She shook her head. "All you brave fellows," she said, "are going out to sea in storm and tempest to work for me. Why should all these ships bring riches to me? I have done nothing. They ought to bring riches for those who work." This shows her tenderness of heart. Never have I heard of any other woman who complained that her servants worked to make her rich while she did nothing. Yet the vicar would rebuke her, saying that riches and increase were the gifts of Providence, and that she must accept the things plainly intended by heaven. And Captain Crowle spoke to the same effect and my father, the schoolmaster, also pointed out that in the Divine scheme there were rich and there were poor: the former for an example and for an encouragement to industry: the latter for the virtues of duty, discipline and contentment—things pleasing in the eyes of the Lord. But still she returned to her talk about the people who worked for her.
And then we sat and talked, while Nigra went on with her work, sitting at the feet of her mistress, whom she watched all the time as a dog keeps one eye always upon his master.
At this time, my mistress, as I have said, was already sixteen years of age, a time when many girls are already married. But she was still a child, or a young girl, at heart: being one of those who, like a fine Orleans plum, ripen slowly and are all the better for the time they take. In person, if I may speak of what should be sacred, she was finely made, somewhat taller than the average, her hair of that fair colour which is the chief glory of the English maiden. Lord! If a Lisbon girl could show that fair hair, with those blue eyes, and that soft cheek, touched with the ruddy hue and the velvet bloom of the September peach, she would draw after her the whole town, with the king and his court and even the grand inquisitor and his accursed crew of torturers. I know not how she was dressed, but it was in simple fashion. Though so great an heiress she went to church no more finely dressed than any of the girls belonging to the better sort, save for a substantial gold chain which had been her father's. And this she always wore about her neck.
She was of a truly affectionate disposition—her mind being as lovely as her face. In manners she was easy and compliant: in discourse sometimes grave and sometimes merry. As for her great possessions, she was so simple in her tastes and habits, being in all respects like the daughter of a plain merchantman's skipper, that she understood little or nothing of what these possessions meant or what they might bestow upon her. She was, in a word, a plain and unaffected damsel with no pretence of anything superior to those around her. She was skilled in all household matters although so well read: she could brew and pickle and make perfumes and cordials for the still room: she could make cakes and puddings: she knew how to carve at table: she had poultry, her ducks, her pigs and her dairy, in the fields within the walls hard by the Lady's Mount. She was always busy and therefore never afflicted with the vapours or the spleen or the longing for one knows not what which afflict the empty mind of the idle and the fashionable dame. There were other good and comely girls in King's Lynn. I might perhaps,—I say it not with boastfulness—have married Victory, daughter of the Reverend Ellis Hayes, curate of St. Nicholas. She was a buxom wench enough and a notable housewife. Or I might have married Amanda, daughter of Dr. Worship, our physician—she who married Tom Rising, and when he broke his neck hunting the fox, afterwards married the Vicar of Hunstanton. She, too, was a fine woman, though something hard of aspect. But there was never, for me, any other woman in the world than Molly, my mistress.
No one, however, must believe that there was any thought or discourse, concerning love between us. I had been her companion and playfellow: I knew her very mind, and could tell at any time of what she was thinking. Sometimes her thoughts were of high and serious things such as were inspired by the sermon; mostly they were of things simple, such as the prospects of the last brew, or the success of the latest cordial. Of suitors she had none, although she was now, as I said, sixteen years of age. There were no suitors. I very well know why, because, perhaps for friendly reasons, Captain Crowle had told me something of his ambition for his ward. She was too rich and too good for the young men of Lynn—what would any of them do with such an heiress? She was too rich and too good even for the gentlefolk of the county, a hearty, rough, good-natured people who hunted and shot and feasted and drank—what would they do with an heiress of wealth beyond their highest hopes—had they any knowledge of her wealth; but I believe that they had none. No one knew how rich she was, except the captain. The girl was intended by her guardian for some great man; he knew not, as yet, how he should find this great man: but he knew that there were very few, even of the noble lords in the House of Peers, whose fortune or whose income would compare with that of his ward—his little maid. And I, who knew this ambition, knew also that I was trusted not to betray confidence, nor to disturb the girl's mind by any talk of love. Now the mind of a young maid piously disposed is like the surface of a calm sea, which looks up to the sky and reflects the blue of heaven, undisturbed: till Dan Cupid comes along and agitates the calm with the reflection of some shepherd swain and ripples the surface with new thoughts which are allowed by heaven, but belong not to any of its many mansions.
Therefore we talked of everything except love: of the voyages to the Portugals and their horrid Inquisition: of the yarns told by sailors of the places they had seen, and so forth. There was no talk about books because there were none. A Ready Reckoner; a Manual of Navigation; Mill's Geography; a Wages Book; the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer were the only books belonging to the good old captain. Nor, in all Lynn, save for the learned shelves of the vicar and the curate of St. Nicholas are there any books. It is not a town which reads or asks for, books. Why, even on market days you will not see any stall for the sale of books such as may be seen every week at Cambridge, and at Norwich, and even at Bury St. Edmund's. 'Tis perhaps pity that so many gentlemen, substantial merchants, and sea captains never read books. For their knowledge of the outer world, and the nations, they trust to the sailors who, to tell the truth, know as much as any books can tell them: but sailors are not always truthful. For their wisdom and their conduct of life and manners these honest merchants depend upon the Old and the New Testament: or, since there are some who neglect that Treasury of Divine knowledge, they trust to mere tradition and to proverbs; to the continuation of their forefathers' habits, and to the memory of what their forefathers achieved.
The sun went down as we sat talking. The sun went down and the soft twilight of June, the month which most I love because there is no darkness, and a man on watch can discern ahead breakers and ships as well as the vast circle of the rolling sea. And then Nigra gathered her work together and arose.
"Come to supper, honey," she said. "Come, Massa Jack," and led the way.
I have often, since I learned and understood things, wondered at the simplicity with which Molly's guardian thought it proper to bring up this young heiress whose hand he intended for some great personage, as yet unknown. He lived for choice in a small parlour overlooking his neighbour's garden: it was nearly as narrow as the cabin to which he was accustomed. His fare was that which, as a sailor, he considered luxurious. The staple, so to speak, was salt beef or salt pork, but not quite so hard as that of the ship's barrels. This evening, for instance, we sat down to a supper consisting of a piece of cold boiled beef somewhat underdone; there was a cold chicken; a sallet of lettuce, spring onions and young radishes; and a gooseberry pie afterwards with plenty of strong brown sugar. With these dainties was served a jug of home-brewed—to my mind a more delicious drink than any of the wine brought home by The Lady of Lynn—I remember now how it stood beside the captain with its noble head of froth, overtopping the Brown George in which it was drawn.
It had been a joyful day. It was destined to conclude with an event neither joyful nor sorrowful—an act of justice. For my own part I could have sung and laughed all through the supper: the more joyful, because Molly looked happy in my happiness. But there was something wrong. When we talked and laughed, the captain laughed with us, but not mirthfully. His face indicated a change of weather, just as in the bay before a storm the waters grow turbid: and I observed also, that Molly's mother, though she laughed with Molly and applauded our sallies, glanced anxiously from time to time at the captain, who was her cousin as well as her husband's executor and her daughter's guardian. And I knew not what to make of these symptoms, because in the midst of fine weather, with an open sea, a fine sky, and a favouring breeze, one does not expect the signs of head winds and driving sleet. What it meant you shall learn, and why I have said that the day was memorable for two reasons.