“What! that you, Harry? How comes it you have left all the fine folk so
soon?” cried Captain Dodge, as he suddenly awoke and saw young Luttrell
at his bedside. “Why, lad, I didn’t expect to see you back here these
ten days to come. Warn’t they polite and civil to you?”
“That they were. They could not haye treated me better if I had been
their own son.”
“How comes it, then, that you slipped your moorings?”
“Well, I can’t well say. There were new guests just arriving, and people
I never saw, and so, with one thing or other, I thought I’d just move
off; and--and--here I am.”
It was not difficult to see that this very lame excuse covered some
other motive, and the old skipper was not the man to be put off by a
flimsy pretext; but, rough sailor and buccaneer as he was, he could
respect the feelings that he thought might be matter of secret meaning,
and merely said: “I’m glad to see you back, at all events. I have no one
to speak to in this place, and, as I lie here, I get so impatient, that
I forget my smashed thigh-bone, and want to be up and about again.”
“So you will, very soon, I hope.”
“Not so soon, lad!” said he, sorrowfully. “It’s a big spar to splice,
the surgeon says, and will take three months; though how I’m to lie here
three months is more than I can tell.”
“I’ll do my best to make it endurable for you. I’ll get books--they’ve
plenty of books here--and maps, and drawings; and I saw a draftboard
this morning, and you’ll see the time won’t hang so heavily as you
feared.”
“That ain’t it at all, Harry. You’ve got to go to Liverpool to Towers
and Smales--them’s the fellows know me well. Smales sailed with me as
a youngster, and you’ll hand them a letter I’ll write, and they’ll look
about for the sort of craft we’re wanting--something bark-rigged, or a
three-masted schooner. I was dreaming of one last night--such a clipper
on a wind! The French are blockading Vera Cruz just now, and if we could
slip past them and get in, one trip would set us all right again.”
“I think I should like that well!” cried the youth. “Like it! Why.
wouldn’t you like it? There ain’t nothing to compare with blockade
running in this life: stealing carefully up till you see the moment to
make a dash--watching your wind, and then with every inch of canvas you
can spread, go at it till the knee timbers crack again, and the planks
work and writhe like the twigs of a wicker basket, and all the ships of
war flying this signal and that to each other, till at last comes a gun
across your bows, and you run up a flag of some sort--English belike,
for the French never suspect John Bull of having a clipper. Then comes
the order to round to, and you pretend to mind it; and just as they man
their boat, dead at them you go, swamp every man of them, and hold on,
while they fire away, at the risk of hulling each other, and never take
more notice of them than one discharge from your pivot-gun, just by way
of returning their salute. That’s what I call sport, boy; and I only
wish I was at it this fine morning.”
“And what happens if you’re taken?”
“That depends on whether you showed fight or not; if you fired a shotted
gun, they hang you.”
Luttrell shook his head, and muttered, “A dog’s death; I don’t like
that.”
“That’s prejudice, Sir; nothing more. Every death a man meets bravely
is a fine death! I’d just as lieve be hanged as flayed alive by the
Choctaws!”
“Perhaps so would!”
“Well, there’s what you’ve got to do. Towers and Smales,
shipbuilders!--they’re the men to find what we want, and they know a
clipper well; they’ve built more slavers than any house in the trade.”
Harry made a wry face; the skipper saw it, and said: “There’s more
prejudice; but when you’ve been at sea as long as I have, you’ll think
less about the cargo than what you get per ton for the freight.”
“I’d not turn slaver, anyhow; that much I can tell you,” said he,
stoutly.
“I’d not do it myself, Sir, except when business was alack and freights
low. It ain’t cheering, noways; and there’s a certain risk in it
besides. Towers and Smales--Towers and Smales!” muttered he over to
himself three or four times. “They’d not be the men they are to-day, I
can tell you, if they never traded in ebony ware! Had you any talk with
your grand friend, Sir Gervais, about that loan he offered me?” asked
he, after a pause.
“Not a word. I came away hurriedly. I had no good opportunity to speak
about it.”
“He said, ‘Two thousand, and pay when I like;’ not hard terms
certainly.”
“And yet I’d rather you’d not accept them,” said Harry, slowly.
“Not take money without interest charged or security asked? What do you
mean?”
“I mean, I rather you’d wait till I’ve seen those lawyers that managed
my father’s affairs, and see whether they can’t sell that trifle of
property that comes to me.”
“Why, didn’t you tell me your father willed it away to some peasant
girl?”
“Yes, the island, for the entail had been broken by my grandfather, but
the small estate in Roscommon goes to the next of kin, and that happens
to be myself. It must be very little worth, but it may help us at least
to get a ship, and we’ll soon do the rest ourselves.”
“That will we, Harry. This is the fourth time in my life I’ve had to
begin all over again, and I’m as fresh for it as on the first day.”
They went on now to talk of the future and all their plans like men
who felt the struggle with life a fair stand up fight, that none with a
stout heart ought ever to think of declining. The skipper had not only
been in every corner of the globe, but had brought back from each spot
some memories of gain, or pleasure, or peril--sensations pretty much
alike to his appreciation--and whether he commanded a whale-boat at
Behring’s Straits, or took in his ship store of cocoa-nuts and yams at
the Spice Islands, adventure ever tracked his steps. Dashed with the
love of danger was the love of gain, and in his narrative one never
could say whether there prevailed more the spirit of enterprise or the
temper of the trader.
“We’ll want that loan from Vyner yet, I see, Harry,” said he, at the
end of a long calculation of necessary outgoings; “and I see no reason
against taking it.”
“I do, though,” said the other, gravely.
“Mayhap some sentimental reason that I’d not give a red cent for, boy.
What is it?”
“I’ll not trouble you with the sentimental reasons,” said Luttrell,
smiling, “though perhaps I’m not without some of them. What I’ll give
you will suffice. While I was one morning with Sir Gervais, going over
all about my father and his affairs, of which he knew far more than I
did, he opened his writing-desk, and took out a great mass of letters.
‘These,’ said he, ‘are in your father’s hand; read them, and you’ll be
better acquainted with him than you have yet been.’ They were on all
manner of themes--of society, field sports, books, and much about
politics--and interested me vastly, till at last I came upon one which
certainly Sir Gervais would not have suffered me to see had he been
aware it was amongst them. It was the last letter my father had ever
written to him, and was almost entirely about myself. He spoke of the
semi-barbarism I had been reared in, and the humble prospects before
me, and he told about my disposition, and my faults of temper--the old
family faults, he called them--that made us all ‘intractable to our
friends, and intolerable to all who were not friends.’ At the end he
asked Vyner to become my guardian, and he added these words: ‘Be a
friend to my boy in all ways that your kindness, your sympathy, your
counsel can dictate. Guide, direct, encourage, or, if need be, reprove
him, but never, whatever you do, aid him with your purse. It is on this
condition I commit him to you. Remember.’”
“Well, I’d be noways obliged to _my_ father if he had made any such
condition about _me_. I’ve never been much the better for all the good
advice I’ve got, but I’ve found the man that lent me a thousand dollars
uncommon useful.”
“I am telling you of what my father wished and asked for,” said Harry,
proudly, “not of anything else.”
“And that’s just what I’m objectin’ to, youngster. It was _his_ pride to
take no help, and it brought him to live and die on a barren rock in the
ocean; but _I_ don’t intend to do that, nor to let you do it. We’ve got
to say to the world, ‘Sheer off there, I’m a comin’, and I mean comin’
when I say it. There’s maybe room enough for us all, but I’ll be smashed
and chawed up but I’ll have room for _me!_”
Whether it was the fierce energy with which he spoke this, or the fact
that in a few rough words he had embodied his whole theory of life,
but certainly Harry looked at him with a sort of wonder blended with
amusement.
“Besides this,” resumed Bodge, with the same decision of tone, “your
father might say, if he pleased, ‘You shan’t help Harry Luttrell,’ but
he never could say, ‘You mustn’t help Herodotus Dodge.’ No, Sir!”
“At all events,” said Harry, “you’ll let me try my own plan first. If
that fail, there will be time enough to consider the other. I’ll start
to-night for Liverpool. After I have seen your friends there, I’ll go
over and consult my lawyers in Dublin; and I mean to run across and see
Arran--the old rock--once more. It shall be my last look at it.”
“It ain’t a beauty, that’s a fact,” said Dodge, who saw nothing of the
agitation in the other’s voice or manner. “Give me an hour or two, and
I’ll write the letters for you, and I’ll tell Smales that if you want
any money----”
“I shall not want it.”
“Then you’ll be unlike any other man that ever wore shoes, Sir, that’s
all!” And Dodge stuffed a formidable piece of tobacco into his mouth, as
though to arrest his eloquence and stop the current of his displeasure,
while Harry waved him a good-by, and went out.
The same evening he started for Liverpool. The skipper’s friends were
most cordial and hospitable to him. They had had long dealings with
Dodge, and found him ever honourable and trustworthy, and Harry heard
with sincere pleasure the praises of his friend. It was evident, too,
that they were taken with young Luttrell, for they brought him about
amongst their friends, introducing him everywhere, and extending to him
every hospitality of their hospitable city. If Harry was very grateful
for all this kindness, his mind continually reverted to the society he
had so lately mixed in, and whose charm he appreciated, new as he was to
life and the world, with an intense zest--the polished urbanity of
Sir Gervais; the thoughtful good nature of Lady Vyner; the gentle
gracefulness of Ada; even Miss Courtenay--no favourite of his, nor he of
hens--yet even she possessed a winning elegance of manner that was very
captivating.
Very unlike all these were the attentions that now surrounded him,
and many were the unfavourable comparisons he drew between his present
friends and their predecessors. Not that he was in love with Ada; he had
asked himself the question more than once, and always had he given the
same answer: “If I had been a man of rank and fortune, I’d have deemed
my lot perfect to have had such a sister.” And really it was sister-like
she had been to him; so candid, so frank, so full of those little cares
that other “love” shrinks from, and dares not deal in. She had pressed
him eagerly, too, to accept assistance from her father--a step she never
could have taken had love been there--and he had refused on grounds
which showed he could speak with a frankness love cannot speak.
“I take it,” muttered he to himself one day, after long reflection--“I
take it that my Luttrell blood moves too slowly for passionate
affection, and that the energy of my nature must seek its exercise in
hatred, not love; and if this be so, what a life is before me!”
At last the ship-builders discovered the craft that Dodge was in search
of. She was a slaver recently captured off Bahia, and ordered to be
sold by the Admiralty. A few lines from Harry described her with all the
enthusiasm that her beauty and fine lines could merit, and he smiled
to himself as he read over the expressions of admiration, which no
loveliness in human form could have wrung from him.
He sailed for Ireland on the night he wrote, but carried his letter with
him, to relate what he might have to say of his meeting with his lawyer.
A little event that occurred at his landing was also mentioned:
“As I was stepping into the boat that was to take me ashore, we were
hailed by a large ship-rigged vessel just getting under weigh, and from
which several boats, crowded with people, were just leaving. We rowed
towards her, and found that they wanted us to take on shore a young lady
whose class evidently prevented her mixing with the vulgar herd that
filled the other boats. She was in deep mourning, and so overwhelmed
with grief, that she was almost unconscious as they lifted her into the
boat. I caught a mere glimpse of her face, and never saw anything so
beautiful in my life. Only think! the vessel was a convict-ship, and
she had gone there to take a last farewell of some father or brother,
perhaps--husband it could scarcely be, she was too young for that.
Can you imagine anything more dreadful? One evidently of rank and
birth--there were unmistakable signs of both about her--mixing even for
an instant with all the pollution of crime and wickedness that crowd the
deck of a convict-ship! I asked leave to accompany her to her house or
hotel, or wherever she was going, but she made a gesture of refusal;
and, though I’d have given more than I dare tell to have known more
about her, I thought it would be so unworthy to follow, her, that I left
her the moment we landed, and never saw her more.
“I am sure I did what was right and becoming, but if you knew how sorry
I am to have been obliged to do it--if you knew how, now that it is all
done and passed, I think of her incessantly--ay, and follow every one
I see in mourning till I discover that it is not she--you’d wonder what
change has come over this thick blood of mine, and set it boiling and
bubbling as it never used to do.”
He went on next to tell of his visit to the agents of his father’s
property. Messrs. Cane and Carter had been duly apprised by Sir Gervais
Vyner that Harry Luttrell was alive, and it scarcely needed the letter
which he carried as a credential, to authenticate him, so striking was
the resemblance he bore to his father.
“You should have been here yesterday, Mr. Luttrell,” said Cane. “You
would have met your cousin. She has left this for Arran this morning.”
Harry muttered something about their not being known to each other, and
Cane continued:
“You’d scarcely guess what brought her here. It was to make over to you,
as the rightful owner, the property on the Arran Islands. We explained
to her that it was a distinct deed of gift--that your late father
bequeathed it to her as a means of support--for she has really nothing
else--and that legally her claim was unassailable. She was not to be
shaken from her resolution. No matter how we put the case--either as
one of law or as one of necessity, for it is a necessity--her invariable
reply was, ‘My mind is made up, and on grounds very different from any
you have touched on;’ and she left us with full directions to make the
requisite conveyances of the estate in your favour. I entreated her to
defer her final determination for a week or two, and all I could obtain
was a promise that if she should change her mind between that time and
the day of signing the papers, she would let me know it. She has also
given us directions about taking a passage for her to Australia; she is
going out to seek occupation as a governess if she can, as a servant if
she must.”
Harry started, and grew pale and red by turns as the other said this. He
thought, indeed, there was some want of delicacy in thus talking to him
of one so nearly allied to him. His ignorance of life, and the Irish
attachment to kindred together, made him feel the speech a harsh one.
“How will it be, Sir,” asked he, curtly, “if I refuse to accept this
cession?”
“The law has no means of enforcing it, Sir. There is no statute which
compels a man to take an estate against his will. She, however, can no
more be bound to retain, than you to receive, this property.”
“We had three hours’ talk,” said Harry, in writing this to Captain
Dodge, “and I ascertained that this very property she is now so anxious
to be free of, had formed up to this the pride and enjoyment of her
life. She had laboured incessantly to improve it, and the condition
of the people who lived on it. She had built a schoolhouse and a small
hospital, and, strange enough, too, a little inn, for the place was in
request with tourists, who now found they could make their visits with
comfort and convenience. Cane also showed me the drawing of a monument
to my father’s memory, the ‘Last Luttrell of Arran,’ she called him; and
I own I was amazed at the simple elegance and taste of the design made
by this poor peasant girl. Even if all these had not shown me that
our old home has fallen into worthy hands, I feel determined not to be
outdone in generosity by this daughter of the people. She shall see that
a Luttrell understands his name and his station. I have told Cane to
inform her that I distinctly refuse to accept the cession; she may endow
her school or her hospital with it; she may partition it out amongst
the cottier occupiers; she may leave it--I believe I said so in my
warmth--to be worked out in masses for her soul--if she be still a
Catholic--if all this while none of her own kith and kin are in want of
assistance; and certainly times must have greatly changed with them if
it be not so. At all events, I’ll not accept it.
“I own to you I was proud to think of the high-hearted girl, bred up
in poverty, and tried by the terrible test of ‘adoption’ to forget her
humble origin. It was very fine and very noble of her, and only that
I fear if I were to see her the illusion might be destroyed, and some
coarse-featured, vulgar creature rout for ever the pleasant image my
mind has formed, I’d certainly make her a visit. Cane presses me much
to do so, but I will not. I shall go over to the island to see the last
resting-place of my poor father, and then leave it for ever. I have made
Cane give me his word of honour not to divulge my secret, nor even admit
that he has more than seen me, and I intend to-morrow to set but for
Arran.
“I asked Cane, when I was leaving him, what she was like, and he
laughingly answered, ‘Can’t you imagine it?’ And so I see I was right.
They were a wild, fierce, proud set, all these of my mother’s family,
with plenty of traditions amongst them of heavy retributions exacted for
wrongs, and they were a strong, well-grown, and well-featured race, but,
after all, not the stuff of which ladies and gentlemen are made in
_my_ country at least. _You_ have told me a different story as regards
_yours_.
“You shall hear from me from the island if I remain there longer than a
day, but, if my present mood endure, that event is very unlikely.”