Читать книгу The Expedition Of Captain Flick - Fergus Hume - Страница 5

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“From London port, to Rio Bay,

I’ve sailed for many a weary day,

To Bristol town, from Frisco’s gate,

I’ve shipped as captain, seaman, mate;

But, now my voyages all are o’er,

I lie a wreck upon the shore:

For here I be, at sixty three,

A mariner in misery.”

Seeing that the coming of Captain Flick was likely to eventuate in the departure of Harry to unknown lands, on an unknown quest, we had much discussion as to what manner of man the tempter might prove to be. Therein we were greatly assisted by Mrs. Barber, who confessed, with many sighs and regretful shakings of the head, that Flick had been a candidate for her hand when she was a West country belle.

“Though, indeed,” she said reprovingly, “Tom Flick was the wildest of them all.”

“How many were there, Aunt Chrissy?”

“Nine, my dear, and one would have made me a countess. But, indeed,” resumed Mrs. Barber, with a sigh, “I preferred a commoner. Poor Francis—it is fifteen years, next Christmas, since he left me a widow! So Tom is coming here again. Dear! dear! It seems like yesterday when he went away.”

“Is he handsome, Aunt Chrissy?” asked Bertha with true feminine curiosity.

“He was very handsome, my dear; but rough in speech and manner.”

“So I should think, judging from his letter,” observed I dryly.

“As a young man, he often came here,” continued Aunt Chrissy, “and your father was greatly attached to him. It was quite a Damon and Pythias friendship.”

“Oh, aunty! when he did not write to papa for nearly forty years.”

“My dear, that was all my fault. Tom proposed, and I refused. He was so masterful and domineering, that I could not bring myself to marry him. He quarrelled with your father on my account, and so we saw him no more. Forty years,” sighed the old lady, “quite a lifetime! I wonder what he is like now.”

“As domineering as ever,” said I, remembering the language in which the letter was couched. “He demands rather than begs for the Carmen.”

“Why does he want the yacht?” asked Mrs. Barber anxiously.

“I cannot say. He reserves such information for a personal interview.”

“I hope it is for none of his wild schemes, my dears. Tom was always full of visionary and ridiculous ideas. It was no use arguing with him, for he bellowed every one down. ‘Roaring Tom,’ they used to call him in my young days.”

“And Roaring Tom he is still,” said Bertha, smiling. “I am sure I shan’t like the creature. Probably he is Caliban and Falstaff in one.”

“No, my dear Bertha,” replied Mrs. Barber, annoyed by this reflection on her taste in swains, “if Tom is at all his old self, you will like him as much as I did. He was the most charming of men—a trifle imperious and noisy, but intensely fascinating.”

And, in proof of this assertion, Aunt Chrissy proceeded to detail certain episodes of that old romance in which she had figured with Flick. From her reminiscences, it would seem that the man was somewhat eccentric, with a liking for wild schemes and impossible adventures. That his proposed expedition might be one of the like nature was highly probable; and, privately, both Bertha and myself were minded to find it so visionary as to be impossible of fulfilment. We did not approve that Harry should throw away his life in realizing the vain fancies of a hot-headed dare-devil; yet, knowing the lad’s predilection for difficulties and dangers, we had but small hope of staying him in the adventure. Bertha, especially, was certain that the result would be otherwise than we wished.

“It will be all settled by the time they arrive here,” said she prophetically, “and Harry will dance in with the information that he leaves for Timbuctoo or the Orinoco next week.”

“But that is impossible. He must wait for our wedding.”

“What is our wedding in his eyes, compared with the chance of fraternizing with savages? He won’t stay, Denis; and who will give me away if he is absent?”

“My dear,” I answered jokingly, “in default of the necessary male relative, we will employ Aunt Chrissy. But you need not anticipate the worst, as yet. After all, Harry has not even written to advise us that he intends to bring Captain Flick.”

“Oh, he’ll arrive, Denis, I am certain; and take Harry with him on this horrid expedition.”

“In that case we must induce the captain to renew his addresses to Mrs. Barber. The influence of love may keep him in England.”

But, indeed, our fears were—for the present—groundless; for when Harry returned, with Flick, no mention was made of the proposed expedition. At their first meeting, as I afterwards learned, the astute seaman had refused to unfold his schemes, or to commit himself to a course of action; alleging, and not without reason, that he had yet to assure himself of Harry’s qualities, before interesting him in a plan which required confidence, prudence, and daring for its fulfilment.

“I’ll have no young hotheads at my heels,” said Roaring Tom, when pressed for an explanation. “Wait till I’ve taken stock of you for a week or so, and I’ll let you know what I think. If you prove a lad of mettle, why, I’ll tell you what’s in my mind; but if I don’t take t’ ye, there’s no more to be said.”

“Save this,” retorted Harry smartly, “that if I don’t go, you may whistle down the wind for my yacht.”

Flick was in nowise offended by so blunt a reply; for, candid himself to the verge of rudeness, and often beyond, he encouraged the same license in others. In his own mind he was more impressed with the qualifications of Harry than he judged prudent to admit at so early a stage of their acquaintance. The overflowing spirits of the young man, his temerarious disposition and ardent love of adventure, recommended him to one in whom the same characteristics, qualified by experience, were to be found. Moreover, Harry’s splendid physique, and abnormal strength were likely to be of inestimable service in the straits into which Flick apprehended they might fall. If, then, with these advantages, were combined a steady head and a cool judgment, the captain had little doubt but that the matter would terminate in a mutual arrangement to realize the daring scheme which he had in his mind.

With a view therefore to study the disposition of his proposed colleague, under advantageous circumstances, Flick gladly accepted an invitation to pass a week in the country; and with his baggage in charge of an ugly little negro—of whom more hereafter—he put himself aboard at Paddington with his host. The greater part of that journey was occupied in Harry asking, and Flick baffling, questions concerning the hinted mystery of the letter which had brought them together. Needless to say Roaring Tom, who was as dogged as a mule and cunning as a fox, came off victorious; and Harry arrived at Barnstaple without being a wit the wiser concerning that which had taken him to London. These details were reported to me by Harry when we waited dinner and Captain Flick in the drawing-room.

Aunt Chrissy and Bertha were also present, both curious to see the man of whom Harry had made so strange a report. Bertha, with no memories to hamper her fancy, conceived an elderly red-faced Boreas, rugged of mood and honest of purpose; but Aunt Chrissy could not credit that her slim young sailor with his brilliant eyes and dashing manner, had declined to so gross a creature. Yet, on the entrance of Flick, loud voiced and burly, Bertha’s portrait proved to be the more truthful of the two.

Roaring Tom—and a more fitting name was never bestowed—was a huge fat man, only a shade smaller in height than Harry, and in bulk he much exceeded our Bucksford Hercules. His face, burnt red by wind and salt spray, was large featured and heavy jowled, while the sparse tufts of white hair, brushed aggressively upward, gave him no distant resemblance to an enraged cockatoo. Notwithstanding his sixty-five years, there were few lines on cheeks or forehead, and from his wide mouth, unhidden by beard or moustache, proceeded a voice which Neptune might have envied. It was a good-humoured countenance; yet it could set stern and cruel enough when occasion demanded, as I have reason to remember. Planted squarely on his feet, with his huge hands hanging down clumped into fists, and a liberal display of white teeth—his own—Roaring Tom resembled an amiable sea monster; yet he had about him an air of good breeding which rendered pardonable his most ungainly gambols. He was Falstaff for girth, Samuel Johnson for domineering, a very whale for unwieldliness, yet a gentleman by right of an inborn breeding which, to a certain extent, neutralized all these defects. Bertha, who, womanlike, is quick in her judgments, fell in love with him on the spot.

“Oh, the sweet sea monster!” she murmured in my ear, as Flick rolled forward to salute his early love. “Oh, the gentle Polyphemus!”

“By gad! Hey! What! It’s Christina!” roared Flick, as gently as a sucking-dove. “Ay, ay, it’s forty years since I set eyes on ye, ma’am. We’re neither of us younger, but ye’ve grown old gracefully. Hey! ho! ho! Married, I hear, ma’am?”

“Married and widowed,” said the old lady, wiping away a tear which I took to be a tribute either to Flick or to her deceased husband. “And you, Thomas?”

“A bachelor still, Christina. Your fault! Why! What! You sent me away, you know. Should have married me—should have married me,” growled Flick, shaking his head, “then I shouldn’t have been an elderly bachelor or you a widow, Christina.”

Finding no ready response to this embarrassing speech, Mrs. Barber introduced her quondam lover to Bertha, who saluted him with a more friendly smile than I ever yet saw her bestow on a fresh acquaintance. I think the thought that Flick had been the schoolfellow of her father—whom she had dearly loved—contributed not a little to this unbending. The old sailor enclosed her slim fingers within both of his hands, and softened his voice for the greeting.

“‘Great is Diana of the Ephesians,”‘ said he, eyeing her keenly. “Harry told me you were pretty, my dear, but did not lead me to expect a goddess. Ay, ay,” added he in a lower tone, as she laughed at the extravagant compliment, “you have poor Maxwell’s laugh when he was a pretty lad at Eton. Humph! we won’t talk of that. But I will say,” he continued, raising his voice to its normal bellow, “you’re a splendid-looking young lady. Hey! if I were only younger, my dear—But I shan’t say more, or this young gentleman will call me out. Eh, Sir Denis? Tell me what you have done to deserve such good fortune as this.”

“Put it to the test by proposing marriage,” I retorted, greatly tickled by this plain speaking.

“Good! good! You’ve some brains under that curly hair, sir. Hey, Christina, the young ones are bolder than we were.”

“No one could have been bolder than you, Thomas,” replied Aunt Chrissy, with a sly smile.

“Eh! eh! Pooh, madam! I was as prim as a boarding-school miss in those days. I’m not prim now—no, by gad!”

“I don’t think you are,” said Bertha demurely.

“Ah, you’re a pretty mutineer! A very—Hey, what’s that? Dinner? Not before it’s wanted! A day in the train makes me hungrier than a week aboard. Come, Christina,” he added, offering his arm to the old lady, “we’ll go down together, as we did in the old days. I wonder if you can eat as good a dinner now as you did then?”

Aunt Chrissy’s reply to this scandalous question was drowned in the uproarious laughter of Flick, who headed the procession to the dining-room, and insisted on shaking hands with the old butler, whom he remembered a mere lad in bygone days.

“Hey, Jeffries! What! alive still? So am I, you see—well and hearty. But your poor master—and my old—Well! well! we’ll talk of that another time,” concluded Flick hastily; and with a tenderness which sat incongruously on so large a creature, he led Mrs. Barber to the table.

We were all pleased that Flick had remembered the old servant; and, as it proved afterwards, it was but one of the many ways in which he showed how good a heart was hidden under his rough exterior.

At dinner the captain proved himself a valiant trencher-man, and was not behind-hand in giving his opinion about the wine, or in praising any dish that specially recommended itself to his fancy. Yet while thus satisfying his appetite, he was not unmindful of Mrs. Barber’s claims to attention; and talked about old times and old friends till both he and she grew quite sentimental. Once his eyes rested on a portrait of the late Maxwell Greenvile, which hung over the sideboard, and he sighed meditatively as he thought of his former schoolfellow. I think Bertha, who noted that he brought his glass to his lips while looking at the picture, liked him the better for that silent tribute to the memory of her father. Flick could have devised no better plan for gaining her goodwill.

But all this time not a word about the expedition. Flick talked of many things, of many places, of many people; but he gave no hint of what his reason might be for wishing to borrow the yacht. Not until dinner was nearly at an end did Harry obtain the reward of his persevering questioning, and succeed in eliciting a remark concerning the motive of his visit. But the hint thus carelessly thrown out enabled us to guess, in some measure, the motive of the proposed expedition. Indirectly the subject was brought about by Flick himself.

“So you’re fond of travelling,” said he to Harry, commenting on a remark of Bertha’s. “I’m glad to hear it. It’s better to go round the world, lad, than to stop at home and see the world go round. Ho! ho!”

“A very pretty epigram,” I interjected, “but only applicable to certain folk.”

“Meaning Harry and myself. Gad! it’s true enough. You and that young lady there are too busy with matrimony to think of roving. Eh, I don’t blame ye, not at all. But such home-staying wouldn’t suit me. Gad! no. I’ve knocked about the world for forty years, and would do so for another forty, only that would take me over the century, and I can’t expect such a length of days.”

“Why do you not settle down, Thomas?” hinted Aunt Chrissy seriously, “and think seriously.”

“Because I’m a creature of habit, Christina. And as to thinking seriously, I’ve had to do that scores of times in order to escape with my life. Nay, nay, ye can’t learn an old dog new tricks; and I’ll go on wandering till I lay my bones in some far-off clime. Perhaps this trip, for aught I know,” he muttered in a lower tone.

“Is it so very perilous, sir?” asked Harry, seeing his chance.

“H’m! I can’t say. I know no more than you do of the manners and customs of the place whither I am going.”

“It must be the North Pole you intend to visit,” suggested Bertha, a trifle satirically.

“Nay, nay, Miss Greenvile! It’s further south, my dear, though in what latitude or longitude I can’t say.”

“Isn’t this place marked on the map, captain?”

“I hope not,” grumbled the mariner. “I don’t want my little claim ‘jumped,’ as they say out West. It’s an unknown land, Sir Denis. Ay, as unknown as was America when Columbus hoisted sail at Palos.”

“Are there any unknown lands now?” said I dubiously. “I thought we had found all that was to be found on this earth of ours—save the Pole itself.”

“There are spaces of ocean,” said Flick emphatically, “which have not yet been explored. Wide wastes of sea ample enough to contain islands of some magnitude.”

“And it is to one of these islands that—”

“Precisely, my lad. Now you have an inkling of what I intend. More I shall not tell you at present: you may learn the truth in Greece.”

“In Greece!” cried all; “and what,” said Harry singly, “may Greece have to do with your unknown island?”

“Nay, lad,” growled the captain cunningly, “you would be instructed ere I have proved your capacity. In seven days or less, if I find you staunch and true, I shall lay the whole matter before you. But,” added he after a pause, “I will say this much, that ere we make for the high seas, we must cast anchor off a certain port of Greece—to learn the route.”

“From whom?”

“Certain strangers who may be there. I shall say no more at present, but direct your attention to my negro servant.”

“Dosk?”

“The same. On his breast is a certain tattooing which can explain the whole secret. So if you gentlemen,” concluded Flick, with a grim smile, “can read picture-writing, I dare swear my tale will be no news to you when the telling comes.”

Which hint set Harry afire to see the body of Dosk, and read the enigma if he could; a matter which he accomplished within the week by a stratagem which recommended him greatly to the consideration of Roaring Tom.