To give the devil his due, no man had such a gift as Richard Ingle for giving orders.
It was scarcely quarter of an hour after The Reformation touched the wharf before she was away again, leaving four of her passengers and the crew of The Lady Betty on the wharf. When she was well out in the river, Ingle ordered a salute of five guns, and then bade his men give three cheers for the Mistress Peggy Neville, the handsomest girl that ever trod the deck of a vessel.
"Here's to her!" he cried himself, "and may she have the luck to marry a buccaneer when yonder stripling is dead and gone!"
Peggy smiled a watery, tearful smile as she heard the five guns. How little, she thought, had she imagined under what circumstances that salute would be fired when Captain Ingle lightly promised it at St. Mary's!
But her hostess would give her no time for thought. She led her swiftly up the winding stair to the little white bedroom, and in a trice she had set black Dinah at work heating the sheets with the great brass warming-pan. Susan was fetching water hot and cold, and she herself was loosening the lacings with which Peggy's own numb fingers fumbled in vain.
All the while she kept her eyes upon the wharf which lay below the window. Already a litter had been improvised of boards that lay on the wharf; four men lifted the figure over the ship's side and laid it down gently. Then the litter was raised and borne toward the house, Romney and his father walking on either side. Once or twice the figure struggled and flung its arms wildly above its head. So violent did the struggles become that at length Master Huntoon drew a phial from his jerkin, and pouring out some drops forced them between the prostrate man's lips. The head fell back, and quiet settled on the limbs so suddenly that Mistress Huntoon uttered an involuntary exclamation of terror.
Peggy caught her anxiety in a moment.
"What are they doing? Where is he? Oh, not—not dead!"
"Why, no, foolish child," answered Lady Betty, ready to pinch herself for her ill-timed outcry. "Look for thyself. See, they are bearing him up the walk, and they will have him undressed and put to bed in no time. Go thou to rest likewise! I promise to bring thee tidings, should there be need of thee in the sick room, and meanwhile let me sing thee a little song that my mother sang to me in the old country, and I again to Romney here in his babyhood."