The Buccaneer: A Tale

by Mrs. S. C. Hall

"Walter, no—nothing very particular; for knavery and villany are seldom rare, and I have been long accustomed to treat with both; only it's too bad to have more unclean spirits than one's own harpying and haunting a man! God! I can breathe better now that fellow's gone. Ah, Master Walter! there be two sorts of villains in the world: one with a broad, bronzed face, a bold loud voice, a drinking look, and an unsheathed dagger—and him men avoid and point at, and children cling to their mother's skirts as he passes by:—the other is masked from top to toe;—his step is slow, his voice harmonised, his eye vigilant, but well-trained; he wears his dagger in his bosom, and crosses his hands thereon as if in piety, but it is, in truth, that his hold may be firm and his stab sure; yet the world know not that, and they trust him, and he is singled out as a pattern-man for youth to follow; and so—but we all play parts—all, all! And now for a stave of a song: Hurrah for the free trade!—a shout for the brave Buccaneers!—a pottle of sack!—and now, sir, I am myself again! The brimstone smell of that dark ruffian nearly overpowered me!" So saying, he passed his hand frequently over his brows, attempting at the same time to laugh away his visible emotion.

"It will not do!" said the young man, whom Dalton had addressed by the name of Walter; "something has disturbed you: surely, Captain, I may ask what it is?"

"Some forty years ago I had a father," replied the Buccaneer, looking earnestly in the youth's face; "he was an aged man then, for he did not marry until he was old, and my mother was beautiful, and quitted his side: but that does not matter; only it shows how, as my poor father had nothing else to love, he loved me with the full tenderness of a most affectionate nature. He was a clergyman too, and a firm royalist; one of those devoted royalists, as regarded both God and king, who would submit, for their sakes, to the stake or the block with rapture at being thought worthy to make the sacrifice. Well, I was wild and wilful, and even then would rather steal a thing than gain it by lawful means: not that I would have stolen aught to keep it, for I was generous enough; but I loved the danger and excitement of theft, and, on the occasion I speak of, I had taken some apples from a neighbouring tree belonging to a poor woman. It was evening when I took this unlucky fruit; and not knowing a safe place in which to deposit it, I was restless and disturbed all night. The next day, from a cause I could not guess at, my father would not suffer me to go out, and was perpetually, on some pretext or other, going to and from the cupboard where my treasure had been placed. I was in agony; and as night again closed in, the agitation and anxiety I had suffered made me ill and pale. My dear father drew near him the little oak table that was set apart for the Bible, and, opening it, said that he had that day composed a sermon for my especial case. I dreaded that my apple-stealing had been discovered; and I was right, though he did not say so. He enlarged in sweet and simple language upon his text: it was this—'There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.' Walter! Walter! the old man has been many years in his grave, and I have been as many a reckless wanderer over the face of the wild earth and still wilder sea; but I have never done a deed of blood and plunder, that those words have not echoed—echoed in my ears, struck upon my heart like the fiend's curse. Yet," he added in a subdued accent, "it was no cursing lips pronounced them: I have been the curse to the holy words, not they to me."

"I never before heard you speak of your father," observed the youth.

"I do not like to speak of him; I ran off to sea when I was about ten years old, and when I came back he was dead. There was war enough in England at that time to occupy my active nature: I first joined the King's party, and had my share of wounds and glory at Gainsborough, where I fought with and saw poor Cavendish killed by that devil Cromwell. It was at that same battle his successes began: he had a brave horse-regiment there of his countrymen, most of them freeholders and freeholders' sons, who upon matter of conscience engaged in this quarrel under him. It was there he ousted us with his canting. Gadsooks! they went as regularly to their psalm-singing as they had been in a conventicle; and thus, d'ye see, being armed after their own fanatical fashion within, and without by the best iron armour, they stood as one man, firmly, and charged as one man, desperately.—But we have other things to talk of than him or me; so sit down, young gentleman, and let's hear the news;—or, stay, Robin must first bring us some wine—my warehouse is full of it; I must wash down the poison that fellow has crammed into my throat. Ah! ah! ah! what chafes me is, that, from my cursed reputation, greater villains than myself thrust me forward to do their work, and think they have a right to storm and stare if I have conscience in any thing. But I'll be even with them all yet—with one in particular. That villain!—shall that far greater villain have peace? 'There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.'"

He summoned Robin, who placed on the table some meat and wine, and other matters that supplied a pretty substantial supper: a ceremony, the rendering justice to which affords us sufficient leisure to examine the form and features of the young Cavalier, who, having laid aside his enormous cloak, reclined on some piles of foreign cloths with an ease and grace that belongs only to those of gentle blood. Amid the bustle and occupation of life, it is a simple matter for people of ordinary rank to assume the bearing of the well-bred; but repose is the true criterion of a gentleman or lady, inasmuch as there is then no motion to take off from an ungraceful attitude or an awkward mien. The features of the Cavalier were almost too high for beauty; and had it not been for a playful smile that frequently flitted across his countenance, elongating his moustache, softening and blending the hard lines that even at four-and-twenty had deepened into furrows, he would have been pronounced of severe aspect. Bright golden hair clustered in rich curls over his forehead, and fell a little on either cheek, giving a picturesque character to the form of the head. His eyes appeared of a dark grey; but they were so much sunk, so overshadowed by his forehead, as to leave one in doubt as to their exact colour. His figure was unusually tall and well-formed, and his whole bearing was more that of an accomplished gentleman than of a cut-and-slash cavalier: his manner was neither reckless nor daring, but it was firm and collected. His dress was composed of the finest black cloth, with a black velvet doublet; and his sword-hilt glittered with diamonds.

Robin did not attempt to place himself at the same table, but sat back on a lower seat and at a little distance, sharing his repast with Crisp, who had scrambled down the stairs after his master, and looked ugly enough to be, what he certainly was, an extraordinary canine genius.

Dalton and Walter laboured under no restraint because of the presence of Robin; on the contrary, he occasionally shared in the conversation, and his opinion upon various topics was frequently asked; indeed, he was fond of bestowing it gratuitously, and seemed highly pleased when called upon to express it.

"Didst hear, Robin, when Blake was expected off Sheerness with the Spanish prizes?"

"In a few days, it is said, he will either bring or send them; but my own thought is, that it will be about a week, neither more nor less, before any ship arrives."