"Yes," he murmured to himself, "the wise man dieth as the fool dieth, and what hath a man for his labours but vexation of spirit. This also is vanity!"
Astbury caught the muttered words. "Very well said, sir, and sounds like Scripture! But I tell you gold's solid, that's no vanity; and if I could but get back to where I buried it——"
Dick was not listening. Something in his own bosom was arguing Astbury's cause, better than that vagrant could do it himself. Homeless, friendless in England, might there not yet be a career for him in the West? Not in cold, pious Rhode Island, but under brighter skies that offered fiercer pleasures. Good Parson Perrient had painted Providence plantation as a sort of paradise, where the liberty and toleration dreamt of by a few in England were the law for all; but was that refuge open to him? The good parson might be dead; his daughter wedded to some sturdy settler, who would have no fancy for such a compromising guest as one bearing the hated name of Harrison! To fly to New England would be but to begin his old life over again, and as Astbury truly said, What had it brought him? What had he gained? What had England gained by all they had done and dared? "If our cause was, as we thought, of God, why did He not own us? What were General Harrison's dreams of a pure republic, but vanity? Who can say if his dreams of heaven were any truer?"
A wild desire flashed across the young man to break once and for all with the puzzles and struggles of the past, and throw in his life with the ruffian who sat opposite to him. He knew his own powers, he could lead, he was cool and prompt; he might be a stupid enough fellow in many ways, but he was a born soldier. Astbury would get together enough of men to follow him; only too many good soldiers were then laying by their useless swords. Why should he not sail in the wake of Drake and Raleigh, and make himself a name? Ay, and found new commonwealths in the land of sunset?
"I must think it over, Astbury," he said, rousing himself. "Sleep brings council, they say; and we have sat our fire out."
"And starving cold it is, too," grumbled Astbury. "Best come to warm countries, Maester Dick!" and so flung himself on the wretched pallet in the corner of the room, and was snoring before many minutes were over. Dick wrapped himself in his cloak and stretched himself on the settle, but sleep was far from him. Many a man of good birth and education he had known driven to take the road and become a highwayman, and think himself none the worse gentleman for it. Pah! that revolted him—that was little better than common thievery. But to sail the South seas! to harry the Spaniard! to free the oppressed Indians! A sort of fever seemed to possess him, and rouse him from the apathy that had fallen on him. He tried to call up his cooler judgment, but in vain; pictures of sunny seas and waving palm groves, of gallant fights and sacked towns danced before him, and his broken slumbers only wove the fancies into dreams. The morning found him still undecided.
"I will go a mile or two along with you, Astbury," he said, "before I give my word. Which way are you bound?"
"Well," he answered, "the best seaport for our purpose would be either Bristol or London."
"No, no," answered Richard. "I may not venture on the back road so as to come to Bristol, and London were worse still. Is there no seaport this side of England would do as well?"
"Well, sir, if 'twas a matter of working my passage, I'd be bound to go where there would be ships trading the right way; but if I was with a gentleman as would oblige me with a loan, 'tis easy to take ship from Harwich, or find one lying in Yarmouth Roads that would carry us part way, and then we could take passage from some French or Spanish port. What do you say, sir, to Yarmouth?"