THE MAID AT THE MARINER’S REST
Bristol was then the second seaport of the kingdom; only London
surpassed it in the number of ships sailing from its docks and in the
amount of hurly-burly, shuffling traffic in its streets. I arrived in
the city near sundown of an evening. As soon as I had had a bite to eat
I set out for the water front. The Mariner’s Rest was the principal
tavern, and thither I went to begin my inquiry for a passage to New
York.
A maid served behind the bar and soon brought me a mug of ale. I could
not help but notice her frail figure and sorrowful eyes; she looked some
two or three and twenty years of age, and had evidently seen much
trouble in her short life. Her refined face was wonderfully out of
keeping with her coarse surroundings. Sometimes, when she had been
rudely spoken to by a tipsy sailor, she would retreat to the back of the
room and rest her head in her hands as if from weariness. Though I
pitied her in my heart, I soon fell to musing upon other things. My mind
was always on the alert now about New York. I constantly pictured myself
wandering along its streets, casting searching glances to this side and
that, as I had so often wandered here in England when I still believed
that Ruth was somewhere near at hand.
I was so wrapped up in my fancy-hope that I did not notice how the room
was filling nor how the noise of mingled oaths and ribald laughter of
the common herd had risen to a din. I did look up soon, however, in time
to notice the entrance of a seaman whose appearance was exceedingly
unlike the rest. He wore rich clothes, and a jeweled sword by his side;
he was tall, kindly and benevolent looking. This man—I took him for a
prosperous merchant who commanded his own ship—made his way laboriously
through the crowd of tables, nodding now and then to someone he knew.
When he reached the farther side of the room he sat down a few chairs
away from me. There was a patronizing look of contempt on his face and
he turned his back squarely upon the company. The girl, perhaps, had
been the first to notice him, and her face brightened at his appearance.
“Will you take me?” she asked, eagerly, as if her life depended on the
answer, as she set his glass before him.
“This is no life for the like of you to lead,” replied the seaman. “Yes,
I’ll take you and I’ll do the best I can to find a home fit for you and
your pretty face to live in.”
At that moment a cry of “Wench, wench, I want some rum,” took the girl
back to her uncongenial task behind the bar. As soon as she was gone I
moved my chair nearer to the new comer.
“Will you pardon me, sir?” I began. “I have arrived from the country
only to-day and am a stranger here. Can you set me on the track of a
ship for America?”
“That I can very quick. I am Captain James Donaldson of the Royal Lion.
She sails for New York the day after to-morrow. I can let you have a
first-rate cabin and good rations to boot if you don’t eat too much. You
have no idea what a swift and steady craft she is.”
“Good,” I exclaimed joyfully. “You may count upon me as a passenger.”
“Tut, tut, you are as hasty as the girl there. You have not seen the
cabin yet, nor do you know my price.”
“I dare say we can arrange that to our satisfaction.”
“One can never tell,” he said, with a shrug of his shoulders. “Folk are
so particular in these days; but come to me in the morning and I will
show you over. I know you will like her. I must be going now. I only
stopped in to speak a word with yon lass. The pretty little wench is
going with me on the voyage.”
He left the tavern immediately, and I remained for some time longer
watching the girl come and go about the room with her easy grace and
soft manner. Suddenly her attractive face filled me with a sort of half
fear. A fortune teller had once foretold that I should meet my wife in
some such place as this. What if this girl were—! Bah! I should not let
such a thing as that get between me and my hunt for Ruth. You cannot
appreciate the force with which this recollection took hold of me unless
you remember the new conviction, a sort of presentiment that I should at
last find Ruth. I always profess great disregard for superstition, but
in my heart of hearts I am more or less affected by it. For this reason
I got up hastily to go out, meaning to escape from the attractive
presence of the pathetic looking maiden. As I stopped at the bar to
settle my score I was again impressed by the fineness of the girl’s
features and could not suppress my curiosity.
“Yours is a strange face to see here,” I said while she was counting out
my change.
“No stranger than yours,” she answered. “You and Captain Donaldson are
the only gentlemen who have been here to-night.” She heaved a sigh. “I
wish they came oftener.”
“You are going across the water with him, I believe.”
“Did you hear?” she asked in a low, earnest tone. “Please do not speak
of it aloud. My master would treat me ill if he knew I was going to
leave him.”
“Never fear,” I said, turning to go. “God be with you.”
“Pardon me,” she said as if to call me back. And then, “Oh, pardon me
again. I made a mistake.”
I left the tavern wondering what the last exclamation meant, for she had
dropped her eyes when I turned round to look at her again, and her face
assumed a look of disappointment. Yet I was glad to be free of the
place, for I still feared that she might come between me and Ruth. For
the moment I quite forgot that we should be together throughout the long
voyage.
The next morning I left my lodgings early and threaded the badly paved
streets that led to the harbor. The ships were headed close up against
the shore and I walked beneath their high bows that projected over my
head in a row like the half of an arched passage. Before long I came to
the Royal Lion. Captain Donaldson was busy directing the movements of
his crew, who were engaged with crows and ropes in stowing away the last
portions of the ship’s cargo. When he saw me, he called to his mate to
take his place, and kindly offered to explore the ship with me himself.
It was a staunch brig, for the most part fitted out with new canvas and
fresh rigging. What struck my soldier eye immediately, and what gave the
Royal Lion its best claim as a safe conveyance for passengers, was its
preparation for military defense. A goodly number of large brass cannons
were mounted upon the deck, and Captain Donaldson assured me that his
magazine was well stocked with small arms and ammunition.
An ocean voyage at the end of the seventeenth century was a dangerous
undertaking. The sea swarmed with pirates. Many a ship returned to port
battered up with cannon shots and its decks reeky with blood stains.
Other ships never came back at all, and it was as common to attribute
their loss to the attacks of the buccaneers as to the furious tropic
storms.
Captain Donaldson and I soon came to terms about my passage. As I left
the ship in his company—for he would go part way along the dock to point
out less favored ships and make comparisons to their disadvantage—as we
walked along he told me what he knew of the lass at the Mariner’s Rest.
She had come of better folk, he told me, and could no longer endure her
present occupation. Her determination was to go to the colonies and take
service in some respectable family till she could save enough to buy her
a little home in one of the Huguenot settlements.
“But that is not what she will really do,” said the Captain. “She is too
pretty a wench for that. Who knows but that you—tut, tut, man, you are
not married, are you?”
He had recalled my fearfulness of the night before and there was
particular force in its being put into words by a perfect stranger. He
continued to chaff me about the girl till, when I left him, I half
repented the bargain I had made to sail in his ship. Yet for all that,
and in spite of myself, when night came I was sitting in the corner of
the Mariner’s Rest. I fretted inwardly that I was there; but I persuaded
myself that I had better get used to her face amid the distractions of
other interests than to wait and make her acquaintance in the lonely
isolation of the ship.
I found the inn, if possible, more noisy than on the night before.
During the day two or three ships had come in from distant parts and
many of their crews were carousing heavily after the long voyage. Some
of the sailors had already drunk themselves into a stupor, but by far
the greater number swore and shouted lustily in their cups. The cry of
wench, wench, rose repeatedly, and at times the accompaniment of jocose
obscenity was disgusting.
The maid shrank pitifully from contact with the rude atmosphere about
her; yet there was a hopeful look in her bright, sparkling eyes. This
expression I set down as due to the fact that to-morrow she would be
free of all this and once more in the way of a decent life. There were
plenty of respectable homes to be had in the colony of New York, and I
had no doubt but that the good captain would look out for her to the
best of his ability.
Two or three times during the evening the drinkers fell to brawling.
Once at a game of cards a Portuguese sailor clapped his cutlass across a
comrade’s head and threatened to lop off his pate if he said a word
more. His opponent was a sniveling bit of a coward who whined at this
threat, but swallowed it as best he could, which, however, he did with a
bad grace, being neither a bully nor a thorough-going jelly fish of a
coward.
I could hardly stand the vile smell of their tobacco, or the look of the
sloppy pools upon the floor where they splattered the foam from their
ale. I was minded once to quit the room altogether, and had even risen
from my feet to go; but I noticed that the clatter of mugs and the din
of voices and the stamping of feet was growing louder with every minute.
The hopeful look had crowded out of the girl’s face, and at that moment
the cry of wench was thundered out, together with an indecent oath that
made me wince. She cast a scared glance of appeal in my direction. I sat
down again, minded to wait and be on hand in case she should need my
protection.
She approached timidly the table of the boor who had summoned her. She
set down the contents of her tray and was about to retreat when he
caught her roughly by the arm. He tried to pull her down upon his knee
and made as if to kiss her. I was on my feet in an instant; but before I
could stir a step the landlord had taken her part. He fetched the
drunken sailor a blow in the face that stretched him on the ground with
the blood dripping from his nose.
“I guess she’s my brat, not yours,” cried the landlord angrily. “Wench,
get back to your place.”
The sailors are such clannish folk that I fully expected a desperate
brawl to follow the landlord’s attack. There was some violent shuffling
of feet in the corner, and one or two men started up and took a step or
two in the direction of the affray, eager for a row. But before the
mob’s anger could come to a focus, someone cried out in a mocking voice:
“Portuguese Tom’s got his lobster now.”
There must have been some local quip to this phrase that I did not
understand, for it produced a storm of laughter, after which they fell
to drinking again in the best of jovial good humor. Tom picked himself
up, a little crestfallen; but even he joined in the laugh against him.
As soon as the crisis was passed I turned my attention to the girl. She
had not moved a step from where she stood with her hands clenched and
her lips tightly pressed together. Her position and the expression of
her face were both so full of fearless scorn that I could not repress an
exclamation of delight.
“Bravo!” I cried.
She looked at me and relaxed into the sensitive woman instantly. “Sit
down,” she said lightly, motioning me to resume my seat. “It is not
often so bad as it is to-night; but it is over and well over, too. Thank
you, sir; thank you.”
Though I had done nothing she had seen that I had been ready to come to
her assistance. “I shall stay till the room is cleared,” I whispered as
she passed me, and then sat down in my place again to watch.
I remained in the tavern for some time; in fact, till it wore on towards
midnight. Then, a bell ringing in the town, the landlord rose and
advised his guests to depart. A rule of the city closed all public
houses at that hour. Slowly, by ones and twos, the riotous sailors took
their leave, helping along those who were too drunk to walk alone. My
seat was in the corner where a high buffet threw me into the shadow. For
this reason probably the host overlooked me, and, for I remained till
the last, he thought that the room was quite empty, though I still
lingered in the shadow. He stepped to the door to usher out the last
guest. On his return he faced the girl menacingly.
“What is this you told me to-day?” he demanded in a fierce tone.
“I am going to leave you, sir.”
“Ha, hussy, I don’t know about that. By whose authority are you going to
leave?”
“By my own.” She did not quail at his brutal tone, but stood unflinching
as she had stood before the brute of a sailor who had insulted her in
the early evening. “There is nothing in my agreement to prevent my going
when I like.”
“There is this in our agreement, wench,” he said, gripping her hand. “We
are here alone, and I tell you plainly that you do not leave this house.
You know what I can do when I am in earnest.”
“Let go my hand,” she answered. “You hurt me.”
Instead of releasing his grip he squeezed her wrist so hard that she
cried out in pain.
“Yes, let go,” said I, stepping into view.
He wheeled round in amazement and dropped the girl’s hand.
“Who the devil are you?”
The excitement of the evening had told on the girl’s nerves. Her spirit
was weakened as we stood in the deserted room that a moment before had
been a very bedlam. “Oh, take me away,” she cried piteously. “He will
beat me if you leave me here.”
The landlord caught up a chair and lifted it above his head.
“Get out of here,” he cried, coming toward me with a swing of the chair
aloft.
“Too fast,” I replied, drawing my sword. “Too fast, my friend. Put down
that chair.”
He obeyed with a vengeance and I sprang aside just in time to avoid the
blow. The chair broke to pieces and then I had him at the mercy of my
sword. He was a bully by nature and a coward at heart. He was soon
whimpering in the corner and begging for grace. I directed the girl to
go to her room and get ready to leave. The main part of her luggage was
already aboard the brig and she had left but a few things to take with
her. While she was doing as I bade her, I guarded the innkeeper and
enjoyed the scared replies he made to my continual threats. We soon left
him to shut up the shop alone and went out into the street.
“You can obtain respectable lodging for the night in the house next to
where I am stopping,” I said. “Will you let me take you there?”
A chill breeze was blowing from the sea and as we walked along it cooled
my heated temper. It must have had the same effect upon the girl, for
her tight grip upon my arm gradually relaxed, and by the time we reached
the second street she was walking with her usual alert step.
“Monsieur,” she said after a while, “from your accent you must be
French.”
“Ah, yes, from Paris; but that was many years ago. There is the house I
am taking you to.”
“Indeed,” she said musingly. “I am from Paris, too. Are we so near the
place? I am almost afraid to go to a strange house alone.” We had
stopped beneath one of the occasional lanterns that were hung out from
houses to light the street. “May I know,” she continued, “who has helped
me to-night?”
“My name is Le Bourse.”
“What! What did you say?”
“Michael Le Bourse. Is my name a strange one?”
“Strange?” She caught me by the shoulders and twisted me towards the
light, looking eagerly in my face. “Was I right last night?” she
continued, all of a tremble with excitement. “Is it—can it be?” Then she
threw herself into my arms. “Don’t you know me, Vincie, don’t you know
me?”
I held her from me in the light; then I knew. “Ruth,” I cried. I took
her in my arms and covered her face with kisses. For a moment we had
nothing to say to each other there in the still street under the
solitary lantern. There seemed to be no world outside; only we two: I
and Ruth, for whom I had sought so many years.
“Ruthie,” I kept whispering again and again. “I have found my little
Ruth.”