MAGGIE STONE TAKES MUCH UPON HERSELF
Shortly before midnight, Tom Bent went quietly about the task of waking
both watches and the Beothics. The three boats from Fort Beatrix were
manned, with the muffling oars. The two small anchors by which the
_Heart of the West_ swung in the tide were fished into two of the boats
by hand. It was a tough job; but, when it was accomplished, the ship was
free without so much as a clank of cable or a turn of the noisy capstan.
Hawsers were passed from the small craft over the bows of the ship, and
at a signal from a lantern in Kingswell's hand, the men bent their backs
to the oars. Then all lights aboard the _Heart of the West_ were
covered, and in the darkness, beside the great tiller, Kingswell caught
his inspiration and his reward to his heart again.
The girl did not leave the commander's side, but kept watch on the high
poop-deck throughout the journey. Until dawn the rowers held to their
toil, and after them, drawn by lines that were sometimes taut and
sometimes under water, but always invisible in the darkness, the ship
stole like a shape of cloud and dream. It was hard work, and slow. With
the breaking of dawn, the leviathan took on signs of life. By that time
she was hidden from Wigwam Harbour by more than one bluff headland. The
pulling boats drifted to her bows, the capstan was manned, and the
anchors were lifted to their places on the forecast rail. Headsails were
set, and the square mizzen was run up. The boats dropped astern and were
made fast, and the weary men climbed aboard the ship.
All day the _Heart of the West_ threaded the green waterways of the
great Bay of Exploits. A light and favourable breeze lent itself to the
venture. After the midday meal, Beatrix, wrapped in a blanket, lay down
by the mizzen and fell asleep. She was tired. The easy motion of the
ship, and the song of the wind in ropes and canvas, sank her fathoms
deep in slumber, with the magic of a fairy lullaby. Kingswell rigged a
piece of sail-cloth from the bulwarks to the mast to shade her face from
the sun.
At last the wide estuary, which ends in Gray Goose River, was reached.
By sunset the mouth of the river was entered. Just then the wind
failed. The boats were manned again, and the ship taken in tow.
Still Mistress Westleigh slumbered peacefully, with the rough blanket
about her dainty body and her head pillowed on Kingswell's folded coat.
Kneeling beside her, Kingswell peered under the shelter of canvas, and
saw that she was smiling in her dreams. How white were her dropped
eyelids, and how clear and rose-tinted her small face. Her lips were
parted a little, as if to whisper some sweet secret. A strand of her
bright, dark hair was across her forehead, and one arm, clear of the
blanket and the deerskin on which she lay, rested on the deck. The rosy
palm was upturned. Kingswell stooped lower and kissed it softly.
Standing up, he found Tom Bent beside him. The mahogany-hued mariner
grinned sheepishly, and gave a hitch to his belt.
"Beggin' the lady's pardon," he whispered, "but, if the angels in heaven
be half so sweet to look at as herself, I'm for going to heaven, in
spite o' the devil. Sink me, but I'd play one o' they golden harps with
a light heart if--if the equals of herself were a-listenin' on the
quarter-deck."
Kingswell blushed and smiled. "You, too?" said he. "You are in love, Tom
Bent."
"Ay, sir," replied the boatswain, "for it can't be helped. I'm in love
and awash, and danged near to sinkin'. Might as well expect a man to
keep sober in the 'Powdered Admiral' on Bristol dock as within ten
knots, to win'ward or lee'ard, o' your sweetheart, sir."
"I agree with you," replied the gentleman, bowing gravely.
Tom Bent pulled his scant forelock, and rolled away about his duty. He
was mightily pleased with himself at having expressed his admiration for
his young commander's choice in such felicitous terms. He prided himself
on his eye for feminine beauty, no matter what the race or the rank of
the fair one,--and a fairer than Mistress Westleigh he swore by all the
gods of the Seven Seas he had never laid eyes on.
The long spring twilight was gathering into dusk when the toiling boats
and the tall ship rounded the point, and opened the fort to the view of
the daring cruisers. Directly in front of the stockade the anchors
plunged into the brown current. The rattle of the cables through the
hawse-holes awoke Beatrix. She had been dreaming of a great garden in
Somerset, and of walking along box-hedged paths with her father on one
side and her lover on the other. Opening her eyes upon the canvas
shelter which Kingswell had spread above her, and with the clangour of
the running cables in her ears, for a second she did not know where she
was. A vague fear oppressed her for a little. Then she recalled the
incidents of the last two days, and was about to crawl from her
resting-place, when the edge of the shelter was lifted, and Kingswell
looked down at her.
"Wake up," he said. "We are at the fort, and Trigget and Maggie Stone
are coming off in a canoe."
"Nay, then I'll stay here until you explain matters," she replied. "You
must bear the brunt of Maggie Stone's displeasure for my sake." She sat
up, laughing softly, and lifted her face in a way that only a dunce
could fail to comprehend. Under cover of the strip of sail-cloth, he
kissed the warm lips and the bright hair.
"Trust me," he laughed; and at that moment Trigget and the servant
climbed to the poop by way of the ladder from the ship's waist. He
advanced to meet them. He saw that Trigget held a folded paper in his
hand, and that the honest eyes of that bold mariner were red and moist.
"What is it?" he inquired; for he had entirely forgotten, for the time
being, the manner of Mistress Westleigh's joining with the expedition.
"Here be your will, sir," said Trigget, handing him the paper.
"It--it--well, maybe it'll not be o' any use now."
"Of course not," replied Kingswell, cheerfully, tearing it across.
Maggie Stone burst into tears. "Jus' the way Sir Ralph went," she
sobbed. "Oh, my beautiful little lady--an' her fit mate for any nobleman
of London town!"
"What the devil do you mean?" cried Kingswell. Then the truth dawned in
his preoccupied brain. "Dry your eyes," he said. "She is safe and
sound."
"Thank God for that," exclaimed William Trigget, devoutly.
"What--the mistress be safe, d'ye say?" cried Maggie Stone, with a
sudden change of face.
Kingswell nodded curtly. He did not like being bawled at on the poop of
his recaptured ship, even by an old serving maid. "Your mistress is
safe--and in my care," he said.
"Indeed, sir?" she queried. "An' may I make so bold as to ax when ye
married Sir Ralph Westleigh's daughter?"
William Trigget murmured something to the effect that his presence was
required forward, and took his departure. Kingswell bit his lip and
stared haughtily at the woman; but he was at a loss for words fully
expressive of his feelings. His indignation brought a flush to his
cheeks which even the dusk of evening could not hide.
"Ye may well redden," cried Maggie Stone. "Ay, ye may well redden, after
sailin' away with an unprotected lass, an' near terrifyin' her old nurse
into fits."
The gentleman recovered his power of speech. "My good girl," he said
(and she was a full twenty years older than his mother), "your joy at
hearing of your mistress's safety takes a wondrous queer and unseemly
way of expressing itself. You seem to forget that you, the lady's
servant, are addressing the lady's betrothed husband."
The old maid glared and drew her scanty skirts about her.
"Maybe so," she retorted. "'Twould never have happened in Somerset."
At that moment Mistress Beatrix appeared suddenly from the other side of
the mizzen.
"How dare you!" she cried. "How dare you speak so to Master Kingswell!"
Anger--quick, scathing anger--rang in her voice. Standing there in her
short skirt, high, beaded moccasins, and blue cloth jacket, she looked
like an indignant boy, save for her coiled hair and bright beauty.
"I am ashamed of you," she added; and then, turning quickly, she flung
herself into Kingswell's ever ready embrace.
Maggie Stone was flustered and somewhat awed by the sudden attack. She
had not been spoken to so for years and years. Would she resort to tears
again, or would she answer back? She was jealous of the girl's love for
Kingswell--and yet she had thanked God many times that that love had
been won by the young Englishman instead of by the swarthy D'Antons. She
sniffed, and mopped her eyes with the back of her hand. Then she changed
her mind and bridled.
"What would the countess, your aunt, say to such behaviour?" she asked.
"Her who watched over ye like a guardian angel in London town."
Beatrix turned, and, still holding her lover's hands, faced the carping
critic.
"And who turned me out of her house at the last of it," she cried,
scornfully. "Who is she, or who was she ever, to question my behaviour?
And who are you, woman, to insult your mistress and the gentleman who
saved you from the knives of the savages? Go back to the fort."
Maggie Stone saw that she had made a serious mistake,--a mistake which,
perhaps, would alienate the lady's affection for ever. She turned, a
pitiable figure, and made to descend the steep ladder which stood close
to the starboard side of the ship, and led to the waist. Her foot caught
in a loop of rope that had not been properly stopped up to its
belaying-pin. She lurched against the line that ran from the break of
the poop to the bulwarks below, made a blind effort to right herself,
and pitched over into the shadowed water below. She did not even scream.
Kingswell dropped his sweetheart's hands, ran to the side and jumped
after the foolish old woman. By that time the twilight had left the
river. The current carried him swiftly down-stream, close under the side
of the ship. The water was uncomfortably cold, and his thick clothes
dragged at his limbs. He cleared his hair from his eyes. A disturbance
appeared on the surface of the stream a few yards ahead. With a quick
stroke or two, he reached it, and caught Maggie Stone by a thin
shoulder. She struggled desperately, mad with fright. Both were pulled
over the gunwale of the _Pelican_ not a moment too soon.