“Marry! Fortune favours her lovers! Greetings, Master French. Damn my
knife! there is not another on the Island I would rather see than thee
at this moment.”
Black’erchief Dick stepped out of the open rowboat which had conveyed
him from the _Coldlight_ and gave a small white hand to Big French, who
assisted him on to the board pathway which was laid over the soft mud.
“Greetings to you, Captain,” said the young man, and then added slowly,
“you’re somewhat before your time, ain’t you?”
Black’erchief Dick broke into a storm of curses.
“Ay,” he said at last, “ay, too early for the tide and so forsooth
compelled--I, Dick Delfazio, compelled, mark you--to put in at this
God-forsaken corner”--he took in the marshland with a comprehensive wave
of a graceful arm, and continued sneering--“which is as flat and empty
as a new-washed platter.”
The big man at his side smiled.
“Nay, prithee, Captain,” he said, “‘tis none so bad.”
The Spaniard turned to him fiercely, but Big French went on quietly: “If
you be a wanting to stay the brig here for the next tide,” he said,
“best to take her up the Pyfleet round to the back o’ the Ship--plenty
o’ water up there,” he added.
Black’erchief Dick shrugged his shoulders.
“The Pyfleet?” he said. “Surely that is Captain Fen de Witt’s haven? I
would not take advantage of his hiding-place.”
The smile on the big man’s face vanished.
“Lord, Captain!” he said quickly, “you cannot leave the brig in open
channel all the night. The Preventative folk may not be very spry
hereabouts, but they ain’t all dead yet--no, not by a long way they
ain’t.”
The Spaniard replied with another shrug.
“As you wish,” he said, and then with a smile, his teeth flashing in the
dusk, he added: “But that I need thee to-night, Master Hercules, I would
not so easily have yielded.”
Big French flushed but he spoke quietly.
“Ah, and what will you be wanting to-night, Captain?” he said.
“Passage in thy cart to the Victory, friend,” replied the Spaniard.
“Oh!” Big French spoke dubiously. “Why do you not rest at the Ship?” he
enquired.
“The Ship?” the thin lips curled in contempt. “Dick Delfazio stay at a
wayside tavern? This moon hath made thee mad, friend French.”
Big French sighed involuntarily and the Spaniard laughed.
“A wench?” he asked.
“Nay,” the blood suffused the young man’s handsome face and he spoke
shortly.
“Well, take me to the Victory,” repeated the Spaniard.
An anxious snuff sounded at his elbow as he spoke. He turned quickly
just in time to seize Habakkuk Coot by the neck of his guernsey.
“You evil-smelling son of a rat,” he began slowly, giving the little man
a shake at every word, “get thee back to the brig and tell Blueneck I
would speak to him.”
With the final word he jerked the wretch off the board pathway and
watched him flounder in the deep oozing mud.
“Haste thee, dog,” he said, touching him lightly with the blade of his
knife.
Habakkuk screamed and floundered on for the rowboat, where he was hauled
in by several of his comrades. The boat then pushed off for the brig.
“You have a wonderful way with your crew, Captain,” said French, looking
after the boat.
“Ay, of a truth,” the Spaniard laughed. “Cannot Dick Delfazio rule a
pack of mangy dogs?”
French looked at him narrowly, and then took up the conversation where
he had left it.
“The Ship is no wayside tavern,” he said. “The folk be simple but the
liquor good and the wenches pretty, and they are waiting for you to
come--the maids in their best caps, and the canary warming on the
hearth.”
Dick looked at him for a moment.
“Master French,” he said, keeping his glittering eyes on the other’s
face. “Master French, ’tis strange that thou should’st be in this part
of the Island so ready for my coming, Master French,” he added, his
voice assuming the soft caressing quality for which it was so
remarkable. “Dare I suppose that it was not to meet me that thou camest
to the East? That it was to the Ship thou camest, eh, Master French?”
Once again the big man blushed to his ears but he laughed.
“Ay, Captain,” he said, “you are right there. ’Twas not to meet you I
came to the East. Prithee tell your men to take the brig down the
Pyfleet and come with me to the Ship.”
The Spaniard laughed strangely.
“Friend French,” he said, “are thy horses lame?”
The young man looked at him for a moment before he spoke.
“Ay,” he said at last. “Wonderful lame.”
Black’erchief Dick threw back his head and laughed heartily.
“Thou art a brave man, French,” he said, but continued quickly: “There
is such a lameness as can be cured to-morrow for a trip to Tiptree, eh,
friend?”
“Ah!” said the big man, nodding his head sagely, “‘tis a wonderful
strange lameness that they have.”
Dick nodded.
By this time the rowboat had once more come to the plank across the mud.
Blueneck, a shadowy figure in the darkness, stepped out and came toward
them.
Dick gave his orders briefly.
“Take the brig up the Pyfleet,” he said. “Any of these fellows will
pilot thee,” he added, pointing to the group of Mersea men on the wall.
Then as an afterthought, “and bring five kegs from the hold to me at the
Ship Tavern.”
A certain amount of enthusiasm among the volunteer pilots was noticeable
after this last remark, and Blueneck smiled as he replied, “Ay, ay,
Cap’n.”
Black’erchief Dick and his friend Big French, the smuggler’s carter,
turned, climbed the wall, and walked together down the lonely road to
the Ship Tavern without speaking.
“Marry!” said Dick, stopping after they had walked for some five
minutes, his hand feeling for his knife. “What’s that?”
Big French stopped also and, standing side by side in the middle of the
road, they listened intently. Apparently just behind the hedge on their
right a human voice, deep and throaty, said clearly,
“Rum--rum--rum--rum,” the sound trailing off weirdly on the last word.
The Spaniard crossed himself, but his hand was steady.
“Is’t a spirit?” he said.
“Nay,” Big French’s voice came stifled from his mouth.
The Spaniard drew his knife. “Then I’ll have at it,” he said.
Once again the stifled monosyllable broke from the younger man’s lips.
Black’erchief Dick looked at his guide quickly. By the faint light of
the winter moon he saw the man’s face was distorted strangely--once
again the ghostly voice behind the hedge said distinctly,
“Rum--rum--ru----.”
“Ho! ho! ho!” roared French, his laughter suddenly breaking forth.
“Peace, Mother Swayle,” he shouted, “by our lakin! you had us well-nigh
feared with your greeting.”
The Spaniard sheathed his knife.
“If ’tis a friend of thine, Master French,” he said, shrugging his
shoulders, “‘tis of no offence to me. Though by my faith,” he added, as
a dark figure in flowing garments bounded over the hedge and stood by
the roadside, “‘tis strange company you keep.”
The tall gaunt woman addressed as Mother Swayle shrank back into the
hedge.
“Who is it with thee, Big French?” she said in her deep, tired voice.
“Black’erchief Dick, new landed by the wall,” said French.
“Ah! I know naught of him--Peace, good swine--farewell, Rum!”
There was a note of finality in the last word and Big French started to
walk on. “Rum,” he said over his shoulder, and added to Dick in an
undertone, “‘Tis only a poor crone--peace to her--her wit’s diseased.”
“Oh!” the Spaniard felt the pocket of his coat and pulled out a silver
dollar. “Here, mother of sin,” he said as he tossed it to her, “buy
thyself rum withal. Almsgiving is a noble virtue,” he added piously to
French as they prepared to walk on. Hardly had the words left his lips
when his silver dollar hit him on the back of the head with considerable
force.
“May you burn, you mange-struck ronyon,” the deep voice grew shrill in
its intensity. “All men are villains and you are a king among them.”
With a foreign oath the Spaniard turned about.
“Rum--rum--r-u-m,” the voice faded away and they heard the patter of
feet down the road.
Black’erchief Dick laughed sharply.
“It is well for Mother Swayle that she lives in the East,” he said, his
eyes glittering. “Were she in the West she would take my bounty, if
not----” He laughed unpleasantly.
Big French looked at him anxiously, uncertain how the fiery Spaniard had
taken the old woman’s vagaries.
“The old one was ducked as a witch in the merrymaking at the Restoring
of the King,” he said at last. “She was not quite drowned,” he
continued, “so the folk--wenches mostly--look up to her and as I said,
Captain, her wit’s diseased.”
Dick shrugged his silken-coated shoulders.
“‘Tis no matter,” he said with a wave of his hand.
Big French sighed in relief and they walked on in silence for a minute
or so. They were now some four hundred yards from the Ship. The high
building with its great thatch showed a dark outline against the cold
starlight, but all the uncurtained lower windows showed the warm glow
within and from the partly open door the sound of singing came out to
them on the cold breeze.
The two unconsciously hastened their steps. When they reached the gate
of the courtyard the words of the song could be heard clearly above the
noise of laughter and banging of pewter.
“_Pretty Poll she loved a sailor_”
Gilbot’s voice was piping a little in advance of the rest.
“_And well she loved he,_
_But he sailed to the mouth_
_Of a stream in the South_
_And was losht in the rolling sea._
_And was losht in the rolling sea._”
Dick straightened his lace ruffles at his throat.
“The dogs seem merry,” he observed as he kicked open the door and
stepped into the candle-lit kitchen of the Ship.
All eyes were immediately turned on him, and he stood perfectly still
for some seconds enjoying to the full the impression he was making.
The Ship’s company was used to the simple finery of Captain Fen de Witt
and his men, and most of them had been to the western end of the Island
and had seen strangers who had come, it was whispered, from London
itself, but Dick’s magnificence was wholly new to most of them, while
even those who had seen him before were surprised at the contrast which
his glistening figure made with the sombre background of the Ship
kitchen’s smoke-blackened walls.
Hal stood staring at him as long as any of the others, and Mistress Sue
let the rum she was drawing fill up one of the great pewter tankards and
spill over on to the stones before she noticed it, so intently did she
look at the stranger in the doorway.
Gilbot alone took no notice of the visitor. He sat happily in his place
by the fireside, his head thrown back a little and his eyes closed,
beating time to imaginary singing with his empty pot.
Joe Pullen was the first to speak. He had just entered by a side door
and apparently was entirely unimpressed by the Spaniard or any one else.
“Evening,” he remarked, as he walked over to the most comfortable seat
in the chimney-corner and sat down. “Evening to you too, sir,” he said,
noticing Dick for the first time--and then he added, peering out of the
fireplace, “Mistress Sue, a rum if you please.”
Black’erchief Dick, noting that the spell was broken, swaggered forward
into the firelight.
“Greeting, friends,” he said courteously, and then after looking round
curiously his eyes rested on Gilbot. “Is this mine host?” he asked.
Gilbot’s eyes opened slowly and his jaw dropped as he saw for the first
time the splendidly garbed figure.
“Eh?” he said at last. “Washt?” He tried to rise but gave it up as an
impossibility, his brow clouded, and he turned his tankard upside down
on his knee.
Dick stood looking at him, a slight smile hovering round his mouth and
twitching the sides of his big Jewish nose.
Gilbot’s face cleared as suddenly as it had clouded.
“Ashk Hal,” he said triumphantly, and leaning back once more he closed
his eyes.
The Spaniard shrugged his shoulders.
“You mistress?” he said, turning to Sue who dropped a curtsey. “Can I
have a bedchamber here this night?”
Sue replied that all was ready for him, and Dick, having assured himself
that everything was to his liking, put his hand into his pocket and
drawing out a handful of gold and silver coins tossed them lightly on
the table.
“Drinks all round, I pray you, mistress,” he said.
There was a slight stir among the company, and the Spaniard was regarded
with still more respect.
Sue stood looking at the coins, her hands on her hips. “‘Tis much too
much,” she murmured.
Black’erchief Dick laughed.
“Marry! Then, mistress, ’twill do for the next lot. I pray thee haste,
my throat is parched,” he said.
Sue, her eyes round with admiration, curtseyed again and ran to the
inner door.
“Anny, lass, come hither I prithee,” she called, and then hastened to
obey the Spaniard.
Anny stepped in unnoticed a moment or two later, and busied herself with
the tankards.
Dick was sitting with his back toward her and she did not see him.
“Here, lass,” said Sue, seeing her, “the foreigner would drink
sack--wilt get it for him?”
There was not much call for Canary sack at the Ship, so Anny was some
minutes finding and tapping a cask. When she returned from the cellar, a
flagon in her hand, the talk had become more animated and one or two
lively spirits had started a song, but above the noise a voice
penetrating although musical was saying loudly, “Marry, Master French,
do you never drink aught but rum in the East that a gentleman is kept
waiting ten minutes for a cup of sack?”
French’s deep tones replied slowly:
“Nay, Captain, very little else but rum; sack be only for gentlefolk.”
Anny hastened forward.
“Here’s for you, sir,” she said briskly, and then stopped, awe-struck
before the Spaniard, dazzled by his appearance.
Black’erchief Dick stretched out a white jewelled hand for the tankard
without looking at the girl.
“Thank thee, mistress,” he said carelessly, lifting it to his lips.
Still Anny did not move and Hal Grame, looking up from the rum keg which
he was tapping, cursed the Spaniard’s clothes with that honest venom
which is only known to youth.
“Ah, a good draught!” The Spaniard put down the pot and touched his lips
with a lace-edged handkerchief.
“Mistress, another by your leave,” he said suddenly. Then his gaze, too,
became fixed, his dark eyes taking in every detail of her face.
“God’s Fool!” he exclaimed. “Mistress, you are wondrous fair.”
Anny blushed and, her senses returning to her, she curtseyed and taking
up the empty tankard tripped off with a gentle--“As you wish,” as she
went.
Black’erchief Dick stared after her for a second or two before he turned
to French.
“By my faith, Master French, you have no poor skill in choosing a
wench,” he said.
Big French laughed and reddened.
“Oh!” he said carelessly. “‘Tis not she but the other I would have
favour from.”
The Spaniard darted a look of misbelief at his big companion, but he
said nothing, for Anny had returned and was standing before him, a
brimming tankard in her hand.
Black’erchief Dick took the wine and set it by untasted, but retained
the brown hand which was even smaller than his own and held it firmly.
“Mistress,” he said, and Anny thought she had never seen such bright
merry eyes, “would you deem it an offence if I asked you your name?”
Anny smiled and curtseyed as she pulled away her hand.
“There be no more offence in asking my name than in holding my hand,
sir,” she said. “‘Tis Anny Farren, an you please so.”
“Anny, a good name and a simple,” said the Spaniard, choosing to ignore
the first remark. “Now tell me, fair Anny,” he continued, “hast ever
been told how beautiful thou art?”
The girl looked round. No one in the noisy company round the fire was
listening to them and a gleam of mischief twinkled in her eyes before
she dropped them as she turned again to the Spaniard.
“Nay, sir,” she said. “Neither has my mirror.”
“Then ’tis a right vile and lying thing, mistress,” said Dick, “for by
my knife”--here he drew the slender thing from his chased silver belt
and held it up to the light--“I never saw a comelier lass than thee.”
Anny looked at the knife curiously.
“‘Tis a pretty weapon you have, sir,” she said innocently.
Dick laughed.
“Pretty!” he said. “Ah, fair Anny, I would not send the blood from those
bright cheeks of thine by telling thee what this same dagger and this
right hand have together accomplished.”
“Oh, never mind the wenches, Captain, let’s have the story,” said one of
the group at the fire, the company’s attention having been drawn to the
Spaniard on the appearance of the knife. Black’erchief Dick stood up.
“Sack for everyone,” he said grandiloquently as he threw another handful
of coins on the tressled table. And then as the tankards were passed
round, “To the fairest wench on the Island, Fair Anny of the Ship,” he
said, lifting his tankard above his head.
The toast was given with a will. The Spaniard was in a fair way to win
popularity.
“‘Tis a fine gentleman, Hal,” whispered Anny to her sweetheart under
cover of the general hub-bub.
“Ay, a deal too fine,” replied the boy, putting a pot down with such
violence that all the others rattled and clinked against one another
with the shock.
Anny laughed.
“Thou art very foolish, O Hal o’ mine,” she said softly.
“There be more tales to tell o’ this dagger than will suffice for one
evening.”
The Spaniard’s voice was once more raised in a flaunting tone. “Let it
be enough,” he continued, “to say that it hath some ninety lives to
answer for.”
There was a general gasp at this information and a slow smile spread
over Black’erchief Dick’s face as he noted their amazement.
“It will be wonderful old I reckon?” Joe Pullen put the question
quietly, but as though he expected an answer in the affirmative.
“Nay,” the Spaniard smiled again, “‘twas of my own killings I was
talking,” he said.
“Oh!” Joe Pullen leant back and closed his eyes as though bored with the
conversation.
This procedure seemed to irritate the Spaniard, for he said suddenly,
“Look, friend, ’tis a fair weapon,” and he threw the glittering thing at
the man in the high-backed seat with a seemingly careless jerk of the
wrist. The dagger shot through the air, a streak of glistening steel,
and fastened itself in the wood half an inch above Joe’s head.
Sue shrieked, but there was a murmur of admiration at the feat from the
men looking on.
Lazily Joe Pullen sat up and wrenched the blade out of the soft wood; he
studied the dagger carefully.
“Ah!” he said at last, an expression of polite interest on his face, “a
wonderful fine throw that, sir,” and then added, the knife poised
delicately between a clumsy thumb and forefinger, “I wonder now could I
do that?” He raised his hand and appeared to be taking aim directly at
the Spaniard’s head.
“_And was losht in the rolling sea_,”
murmured Gilbot, his head fell forward on his chest and his pot,
slipping off his knee, fell clattering on the stones. The noise woke
him, and he looked up just in time to see Pullen, knife in hand,
standing in the middle of the room.
“Eh? eh?” the old man’s voice had the remnant of a note of authority in
it. “Put down t’ knife, lad. Ain’t no good in knives.” His head fell
forward on his chest again. “Why not shing happy shong?” he mumbled.
Joe grinned. “Ah,” he said slowly, “maybe the old’n’s right.” He handed
the knife to the Spaniard who took it without a word. “I might have hit
you--I ain’t a very good hand wi’ knives,” he said pleasantly.
The Spaniard smiled graciously. “Doubtless you will learn,” he said, his
jauntiness returning, and then continuing, “Fair Mistress Anny, will you
see these tapped?” and he pointed to five rum kegs which Blueneck,
Habakkuk Coot, and one or two others of the _Coldlight’s_ crew had just
brought in. “Rum all round,” he said, “and the charge to me.”
By the time his last command had been obeyed, the company in the Ship
was more noisy than before, and, answering to the call for a song, old
Gilbot, having been assisted to his feet, leaned his back against the
nearest ale barrel and quavered forth in a voice which evidently had
once been very tuneful:
“_Oh, no one remembers poor Will_
_Who shtayed by hish mate at the mill;_
_He ground up more bonesh_
_Than barley or stonesh,_
_And more than old Rowley could kill._”
“More bones, more bones,” roared the company as the rum flowed more
freely.
“_More bones! more bones!_
_And more than old Rowley could kill._”
“Ah, ha, may the Lord bless ye, fine gentlemen, and could ye spare a
drop o’ rum for a poor woman to take to her man who’s dying o’ the
cold?”
This request, uttered in a high-pitched whining voice coming from just
behind the half-opened door, startled the revellers and they paused to
listen, all eyes being fastened on the door. They watched it open a
little farther, and round it just below the latch appeared the head of
an old woman. The face, red and coarse, smiled leeringly, and the gray
elf locks above it were matted and ill-kempt.
Anny, who was standing near Black’erchief Dick, caught her breath.
“Lord! ’Tis Pet Salt,” she whispered as she shrank against the table.
The Spaniard dropped a hand over hers unnoticed by any one save
Hal--“Why shudderest thou, wench?” he said softly. Anny slipped her hand
away.
“‘Tis naught,” she said.
“Will ’ee spare a little rum, fair gentlemen?”
The old woman came a little farther into the room, disclosing a body so
bent and twisted as to be hardly human. She came nearer, the firelight
flickered on her, and a murmur rose from the company, she was so ragged
and scarred. The Spaniard looked at her critically, then he turned to
French.
“You have strange crones up this part of the Island, friend,” he
observed.
French laughed.
“Oh, this one won’t treat your almsgiving the way Nan Swayle did,” he
said.
At the sound of the name, Nan Swayle, an extraordinary change came over
the terrible old figure in the firelight. She straightened herself with
a fearful effort and, her small eyes blazing with fury, broke forth into
such a stream of horrible epithets that the rough company of the Ship
looked at one another shamefacedly.
“Peace, hag,” the Spaniard strode out from the crowd and touched the old
woman with the tip of his forefinger.
Pet Salt stopped, and, seeing the gaudy figure in front of her, fell on
her knees and holding up a fat, begrimed hand recommenced her whining.
Dick stood there for a second or two, and then turned his head.
“Blueneck,” he said, “bring out a small rum keg.”
The old woman fell snivelling at his feet.
The Spaniard kicked her gently.
“O mother of many evils,” he said, “get thee out of this room with thy
keg, methinks the air stinks with thee.”
Blueneck stepped forward, jerked the woman to her feet, and put the rum
on the floor beside her. Mumbling blessings, thanks, and curses, she
stumbled out of the open door, the keg clasped in her arms.
Dick watched her go and then turning to Sue: “Mistress, I would wash my
hands,” he said, looking at the tip of his forefinger.
Sue ran to get water and the company began to break up for the night.
“Good-night to ’ee,” shouted Hal, as Joe Pullen went out, “may thy wife
be sleeping sound.”
“Would she were sleeping with a heavenly soundness, mate,” replied the
other as he shut the door behind him.
The crew of the _Coldlight_ went off in a body to their ship, rolling
and singing happily.
Sue and Hal assisted the old landlord to his room, a nightly duty of
theirs, and Anny flitted about getting candles for the visitors.
Dick looked at Big French as they stood for a moment alone together
before the dying fire.
“Methinks thy horses will not have recovered from their lameness by
to-morrow, friend French,” he said, as Anny, two lighted candles in her
hand, appeared at an inner doorway.
French followed the direction of the other’s eyes, then he shrugged his
broad shoulders.
“As you wish, Captain,” he said carelessly, and wondered why the
Spaniard should laugh so triumphantly at his answer.
Some minutes later all was still in the Ship Tavern. Hal Grame alone
stood before the fast-graying embers in the kitchen, thinking miserably.
For the first time since he could remember, his childhood’s sweetheart
had forgotten to kiss him as she bade him good-night.