III.

We pass to a Saturday morning, two years later, and to William Geake's

cottage at the western end of Gantick village.

Naomi had plucked three fowls and trussed them, and wrapping each in a

white napkin, had packed them in her basket with a dozen and a half of

eggs, a few pats of butter, and a nosegay or two of

garden-flowers--Sweet Williams, marigolds, and heart's-ease: for it was

market-day at Tregarrick. Then she put on boots and shawl, tied her

bonnet, and slung a second pair of boots across her arm: for the roads

were heavy and she would leave the muddy pair with a friend who lived at

the entrance of the town, not choosing to appear untidy as she walked up

the Fore Street. These arrangements made, she went to seek her husband,

who was busy planing a coffin-lid in the workshop behind the cottage,

and ruminating upon to-morrow's sermon.

"You'll be about startin'," he said, lifting his head and pushing his

spectacles up over his eye-brows.

Naomi set her basket down on his work-table, and drew her breath back

between her teeth--which is the Cornish mode of saying "Yes." "I want

you to make me a couple of skivers," she said. "Aun' Hambly sent over

word she'd a brace o' chicken for me to sell, an' I was to call for

'em: an' I'd be ashamed to sell a fowl the way she skivers it."

William set down his plane, picked up an odd scrap of wood and cut out

the skewers with his pocket-knife; while Naomi watched with a smile

on her face. Whether or no William had recovered her soul, as he

promised, she had certainly given her heart into his keeping. The love

of such a widow, he found, is as the surrender of a maid, with wisdom

added.

The skewers finished, he walked out through the house with her and

down the garden-path, carrying the basket as far as the gate. The

scent of pine-shavings came with him. Half-way down the path Naomi

turned aside and picking a sprig of Boy's Love, held it up for him

to smell. The action was trivial, but as he took the sprig they both

laughed, looking in each other's eyes. Then they kissed; and the staid

woman went her way down the road, while the staid man loitered for a

moment by the gate and watched her as she went.

Now as he took his eyes away and glanced for an instant in the other

direction, he was aware of a man who had just come round the angle of

the garden hedge and, standing in the middle of the road, not a dozen

yards off, was also staring after his wife.

This stranger was a broad-shouldered fellow in a suit of blue seaman's

cloth, the trousers of which were tucked inside a pair of Wellington

boots. His complexion was brown as a nut, and he wore rings in his

ears: but the features were British enough. A perplexed, ingratiating

and rather silly smile overspread them.

The two men regarded each other for a bit, and then the stranger drew

nearer.

"I do believe that was Na'mi," he said, nodding his head after the

woman's figure, that had not yet passed out of sight.

William Geake opened his eyes wide and answered curtly, "Yes: that's

my wife--Naomi Geake. What then?"

The man scratched his head, contemplating William as he might some

illegible sign-post set up at an unusually bothersome cross-road.

"She keeps very han'some, I will say." His smile grew still more

ingratiating.

"Was you wishin' to speak wi' her?"

"Well, there! I was an' yet I wasn't. 'Tis terrible puzzlin'. You

don't know me, I dessay."

"No, I don't."

"I be called Abe Bricknell--A-bra-ham Bricknell. I used to be

Na'mi's husband, one time. There now"--with an accent of genuine

contrition--"I felt sure 'twould put you out."

The tongue grew dry in William Geake's mouth, and the sunlight died

off the road before him. He stared at a blister in the green paint of

the garden-gate and began to peel it away slowly with his thumb-nail:

then, pulling out his handkerchief, picked away at the paint that had

lodged under the nail, very carefully, while he fought for speech.

"I be altered a brave bit," said Naomi's first husband, still with his

silly smile.

"Come into th' house," William managed to say at last; and turning,

led the way to the door. On his way he caught himself wondering why

the hum of the bees had never sounded so loudly in the garden before:

and this was all he could think about till he reached the doorstep.

Then he turned.

"Th' Lord's ways be past findin' out," he said, passing a hand over

his eyes.

"That's so: that's what _I_ say mysel'," the other assented

cheerfully, as if glad to find their wits jumping together.

"Man!" William rounded on him fiercely. "What's kept 'ee, all these

years? Aw, man, man! do 'ee know what you've done?"

"I'd a sun-stroke," said the wanderer, tapping his head and still

wearing his deprecatory smile; "a very bad sun-stroke. I sailed in the

_John S. Hancock_. I dessay Na'mi told you about that, eh?"

"Get on wi' your tale."

"Pete Hancock was cap'n. The vessel was called after his uncle, you

know, an' the Hancocks had a-bought up most o' the shares in her.

That's how Pete came to be cap'n. We sailed on a Friday--unlucky, I've

heard that is. But Pete said them that laid th' Atlantic cable had

started that day an' broke the spell. Pete had a lot o' tales, but he

made a poor cap'n; no head."

"Look here," put in "William with desperate calm," I don't want to

know about Peter Hancock."

"There's not much to know if you did. He made a very poor cap'n,

though it don't become one to say so, now he's gone. An affectionate

man, though, for all his short-comin's. The last time he brought his

vessel home from New Orleans he was in that pore to get back to his

wife an' childer, he ripped along the Gulf Stream and pretty well

ribbed the keelson out of her. Thought, I reckon, that since all the

shareholders belonged to his family th' expense wouldn' be grudged.

But I guess it made her tender. That's how she came to go down so

suddent."

"She foundered?"

"I'm comin' to that. We'd just run our nose into the tropics an' was

headin' down for Kingston Harbour--slippin' along at five knots easy

an' steady, an' not a sign of trouble. The time, so far as I can tell,

was somewhere near five bells in the middle watch. I'd turned in,

leavin' Pete on deck, an' was fast asleep; when all of a suddent a

great jolt sent me flyin' out o' the berth. As soon as I got my legs

an' wits again I was up on deck, and already the barque was settlin'

by the head like a burst crock. She'd crushed her breastbone in on a

sunken tramp of a derelict--a dismasted water-logged lump, that maybe

had been washin' about the Atlantic for twenty year' an' more before

her app'inted time came to drift across our fair-way an' settle the

hash o' the _John S. Hancock_. Sir, I reckon she went down inside o'

five minutes. We'd but bare time to get out one boat and push clear

o' the whirl of her. All hands jumped in; she was but a sixteen foot

boat, an' we loaded her down to the gun'l a'most. There was a brave

star-shine, but no moon. Cruel things happen 'pon the sea."

He passed a hand over his eyes, as if to brush off the film his

sufferings had drawn across them. Then he pursued:

"Cruel things happen 'pon the sea. We'd no food nor drink but a tin o'

preserved pears; Lord knows how that got there; but 'twas soon done.

Pete had a small compass, a gimcrack affair hangin' to his watch-chain,

an' we pulled by it west-sou'-west towards the nighest land, which we

made out must be some one or another o' the Leeward Islands; but 'twas

more to keep ourselves busy than for aught else: the boat was so low in

the water that even with the Trade to help us, we made but a mile an

hour, an' had to be balin' all day and all night. The third day, as the

sun grew hot, two o' the men went mad. We had to pitch 'em overboard an'

beat 'em off wi' the oars till they drowned: else they'd ha' sunk the

boat. This seemed to hang on Pete's mind, in a way. All the next night

he talked light-headed; said he could hear the dead men hailin' their

names. About midnight he jumped after 'em--to fetch 'em, he said--an'

was drowned. He took his compass with him, but that didn't make much

odds. The boat was lighter now, an' we hadn' to bale. Pretty soon I got

too weak to notice how the men went. I was lyin' wi' my head under the

stern sheets an' only pulled mysel' up, now an' then, to peer out over

the gun'l. I s'pose 'twas the splashes as the men went over that made me

do this. I don't know for certain. There was sharks about: cruel things

happen 'pon the sea. The boat was in a gashly cauch of blood too. One

chap--Jeff Tresawna it was: his mother lived over to Looe--had tried to

open a vein, to drink, an' had made a mess o't an' bled to death. Far as

I know there was no fightin' to eat one another, same as one hears tell

of now an' then. The men just went mad and jumped like sheep: 'twas a

reg'lar disease. Two would go quick, one atop of t'other; an' then

there'd be a long stillness, an' then a yellin' again an' two more

splashes, maybe three. All through it I was dozin', off an' on; an' I

reckon these things got mixed up an' repeated in my head: for our crew

was only sixteen all told, an' it seemed to me I'd heard scores go over.

Anyway I opened my eyes at last--night it was, an' all the stars

blazin'--an' the boat was empty all except me an' Jeff Tresawna, him

that had bled to death. He was lying up high in the bows, wi' his legs

stretched Out towards me along the bottom-boards. There was a twinkle o'

dew 'pon the thwarts an' gun'l, an' I managed to suck my shirt-sleeve,

that was wringin' wet, an' dropped off dozin' again belike. The nex'

thing I minded was a sort o' dream that I was home to Carne again, over

Pendower beach--that's where my father an' mother lived. I heard the

breakers quite plain. The sound of 'em woke me up. This was a little

after daybreak. The sound kept on after I'd opened my eyes, though not

so loud. I took another suck at my shirt-sleeve an' pulled myself up to

my knees by the thwart an' looked over. 'Twas the sound o' broken water,

sure enough, that I'd been hearing; an' 'twas breakin' round half a

dozen small islands, to leeward, between me an' the horizon. I call 'em

islands; but they was just rocks stickin' up from the sea, and birds on

'em in plenty; but otherwise, if you'll excuse the liberty, as bare as

the top o' your head."

Geake nodded gravely, with set face.

"I've heard since," went on the seaman, "that these were bits, so to

say, belongin' to the Leeward Islands, about eighty miles sou'west o'

St. Kitt's. Our boat must ha' driven past St. Kitt's, but just out o'

sight; or perhaps we'd passed a peep of it in the night-time. Well, as

you'll be guessin' the boat was pretty nigh to one o' these islands,

or I shouldn' ha' heard the wash. Half a mile off it was, I dessay,

an' a pretty big wash. This was caused by the current, no doubt, for

the wind was nex' to nothin', an' no swell around the boat. What's

more, the current was takin' us, broadside on, pretty well straight

for the rocks. There was no rudder an' only one oar left i' the boat;

an' that was broke off short at the blade. But I managed to slip it

over the starn an' made shift to keep her head straight. Her nose went

bump on the shore, an' then she swung round an' went drivin' past: me

not havin' strength left to put out a hand, much less to catch hold

an' stop the way on us. We might ha' driven past an' off to sea again,

if it hadn' been for a spit o' rock that reached out ahead. This

brought us up short, an' there we lay an' bump'd for a bit. I dessay

it took me half an hour to get out over the side: an' all the time I

kept hold o' the broken oar. I dunno why I did this: but it saved my

life afterwards. Hav'ee got such a thing as a drop o' cider in the

house?"

"We go upon temperance principles here," said Geake. He rose and

brought a jug of water and a glass.

"That'll do," said the wanderer, and helped himself. "Na'mi used to

take a glass o' beer wi' her meals, I remember. Well, as I was agoin'

to tell you, havin' got out o' the boat, I'd just sense enough left to

clamber up above high-water mark, an' there I sat starin' stupid-like

an' wonderin' how I'd done it. Down below, the boat was heavin' i' the

wash an' joltin' 'pon the rocks, an' I watched her--bump, bump, up an'

down, up an' down--wi' Jeff jamm'd by the shoulders i' the bows, and

glazin' up at me wi' a silly blank face, like as if he couldn' make it

all out. As the tide rose him up nearer, I crawled away further up.

Seemed to me he an' the boat was after me like a sick dream, an' I

grinned every time the timbers gave an extry loud crack. At last her

bottom was stove, an' she filled very quiet an' went down. The wind

was fresher by this an' some heavy clouds comin' up. Then it rained.

I don't rightly know if this was the same day or no: can't fit in the

days an' nights. But it rained heavy. There was a quill-feather lyin'

close by my hand--the rock was strewed wi' feathers an' the birds'

droppin's--an' with it I tried to get at the rain-water that was

caught in the crannies o' the rocks. While I was searchin' about I

came across an egg. It was stinkin', but I ate it. After that, feelin'

a bit stronger, I'd a mind to fix up the oar for a mark, in case any

vessel passed near an' me asleep or too weak to make a signal. I found

a handy chink i' the rock to plant it in, an' a rovin' pain I had in

my stomach while I was fixin' it. That was the egg, I dessay. An' my

head in a maze, too: but I'd sense enough to think now what a fool

I was not to have took Jeff's shirt off'n, to serve me for a flag.

Hows'ever, my own bein' wringin' wet, an' the sun pretty strong just

then, I slipped it off an' hitched it atop o' the oar to dry an' be a

flag at the same time, till I could rig up some kind o' streamer, out

o' the seaweed. An' then I was forced to vomit. And that's about the

last thing, Mister Geake, I can mind doin'. 'Tis all foolishness after

that. They tell me that a 'Merican schooner, the _Shawanee_, sighted

my shirt flappin', an' sent a boat an' took me off an' landed me at

New Orleens. My head was bad--oh, very bad--an' they put me in a

'sylum an' cured me. But they took eight year' over it, an' I doubt if

'tis much of a job after all. I wasn' bad all the time, I must tell

you, sir; but 'tis only lately my mem'ry would work any further back

'n the wreck o' the barque. Everything seemed to begin an' end wi'

that. 'Tis about a year back that some visitors came to the 'sylum.

There was a lady in the party, an' something in her face, when she

spoke to me, put me in mind o' Na'mi, an' I remembered I was a married

man. Inside of a fortnight, part by thinkin'--'tis hard work still

for me to think--part by dreamin', I'd a-worried it all out. I was

betterin' fast by that. Soon as I was well enough to be discharged, I

worked my passage home in a grain ship, the _Druid_, o' Liverpool. I

was reckonin' all the way back that Na'mi'd be main glad to see me

agen. But now I s'pose she won't."

"It'll come nigh to killin' her."

"I dessay, now, you two have got to be very fond? She used to be a

partic'lar lovin' sort o' woman."

"I love her more 'n heaven!" William broke out; and then cowered as if

he half expected to be struck with lightning for the words.

"I heard of her havin' married, down at the Fifteen Balls, at Troy. I

dropped in there to pick up the news."

"What! You've been tellin' folks who you be!"

"Not a word. First of all I was minded to play off a little surprise

'pon old Toms, the landlord, who didn' know me from Adam. But hearin'

this, just as I was a-leadin' up to my little joke, I thought maybe

'twould annoy Na'mi. She used to be very strict in some of her

notions."

William Geake took two hasty turns up and down the little parlour. His

Bible, in which before breakfast he had been searching for a text,

lay open on the side table. Behind its place on the shelf was a

small skivet he had let into the wall; and in that drawer was stored

something over twenty-five pounds, the third of his savings. Geake

kept a bank-account, and the balance lay at interest with Messrs.

Climo and Hodges, of St. Austell. But he had the true countryman's

aversion to putting all his eggs in one basket; and although Messrs.

Climo and Hodges were safe as the Bank of England, preferred to keep

this portion of his wealth in his own stocking. He closed the Bible

hastily; rammed it back, upside down, in its place; then took it out

again, and stood holding it in his two hands and trembling. He was

living in sin: he was minded to sin yet deeper. And yet what had he

done to deserve Naomi in comparison with the unspeakable tribulations

this simple mariner had suffered? Sure, God must have preserved the

fellow with especial care, and of wise purpose brought him through

shipwreck, famine, and madness home to his lawful wife. The man had

made Naomi a good husband. Had William Geake made her a better?

(Husband?)--here he dropped the Bible down on the table again as if it

burned his fingers. Whatever had to be done must be done quickly. Here

was the innocent wrecker of so much happiness hanging on his lips for

the next word, watching wistfully for his orders, like any spaniel

dog. And Naomi would be back before nightfall. God was giving him no

time: it was unfair to hustle a man in this way. In the whirl of his

thoughts he seemed to hear Naomi's footfall drawing nearer and nearer

home. He could almost upbraid the Almighty here for leaving him and

Naomi childless. A child would have made the temptation irresistible.

"I wish a'most that I'd never called, if it puts you out so terrible,"

was the wanderer's plaintive remark after two minutes of silent

waiting.

This sentence settled it. The temptation _was_ irresistible. Geake

unlocked the skivet, plunged a hand in and banged down a fistful of

notes on the table.

"Here," said he; "here's five-an'-twenty pound'. You shall have it all

if you'll go straight out o' this door an' back to America."