"Dearest Roger," and the written words made her blush crimson and hold
her face closer to the paper. "Dearest Roger, I would that I might come
to you to-night; but they say it is impossible. Your mother is in
Bristol, and awaits you there. Mr. John Davis has brought me hither to
the Crown Inn. In the morning we shall open the prison door for you.
Oh, my dear Roger, to think that I shall see you at last!"
"When can we have the answer back?" she asked; and the landlord told
her, smiling, that it would be very late, if indeed there were any
answer at all, and reminded her, with insolent patience, that he had
already told her they would not open their prison gates, for Lords or
Commons, to any one who came by night.
"You may send the answer by one of your maids to the lady's room,"
commanded the Bristol magnate, in a tone that chased the servile smile
from the inn-keeper's face.
When Mary waked, the morning sun was pouring in at her window, and there
was no word of any answer. Old Matthew had spoken with the young
messenger, and brought word that he had given the letter to one of the
watch by the gate, who had taken the money, and promised to do his best
to put the message into Mr. Wallingford's hands that night when they
changed guard.
"We might have been here last night; why, 't is but a step!" said John
Davis, as they drew near the dismal prison next morning; but his young
companion made no answer. He could not guess what happy fear mingled
with her glad anticipation now, nor how her certainties and
apprehensions were battling with each other.
Matthew's own horse and another that he led for Mr. Wallingford were
weighted with provisions, so that he trudged afoot alongside. It was
easy to hear in Plymouth town how the American prisoners lacked such
things, and yet Mary could hardly wait now to make the generous purchase
which she had planned. She could not know all that Matthew had learned,
and told his master in whispers in the stable yard.
As they rode nearer to the prison a flaw of wind brought toward them all
the horrible odors of the crowded place, like a warning of the distress
and misery within. Though it was so early, there were many persons
standing outside the gates: some of them were jeering at the sad
spectacle, and some talking in a friendly way with the men who stood
within. Happily, it was not only a few compassionate Americans who had
posted themselves here to give what they could of food and succor, but
among the Plymouth folk themselves many a heart was wrung with pity, and
one poor old body had toiled out of the town with a basket of food to
smuggle through the bars; cakes and biscuit of a humble sort enough, but
well flavored with love. Mary saw her take thread and needles out of
her pocket, and sit down on the ground to mend some poor rags of
clothing. "My own lad went for a sailor," she said, when they thanked
her and called her "mother."
There was long delay; the guards pushed back the crowd again and again;
one must stand close to see the sights within. All at once there was a
cry and scuffling among the idlers, as some soldiers came riding up, one
of them bringing an old horse with a man thrown across the saddle and
tied down. As they loosed him he slid heavily to the ground as if he
were dead, and the spectators closed about him.
Mary Hamilton could only look on in horror and apprehension. Her
companion was in the midst of the pushing crowd.
"'T was a prisoner who escaped last night and has been retaken," he said
hastily, as he returned to her side. "You may stay here with Matthew,
my dear, while I take our letters and go in. I see that it is no place
for you; they are like wild beasts."
"I must go, too," said Mary; "you will not forbid me now. Good
heavens!" she cried aloud. "Now that they stand away from the gate I
can see within. Oh, the poor prisoners! Oh, I cannot bear their sick
faces! They are starving, sir! These must be the men who had the fever
you told me of. I wish we had brought more wine and food to these poor
fellows! Let us go in at once," she cried again, and was in a passion
of pity and terror at the sight.
"Let us go in! Let us go in!" she begged. "Oh, you forget that they
are my own countrymen! I cannot wait!"
The guard now returned with a message, and the alderman gave his bridle
to the groom. Mary was afoot sooner than he, and had run to the gate,
pushing her way among the idle sightseers to the heavy grating. They
were calling from both sides of the gate to old Matthew, who was
standing with the horses, to come up and give them what he had brought.
Mary Hamilton felt as if she were among wolves: they did not listen;
they did not wait to find what she had to say. "For love of God, give me
a shilling for a little 'baccy, my lady," said one voice in her ear. "I
'll fetch them the 'baccy from the town, poor boys; they lack it most of
anything, and he 'll drink the money!" protested an old beggar woman at
her side. "Go in? They 'll let no ladies in!" and she gave a queer
laugh. "And if you 're once in, all you 'll pray for is to be out again
and forget the sight."
The governor was in his room, which had a small grated window toward the
prison yard; but there was a curtain before it, and he looked up
anxiously to see if this were close drawn as his early guests entered.
This task of jailer was a terrible duty for any man, and he swore under
his breath at Lord Mount Edgecumbe for interfering with what at best was
an impossible piece of business. If he had seen to it that they had
decent supplies for the prison, and hanged a score of their purveyors
and contractors, now, or had blown the whole rotten place into the air
with his fleet guns, 't were a better kindness!
The clerk stood waiting for orders.
"Show them in, then, these people," he grumbled, and made a feint of
being busy with some papers as Miss Hamilton and her escort appeared.
The governor saw at once that the honorable Mr. Davis was a man of
consequence.
"My Lord Mount Edgecumbe writes me that you would make inquiries for a
prisoner here," said the old soldier, less roughly because the second
guest proved to be a lady and most fair to see. She looked very pale,
and was watching him with angry eyes. As she had crossed the prison
yard, she had seen fewer miseries because her tears had blinded her.
There had been one imploring voice calling her by her own name. "Stop,
Miss Hamilton, stop, for God's sake!" some one had cried; but the guard
had kept the poor prisoners off, and an attendant hurried her along by
force when she would gladly have lingered. The horror of it all was too
much for her; it was the first time she had ever been in a jail.
"I am fearful of your sad disappointment, madam," said the governor of
the prison. "You wished to see Lieutenant Roger Wallingford. I grieve
to say"--He spoke kindly, but looked to ward Mary and stopped, and then,
sighing heavily, turned his eyes toward Mr. Davis with a kind of relief.
"He is not dead, I hope, sir?" asked the old man, for Mary could not
speak. "We have the order for his release."
"No, he is not dead to any certain knowledge," explained the governor,
more slowly than before, "but he was one of a party that made their
escape from this prison last night; 't was through one of their silly
tunnels that they dig. They have some of them been shot down, and one,
I hear, has just been taken and brought in alive; but Wallingford's name
is not among any of these." He turned to some records, and then went to
the grated window and looked out, but pulled the curtain across it
impatiently as he came away. "You brought his pardon?" the governor then
asked brusquely. "I should think he would be the last man for a pardon.
Why, he was with Paul Jones, sir; but a very decent fellow, a gentleman,
they tell me. I did not see him; I am not long here. This young lady
had best go back to the inn," and he stole a look at Mary, who sat in
despairing silence. A strange flush had replaced her first pallor. She
had thought but a moment before that she should soon look again into
Roger Wallingford's face and tell him that he was free. On the end of
the governor's writing table lay the note that she had written with such
a happy heart only the night before.
*XXXVIII*
*FULL OF STRAYING STREETS*
"Nona ne souffrons quo dans la mesure ou nous co-operons a nos
souffrances."
"His age saw visions, though his youth dream'd dreams."
The town of Bristol was crowded with Loyalist refugees: some who had
fled the colonies for honest love of their King, and some who believed
that when the King's troops had put down the rebellion they should be
well rewarded for holding to his cause. They were most of them cut off
from what estates they may have had, and were begging for pensions from
a government that seemed cruelly indifferent. Their sad faces fairly
shadowed the Bristol streets, while many of them idled the day through,
discussing their prospects with one another, and killing time that might
have been lived to some profit. The disappointment of their hope was
unexpected, and an England that showed them neither sympathy nor honor
when they landed on her shores, glowing with self-sacrifice, was but a
sad astonishment. England, their own mother country, seemed fallen into
a querulous dotage, with her King's ministers so pompous in their stupid
ignorance and self-consequence, and her best statesmen fighting hard to
be heard. It was an age of gamester heroes and of reckless living; a
poor page of English history was unfolded before their wistful eyes.
These honest Loyalists were made to know the mortified feelings of
country gentlefolk come unheralded to a city house that was busy with
its splendors on a feast day, and impatient of what was inopportune.
Worse than this, though Judge Curwen and other loyal Americans of his
company were still hopeful of consideration, and of being warmly
received by England as her own true children, they were oftener held
guilty of the vexing behavior of their brothers, those rebels against
English authority whom they had left behind. Something to Mary's
wonder, Madam Wallingford would have few of them to friend. She was too
great a person at home to consent even now to any social familiarity on
the score of political sympathies. She was known to have brought much
money, and it was made easy for her to share this with one and another
distressed acquaintance or friend's friend; but while this was done with
generosity, she showed herself more and more impatient of their
arguments, even of those plaints which were always ready, and the story
of such grievances as had led them into exile.
"I am too ill and sad to listen to these things," she said often, even
to her friends the Pepperrells, who came from London to visit her. "I
only know my country's troubles through my own sorrow." She begged them
at last to find poor Roger's grave, so she might go there to pray for
him; 't was all that she could do. "Oh no," she would say mournfully to
those who looked for her assent to their own views of the great
situation, "do not expect me to understand you. I am only a mother, and
all my life is done!"
The Bristol streets were busy as Miss Hamilton came walking through the
town, and the bells were ringing for a holiday. She was deep in anxious
thought, and kept steadily on her way toward the abbey church, without
even a glance at a tradesman's window or a look at the people she met.
Life was filled with new anxieties. Since the day when they had left
Plymouth they could find no trace of Roger Wallingford, beyond the
certainty that he had made his escape with some fellow prisoners through
a tunnel which they had been for many days digging under the prison
wall. There had been a light near the opening in the field outside, and
a guard set, but six men had gone out of the narrow hole and crawled
away. It was a windy night, and the lantern light and shadows wavered
on the ground and hid them. Two were shot and killed, but two were
captured and brought back at once, while another was shot and got away,
stumbling and falling often, and bleeding like a slaughtered creature,
as the watch could see next morning by daylight. This poor fellow had
escaped to the moors; there was a pool of blood in a place where he must
have hidden for some hours among the furze bushes. There was so large a
bounty paid for any escaped traitors and felons like these, who might be
brought back alive to the Mill Prison, that the poor moorland folk back
of Plymouth were ever on the quest. Roger Wallingford might have been
that bleeding man. They would not dare to keep together; his companion
might have left him dying or dead somewhere in the lonely waste country
that stretched miles away above the prison. His fate was sure if he
should be captured; he was not a man to yield his life too easily. There
were some carefully worded notices posted,--broadsides which might
easily reach the eyes of such fugitives if they ventured into any of the
Devon towns near by; but they might well have starved to death by this
time in the deserts of Dartmoor. One sailor beside the lieutenant had
succeeded in making his escape.
Mary Hamilton had left her lady pale and in tears that morning, and all
her affectionate solicitude had been in vain.
There was some relief in finding herself afoot in the fresh air. For
the first time she wondered if they must yield all their hopes and think
of going home. It must be so if they should come to know that Roger was
really dead, and her heart stopped as if with a sudden shock. Alas,
next moment she remembered that for poor Madam Wallingford there was no
safe return; her son was not yet disproven of Tory crimes. If there were
any chance of sailing, the poor lady was far too ill and feeble in these
last days. The summer, the little that was left of it, looked long and
dreary; the days were already growing short. There had not come a word
from home since they sailed.
There was no longer much use in riding abroad on futile quests, and in
these last days most persons had ceased to ask if there were any news of
the lieutenant. Week after week had gone by, and his mother's proud
courage was gone, while her bodily strength was fast failing. Lord
Newburgh and Mr. Fairfax, even Lord Mount Edgecumbe himself, had shown
very great kindness in so difficult a matter, and Mary never let them go
away unthanked for any favors which it could only be a happiness for any
man to bestow. The gift and spell of beauty were always hers, and a
heart that was always ready to show both gratitude and affection. She
might not speak these things, but she was instant in giving the sweetest
recognition to the smallest service that she might discover.
The abbey church of St. Augustine was cool and dim as Mary Hamilton went
in, with a drooping head and a heavy heart. Her courage had never
before seemed so utterly to fail. She had passed two forlorn Royalists
at the gatehouse who were talking of their pensions, and heard one of
them say, "If I were safe home again I'd never leave it, principles or
no principles!" and the words rang dull and heavy in her ears. She sat
down on an old stone bench in the side aisle; the light came sifting
down to the worn stone pavement, but she was in shadow, behind a great
pillar that stood like a monstrous tree to hold the lofty roof. There
was no one in sight. The lonely girl looked up at a familiar old
Jacobean monument on the wall, with the primly ruffed father and mother
kneeling side by side with clasped hands, and their children kneeling in
a row behind them down to the very least, in a pious little succession.
They were all together there in comfortable safety, and many ancient
tablets covered the walls about them with the names and virtues of
soldiers and sailors, priests and noblemen, and gallant gentlemen of Old
England with their children and their good wives.
"They have all won through," whispered Mary to herself. "They have all
fought the long battle and have carried care like me, and they have all
won through. I shall not be a coward, either," and her young heart
rose; but still the tears kept coming, and she sat bowed in the shadow
and could not lift her head, which until lately had faced the sun like a
flower. She sat there, at last, not thinking of her present troubles,
but of home: of old Peggy and the young maids who often sang at their
pleasant work; the great river at full tide, with its wooded shores and
all its points and bays; the fishing weirs in the distance; the slow,
swaying flight of the eagles and the straight course of the herons
overhead. She thought of the large, quiet house facing southward, and
its rows of elms, and the slender poplars going down the garden
terraces; she even heard the drone of the river falls; she saw the house
standing empty, all the wide doors shut to their old hospitality. A
sense of awful distance fell upon her heart. The responsibility and
hopelessness of her errand were too heavy on her young heart. She
covered her face and bent still lower, but she could not stop her tears.
There came the sound of footsteps up the nave: it might be the old
verger in his rusty gown, or some sightseer stopping here and there to
read an inscription. Poor Mary's tears would have their way: to one of
her deep nature weeping was sad enough in itself; to cry for sorrow's
sake was no common sorrow. She was safe in her dim corner, and thought
little of being seen; she was only a poor girl in sore trouble, with her
head sunk in her hands, who could not in any way concern a stranger.
The wandering footsteps stopped near by, instead of going on and
entering the choir. She noticed, then, in a dull way, the light echo of
their sound among the arches overhead.
"My God!" said a man's voice, as if in great dismay.
The speaker stepped quickly to Mary's side, and laid his hand gently on
her shoulder. She looked up into the face of Captain Paul Jones of the
Ranger.
*XXXIX*
*MERCY AND MANLY COURAGE*
"Look on his honour!
That bears no stamp of time, no wrinkles on it;
No sad demolishment nor death can reach it."
"O my dear better Angel and my star,
My earthly sight needs yours, your heavenly, mine!"
The captain's eyes were full of tears; it was no sign that he lacked
manliness. To find Miss Hamilton in England, to find her alone and in
piteous despair, was the opportunity of his own heart. He could not but
be startled into wondering silence; the event was too astonishing even
for one so equal to emergencies; but he stood ready, with beating heart
and sure sense of a man's abundant strength, to shelter her and to fight
against the thing that troubled her, whatever it might be. Presently he
seated himself by Mary's side, and took her hand in his and held it
fast, still without speaking. She was the better for such friendliness,
and yet wept the more for his very sympathy.
The captain waited until her passion of tears had spent itself. It was
a pity she could not watch his compassionate face; all that was best and
kindest in the man was there to see, with a grave look born of conflict
and many grievous disappointments. To see Paul Jones now, one could not
but believe him capable of the sternest self-command; he had at least
the unassuming and quiet pride of a man who knows no master save
himself. His eyes were full of womanly tenderness as he looked down at
the pathetic bowed head beside him. Next moment they had a keen
brightness as he caught sight of a tablet on the abbey wall to some
Bristol hero long dead,--the gallant servant, through many perils by sea
and land, of Anne his Queen: it was a record that the captain's heart
could perfectly understand.
"Calm yourself now, my dearest girl," he said at last, with gentle
authority. "I must not stay long beside you; I am always in danger
here. I was not unknown in Bristol as a younger man."
Mary lifted her head; for a moment the sight of his face helped to put
her own miseries quite out of mind. Her ready sympathy was quickly
enough roused when she saw how Paul Jones had changed. He had grown much
older; years might have passed instead of months since that last evening
he had spent in America, when she had seen him go away with his men by
moonlight down the river. Now more than ever he might easily win the
admiration of a woman's heart! She had half forgotten the charm of his
voice, the simple directness of his eyes and their strange light, with
something in his behavior that men called arrogance and willful rivalry,
and women recognized as a natural royalty and irresistible, compelling
power. To men he was too imperious, to women all gentleness and
courtesy.
"You are in disguise!" she exclaimed, amazed at his courage. "How do
you dare, even you, to be here in Bristol in broad day?" and she found
herself smiling, in spite of her unchecked tears. The captain held a
rough woolen cap in his hand; he was dressed in that poor garb of the
hungry Spanish sailor of Quiberon, which had so often done him good
service.
"Tell me what has brought you here," he answered. "That is by far the
greatest wonder. I am no fit figure to sit beside you, but 't is the
hand of God that has brought us here together. Heaven forbid that you
should ever shed such bitter tears again!" he said devoutly, and sat
gazing at her like a man in a day dream.
"Sometimes God wills that we shall be sorry-hearted; but when He sends
the comfort of a friend, God himself can do no more," answered the girl,
and there fell a silence between them. There was a sparrow flying to
and fro among the pillars, and chirping gayly under the high roof,--a
tiny far-fallen note, and full of busy cheer. The late summer sunshine
lay along the floor of that ancient house of God where Mary and the
captain sat alone together, and there seemed to be no other soul in the
place.
Her face was shining brighter and brighter; at last, at last she could
know the truth, and hear what had happened at Whitehaven, and ask for
help where help could be surely given.
"But why are you here? You must indeed be bold, my lord captain!" she
ventured again, in something very like the old gay manner that he knew;
yet she still looked very white, except for her tear-stained eyes.
"There were new tales of your seafaring told in the town only yesterday.
I believe they are expecting you in every corner of England at once, and
every flock of their shipping is dreading a sight of the Sea Wolf."
"I do my own errands,--that is all," replied the captain soberly. "My
poor Ranger is lying now in the port of Brest. I am much hampered by
enemies, but I shall presently break their nets.... I was for a look at
their shipping here, and how well they can defend it. There is a
well-manned, able fish-boat out of Roscoff, on the Breton coast, which
serves me well on these expeditions. I have a plan, later, for doing
great mischief to their Baltic fleet. I had to bring the worst of my
ship's company with me; 't is my only discomfort," said Paul Jones, with
bitterness. "I have suffered far too much," and he sighed heavily and
changed his tone. "I believe now that God's providence has brought me
to your side; such happiness as this makes up for everything. You
remember that I have been a sailor all my life," he continued, as if he
could not trust himself to speak with true feeling. "I have been
acquainted since childhood with these English ports."
"You did not know that I had come to Bristol?" said Mary. "Oh yes, we
have been here these many weeks now," and she also sighed.
"How should I know?" asked Paul Jones impatiently. "I am overwhelmed by
such an amazing discovery. I could burst into tears; I am near to being
unmanned, though you do not suspect it. Think, dear, think what it is
to me! I have no discretion, either, when I babble my most secret
affairs aloud, and hardly know what I am saying. I must leave you in a
few short moments. What has brought you here? Tell me the truth, and
how I may safely manage to see you once again. If you were only in
France, with my dear ladies there, they would love and cherish you with
all their kind hearts! 'T is the Duchess of Chartres who has been my
good angel since I came to France, and another most exquisite being whom
I first met at her house,--a royal princess, too. Oh, I have much to
tell you! Their generous friendship and perfect sympathy alone have
kept me from sinking down. I have suffered unbelievable torture from
the jealousy and ignorance of men who should have known their business
better, and given me every aid."