“She won’t make four knots an hour.”
“And the distance is the same by sea and land.”
“If Murch gets there first——” Morgan broke off and stared at me in white dismay. “Harry,” says she, “you must follow him.”
XX
The Longest Liver takes All
There was no help for it. The poor, guileless clerk must take the road and chase the formidable old captain of buccaneers; and where was the use of such an enterprise, was more than he knew. But, as he may have indicated once or twice in the course of these memoirs, what Mistress Morgan Leroux commanded had to be done. Of course, if Mr Murch won this singular race, and came aboard his ship before Brandon Pomfrett in the Willing Mind could make Morte Bay, our game was lost. Murch would fight the ship or sink her, rather than yield; a single lucky shot would disable the unarmed schooner, and her boats would be helpless under fire of small-arms. Moreover, in a place where none knew him, Mr Murch would have the civil power at his back; his papers were in order; to all appearance, the ship was his; he was the honest shipmaster, and Captain Pomfrett the picaroon. Pomfrett might sheer off, it is true, and invoke the law himself, or appeal for help to a ship of Her Majesty’s, if he could find one. But his chances of either succour on the desolate coast of North Devon were small; moreover, if he came within range of Mr Murch’s artillery, he was like to leave his bones in Morte Bay—a name in itself of unpleasant import—and, in Mr Murch’s favourite phrase, the longest liver would take all. Pomfrett might, again, return as a last resource to Bristol, if he found Mr Murch in possession, and contrived to escape from him. But, by the time he had made the voyage, and his uncle had taken measures to recover the Blessed Endeavour, it was hard but Mr Murch would have found a way to put to sea again; and, once on blue water, it was long odds, indeed, if any of our company ever again saw so much as the lift of his topsails. No: there was little room for doubt that the issue lay with the winner of the race between mounted man and sailing ship. But, even so, how was Henry Winter to help? He was no Milanion, goddess-favoured; he had no golden apples to strew in Mr Murch’s path. Indeed, ’tis doubtful if a whole orchard of such fruit would have given pause to this desperate Atalanta. Besides, Murch knew of my presence in Bristol, and he would be on his guard against any surprisal. Altogether, I had as lief give chase unarmed to a bear robbed of her whelps.
I should be better employed (I said) in laying the case before Mr Brandon Pomfrett the elder. It was hard if that magnate, with all Bristol city at his back, could not devise a scheme to reinforce his luckless nephew. But Morgan Leroux scorned the notion.
“What!” says she. “Go whining to that pot-bellied burgess, asking for help for his poor little nephew? I had thought better of your understanding, Henry. I thought you knew Brandon better than that!”
“I know him so well,” said I, “that I know he would forfeit all in the world rather than a scruple of childish vanity.”
Morgan struck her fist upon the table, and I was sorry I had spoken. “Vanity or not,” says she, very angry, “he’s set himself to play a match, and it’s not you shall spoil the sport, Mr Henry Winter, I can tell you. And vanity or none, there’s courage as well, at any rate. And that’s a quality useful at a pinch, Mr Winter,” says Morgan, with great meaning.
“You think I don’t want to go?” I said.