Time glided on, and Gil's ship was fast getting ready for sea. It was
to be a good trip this season; and, as she approached completion, her
freight was gradually accumulated, for, as in a quiet matter-of-fact
way, the captain let the relations between him and Mace stand in
abeyance, the founder made some slight advances, and business
arrangements were resumed.
It would have been a serious matter for both if they had stood out, for
Gil formed almost the only channel through which Jeremiah Cobbe's
productions were sold, and upon him depended the supply of two of the
principal ingredients with which one of the founder's branches of
industry was carried on.
So gunpowder was made and ground. Gil--though never asked to the house,
nor making any attempt to see Mace, and at their casual encounters
meeting her quite as a friend--spent much of his time at the founder's
works, superintending a casting, watching the purification of some batch
of nitre that he had brought home, and, above all, helping at the trial
of a newly-finished howitzer or culverin.
The founder was pleased, for he told himself that the young people were
growing sensible, and he became more friendly to Gil, who at last, after
sundry night journeys had been noted by the people about, found himself
ready for another voyage.
"When do you sail, then?" said the founder to him one morning.
"I have thought of going to-morrow," was the reply; "but the tide hardly
suits."
"Then put it off till the next day, my lad, and we'll have out the new
piece to-morrow, and try her across the Pool."
"With all my heart," said Gil, and the next morning he was busy and
light-hearted at the foundry, with old Wat Kilby and half-a-dozen more,
helping and superintending the mounting and dragging out of the great
newly-finished piece of artillery, on which the founder for some time
had been engaged.
"She'll startle some of them," he said, as he patted the great piece on
the breech, just as Mace came up slowly, and saluted Gil. "You shall
have the first shot with her, Tit," he said, as the idea occurred to
him.
"Will it be safe to let her?" said Gil, rather anxiously, as he saw Mace
shudder and shrink back.
"Safe? Just as if one of my pieces could burst!" cried the founder,
disdainfully.
"The girt barrel be ready, Mas' Cobbe," said Tom Croftly, as he came up
to announce that he had set up a great tub on a platform of planks on
the other side of the Pool.
"We'll soon batter that down," cried the founder, as with a loud cheer
the huge piece of artillery was dragged up to the end of the lake,
facing the founder's house, the whole of the men turning out to see the
first discharge.
"You'll help me to load and train her?" said the founder, who was as
excited over the trial as a boy.
"Ay, I'll help," cried Gil, rolling up the sleeves of his doublet, and
taking the lead at charging the monster; Mace smiling as she looked on,
and saw the strength he brought to bear, ramming the powder, lifting the
great shot as if it were a child's ball, and then driving it home.
"Don't aim at the target till we get the charged shell," said the
founder. "This is only a christening shot."
"Then we'll call the piece `Mace the First,'" said Gil, laughing.
"That's her name, then," said the founder; "and she shall be the first
of many Maces. Why are you aiming so low?"
"I want to show you a shot of mine that I should use against a Spaniard
if I wished to sink her," said Gil, smiling, as by means of wedges he
depressed the muzzle of the piece.
"But stop, man, the ball will go to the bottom of the Pool, and I want
you to hit yon ragged oak."
"So I shall," cried Gil, taking aim. "Give me leave, and you shall
see."
"There," he said, when he had adjusted the piece to his satisfaction,
"that will about do. Now, Wat, ready with that linstock. What are you
looking at, man?"
Wat Kilby, whose eyes had been fixed on Janet staring out of the window,
uttered a low growl, and lit the linstock.
"Now, Master Cobbe," cried Gil, "do you feel satisfied that the piece is
safe?"
"My life upon it," cried the founder.
"Nay," said Gil, gently; "it is thy child's life."
The founder frowned, and was about to speak hastily, but he refrained.
"Thou art right, friend Gil," he said; "but have no fear, the piece is
made of my toughest stuff. Come, my child, be ready with the linstock."
Gil's countenance betrayed his uneasiness; and, to give him confidence,
Mace let her eyes meet his, with a calm, loving look, as she mastered
her dread and horror, took the burning linstock, and stood ready near
the breech.
There was a general rush to right and left as the lighted linstock was
brought forward; only the founder, Gil, and Wat Kilby, who handed the
light, remaining, the latter coolly squatting down near the mouth of the
piece to watch the course of the shot.
The founder smiled grimly as he said to his child:
"A little more to the right, my lass. I warrant she don't burst; but
she'll kick like a Castilian mule. Now, captain, if you like to stand
aside, there's no need for you to run a risk."
Gil smiled and nodded his head as he took a final glance along the piece
to satisfy himself as to the direction in which it was laid.
"There," he said. "I am quite ready; raise your arm a little, Mace, and
let the burning linstock fall softly on the touch-hole. Now, Master
Cobbe, give the word, please; when you will."
"As I cry three," cried the founder--"Ready--One, two, _three_."
Gil stood by the side of the piece, opposite to Mace, watching her face
as she stood firm and unflinching; and as she lowered the linstock he
inwardly cried, "Brave girl! she would face a peril that would kill any
of less sterling mould."
For, at the word "three," she let the linstock-end, with its burning
slow match, touch lightly, exactly on the point where the priming lay.
Then there was a flash, a ball of white smoke, vomited from the
howitzer's mouth, a deafening roar, and the great iron ball struck the
water fifty yards away, rose, dipped again, and went on skipping along
the surface of the water till it crossed the lake, and split the
decaying oak to fragments, where it stood blasted on the further shore.
A loud hurrah from the lookers-on told of their satisfaction; and the
founder turned in admiration to the captain.
"A wonderful shot," he said; "but how learned you that trick, friend
Gil? I thought we should never see the ball again."
"From throwing stones," said Gil, smiling. "If a stone should bound
along the surface, why not a shot? That is the deadliest shot to my
mind, Master Cobbe, that one could send at an enemy's ship, and it was
bravely fired."
"Of course," said the founder, proudly. "If my child knew that I had
made the powder, and my hands had designed and fashioned the piece, she
felt she would have naught to fear. And now for a shell."
"Yes," said Gil, thoughtfully; "now for a shell. You think your piece
will fire one straight, Master Cobbe, as well as a mortar throws one in
a half-circle through the air?"
"I do," said the founder. "I lay my life on it."
"Then," said Gil, "I'd like to try my plan at the same time."
"What may that be, my lad?"
"Well, sir, it is this," said Gil. "You load your piece, then you
prepare your well-charged shell, with a piece of slow match in its eye."
"Yes."
"And according to whether that is long or short, so is the time before
it bursts the shell."
"Exactly, my lad."
"And you light the fuse or match before you place it in the howitzer."
"How else could you do it, my lad?"
"That we will try," said Gil. "I propose that you load the piece as you
would a common gun, and then put in the shell with its fuse unlit."
"Why, that's no better than a shot," cried Wat Kilby.
"Nay, old lad, the powder would fire the match when the piece went off,
and thus all the awkward preparation would be saved."
"My faith, Gil," said the founder, smiling, "it's a grand idea, and you
shall try it; for if it succeeds there ought to be a big reward for the
man who invents such a plan."
"Let's try, then," said Gil, quietly; and, with Wat Kilby's help, the
piece was recharged, a shell filled with powder, and, with its fuse
towards the charge, rammed home. Then the great piece was laid so that
it commanded the broad tub set up as a mark.
"I reckon," said Gil, "that this shell should burst just about when it
strikes that mark, which should be shattered to pieces; and, if an
enemy's ship, or a fortress, terribly crippled by the effect."
"Good, my lad, it should," said the founder, smiling.
Without another word, Gil carefully adjusted the piece; the linstock was
again handed to Mace, and, hiding a shudder, for her father's sake she
once more fired the great gun, and after a few moments, as the roar
rolled like thunder over the Pool, the founder exclaimed--
"A failure, Gil, a--"
_Crash_!
From a mile away came the roar of the bursting shell, like an echo of
the first shot.
"A success, sir, a success; but we wanted a quarter the fuse," said Gil,
smiling.
"It's glorious--it's grand!" cried the founder, excitedly. "Gil, your
hand--nay, we don't shake hands now. Captain Carr, you could make a
name as the greatest gunner in our land. Mace, my child, bravely fired.
Why, that shell must have struck the high rocks, where the new
ironstone lies."
"Ay, it has," said Wat Kilby, who stood shading his eyes with his hand,
as he gazed at the high precipitous rocks away behind the gabled house.
"Quick, there, another shot!" cried the founder. "Mace, my child, art
ready for another?"
"Nay, father," she said quietly, and with a pained look in her eyes;
"you should try this time."
"Ay, lass, and I will," he cried, as he watched the sponging-out and
reloading of the piece; while Mace, who little recked in that shot of
what she had done for her future, stood now a spectator, instead of an
actor in the scene.
The piece was soon ready, and this time the shell was prepared by Gil
himself, with a shorter fuse.
"Lay her so that the shell may burst over the great charcoal-heap by the
corner of the wood," said the founder; and, after exercising a great
deal of care, Gil laid the piece quite to his satisfaction.
"Now try," he said. "Ready!"
"Ready," cried the founder.
"Fire."
The linstock was again applied; there was the same tremendous roar; the
great piece leaped back several feet, and a few seconds later, _crash_!
came the bursting of the shell once more, so near to the charcoal hill
that the air was filled with the fragments that were scattered far.
"A great success, Gil; you have won a prize," cried the founder, "one of
those that the world will talk of a century hence; but hey-day! what's
this?"
There was the quick trampling of horses' feet, and at the end of a few
seconds two horsemen came tearing along the track at full speed, their
riders having apparently lost all control over their steeds. The first
kept his seat, and tugged hard at the bridle; but the second was well on
his horse's neck, to which he clung with all his might, his red face and
his thickly-padded feather breeches showing that it was Sir Thomas
Beckley, whose appearance was greeted by the founder with a roar of
laughter.
Gil hardly glanced at him, for the happy sunshine of the past hours
seemed to have been clouded, as the frightened horses stopped of their
own accord, and he saw that the first arrival was Sir Mark, whose horse,
like that of the baronet, had been startled by the bursting shell.
Volume 2, Chapter VIII.