Читать книгу The Mate of the Good Ship York; Or, The Ship's Adventure - William Clark Russell - Страница 4

Table of Contents

George Hardy and Miss Julia Armstrong sat down to supper at the little round table; Bax lurked as if he would wait; Hardy said they could manage very well without him, and the pair fell to. The window was open, and all the rich, decaying perfumes of the autumn evening floated into the atmosphere, and sweetened it with the incense of the night.

Hardy looked at his companion, and felt again the delight he used to take in the contemplation of her shape. The same old suggestion was in her—that of the Vivandière. But why? He could not have explained, and neither can I. Every movement was full of beauty and piquancy, and she wore her hair parted a little on one side.

"Is your bedroom comfortable?" asked Hardy.

"A sweet, old-fashioned little room," she said, "and the bed's a four-poster. It has curtain rings, and if I tremble in bed they will rattle, and I shall think it the death-tick, which I hate to hear. Will that sofa make a comfortable bed for you?"

"You are asking a sailor that question," he answered. "I would be glad to carry it to sea with me, and sleep all around the world in it. Have you written a farewell letter to your father?"

"No; I have left him as a spirit might, in utter silence. His wife will not let him trouble himself. When the time comes for locking up the bolt will be shot, and he will fill his pipe and fill his glass, and say to his wife that he is afraid there is some truth in the story that Mr. Gubbins was telling him about Miss Cornflower and the Congregational minister. That is the sort of interest he will take in my not turning up."

She frowned, and put down her knife and fork, and seemed as if she did not mean to go on eating. Hardy poured out a glass of frothing ale. It was a fine sparkling ale, better than champagne, and looked an elegant drink, fit for red lips in the thin glass it brimmed with foam. She took it and drank.

"It is hard for any girl to be in want," said Hardy; "but there is no distress to equal that of the lady who is in poverty. What, in God's name, can she do? She is not wanted in the kitchen, and if I were she I would rather sell matches than be a governess."

"It is the well-to-do lady who makes it hard for the poor lady," exclaimed the girl. "Two years ago I got a situation as nurse to attend an aged sick woman—she was eighty. She lived with a lady. You would think this person would have known how to treat the daughter of an officer in the navy, who was too poor to maintain her as a lady. Mr. Hardy, she used to call me Armstrong, as though I was her housemaid. I had my meals separate. When they went away for a change I was not good enough to sit in the carriage; they made me sit on the box, and the coachman, in the genial manner of the mews, asked me if I was the new maid, and if my name was Jemima. When we arrived the lady told me I must not sit with them if company came, as my presence might be objected to. I went to my bedroom, and kept in it till I was called out, and then returned to it."

"It is time you cleared out," said Hardy. "The soft hearts seem to be found at sea nowadays; at all events, they are not so scarce there as fresh eggs," said he, helping himself. "Your intentions are to get abroad and seek a berth abroad. I should like to read the map of them. You have saved seven pounds odd, and you arrive in London at night, and you don't know where to go. Next day you ask your way—where? To the docks; but what docks? London, Millwall, East India, West India, and so on. You enter a forest without a compass. Now what are you going to do?"

"I meant to go on board ship after ship," she answered, with spirit, "and ask anybody I saw if there was a berth for me on board."

"Did you ever see a large full-rigged ship in all your life?" he inquired, smiling.

"Never," she replied, emphatically.

"Go to the docks, and you'll see hundreds, and there won't be one that wants you."

"What is the name of your ship?" she asked.

"The York."

"Where is she going to?"

"She is bound to Australia."

"Is there no place for me in that ship?" she said. She looked at him piteously, though her natural grace of coquetry broke through all the same, with the planting of her hands upon her hips, and the way she side-dropped her head at him.

"We carry no stewardess, no females, no passengers," he answered. "The captain is a stranger to me. No, my ship is of no use to you," he continued, after a pause. "You must call with me upon some shipping people. There may be a vacancy for a stewardess. But suppose the ship is sailing for India?"

She gazed at him a little vacantly.

"We shall find some means of getting abroad," he went on, running a note of cheerfulness into his voice, for he thought by the look in the girl's eyes that she was beginning to bend on signals of distress, which would be hoisted in a pearly downpour presently. "At all events, you can't be worse off than you are, and somebody says that when you are at the bottom of the wheel the next revolution must hoist you."

They talked in this strain until they had supped, then Hardy, not seeing a bell, opened the door and shouted to Miss Bax to clear away. When the door was opened they could hear voices in the back room beyond, and a gush of Cavendish tobacco smoke came in. Some friends of Bax had called in a casual way by the back entrance, across the fields, which meant several drinks, clouds of tobacco, and all the gossip of the social sphere which Bax and his friends adorned. When Miss Bax had cleared the table she placed a bottle of whisky upon it at the request of Hardy, also cold water and glasses. She then said there was no hurry to go to bed. Father did not go to bed until eleven, and she left them with a smile as though they were a young married couple spending their honeymoon in Bax's farm, instead of one of them being an honest, generous-hearted young sailor intent on doing his dead best to rescue a young English lady from bitter privation, and perhaps from miserable disgrace; and the other of them being a broken-hearted girl hurrying from a home of tyranny and drink, a home of one base nature, and of one spiritless one (which is likewise a baseness), with a future as dark as the night that lay outside, in whose funeral tapestries her imagination alone could have beheld the stirrings of the life that was to give her content and liberty, in whose impenetrable depths she found no more than a minute gleam of light from Hardy's strange and chanceful encounter with her while she lay in a swoon deep as death.

With her consent the sailor lighted a pipe. The girl sat in a chair opposite to him, her head a little on one side, hands on her hips, all in the old, fascinating, coquettish, incommunicable way. Outside the night lay in a thin gloom, and they saw the stars shining above the trees. The hush of the sleeping land was in the air. You heard nothing but the silver tinkling of a natural fall of water that ran down the hillside, and fell purely in a stone bowl for men, horses, and dogs to drink.

"You are a plucky girl," said Hardy; "but I think you are attempting more than you understand. You talk, for instance, of going to the workhouse. You are the last girl in the world to go to the workhouse. Think of dying in a workhouse," he continued, whilst she watched him without smiling. "Creatures bend over your bed, and say, 'Isn't she gone yet?' That's the sympathy of the workhouse."

"I want to get out of England, abroad, and be independent," said Julia.

He looked at an old clock upon the mantelpiece. The hour was about eight. He asked her if she would have some whisky and water, and on her declining, he mixed a draught for himself, then went to the door and called to Bax, leaving the girl to wonder what he meant to do. The farmer arrived.

"Bax," said the sailor, "you have given us a capital supper."

"I'm much obliged to you, sir," answered Bax.

"This is an excellent whisky," continued Hardy, "and I drink your health"—here he sipped—"and the health of your worthy daughter"—here he sipped again—"in your very hospitable gift."

Bax grinned, and said, "We make no charge. You're my guests, and you're welcome."

"Bax," said Hardy, "haven't you a spring cart?"

"Yes," answered Bax.

"Got a horse?"

"Got a pretty little mare."

"Will you drive me over to Captain Armstrong's as soon as possible to fetch this young lady's luggage?"

Julia started in her chair, and said, "Don't trouble, Mr. Hardy. My father will send the box on to me when he gets my address in London."

"How d'ye know he will?" inquired Hardy.

"Ah!" murmured Bax.

"Suppose the stepmother declines to let the box go?" said Hardy. "Now you'll want all the clothes you've got and can get, Miss Armstrong, if you mean to colonise. Bax, bear a hand, my lad; clap your mare to the cart, and report when you're ready."

He spoke as if he was on the quarter-deck of a ship and making the sailors jump for their lives, and Bax went out, saying, "I'll not be ten minutes."

"How good you are to me!" exclaimed Julia, gathering the side of her pocket-handkerchief unconsciously, and looking at him with eyes that seemed to tremble with emotion. "What should I have done had you not found me? I might have died under that hedge."

"Let me see," said Hardy; "how far off from here does your father live?"

She reflected and answered, "Quite six miles."

"Well, we shall be back with your box before ten. Don't sit up; you want all the rest you can get. To-morrow will be full of business."

"Oh!" cried Julia, "I hope there will be no trouble. Father may—He won't like you to know that I have run away. He may insist upon returning with you, or coming here."

"If he is at home he may, and we'll give him a lift with pleasure."

"I should refuse to meet him," cried the girl, standing up in a sudden passion of indignation. "He has seen me suffer and has looked on. If he comes here it is not for me, but for that," and she pointed to the bottle of whisky.

"You shall have your box of clothes, anyhow," said Hardy, smoking coolly and looking at the girl; and three minutes after he had said this Miss Bax came in, and reported that "father and the cart was at the gate."

"Don't let Miss Armstrong sit up," said Hardy. "Do those chaps back talk very loud?"

"When they arguefy," answered Miss Bax. "They're wrangling over the age of the queen now."

"Well, when Miss Armstrong goes to bed silence them," said Hardy, "for I want the lady to sleep well. We shall meet at breakfast," said he, turning to Julia and taking her hand.

"I shall wait up for you. How could I sleep?" she replied.

He smiled, but answered nothing, filled and relighted his pipe, and walked out.

The drive was pleasant, down-hill. The road stretched before them like satin with the dust of it, and many spacious groups of trees lifted their motionless shapes against the sky-line of the tall land and the stars twinkling above it. Specks of light in houses reposed like glow worms in the deep shades of the valley and up the acclivities, but the river streamed in blackness, and the lamps of a small town past the railway station were lost behind the bend.

Hardy stared at his father's house as they drove past, always in darkness on this side, but he knew there would be lights in the windows which overlooked the grounds that sank toward the river.

The house Captain Armstrong lived in was two miles further on round the corner, and made one of about a dozen little villas and cottages, including a church and a public-house. It was a very small cottage, thatched; but its sun-bright windows, its handsome door and brass knocker—the taste, in short of the man who had built it in years gone by—made it very fit for the occupation of a gentleman. It was sunk deep in a broad piece of garden land, and the apple-trees, whose boughs were laden, scented the still night air refreshingly.

"Here we be," said Bax, drawing up, and the sailor sprang off the cart, and walked down the path to the door with the brass knocker.

He hammered briskly, and tugged at a metal knob which shivered a little bell into ecstasies of alarm. A small dog barked shrilly with terror and hate, and in a minute the door was opened by a servant, past whom the small dog fled, and tried to marry his teeth in Hardy's right boot. A kick rushed the little beast back into the passage, and Hardy said to the servant, "I have called for Miss Armstrong's trunk."

"Oh, indeed," she said, looking behind her.

"Yes, indeed," he exclaimed. "I'm in a hurry. I've six miles to go. Is Captain Armstrong in?"

"No," was the answer, and as the servant spoke a door on the right of the passage was thrown open, and the figure of a stout woman stood between Hardy and the flame of the oil-float which illuminated the passage at the extremity.

"Who is it? and what does he want?" said the stout figure, approaching by two or three paces.

"I am Mr. Hardy, son of your husband's doctor," was the reply, "and I have called for Miss Armstrong's trunk. It stands ready corded in her bedroom, and I am in a hurry."

"Where is Miss Armstrong going?" said the stout figure, who was indeed Mrs. Armstrong.

"To the ends of the earth to escape you," he answered. "Bax," he roared, "fling your reins over the gate-post, and come and lend me a hand to ship the box in your cart."

"The box shall not leave this house without Captain Armstrong's permission," said Mrs. Armstrong, who, poor as the light was, you could see carried a great deal of colour in her face of a streaky or venous nature; her eyes were small, and gazed with rapid winks as though they snapped at you as you snap the hammer of a revolver; her bust was immense; her black hair was smoothed like streaks of paint down her cheeks and round her ears, and she wore a cap with something in it that nodded, giving more significance to her words than they needed.

"Where is Captain Armstrong?" said the sailor.

"Out," was the reply.

"He'll not care whether I take it or leave it." He could not bring himself to speak even civilly to her. "Whilst you fetch him we'll tranship it, and the captain can get in and argue the point whilst we drive away. Come along, Bax. Sally, show us the road to the young lady's bedroom."

"Maria," exclaimed Mrs. Armstrong, cold and bitter, "go and knock on Constable Rogers's door, and tell him to come here at once."

"Shall I fetch the master also?" said Maria, quivering in her figure in the hot anticipation of rushing out.

"No, the walk is too long. I want you back, and the constable."

The girl shot up the walk.

"Bax," said Hardy, "come along. We'll easily find the room."

Bax hung in the wind.

"What's the constable a-going to say?" he muttered. "Won't it be breaking in if we enters without the missis's leave?"

Hardy looked at him, and then stepped to the foot of the staircase.

"You dare not go up-stairs, sir!" said Mrs. Armstrong, in a voice that trembled.

Hardy mounted.

"The constable shall lock you up," shrieked the enraged woman.

"Coom down, coom down, Mr. Hardy," sang out Bax. "The constable'll make it right."

Hardy pulled out a box of wax matches and struck one. The landing was in darkness, and he wanted to see. He guessed the girl's bedroom by intuition, opened the door, and saw the trunk—a small one—seized the handle, and dragged it to the head of the staircase. It was lighter than a sea chest, and with a heave he settled it on his shoulder, and went creaking down-stairs.

"I defy you to take that box out of my house without my leave," yelled Mrs. Armstrong.

Hardy seemed cool, but his spirits were in a blaze. He regarded the sending for a constable as an atrocious act of insolence, and he walked past the woman, not in the smallest degree caring whether he plunged the corner of the box into her head or not. She took care, however, to give him a wide berth, and he passed through the house door, whilst the little dog barked furiously at a safe distance at the end of the passage.

"Give me a hand with this," said he to Bax. "This is no business of the constable. The box belongs to a young lady who wants it, and I intend that she shall have it."

"Mr. Hardy," answered Bax, "I'd rather not meddle with the box till the constable cooms; he'll be 'ere in a minute. He allus smokes his pipe by his fireside at this hour. If it should be the wrong box—"

"It's the right box," exclaimed Hardy, standing with the trunk on his shoulder.

"I'd rather wait for Rogers to make it all right," said Bax.

Hardy sent a sea blessing at his head, and without another word walked rapidly to the cart, threw the box in, took the reins off the gate, sprang on to the seat, and drove off.

"Stop, sir; stop, for God's sake!" shouted Bax, beginning to run. But he was too fat to run. He was blowing hard when he gained the road, and stood staring after his cart. Hardy whipped the mare into a gallop, and gained the farm in half the time that Bax would have taken to measure the ground. He drew up at the gate, secured the horse by the reins, and, shouldering the trunk, marched to the door, and was admitted by Miss Bax.

"Where's father?" was her first cry.

"I left him enjoying a yarn with Mrs. Armstrong," answered Hardy, thrusting with the trunk into the room, where Julia was still sitting just as he had left her. "There are your clothes, Miss Armstrong," said the sailor, lowering the box on to the floor.

"Father's come to no 'urt, I hope?" said Miss Bax, addressing Miss Armstrong.

Hardy related exactly the story of his repulse by the insolent stepmother, his bringing the box down-stairs alone, Bax's fear of the law, and so forth.

"And now," said he, "as you've not gone to bed, Miss Armstrong, I'll sit down and keep you company, and smoke one more pipe, and wait for the constable."

"Well, if father's all right," said Miss Bax, "he'll be here with the constable, and soon, I hope; but it's all up-hill, and his wind don't favour him. I've got help at the back, and will put the mare up," and thus speaking she passed out, and left the young couple alone.

"So she actually sent for a constable!" exclaimed Julia, whilst Hardy filled his pipe, and looked at the grog bottle on the table. "Could you imagine a more horrible woman?"

"Here are the goods anyhow," said Hardy, striking a match. "It's your box, of course—I mean, I've made no mistake, I hope."

"Certainly it is my box," she exclaimed, slightly flushing and poising her hands on her hips, and dropping her head at him in a posture that brightened his eyes with delight, "and all I possess in this wide world is in it."

"I would not like to be the constable if he touches it or is even insolent over it," said Hardy, stretching backwards his broad shoulders, with a glance at himself in the little fly-protected mirror. He then poured out some whisky and water, and sat down near Julia.

"She did not express any astonishment at my leaving home?" said the girl.

"The dog did most of the talk," he answered, "and made for my choicest corn," and he looked at his boot, which exhibited the indent of the beast's teeth. "How your father could have—"

"Was she drunk?" asked Julia.

"I dare say she was. Some people get drunk without showing it. Miss Armstrong, I am no longer surprised that you should run away."

She smiled, but with mingled sadness and bitterness, and said, "If my father comes in with Bax and the constable, I shall walk out, and I beg you to give me your protection, Mr. Hardy, and to save me from seeing him."

Hardy bowed, but made no answer. He was a man of careless thoughts and many heedless views in all sorts of directions, a sailor, in short, whose horizon was salt and limited, yet he could not help feeling shocked at the extravagance of fear and dislike which the half-pay captain had by bitter neglect and a Christless marriage excited in the breast of a girl who seemed a true-hearted, heroic young woman, beautiful of figure, and with a face of romantic interest.

"Can the constable do anything if he comes?" she asked.

"Oh, yes," answered the sailor, "he can walk out. In what law book is it written that a man may not possess his own? That is yours," said he, pointing to the trunk, "and if Constable Rogers touches it we'll have him before the magistrates, of whom, by the way, my father is one."

He looked at her very thoughtfully, and she looked at him till her gray eyes drooped to her lap. The Persian kitten had left the room, and she had nothing to toy with but her handkerchief. Now, by the expression of Hardy's face, you could have said that he fastened his eyes upon her, not out of feeling, nor out of the sense of being alone with her, nor of the enjoyment of the spectacle of her matchless figure, but because he was maturing thoughts concerning her well-being. He had certainly a most honest face, and you tasted the manliness of his nature in each utterance and in every smile.

"I want to talk to you," said he, "about our arrival in London. I must get you close to the docks. I'll put you in the way of making a few inquiries whilst I am busy on board my ship; meanwhile I shall be asking questions."

"Oh, Mr. Hardy, what should I have done had I not met you?" she cried, in an irrepressible outburst of gratitude, and again he saw tears in her eyes, for she had lived hard and had fared hard for some years now, and kindness easily broke her down, as one long divorced from home will melt on her return to the sound of the music that her mother loved and sang to her.

"Do you know London?" said the sailor.

"I was never in London," she answered.

"Have you ever seen a ship?"

"I came home in a ship from India," she replied, "but I was too young to remember the vessel."

"You will not like the East End of London," said Hardy. "I don't know why sailors should make the places they live in dirty, yet it is true that after leaving Whitechapel the closer you draw to the docks, the grimier life looks. Jack has spent his money, you see, and is going away tipsy and ragged, and what he leaves behind him is anything but sweet, and they serve him as though he were a Yahoo. Look at his lodging-house and his boarding-house, at the dens in which he revolves to the ghastly notes of a black fiddler, with objects fit only to be lectured upon, or for the show of a Barnum. Take his line of railway, the Blackwall line; the farmers wouldn't send their swine to market in the carriages, and so the sailor travels in them."

"How long have you been at sea, Mr. Hardy?"

"I went to sea when I was fourteen years old, and I am now twenty-six."

"In twelve years you have become a mate?"

"Chief mate," he said.

"Oh," she exclaimed, "what would I give if you carried a stewardess, and your captain would consent to take me!"

"I wish it could be contrived," said he, in his plain, straight way, "but owners never ship people they don't want. Even if I had influence, an objection would be raised that you were the only woman on board."

"But I have read," she exclaimed, "that a captain takes his wife to sea, and she may be the only woman in the ship."

"Ay, but she's the captain's wife," he answered, with a smile, "and if she were a shipload of females she couldn't be more."

They then began to talk of London and the East End, of a convenient part to take a lodging in, how it was certain that she must obtain a berth somewhere or somehow before Hardy sailed; and whilst they conversed the door opened, and Bax entered, purple with exercise and beer.

"Well," said he, breathing comfortably, as though he had refreshed himself before entering with rest and ale, "that was a fine trick of yourn, Mr. Hardy."

"Never mind about that, Bax," exclaimed the young sailor, cutting him short in his peremptory quarter-deck way. "Where's the constable?"

"He bain't cooming," answered Bax. "He knows the difference between climbing up a hill and climbing into bed."

"Sit down, Bax, and take some whisky," said Hardy, both he and Julia laughing; and after waiting for the farmer to mingle some whisky and water and pull a chair, he said, "Tell us what passed, Bax."

"Well," began Bax, "it was just after you'd trotted out of sight, with me hallering, being afraid of the law I was, when oop cooms the maid 'long with Constable Rogers. 'Oh, Mr. Rogers,' sings out Mrs. Armstrong, who was standin' in her door, 'the doctor's son's been 'ere in Farmer Bax's cart, and busted into this house, and gone off with my stepdarter's troonk agin my commands.' 'Where's your stepdarter?' said the constable, not speaking overcivil—blamed if I thinks he likes the woman, and he didn't love her the better for routing of him out. 'I don't know,' answered Mrs. Armstrong. 'Yes, you do,' says I. 'She's opp stopping in my house along with the gent as fetched her luggage.' 'What do you want me to do?' says Rogers. 'Your duty,' answers Mrs. Armstrong, 'twixt a snap of her teeth that was like cocking a goon at him. 'What do constables usually do when they're called in to houses which have been busted into and goods taken, otherwise stolen, agin orders?' Here Bax laughed slowly, as though recollecting something in this passage of words which he could not communicate, but which, nevertheless, he could enjoy. 'But there was no busting in here that I can see,' says Rogers, looking at me; 'you knocked and rung, didn't you?' 'Why, yes, of course we did,' says I, 'and the gent spoke the lady as civil as though she had been a maid of hanner or the queen herself.' 'Oh, what a liar, what a beast you must be!' says Mrs. Armstrong, screaming like. 'He forces his way oop-stairs, Mr. Constable, and brings down the box on his shoulder, me standing at the foot of the steps, and telling him not to touch it.' 'Was he sent by the party as the box belongs to?' asks the constable. 'Certainly he was, Mr. Rogers,' says I. 'They're going away to-morrow by the early train, and she naturally wanted her box to take with her.' 'There's nothing for me 'ere to interfere with that I can see,' says Rogers, drawing himself up, and puttin' on the face of a judge delivering a vardick. 'The lady has a right to her own. Your door was knocked on civilly, and the gent she asked to bring it away did so, and there's northen for me to meddle with;' and with that, without saying good night, he turns his back, and walks into the road, me at his side, and she hallering arter him that he didn't do his duty, and she'd lodge a complaint agin him, and 'ave the place cleared of a stoopid old fool. 'She's like my cat when he begins to talk to Springett's cat over the wall,' says Mr. Rogers. 'I wish the young lady well out of it, I do. Good-night, Mr. Bax.' So I sets off 'ome, and that's just what all 'appened."

Julia, though she had laughed and often smiled, now sat looking subdued with grief and disgrace. It was horrible to the feelings of a lady to possess such a stepmother as the wretch who owned the little dog that bit, and horrible also to hear her represented and dramatised in the language of Bax in the presence of the man who, as God had willed it, seemed the only friend she possessed in this wide world. Nevertheless, they continued talking until eleven o'clock, by which hour Bax had grown too maudlin for human companionship.

Julia went to bed, and Bax rolled through the door to the back premises to send his daughter to the young sailor. All that he requested was a rug, a blanket, and a pillow, and then when the house was locked up, and Miss Bax had bid him goodnight, he turned down the lamp, snugged himself on the sofa, and lay listening to Miss Julia's restless pacing overhead. There was sleeplessness in her walk; but the delicate tramp of her tireless feet ceased at last. He thought of her in her loneliness, and pity moved his heart, and he vowed that he would see her in safety, buoyed by a full promise of independence in the future, before he left England.

The window stood open a little way, and all night-sounds were clear. The stream babbled in the road, and its voice was like the syllabling of the perfumes stealing darkling down into the valley. He heard the distant hooting of owls like the crying of idiot boys, one seeking the other, and the thin thunder of the distant railway was a night-sound, together with the shuddering of the dry autumn leaves upon the boughs as though the trees shivered to the chill of the passing moan of air. And then Hardy fell asleep.