Chapter Five.
The Voyage, and what came of it.
Stephen Bassett was not the better for that day’s work, though the accident was too slight to have harmed a man in fair health, and it made a sound reason for Friar Luke to urge upon him that he should give up his wild project of going west in the Queen Maud. But the carver was, if possible, only the more bent upon the scheme. He wanted to get Hugh out of London, where was more stir of arms and rumour of wars than in the shires, and have him safely bound apprentice where there should be no withdrawing.
“He will not fail me, poor little lad,” he said; “but were I to be taken from him here his task would be ten times harder. Besides, I see no opening for him except what the good brothers offer, which he would hate worst of all.”
So he kept the tales of his aches and weakness to himself as much as he could, though it cost him not a little to avoid Friar Luke’s reproachful eye when he came in from the garden with his herbs; and, armed with a letter from the prior—written in Latin on a strip of vellum—to the head of the Franciscans in Exeter, and accompanied to the water’s edge by several of the brethren, and a hospitable store of provisions with which they insisted on supplying them, the little party and their gear got safely on board the vessel, and would go down the river by the next tide. Little Moll and her mother were there, which made it seem more friendly to poor Hugh, who looked about him with dismay, and had had all possible mischances put before him by the friars, who thought Bassett’s action nothing less than flying in the face of Providence.
Still, when the farewells had all been spoken, the cumbersome anchor dragged out of the mud, and the great square sail with its sprawling centre device rigged up, they went merrily down the river. It was getting towards the middle of October, and the great buildings of London, the Abbey of Westminster, the Church of the Templars, the Gothic spire of St. Paul’s, the Tower, and various beautiful conventual buildings, stood, mostly surrounded by fine trees, in all the glory of autumnal gold and red. The lesser buildings—the very hovels—were picturesque, the river ran clear and strong, the vessels flaunted bright sails, colour was everywhere, and the soft blue mists but made a fair background for the scene.
Stephen Bassett stood watching, with a feeling that it was for the last time, when Andrew the ship-master joined him.
“A fair prospect,” said the carver.
“Ay, though I love my red Devon hills better. But, tell me, master, is it true, as thy boy relates, that you met King Edward yesterday and spoke with him?”
“I said not much, I had no breath left in my body,” said Stephen, smiling; “but it is true that the king spoke to us, chiefly to Hugh, and was very gracious.”
“To think of that!” said the sailor, staring. He walked away, but after this it was evident that his respect for his passengers was mightily increased, and he seldom came near Stephen without putting some question as to how the king looked and spoke, while Hugh had the same to answer from them all—more, indeed, since he never tired of the subject, and his pride in it was immense. His father had sewn his gold piece into the lining of his vest; Hugh never intended to spend it, it was for “remembrance,” as he was never tired of telling his father; and Stephen used laughingly to inquire whether Hugh had begun to persuade himself that he had been the hero of some courageous adventure, for reward of which the king had bestowed the token upon him? The boy used to redden at this, for there was a certain truth in the jest, and finding himself listened to with such interest by the sailors was like to turn his head.
Fortunately, as usual, there was a depreciating element. The youngest on board was a round-shouldered somewhat misshapen lad of seventeen, ill-favoured in temper as well as face, unpopular among his mates, except for one gift, that of storytelling. He could relate or invent tales with amazing ease, and on days when there was an idle calm the men, who at other times knocked him about roughly, would listen spell-bound for hours. This was his moment of glory.
But on this voyage his power seemed gone. The real explanation was very simple: the wind had shifted so as to follow them favourably, they had got safely round the dangerous Goodwins, and swept down the Channel past Dover, its castle and old British church standing out sharply above the white cliffs, while the setting sun shone like fire on the great sail of the vessel. They cast anchor in the first convenient creek; this required care and labour with the oars to avoid shoals, and the men were too sleepy afterwards to listen to stories. So it went on; the breeze blew freshly from the east, Stephen, crouched under what shelter the stern could afford, shivered, but Andrew the master rubbed his hands, and there was no slackening sail or delay.
This was really the reason why the sailors would not listen to the boy Jakes, but he chose to lay it to Hugh’s charge.
“Young fool,” he muttered, “always boasting, and telling about the king, I wonder they hearken!”
Such spite as he could work he was not slow to show. Many rough practical jokes he played, which Stephen counselled his boy to receive good-humouredly. But Hugh was set up with his Ludgate Hill adventure and the notice it had brought him, so that it made him mad to be jeered at for feeling sea-sick, or tripped up over ropes, or brought to the ground when he imagined himself to be sitting on something solid. Jakes was afraid of Agrippa, never having seen a monkey before, and fully sharing the idea that here was something uncanny, which was quite able to revenge itself if any harm was attempted. Jakes, therefore, let him alone, and even preferred to play his malicious jokes upon Hugh when the monkey had climbed the ropes and was out of reach and sight.
The voyage had on the whole been a success, and the Queen Maud was at length coasting along under the white cliffs of Dorsetshire, with the red ones of Devon lying rich and soft against a blue grey sky before them, and the sea leaping and whitening under the easterly wind.
“Strange that it should blow so long at this season,” said the master, standing by Bassett and looking forwards.
“If it goes on, we may get in to-morrow night?”
“Ay, if it doesn’t freshen into a gale, which the saints forbid! I mind not a gale in my teeth, but rocks before and the wind driving behind is what I mislike. Methinks, master,” he added, abruptly, “it will be well for you to get to your journey’s end.”
“I have a longer before me,” said Stephen, with a smile.
“Ay, to Exeter,” answered Andrew, misunderstanding, “and I have been thinking I would put you ashore at Teignmouth, and save you a piece of your journey. I might try Exmouth, but—there are ill tales of Exmouth, as I told you there were of Dartmouth,” he added, with a laugh; “at Dartmouth they know me, but at Exmouth—there might by chance be a mistake.”
Stephen thanked him heartily, saying, and truly, that the shortening of the road would be a great gain. They put in that night at a small harbour formed for the convenience of coasting vessels, but though their start was made with the first glimmer of dawn, Jakes, who generally had to be aroused by a rope’s end or a kick, had been on shore, and came back carrying a bag and grinning from ear to ear, so that Hugh was forced to ask him what he had got.
“Apples,” he said, still grinning; “rare fine apples. Bide a bit, and shalt have one.”
Hugh, who loved apples as well as any boy with a wholesome appetite should do, kept an eye on Jakes and his promise without suspecting that there might be anything unfriendly in this sudden change of disposition. The wind had freshened, of that there could be no doubt, and the sailors were busy with the lumbering sail, when Jakes beckoned Hugh forward to the bow, where was the bag.
“Put in thy hand and pull’m out, quick!” he said, running back to his work; and, thinking no harm, Hugh thrust in boldly, to have his fingers instantly seized in a nip which made him feel as if by the next moment they would be all left behind in the bag.
He cried out lustily, and dragged out his hand, to which a fine blue-black lobster was hanging, a creature at least as strange to Hugh as the monkey was to Jakes. The more he shook the tighter the lobster pinched, and when one of the sailors looked round the sail he could do nothing but split his sides with laughing. Hugh, crimson with pain and fright, was dancing about, vainly trying to disengage his hand. Jakes, the next to appear, broke into uproarious merriment.
“Ha, ha, ha!” he yelled, “told him there were apples in the bag, and he went for to steal ’em! Serve him right, serve him right! How like you your apples, my master?”
The buffeting of the wind in the sail and the rising noise of the sea had kept much of this from Stephen, but he at last became conscious that something unusual was going on, and made his way to the bows.
“Father!” cried poor Hugh, flying to him.
“Why, my little lad!” said Bassett, unable himself to avoid a smile, “what coil have you got into?”
“What is it?” demanded the boy, in a shamefaced whisper, as his father proceeded quietly to loosen the great claws.
“A lobster. Didst never see his like? He will be a dainty morsel for supper, and will change his blue coat for a scarlet. There,” he added, as he finished his task, “I counsel Agrippa not to let his curiosity jeopardise his tail. But how did he fasten on you?”
“It was that wicked Jakes!” cried Hugh, with flashing eyes.
“Were a stealing my apples,” Jakes retorted, defiantly. “Told him there was apples in the bag, and he put in his hand and the lobster caught un.” And clapping his unshapely hands on his knees, he roared with laughter once more, until he bent himself double. Hugh flew at him like a tiger, but the other sailor pulled him off.
“Never heed the great lozel,” he said. “It was but an apple.”
“He told me—he told me to put in my hand and take one out,” panted Hugh, struggling with his captor. “He’s a false liar!”
“Softly, Hugh, softly,” said his father gravely.
Jakes was for telling his story again with fresh detail, when the master’s voice was heard calling angrily. Stephen got Hugh back into shelter, and Agrippa, frightened by the creaking of the mast and the straining of ropes, clambered down to take refuge in his master’s arms. Hugh’s face was like a thunder-cloud. He burst out presently—
“To call me a thief!”
Stephen was silent.
“If Dickon had left me alone, I would have made him own it was a false lie. I would I were a man!”
“Why?”
“I should be strong and could fight,” the boy said, surprised at the question.
“I often think of that time,” returned Bassett thoughtfully. “I may not be here to see it, and I would fain know—” He paused.
“What?” asked Hugh.
“Who thou wilt fight?”
“Who? Mine enemies,” said Hugh, lifting his head.
“If you know them.”
“I shall know them, because they will try to do me a mischief. Jakes—he is an enemy,” fiercely.
“Thou hast worse than Jakes, my poor little lad,” Stephen said, tenderly, “and nearer at hand. Thine own passions will truly do thee a mischief, except thou keep them under. There’s fighting ground for thee. And, see here, I have long meant to say something to thee about King Edward, only I have an ill-trick of putting off. Thou thinkest the only way of serving him is by hard blows. He himself would tell thee that there be better ways. Serve the State faithfully as a peaceful citizen, keep the laws, and work for the glory of God and the honour of England. He would tell thee more. That his hardest work of government has been the task of governing himself. That is what has made him a great king. It seems small to thee just now, but one day, my Hugh, my words may come back.”
A fit of coughing stopped him. Hugh’s ill-temper had had a little cooling time, but it had not by any means left him. It was not the pain, perhaps it was not even so much the being called a thief, for no one on board was like to listen much to Jakes, and as for his father he had not even cared to allude to the absurd accusation. What Hugh really so much hated was the being laughed at. He had heard the men roaring with merriment after Dickon joined them, even his father had laughed; it would be for ever a sort of standing joke. What turned his thoughts more than anything was the weather. Anyone could see how much the wind had strengthened since they put out to sea. The colours, which had been clear and distinct, now had become blurred; a wet mist, not yet rain, but near it, was driving up from the southeast; the waves had grown larger and rushed past them in wild hurly-burly; the air was full of noisy tumult; the clumsy vessel groaned and laboured on her way, and Stephen and Hugh could not find shelter enough to protect them from the clouds of spray which swept across the vessel.
Andrew, the master, was too closely occupied with his work to come near them; he shouted directions to the man who was steering, but kept by the sail, and Bassett knew enough of the sea to suspect that they were in a position of some peril. For himself he thought it mattered little. He knew that he was even more ill than he outwardly appeared, and the wetting under which he was shivering was likely to quicken matters. But for Hugh? He could resign himself, it was a far harder matter to resign this young life, so full of vigorous promise—to give up with him all the hopes in which he had indulged of fame to come to his name, though not in his life. He had dreamt of late much of this; had pictured Hugh leaping to eminence, leaving his mark as a stone-carver in some beautiful cathedral, where age after age his work should stand, and when men asked who had done this great thing, the answer would be—Hugh Bassett. Was it all to end in an unknown grave under the grey waters which leaped so wildly round their prey?
Every half-hour the storm seemed to increase in fury. The shores on either side were now blotted out, and the steering was a matter of great difficulty. Andrew took it himself for a time, but his quick eye and steady courage were needed for the look-out, and he went forward again until he gave orders to strike sail. Then he once more came back and stood near Bassett and Hugh, looking as undaunted as ever. But when he spoke they could scarce hear his voice for the turmoil of the sea.
“Rough weather, goodman!”
“Ay! Will the boat hold?”
Andrew, who had stooped down to catch the carver’s words, straightened himself with a laugh.
“Ay, ay, the boat will hold. No fear of her failing. But where she will carry us I would I could say so certainly. Thou wouldst fain be back in the drones’ hive hearkening to book and bell, eh?”
“I am right glad to be remembered in the good brothers’ prayers,” said Stephen, quietly.
“Well, it may be as you say. Those I have known—I would not have given a base pollard for the pardon-mongers’ prayers; but there are false loons in every craft.”
They were silent again, for their voices were pretty well stormed down, and the sea broke so fiercely over the vessel that two or three of the men had to be constantly baling it out. Still she held her way gallantly. The shipmen of that day were not without an imperfect form of compass, in which the needle was laid upon a couple of straws in a vessel of water, but these contrivances were apt to get out of gear at the very time when they were most needed, such as a storm like that now raging round the Queen Maud, and hardy sailors trusted rather to their own skill and courage or their knowledge of the coast. Nothing was, therefore, so dangerous as fog or mist.
To Hugh, however, what seemed most terrible was the wild driving storm and the rush of the waves against the boat, which shivered under each stroke as if she had received a mortal blow. Agrippa, wet and miserable, cowered in his master’s arms, and turned up a piteous little wrinkled face full of inquiry. Hugh crept closer to his father, and at last put his question—
“Shall we be drowned?”
Stephen turned and caught his hands in his.
“Nay, my little lad, I know not, I know not! I should not have brought thee!”
The boy looked in his face gallantly.
“I am not frightened,” he said, “only I wish poor Agrippa were safe.”
They were silent again after this. Andrew was evidently uneasy; he shouted orders to the sailors, and strained his eyes through the baffling mist as if he feared what might be in advance of him. His hope, and it was a feeble one, consisted in the chance that he might strike the estuary of the Teign, avoiding the bar, and, as the tide would be full, getting into the shelter of the river. He was one of the most skilful of the sailors of the west, knowing all the currents and dangers thoroughly; but navigation was then in its infancy, and vessels were clumsy, lumbering things, suited but to calm weather, when they would coast along from creek to creek. The bolder craft chiefly belonged to pirates. Still, England was beginning to awake to her sea powers, and Henry the Third had taken the title of Ruler of the Seas in honour of a victory gained over the Spaniards. Andrew himself had been down as far as Spain, and was held to be over-daring; moreover, he wanted to hasten his voyage and get back to his wife and to Moll, otherwise he would hardly have put out that morning in the teeth of a possible gale.
And now, although nothing was to be seen except perhaps what seemed like a thickening of the mist, Stephen knew from the master’s face that the danger was worse. He was so numb and cold himself as to feel indifferent to his own fate—besides, as he reflected, at the most it was but shortening his life by a month or two—but his love for Hugh went up in a yearning cry that he might be saved. He touched him, and made the boy put his ear close to his mouth.
“See here, Hugh,” he said, with labouring breath, “if you are spared out of this coil thou must make thy way to Exeter. The Franciscans will take thee in at first, but thou must seek out James Alwyn. I mind me that was the name of thy mother’s cousin. Get him to apprentice thee where thou canst learn thy trade. Thou hast it in thee—do not forget.”
“No, father,” said poor little Hugh, glancing fearfully round.
It was but a minute after that, or so it seemed, that they heard a cry from one of the sailors. The wall of mist had suddenly become solid; it loomed before them in unmistakable cliffs, so near that the man who was steering dropped the rudder and fell upon his knees. With a cry of rage Andrew leaped back from the bows, seized the rudder, and using all his strength forced her head somewhat round. It was a strange sight, this struggle of the man with the elements. The man standing undaunted in the midst of a hurly-burly which threatened quick death, facing his danger without flinching, resolute, bent upon snatching every advantage which skill could give him. That the vessel was drifting against the wall of red rock before them was plain; Stephen, clutching Hugh in his arms, wondered that the master should hope to avert it. Suddenly he saw Andrew’s face change. He set his teeth, and slackening the rudder drove straight for the cliffs.
There was a breathless pause; the next minute the vessel struck a small sandy beach, driven up it and wedged there by the uplifting force of the waves. The master’s keen eye had noted the one comparative chance of safety, and had tried for it. Almost as the ship touched the sailors sprang forward and leaped into the sea. Only Andrew, Bassett, Hugh and Agrippa remained on board.