REPORTED TALE OF A SMUGGLER, A REVENUE CUTTER, AND AN OFFICIOUS
MINISTER.
You have heard tell, of course, of Captain John Carter, the famous
smuggler of Prussia Cove, and his brothers Harry, Francis, and Charles,
and Captain Will Richards, "Tummels," Carpenter Hosking, Uncle Billy,
and the rest of the Cove boys; likewise of old Nan Leggo and Bessie
Bussow that kept the Kiddlywink[1] there? Well, well, I see our
youngsters going to school nowadays with their hair brushed, and I hear
them singing away inside the classroom for all the world as if they were
glad to grow up and pay taxes; and it makes me wonder if they can be the
children of that old-fangled race. Sometimes I think it's high time for
me to go. There was a newspaper fellow down here when the _General
Walker_ came ashore, and, after asking a lot of questions, he put the
case in a nutshell. "You're a link with the past," he said; "that's
what you are." I don't know if he invented the expression, or if he
picked it up somewhere and used it on me, but it's a terrible clever
one.
You mustn't think I'm boasting. I never knew Captain John; he died in
the year 'seven, and I wasn't born for twelve months after. But I've
shaken hands with Captain Harry--the one who was taken prisoner by the
French, and came near to losing his head. He spent his latter years
farming at Rinsey and local preaching; a very earnest man. He gave me
my first-class ticket--that was in the late twenties, and not long
before his death. And Captain Will Richards I knew well; he took over
the business after Captain John, and lasted down to the Crimea year.
I carried the coffin; eighty-five his age was, according to the plate on
it; but, of course, the business had come to an end long before.
Everybody calls it Prussia Cove in these days. The visitors ask for
Prussia Cove, and go and crane their heads over. You know the place?--
just east of Cuddan Point. It's three coves really; Pisky's Cove,
Bessie's Cove, and Prussia. The first has no good landing, but plenty
of good caves; east of that comes Bessie's, where the Kiddlywink stood,
with a harbour cut in the solid rock, and a roadway, and more caves; and
east of that, with a point and a small island dividing them, comes
Prussia, where John Carter had his house. Before his time it was called
Porthleah, but he got the nickname "King o' Prussia" as a boy, and it
stuck to him, and now it sticks to the old place. The visitors crane
their heads over (for you must do that to count the vessels in the
harbour right underneath you), and ask foolish questions, and get
answered with a pack of lies. There's an old tale for one, about a
fellow who heard that the real King of Prussia had been defeated by
Napoleon Bonaparte. "Ah," says he, "I'm sorry for that man.
Misfortunes never come single; not more'n six weeks ago he lost three
hundred keg of brandy, by information, so I'm told." All nonsense!
Porthleah never lost but one keg in all John Carter's time, and that was
a leaky one in a pool at Pisky's which the custom-house fellows sniffed
as they went by. To be sure, one day when the King was away from home,
the collector came round from Penzance, seized a cargo, and carried it
off to the Custom House store. What did Carter do when he came home and
heard about it? He had agreed to deliver the goods by a certain day,
his character for honest business was at stake and he wasn't going to
disappoint his customers. So he rode into Penzance that night, broke
open the Custom House store, and rode back with all his kegs; nothing
else, mind you. When the officers next morning discovered what had
happened, they allowed at once this was Carter's work, because he was an
honest man and wouldn't take anything that didn't belong to him.
But the tale they tell oftenest is about the battery he kept on Enys
Point, and how he opened fire with it upon His Majesty's vessel; and I
want you to have the rights of _that_ as I had it from Captain Will
Richards himself. To hear folks speak you would think the King just
opened fire and blazed away for the fun of it; whereas, with all his
daring, he was the quietest, most inoffensive man in the trade, if only
you let him alone. Mr. Wearne, the collector, understood this, and it
was not by his fault either that the firing came about, but all through
an interfering woman and a preacher who couldn't mind his own business.
It began in this way. Bessie Bussow had a sister-in-law married and
living over here in Ardevora--Ann Geen was the name of her--a daughter
of Kitty Lemal. (You've heard tell of Kitty Lemal and her eight
daughters, and her stocking full of guineas? No? Well there's another
story for you one of these days.) This Ann was the youngest of the
eight, and married John Geen latish in life, just in time to bring him a
boy before he left her a widow; and after her mother Kitty died she and
the boy lived together in the old house at Carne Glaze--Ugnes House[2]
they used to call it. The boy, being the son of old parents, was a
lean, scrag-necked child, with a lollopping big head, too clever for his
years. He had the Lemals' pluck inside him though, for all his unhandy
looks; and, of course, his mother thought him a nonesuch.
Well, with all the country talking about John Carter and his doings, you
may fancy that every boy in Ardevora wanted to grow up in a hurry and be
off to Prussia Cove a-smuggling. It took young Phoby Geen (his real
name was Deiphobus) as bad as the rest. He had been over to the Cove
with his mother on a visit to Bessie Bussow, and there in the Kiddlywink
the King had patted him on his big head and given him a shilling.
After that the boy gave his mother no peace. She, poor soul, wanted to
make a preacher of him, and wouldn't hear of his going; but often, after
he had turned fifteen, she would be out of bed ten times of a night and
listening at his door to make sure he hadn't run off in the dark.
I told you the boy was clever; and this is how he gained his end.
There had always been a tale that the Ugnes House was haunted--the ghost
being old Reginald Bottrell, Kitty Lemal's father, a very respectable
sea-captain, who died in his bed with no reason whatever for being
uncomfortable in the next world. Still, "walk" he did, or was said to;
and one fine day the boy came to his mother with a pretty tale.
It went that, the evening before, he and his young cousin, Arch'laus
Bryant, had been lying stretched on their stomachs before the fire in
the big room--he reading the _Pilgrim's Progress_ by the light of the
turves, and Arch'laus listening. The boys were waiting for their
supper, and for Mrs. Geen to come back from her Saturday's shopping.
Happening to look up as he turned a page, Phoby saw, on the steps which
led down into the room, a brisk, stout little gentleman, dressed in a
long, cutaway coat, black velvet waistcoat and breeches, black ribbed
stockings, and pump shoes tied with a bow. He twinkled with brass or
gilt buttons--one row down the coat and two rows down the waistcoat--and
each button was stamped with a pattern of flowers. His head was bald,
except for a bit of hair at the back; he had no hat; and when he turned,
after closing the door behind him, Phoby took notice that his belly was
round and as tight as a drum. The boy denied being frightened;
"the gentleman," he said, "was most pleasant-looking in all his
features. I didn't take 'en for a sperat, but for somebody come to see
mother. I stood up and said, 'Good eveling, sir. Mother'll be back in
a minute or two if you'll take a seat.'" "I'm not come for she, but
for thee," he said; "Deiphobus Geen, idle no longer. Arise, take my
advice, and go a-smuggling." And with that he vanished through the
door.
The boy pitched this tale to his mother, and Arch'laus backed him up,
adding that the ghost had turned to him and said, "Thou, too, Arch'laus
in a year's time shall be a smuggler--p'r'aps sooner." He told this to
his father and got strapped for it. But Mrs. Geen came of a family that
believed in ghosts. The boy's tale described his grandfather to a
hair--which was not wonderful considering how often she had talked to
Phoby about the old man. At any rate, after being in two minds for a
week she gave way, after a fashion, and allowed Phoby to run over to
Prussia Cove to his aunt, Bessie Bussow; and Bessie--who loved spirit--
had him apprenticed to Hosking, the Cove carpenter. Pretty carpenter's
work Hosking was likely to teach him!
Now, after the way of women, the deed was no sooner done than Mrs. Geen
began to repent it. She knew very well that her dear boy would run into
danger; but she kept her trouble to herself until there arrived at
Ardevora a new Methodist preacher called Meakin. In those days John
Wesley himself used to pay us a visit pretty well every August or
September, but this year, for some reason or other, he gave us an extra
revival, and sent down this Meakin to us at the beginning of June.
For a very good reason he was never sent again.
He started very well indeed. You couldn't call him much to look at; he
had a long pair of legs which seemed differently jointed to yours and
mine; no shoulders nor stomach to speak of, no-coloured hair, and a
glazing, watery eye. But the wonder began when you heard his voice.
It filled his clothes out suddenly like one of those indiarubber
squeakers the children blow at Whitsun Fair; and coming from a man whose
looks were all against him, it made you feel humble-minded for having
been so quick to judge. I think he had found out the value of this kind
of surprise and went about neglecting his appearance on purpose.
As I say, he started very well. He preached at the Stennack on
Saturday, and next day near the market-place, "for the sake," he said,
"of those who could not climb the hill"--though, to be sure, they
needn't have left their doors to hear him a mile off. There was a tidy
gathering--farm-carts and market-carts and gigs from all parts of the
country round--almost as many as if he had been John Wesley himself.
He preached again at five o'clock in the evening, and so fired up Mrs.
Geen that by ten next morning she was down at Nance's house, where he
lodged, laying all her trouble before him.
Mr. Meakin heard her out, and then took a line which altogether
surprised her. He seemed to care less for the danger her Phoby was
running than for the crime he was committing. Yes; he called it a
crime!
"As a Christian woman," he said, "you must know his soul's in danger.
What in comparison with that does his body matter?"
Mrs. Geen hadn't any answer for this, so what she said was, "My Phoby
've never given me a day's trouble since his teething." And then,
seeing the preacher was upset, and wishing to keep things as pleasant as
possible, she went on, "I don't see no crime in learning to be a
carpenter."
"By your own showing," said Mr. Meakin, "he is in danger of being led
into smuggling by wild companions."
"Nothing wild about John Carter," she held out. "A married man and as
steady as you could wish to see; a man with convictions of sin, as I
know, an' two of his brothers saved. You couldn' hear a prettier
preacher than Charles. And John, he always runs a freight most careful.
I never heard of any wildness at all in connection with he--not a
whisper."
The preacher fairly stamped, and began tapping the palm of his hand with
his forefinger.
"But the smuggling, ma'am--that's what I call your attention to!
The smuggling itself is not only a crime but a sin; every bit as much a
sin as the violence and swearing which go with it."
"No swearing at all," said Ann Geen. "You don't know John Carter, or
you wouldn' suggest such a thing. Every man that swears in his employ
is docked sixpence out of his pay. My sister-in-law keeps the money in
a box over her chimney-piece, and they drink it out together come
Christmas."
By this the preacher was fairly dancing. "Woman!" he shouted, soon as
he could recover his mouth-speech.
"I'm no such thing!" said she, up at once and very indignant.
"And your master, John Wesley, would never have said it."
The preacher took a gulp and tried a quieter tack. "I beg your pardon,
ma'am," says he, "but you seemed to be wilfully misunderstanding me.
Let us confine ourselves to smuggling," says he.
"Very well," says she; "I'm agreeable."
"I tell you, then, that it's a sin; it's defrauding the King just as
much as if you dipped your hand into His Majesty's pocket"--"I shouldn'
dream of being so familiar," said Mrs. Geen, but he didn't hear her--
"and if you'll permit me, I'll explain how that is," he said.
"Well," she allowed, folding the shawl about her which she always wore
in the hottest weather; "you can say what you mind to about it, so long
as you help me get my Phoby back. That's what I come for."
I daresay, now, you've sometimes heard it brought up against us in these
parts that we're like the men of Athens, always ready to listen to any
new thing. The preacher took up his parable then and there; and being,
as I say, an able man in spite of his looks, within half an hour he had
actually convinced the woman that there was something to be ashamed of
in smuggling. And as soon as he'd done that, nothing would satisfy her
but to hire the pony-cart from the George and Dragon and drive the
preacher to Prussia Cove the very next day to rescue her boy from these
evil companions. "'Twould be a great thing to convince John Carter,"
she said, "and a feather in your cap. And even if you don't, the place
is worth seeing, and he usually kills a pair of ducks for visitors."
So early the next day (Tuesday, June 4), away they started; and, the day
being hot and the pony slow, arrived at Bessie Bussow's about four
o'clock. 'Tis a pretty peaceable spot on a June afternoon, with the sun
dropping out to sea and right against your eyes; and this day the Cove
seemed more peaceable than ordinary--the boats at anchor, no sound of
work at all, and scarcely a sign of life but the smoke from Bessie
Bussow's chimney.
"Where's my boy?" was the first question Mrs. Geen put to her
sister-in-law after the two women had kissed each other.
"Out seaning," answered Bessie, as prompt as you please.
"But most likely he'll be home some time to-night. The master's got a
new sean-boat, and all the boys be out working her. There's not a soul
left in the Cove barring the master himself and Uncle Billy."
"Well, I'm glad of my life the boy's at such innocent work; but I've
come to see John Carter and take him away. The preacher here says that
smuggling is a sin and the soul's destruction; he's quite sure of it in
his own mind, and whiles there's any doubt I don't want my Phoby to risk
it."
"Aw?" said Bessie. "I'd dearly like to hear how he makes that out.
But I han't got time to be talking just now. You'd best take him across
and let him try to persuade John Carter, while I get your room ready.
I saw John going towards his house ten minutes ago, and I'se warn he'll
offer the preacher a bed and listen to all he's got to say."
So, having stabled the pony, Mrs. Geen and the preacher walked over to
Carter's house together. They found the King in his kitchen-parlour,
divided between his accounts and a mug of cider, and he made them
welcome, being always fond of preachers and having a great respect for
Ann Geen because of her family.
There was a great heap of shavings in the fire-place, for the room was a
sunny one, facing south by west. But the King told her where to find
some tea that had never paid duty, and she took off her bonnet and
boiled the kettle in the kitchen at the back, and it wasn't till they'd
drunk a cup that she explained what had brought her, and called on the
preacher to wrestle.
Captain John listened very politely, or seemed to, and nodded his head
at the right time; but he couldn't help being a bit absent-minded.
Fact was, he expected a cargo home that very evening, and didn't feel so
easy about it as usual. Up to now he had always run his stuff in
goodish-sized vessels--luggers or cutter-rigged craft running up to
fifty or sixty tons as we should reckon now. But Captain Will Richards
had taken a great fancy to the Cawsand plan of using light-built open
row-boats or, as you might say, galleys, pulling eight oars, and put
together to pass for sean-boats. After the war, when there was no
longer any privateering, vessels like Captain Carter's, carrying
eighteen or twenty guns apiece, couldn't pretend to be other than
smugglers or pirates, and then these make-belief sean-boats came into
use everywhere. But just now they were a novelty. The King, persuaded
by Richards, ordered one down from Cawsand, and had already used it once
or twice to meet his larger craft somewhere in a good offing and
tranship their cargoes. By this he could run his kegs ashore at any
state of the tide, leaving the empty vessels to be watched or overhauled
by the Customs' fellows.
But this time--the weather being fine and settled, and the winds light--
he was trying a faster game, and had sent the sean-boat right across
channel to Roscoff, keeping his sailing-craft in harbour. It would be
dark before nine, no moon till after mid-night, and by all calculations
the boat ought to make the cove between ten and eleven, after lying well
outside and waiting her chance. It all seemed promising enough, but
somehow the King couldn't be quite easy.
However, he listened quietly, and the preacher talked away for one solid
hour, until Uncle Billy Leggo (who had been keeping watch all the
afternoon) came knocking at the door. "You'll excuse me a minute," said
the King, and went outside to hear the report. The weather had been
flat calm all day, with a slow ground-swell running into the cove, but
with the cool of the evening a light off-shore breeze had sprung up, and
Uncle Billy had just seen the Revenue cutter stealing out from Penzance.
"Botheration!" said Captain Carter, and fined himself sixpence.
Then he went back to the parlour, and the preacher started afresh.
Twice again before supper came Uncle Billy with news of the cutter's
movements, and the second time there could be no mistaking them, for she
was dodging back and forth and lying foxy around Cuddan Point.
All through supper the preacher talked on and on, and the King ate
without knowing what he was eating. He couldn't afford to lose this
cargo; yet Mr. Collector Wearne meant business this time, and would
collar the boat to a certainty unless she were warned off. But to show
a light from the coast meant a hundred pounds fine or twelve months'
hard labour. The King slewed round in his chair and looked at the great
pile of shavings in the fireplace. A hundred pounds fine with the
chance of burning the house-thatch about his ears!
Supper over, he and his guests turned their chairs towards the
fireplace. The King took flint and steel and struck a match; lit his
pipe, and stared at the shavings; then dropped the light on the floor,
ground it out with his heel, and puffed away thoughtfully. The preacher
went on talking.
"Render unto Caesar . . . tribute to whom tribute is due. That applies
to King George to-day every bit so much as it did to Caesar."
"Caesar and King George be two different persons," said Captain John,
stopping his pipe with his thumb.
"The principle's the same."
"I don't see it," said the captain. "I read my Bible, and it says that
Caesar ordered the whole world to be taxed. Now that's sense.
Caesar didn't go niggling away with a duty on silk here and another on
brandy there and another on tea and another on East Indy calicoes. Mind
you, I've got no personal feeling against King George; but it does annoy
me to see a man calling hisself King of England and making money in
these petty ways."
"It's his birthday to-day," put in Mrs. Geen; "though I didn't remember
it till I saw the flag on Ardevora church-tower this morning."
"Is it? Then we'll drink his health, ma'am, to show there's no
animosity." Captain John fetched a bottle of brandy and glasses and
mixed drinks for his guests. Then he took his seat, reached out for
flint and steel again, and says he very quietly--
"I wish the boys were at home. We'd have a bonfire."
"Up to Walsall--that's where I come from," said the preacher, "we always
kept up His Majesty's birthday with a bonfire and fireworks. But you
don't seem so loyal in these parts."
"Fireworks? Did you now?" Captain John set down the tinder-box and
rubbed his chin. "Well," said he, going to a cupboard, and glancing up
on his way at the tall clock, "as it happens I've a rocket or two here--
though to be sure it seems like a waste, with nobody left in the Cove to
see or raise so much as a cheer."
"It's the spirit of the thing that counts," said the preacher.
"They've lain here so long," Captain John went on in a sort of musing
way, "they may be mildewed, for all I know."
"You leave that to me," said the preacher; "I knows all about fireworks.
There don't seem nothing wrong about this one," he said, taking it and
fingering the fuse. "May I have a try with 'em?"
"Try, and welcome. I don't understand these things for my part: I only
know they takes up a lot of room in the cupboard, and I'll be glad to
see the last of 'em."
So out into the night they three went together. But when they had the
rocket fixed, Captain John was taken that poorly he had to come back and
sit in the chair, and rub his thighs and his stomach. And when, sitting
there, he heard the rocket go up, _whoosh!_ he had to rub them the
harder.
"It went off capital!" called the preacher, popping his head in at the
door. "Can't us try another?" And now Captain John had to rub his eyes
before turning to him. "Take the lot," he said, and pushed the whole
bundle into the preacher's hands. "Aw, if King George had a few more
friends like you! Take the lot of 'em, loyal man!" He fairly thrust
him out to door, and had to lean a hand there before he could follow,
feeling weak all over to think of Collector Wearne and his men, and what
their faces must be like, down in the Revenue cutter; but he had no time
to taste the fun of it properly, for just then he heard Bessie Bussow's
voice outside asking questions all of a screech. The first rocket had
fetched her over hot-foot and agog, and the captain had to run out and
stop her tongue, and send her home with Ann Geen. But they didn't go
till the preacher had touched off every single rocket, stepping back
as they went _whoosh! whoosh!_ and waving his hat and crying, "God save
the King!" "God save the King!" cried Captain John after him, and
Bessie stood wondering if the end of the world had come, or the master
had gone clean out of his wits.
The captain used to try and explain it afterwards when he told the
story. "You've seen a woman in hysterics," he'd say, "and you know how
a man feels when he wants to drop work and go on the drink for a week.
Well, 'twasn' exactly one or t'other with me, but a little like both.
I'm a level-headed tradesman, and known for such, but if ever that chap
walks into my house again, I'll be wise, and go straight out by the back
door and put myself under restraint."
After the women had gone, he took the fellow back to the kitchen, and
sat putting questions to him in a reverent sort of voice, and eyeing him
as awesome as Billy Bennett when he hooked the mermaid, until the poor
creature talked himself sleepy, and asked to be shown to his room.
Captain Carter saw him to bed, came downstairs to the parlour again, and
spread himself on the sofa for forty winks; for between the boat dodging
out to sea and the pack-horses waiting ready up at Trenowl's farm above
the hill, there was no going to bed for him that night.
He had been sleeping maybe for two hours, when a whistle fetched him to
his feet and out of the door like a scout. 'Twas nothing more nor less
than the boys' arrival signal, and this was what had happened.
When the preacher's first rocket went off, the collector, down on board
the cutter, was taking his bit of supper in the cabin. At the sound of
it he rushed up the companion, and found all his crew on deck with their
necks cricked back, barring one man, who that moment popped his head up
through the fore-hatchway. "What on earth was that?" he asked.
"A rocket, sir," said the chief boatman; "just sent up from Prussia
Cove." Mr. Wearne couldn't find his breath for a moment; but when he
did, 'twas to say, "Very well, John Carter. I've a-got you this time,
my dandy! I don't quite understand how you come to be such a fool.
But that rocket costs you a hundred pounds, and if I'm not mistaken I'll
have your cargo 'pon top of it."
The breeze still blew pretty steady, and he gave orders to stand out
into the bay, get an offing, and keep a sharp look-out as the moon rose.
He knew that all Carter's ordinary craft, except the sean-boat, were
quiet at anchor at Bessie's Cove; but he reckoned that the boat had gone
out this time to meet and unload a stranger. He never dreamed she would
be crossing all the way to Roscoff and back on her own account.
He knew, too, that Carter had a "spot" near Mousehole to fall back upon
when a landing at Prussia Cove couldn't be worked. So he stood out to
put the cutter on a line commanding both places, which, with the
soldier's wind then blowing, was easy enough; and as she pushed out her
nose past Cuddan Point the whole sky began to bang with rockets.
This puzzled him fairly, as Carter knew it would. And it puzzled the
Cove boys in the sean-boat as they lay on their oars about three miles
from shore and discussed the first warning. But in one of the flashes
Captain Harry Carter, who was commanding, spied the cutter's sails quite
plain under the dark of the land, plain enough to see that she was
running out free. He knew that he couldn't have been seen by her in the
heave of the swell, for the sean-boat lay pretty low with her heavy
cargo, and he'd given her a lick of grey paint at Roscoff by way of
extra precaution. So, thought he, "A signal's a signal; but brother
John doesn't know what I know. Let the cutter stand out as she's going,
and we'll nip in round the tail of her. She can't follow into the Cove,
with her draught, even if she spies us; and by daybreak we'll have the
best part of the cargo landed." And so he did, muffling oars and
crossing over a mile to southward of the cutter, and after that way-all!
and pull for the Cove.
The preacher at John Carter's, and Mrs. Geen at Bessie Bussow's, both
woke early next morning. But Mrs. Geen was first by a good hour, and
what pulled the preacher out of bed was the sound of guns. He put his
head out of window, and could hardly believe it was the peaceful place
he'd come upon last evening. The beach swarmed with men like emmets.
Near up, by high-water mark, men were unloading a long-boat for dear
life--some passing kegs, others slinging them to horses, others running
the horses up the cliff under his window. At first he thought it must
be their trampling had woke him out of sleep, but the next moment
_bang!_ the room shook all about him, a cloud of smoke drifted up
towards him from the Enys Point, and through it, while 'twas clearing,
he saw John Carter and another man run to the battery and begin to load
again, with Mrs. Geen behind them waving a rammer, and dancing like a
paper-woman in a cyclone. Below the mouth of the Cove tossed a boatload
of men, pulling and backing with their heads ducked, their faces on a
level with their shoulders, and all turned back towards the battery,
while a big red-faced man stood up in the stern-sheets shaking his fist
and dancing almost as excitedly as Mrs. Geen. Still farther out, a fine
cutter lay rocking on the swell, her bosom swinging and sails shaking in
the flat calm.
The preacher dragged on his clothes somehow, tore out of the house and
down to the Point as fast as legs would carry him. "Wha--what's the
meanin' of this?" he screeched, rushing up to Captain John, who was
sighting one of his three little nine-pounders.
"Blest if _I_ know!" said the captain. "We was a peaceable lot enough
till you and Mrs. Geen came a-visiting; but you two would play Hamlet's
ghost with a Quaker meeting."
"It's my Phoby--they're after my Phoby!" screamed Mrs. Geen, and then
she turned on the fellow behind Captain John; it was Hosking, once a
man-of-war's man, and now supposed to be teaching her boy the carpentry
trade. "_This_ is what you bring en to, is it? You deceiver, you!
You bare-faced villain!" (The man had a beard as big as a furze bush.)
"Look at the poor lamb up there loadin' the hosses, and to think I bore
and reared en for this! If you let one of they fellows lay hands on my
Phoby I'll scratch out ivery eye in your head . . ."
"Stand by, Tim," says the captain quietly. "Drat the boat! If she
keeps bobbiting about like that I shall hit her, sure 'nuff!"
_Bang!_ went the little gun, and kicked backwards clean over its
carriage. The shot whizzed about six feet above the boat, and plunged
into the heaving swell between it and the cutter. "Bit too near, that.
I don't want to hurt Roger Wearne, though he _do_ make such tempting,
ugly faces."
"But what do they want? What are they after?" stuttered the preacher.
"They're after my Phoby!" cried Mrs. Geen.
"Not a bit of it," said Captain John good-humouredly. "From all I can
see it's the preacher here they want to collar."
"_Me!_" screams the poor man--"_me!_"
"Well, if you _will_ go letting off rockets. I dunno what it costs up
to Walsall, or wherever you come from, but down in these parts 'tis a
hundred pound or twelve calendar months."
The preacher turned white and began to shake all of a sudden like a
leaf. "But I didn't mean--I had no idea--you don't intend to tell me--"
he stammered.
"Here, Tummels!" Captain John hailed a man who came running down to lend
a hand with the guns. "Take the preacher here and fix him on one of the
horses; sling a keg each side of him if he looks like tumbling off.
Sorry to hurry you, sir," he explained; "but 'tis for your good.
You must clear out of this before the officers get sight of your face,
and I don't know how much longer I can frighten 'em off. When you get
up to Trenowl you can cast loose and run, and it mayn't be time wasted
if you make up an _alibi_ as you go along. It don't seem hospitable, I
grant ee, but as a smuggler you're too enterprising for this little
out-o'-the-way cove."
Tummels led the preacher away in too much of a daze to answer.
He opened his mouth, but at that moment _bang!_ went Hosking with
another of the guns. By and by Captain John let out a chuckle as he saw
the poor man moving up the cliff track, swaying between two kegs and
clutching at his horse's mane every time Tummels smacked the beast on
the rump. The horse he rode was almost the last. By seven o'clock the
boys had cleared the whole of their cargo, and still the preventive boat
hung in the mouth of the Cove, pulling and backing and waiting for the
chance Captain John never allowed them.
You see, Captain Harry, having dodged in behind the cutter without being
spied, had a pretty start with the unloading. When day broke, Mr.
Wearne, finding no sean-boat or suspicious craft in sight, and allowing
that there was no fear of another attempt before nightfall, had stood
down again for Prussia Cove, meaning to send in a boat (for the cutter
drew too much water) and have it out with Captain Carter about the
rockets. You can fancy his face when he came abreast the entrance and
found the boys working like a hive of bees. As for resistance, the King
always swore he hadn't an idea of it till Mrs. Geen put it into his
head. The battery was never intended for more than show. "She's a
wonderful woman," he declared; but he had a monstrous respect for all
the Lemals. "Blood in every one of 'em," he said.
But, of course, the fun wasn't finished yet. Soon after seven, and
after the last of the cargo had been salved under their eyes, the
preventive men drew off. By a quarter past eight Wearne had worked the
cutter in as close as he dared, and then opened fire with his guns.
The first shot struck the 'taty-patch in front of Carter's house; the
second plunked into the water not fifteen yards from the gun's muzzle.
In the swell running she could make no practice at all, though she kept
it up till midday. The boys behind the battery ran out and cheered
whenever one flew extra wide, and this made Wearne mad. Will Richards,
Tummels, and young Phoby Geen posted themselves in shelter behind the
captain's house, and whenever a shot buried itself in the soft cliff one
of them would run with a tubbal and dig it out. All this time Uncle
Bill Leggo, having finished loading up the kegs, was carting water from
the stream on the beach to the kitchen garden above the house, and his
old sister Nan leading the horses (for it was a two-horse job).
Richards called to him to leave out, it was too dangerous. "Now there,"
said Uncle Bill, "I've been thinkin' of Nan and the hosses this brave
while!"
At noon Wearne ceased firing, and sent off a boat towards Penzance.
The Cove boys still held the battery; and the two parties had their
dinners, lit their pipes and studied each other all the long
after-noon. But towards five o'clock a riding company arrived to help
the law, and opened a musket fire on the rear of the battery from the
hedge at the top of the hill. The game was up now. The boys scattered
and took shelter in Bessie Bussow's house, and Captain John, having
hoisted a flag of truce, waited for Wearne and his boat with all the
calmness in life.
"A pretty day's work this!" was the collector's first word as he stepped
ashore.
"Amusin' from first to last," agreed Captain John in his cordial way.
Says the collector slowly, "Well, tastes differ. You may be right, of
course, but we'll begin at the beginning, and see how it works out.
First, then, at nine forty-five last night you showed an unauthorised
light for the purpose of cheating the revenue. Cost of that caper, one
hundred pounds."
"Be you talkin' of the rockets?"
"'Course I be."
"Well then, _I_ didn't fire them, nor anyone belongin' to the Cove.
I didn't set anyone to fire them, and they waren't fired to warn
anybody. Let alone I have proof they was sent up by a Methody preacher
to relieve his feelin's. You've known me too long, Roger Wearne, to
think me fool enough to waste a whole future joy[3] over so simple a
business as warnin' a boat."
"What are you tellin' me?"
"The truth, as I always do; and I advise you to believe it, or 'twon't
be the first time you've seen too far into a brick wall."
Wearne knew well enough what Captain John meant. Just a year before he
had paid a surprise visit to the Cove, ferreted out a locked shed and
asked to be shown what was inside. The King refused. "It held
nothing," he said, "but provisions for his brother Henry's vessel."
Of course Wearne couldn't believe this; a locked store in Prussia Cove
was much too sure a thing. So first he argued, and then he broke the
door open, and, sure enough, found innocent provisions inside just as
he'd been promised. Next morning the shed was empty. "Didn' I warn
'ee," said John, "against breaking in that door and leaving my property
exposed. Now I'll have to make 'ee pay for it;" and pay for it Wearne
did.
"All I know," the captain went on, "is that a Methody preacher paid me a
visit last night, with the objic (so far as I can make out, for things
have been movin' so fast I hadn't time to question en as I wished) o'
teachin' me what was due to King George. In pursooance o' which--it
being His Majesty's birthday--he took and fired a dozen rockets I keep
on the off-chance of wantin' one of these days to signal the Custom
House at Penzance. I own 'twas a funny thing to do, but folks takes
their patriotism different. I daresay, now, _you_ didn't even remember
'twas His Majesty's birthday."
Wearne tried a fresh tack. "We'll take that yarn later on," he said.
"You can't deny a cargo was run this morning."
"We'll allow it for the moment. But that only proves that no boat was
warned away."
"And when I sent a boat in to capture it, you deliberately opened fire;
in other words, tried to murder me, His Majesty's representative."
"Tried to murder you? Look here." Captain John stepped to one of his
still loaded guns and pointed it carefully at a plank floating out at
the mouth of the Cove--a plank knocked by the cutter's guns out of Uncle
Bill Leggo's 'taty patch, and now drifting out to sea on the first of
the ebb. He pointed the gun carefully, let fly, and knocked the bit of
wood to flinders. "That's what I do when I try," he said. "Why, bless
'ee, I was no more in earnest than _you_ were!"
This made Wearne blush for his marksmanship. "But _you'll_ have to
prove that," he said.
"Why, damme," said John Carter, and fined himself another sixpence on
the spot; "if you are so partic'ler, _get out there in the boat again,
and I will_."
Well, the upshot was that after some palaver Wearne agreed to walk up to
the captain's house and reckon the accounts between them. He had missed
a pretty haul and been openly defied. On the other hand he hadn't a man
hurt, and he knew the King's Government still owed John Carter for a
lugger he had lent two years before to chase a French privateer lying
off Ardevora. Carter had sent the lugger round at Wearne's particular
request; she was short handed, and after a running fight of three or
four hours the Frenchman put in a shot which sent her to the bottom and
drowned fourteen hands. For this, as Wearne knew, he had never received
proper compensation. I fancy the two came to an agreement to set one
thing against another and call quits. At any rate, John was put to no
further annoyance over that day's caper. As for the preacher, I'm told
that no person in these parts ever set eyes on him again. And Ann Geen
drove home that evening with her Phoby beside her. "I'm sorry to let
'ee go, my son," said John; "but 'twould never do for me to have your
mother comin' over here too often. I've a great respect for all the
Lemals; but on the female side they be too frolicsome for a steady-going
trade like mine."
[1] Drinking-house.
[2] Huguenot's house.
[3] Feu de joie.