Captain Lawrence spent the day at the Point, thoroughly enjoying a long
gossip, and, after an early dinner, proposed a walk around the grounds
and a look at the river and the pool.
"What a lovely spot it is!" he said, as he wandered about the side of
the combe. "I must have such a place as this when I give up the sea."
"There isn't such a place, Jack," said Captain Revel proudly. "But I
want you to look round the pool.--I don't think I'll climb down, Nic.
It's rather hot; and I'll sit down on the stone for a few minutes while
you two plan where you could ambush the men."
"Right," said Captain Lawrence; and he actively followed Nic, pausing
here and there, till they had descended to where the fall just splashed
gently down into the clear pool, whose bigger stones about the bottom
were now half-bare.
"Lovely place this, Nic, my boy. I could sit down here and doze away
the rest of my days. But what a pity it is that your father worries
himself so about these poaching scoundrels! Can't you wean him from it?
Tell him, or I will, that it isn't worth the trouble. Plenty more fish
will come, and there must be a little grit in every one's wheel."
"Oh, I've tried everything, sir," replied Nic. "The fact is that he is
not so well as I should like to see him; and when he has an irritable
fit, the idea of any one trespassing and taking the fish half-maddens
him."
"Well, we must see what we can do, my boy. It ought to be stopped. A
set of idlers like this requires a severe lesson. A good dose of
capstan bar and some broken heads will sicken them, and then perhaps
they will let you alone."
"I hope so, sir."
"I think I can contrive that it shall," said the visitor dryly. "I
shall bring or send some trusty men. There, I have seen all I want to
see. Let's get back."
He turned to climb up the side of the gorge; and as Nic followed, the
place made him recall his encounter with Pete Burge, and how different
the pool looked then; and, somehow, he could not help hoping that the
big, bluff fellow might not be present during the sharp encounter with
Captain Lawrence's trusty men.
"Hah! Began to think you long, Jack," said Captain Revel; and they
returned to the house and entered, after a glance seaward, where the
ship lay at anchor.
Towards evening Solly was sent to hoist a signal upon the flagstaff, and
soon after a boat was seen pulling towards the shore. Then the visitor
took his leave, renewing his promise to reply to a signal by sending a
strong party of men.
Nic walked down to the boat with his father's friend, and answered
several questions about the type of men who came after the salmon.
"I see, I see," said Captain Lawrence; "but do you think they'll fight
well?"
"Oh yes; there are some daring rascals among them."
"So much the better, my dear boy. There, good-bye. Mind--two small
flags on your signal-halyards after the first heavy rain upon the moor,
and you may expect us at dusk. If the rascals don't come we'll have
another try; but you'll know whether they'll be there by the fish in the
pool. They'll know too--trust 'em. Look, there's your father watching
us--" and he waved his hand. "Good-bye, Nic, my dear boy. Good-bye!"
He shook hands very warmly. Two of his men who were ashore joined hands
to make what children call a "dandy-chair," the Captain placed his hands
upon their shoulders, and they waded through the shallow water to the
boat, pausing to give her a shove off before climbing in; and then, as
the oars made the water flash in the evening light, Nic climbed the long
hill again, to stand with his father, watching the boat till she reached
the side of the ship.
"Now then, my boy," said the old man, "we're going to give those fellows
such a lesson as they have never had before."
He little knew how truly he was speaking.
"I hope so, father," said Nic; and he was delighted to find how pleased
the old officer seemed.
The next morning, when Nic opened his bedroom window, the king's ship
was not in sight; and for a week Captain Revel was fidgeting and
watching the sky, for no rain came, and there was not water enough in
the river for fresh salmon to come as far as the pool.
"Did you ever see anything like it, Nic, my boy?" the Captain said again
and again; "that's always the way: if I didn't want it to rain, there'd
be a big storm up in the hills, and the fall would be roaring like a
sou'-wester off the Land's End; but now I want just enough water to fill
the river, not a drop will come. How long did Jack Lawrence say that he
was going to stop about Plymouth?"
"He didn't say, father, that I remember," replied Nic. "Then he'll soon
be off; and just in the miserable, cantankerous way in which things
happen, the very day he sets sail there'll be a storm on Dartmoor, and
the next morning the pool will be full of salmon, and those scoundrels
will come to set me at defiance, and clear off every fish."
"I say, father," said Nic merrily, "isn't that making troubles, and
fancying storms before they come?"
"What, sir? How dare you speak to me like that?" cried the
Captain.--"And you, Solly, you mutinous scoundrel, how dare you laugh?"
he roared, turning to his body-servant, who happened to be in the hail.
"Beg your honour's pardon; I didn't laugh."
"You did laugh, sir," roared the Captain--"that is, I saw you look at
Master Nic here and smile. It's outrageous. Every one is turning
against me, and I'm beginning to think it's time I was out of this
miserable world."
He snatched up his stick from the stand, banged on the old straw hat he
wore, and stamped out of the porch to turn away to the left, leaving Nic
hesitating as to what he should do, deeply grieved as he was at his
father's annoyance and display of temper. One moment he was for
following and trying to say something which would tend to calm the
irritation. The next he was thinking it would be best to leave the old
man to himself, trusting to the walk in the pleasant grounds having the
desired result.
But this idea was knocked over directly by Solly, who had followed his
master to the porch, and stood watching him for a few moments.
"Oh dear, dear! Master Nic," he cried, turning back, "he's gone down
the combe path to see whether there's any more water running down; and
there aren't, and he'll be a-wherriting his werry inside out, and that
wherrits mine too. For I can't abear to see the poor old skipper like
this here."
"No, Solly, neither can I," said Nic gloomily.
"It's his old hurts does it, sir. It aren't nat'ral. Here he is laid
up, as you may say, in clover, in as nice a place as an old sailor could
end his days in."
"Yes, Solly," said Nic sadly; "it is a beautiful old place."
"Ay, it is, sir; and when I cons it over I feel it. Why, Master Nic,
when I think of all the real trouble as there is in life, and what some
folks has to go through, I asks myself what I've ever done to have such
good luck as to be safely moored here in such a harbour. It's a lovely
home, and the troubles is nothing--on'y a bit of a gale blowed by the
skipper now and then along of the wrong boots as hurts his corns, or him
being a-carrying on too much sail, and bustin' off a button in a hurry.
And who minds that?"
"Ah! who minds a trifle like that, Solly?" sighed Nic. "Well, sir, you
see he does. Wind gets up directly, and he talks to me as if I'd
mutinied. But I don't mind. I know all the time that he's the best and
bravest skipper as ever lived, and I'd do anything for him to save him
from trouble."
"I know you would, Solly," said Nic, laying a hand upon the rugged old
sailor's shoulder.
"Thank ye, Master Nic; that does a man good. But look here, sir; I
can't help saying it. The fact is, after his rough, stormy life,
everything here's made too easy for the skipper. He's a bit worried by
his old wounds, and that's all; and consekens is 'cause he aren't got no
real troubles he wherrits himself and makes quakers."
"Makes quakers?" said Nic wonderingly.
"Sham troubles, Master Nic--wooden guns, as we call quakers out at sea
or in a fort. Strikes me, sir, as a real, downright, good, gen-u-wine
trouble, such as losing all his money, would be the making of the
Captain; and after that he'd be ready to laugh at losing a few salmon as
he don't want. I say, Master Nic, you aren't offended at me for making
so bold?"
"No, Solly, no," said the young man sadly. "You mean well, I know.
There, say no more about it. I hope all this will settle itself, as so
many troubles do."
Nic strolled out into the grounds and unconsciously followed his father,
who had gone to the edge of the combe; but he had not walked far before
a cheery hail saluted his ears, and, to his great delight, he found the
Captain looking radiant.
"Nic, my boy, it's all right," he cried; "my left arm aches terribly and
my corns are shooting like mad. Well, what are you staring at? Don't
you see it means rain? Look yonder, too. Bah! It's of no use to tell
you, boy. You've never been to sea. You've never had to keep your
weather-eye open. See that bit of silvery cloud yonder over Rigdon Tor?
And do you notice what a peculiar gleam there is in the air, and how
the flies bite?"
"Yes--yes, I see all that, father."
"Well, it's rain coming, my boy. There's going to be a thunderstorm up
in the hills before many hours are past. I'm not a clever man, but I
can tell what the weather's going to be as well as most folk."
"I'm glad of it, father, if it will please you."
"Please me, boy? I shall be delighted. To-morrow morning the salmon
will be running up the river again, and we may hoist the signal for
help. I say, you don't think Jack Lawrence has gone yet?"
"No, father," said Nic; "I do not."
"Why, Nic?--why?" cried the old sailor.
"Because he said to me he should certainly come up and see us again
before he went."
"To be sure; so he did to me, Nic. I say, my boy, I--that is--er--
wasn't I a little bit crusty this morning to you and poor old William
Solly?"
"Well, yes; just a little, father," said Nic, taking his arm.
"Sorry for it. Change of the weather, Nic, affects me. It was coming
on. I must apologise to Solly. Grand old fellow, William Solly. Saved
my life over and over again. Man who would die for his master, Nic; and
a man who would do that is more than a servant, Nic--he is a friend."