he could endure no longer, and then he
would try for one more minute; and so, minute by minute, the pain and
weariness wore themselves into a kind of nexus of suffering, a dolorous
condition in which he seemed to have existed always, and which would
endure for ever. Then he fell into a broken sleep, bowing forward with
both hands clasping the pommel of the saddle; and he thought he was at
sea again and had fallen asleep on watch; and then he thought he was
a child, going to church with the sound of the bells in his ears, the
tedious Sunday bells; and then he would awake again to see the moon
shining from a rift in the clouds and a humped shadow gliding beside
him. At these times I had wit enough to take an observation of the
stars; and so it was, I suppose, that I kept the road, travelling at
the foot of the Quantocks, and passed between the butt of the hills and
the sea, and came to Watchett.
It was midnight then, and not a light shone in any window, save one;
and, steering for that, I came to the inn of the place. I slid off and
fell down in a heap, and staggered up, and into the tavern; and there,
beside a great fire, with a bottle at his elbow, sat Mr Murch. I had
forgot Mr Murch. There he was, and I suppose I stood staring at him
like a ninny. Murch looked up, took his cigarro from his mouth, and
surveyed me in silence.
“What, Mr Winter?” says Murch. “This is indeed an unexpected meeting.
Why, I thought I saw you no later than this morning, but my eyes are
older than they were, and I believed they had deceived me. Well, and
how do you do, sir?”
He held out his hand, and what could I do but take it? He ordered
supper for me, and mulled wine, and what could I do but accept his
hospitality? I have often asked myself these questions; and although my
conduct may have presented a lamentable weakness, I have never repented
it. Mr Murch plied me with food and wine, using the most dignified
courtesy; when I had well eaten and drunk, he offered me a cigarro; and
still he talked of the weather, and the state of the roads, and the
prospects of the country, and what else I forget, but never a word of
nearer import. And so long as he chose to maintain reserve, I was in no
mood to break it.
“I am truly sorry, Mr Winter,” says Murch, at length, “that I cannot
ask you to be my guest for the night. But the truth is, I have affairs
of some urgency that call me farther, and I must be jogging even now.”
“The regret would be mine,” I said, “were it not, by a singular
chance, that I must be going forward likewise.”
“Dear me!” cried Murch. “And which way lies your road, sir?”
“Along the coast, all down into Devon. And which way lies yours, sir?”
“Why, the very same,” says Murch, heartily. “But what an extraordinary
chance, as you say, Mr Winter, that has brought us together from the
ends of the earth. We are to be fellow-travellers, again, it seems.
What do you say? Shall we be jogging?”
“With all my heart,” I said.
And so it was that Mr Murch and I took the road together, and you may
judge of my emotions in this dilemma. How could I quarrel with this
extraordinary man? The thing were difficult enough, though we were at
open enmity; and now, stuffed as I was with Mr Murch’s victuals, and
treated by my host as a long-lost friend, ’twas merely impossible.
I had been but a spectator of the comedy of the three buccaneers
throughout, and content enough to be no more; it seemed I was to remain
a spectator to the end of the piece. Some hazy notion of putting off
in a shore-boat to warn the schooner, arose in my labouring mind; but,
of what use would that be, even supposing I could escape from Mr Murch,
since Pomfrett and Dawkins, that redoubtable navigator, were already
cramming the _Willing Mind_ main-chains under? Still, they would be the
better prepared had they due warning, and I resolved to attempt this
feat did the opportunity arise. But it never arose, as I shall proceed
to show, and I do but mention this futile scheme, in justice to Henry
Winter; who would fain appear as a man not so utterly destitute of
resource in emergency as events would seem to indicate. And, although
it cannot be denied that the said personage was never cast for a hero,
I have never remarked that he was the less happy for that. Heroism is
a fine profession: but it entails a deal of riding and riving, hard
knocks and hard fare, and discomfortable tumults of passion, and little
enough in the upshot to show for them, very likely. And so to my tale.
“I’ll neither ride nor sail on the private account any more,” says
Murch, as we plashed forward in the dark. “This is the last cast.
Strange, how we spend our lives getting and saving, and go down quick
into the grave at the last. We’re all at knuckle-bones with Signor
Death, Mr Winter. I’ve seen many a tall fellow swinging in chains on
Gallow’s Point, who would have made an ornament to his country had
he lived; the birds feeding on the head of many a fine man who was
ready to become a member of Parliament or a Doctor of Divinity. But
his repentance came too late, you see--his log was never kept posted.
I took warning early by those poor dangling memorials, Mr Winter.
You know my rule--a clean ship, alow and aloft, fit for the Great
Commander’s inspection by day or night. So I count upon a little
leisure in the evening of my days--a clear conscience, no regrets, a
good house out of sound of the sea, a cellar of good wine, a library
of the classics. For it may surprise you, Mr Winter, to hear that
I’ve never read the literature of the ancients. The time to gain that
learning which is given to fortunate young men like yourself, sir, must
be bought with many a painful year by those who do their business in
the great waters.”
He spoke with a settled assurance, strange to remark in a man who was
even then riding a desperate race with fortune; and as we journeyed he
continued to talk in the same strain. Day was breaking behind the wild
hills as we rode into Porlock. Winter had gone in the night; the soft
air, filled with the noise of running waters, savoured of the spring;
and the sky was faintly touched with hues of rose. We broke our fast at
the inn, and Mr Murch ate more than you would think possible.
“I don’t know how it is,” said he. “I’m as hungry as a boy, and it’s
not my habit, neither. Why, I feel younger to-day than I have done this
many a year, Mr Winter. Is it English air and Exmoor mutton? At this
rate, I shall live for ever.”
And his eye was bright as a young man’s as he got into the saddle
again, despite the pain it must have cost him, as I knew from my own
sufferings.
We had taken fresh horses, and so rode from out the cup of the valley
and came upon the summit of the moorland, where the wind blew keen. We
halted, and gazed to seaward. The sea, a brilliant blue, spread away
into a bright haze, dotted here and there with sails of ships; but I
could not tell, at that distance, if the schooner were among them.
Murch, who knew the look of the ship better than I, might have made her
out; but if he did, he kept the discovery to himself; and we jogged
on without a word. Presently Mr Murch began to talk again, and all he
said was pitched in the same key of moralism. He told of his voyages,
and the strange countries he had explored, and the foreign cities he
had visited; and to hear him talk, you would think the old buccaneer
had spent his life as the peaceablest explorer in the world, journeying
in the interests of the Royal Society. Yet his narrative continually
inferred misfortune or disaster, or something of a darker name,
requiring immediate repentance. The word was always on his lips; for
want of repentance, it appeared, all his old companions had perished in
one way or another; by means of this singular operation, himself had
survived danger and escaped judgment, to devote himself at last to the
study of the ancients.
“Their bones lie scattered far and wide--the bones of my good
shipmates,” said Murch, “I shall think upon them as I sit beside the
winter fire, with the claret warming before the blaze. Some lie
fathoms deep; the skeletons of some are whitening on sandy Cays; the
hanged men are melted to the four winds, sinew and bone. What a troop
of ghosts, to come at my signal as I sit snug by the fire, the rain
dashing on the windows.... But would you believe it, Mr Winter,” cried
Murch, breaking off suddenly, “I’m hungry again--actually famished.”
It was at this point that I began to regard the old buccaneer with a
tincture of fear. There was something not right about the man. What
was it? Not merely was his ordinary strain of talk heightened as by a
touch of fever, which might have been caused by the excitement of his
enterprise, but there was something new and daunting in him, though I
could not put a name to it. I did not like his look. It might easily be
that his late disastrous voyage, coming upon him on the top of a long
life of sailing and fighting in hot climates, had unsettled his wits.
It would be an ill moment for me if Mr Murch went mad on these desolate
hills; and I kept a wary eye upon my travelling companion. And yet
there was nothing of madness in his talk, and his manner held the same
strong composure.
We must needs halt at Lynton for another meal, though it was scarce
two hours since we had breakfasted at Porlock. Murch took his food
standing, in a greedy haste. Then we were in the saddle again, making a
long stage of it to Ilfracombe, for the going was extremely heavy. Yet
Murch never lost his patience, but held steadily onward, with the same
bright-eyed composure, the same intermittent talk, the same complaints
of hunger. So, mile after mile, we ploughed our way across the unending
wastes of moorland, high above the sea, and still the next hill rose
in soft undulations before us, and still the wind blew with a constant
force in our faces. It was long past noon when we rode down into
Ilfracombe, where we had another full meal.
The sun was sinking as we came out upon the bare heights above Morte
Point, the northern horn of Morte Bay, of which Baggy Point, beneath
which lay the ship, made the southern; and there, some five miles
out to seaward, was a little ship beating up against the wind. Now,
Morte Bay is scarce four miles round the bend, all level sand, rising
landward into grassy dunes. The schooner--if indeed that little craft
were she--had nearly double that distance to make, against a head
wind. There, beyond the long, brown reach of sand, hid in the purple
shadow of the rocky point, lay the _Blessed Endeavour_. Murch halted,
staring to seaward under his hand, the level sunlight striking upon the
lower part of his face, revealing every wrinkle of his netted skin,
every hair of his great white beard. So I see him now, staring to
seaward under his hand, sitting motionless on his horse.
He struck spurs in and clattered down the rocky and steep descent to
the sea-shore. Halfway down his horse stumbled and fell, Murch avoiding
the animal and coming unhurt to his feet. The poor beast had broken his
leg--a glance told us that.
Without a word, Murch drew a pistol and shot the animal through the
head; and the smoke had not cleared, or the echoes done leaping from
rock to rock, before he had mounted my horse--for I had incautiously
dismounted--and was picking his way down the hill at the best pace he
could. Slow as he went, ’twas faster than I could travel. But I had
a pistol, too, and now was the time to use it; there was no scruple
to prevent my shooting my own horse, at least, and I hauled out the
weapon, looked to the priming, and dragged myself to a stumbling run.
We came to the belt of rolling sand-dunes, and the little, steep
ascents checked Mr Murch’s jaded nag, already oppressed with a rider
near double the weight he had been carrying hitherto. I lay down and
took a steady rest, and when horse and rider forged upon the reddening
sunset sky, I pulled the trigger. ’Twas a long shot, but the ball
struck the wretched animal somewhere; he stumbled and fell. By the time
Murch had disengaged himself, and was lashing savagely at his horse,
I had loaded afresh, and the second shot told also. Murch dropped the
bridle, facing about, and fired in my direction; but I was hid in the
long dry grass, and the bullet sang harmlessly overhead. I thought
he would have made at me then; but no, he turned about; I saw his
great figure for an instant, black upon the red flush of the sky, as
he crossed the summit of the hillock. As he dropped into the hollow
I rose to pursue him. We were on equal terms now, so far as two such
different men might be; but, I began to think that Harry Winter, in the
words of old Dawkins’s chanty, might cry farewell to earth and sky.
Nothing seemed easier than for Murch to plant a bullet in him among the
sand-hills.
But, avoiding the sky-line, I ran along the hollows of the dunes, until
I caught a glimpse of Mr Murch, far out on the vast stretch of sand,
trotting heavily forward. The tide was low, showing no more than a
delicate fringe of foam beyond a mile of wet sand, gleaming blood-red
in the dying sunlight. Far to seaward, the dagger-point of a sail
notched the glimmering waters. In the impenetrable shadow of the dark
cliffs that rose beyond the brown plain of sand and ran bluntly out to
sea, the ship, the goal of forlorn hope, lay still hidden from sight.