Читать книгу Sweet Mace: A Sussex Legend of the Iron Times - George Manville Fenn - Страница 5

“Sir Thomas, and if I did not feel bound to carry out my royal master’s commands, I’d go no further, but sit down here on this shady bank, and bask in the sunshine of your daughter’s eyes. Once more I say, is there any ending to this winding lane?”

“Patience, Sir Mark; pray have patience,” said portly Sir Thomas Beckley, baronet and justice of the peace, as he took off his sugar-loaf hat with its plume of cock’s feathers, and wiped the great beads of perspiration from his pink brow. “Patience; and pray do not stuff my daughter’s head with courtly phrases, or you will make her vain.”

“Patience? Why, Sir Thomas, it is for her sake I am speaking. This lane has gone up and down, and in and out, and backwards and forwards, till my heart aches more than my legs to see her pretty little feet getting wedged between stones, and her face flushed with toil.”

“Well, yes,” said Sir Thomas, “the roads are rather bad down here in Sussex.”

“Bad, man? Why, they are abominable. They are as if cursed by witches. In winter they must be sloughs and pits for unwary feet.”

“This is but a by-road, Sir Mark,” said the baronet, pompously.

“By-road, indeed! Mistress Anne, why did you not have the carriage?”

“This lane was never meant for carriages, Sir Mark,” cried Sir Thomas, hastily. “The last time I had it brought down here, my two stout horses dragged the fore wheels from the body.”

“The ruts are ready to drag my legs from my body, Sir Thomas; and, fiends and torture, what blocks! Why, what rock is that?”

“Refuse or cinder from the iron forges, Sir Mark,” replied the baronet, with the air of a guide. “In this district, sir, the finest iron is found in abundance just below the surface.”

“And you own a goodly portion of the land, Sir Thomas?” said Sir Mark, with an involuntary glance at the lady.

“Well, yes,” replied the baronet with a round look of satisfaction; “I have a fair number of acres and some wide-spread forest land for timber and charcoal-burning should I care to smelt.”

“Happy man,” said Sir Mark. “’Tis a pleasant life down here in these woods. But Mistress Anne, is it not dull in winter?”

“Oh, yes, Sir Mark, so dull; and we are shut in at times for weeks.”

“No wonder with such roads as these. Sir Thomas, have you no pity for your daughter’s state?”

“The weather has come in hot,” said Sir Thomas, carefully taking off his plumed hat. “But we are just there now; shall we rest awhile?”

“Ay, that we will. Mistress Anne, here is a fallen tree with waving bracken and the shining leaves of the beech to shelter you from the sun. There, am I right—is that oak—are those bracken fronds?”

“Quite right,” said the lady addressed, as, either from the action of her heart or the warmth of the sun, she blushed deeply, the red glow spreading up to the deep auburn, fuzzy hair that gathered over her freckled forehead. Then carefully spreading her skirts she seated herself upon the fallen trunk of a huge oak that had been felled the previous winter, judging by the state of the chips that still lay around, the branches having been lopped, cut into short lengths, and piled into a long low stack.

“Ah, that is restful,” said Sir Mark, smiling down at the lady, while the baronet glanced from one to the other, dabbed his face, and then pressed down the feather-stuffed breeches that puffed out his hips; also his best, put on in honour of his visitor from town, but evidently unpleasant wear in the hot and airless lane.

“May I sit by thee, sweet—or at your feet?” whispered Sir Mark, with a glance at the angular oak-chips blackened by the action of the iron-impregnated water that sometimes rushed down the lane.

For answer Mistress Anne uttered a shriek, rose quickly, and half threw herself in the young man’s arms.

“A snake—a viper—an adder,” she cried, as, raising its head and uttering a low hiss, a reptile some two feet or so long glided from beneath the tree and disappeared amidst the rustling ferns.

Sir Mark Leslie, a rather handsome, imperious-looking young man, with somewhat effeminate features, showily dressed in russet velvet, with a short stiff frill around his neck, started back a step, and clapping his hand on his sword half drew it from its sheath; but, as a hearty, hoarse roar of laughter fell upon his ear, he flushed angrily, and thrust it back to turn upon the man who had dared to laugh at him, while the reptile made its way into a shallow rabbit-burrow in the steep overhanging bank. For the rugged little path, ill-made with dark-hued, furnace-cinder, ran here deep down between two water-worn banks that looked as if the earth had cracked asunder, leaving twin sides mottled with rugged stone and yellow sandbeds, upon whose shelving slopes ferns and brambles luxuriated, and trees flourished with roots half-aerial, half-buried in the soil. The sea-breeze might be sweeping the hills above, but down here there would be hardly a breath of air, while Nature’s train held revel far and near. Freshly-turned sandy earth showed where the rabbits burrowed, high up in the soft bank the sandmartins had a colony, while night and morn the woodland was musical with the notes of blackbird and thrush, though the concert Gil Carr had listened to a month before was more subdued, and the nightingale kept his sweet lays till another year.

Just beyond where the little party had halted, the high bank displayed another rift, through which a faint track ran at right angles to the one they had pursued, apparently deep through the overhanging wood, for the way was darkened by the trees to a dim green-hued twilight, dashed and splashed and streaked with silver sunshine, which played like dazzling cobwebs amidst the sprays and twigs of hazel, dogwood, and hornbeam, or lay in glittering patches upon the clover-leaved woodsorrel, which carpeted the soil with velvet-green.

It was from the corner of the bank which formed this side-track that the hoarse laughter came, and, turning sharply, Sir Mark gazed fiercely upon a rugged-looking mahogany-faced man, who seemed to have faced storm and sunshine where these slaves of Nature work their worst. His scanty hair was grizzled, his beard rusty, half-grey, and unkempt; his hands were knotted and gnarled, and, saving his eyes, everything about him betokened wear and tear. They alone flashed, and brightly, from beneath his shaggy brows, as, leaning against the corner, he stood with crossed legs, one hand holding a little thick-stemmed, very small-bowled clay pipe, which he leisurely smoked, resting his elbow the while in his right hand.

“Who are you? how dare you look at me like that, you dog?” cried the young man imperiously.

“Who am I, my jack-a-dandy?” said the other, taking his pipe from his lips and emitting a thin fine thread of smoke. “That’s no concern of thine. Hey, halloa there! Abel Churr, ahoy!”

A responsive shout came from out of the wood, and a thin, bent, cunning-looking man, with closely set, uneasy eyes, came quickly from amidst the hazels, which he parted with his hands, as he advanced.

“Here’s what you are seeking, lad. You are just in time. A brave girt fellow for you.”

“Where, where, Mas’ Wat?”

“He’s just gone up yon bank into the bit of a coney-hole; and our gay Saint George there was whipping out his skewer to pook the dragon, and save Sir Thomas’s fair daughter from his fangs, when I laughed, and sent the steel back into his sheath.”

“Let me pass you,” said the new-comer eagerly, as stick in hand, and with a rabbit-skin wallet slung from his shoulder beneath his arm, he hastily came out into the lane, and, saluting the portly baronet and the lady, began to climb the bank.

Sir Mark scowled at the smoker with a look full of resentment, but the latter replaced his pipe and gazed full at him with so keen and unblushing a stare that the young courtier was disconcerted.

“Coarse boor!” he muttered, turning away with a contemptuous shrug.

“Jack-a-dandy!” said the smoker to himself. Then aloud, “A fine day, Mas’ Beckley. Save your worship, I beg pardon; it’s Sir Thomas, now, is it not?”

“Yes, Master Wat Kilby, it is,” said the baronet, stiffly; and he coughed aloud, and gave the large cane he carried a thump on the ground as he turned to watch the proceedings of the new-comer.

The lank rugged man took a step or two forward as well, to the great disgust of Sir Mark, who had held out his arm to the lady, to receive both her hands, as with an extensive display of alarm she stood shrinking away, while the thin, eager man went up the bank, pushing the branches and ferns aside with his stick, peering before him the while.

There was something eminently foxy or weasel-like in his sharp, quick movements, giving him the aspect of one much accustomed to dealing with animal life as a trapper; and as he went on forcing his way through the tangled growth his actions formed sufficient attraction to cause all present to watch him intently.

“I don’t think he came out of yon hole, Mas’ Churr,” said the big man, emitting another puff of smoke, as if the weed he burned were precious. “Pook him with your stick.”

“Do you say it was a neddar, Mas’ Kilby?” said the man in a harsh, husky voice; “or was it only a snake?”

“An adder, Mas’ Churr, and the bravest and biggest I’ve seen this year. That’s the spot up yonder. By all the saints, I’d like to see him tackle one o’ the girt fellows I’ve known out in the Indian Isles, long as a ship and big round as our mast.”

“Travellers’ snakes,” said Sir Mark, contemptuously.

“Yes, my gay spark,” said the old fellow, with his eyes lighting up and flashing; “or one of the great poisonous adders out in the West, with rattles in their tails, from whose bite a man dies in an hour.”

“Pish!” ejaculated the young man; and then smiling encouragement to his companion, who was not in the least alarmed, he watched the thin man as he crept up to the rabbit-burrow, peered in, and then laid down his stick.

“There’s rats at times in these holes,” he said, “and they’ll get hold of your hands and bite rare sharp.”

Going down upon his knees, he pressed back a few fronds of bracken, bent forward, thrust in his right hand, seized the little serpent by the tail, and drew it rapidly through his left hand, which closed round the creature’s neck, then after stooping to raise his stick he brought the reptile down the bank, writhing and twining about his wrist.

“Don’t—pray don’t let him come near me!” cried the lady excitedly; and she clung to the young man’s arm.

“Fear not,” said the latter, with an encouraging smile, one which seemed to give her confidence, for she sighed, cast down her eyes, and then stood firm, as the adder-hunter took a knife from his pocket, and with a sly smile opened the gaping jaws, and showed the lookers-on the little keen poison-fangs lying flat down backwards on the roof of the viper’s mouth, till he raised them up, ending by jerking them both out with the knife-point, and placing the reptile in his wallet.

“You do something with them, Churr, do you not?” said Sir Thomas, for his guests’ behoof, for he knew by heart the whole of Abel Churr’s career.

“Yes, worshipful sir,” said Churr, humbly: “the people come from far and near to get neddar’s fat from me. It cures all kinds of ills in the skin, and heals the worst of cuts.”

“I wonder whether it would heal broken hearts,” said the young man in a whisper, as his eyes met those of Mistress Anne, who cast hers down and blushed.

“That will do, Abel Churr, that will do,” said Sir Thomas, importantly; and the adder-hunter pulled the front of his hair humbly and slunk away; the big, grizzled man sat himself down on a ledge of the bank, pulled out flint and steel, and proceeded to fill and light his pipe; and, rested by the incident they had witnessed, the little party proceeded on their journey along the rugged lane.

“Now, frankly, Sir Thomas,” said the young man, “how much farther is it?”

“Not five hundred yards, Sir Mark. There, you can see the furnace-smoke over yon clump of beeches, and just to the left, there—that light patch—that’s Roehurst Pool.”

“And pray what has Roehurst Pool to do with Master Jeremiah Cobbe, may I ask?”

“To do with him, Sir Mark? Why, it is a great piece of dammed-up water that sets his wheels in motion to make the tilt-hammers beat his iron, grind his charcoal, and blow his furnaces when he casts cannon. Oh, it has everything to do with him, Sir Mark.”

“Then he really has extensive works here?”

“Not so very large; not so very small; but he has many men at work for him getting the iron out of the hills, cutting down wood, making charcoal, and tending his furnaces. He is a busy man, Sir Mark.”

“Yes?” said the visitor inquiringly; “and what does he do with his guns and powder when he makes them?”

“I cannot say,” replied the baronet; “only that they are shipped away, and go down the little river here out to sea in the same ship that brings him sulphur from Sicily and Chinese salt from the far East. That was one of the captain’s men.”

“What captain? What men?”

“That tall, stout fellow we talked with—Wat Kilby—he is the captain’s head man—Captain Carr—Culverin Carr they call him here.”

“A fine, handsome, corsair-like fellow, with the look of a Spaniard and the daring of a hero?” said the visitor mockingly.

“Yes,” said the baronet quietly; “you have just described him, Sir Mark. His father, they say, went with Sir Walter Raleigh on his ill-fated expedition. The son was in the same ship, and when old Captain Carr died he left his son to the care of his crew.”

“And they made the youth their captain,” said Mistress Anne, with heightened colour.

“Yes,” said Sir Thomas, “and he has been their captain ever since.”

“But,” said Sir Mark curiously, “what are they—buccaneers—pirates?”

“Heaven knows,” said Sir Thomas, giving a glance round. “There are matters, Sir Mark,” he continued nervously, “that it is not always wise to discuss in a place where the very trees have ears.”

“Absurd!” cried Sir Mark. “Here, in his Majesty’s dominions, all men should be able to speak freely, and you excite my curiosity, Sir Thomas. Please to bear in mind that I am his Highness’s representative,” he continued stiffly, “sent here upon a special ambassage. Reports have reached the Court of a reckless buccaneering party, of the refuse and dregs of Raleigh’s freebooters, haunting the south coast; but I knew not that it was here in Sussex.”

“For heaven’s sake, Sir Mark,” whispered the baronet, mopping his face, “be advised and say no more. The place here is haunted by them, and they do what pleases them best. I am a justice, Sir Mark, but my authority is set at naught. You heard that man Kilby, how wanting in reverence he was? He is a sample of the rest, and I pray nightly when their ship sails from here that she may never return again.”

“A noble Christian-like feeling,” cried Sir Mark. “But, tut, tut, Sir Thomas, this must not be. Rouse up, man. These knaves must be brought to book if they don’t behave. Have no fear, sir; a word from me to the King, and his Majesty’s wisdom would be brought to bear on the need of sweeping this place clear of such dregs.”

Sir Thomas was gazing uneasily around, while Mistress Anne seemed to cast off her mincing ways, and her eyes flashed eagerly as she drank in the young courtier’s words.

“I know his Highness means well to all his subjects, Sir Mark,” said the baronet, nervously. “I thank him for conferring upon me my title, and he has no more loyal subject in these parts; but pray, Sir Mark, do not be too eager to report all you see. We are very lonely here, and far from cities and their ways. There is no man in these parts, sir, who is not influenced by—by—”

“Captain Culverin?”

“Hush—hush, pray, Sir Mark,” whispered the baronet, and then to himself, “Thank heaven we are here.”

“And is this the place?” said Sir Mark, standing pointing his moustache, as they emerged from the path upon the edge of a fine spreading sheet of water, embowered in noble woods and half covered with aquatic vegetation. In various parts clusters of water-fowl sat lightly on the glistening surface; mother-ducks sailed in safety with their downy broods in and out of the reedy water-lanes; coots and gallinules jerked themselves along the surface, while high in air a colony of black-headed gulls wheeled over the reeds, their breeding-place and sanctuary, safe from harm. Here and there along the edges, where the water was shallow, gaunt grey herons stood knee-deep, making, from time to time, a dart with their javelin-bills; and so clear, so mirror-like, was the expanse, that the noble forest-trees upon the other side were reflected plainly in the depths.

At the lower end stood a quaint, gable-ended house, and away to the right, where the waters were gathered together and rushed over a weir, were several long wooden buildings, with three or four roughly built of the sandstone of the district, two having massive chimneys, from which wreaths of pale blue smoke ascended into the soft summer air.

It was a lovely spot, and seemed to be the abode of peace and plenty, more than one where dire engines of warfare were fashioned at the furnace-mouth, and that black thunder sand, whose flash means death and destruction, was mixed by begrimed men from ingredients that left alone were innocent and secure. For the gable-ended house was white with clustering roses; the bright lattice windows sparkled in the sunshine; and the water, as it ran over the weir, made silver sounds that lulled the senses, as they whispered music to the ear.

Stretching far along the edge of the great pool there was an extensive well-kept garden, rich with flowers, pleasant with its green lawn, and made glorious now with its abundant trees; while still further along the Pool, nestling in a sheltered nook, shaded by tall trees and a mighty bank of sandstone rock, a patch of hops were rapidly nearing the tops of their poles as if climbing to get a peep at the field where the barley was springing rank and green, bridegroom and bride who should in the glowing October month be wedded well and breed strong ale.

“A very Paradise,” continued Sir Mark eagerly; “and look, Sir Thomas, over yonder. Who is the maiden? Look! Out there!”

Sir Thomas glanced nervously at his daughter, whose cheeks were very red, and whose eyes flashed no longer a soft and timid light.

“It is the founder’s daughter, Sir Mark. Sweet Mace they call her here,” and he wiped his forehead and gave his feather-padded breeches another hitch as he caught his daughter’s eyes once more.

“Sweet Mace!” said the King’s messenger, inquiringly. “Mace—nutmeg—spice!”

“Nay, Sir Mark, it was her father’s fancy, so they say. Mace or meadow-sweet, it is the same: the creamy-scented blossom that grows beside the Pool.”

“A forest fairy!” cried the young man, eagerly; “and the man, Sir Thomas?”

“Hush, pray, Sir Mark,” whispered the baronet; “the water carries sound.”

“Who is it, sir, I say?” cried the visitor, with an imperious stamp, as the object of his question turned his head.

“It’s he, himself, Sir Mark,” groaned the wretched man, glancing helplessly at the speaker; “the man of whom we spake.”

“What! Jeremiah Cobbe?”

“No; Captain Carr.”