EXIT CAPTAIN TOM
When they returned to the deck the boat was preparing to continue her
journey. The fruit vendors--and with what delicious fruit the Guernsey
men board the Jersey boats!--were preparing to take their leave, and
those passengers who had gone to stretch their legs with a saunter on
the jetty were returning to the steamer.
The rest of the voyage was uneventful. Jersey is not very far away
from Guernsey, and for a considerable part of the distance the
passengers were in sight of land. The breeze began to freshen, and as
they steamed round Jersey towards St. Heliers it began to dawn upon
not a few that enough of this sort of thing was as good as a feast.
There is such a very striking difference between steaming over a
tranquil sea and being tossed and tumbled among boisterous waves. It
was fortunate they were so near their journey's end. Several of the
travellers were congratulating themselves that, when they reached dry
land, they would be able to boast that they had voyaged from
Southampton to Jersey without experiencing a single qualm. Had the
journey been prolonged much further, that boast would have been
cruelly knocked on the head. When they drew up beside the pier at St.
Heliers, coming events, as it were, had already cast their shadows
before. They were saved just in the nick of time.
Bertie and the captain were among the first on shore; and, not
unnaturally, the young gentleman supposed that their journeying was at
an end. But he was wrong.
"Step out! We have no time to lose! We have to catch another boat,
which is due to start."
Bertie stepped out. He wondered if the other boat was to take them
back to England. Did the captain mean to pass the rest of his life in
voyaging to and fro?
The disappointed flymen, to whom the arrival of the mail-boat is the
great event of the St. Heliers day, let them pass. The hotel and
boarding-house touters touted, so far as they were concerned, in vain.
The captain gave no heed to their solicitations. He evidently knew his
way about, for he walked quickly down the jetty, turned unhesitatingly
to the left when he reached the bottom, crossed the harbour, and down
the jetty again upon the other side. About half-way down was a fussy
little steamer which was making ready to start.
"Here you are! Jump on board!"
If Bertie did not exactly jump, he at any rate got on board.
What the boat was Bertie knew not, nor whither it was going. Compared
to the _Ella_, which they had just quitted, it was so small a craft
that he scarcely thought it could be going back the way the mail had
come.
As a matter of fact it was not.
Two or three times a week a fussy little steamer passes to and fro
between Jersey and France. The two French ports at which it touches
are St. Malo and St. Brieuc. One journey it takes to St. Malo, the
next to St. Brieuc. On this occasion it was about to voyage to St.
Brieuc.
St. Brieuc, as some people may not know, is the chief town of the
department of Cotes-du-Nord, in Brittany--about as unpretending a
chief town as one could find. That Captain Loftus had some
preconceived end in view, and had not started on a wild-goose chase,
not, as might have at first appeared, going hither and thither as his
fancy swayed him, seemed plain.
A more roundabout route to France he could scarcely have chosen. Had
he simply desired to reach the Continent, fast steamers which passed
from Southampton to Havre in little less than half the time which the
journey had already occupied, were at his disposal. Very many people,
some of them constant travellers, are ignorant of the fact that a
little steamer is constantly plying between Jersey and Brittany. It is
dependent on the tides for its time of departure. Only in the local
papers are the hours advertised. Captain Loftus must have been pretty
well posted on the matter to have been aware that on this particular
day the little steamer, _La Commerce_, would be starting for St.
Brieuc about the time the mail-boat entered Jersey.
He must have had some particular object in making for that remote
corner of Breton France. No sooner did the boat enter the little
harbour than he made a dash for the railway station.
Bertie seemed to have passed into another world. He had not the
faintest notion where he was. He was not even sure that they had
reached Jersey. He heard strange tongues sounding in his ears; saw
strange costumes before his eyes. In his then state of bewilderment he
would have been quite ready to believe anybody who might have chosen
to tell him that he had arrived in Timbuctoo.
Some light was thrown upon the subject when they reached the station.
The captain took some money out of his pocket and held it out to
Bertie.
"Go and ask for the tickets," he said.
Bertie stared. If he had been told to go and ask the man in the moon
for a lock of his hair he could not have been more puzzled.
"Do you hear what I say? Go and ask for the tickets."
"Tickets? Where for?"
The captain hesitated a moment, then said:
"Two first-class tickets for Constantinople."
He handed Bertie some silver coins.
"Two first-class tickets for Constantinople."
Bertie stammeringly repeated the words. Could the captain be in
earnest?
"I want to catch the train; look alive, or----"
The captain touched the pocket where the revolver was.
Bertie doubtfully advanced to the booking office, gazing behind him as
he went to make quite sure that the captain had meant what he said.
There was an old lady taking tickets, so he waited his turn.
"Two first-class tickets for Constantinople."
"_Comment?_"
He stared at the booking-clerk, and the booking-clerk stared at him,
each in complete ignorance of what the other meant.
"Do you mean to say you can't speak French?"
The captain came to the rescue, speaking so gently that his words were
only audible to Bertie's ears.
"No--o."
"Do you mean to say you don't know enough to be able to ask for two
first-class tickets for Constantinople?"
"No--o."
"How much French do you know?"
"No--one."
The captain evidently knew a great deal, for he immediately addressed
the booking-clerk in fluent French--French which that official
understood, for two tickets were at once forthcoming. But whether they
were for Constantinople, or for Jericho, or for Kamtchatka, was more
than the boy could tell. He was in the pleasant position of not being
able to understand a word that was said; of being without the faintest
notion where he was, and of not having the least idea where he was
going to.
It may be mentioned, however, that the captain had not asked for
tickets for Constantinople--which at St. Brieuc he would have
experienced some difficulty in getting--but for Brest.
They had not long to wait before the through train from Paris entered
the station. They got into a first-class carriage, which they had for
themselves, and in due time they were off.
The state of Bertie's mind was easier imagined than described. He had
been in a dream since he had started on his journey to the Land of
Golden Dreams; and dreams have a tendency to become more and more
incoherent.
His adventures up to the time of leaving London had been strange
enough, but he had at least known in what part of the world he was.
Now he was not possessed of even that rudimentary knowledge. The
continued travelling towards an unknown destination, the unresting
onward rush, as though the captain meant, like the brook, to "go on
for ever"--and this in the case of a boy who had never travelled more
than twenty miles from home in his life--had in itself been enough to
confuse him; but the sudden discovery that he was in an unknown
country, in which they spoke an unknown tongue, put the climax to his
mental muddle. Had the captain, revolver in hand, then and there
insisted on his informing him which part of his body as a rule was
uppermost, he would have been wholly at a loss to state whether it was
on his head or heels he was accustomed to stand.
Something strange, too, about the railway carriage, about the country
through which they passed, about the people and the very houses he saw
through the carriage window made his muddle more.
The names of the roadside stations at which they stopped, which were
shouted out with stentorian lungs, were such oddities. They came to
one where the word "Guingamp" was painted in huge letters on a large
white board. Guingamp! What was the pronunciation of such a word as
that? And fancy living at a town with such a name! He was not aware
that, like a conjurer's trick, it was only a question of knowing how
it was done, and Guingamp would come as glibly to his tongue as Slough
or Upton.
And then Belle-Isle-en-Terre and Plouigneau--what names! The
educational system which flourished at Mecklemburg House had tended to
make French an even stranger tongue than it need have done. He saw the
letters on the boards, but he could no more pronounce the words which
they were supposed to form than he could fly.
Throughout the long journey--and it is a long journey from St. Brieuc
to Brest--not a word had been exchanged. The captain had scarcely
moved. He had stretched his legs out on the seat, and had taken up the
easiest position which was attainable under the circumstances; but he
had not closed his eyes. Bertie wondered if he never slept; if those
fierce black eyes remained always on the watch.
The captain looked straight in front of him; and, although he seemed
to pay no heed to what the boy was doing, Bertie was conscious that he
never moved without the captain knowing it. What a life this man must
lead, to be ever on the watch; to be ever fearful that the time of the
avenger had come at last; that the prison gates were about to close on
him, and, perhaps, this time for ever.
"Uncle Tom" seemed to be as much at home in Brest as he had been
everywhere. The station was filled with the usual crowd. Porters
advanced to offer their services to carry the Gladstone bag and place
it on a cab, outside the cabmen hailed them in the hope of a fare; but
the captain, paying no heed to any of them, marched quickly on.
Were they at their journey's end? Bertie wondered. Was this
Constantinople, or had they another stage to go? If not
Constantinople, and he had a vague idea that Constantinople could not
be reached quite so quickly as they had come--what place was it?
What struck him chiefly as they passed into the town was the number of
men in uniform there seemed to be about. Every third person they met
seemed to wear a uniform. He supposed they were soldiers, though he
had never seen soldiers dressed like these before; and then what a
number of them there were! Geography is not a strong point of the
English education system, and he had never been taught at Mecklemburg
House that Brest was to France much more than Portsmouth is to
England, and that its population consists of four classes, soldiers,
sailors, dockyard labourers--looking at all those, of whatever grade,
who labour in the dockyard in the light of labourers--and, a long way
behind the other three, civilians: "civilians" being a generic name
for that--regarded from a Brest point of view--absolutely
insignificant class who have no direct connection with war or making
ready for war.
On their arrival the day was well advanced, and as they went down the
Rue de Siam they met the men returning from the yards. Bertie had
never seen such a sight before, not even in the course of his present
adventures. The Rue de Siam runs down the hill. The dockyards are at
the foot. From where they stood, as far as the eye could reach,
advanced a dense mass of dirt-grimed men. They were the Government
employes, employed by France to make engines and ships of war, and as
the seemingly never-ending stream went past he actually moved closer
to the captain with a vague idea that he might--think of it, ye
heroes!--need _his_ protection; for it seemed to the lad that, taken
in the mass, he had never seen a more repulsive-looking set of
gentlemen even in his dreams.
The captain went straight down to the bridge; then he paused, seeming
to hesitate a moment, then turned to the right, striking into what
seemed very much like a nest of rookeries. They came to an ancient,
disreputable-looking inn. This they entered; and as they did so
Bertie's memory suddenly travelled back to the Kingston inn, into
which he had been enticed by the Original Badger. The two houses were
about on a par.
Apparently the establishment was not accustomed to receive guests of
their distinguished appearance--though Bertie was shabby enough--for
the aged crone who received them was evidently bent double by her
sense of the honour which was paid to the house.
She and the captain carried on a voluble conversation, though, for all
that Bertie understood of what they said, they might as well have held
their peace. He remained standing in the centre of the brick floor,
shuffling from foot to foot, feeling and looking as much out of place
as though he had been suddenly dropped into the middle of China.
Gabble, gabble went the old crone's tongue, wiggle-waggle went her
picturesque white cap--the only picturesque thing there was about
her--up and down went her arms and hands. She was the personification
of volubility, but unfortunately she might have been dumb for any
meaning which her words conveyed to Bertie.
Yet, incomprehensible as her speech might be and was, he could not rid
himself of an impression, derived from her manner to the captain, and
the captain's manner to her, that they two had met before, and that,
in fact, they knew each other very well indeed. But neither then nor
at any other time did he get beyond impression.
Certainly her after-conduct was not of a kind to show that, even if
she knew the gentleman, she had much faith in his integrity, unless,
as was possible, the understanding between the two was of a very deep
and subtle kind indeed.
She showed the new arrivals up a flight of rickety stairs, into a room
in which there were two beds of a somewhat better sort than might have
been expected. Some attempt had also been made to fit the room up
after the French fashion, so that it might serve as sitting-room as
well as bedroom. There was a table in the centre, and the apartment
also contained two or three rush-bottomed chairs.
The old crone, having shown them in, said something to the captain and
disappeared. The man and the boy were left alone. They had not spoken
to each other since they had left St. Brieuc, and there was not much
spoken now.
"You can take your hat off and sit down. We shall sleep here to-night."
So at any rate they had reached a temporary resting-place at last;
their journey was not to be quite unceasing. It was only the night
before they had left London, but it seemed to Bertie that it was a
year ago.
He did as he was bid--took his hat off and sat on a chair. The captain
sat down also, seating himself on one chair and putting his feet upon
another. Not a word was spoken; they simply sat and waited, perhaps
twenty minutes.
Bertie wondered what they were waiting for, but the reappearance of
the crone with a coarse white tablecloth shed light upon the matter.
They had been waiting while a meal was being prepared.
The prospect revived his spirits. He had not tasted food since they
had left the _Ella_, and his appetite was always hale and hearty. But
he was thrown into the deepest agitation by a remark which the crone
addressed to him. He had not the faintest notion what it was she said;
but the mere fact of being addressed in a foreign and therefore
unknown tongue made him feel quite ill.
The captain did not improve the matter.
"Why don't you answer the woman?"
"I don't know what she says."
"Are you acting, or is it real?"
Bertie only wished that he had been acting, and that his ignorance had
not been real. At Mecklemburg House the idea of learning French had
seemed to him absurd, an altogether frivolous waste of time. What
would he not have given then--and still more, what would he not have
given a little later on--to have made better use of his opportunities
when he had them? Circumstances alter cases.
The captain looked at him for a moment or two with his fierce black
eyes; then he said something to the old woman which made her laugh.
Not a pleasant laugh by any means, and it did not add to Bertie's
sense of comfort that such a laugh was being laughed at him.
"Sit up to the table!"
The old woman had laid the table, and had then disappeared to fetch
the food to put before her guests. Bertie sat up. The meal appeared.
Not by any means a bad one--better, like the room itself, than might
have been expected.
When they had finished, and the old crone had cleared the things away,
the captain stood up and lighted a cigar.
"Now, my lad, you'd better tumble into bed. I've a strong belief in
the virtue of early hours. There's nothing like sleep for boys, even
for those with a turn for humour."
Bertie had not himself a taste for early hours as a rule--it may be
even questioned if the captain had--but he was ready enough for bed
just then, and he had scarcely got between the sheets before he was
asleep. But what surprised him was to see the captain prepare himself
for bed as well. Bertie had one bed, the captain the other. The lights
were put out; and at an unusually early hour silence reigned.
Perhaps the journey had fatigued the man as much as the boy. It is
beyond question that the captain was asleep almost as soon as Bertie
was.
But he did not sleep quite so long.
While it was yet dark he got up, and, having lit a candle, looked at
his watch. Then he dressed very quietly, making not the slightest
noise. He took his revolver from underneath his pillow, and replaced
it in the top pocket of his overcoat. He also took from underneath his
pillow a leathern case. He opened it. It contained a necklace of
wondrous beauty, formed of diamonds of uncommon brilliancy and size.
His great black eyes sparkled at the precious stones, and the precious
stones sparkled back at him.
It was that necklace which had once belonged to the Countess of
Ferndale, and which, according to Mr. Rosenheim, had cost more than
twenty thousand pounds. The captain reclosed the leathern case, and
put it in the same pocket which contained his revolver.
Then, being fully dressed, even to his hat and boots, he crossed the
room and looked at Bertie. The boy was fast asleep.
"The young beggar's smiling again."
The young beggar was; perhaps he was again dreaming of his mother.
The captain took his Gladstone bag and crept on tiptoe down the
stairs. Curiously enough the front door was unbarred, so that it was
not long before he was standing in the street. Then, having lighted,
not a cigar this time, but a pipe, he started at a pace considerably
over four miles an hour, straight off through the country lanes, to
Landerneau. He must have had a complete knowledge of the country to
have performed that feat, for Landerneau is at a distance of not less
than fifteen miles from Brest; and in spite of the darkness which
prevailed, at any rate when he started, he turned aside from the high
road, and selected those by-paths which only a native of the country
as a rule knows well.
Landerneau is a junction on the line which runs to Nantes. He caught
the first train to that great seaport, and that afternoon he boarded,
at St. Nazaire, a steamer which was bound for the United States of
America, and by night he was far away on the high seas.
Henceforward he disappears from the pages of this story. He had laid
his plans well. He had destroyed the trail, and the only witness of
his crime whom he had any cause to fear he had left penniless in the
most rabid town in France, where any Englishman who is penniless, and
unable to speak any language but his own, was not likely to receive
much consideration from the inhabitants.