“I will, seh.”

“What are you going to do now?” said Stukeley. Captain Cammock relit

his pipe at the lamp, stopping the red fragments with his thumb. The

boatswain knocked at the door, cap in hand.

“Call all hands aft, boatswain.”

“What der hell?” said Mr. Iles, as the call sounded. The men came

hurrying aft, swearing at having their dog-watch spoiled. Some of them

were half clad, just out of their hammocks; others were buttoning

their clothes. In the last of the daylight, in the glow which gives a

holy beauty to all things, they seemed a strange company. Just so will

the assembling souls look, when the heavens crinkle into flame, as the

triumphing clarion shrills, bringing together the awed, the sullen,

the expectant.

“Muster your watch, Mr. Iles.”

“No. We’ll settle it here,” said Stukeley, thinking that the cabin was

safer for his purpose than the deck. “We’ll settle it here, old

Brandyco.”

Cammock brushed past him and went on to the poop, without replying.

Iles, much puzzled, was about to follow.

“Don’t go,” said Stukeley. “I wouldn’t go. Don’t go. I’ll make it

square for you.”

“B’gee. I’d better go,” said Iles. “I don’t know what game he’s up to,

do I hell?”

He went on deck, to the starboard side, where he began to muster his

watch. Mr. Cottrill’s voice, much more slow and grave than his, made a

strange echo with him, each calling a name in turn, each drawing a

response from a voice of different pitch. “Shepherd.” “Here, sir.”

“Arnold.” “Here, sir.” “Richard Arnold.” “Here, sir.” “John Wise.”

“Present, sir.” “Adams.” “At the wheel, sir.” Then the reports: “Port

watch all present, sir, except the wheel and look-outs.” “Starboard

watch all present, sir.” “Idlers and boys all present, sir”; followed

by Captain Cammock’s “Very well,” as he paced to and fro across the

forward end of the poop. Captain Margaret stood with Perrin by the

poop-bell, with their hats off, out of deference to Captain Cammock.

They stood still in their most splendid clothes, just as they had

risen from the feast. They looked down on all the upturned faces a few

feet beneath them, wondering at the beauty of the scene, lit now, by

the dying sun, into a glow, that made each face glorious. Still

Captain Cammock walked to and fro, casting a contemptuous glance as he

turned; his face set and passionless; his eyes taking in each face of

all the crowd. Stukeley, who had followed his friend on deck, asked

Margaret if he was going to lead in prayer; but he got no answer; the

men, impressed and puzzled, did not titter. Cammock stopped in his

walk, and looked over the poop-rail at the crew.

“Thomas Iles,” he said.

“Sir,” said Iles, turning and looking up.

“I break you, for refusing duty.”

“What, sir?”

“Mr. Cottrill.”

“Sir.”

“Put the man Iles in your watch.”

“Very good, sir.”

“Iles, go below and get your chest. Take it forward to the fo’c’s’le.

You belong to Mr. Cottrill’s watch.”

“What the hell”--began Stukeley.

“Silence, please.”

“I ain’t goin’ to take no break from you,” said Iles.

“Mr. Cottrill,” said Cammock, “log that man.”

“Go below and get your chest, Iles,” said Cottrill.

“Get ter hell,” said Iles.

Cottrill walked up to him and smote him in the eye. “Get your chest,

pronto,” he said. “Give me any more of your lip and I’ll lay your

spine bare. Give him a hand you, Wise.”

“You know the rules, men,” said Captain Cammock. “Choose your new

second mate.”

The men shuffled and shifted. One of them, a leader in the fo’c’s’le,

shoved the bosun forward. “What the hell, boys,” said the bosun under

his breath. “We’d rather you chose, sir,” said old Sails, coming from

among the crowd after a moment of busy whispering.

“I choose you, boatswain,” said Cammock. “Ay or no, you?”

“Ay, sir.”

“Mr. Ramage, you’re our second mate. Come to my cabin at eight bells

and sign the articles. You, Griffin Harris, take Mr. Ramage’s call; I

make you boatswain. Mr. Ramage, tell one of the hands to shift your

gear into the second mate’s cabin. Harris, bring your chest aft to the

round-house. Men, remember that Mr. Ramage is Mister Ramage. Take the

call, Harris.”

Griffin Harris, a short, thick-set seaman, hanging his head but

showing no trace of emotion, pulled his forelock and stepped up to Mr.

Ramage.

“Beg pardon, Mr. Ramage,” he said, “might I have the call, sir.” Mr.

Ramage slipped the chain from his neck and handed it to him.

“Pipe down, bosun.”

Harris took the pipe and blew the tremolo of the belay. The men turned

to walk forward, just as Iles and Wise reappeared with the chest and

bag. Captain Cammock’s sternness vanished the moment the pipe down had

sounded.

“You’ll have to pipe better than that, bosun,” he said. “You pipe like

Wally with the stiff neck.” The new bosun laughed. “I’ll pipe fine

against we get there, sir.”

Stukeley walked up to Captain Cammock. “What the hell d’you mean by

insulting my friend?” he said.

Cammock paid no attention to him, but walked up to Margaret to ask if

he would stand the first watch with the new second mate.

“Certainly,” said Margaret.

“I asked you a question,” said Stukeley bitterly, in a loud voice, so

that the men loitering in the waist could hear. “D’ye hear me, Captain

Cammock? What the hell d’you mean by insulting my friend?”

“Stukeley,” said Margaret, “go below.”

“I’m not talking to you,” said Stukeley.

“No,” said Margaret; “but I’m giving you some sound advice. Go below.”

“You’re a funny devil, aren’t you? Now then, Brandyface, you’ll give

me an answer.”

At this moment Iles came up, from his old haunts, in the ’tween-decks,

carrying his demijohn of carefully saved spirits.

“What have you got there, Iles?” said the captain quickly.

“My whack of rum.”

“Take your cap off, or I’ll knock it off. What did you say?”

“My whack of rum, Captain Cammock, sir.”

“Yes. You’d better remember that. Put down that demijohn.”

“Please, sir. It’s mine, sir.”

He laid down the demijohn, fingering his cap.

“Steward, whack that rum out to all hands at eight bells. Allow it to

the man Iles in the savings book.”

“I will, seh.”

“There,” said Cammock, turning to Margaret. “He’s not going to curry

favour forward with a couple of gallons of rum. He’d have had half the

watch blind if I’d not seen him that time.”

Stukeley put his hand on Cammock’s shoulder. “You damned old pirate,”

he said. “Now you’ll settle with me. Your little go’s over. Now it’s

mine.”

Cammock turned to Margaret. “Take his other arm, sir,” he said.

He caught Stukeley by the wrist with his left hand. Margaret tackled

him swiftly on the other side. Together they marched him below to

Cammock’s cabin, which they entered locking the door behind them.

“Now, Mr. Stukeley,” said Cammock, placing his prisoner on the settee.

“I command this ship. Be quiet now. Not a word, sir, till I’m done.

You give me any more trouble. You so much as try to come between me

and my hands, and you’ll go in irons till I can put you ashore.”

“That’s entirely right, Captain Cammock,” said Margaret. “You’d do

well to remember it, Stukeley.”

“I’ll remember it,” said Stukeley. “And I’ll make you two remember

it.”

“Another thing,” said Cammock. “While you live aft, you’ll act aft.

You’ll hold no conversation with any member of my crew, except through

one of my officers. And I shall expect you to keep from the main deck

and the ’tween-decks. I say nothing about your insults. Them’s only

the bubbling in your mind, I guess. I’m sorry for you. But give me no

more, sir. If you do, or if you break the rules I make, you’ll go in

irons till we land.”

“Anything more?” said Stukeley.

“There’ll be more when I see you need it.”

“All right, Maggy. I’ll remember this. Is that all now?”

“Yes. That’s all,” said Margaret.

“Then I advise you to let me go.”

“There’s the door,” said Margaret, turning back the key. “Allow me to

come with you.”

“Thank you. I choose my own company.”

“No, sir,” said Cammock. “We shall do that for you. You ain’t fit to

choose your own company. I’m sorry to have to say it.”

“You wait, Mr. Cammock. You wait.”

“Will you come on deck, Stukeley?” said Margaret. “Or will you join

your wife?”

“You may go to hell,” said Stukeley. With this repartee he walked aft

to vent his spleen upon Olivia. Guessing his intention, Margaret

stayed with him till the bell called the starboard watch on deck.

VII.

THE TOBACCO MERCHANT

“This is all our world;

We shall know nothing here but one another.”

_The Two Noble Kinsmen._

Six days after striking soundings, the _Broken Heart_ sailed up the

James River with the flood, to let go her anchor off Jamestown as the

last gun of her salute was fired. Her colours were dipped to the

colours on the Governor’s flagstaff. Her sails were all clued up

together; the bunts of the furls were tight and shapely, crossed by

the broad black bands of the bunt-gaskets.

Captain Cammock walked the poop with Margaret, pretending to watch the

squaring of the yards. Both were puzzled and ill at ease. They were in

that troublous state of waiting to be assured; their anxiety was such

that a decisive blow, either for or against them, would have seemed

better than the uncertainty which made them hope for one thing while

fearing the other. On entering Chesapeake Bay, they had squared their

yards, intending to run up past Stingray, to Hog Creek on the Accomac

side, where some of Cammock’s friends were planting. But a man-of-war

sloop, flying the ensign, and full of men, had crossed their bows,

bidding them heave-to and send a boat. Cammock had gone aboard her to

find out what she wanted; and had received orders to proceed direct to

Jamestown, to discharge his cargo there. No explanation was given

except that “Those were the orders.” The officer of the watch would

tell him nothing more. He had returned on board after this, feeling

sure that danger threatened them. He was inclined to think that word

had come from England ordering their arrest on arrival. But he was not

sure. The lieutenant had been surly after a drunken night. His remark

of “You’ll find out about that when you get there” might have come

from a momentary irritation at being questioned. Margaret had called

up Stukeley, to tell him his fears, and Stukeley had counselled

putting to sea. This was impossible; for the sloop was almost within

hail; while without Point Comfort, under her whole topsails, her open

port-lids flashing, was one of the two frigates on the station coming

in from her cruise to take fresh water. They were in the trap; they

could only hope for the best. Stukeley took the news badly. He stood

by the mizen rigging, with a white face, licking his lips and making

wild suggestions.

“Couldn’t you put me ashore?” he asked. “Send me in a boat. Until you

leave?”

“How about Olivia? Have you told her yet, what you expect?”

“No, of course I’ve not told her. Can’t you talk sense?”

“Hadn’t you better tell her? I mean, as--in kindness to her.”

“No. I can’t.”

“Shall I tell her?”

“My God, no. Look here, Margaret. I tell you why I can’t tell her. I’m

a blackguard, and all that. Look here. She’s going to have a child.”

“My God. Are you sure, Stukeley?”

“Sure? Damn it, man. It’s serious. For God’s sake talk sense.”

“Well. My God. She must be told, man. It’ll only be worse for her

later.”

“No, it won’t be.”

“But what are you going to do?”

“Do? I tell you it’ll be death for her if she learns.”

“But you must think of her, Stukeley. Man. How. Supposing. She can’t

come to Darien. It’s impossible.”

“It’s not impossible. It’d be all right.”

“Well, Stukeley, I give you up.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Things must take their course. I can’t think what I can do.”

“Are you going to give me up?”

“You must see that you’ll be taken. If there’s a letter.”

“If. If. Oh. Good luck, you.”

“Yes. But think of Olivia. Man. She must go home. You must see that.”

“Yes. But she doesn’t. You know how queer women get at these times.

She insists on coming with me.”

“I don’t know. Go and tell her. Go on and tell her, cost what it may.”

“I’ve got to consider her child.”

“Captain Cammock, you’ve got a clear head. What do you say?”

“You could head me up in a cask,” said Stukeley.

“Well,” said Cammock. “I say, go and eat a good big dinner. We shan’t

be in till afternoon; till two or three, perhaps, if the wind drops.

If there’s to be an arrest, you’ll know of it soon enough. It’ll

settle itself. Don’t cross no river till you come to the water. Why?

Cos you may get drowned anyway.”

“But about my wife?”

“Oh, she’ll be well looked after. We’ll look after her.”

“Damn you.”

“Captain Margaret,” said Cammock, “just come aft with me, while I take

some bearings.”

When they had walked out of earshot of Stukeley, Cammock added that it

would be a good thing to let the man suffer for a spell.

“But how about Mrs. Stukeley, captain? And her little one?”

“I wasn’t thinking of them, sir. I’m thinking of you and Mr. Perrin.

And the ship, too. We may be a political matter, sir. The Lords who

fitted us out; they’ve got enemies--political enemies. They may say,

‘Oh, you’ve sent out a gang of pirates, who rescue escaping felons.’

There may be the devil’s own row at home about us. Law is all right

and fair. But there’s no law nor right in politics.”

“We shall know soon.”

“Yes. Very soon now.”

“It’s anxious work, waiting.”

“Why, yes. Worse than the event.”

“It’ll come hard on that poor girl.”

“She’s better quit of him, sir. Much better.”

“She won’t think that.”

“Not at first. But she will.”

“I wonder what it’s going to be. Pretty, that little cove there, with

the little green boat coming out.”

“Very pretty sights at sea, sir. Nice bit of timber yonder. Good spars

in them red pine. Don’t borrow trouble, sir. We’ll know soon enough.”

Thus they talked together as the ship came slowly to her anchorage.

Perrin joined them, seemingly indifferent to the present trouble.

“Whatever happens,” he said, “we shall be ourselves. It’s no use

worrying.” He smoked more than usual after dinner, and then made

outline draughts of the coast. He was not being brave; but having

little imagination he was indifferent. It was hot, too; and hot

weather always made him dull. The sight of the new land pleased him.

There was forest; miles of forest; forest rising over hills, lapsing

to hollows of marsh, coming down to the sea, fading in a blur of

branches. Here and there were clearings. Here and there, in sandy

bays, the cows came, lowing at the sea. Smoke, in blue spires, rose up

at a planter’s slip where a sloop was building. At times, as they

neared the land, before going about on another reach, they heard the

voices of men, the chop of axes upon timber. A country sloop lay at a

jetty. Her men were hoisting casks aboard, singing at the tackles. A

saw was at work at hand. Men were carrying planks to the jetty end.

One of the men, laying down his load, waved to the ship as Captain

Cammock flung his colours out. Very proudly, with all the dignity of

beauty, the _Broken Heart_ marched to her rest. Her sailors cheered.

They fired their guns, took up their berth and anchored. Jamestown lay

before them; with some twenty of her citizens watching them from the

battery. Already one or two men were putting out in boats towards

them.

“That’s not the whole city,” said Perrin. “There’s only twenty or

thirty houses, beside the fort and the church.”

“That’s Jamestown,” said Cammock. “Now, Captain Margaret. Now for it.”

“Not much longer to wait. We’ll go ashore together.”

“No, sir. I’ll go alone. If anything’s going to happen, I’ll send off

word. Then you can look to the lady.”

“Ah, thank you, Captain.”

“Well. We’ll know soon. I’ll wave my hat from the pier if it’s all

well, sir. Cheer up, sir. Mr. Cottrill, there.”

“Ay, ay, Captain Cammock.”

“My gig’s crew, mister. Are they in their whites?”

“Gig’s crew all dressed, sir.”

“Tell the bosun to pipe them away. No one to come aboard, Mr.

Cottrill.”

“No one to come aboard, sir.”

“You better keep an eye on Mr. Stukeley, Captain Margaret. He may cut

up rash.”

“I will. Good-bye, captain. Good luck.”

“We’ll know soon.”

“Got your papers?”

“All correct, sir. Now.” He passed over the side, and shoved off.

Margaret watched the boat pull past, glad of that small diversion. She

was a six-oar gig, whale-built, painted dark-blue and white, steering,

on state occasions, with a brass-yoked rudder, at other times with an

oar. A boy in a white jacket steered her with the yoke-lines, sitting

behind Cammock’s back-board.

“Look, Edward,” said Margaret. “How character shows in little things.

Look at the style of the rowers. Look at the stroke, bowing his head

as he comes aft, and the two midship oars watching their blades. What

makes men watch their blades?”

“Weak will. Or vanity. I always do it. A sense of beauty, too. Desire

of pleasure. The swirl and the bubbles are beautiful. What do you make

of the bow?”

“He’s not got room to pull. The stern-sheets are too roomy.”

“He’s a coward,” said Perrin. “I should be like that. He shirks each

stroke because he’s afraid of knocking the second bow’s back.”

“Yes. That’s it.”

“The weakest man is always put in the bow. He has to jump out with the

painter.”

“The most intelligent man, probably.”

“No. I shouldn’t say the most intelligent. The most sensitive.”

“What do you make of Cammock’s back?”

“Cammock’s a fine fellow.”

“Isn’t it strange that he should be what he is?”

“After mixing---- Good Lord, what ruffians he’s mixed with.”

“I should like to know how he comes by it. I’m a great believer in

heredity. I wonder what his people were. He’s got refinement, too, in

a curious sort of way.”

“The poor are often very refined,” said Perrin. “The very poor.

Especially in the country.”

“I suppose because they’ve nothing to make them false.”

“Yes.”

“You know, Edward, that Olivia’s going to have a child?”

“No. Good Lord. What in the world? Supposing there’s a letter?”

“That’s the question. There it is. And there goes Cammock up the

stage.”

“But it knocks her coming to Darien?”

“Stukeley says not.”

“Good God, though. It must.”

“We probably shan’t leave here, Edward. And anyway he’s her husband.”

“You must refuse to take her.”

“Yes. But even if we get to Darien--I don’t think it likely--she’s as

well with us as here, Edward.”

“That’s true, too. Well. I told you how it would be, Charles. Didn’t

I?”

Cammock was a long time gone; but not such a long time as it seemed.

Margaret, deserted by Perrin, who was called away by Cottrill, paced

the poop moodily, losing, in dejection, the clumsy trick of carriage

which marred his gait. His ordinary walk had a kind of jaunty spring,

which seemed unnatural to the man, improper to his essential

character. There was no jauntiness in him at this moment; for his

trouble was heavy. For possible arrest he cared nothing; for possible

hanging he cared nothing. “I shall still be myself,” he said,

repeating what Perrin had repeated from another. “What does it matter

if I am hanged?” Bells seemed to be ringing in his brain, heavy bells

and dull, with merry impish bells. “Olivia’s going to have a child,”

they said. “Olivia’s going to have a child. Going to have a child. A

child. A child.” Like many lonely men, he desired children. They had

played about him in his dreams of her. Girls mostly, with Olivia’s

eyes, her throat, her voice. Now was come the end of everything. Her

child would be a monster, a goat-footed boy, a Stukeley. He shuddered

to think of the child’s hair, curling and black like the father’s

hair, negro hair; his nerves were shaken. As for his love for Olivia,

that would never be the same; it was changed now, wholly changed. No

man’s love could bear that, could forgive that; though it glorified

her, in a way, and made her very sacred.

He leaned over the taffrail, to watch for Cammock, who had vanished

among the strangers, like a stone cast into water. Something stirred

beside him, and there was Olivia, dressed in clothes which she had

worn long ago at home, looking as she had looked then; but that her

face was paler. He started to see her, thinking for a moment that she

had come to tell him, hoping it with all his heart. It would make

their friendship perfect, he thought, if this might be done together.

She smiled to see him start; but her face instantly grew grave again.

“Charles,” she said, “is anything the matter with Tom?”

“Matter with him?” he repeated. “Is he ill? Has he hurt himself?” For

just one wild second, he wondered, in an agony that was half hope, if

the man had taken poison.

“I can’t get him to speak to me. And he’s so white, Charles, I can’t

help thinking that he is sunstruck.”

“Shall I go down?”

“He won’t see anybody. He won’t---- Oh, Charles, I wish I’d been on

deck with him. Was he in the sun? Are you sure he wasn’t?”

“He wasn’t in the sun, Olivia. He wasn’t on deck for more than a few

minutes.”

“But where was he, then? He must have been forward, where you couldn’t

see him.”

“I do hope he wasn’t,” said Margaret, hating himself for his

deception. The words “Mrs. Inigo” rose to his lips; but he kept from

uttering them. “I ought to have prevented all this. I might have. I

ought to have kept them apart till---- She ought not to be fretting.”

He bit his lips at the thought of his negligence.

“I’ll come down at once, Olivia,” he said. “Oh, Olivia,” he added, his

voice growing tender and moving, “you look so white and worried. I’ll

look after Stukeley. Won’t you lie down and rest? It’s much too hot

for you in the sun here. And then the excitement.”

“Oh, never mind me,” she said hurriedly, almost gaily. “I’m not in the

least ill. It’s Tom.” As women sometimes will, in moments of emotion,

she acted impulsively, laying her hand on his arm, sending the blood

to his temples.

“Come on down, then,” he said thickly. “We’ll see. We’ll see your

husband.” He glanced over the side again, biting his lips, his face

turned away, as she took his arm. In that glance he saw the slip below

the battery, with its green piles, barnacled, clucked about by the

tides, mounted with tarpaulined cannon. Cammock stood upon the slip

end, his gig’s crew, their oars tossed, just below him. Townsmen were

talking to him; but he stood unheeding, looking at the _Broken Heart_,

waving his hat. Margaret waved his hat in answer, to show that he saw;

then, breathing a deep sigh, he led Olivia below.

“Why. What makes you sigh like that?” she asked.

“Why do I sigh? Captain Cammock was signalling to me. I was afraid we

might be quarantined. But it’s all right now. He’s signalled that it’s

all right. I’m relieved.”

“Charles,” she said, pausing in the alleyway, “I sometimes feel that

I’ve given you pain by coming with you like this. Have I?”

“No, Olivia,” he answered. “How could you?”

“But are you sure? I couldn’t bear to think that I had.”

“I am very sure of that, Olivia.”

“You aren’t angry with me for asking?”

“We’re old friends, you and I, Olivia. Old friends like you and I

don’t get angry with each other.”

“Some day I hope you’ll marry, Charles. You’d make the right woman

very happy.”

“Ah no, no. We mustn’t talk of that.”

“You will, Charles. You will. And yet it would be sad to see all one’s

boy and girl friends married. A woman doesn’t like to feel old.”

“Olivia.”

“Now come in and see Tom. Do you think there are good doctors here?”

The question was earnestly asked. It seemed to Margaret that it took

for granted that he knew, that it was the woman’s way of taking him

into her confidence, into the dark, locked cupboard, meagrely

catalogued without, which is a woman’s confidence. It made a strange

jangling of all his strings to hear her. In the dark passage there,

with her great eyes looking into his, and the earrings gleaming palely

against the hair, she moved him, she shook him out of tune.

“Olivia,” he said, stammering. “Olivia. If. When. When your. If you

ever have a child, Olivia. Will you let me--let me---- Let me see it

often. Be its godfather. Be something to it?”

“Yes,” she said softly, pressing the back of his hand quickly. “Yes,

Charles. I promise you that.”

“You aren’t hurt, Olivia?”

“No, Charles. Not hurt.”

“God bless you, Olivia.”

“Come in to Tom, now,” she said in a low voice. She was moved and

touched. They went in.

Stukeley sat at the cabin table, drinking brandy without water. He was

white and sick. Their entrance made him start up with an oath.

“What’s the matter, Stukeley?” said Margaret. “We aren’t going

into--into quarantine. Cammock’s signalled that it’s all right. What’s

the matter with you? Let me feel your pulse.”

“Ah,” he said, gasping. “Ah. This heat’s upset me.”

“How are you, Tom?” Olivia tenderly asked. “How’s your head?”

“Oh, my head’s all right. Don’t bother. Don’t bother.” He rose from

his seat, laughing wildly. “What a turn it gave me,” he said. “I’m

going to see old Brandyco. I’m all right again, Olivia.” He took her

by the shoulders and bent back her head so that he might kiss her.

“Poor little Olive,” he said caressingly, pinching her arms. “She’s

been worrying, ever so. Hasn’t she? Hasn’t she? Eh?” He kissed her

eyes. Margaret turned away, wondering whether the kiss smelt worse of

brandy or tobacco.

“Don’t go on deck,” said Olivia. “Don’t go on deck, Tom dear. The

sun’s so strong.”

“But you’ll want to hear about Jamestown from Cammock.”

“No, Tom dear. I don’t. I want you. I want you to rest and get well.”

“I’d like. I must just see Cammock.”

“But what makes you so eager to see Captain Cammock, Tom?”

“Stukeley looks on the captain as a sort of a show,” said Margaret

quickly. “The captain has just been talking with strangers. Wouldn’t

you like to see a man who’d really seen a new face, Olivia; and heard

a new voice?”

Olivia smiled.

“I don’t think Tom’s strong enough for excitements,” she said.

“No,” said Margaret, leaving the cabin. “But I don’t think there’s

much wrong. I think he’ll soon be all right, Olivia. Make him lie down

and rest. I must just see the captain.” He went on deck hurriedly,

holding his breath till he was in the fresh air. “Poison,” he said to

himself. “Poison. What a life. What squalor. That woman going to have

a child. And Stukeley, pah. Drinking and smoking there, waiting to be

dragged to gaol. She doesn’t see it. One would think he must shock

every fibre of her nature. And he doesn’t. He gives her love, I

suppose. That was the only thing she wanted. And now that beast is her

standard.” In the pure air he blamed himself for thinking ill of her.

“After all,” he thought, “Stukeley isn’t a beast to her. She, with her

much finer sense, sees something in him. Something that is all the

world to her. Something beautiful. She may even be happy with him. She

may be.” He thought pitifully of women and angrily of men. It was all

wrong, he thought. Men and women could never understand each other,

except in rare moments, in love, when the light in each heart burned

clearly. Women were hidden; they were driven to covert, poor trembling

fawns. They were like the nymphs hidden in the reeds by the river.

They took care that men should see only the reeds. He had never really

seen Olivia; he was not sure if he knew her yet; he couldn’t say what

it was that he loved. He did not care; he was not going to ask. She

was beautiful; her beauty moved him to the bone; beauty was in all of

her, in the whole woman, the whole nature, body and spirit, in the

ways of body and spirit. She was going to have a child; Stukeley’s

child; red-cheeked, curly; a little boy-beast, the bully of his

school. Ah, but the child would be hers, too. She would bring it up to

be like her. He would have that refinement of voice, that lovely,

merry, almost timid manner, her eyes, her grace, her shyness. Captain

Cammock, who had been watching him for a full thirty seconds, half

amused, half sad, that his passion had so strong a hold still, even in

a moment of anxiety, now tapped him on the shoulder.

“Ah, captain.”

“It’s all right, sir. Nothing come yet. You can land your goods as

soon as you like. The Governor said he remembered you, and hopes that

you will wait upon him.”

“Good. I will.”

“It is good, sir. Oh, I’ve ordered some fresh meat, sir, and some

fowls.”

“Yes. We must feast to-night. And send the boat in for a cask of fresh

water. Two-month water is poor tipple.”

“Yes. What would you say to six-month water? We must give a free pump

in port. And a cask of rum or beer, sir, on the quarter-deck, would

help our trade. For visitors you know, sir.”

“See to it then, captain. A letter may come while we’re here, though.”

“Then make the Governor and the others your friends. Send ’em a few

cases of wine. Square the man-of-war captains. There’ll be no trouble

if you make them all your friends.”

“It doesn’t sound pretty.”

“Nor a wrung neck don’t look it.”

During the next few days there was bustle in the _Broken Heart_.

Visitors came aboard to look at samples of goods; to talk with the

seamen; and to taste the rum and beer, which was served out, a cup to

each comer, for the first forty-eight hours of her stay in the port.

All sorts came aboard her; traders and planters, oyster and fisher

men, soldiers from the fort, officers of the Governor’s house,

Indians, men from the backwoods, trappers, a sun-burned,

good-humoured, silent company, very sharp at a bargain.

After the first two days, the trade began. The seamen rigged up

trading-booths ashore, with some old sails, stretched upon poles.

Planks were laid upon casks to serve as trade tables. The goods were

arranged at the back of each booth, in the care of trusty hands.

Clothing was more in demand than any other kind of goods; but the only

clothes bought were those of fine quality and beautiful colour. It

puzzled Captain Margaret to see a small planter, owning perhaps only

one white apprenticed servant, or redemptioner, buying clothes of

great price, putting them on in the booth, and riding off, like an

earl, on his little Virginian horse, to his little clearing in the

wilderness. A few planters, especially those who were newly come to

the colony from the islands, where they had been privateering, paid

for their purchases in ounces of silver. It was easy to recognize

these planters. They had not lost their sea-walk, nor that steadfast

anxiety of gaze which marks the sailor. They all carried arms; though

the richer sort of them wore only pistols and a knife, leaving the

carriage of the musket, the bag containing lead, a mould, and some

bullets, and the heavy leather-covered powder-bottle, to a

redemptioner, a Moskito Indian, or, more rarely, to a negro slave.

Cammock had known some of these men in the past. Often, as he sat in

the shade, watching the beauty of the scene, now so glorious with

coming autumn, Captain Margaret would see one of these strangers

approaching, followed by his man. He was always impressed by them,

sometimes by their physical splendour, sometimes by the sense that

they were full of a rather terrible exuberance. As he watched such a

man approaching the booths, puffing at his pipe, dressed in elaborate

clothes, hung about with silver at all points, with silver buttons,

silver brooches, silver discs, buckles of heavy silver, links and

stars of silver, silver chains and necklets, so that the man’s whole

wealth was on his body at one time, Captain Margaret was conscious of

a feeling of envy. His own training, his own beautifully ordered life

in an English college, had shut him off from such a life as this

man’s. This clashing, tinkling pirate--he was nothing more, although

he often looked so fine--was master of his world. Captain Margaret was

the slave of his; the unhappy slave. The pirate could leave his

plantation when he wished, letting the wild bines choke his tobacco.

He could ship himself in any ship in the harbour, and go to any part

of the world which pleased his fancy. If chance flung him down in a

tropical forest, on an island in the sea, in a battle, in a shipwreck,

at a wedding, he would know what to do, what to say, what to propose.

The world had no terrors for such a man. Captain Margaret forgot, when

he thought thus enviously, that he himself was one of the few who had

escaped from the world, escaped from that necessity for tooth and claw

which is nature; and that by being no longer “natural,” instinctive,

common, he had risen to something higher, to a point from which he

could regard the pirate as an interesting work of art. He never

pursued his fancy far enough to ask himself if he would willingly

imitate or possess that work; because the pirate, passing him by with

a hard, shrewd glance, would stride into the booth, taking off his hat

to thrust back his long hair. He would listen then to the

conversation. If the man was known to Cammock, the talk began

promptly.

“Any Don Peraltoes, this trip?”

“What? Peraltoes? You weren’t there?”

“Ain’t you Ned?”

“And you’re Lion. I’d never have known you. Any of ’em with you?”

“No, I quit the trade. Come and have something.”

Then they would mix some rum and sugar, and sprinkle the mixture with

a squeeze of a scrap of lemon-peel. They would drink together, calling

their curious toasts of “Salue,” “Here’s How,” “Happy Days,” and

“Plenty Dollars.” Then, over the trade as the men haggled--

“Got any powder, Lion?”

“I can only sell powder if you’ve a license from the Governor.”

“Any small arms?”

“The same there.”

“Them’s a nice lot of macheats. How do they come?”

“An ounce apiece. Or fifty pound of leaf.”

“Steep. Let’s see one. A good trade knife.”

“What are you doing now?”

“I got about fifty acres burned off. That’s the grant here, Lion,

fifty acres. Tobacco, you know. I do a bit of fishing, whiles. A nice

handy sloop, I got. Small, of course.”

“Crops good?”

“A sight too good, if you ask me. This black soil’ll sprout a coffin.

But tobacco’s away down. We burn half our crops, trying to keep up

prices. It’s only worth about ninepence.”

“Are you going to stick at it?”

“It’s a bit quiet. I lie out in the woods whiles.”

“Anything else doing?”

“You were here yourself?”

“I come here with Crawfot’s party. I was here. Yes. Sure.”

“Crawfot’s dead, if you mean Tom. Did you ever try any running?”

“Running rum from Jamaica?”

“Yes. I do a bit that way. Other things, too. I’m in with some of

Ned’s lot.”

“Ned Davis?”

“Yes. We run blacks sometimes, too. Run ’em into Carolina. New York

sometimes.”

“Ah. How did Tom die?”

“Indians. I done a bit that way, too, Lion. You catch two or three

squaws. They fetch as much as a white woman down to Campeachy. Two or

three of them; it runs into money.”

“I’ve known that done,” said Cammock. “The man done it was Robert

Jolly. He come to a jolly end, what’s more. The braves got him.”

“There’s always a risk of that,” said Ned. “And it’s 10,000 lbs. of

leaf fine, if the Governor gets you.”

“Well, Ned. If you want fun, why don’t you come in with us. And bring

in some of your mates.”

“Is this trade only a blind, then?”

“Not on your life. But we’re in for a big thing. A very big thing. I

wouldn’t mention it. But you see, I know you, Ned; and so, you see,

it’s like this.”

Between them, Margaret and Cammock persuaded some half a dozen

recruits to join during the first few days in port. The new recruits

promised to come aboard when the ship sailed, but not before, lest the

Governor should grow suspicious. They agreed, also, seeing that

Margaret had a commission, to submit to a sharper discipline than was

usual among privateers. Margaret had no intention of admitting these

men into his fo’c’s’le. They were not waged men like the seamen

shipped in London; but volunteers agreeing to serve for shares. To

admit them into the fo’c’s’le, where they would enjoy certain

privileges not shared by the sailors, would cause bad blood, and

bickering for precedence. To avoid this, he planned with Cammock to

create a military company, to be called “the men of war.” The

privateers who joined him were to be enlisted in this company, under

the command (as he suggested) of an old buccaneer (one of the first to

join) who kept an alehouse some miles out of Jamestown. This old man

was named Raphael Gamage. He had served with Cammock many years before

in Morgan’s raid on Porto Bello. As far as Cammock could remember, he

was a trusty old man, well liked. The troop of men of war (when fully

recruited) was to mess in the ’tween-decks; just forward of the

officers’ cabins and the wardroom. At sea, they were to work the

mizen-mast, standing three watches. In battle, half of them were to

man the quarter-deck guns, while the other half walked the poop as

sharp-shooters. But all of them, at all times, were to obey the

officers of the ship like the other members of her crew. It was a

pleasure to Perrin to help in the arrangement of the ’tween-decks for

the reception of these men. He screwed in hammock-hooks and battens,

and designed removable mess-tables which the carpenter, being one of

the politest of men, thought equal to the Navy.

Trade throve beyond their dreams; for the _Broken Heart_ was the first

ship in since the tobacco crop. Her general cargo of hemp and flax

seed, tools, wines, ploughs, linens and woollens, boxes, cart-wheels,

rope, weapons, books, and musical instruments, sold at good rates, for

silver and leaf tobacco.

Captain Margaret had planned to arrive at Jamestown early in the

season, so that he might secure the cream of the tobacco crop before

the summer fleet came in. Now that he was safe for a little while, he

set about his business. At the end of the fifth day he chartered a

couple of swift sloops from a Jamaica merchant, and loaded them, in

one day, under official supervision, with fifty tons of assorted

goods. He kept some twenty seamen at the work, from turn-to time till

sunset, driving them himself. His zeal startled all of them. But

Margaret was working with his whole nature to save the merchants who

had fitted him out. He felt that he had risked their money, by

gratifying a foolish whim; now he was to save them, having seen his

chance. The bales and casks swung up out of the hold into the sloops.

The winches clanked, the ropes creaked, the bosun swore at the

slingmen. The slingmen, dripping in the hot darkness, damned and spat,

and worked their hands full of splinters. A fine dust rose up out of

the hatch to quiver in the sunlight. The slings fell with a rattling

thud on to the boxes below; the block creaked as the fall was

overhauled; a thirsty throat called “Hoist.” The bosun, too hurried to

pipe, bent over the coamings to spit, telling the men on deck to hoist

or sway away. Up came the boxes and casks, swinging to the yard-arm

tackle. The boatswain, bearing them over, swearing, followed them to

the rail, as the yard-arm was rounded in. Then there came the “High

enough. Walk back”; and the sling strained slowly downwards to the

stevedores, whose black skins gleamed in the sun. By sunset the sloops

were cast off from the _Broken Heart_. Cammock and Margaret swung

themselves into the stern of one of them as she sheered out. The

slingmen, relieved from their hell below, stared at them silently over

the rail with grime-ringed eyes. The sweat had streaked the dirt on

their faces, making them look haggard. Like a row of corpses, dug up

after the first day of burial, those silent men stood. Margaret,

looking at them, thought with horror that the lives of some men might

be expressed, defined, summed, in a sort of purser’s tally: so many

boxes hoisted out, so many creatures killed, so many pots drunk, so

many books read: with the sum added, the life extinct, nothing

remaining, nothing for God or the Devil; merely a sum in addition for

the harping quirers.

Sail was packed upon the sloops. All that night they drove, a red lamp

burning astern. At dawn, when the sea below the woods was like steel,

though tremulous in pale light, they were standing in to a jetty on

the Accomac side. It was dusk in the clearing where the house stood;

but the stumps of felled trees stood up black, a troop of dwarfs; and

the cattle moved dimly among them, cropping grass with a wrench. Casks

stood at the edge of the jetty; there was a gleam upon their hoops.

There was a gleam of dew upon the forest, as a little dawn-wind,

stirring the birds, made a patter of dropping. A fire with a waving

flame burned under a pent-house, making a thick, sweet smoke, which

floated everywhere, smelling of burning gum, driving away the

mosquitoes. When the flame leaped up, brightly shaking, it showed a

tilted cart, with a man under a red robe asleep against the wheel.

Quietly, before the light was come, they made the sloops fast and

stepped ashore. They stamped to kill the numbness in their feet; then,

rousing the sleeper, they helped him to prepare a breakfast, of

apples, fish, and new cider, before trading for his tobacco.

All that day they plied along the Accomac coast, Cammock in the

_Peach_, Margaret in the _Daisy_, buying tobacco at every clearing,

paying the planters in goods. When the _Peach_ sloop was full, Cammock

drove her back, with her boom-end under, to sling the tobacco into the

_Broken Heart_ at dawn, and to fill up again with trade. Margaret’s

keenness puzzled him; the man was on fire. “I thought he was one of

these dreamy fellows,” he said to himself. “But he drives a tight

bargain, and he goes at it like a tiger.”

He went aboard the ship, putting all hands to the work of clearing and

reloading the sloop. Mr. Cottrill met him at the gangway with word

that two of their best men had deserted from the trading-booth, taking

with them about fifty pounds’ worth of goods; that they had gone off

at sunset, just as the sloops cast off; and that one of the men aboard

had heard that they were going for a run with a gang of

Indian-snatchers. Worse still. The foretopmast was sprung at the heel,

and the new spar couldn’t be ready for a week. Cammock had been at a

driving strain for a couple of days; but, like most hard cases, he

found the second day a day of exaltation, of nervous excitement. The

news pleased him; it occupied his mind. He bade his men get out trade

from all three hatches as fast as the winches could sway it out, while

he with a dozen men went ashore in the sloop, still half full of

tobacco.

As soon as he got ashore he struck the booth, crammed all the goods

into the sloop, lock, stock, and barrel, and carried them back aboard.

As they were thrust into the sloop he made a rough inventory.

“Now, Mr. Cottrill,” he said, “just take this list and check it as

soon as you’ve got a chance. Then check it with the trade-book, and

find out what’s missing. Then check that with the clerk’s list. Rig up

an awning from the break of the poop to the mast there. That’ll be

your trade booth. Call the trade clerk. Call Mrs. Inigo. Mr. Harthop,

you’ll keep your trade booth here in future. Mrs. Inigo, you’ll have

to give up your berth in the sail-locker. See to that, Mr. Cottrill.

Mrs. Inigo’ll sleep in the steward’s room. The steward’ll have to go

into the round-house. Mr. Harthop, you’ll use the sail-room, where

Mrs. Inigo’s been sleeping, as your sample-room. See that no one goes

up the alleyway to the cabin. Keep a clear gangway from the alley to

the companion there. Mr. Cottrill, give Mr. Harthop three hands and

let him arrange his shop. He’d better stone out the sail-room after

breakfast. Shift your things, Mrs. Inigo. You, too, steward. Mr.

Cottrill, pick out three good hands to be under Mr. Harthop. Quiet,

steady men. Pick one or two of the boys. Mr. Harthop, what were you

doing to let those men away?”

Mr. Harthop, a little, bald jocular man with a pale face and long

drooping moustaches, which gave him a sad, Chinese expression, rolled

slowly forward, peering under his spectacles.

“I’d gone up to the Governor’s house, sir, with some velvets.”

“Why didn’t you send one of the men? Or wait till trade was over for

the day?”

“The Governor’s lady asked me to come, Captain Cammock.”

“Women’ll be the death of this cruise,” said Cammock to himself. “Who

was in charge while you were gone?”

“Smale, the boy, Captain Cammock, sir. I was only gone twenty

minutes.”

“There it is,” said Cammock. “Smale, how did this happen?”

“Please, zur,” said Smale, a short young ploughboy from

Gloucestershire, “I were a-’avin’ my zupper, zur. ’N I seed a owd

feller come up and give ’is fist like to Andrews. And her’d a-done it

avore. Zo they talked, and by’n by, Captain Cammock, zur, another

feller come like. Her said as Mr. Harthop said as I wus to go to

Governor’s house, to fetch a few fowls for th’ ’en-coop. Zo I went.

And her’d all gone avore I’d come back. And her’d took the things.”

Cammock kept back what he thought of the Governor’s wife.

“Mr. Cottrill,” he said. “You, Mr. Ramage, and the bosun, will have to

stand trade watches. No visitor is to talk to any of the hands under

any pretext whatsoever.”

“Ay, ay, sir. I thought I could have trusted Andrews.”

“You may go, Mr. Harthop. It ought never to have been allowed.

Directly my back was turned.” He was blaming himself for having been

so easy of access, and so friendly with old acquaintance. “Naturally,”

he said to himself, “the men got notions. Well, they’ll get no more.”

He walked to the waist, where the work was going busily with songs.

The sloop was being loaded forward as she discharged abaft. His

presence made the men zealous. He had never seen cargo worked so well.

“Bosun,” he called, “who’s night watchman?”

“Pearson, Captain Cammock,” said Harris. He smeared his mouth with the

back of his hand, and left a cask to dangle aloft over the hatch. He

ran towards Cammock in a shambling trot.

“Tell Pearson that I want him. Mr. Cottrill, choose a good man to

stand night watchman with Pearson, to walk round the ship,

harbour-guard, all night long, in opposite directions. No man whatever

to come aboard or to leave the ship after sunset. Pearson, when you

come on duty to-night you’ll apply to Mr. Ramage for a pair of

pistols. You’re to shoot at any man who attempts to desert. You’re to

heave cold shot into any boat which tries to come alongside. Tell the

lamp-man he’s to have lanterns lit abreast the main and fore chains.

Call all hands if any boat comes off to us after two bells. You’re to

shoot at any boat which does not answer to a hail. You understand.”

“Yes, sir. Shoot at any man as tries to desert, and any boat as don’t

reply.”

“H’m,” said Cammock to himself, noting the faces of the crew.

“There’ll be no more deserting from this hooker.”

“Carry on,” he said aloud. “Bosun, call away the gig. Let the gig’s

crew dress. Doctor, there, kill me six fowls. The best we’ve got in

the fattening coop. Steward there. Call the steward you, boy. Tell him

to bring a dozen Burgundy. Now, Mr. Cottrill, a word with you, sir.

Mr. Perrin and the rest, are they all well?”

“As far as I know, they are, sir.”

“Mr. Stukeley?”

“Mr. Stukeley’s like fat Jack of the Boneyard, I guess, sir. He’s

bigger than the admiral.”

“What’s he been doing?”

“He’s been wanting the gig’s crew all day. I told him I needed the men

in the hold. He’d have to use the long-boat, I said, when she goes in

for water.”

“Very right. Yes?”

“So he came and called me down before the men. Said I wasn’t a

gentleman. He said as Captain Margaret had said he and his lady was to

have the gig whenever they wanted her.”

“Was Mrs. Stukeley there?”

“No, sir. So I up and said that I’d had no orders. Then he calls me

down some more; and goes and gets Mr. Perrin to come to me, to say

that Captain Margaret wished to oblige Mr. Stukeley in all things.”

“Yes?”

“So I told Mr. Perrin, pretty quick, I said, I was in command, I said.

It wasn’t for him to tell me my duty. I told him to tell his society

friends they could do the Barney’s Bull act. They’d get no gig out of

me. That’s what I said.”

“Yes?”

“So that Mr. Stukeley, he went ashore in the long-boat, after calling

me down some more before the men. He got a shore-boat to go about in.

After that he said his boatman should have dinner aboard of us. I

stopped that. But Mr. Stukeley was very rude, and then the man got

rude. All hands working the hatch there, hearing it all. Mrs. Stukeley

beside. So that was two blocks, I thought. I give the boatman a thick

ear there and then. I told him if he didn’t sheer off I’d drop a cold

shot into him. And I would have. Mr. Stukeley told me to keep my hands

off the man. Then the man wanted his money. My hat, we had it all up

and down. I thought that Stukeley would hit me, one time. I wish ’e

’ad done. I’d a laid him out.”

“And Mr. Perrin? How did it end?”

“I saw some of the hands knocked off to listen, so I give them a few.

And he stood there telling them not to take no blows. Telling ’em to

down me. And then the long-boat come alongside with water. Mr. Ramage

was in her, of course. He hears the row, and he come over the side

just as quick as cut. He just took that Stukeley by the arm, and

walked him into the alleyway. ‘Don’t you incite no sailors, sir,’ he

says. ‘No more of that, sir. I respects your feelings, sir,’ he says,

‘but for Gord’s and your lady’s sake,’ he says, ‘you quit. You don’t

know what you’re doin’.’ That was the end for that time. I suppose

we’ll ’ave another dollop of it to-day.”

“Put him in irons at once, publicly, if he gives you any more trouble.

And he’s not to talk to any man. That’s another thing. Iron him

directly he gives a back answer. Tell Mr. Ramage, too. Now bring those

fowls along doctor. I’m off to the man-of-war sloop, about them

Indian-snatchers.”

He pulled aboard the man-of-war sloop, with his present of wine and

poultry. As he sat in his gig calling to the men to pull the stroke

out, he wrote descriptions of the missing seamen.

When he returned to the _Broken Heart_, the sloop was nearly full of

trade. It was just half-past seven. He went to his cabin to wash,

walking quickly and quietly, like a forest Indian. There was some

slight noise to his left as he entered the alleyway. He turned

sharply, to look into the sail-room, to see if it were ready for the

samples. The door shut in his face with a bang. He could not swear to

it--the door shut in a fraction of a second--yet it seemed to him that

he had seen Stukeley with Mrs. Inigo, for one bright flash of time. He

would not open to make sure; for it was a woman’s cabin; he might have

been mistaken; but he turned in his tracks and blew his whistle. A man

ran to him.

“Get some dry stone, and stone this door clean,” he said, showing Mrs.

Inigo’s door. “Stone the outside, and keep at it till breakfast.” That

would keep Stukeley within (if he were within) until breakfast, at any

rate. He flung his clothes from him and swilled himself with water;

then dressed rapidly and went to Perrin’s cabin. “Mr. Perrin,” he

said, bursting in after knocking once, “how are you, Mr. Perrin? I

want you to keep your eye on Mrs. Inigo’s door. See who comes out of

it. Is Mrs. Stukeley well?”

“Very well. How are you and the captain?”

“The captain’ll be back later in the day. I’m just off again.”

“We’d a lot of trouble yesterday. I’ll be glad when you’re back for

good.”

“Cheer up, sir,” said Cammock. “Remember. Mrs. Inigo’s door till one

bell. If Mrs. Inigo comes out, open it and search the cabin.” He went

on deck again, where the steward met him with a tray. He sat down on a

coaming and made a hurried breakfast, while the sloop’s crew hoisted

sail. When he had finished his meal, he glanced into the alleyway,

where the man was rubbing holystone across the door. “Anybody in

there?” he said.

“I hear some one shifting around, sir,” said the man. “The woman’s

getting her gear, sir.”

“Right,” said Cammock. “I wish I could stay to see the end,” he said

to himself. “But I must be off.” In a few minutes he was bound again

for Accomac, under a huge square cutter’s foresail, which made the

sloop leap like a flying-fish.

Very late one night, having just arrived aboard after a week of

labour, Captain Margaret sat in his cabin comparing tally-books with

Captain Cammock; but quietly, lest they should wake Perrin. He was

very tired; for the hurry from one clearing to another, and the long

rides into the wilderness to planters who lived far away, had been a

strain. He had endured them only in the fire of his excitement. He had

enjoyed his week of bargaining; the zest of the struggle had been like

wine to him. On the lonely clearings, or drinking with strangers in

woodmen’s shacks, he had forgotten his love, forgotten the torment of

the voyage, Olivia’s child, the settlement on Darien. All had been

forgotten. Now that the struggle was over, he felt the exhaustion; but

nodding as he was, over his tally-book, his whirling brain praised him

with that excited inner voice which talks to the overwrought. “You’ve

got the pick of the crop, the pick of the crop, the cream of the

year’s leaf,” the voice kept telling him. He had bought seven hundred

tons of the best tobacco in the colony; the little that remained to be

sold was the poor, crude leaf from the young plants and the poorly

cured, poorly flavoured leaf from the distant walks in the forest.

“We’ve got the whole trade, sir,” said Cammock. “You needn’t fear for

your owners.”

“No,” said Margaret. “Now to get a bottom to carry it home. Of course,

in a week we ought to have the summer fleet here.”

“They’ll not find much,” said Cammock. “We’ve got it all. But

supposing a letter comes with the fleet. We shall have to sail that

night probably, shan’t we? Supposing we’ve to cut and run, leaving it

all in the warehouse?”

“I’ve thought of that,” said Margaret, “I thought of that, too.

Heigho, captain, I’m tired. This week has been an experience. I shall

leave Mr. Harthop in charge ashore, with powers to deal. He’s shrewd.

He’s got a funny way of getting at the point with that queer humour as

a cloak. And I’ve got Howard, Cammock. Howard’s our agent.”

“You’ve got the Governor, sir?”

“Oh yes. That was my first move. I knew old Howard wanted specie; so I

went to see him and told him my plans. He was expensive, though. He

knew his worth to a penny.”

“What it is to be a gentleman. If I’d gone, he’d have kicked me out.

Well. Birth tells, they say.”

Perrin sat up in his bunk, and looked at them through the curtains.

“A servile, insolent, bribing, tipping race, the English,” he said.

“An Englishman will never do anything for any one without expecting

something.”

“Oh, you’re awake, are you? At it again, too,” said Cammock. “How

about that door, sir?”

“Well, Edward, how are you? What door is this?”

“Oh. Mrs. Inigo’s door,” said Perrin. “Oh yes. Yes. Mrs. Inigo came

out at eight bells, and then I tried to get in. But it was locked on

the inside. So I called Mr. Harthop’s three men, and the man who was

scrubbing it.”

“Good. Good,” said Cammock.

“And I told them ‘the door was jammed.’ So they’d a jemmy there, for

opening cases with, and we burst the door open. We found Stukeley

inside.”

“Stukeley?” said Margaret. “I half suspected that.”

“He was on his knees on the deck, sponging that blue silk dress Olivia

wears.”

“Ha,” said Captain Cammock. “I should never have thought of that.”

“Shrewd these Cornish women are.”

“He was rather red in the face, but he asked us what was the matter.

Then he asked me to give him a hand, as he’d got to get the dress

ready for Olivia, he said. She’d spilt some chocolate down it. It

was----”

“Was he flustered? Hectoring?”

“Afterwards. Not then. He kept saying that Olivia wished to wear the

dress at breakfast.”

“Did she?”

“Yes. Oh yes. I don’t know, Charles. There might have been nothing

wrong.”

“I thought I saw something,” said Cammock.

“Well,” said Margaret. “I suppose we’ll have to discharge Mrs. Inigo,

and pay her passage home. Captain Cammock, what do you think of

Stukeley?”

“I’m like the parrot,” said Cammock, “I think a lot more’n I’ll say.

Now turn in, all hands. A long lie, and pie for dinner. Captain

Margaret, if you don’t turn in, you’ll find you won’t sleep. Oh. Has

Mr. Stukeley been in irons?”

“He’s been threatened with them. He’s been very quiet though lately.

That Inigo time gave him a scare, I think.”

“Well. Good night, gentlemen.”

“Good night.”

As Captain Margaret drew his bunk-curtains and settled himself to

sleep, the voices in his brain took bodies to them, fiery bodies,

which leaned and called to him. “You’ve got the pick of the crop, the

pick of the crop, the pick of the crop,” they called. “Lucky devil.

Lucky devil. Oh, you lucky devil.”

VIII.

IN PORT

“Yet still he stands prefract and insolent.”

_Charles, Duke of Byron._

After breakfast the next morning the two Stukeleys sat in their

stateroom talking. They had had a week of comparative isolation, of

comparative privacy, very sweet to Olivia, who had learned, during the

voyage, to regret the days at Salcombe, when one had but to close a

door, to shut the world of love from that other world, full of thorns

and thistles, where ordinary mortals walked, not having the key of the

burning imagination. With Margaret and Cammock away, and Perrin seldom

present at meals, owing to his fear of the badgering of Stukeley, the

cabin of the _Broken Heart_ had come to be something of a home to her.

She could feel again that nothing else really existed, that no one

else really lived, that all the world, all the meaning and glory and

life of the world, centred in the two burning mouths, in the two

hearts which divined each other, apprehending all things in

themselves. During that week of privacy she had even learned to think

tenderly again of the three men who had shared the cabin with her. She

found that she no longer resented Cammock’s want of breeding; his want

of culture; his past as explained by Tom; his social position as

compared with her aunt Pile’s coachman. During the voyage she had

grown to dislike Margaret and Perrin, much as one dislikes the guests

who have overstayed their welcome. She had been too much in the

rapture of love to see things clearly, to judge character clearly; she

had taken her judgments ready-made from Tom, who disliked the two men.

She had liked them both as old friends; had liked them much, in the

old days, before she knew life. But, under the strain of the voyage,

ever prompted by Stukeley’s bitterness, while looking on them as her

friends, she had come to resent their continual presence, to be cross

at their conversation, which (as she felt instinctively) was

restrained by their dislike of Tom, through their want of imaginative

sympathy with his point of view. Now that they were no longer ever

present, like spices added to each dish till every dish disgusts, she

thought of them both with pity; feeling that they were growing old in

their ways, narrowed in their sympathies, never knowing the meaning of

life, which is love. Thus thought she, in the confidence of exulting

health, in the rapture of being possessed, with the merciless pity of

a newly married woman. This that she had waited for, this love which

crowned and made her, it cleared the eyes, she thought, it exalted, it

ennobled, it glorified. She would that those two pathetic figures,

Margaret so serious and proud, with his clumsy walk, and halting,

almost affected picked precision of phrase, and Perrin, the forlorn

parasite who looked as though he had been frozen, were married; she

would so gladly see them happy, tasting something of the joy which

made earth heaven to her. Margaret would be a beautiful lover, very

thoughtful and tender, but cold; he was cold-hearted, she thought, and

rather frightening. Perrin would be attracted by some little merry

woman who would laugh at him and twist him round her finger. Perrin,

she confessed to Tom, attracted her more than the other, because he

looked so wretched. Being so happy herself, she wished others to be

happy. Her education, like most women’s education, had been aimed to

make her fear the world, to make her shrink from those characters who

judged the world and sought to direct it. Her own world, beautiful as

it was, existed only by the exclusion of such characters; her nature

could not accept Margaret wholly; she could only respect and vaguely

fear him, as one respects and fears all things which one is not wise

enough to understand. Perrin looked wretched, and having a tenderness

for wretched folk, she thought that she understood him. All the time,

unknown to her, the three men summed her up with pity and reverence

and tender devotion; but mostly with pity, and with a mournful, tender

curiosity. It was perhaps partly that curiosity which had made their

absence pleasant to her. Their absence had been a relief to her, it

had also relieved her husband. And since their arrival at Virginia her

husband had made her anxious; he had behaved very queerly at times,

ever since the first day. She felt that he was keeping something from

her, perhaps some ailment which tortured him and made him irritable.

She had been very thankful to have her dear love so much to herself

during an entire week.

But at breakfast that morning the presence of the three men (and the

prospect of their future presence) had shown her how much she longed

for the quiet retirement of a home, where life could be culled,

chosen, made up as one makes a nosegay, by beautiful friends, art,

music, all the essences of life, all doubly precious to her now that

life had become so precious.

“Tom,” she said, “Tom, dear, I want to talk to you about our life

here. I don’t think it can go on, dear.”

“Why, little Olive, what’s up? What ruffles your serenity?”

“Tom, dear, I cannot bear this ship life. And those three men. At

every meal I feel that one of them is watching me. Oh, and no woman to

talk to. I think of our lovely times at Salcombe, Tom. We could shut

the door; and it would be just our two selves.”

“Jolly times at Salcombe, hadn’t we? But what’s the matter, eh?”

“This ship life, Tom. It’s that. The men are so rude, and so rude to

you, Tom. I can’t go on with it. I want to go back to England.”

“But I’ve promised to go to Darien, Olive.”

“I know, dear. I know. Don’t think me very foolish, Tom. But I don’t

think I’m strong enough. Tom, darling, could not we leave this life?

Think how rude Mr. Cottrill was to you only the other day. I do so

long for our old happy life together. Away from the sea.”

“Look here, Livy. I understand. You’re lonely. Suppose we go and stay

ashore for a while. You would meet ladies ashore. You’ve met them

already.”

“Tom, I can’t meet those ladies. They’re not nice.”

“What’s wrong with them? What’s wrong with Mrs. Montague?”

“I feel that she isn’t a nice woman. That she isn’t---- You know I

went to see her the day before yesterday. She was hung about with

silver just like a savage, and all the young officers were there,

playing cards. And Captain Montague had gone to Charlestown, and she

was alone there, with all those men. So I sat down for a moment to

rest after the walk and then came away. That was no place for me.”

“Well, we could stop with the Governor. Maggy knows him. What’s wrong

with old Mrs. Prinsep?”

“I don’t like her, Tom. She’s a bitter woman. Oh, Tom, let’s go home.”

“But I’ve promised, Livy.”

“Yes, dear. I know. But we can’t always keep our promises. We can’t go

to Darien. We can’t.”

“But what else can we do? We must, my dear. I can’t pay our passage

home. I came away in such a rush. I’ve not got five pounds with me.”

“Oh, Tom, Tom. But that doesn’t matter, dear. We could borrow. Charles

or Edward would lend to us.”

“No, thanks, Livy. There are some things I draw the line at. I can’t

take a man’s hospitality and then borrow money from him.”

“But---- I know them better than you do, Tom. I could ask them.”

“Do you suppose, Livy, that I could let you borrow money from any

man?”

“Then we could ask for a passage home in the convoy to the summer

fleet. They would take us.”

Stukeley smiled uneasily, knowing only too well how likely he was to

get a passage home with that convoy in any case.

“Olive,” he said, “do you remember a tale Captain Cammock told us

about a little ruined city full of gold?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“D’you know, Olive, I’ve been half planning with Cammock to go to look

for that ruined city. You see, Livy, we shall only be here probably

till the summer fleet arrives. Ten days, or so. Do you think you could

stand it for another month or two? If we found that city, I could buy

my little Olive that summer cottage we set our hearts on.”

“Oh, take me home, Tom. Never mind the cottage. And I couldn’t have

you going into the forest. I couldn’t be alone in the ship.”

“But then, Olive. Since I married my little Olive here, I’ve been

wanting to do something for others. Living as a bachelor, one gets

selfish. I want very much to help those Indians, Olive. To do

something in return for you, dear.”

“I know, dear. It’s so like you. It’s noble of you. But you could do

something for the people at home: for the poor. You could teach them.

We could teach them together. But oh, don’t let’s go to Darien, Tom.

We shall be separated. Tom, I couldn’t bear to be alone in the ship.

And there may be fighting.”

“Come, come, Livy,” said Stukeley. He was nettled at what he judged to

be her damned female pigheadedness, yet anxious to make his

indignation appear moral. That is the common custom of the wicked, to

the world’s misfortune. “Come, come,” he said, “you mustn’t talk in

that way. We’re going to liberate the Indians. Eh? To show them what

British Freedom means. Eh? We mustn’t think of ourselves, and our

little aches and pains. We must think of the world.” He himself was

ever ready to think of the world, or the flesh, or the devil, or all

three. “We must think of the world, Livy. And if we should succeed. I

think you would be proud of me, Livy.”

“I should be, Tom, dear. Very, very proud. But oh, Tom, do let us go

home. We should be so happy there again. Here, we can’t get away from

strangers. I can’t live among these people. They’re dreadful. And

Darien, Tom. It’s a lawless place, full of the most terrible men.”

“Oh, they’re all right,” he answered. “They’re all right. And I shall

be with you, my dear child. We must go to Darien, Livy. My honour’s

pledged. I can’t draw back in honour. They would call me a coward.

They’d say I was afraid. Besides, I can’t very well pay our way home.

And I can’t borrow. You do realize my position, Livy? We must go on.”

“Oh, Tom,” said Olivia, crying now, in spite of brave efforts. “I

didn’t think--I thought you’d take me when I begged you. We might be

home in three weeks. Oh, Tom, do.” She clung to him, looking up at

him, smiling appeal in spite of tears. Stukeley bit his lips from

annoyance, longing to box her ears, to give her, as he phrased it,

something to cry for. She thought that he was on the rack between his

pledged honour and his love for her.

“No, Livy,” he said, parodying Captain Margaret’s manner towards an

inferior. “No, Livy, dear. Don’t make it hard for me. We must never

draw back from a noble cause, dear.” He thought that this would bring

more tears, and force him to be brutal; he was not going to stand

there while she snivelled on his shoulder. “A snivelling woman,” he

always maintained, “is not a thing to be encouraged.” But to his

surprise his answer checked her tears; she had never loved him more

than when he placed his honour even above his love for her.

“There, Tom,” she said. “Forgive me. I won’t cry any more, dear. My

nerves are upset. I won’t ask again, Tom. Of course, we’ll go to

Darien. But I wasn’t thoughtless of your honour, Tom. You don’t think

that? I wasn’t. I was only fidgety and frightened. Women are so silly.

You don’t know how silly.”

“There, there,” he said. “There, there. What pretty ears you’ve got,

Livy. Why in the world d’you wear earrings with ears like yours?”

“They’re only clip earrings, you old goose.”

“I shall bite them.”

“No, Tom. Not my ears now. My dear Tom. Do forgive me. You know I love

you.”

“You’ve got the reddest lips I ever saw in a woman, Livy.”

“Oh. Do you notice women’s lips?”

“I notice yours. Almost the first thing I noticed of you was how red

your lips were. What do you put on them?”

“Nothing. You put something on them sometimes.”

“What? A gag?”

“No. Your old silly mouth that asks so many questions.”

“I’ll get you some hot water for your eyes. You must bathe them.”

“How good and tender you are to me, Tom.”

As he walked to get a jugful of hot water he muttered to himself about

her. “Bread and butter,” he repeated. “Bread and butter. A life of

bread and butter. Forty years of it, good luck. Forty years of it to

come. Batter pudding.” He met with Cammock in the alleyway; it

occurred to him to be civil. “Captain Cammock,” he said, “will you

join me in my smoking-room after dinner to-day? I’ve some Verinas

tobacco. I’d like your opinion of it.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Cammock, wondering what had caused such sudden

friendliness. “But which do you call your smoking-room?”

“That little tiny cabin just forward of the bath-room. It’s only big

enough for a few chairs and a bookshelf.”

“Oh, the after-hospital,” said Cammock. “I’ll be very pleased, sir.

But where did you speak with Verinas tobacco, Mr. Stukeley?”

“I spoke with it ashore,” said Stukeley, “of a Mr. Davis, whom I think

you know.”

“Ah,” said Cammock. “Indeed? Well. After dinner, sir.”

Later in the morning, Stukeley tried his tobacco alone, on the cabin

cushions, looking through the windows at the town. He added up the

chances for and against himself, smiling with satisfaction at the

kindly aspect of the planets. His chief fear had been an arrest on

arrival. That fear had been proved to be groundless. Then there was

the chance of arrest after the arrival of the summer fleet with the

mails. That chance, though possibly dangerous, was not to be dreaded.

Old Howard, the Governor, was a friend of Maggy’s, and Maggy had

bribed him to obtain illegal rights of trade. He could put the

Governor into some trouble, should he press for an arrest on the

arrival of orders from the Board. But he wasn’t likely to press for an

arrest. He would give a quiet hint for them to go. But even if the

arrest were ordered, he had allies in the _Broken Heart_. He knew that

Margaret and the others would do anything to shield and spare Olivia.

They thought that she was going to have a child. Good Lord, they were

a comical trio. They thought that an arrest would probably kill her.

And Maggy, that stiff, shambling, stuck-up, conceited prig, Maggy who

had been going to fight a duel with him. Swords and pistols, damme;

swords and pistols, damme. Well. What had it all come to? Why, Maggy

would stop him in the alleyway, taking him gently by the arm, as one

takes the doctor by the arm, when he comes out of the sick-room. “How

is Olivia, Stukeley? How is she this morning?” Bated breath, good

Lord. Best doctor’s manner. And Perrin running ashore for fruit and

fresh fish and eggs. And Cammock. Well, Cammock was a bit of a dark

horse; so he would make much of Cammock for some days. Besides, that

little ruined city, full of gold, might turn out to be worth looking

for. As for Olivia, she would have to come to Darien, whether she

cried or not. He rather liked living at free quarters, as cock of the

walk. He wasn’t going to go ashore in Virginia to settle among the

colonists. Besides, in Darien, there would be a bit of sport, by all

accounts. There would be shooting; perhaps a little shooting at

Spaniards; plunder to be made; good living generally. The only bitter

sediment in this cup of pleasure was Mrs. Inigo. He had been very

nearly caught with Mrs. Inigo. He knew that he had raised suspicions,

that he would have to walk warily for some little time. He wished that

he was married to Mrs. Inigo. All this talk of love, such talk as

Olivia loved, this talk of trust and sacrament and the rest of it. He

was sick of it. He thought that men were naturally polygamous. A few

fools and perverts. What right had they to dictate to him? Mrs. Inigo

would be just the sort of wife for him. She would understand. And she

wouldn’t make him sick with talk about Beauty. She hadn’t mixed with

the gang of twisters Olivia had known. Maggy was the boy for Beauty.

There was where Olivia learned her beauty talk. Twisters. That was all

that Maggy’s gang were. He would like to twist their necks. As for the

colonials, the Virginian women didn’t please him. The garrison ladies

were like all the garrison ladies known to him, silly little empty

fools, without enough imagination to be vicious. They could just

chatter, play cards, kiss their beastly lap-dogs, and wear their

English clothes to church, so as to show off before the colonials. The

colonial girls were not like women at all. They were like young

horses, like young men. They would dance and romp, like colts in a

hay-lot. But their idea of an evening’s amusement was to roll a man in

a corn-crib, and smother him with pillows or flour. The colonial men

bored him; he had always thought ill of farmers. Their talk was all of

the tobacco crop, the duty, the burning of half the leaf, and the

destruction of those plantations which were too productive. They had

no wines. Their only drinks were rum and new cider. They did not play

cards. Their chief amusement seemed to be riding to prayer-meetings.

They would often ride forty miles to a prayer-meeting in the woods. He

rather liked them for that. He would have ridden a hundred miles to

avoid a Church service there, under a Virginian parson. “They pay

their parsons in tobacco,” he said to himself. “They get the very

sweepings of the Church. What souls they must have, when you can save

five thousand of them for forty pounds a year.”

Thus his thoughts ran inside his skull, under his curly black hair,

behind that red face so long the adoration of shop-girls. But after

dinner, in the little room known as the after-hospital, when,

stretched at ease in the bunk, he could see Cammock sitting upright in

the chair, through the wavering tobacco-smoke, his thoughts ran upon

other matters. He thought of the coming cruise to Darien.

“Good tobacco, captain?”

“Yes, sir. But it’s not Verinas. It’s too strong. Too red. This is

some of that Mexican tobacco. It leaves that tang, like a metal.

That’s how you can tell, sir. Just puff out, sir, and roll your tongue

round. You taste what I mean?”

“Yes. But I bought it as Verinas. I paid four shillings the Spanish

pound.”

“That gang of Davis’s saw you coming, sir.”

“Really? Well. It’s my turn to laugh next. You tell them that,

captain.”

“They’re no friends of mine, sir,” said Cammock simply.

“Aren’t they? I thought they were particular friends of yours. You

sailed with them?”

“I’ve sailed with a good many as I’m no friends with.”

“Really.”

“I say nothing against them,” said Cammock. “They’re very good seamen.

Doing good as planters, too, sir. They’ve quite a lot of ground burnt

off. I dare say you’ve seen it.”

“Yes. But I thought from what they said that they were particular

friends of yours. Eh?”

“Indeed, sir. When did you see them?”

“I saw them yesterday, Captain Cammock.”

“Indeed, sir.”

“They said that you and Captain Margaret had just arranged to take

about thirty of them, as a sort of company of soldiers. To have them

aboard here. Eh? Men of war. Eh? Pretty nearly the whole village of

them.”

“Indeed, sir.”

“You don’t like your little secrets to be known.”

“Ah? Oh. I forgot to ask, Mr. Stukeley. How is Mrs. Stukeley?”

“She’s very well, thanks. You didn’t think I’d learn your little

secret about the men of war.”

“I didn’t think one way or the other. You’d have known some day sure

enough. I needn’t disguise the fact. Yes. We’ve just got thirty of

them, to join at an hour’s notice.”

“When we sail? When will that be?”

“We ought to a gone to-day. Only our foretopmast’s sprung. We have to

wait for a new one. But you know yourself, sir. We may have to sail at

an hour’s notice, spar or no spar.”

“Thank you for reminding me. You’re a person of great delicacy,

Cammock. For one of your rank in life.”

“I believe I am, sir. Let it go at that.”

“Can we sail at an hour’s notice?”

“If the Governor, and that old frigate, the royal _Nonsuch_, don’t

object. I suppose we could if we had to, even without a topmast. But

if our topmast ain’t aboard, we couldn’t run very fast. I reckon we

could, sir.”

“Leaving all that tobacco ashore?”

“Yes. All except about fifty ton, which we’ve got aboard. That

tobacco’ll go home in the summer fleet, if the fleet don’t want to

cross home light.”

“I hear you’ve got all the pick of the crop.”

“You hear a lot of things, sir. Well-informed man, Ed Davis.”

“He knows what’s going on,” said Stukeley. “When you’re shut up with a

couple of old sheep, like your two owners, you need a change.”

“So I believe, sir.”

“What d’you mean?”

“I mean just what I said.”

“Ah, yes. A simple, rugged nature. Eh? But how can we put to sea with

so much cargo out of her?”

“We’re not too light, Mr. Stukeley. It ain’t as though we’d emptied

her. We’ve taken in a lot of fresh water. A lot of scantling, too. A

lot of this Virginia cider. Then there’s the new cables we bought from

them Hog Islers. Besides the fifty odd ton of tobacco. Still, I don’t

say but what she’ll cut up a bit of a dance, if she gets any weather

going south.”

“I thought all her cargo was consigned to Virginia.”

“Did you, sir?”

“Surely. What’s the good of fencing? Good luck, captain. I’m not an

old sheep, like your owners.”

“Indeed, sir.”

“You’re getting funny, captain. A wit. You ought to have been at the

University.”

“That’s where they make gentlemen, sir.”

“Oh, you know that?”

“We’d one of them come with us in the _Trinity_. I know all about the

universities.”

“He taught you, eh? Private tuition in the forecastle?”

“Yes. As you might say. One of the things he taught was---- Well. You

were at one yourself. I don’t think he could have learned you much.”

“Don’t you? Could he have learned me (as you call it) that the reason

you’ve not discharged your cargo here is that you’re going to try to

trade along the Main?”

“Ned Davis knows a lot, it seems.”

“Don’t be so confounded smart and hippy. See? I know all your plans. I

know all you can do, and all you’re going to try to do. And I know

exactly where you’ll go wrong.”

“Then we shan’t have the trouble of telling you.”

“What d’you say to going up the river after Springer’s little city?

Eh? There might be something in that.”

“I met a power of clever men in my time,” said Cammock. “I don’t say

men of learning and that. I mean clever fellers. I been up rivers with

’em.”

“Looking for cities?”

“Cities sometimes. Sometimes it was gold mines. Then again it’d be

Indians. Boys to spear fish and that. Or perhaps it was only a

snatching-raid. The clever fellers was never any good at it. But, hear

’em talk. My.”

“I gather your intellect is trying to express the fact that you

dislike me. I think I trace so much. I see your brain floundering

towards it.”

“Huh,” said Cammock, snorting. “I think I see you floundering towards

that little city. Man alive. Good heart alive. D’ye know what sort one

of them rivers is, to go up? You’ve neither skill nor sense of it. You

lie there bilged in your bunk like a barge at low tide, and you come

the funny nigger, trying to get a raise. I’ll tell you what them

rivers is like. See here, now. Listen to me. I’ll perhaps give you

some idea of the land you’re bound for.”

“Really? I don’t know that I want to hear you.”

“No. But I want you to hear me, Mr. Stukeley. I’ll tell you where the

golden city is.”

“Now you’re talking business.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Well. When you come in from the Samballoes,

you’ll see the land ahead of you, like a wall of green. Just like a

wall. Think. Dense. Then you come to two rivers, about thirty yards

across. They’re the two mouths of the Conception River. You try to go

up one of them in your boat. First thing you know is a thundering big

bar. You’d be surprised how ugly them little bars get. Well. Suppose

you get across. What’s next? D’ye know what a snag is?”

“A branch of alder or willow, fallen into the river.”

“Yes. Or a whole whacking big great oak, Mr. Stukeley, fallen right

across, and rotting there. With its branches all jammed up with drift

and drowned things. Hornets’ nests stuck in ’em. Great grey paper

bags. So then you land, and take out your macheat, and cut a path

around that tree, and drag your boat round. May take you an hour or

more. Then into your boat again, after sliding down a mud-bank with

eighteen inch of slime on top. Presently you come to a lot more trees.

Out you get and cut another road. Perhaps you go back a half-mile to

find a place where you can land. Oh. It’s death, going up one of them

brooks. Then, there’s shallows where you wade. Rapids where you wade

and haul, losing your footing and getting soused. By and by comes a

cloud-burst somewhere in the hills above. Or perhaps a jam of logs

bursts, a kind of a natural dam, a mile or two above you. Then. Woosh.

You see a wall of water a yard high coming at you. If you’re slippy on

your oars you get ashore from that. Maybe you hear it coming. It makes

a roar like the tide. You drag your boat ashore.”

“Aren’t you rather laying it on for my benefit?”

“As for laying it on, Mr. Stukeley, I’ll make you judge for yourself

as soon as we come on the coast. I tell you one thing. You’ll sing

mighty small when you come to tackle such a country. That’s something

you won’t have learned, where you learned your manners.”

Stukeley laughed. “Well. Go on with your yarn,” he said. “I like

hearing of foreign parts.”

“No,” said Cammock. “I’m not going on. But there’s your city. It’s

within twenty miles of the sea, and within five of the eastern

Conception.”

“Will you come to look for it with me?”

“No, sir,” said Cammock. “I won’t. I don’t fancy your company.”

“I like you, captain.”

Cammock looked at him steadily for a moment, and then lit his pipe at

the brazier.

“What are the women like in Darien?”

“You’re a married man, Mr. Stukeley.”

“Thank you. I know I’m a married man. I asked you what the women are

like?”

“They’re mostly a rather duskish brown or copper colour.”

“So I think I know. Can a fellow have any fun with them?”

“They’re modest, merry creatures. Very kind, simple creatures. Another

thing. They’re strong as colts. You see, they do most of the work.

They’ll carry a man like you. I guess you’re one and a half

hundred-weight. They’d carry you across a swamp. And they’re only very

small, you know. As for fun, I don’t know what you mean.”

“Cammock, the chaste pirate.”

“Now go easy, Mr. Stukeley. I can take a lot, but I don’t take pirate

of any man.”

“The virgin martyr.”

“We had one of our men a martyr, Mr. Stukeley. He tried to have a bit

of ‘fun,’ as you call it, with one of the Samballoes women. Lemuel

Bath his name was. They caught him, as it happened. And they done to

him what they do to each other, if they try any ‘fun’ and get caught.

That was ashore on the Main at the back of Sasardi there. I was ashore

the next day, filling water at the ’Seniqua. We seen Bath come

crippling down the beach, with his head back, and his hands tearing

his chest all bloody. Tearing his chest into strips with pain. Naked,

too. He died that evening. No, sir. Don’t you try it.”

“Thanks. Niggers aren’t in my line. I leave them to pirates.”

“That’s you. It’s time I was on deck, Mr. Stukeley. Adios, señor.

Divertiete. That’s what we used to say to the Spaniards when their

ransoms were paid.” He nodded to the head which watched him from the

bunk. Turning on his heel, he passed from the cabin, pressing his

thumb upon his pipe to kill the ember in the bowl. “I wonder if

there’s many like him,” he said to himself. “I wonder what it is makes

him like that. I’d like him in a watch. Oh, mommer.” As he muttered

thus, in passing to the deck, Stukeley turned in his bunk, drawing the

curtain. “Hulking boor,” he said to himself. “Hulking old savage. This

is the sort of company we keep when we come to sea. Crusty he gets,

when you bait him.” He thought of the little golden city and of the

little brown women, with resolve to try them both. “Good luck,” he

said; “I hope we’ll soon get out of here, before Olivia’s nerves go

off again.” As he settled himself down for his nap he was roused by a

noise in the sample-room, where Mr. Harthop broke in a caskhead with a

tomahawk. He went to the alleyway-door to call down the passage to

Margaret’s cabin.

“Margaret,” he cried, “can’t you stop that beastly noise for a bit?

Olivia’s lying down.”

“I am sorry,” said Margaret, coming from his cabin. “I ought to

have---- Mr. Harthop, will you please unhead your casks on deck? The

noise upsets Mrs. Stukeley. Apologize for me, Stukeley.”

The noise ceased, and Stukeley slept like an infant, showing his

strong white teeth in a smile. Harthop muttered and swore, wishing

that a ship with a woman in her might sail the rivers of hell; for

that was all she was fit for. He reproved the man who was working with

him for suggesting the tomahawk. The man sulked and loafed for the

rest of the afternoon, and then told a sympathetic fo’c’s’le that you

got your head bit off if that pale judy in the cabin heard you so much

as “hem.” Harthop, nursing his wrath till knock-off time, took it out

of the boy who kept his cabin clean.

“Can’t you find some other place to stow your brass-rags, without

putting them under my mattress?”

“Please, sir, they’re not the brass-rags. They’re the rags you stuff

in the leaky seam, sir. In wet weather, sir.”

“My bed’s no place for them, you dirty young hound. What have you done

with the molasses that was left?”

“You’d ate all your molasses, sir; from last week.”

“There was some left in the tin. You’ve been at it again.”

“No, sir. I swear I haven’t, sir.”

“How many times have I told you I won’t have you swear? Eh? Give me my

supplejack.”

“Oh, sir, I won’t do it again. I won’t do it again.”

“There, my boy. Perhaps that’ll teach you another time. Now go and lay

my supper. If you don’t stop howling I’ll give you another six.”

The boy went forward howling, to hide in the darkness of the hold,

where he could cry by himself, choking with misery and shame, praying

for death. If he had had a flint and steel he would have burnt the

_Broken Heart_ at her anchor. As he had none, he sobbed himself to

sleep, careless of Mr. Harthop’s supper, full of the bleeding, aching

misery which none save the wronged child can ever taste to the full.

When it was dark and all had gone to bed, he crept aft to the

ward-room, where the bread-barge and the case of spirits stood, just

as the two mates had left them. He helped himself to bread and rum;

for misery had made him reckless. Besides, having defied Mr. Harthop

he might as well defy the two mates. So he ate and drank, looking at

the light on the landing-stage, which made a golden track to dance. It

trembled in yellow flakes on the water, a path of gold, to the

blackness of the rudder eddies below him. He was not very sure if he

could swim so far; but he did not care. He was too wretched to mind

drowning. It was very dark in the wardroom. It was dark above him in

the cabin. Below him, the ship’s shadow was dark. He was sure that the

watchmen would not see him. They never walked on the poop. After a

moment of groping he found the falls of the relieving-tackle, and

unrove the raw hide till he had an end ten feet long. He hitched the

tackle so that the block should not creak, and paid out the end

through the chase-port. Then, as even the most miserable of us will,

he felt the misery of leaving. This ship of wretchedness had been a

home to him. He remembered the singing in the dog-watch. It was awful

to have to go like that. In his wretchedness, a tear or two rolled

down his cheek, to splash on the port-sill. A light footstep moved up

and down above him. One of the stern-windows of the cabin opened with

a little rattle. He heard Stukeley’s voice coming from the state-room

drowsily. Then Mrs. Stukeley spoke from overhead.

“It’s such a beautiful night, Tom. Do come and see the stars. They’re

wonderful. Wonderful. Come and see them, Tom dear.”

“You’ll catch your death of cold.”

“Bow-wow-wow. What an old bear. I shan’t. I’ve got on my

dressing-gown.”

“Thanks. I prefer my bed.”

The listener in the wardroom smiled in spite of his misery; then

trembled lest the lady should stay long. For suppose a watchman crept

below to see if the mates had left any rum behind them? Suppose

anybody came--Mr. Harthop, Mr. Ramage? He peered into the

’tween-decks, where all was dark and still, save for the cat’s eyes

gleaming green, watching for a mouse, and the snores of Mr. Ramage in

his hammock. Then, up above him, moved by the beauty of the night, the

woman began to sing, in a voice of drowsy sweetness, in a little low

voice that made each word a pearl, a round, lustrous pearl, a tiny

globe that glowed in the mind, it was so perfect, so ripe, so tender.

She was singing that old song of Campion’s about the woman who had

played with love in the hour of her beauty. She was a woman who had

played, and been played with; till her beauty withered just as she had

learned the worth of love, just as life had made her worthy of love,

at her coming to wisdom:--

Where are all thy beauties now, all hearts enchaining?

Whither are thy flatterers gone, with all their feigning?

All fled, and thou, alone, still here remaining.

. . . . . . . . . . .

When thy story, long time hence, shall be perusèd,

Let the blemish of thy rule be thus excusèd,

“None ever lived more just, none more abusèd.”

The window closed amid murmured words; Stukeley, moved by the voice,

had drawn his wife away. The boy sighed that it was over; then corked

the rum-bottle and put it in his pocket. He would have taken some

bread, had he been able to carry it dry. He thought of dashing to his

chest in the half-deck for an extra shirt; but gave up the plan as

being too risky. Very quietly and quickly he slid down the rope into

the water, letting the tide take him, striking out now and again,

towards the landing-stage. He was puzzled by the coming of the

ripples; they hit him in the cheek before he judged that they were

near. He got a mouthful once, and choked; but none heard. Very soon he

was clambering up the landing, gulping rum with shudders. Then, after

wringing out his jacket, he set out to run along the sandy track that

was the street. The dogs barked as they heard his feet beat; but he

kept on, for some three miles, till he dropped tired out among the

wood. There he lay shivering in the scrub till the dawn, when, seeing

a plantation near, he sought shelter of the planter, who hired him

“for his keep,” glad of the chance. In the morning, when hue and cry

was made for him, when boys and men called and crawled for him among

the cargo of the ship, no one suspected that Stukeley was the indirect

cause of his desertion. The mates swore when they found their rum

gone. The other boys swore when they had to do the deserter’s work.

Cammock swore at the watchmen for not barring in the chase-ports,

while the watchmen swore that they had barred them. Mr. Harthop swore

that if ever he caught that boy again he would give him cherriliccum

pie. Thus the matter came to an end.

IX.

A FAREWELL DINNER

The shame and obloquy I leave thine own;

Inherit those rewards; they’re fitter for thee.

Your oil’s spent, and your snuff stinks: go out basely.

_The False One._

Standing on the poop, looking seaward, the five cabin-dwellers

watched the summer fleet come in. It came in haltingly, a scattered

troop of ships, some with spars gone, one or two, fir-built, streaked

white where a shot had struck; all seaworn. Cammock, watching them,

sent his boat round to the “men of war” to order them aboard at once.

Harthop had already been settled ashore, in charge of the tobacco,

under the Governor’s eye. He would make good terms for the ship’s

owners; the merchants at home could hardly lose on the venture.

“We’re all right, sir,” said Cammock to Margaret. “There’s probably a

letter. But the Governor’s your friend. You needn’t worry.”

“I wish I could see things as you see them, captain,” said Margaret.

“But I can’t. How is it you always have a plan? How do you discipline

yourself? How is it you’re always ready?”

“I dunno, sir. I’ve only got a few things to think of, and I think ’em

out. P’r’aps that’s it. But just step aft, sir. Look here, sir. We’re

ready to sail. The new topmast’s aloft. We’re a little light, perhaps,

but nothing to hurt. The thing is--are you going to give him up? You

got to decide now.”

“I can’t. We must think of her child.”

“She can’t have a child on the Isthmus.”

“There’ll be time enough to arrange something else when we get there.

But she must be spared the shock.”

“Very good, sir. I’ll send the long-boat in for all the fresh meat and

fruit there is.”

“Oh, I know, captain. I know it’s not the rightest thing for her. A

voyage to sea.”

“She’ll get that anyway, sir. Either way. Very good, sir. I’ll have

all ready to sail. I’ve sent for the ‘men of war.’ They’ll join us

either here, or between the Points. Well, Mr. Perrin. We’re off

to-night, sir.”

“But we’re all dining with the Governor. You’ve surely not forgotten

that, Charles.”

“Look there, Edward. There’s the summer fleet.”

“What if it is? We can’t throw the Governor over. We must dine with

the Governor. What? You an Englishman and want not to dine with a

lord?”

“How about our friend there?”

“No Englishman would arrest a guest at dinner. He values his digestion

and his butler’s opinion too much. There’s no risk. Oh, we must go to

the dinner. I’ve got a new American coat to go in.”

“No harm in it, sir,” said Cammock. “It might divert the lady, poor

thing.”

“Yes,” said Margaret, sighing. “If it won’t tire her.” He crossed over

to the Stukeleys. “Olivia,” he said, “Perrin has just reminded me that

we’re dining to-night at the Governor’s. It won’t tire you?”

“Tire me? Of course it won’t.”

“You would like to go?”

“We both want to go. Tom’s going to sing ‘Twankydillo.’ We may have

enough ladies for a dance.”

“We shall probably sail, directly we come aboard to-night.”

“Sail, Charles? Not for Darien?”

“Yes, Olivia. For Darien.”

“Ah-h.” She turned white. Little as she liked Virginia, she knew it,

she had proved it. The unknown was before her now, close at hand,

shapeless yet, ill-defined, a spectral country. For a moment she

stared blankly at Margaret with the eyes of a frightened animal.

“Isn’t it. Isn’t it rather sudden?” she asked.

“Yes. Rather sudden,” he answered in a hard voice. “But, of course, we

may not go. You see, Stukeley. You see, Olivia. The summer fleet there

may have letters for us. May have letters for us.” He groped about for

an excuse. “My owners,” he went on. “My merchants may wish me to

proceed at once. On the other hand, we may be told to trade at

Charleston. Or trade rather longer here. Though we’ve done well here.

It’s possible. You understand, Olivia. I told you the day we left

Falmouth. Our whole aim was to have our work done before the summer

fleet arrived. To buy up the tobacco crop before some of it is fully

cured. And, to tell the truth, we’ve hurried all we could.”

“Don’t worry, old girl,” said Stukeley, drawing his wife aside. “The

sooner we go, the sooner we’ll be back.”

“Oh, Tom. Don’t go. Don’t let us go.”

“Oh, come, come,” he said, biting his lips. “It’ll be all right.

Maggy. Come here, Maggy. If you meet a home-bound English ship on our

way we may ask to be transhipped.”

“Oh,” said Olivia; “then why not go ashore now, Tom? Why go on to

Darien?”

Stukeley muttered to himself about his folly. “Now we’re going all

over it again,” he said to himself. “Remember, I’m pledged in honour,

Livy,” he said.

“Then, Charles, you’ll release him from his pledge, won’t you? Let him

come ashore. I want to go home.”

Margaret flushed, and then turned white. For a moment he wavered; she

saw him waver.

“You will, Charles. Won’t you?”

“Olivia,” he answered. “I cannot. I’d like to. But he’s such a good

Spanish scholar. He’s the only one of us who really knows Spanish. I’d

grown to count on him. We all had.”

“But you could get Spanish talkers here, Charles. Couldn’t he, Captain

Cammock?”

“No, ma’am. You couldn’t get gentlemen, Mrs. Stukeley. And you see the

Dons is particular.”

“Yet you sailed from London without a Spanish talker.”

“Yes,” said Perrin. “But our plans were different then.”

“How were they different then? I’m going to cross-examine you all.”

“We decided to try to trade with some of the Spanish cities, Olivia;

having so good an interpreter.”

“I thought you were going to fight with the Spanish cities. That’s

what we decided in council.”

“My dear Livy,” said Stukeley. “You’re like a justice of the peace.”

“But I want----” She checked herself sharply, and looked at the

incoming ships. The men also turned to look, as she had planned that

they should.

“That’s a nice one, isn’t it, Captain Cammock?”

“The Dutch-built one, Mrs. Stukeley? No.”

“How do you know she’s Dutch-built?”

“How do you know whether to trust a man when you meet him, Mrs.

Stukeley? You don’t rightly know. You have an instinct. I’ve an

instinct for ships. There’s twenty things tells me she’s Dutch, long

before I’ve time to examine them.”

“Yes,” said Margaret, only too glad of the diversion. “But I want you

to tell us now what it is that makes you say she’s Dutch. It’s in her

hull, isn’t it? What is it in her hull?”

“The Dutch, sir,” said Cammock, “are built for the India trade, and

they give their ships a rather high sheer, and not quite so much

camber as an English builder likes. Then they like a very flat floor,

and a tuck that----” He wandered on into a swamp of sea terms, taking

it for granted that his hearers understood him. Margaret and Perrin

plied him close with questions as the ship loitered past them, rolling

in the light wind, her men singing out at her cluelines. While they

talked, Stukeley and Olivia went below to the cabin; Stukeley with the

feeling that Olivia would now make no more fuss; Olivia with the sense

that all was not well, that something was withheld from her.

“Tom,” she said suddenly, as soon as the cabin-door had closed,

“you’re keeping something from me. What is it? Why am I not to know?”

“I’m not keeping anything back.”

“Tom, I think you’re being made a tool of. I think Charles has some

scheme that isn’t quite right. Don’t be dragged into it, Tom.”

“Dragged into it, Livy?”

“You’ve a noble, trusting nature, Tom; and I love you for it. But. Oh,

I feel sure Charles has some deep-laid scheme, that he’s afraid to

tell you of. I don’t think he was telling the truth to me just now.”

“Oh, nonsense, Livy. He couldn’t tell a lie if he tried.”

“No, Tom, dear; but he was trying.”

“When?”

“He was trying to find a reason for the ship’s sailing to-night.”

“But it was the plan, Livy. We expected to sail as soon as the summer

fleet came.”

“Why, Tom? Tell me that.”

“There may be letters ordering us to sail. My dear girl. Maggy’s got a

whole firm of merchants to order him as they please. We had to be

ready in case an order came from them. There may be no order.”

“But we weren’t ready, Tom. When the fleet was signalled we were in

the midst of trading.”

“Yes. But my dear child. If there’s no order, we may trade again

to-morrow.”

“You think it’s all right then, Tom? Do you?”

“Of course I do, Livy. You’ve got fine eyes, Livy. Did you know that?”

“But why should they alter their scheme of fighting the Spaniards? You

promised to help the Indians against the Spaniards. Now you’re

suddenly asked to help Charles’s merchants to make trade with the

Spaniards. You never promised to do that. And I should never have let

you. Never. Never. Oh, Tom, they’ve tricked us cruelly. They aren’t

going to help the Indians, Tom. They’re going to make money, like

common city-merchants. And they want my noble, generous Tom to help

them. Don’t do it, dear. Don’t do it. I can’t bear it.”

“My dear Livy.”

“I can’t have you mixed up with merchants.”

“Look here, old girl. Aren’t you a little unreasonable? We’ve decided

that we can help the Indians best by making some sort of agreement

with the Spaniards.”

“You say _we_ have decided this. When was it decided? Why wasn’t I

told?”

“We haven’t really decided. It was suggested last night. After you’d

gone to bed.”

“Why wasn’t I told? What was suggested?”

“It’s a fine idea, Livy. Cammock suggested our going to one of the

towns and proposing an agreement with the Governor.”

“What sort of an agreement?”

“The Governor to trade with us, just as if we were Spanish. The

English to abstain from hostilities, and the Indians to be accounted

English subjects. And they want me to interview the Governor.”

“It’s only an excuse to make money, Tom. To make money without the

self-sacrifice of fighting. And what if the Spaniards refuse?”

“Then we should have some just excuse for proceeding as we’d planned.”

“Tom, I don’t think they’ve been straightforward with us. There’s

something hidden. I’m sure of it.”

“But what can be hidden, Livy? My darling charmer. Eh? Besides, look

here, my beauty-spot. I’m ambitious. I want to make my Livy proud.

See? If I see these Governors, and bring off some arrangement. You

see? It’s a big matter, Livy. It’s knighthood. It may be a seat on the

Trade and Plantations Board. It may be all sorts of things.”

“Yes,” she said. “Tom, I quite see that. I’m ambitious for you, too.

There, dear, I know you’ve set your heart on it. Oh, Tom, though, I

hate the thought of it all. And I’m sure there’s something hidden. I’m

sure there is. I wish I knew.”

“Nonsense,” he said, taking her in his arms. “Where’d you like to be

kissed? I’m going to kiss your nose because you’ve got it turned up in

the air to-day.”

“I haven’t, Tom.”

“Come here,” he said, catching her as she wriggled free. “None of your

wriggles. Come and be kissed. You’re not going to dress till your nose

is kissed.”

An hour later, they stood in the Governor’s house waiting for the

Governor to receive them. They fidgeted about the large, cool, rather

bare room; now staring through the window at the ships, now fingering

the books, turning up the pictures to the light. Stukeley took a

pistol from the wall, and examined the engraved silver of the butt.

Olivia chatted with Perrin about the rambler roses trailing round the

window.

“We must take some slips to Darien,” said Perrin. “But I don’t much

like this dark red kind.”

“We have them at home,” she answered quietly. “I shall take home some

slips from Darien; for everything will grow with us. I expect lots of

things would transplant.”

“Yes, lots,” he answered.

“Olivia,” said Margaret, “have you seen this Rembrandt?”

“Why,” she said. “It’s the Hundred Guilder Print. It’s like meeting an

old friend.”

“Yes,” said Margaret, peering. “It’s a very beautiful state, too.

What’s the etching beyond you there, Edward?”

“One of Hollar’s.”

“Ah, yes,” said Margaret. “It’s interesting to put a Hollar beside the

real thing. No artist can make a ship wonderful to us. A ship is a

wonderful work of art without him. Just look at them there, Olivia.”

“They’re beautiful,” she said, looking at the ships. “Why. The _Broken

Heart’s_ under sail.”

“Her topsails are on the caps. Ready for us to go.”

“In case we do go?”

“Yes. In case.” Olivia looked at him steadily, noting that, for all

his self-control, he seemed uneasy at her look. The situation was

saved by the entrance of an orderly, in the white coat and blue scarf

of the Virginia troop. He saluted.

“The Governor presents ’s compliments ’n’ ’ll join you d’rec’ly.”

“Thank you,” said Margaret. “I suppose the mails have arrived? Do you

know?”

“Yes, sir,” said the man, as he stood in the doorway. “In the summer

fleet, sir.”

“Thank you.”

“What have you got there, Tom?” said Olivia.

“A little pretty pistol,” he said.

“Nice silver chasing,” said Perrin.

“Spanish,” said Margaret. “They make those at Toledo.”

“Let me see,” said Olivia.

“Yes. Spanish,” said Stukeley. “Wheel-lock. Loaded. Priming-cup

lidded. A very nice little gun. See the Spanish motto?”

“What does the Spanish mean?” asked Olivia. “_Se nada, pero._ I can’t

read it.”

“It means, ‘I know nothing. But I talk well.’ I wonder if I’ve

forgotten my pistol shooting. Eh? I used to be able to nail the ace of

diamonds at a dozen yards. Let’s make Pilly back up against the wall,

and do the William Tell act.”

“Tom, dear. Don’t play with that. It’s loaded. You might hurt

somebody.”

“Yes. Put it down, Stukeley,” said Margaret. “It’s one of old Howard’s

treasures. Put it down.”

“Put it down?” said Stukeley. “You’ve got a nerve to tell me to put it

down. I want this little gun. I like it. I’m going to bag it. If

anybody interferes with me at dinner, Livy, I shall just plug him.

Pop. In between the eyes. You see if I don’t.” He slipped the pistol

into his pocket.

Margaret smiled to see Olivia’s face of horror.

“Why,” said Stukeley. “Why, Livy, that’s what they do in this country.

What are old what’s-his-name’s swords like? Look here, for a sword.

Eh? There’s a temper. Look here. See?”

“That’s a fine piece of steel,” said Margaret. “Is it Milanese?”

“Milanese? Milanese? Milanese in your eye. Are you touched? It’s

Spanish. Comes from a place called Toledo, if you’ve ever heard of it.

Spanish motto like the other. Old Howard must collect Spanish things.”

“What is the motto?” Olivia asked.

“_No me saques sin razon_: well. Do not draw me without reason. Unless

he spits in your face, for instance. _No me envaines sin honor_: Nor

sheathe me till. Well. Till you’ve made sure.”

“Made sure?”

“Seen that the other fellow’s juice is pink. Stand still, Maggy, till

I see if you’ve got red blood in you. I could prod you from here just

under your fourth rib. Ping. Eh? This sword just suits me. Look,

Olivia. Look how they’ve inlaid this hilt.”

“What beautiful work, Tom. And what a waste. To put all that beautiful

work on to a sword.”

“A sword’s a knight’s weapon,” said Margaret. “How could we defend

Olivia Stukeley if our swords weren’t worthily made.”

“There’s the question,” said Stukeley. “Look at old Pilly there. What

book have you got there, Pilly? Read it out to us.”

“It’s a book of sick man’s meditations,” said Perrin. “I won’t read it

out. Look at it. It’s all thumbed to dog’s ears.”

“Howard’s,” said Margaret. “What an extraordinary book for him to

have.”

“Oh,” said Perrin, “that’s the secret of an Englishman’s success. He’s

nothing better than a pirate, grabbing all he can get. Oh, I’m not

English, myself. But the secret of his success is in this book here.

He makes his peace with God as he goes on. The other people. I don’t

know about the Dutch. They beat you; so they must be like you, only

better. The other people try to make their peace before or after; and

so they lose, either way. But you know, Olivia, you are----”

“The Dutch didn’t beat us,” said Stukeley. “We beat them. So you’re

out of it there, little Taffy with the Leek.”

“How about the Medway? Look, Olivia. Look at Jamestown. This is the

capital of our chief colony. Would any other nation in the world

produce a capital of twenty wooden houses, a fort, a church, and a

Governor’s mansion? This is the mansion. Look at it.”