The Tragedy of Ida Noble

by William Clark Russell

I punctually took sights every day with Captain Dopping, and every day, therefore, knew the exact position of the schooner at noon. The point of coast we were making for lay a few miles to the south of St. Bees Head. I reckoned that we should be off it by about the 18th. As the days passed, indeed I may say as the hours passed, the Spaniards grew visibly more anxious. Their laughter was infrequent, their conversation earnest and often agitated, as I might reasonably suppose by the tones of their voices and by their demeanor; they came and went restlessly, one or the other of them often appearing on deck in the night watches, and they never sat long at table.

But their behavior was perfectly consistent, entirely natural, such as was to have been expected in men who had embarked on a wild romantic adventure, heavily laden with possibilities of tragedy. They had very little to say to me, nor were their conversations with Captain Dopping as frequent as before. They kept much together, walking arm in arm, Don Christoval grave to austerity, Don Lazarillo energetic in gesticulation, often pausing to withdraw his arm to smite his hands with vicious emphasis of what he might be saying, and all their talk, as I might imagine, was wholly about the probable issue of this attempt to obtain possession of Señora del Padron.

I had many opportunities of speaking to the seamen. I warily questioned them, and one or two appeared convinced that the object of this expedition was as had been represented to them, while the others owned that though they did not doubt Don Christoval's story, it might not be exactly as he had put it, either.

"But what does it signify?" a man named Scott said to me in one middle-watch while I conversed with him as he stood at the helm. "If when we gets ashore and we find out that the job's different from what we've been made to believe it, why, sir, here stands one," said he, thumping his breast, "who'll find it easy enough to say 'No' if he means 'No.' There's no blazing furriner in all Europe, let alone a Spaniard, as is good enough for an Englishman to get into a mess for. This here Don says he wants his wife, and I suppose his money's as good as any other man's. Well, we're willing for to help him to get his wife, and as his tarms are handsome we're quite agreeable to a bit of a shindy when it comes to our marching up to the house and asking that the gent's lawful wife should be restored to him. But if it ain't that," said he, squirting a mouthful of tobacco juice over the stern, "if it's to be something that we haven't agreed for, some job as might end in a prison hulk and a free passage to Australia, here stands one," he repeated, striking himself afresh, "as'll find it easy to say 'No,' if so be as 'No' is the meaning that's in his mind."

This, as I collected from the short chats I held with others of the men, fairly represented the sentiments of the schooner's forecastle on the subject of our expedition.

We had hauled on a course a trifle more westerly than was necessary to secure ourselves a wide offing, and then, somewhere about one o'clock on the afternoon of the 18th, we shifted our helm and headed the yacht east-north-east. All hands were on deck on the look-out for the land, the pale blue loom of which might now at any moment be visible on the sea-line. The wind was about south, the day clear, hot and tranquil; there was a terrace of swollen white vapor down in the west, with a look of thunder in the knitted texture of the brows of the stuff, but the mercury in the barometer stood high, and I could find nothing to disquiet me in the appearance of the English heavens, tessellated here and there with spaces of high-poised, delicate cloud that gleamed with divers hues like the pearly inside of a mussel-shell.

Lunch had been served on deck to the two Spaniards. I noticed a change in Don Christoval; his face had hardened, there was an air of sneering temper in his rare smile that reduced it to little more than a mirthless grin, and often a vindictive look in his eyes as he would stand staring ahead at the sea, swaying his noble figure to the heave of the deck. His manner, indeed, suggested itself as that of one who seeks for courage in temper, for resolution in the evocation of hot thoughts. Don Lazarillo was pale as though oppressed with nausea. He constantly raised his hat to press a large silk pocket-handkerchief to his brow. When I glanced at him I'd wonder whether, when the hour came, he would be among those who entered the boat.

A small brig, a collier, with dingy ill-fitting canvas, her yards braced sharp up, passed under our stern near enough to hail us, but we took no notice of the old fellow who stood flourishing his hand upon the rail; whereupon to mark his disgust he flung his tall, weather-worn hat down on to the deck, and shook his fist at us with a shout whose meaning did not catch my ear, though a laugh arose among the men forward. The cook Mariana showed himself very agitated. He was constantly in and out of his galley, running into the schooner's head to stare, then darting back afresh to his pots and pans, one moment popping his hideous face out from the door to starboard, then thrusting it through the door to port, making one think of those little toy monsters which spring out of a box when you free the lid.

At four o'clock the land was in sight. The giant St. Bees Head dimly shaded the sea-line in the north-east, and thence the shore stretched in a blue film to the south, dying out in the azure atmosphere. Don Christoval leaned over the rail viewing the land with a face darkened by an immovable frown, the scowling air of which gave a malevolent expression to his eyes. He stood rooted—motionless—his hand with a paper cigar between his fingers, half raised to his mouth, as though the whole form of him had been withered by a blast of lightning.