Marjorie

‘That’s right, lad,’ he said; and then, turning to my mother, he took her worn hand in his strong one, and, to my surprise and pleasure, kissed it with a reverential courtesy, as if she had been a Court lady.

As Captain Marmaduke turned to go I caught at his hand.

‘Where is Lancelot?’ I asked; ‘is he here in Sendennis?’ For in the midst of all the joy and wonder of this sea business my heart was on fire to see that face again.

Captain Marmaduke laughed.

‘If he were in Sendennis at this hour he would be here, I make no doubt. He is in London, looking after one or two matters which methought he could manage better than I could. But he will be here in good time, and it is time for me to be off. Remember, my lad, to-morrow,’ and with a bow for my mother and a bear’s grip for me he passed outside the shop, leaving my mother and me staring at each other in great amazement. But for all my amazement the main thought in my mind was of a certain picture of a girl’s face that lay, shrined in a cedar-wood box, hidden away in my room upstairs. And so it happened that though my lips were busy with the name of Lancelot my brain was busy with the name of Marjorie.

CHAPTER VIII

THE COMPANY AT THE NOBLE ROSE

The next morning I was up betimes; indeed, I do not think that I slept very much that night, and such sleep as I did have was of a disturbed sort, peopled with wild sea-dreams of all kinds. In my impatience it seemed to me as if the time would never come for me to keep my appointment with Captain Marmaduke; but then, as ever, the hands of the clock went round their appointed circle, and at half-past eleven I was at my destination. The Noble Rose stood in the market square. It was a fine place enough, or seemed so to my eyes then, with its pillared portal and its great bow-windows at each side, where the gentlemen of quality loved to sit of fine evenings drinking their ale or their brandy, and watching the world go by.

In the left-hand window as I came up I saw that the Captain was sitting, and as I came up he saw me and beckoned me to come inside.

With a beating heart I entered the inn hall, and was making for the Captain’s room when a servant barred my way.

‘Now then, where are you posting to?’ he asked, with an insolent good-humour. ‘This is a private room, and holds private company.’

‘I know that,’ I answered, ‘but it holds a friend of mine, whom I want to see and who wants to see me.’

The man laughed rudely. ‘Very likely,’ he said, ‘that the company in the Dolphin are friends of yours,’ and then, as I was still pressing forward, he put out his hand as if to stay me.

This angered me; and taking the knave by the collar, I swung him aside so briskly that he went staggering across the hall and brought up ruefully humped against a settle. Before he could come at me again the door of the Dolphin opened, and Captain Marmaduke appeared upon the threshold. He looked in some astonishment from the rogue scowling on the settle to me flushed with anger.

‘Heyday, lad,’ he said, ‘are you having a bout of fisticuffs to keep your hand in?’

‘This fellow,’ I said, ‘tried to hinder me from entering yonder room, and I did but push him aside out of my path.’

‘Hum!’ said Captain Marmaduke, ‘’twas a lusty push, and cleared your course, certainly. Well, well, I like you the better, lad, for not being lightly balked in your business.’ And therewith he led me into the Dolphin.

There was a sea-coal fire in the grate, for the day was raw and the glow welcome. Beside the fire an elderly gentleman sat in an arm-chair. He had a black silk skull-cap on his head, and his face was wrinkled and his eyes were bright, and his face, now turned upon me, showed harsh. I knew of course that he was Lancelot’s other uncle, he who would never suffer that I should set foot within his gates. Indeed, his face in many points resembled that of his brother – as much as an ugly face can resemble a fair one. There was a likeness in the forehead and there was a likeness in the eyes, which were something of the same china-blue colour, though of a lighter shade, and with only cold unkindness there instead of the genial kindness of the Captain’s.

A man stood on the other side of the open fireplace, a man of about forty-five, of something over the middle height and marvellously well-built. He was clad in what, though it was not distinctly a seaman’s habit, yet suggested the ways of the sea, and there was a kind of foppishness about his rig which set me wondering, for I was used to a slovenly squalor or a slovenly bravery in the sailors I knew most of. He was a handsome fellow, with dark curling hair and dark eyes, and a dark skin that seemed Italian.

I have heard men say that there is no art to read the mind’s complexion in the face. These fellows pretend that your villain is often smooth-faced as well as smooth-tongued, and pleases the eye to the benefit of his mischievous ends. Whereas, on the other hand, many an honest fellow is damned for a scoundrel because with the nature of an angel he has the mask of a fiend. In which two fancies I have no belief. A rogue is a rogue all the world over, and flies his flag in his face for those who can read the bunting. He may flatter the light eye or the cold eye, but the warm gaze will find some lurking line by the lip, some wryness of feature, some twist of the devil’s fingers in his face, to betray him. And as for an honest man looking like a rogue, the thing is impossible. I have seen no small matter of marvels in my time – even, as I think, the great sea serpent himself, though this is not the time and place to record it – but I have never seen the marvel of a good man with a bad man’s face, and it was my first and last impression that the face of Cornelys Jensen was the face of a rogue.

CHAPTER IX

THE TALK IN THE DOLPHIN

Captain Marmaduke presented me to the two men, while his hand still rested on my shoulder.

‘Brother,’ he said, ‘this is Master Ralph Crowninshield, of whom you have often heard from Lancelot.’

‘Aye,’ said the old man, looking at me without any salutation. ‘Aye, I have heard of him from Lancelot.’

Captain Marmaduke now turned towards the other man, who had never taken his eyes off me since I entered the room.

‘Cornelys Jensen, here is Master Ralph Crowninshield, your shipmate that is to be.’

Cornelys Jensen came across the room in a couple of swinging strides and held out his hand to me. Something in his carriage reminded me of certain play-actors who had come to the town once. This man carried himself like a stage king. We clasped hands, and he spoke.

‘Salutation, shipmate.’

Then we unclasped, and he returned to his post by the fireplace with the same exaggeration of action as before.

The old man broke a short silence. ‘Well, Marmaduke, why have you brought this boy here?’

The Captain motioned me to a seat, which I took, and sat back himself in his former place.

‘Because the boy is going with me, and I thought that you might have something to say to him before he went.’

‘Something to say to him?’

The old man repeated the words like a sneer, then he faced on me again and addressed me with an unmoving face.

‘Yes, I have something to say to you. Young man, you are going on a fool’s errand.’

Captain Marmaduke laughed a little at this, but I could see that he was not pleased.

‘Come, brother, don’t say that,’ he said.

‘But I do say it,’ the old gentleman repeated. ‘A fool’s errand it is, and a fool’s errand it will be called; and it shall not be said of Nathaniel Amber that he saw his brother make a fool of himself without telling him his mind.’

‘I can always trust you for that, Nathaniel,’ said the Captain gravely. The old man went on without heeding the interruption.

‘A fool’s errand I call it, and shall always call it. What a plague! can a man find moneys and a tall ship and stout fellows, and set them to no better use than to found a Fool’s Paradise with them at the heel of the world? Ships were made for traffic and shipmen for trade, and not for such whimsies.’

The Captain frowned, but he said nothing, and tapped the toes of his crossed boots with his malacca. But Cornelys Jensen, advancing forward, put in his word.

‘Saving your presence, Master Nathaniel,’ he said, ‘but is not this a most honourable and commendable enterprise? What better thing could a gallant gentleman do than to found such a brotherhood of honest hearts and honest hands as Captain Marmaduke here proposes?’

The frown faded from the Captain’s face, and a pleased flush deepened its warm colour. It is a curious thing that men of his kidney – men with an unerring eye for a good man – have often a poor eye for a rogue. It amazed me to see my Captain so pleased at the praisings of Cornelys Jensen. But I was to find out later that he was the easiest man in the world to deceive.

‘Spoken like a man, Cornelys; spoken like a true man,’ he said.

‘I must ever speak my mind,’ said Cornelys Jensen. ‘I may be a rough sea-fellow, but if I have a thing to say I must needs spit it out, whether it please or pain. And I say roundly here, in your honour’s presence, that I think this to be a noble venture, and that I have never, since first I saw salt water, prepared for any cruise with so much pleasure.’

Which was indeed true, but not as he intended my Captain to take it, and as my Captain did take it.

‘Well,’ grumbled Nathaniel, ‘you are a pair of fools, both of you,’ and as he spoke he glanced from one to the other with those little shrewd eyes of his, looking at my Captain first and then at Cornelys.

Young as I was, and fresh to the reading of the faces of crafty men, I thought that the look in his eyes – for his face changed not at all – was very different when they rested on the brown face of Cornelys Jensen than when they looked on the florid visage of my good patron. He glanced with contempt upon his kinsman, but I did not see contempt in the gaze he fixed upon Cornelys, who returned his gaze with a steady, unabashed stare.

‘Yes,’ the old man went on, ‘you are a pair of fools, and a fool and his money is a pithy proverb, and true enough of one of you. But it is well sometimes to treat a fool according to his folly, and so, if you are really determined upon this adventure – ’

He paused, and looked again at the Captain and again at Cornelys Jensen.

Cornelys Jensen remained perfectly unmoved. The Captain’s face grew a shade redder.

‘I am,’ he said shortly.

‘Very well, then,’ said the old gentleman; ‘as you are my brother, I must needs humour you. You shall have the moneys you need – ’

‘Now that’s talking,’ interrupted the Captain.

‘Although I know it is a foolhardy thing for me to do.’

‘You get good enough security, it seems to me,’ said the Captain, a thought gruffly.

‘Maybe I do,’ said Nathaniel, ‘and maybe I do not. Maybe I have a fancy for my fine guineas, and do not care to part with them, however good the security may be.’

‘Lord, how you chop and change!’ said the Captain. ‘Act like a plain man, brother. Will you or will you not?’

‘I have said that I will,’ said Nathaniel slowly.

I could see that for some reason it amused him to irritate his brother by his reluctance and by his slow speech. The ancient knave knew it for the surest way to spur him to the enterprise.

‘When can I have the money?’ asked the Captain.

‘Not to-day,’ said Nathaniel slowly, ‘nor yet to-morrow.’

‘Why not to-morrow? It would serve me well to-morrow.’

‘Very well,’ said Nathaniel with a sigh; ‘to-morrow it shall be, though you do jostle me vilely.’

‘Man alive! I want to be off to sea,’ said the Captain.

‘The sooner we are off the better,’ interpolated Jensen; and once again I noted that Nathaniel shot a swift glance at him through his half-closed lids.

‘You are bustling fellows, you that follow the sea life,’ said Nathaniel. ‘Well, it shall be to-morrow, and I will have all the papers made ready and the money in fat bags, and you will have nothing to do but to sign the one and to pocket the other. And now I must be jogging.’

The Captain made no show of staying him. Nathaniel moved towards the door slowly, weighing up upon his crutched stick.

‘Farewell, Marmaduke!’ he said. He took the Captain’s hand, but soon parted with it.

Then he looked at me.

‘Good-day, young fellow,’ he said. ‘Do not forget that I told you you went on a fool’s errand.’

I drew aside to make way for him, and he left the room without a look or a word for Cornelys Jensen. In another minute I saw him through the window hobbling along the street.

He looked malignant enough, but I did not know then how malignant a thing he was. I was ever a weak wretch at figures and business and finance, but it was made plain to me later that Master Nathaniel had so handled Master Marmaduke in this matter of the lending of moneys, that if by any chance anything grave were to happen to Master Marmaduke and to the lad Lancelot and the lass Marjorie all that belonged to Captain Marmaduke would swell the wealth of his brother. And here were Captain Marmaduke and Lancelot and Marjorie all going to sea together and going in company of Cornelys Jensen. And I know now that Master Nathaniel knew Cornelys Jensen very well. But I did not know it then or dream it as I turned from the window and looked at the handsome rascal, who seemed agog to be going.

‘Shall you need me longer, Captain?’ Jensen asked. ‘There is much to do which should be doing.’

‘Nay,’ said the Captain, ‘you are free, for me. I know that there is much to do, and I know that you are the man to do it. But I shall see you in the evening.’

Jensen saluted the Captain, nodded to me, and strode out of the room. Then the Captain sat me down and talked for some twenty minutes of his plan and his hope. If I did not understand much, I felt that I was a fortunate fellow to be in such a glorious enterprise. I wish I had been more mindful of all that he said, but my mind was ever somewhat of a sieve for long speeches, and the dear gentleman spoke at length.

Presently he consulted his watch.

‘The coach should be in soon,’ he said. ‘Let us go forth and await it.’

We went out of the Dolphin together into the hall, and there we came to a halt, for he had thought upon some new point in his undertaking, and he began to hold forth to me upon that.

I can see the whole place now – the dark oak walls, the dark oak stairs, and my Captain’s blue coat and scarlet face making a brave bit of colour in the sombre place. The Noble Rose is gone long since, but that hall lives in my memory for a thing that just then happened.

CHAPTER X

SHE COMES DOWN THE STAIRS

From the hall of the Noble Rose sprang an oak staircase, and at this instant a girl began to descend the stairs. She was quite young – a tall slip of a thing, who scarcely seemed nineteen – and she had hair of a yellow that looked as if it loved the sun, and her eyes were of a softer blue than my friend’s. I knew that at last I looked on Marjorie, Lancelot’s Marjorie, the maid whose very picture had seemed farther from me than the farthest star. Her face was fresh, as of one who has enjoyed liberally the open air, and not sat mewed within four walls like a town miss. I noted, too, that her steps as she came down the stairs were not taken mincingly, as school-girls are wont to walk, but with decision, like a boy.

Indeed, though she was a beautiful girl, and soon to make a beautiful woman, there was a quality of manliness in her which pleased me much then and more thereafter. There is a play I have seen acted in which a girl goes to live in a wood in a man’s habit. I have thought since that she of the play must have showed like this girl, and indeed I speak but what I know when I say that man’s apparel became her bravely. Now, as she came down the stairs she was clad in some kind of flowered gown of blue and white which set off her fair loveliness divinely. She carried some yellow flowers at her girdle; they were Lent lilies, as I believe.

This apparition distracting my attention from the Captain’s words, he wheeled round upon his heel and learnt the cause of my inattention. Immediately he smiled and called to the maiden.

‘Come here, niece; I have found you a new friend.’

She came forward, smiling to him, and then looked at me with an expression of the sweetest gravity in the world. Surely there never was such a girl in the world since the sun first shone on maidens.

‘Lass,’ said the Captain, ‘this is our new friend. His name is Raphael Crowninshield, but, because I think he has more of the man in him than of the archangel, I mean to call him Ralph.’

The girl held out her hand to me in a way that reminded me much of Lancelot.

As I took her hand I felt that my face was flaming like the sun in a sea-fog – no less round and no less red. I was timid with girls, for I knew but few, and after my misfortune I had shunned those few most carefully. She was not shy herself, though, and she did not seem to note my shyness – or, if she did, it gave her no pleasure to note it, as it would have given many less gracious maidens. Her hand was not very small, but it was finely fashioned – a noble hand, like my Captain’s and like Lancelot’s; a hand that gave a true grasp; a hand that it was a pleasure to hold.

‘Shall I call you Ralph or Raphael?’ she said.

My face grew hotter, and I stammered foolishly as I answered her that I begged she would call me by what name she pleased, but that if it pleased my Captain to call me Ralph, then Ralph I was ready to be.

‘Well and good, Ralph,’ she said.

We had parted hands by this time, but I was still staring at her, full of wonder.

‘This boy,’ said the Captain, ‘goes with us in the Royal Christopher. We will find our New World together. He is a good fellow, and should make a good sailor in time.’

As the Captain spoke of me and the girl looked at me I felt hotter and more foolish, and could think of nothing to say. But even if I could have thought of anything to say I had no time to say it in, for there came an interruption which ended my embarrassment; a horn sounded loudly, and every soul in Sendennis knew that the coach was in.

In a moment everything was changed. The Captain took his hand from my shoulder; the girl took her gaze from my face. There was a clatter of wheels, a trampling of horses’ hoofs. The coach had drawn up in front of the inn door. We three – my Captain, the girl, and myself – ran across the hall and out on the portico. There was the usual crowd about the newly arrived coach; but there was only one person in the crowd for whom we looked, and him we soon found.

A lithe figure in a buff travelling coat swung off the box-seat, and Lancelot was with us again. He had an arm around the girl’s neck, and kissed her with no heed of the people; he had a hand clasped between the two hands of the Captain, who squeezed his fingers fondly. Then he looked at me, and leaving his kindred he caught both my hands in both his, while his joy shone in his eyes.

‘Raphael, my old Raphael, is it you?’ he said; ‘but my heart is glad of this.’

I wrung his hands. I could scarcely speak for happiness at seeing him again.

‘You must not call him Raphael any more,’ the girl said demurely. ‘He is to be Ralph now, for all of us, so my uncle says.’

‘Is that so?’ said Lancelot, looking up at the Captain. ‘Well, we must obey orders, and indeed I would rather have Ralph than Raphael. ’Tis less of an outlandish name.’

Then we all laughed, and we all came back into the hall of the inn together.

I watched Lancelot with wonder and with pride. He had grown amazingly in the years since I had seen him, and carried himself like a man. He was handsomer than ever I thought, and liker to our island’s patron saint. As he stripped off his travelling coat and stood up in the neat habit of a well-to-do town gentleman, he looked such a cavalier as no woman but would wish for a lover, no man but desire for a friend.

‘Lads and lass,’ said Captain Amber, ‘it will soon be time to dine. We have waited dinner for this scapegrace’ – and he pinched Lancelot’s ear – ‘so get the dust of travel off as quickly as may be, and we will sit down with good appetite.’

At these words I made to go away, for I did not dream that I was to be of the party; but the Captain, seeing my action, caught me by the arm.

‘Nay, Ralph,’ he said, ‘you must stay and dine with us. You are one of us now, and Lancelot must not lose you on this first day of fair meeting.’

I was indeed glad to accept, for Lancelot’s sake. But there was another reason in my heart which made me glad also, and that reason was that I should see the girl again who was my Captain’s darling, the sister whom Lancelot had kissed.

So I said that I would come gladly, if so be that I had time to run home and tell my mother, lest she might be keeping dinner for me.

‘That’s right, lad, that’s right. Ever think of the feelings of others.’

My Captain was always full of moral counsels and maxims of good conduct, but they came from him as naturally as his breath, and his own life was so honourable that there was nothing sanctimonious in his way or his words.

As I was about to start he begged me to assure my mother that if she would join them at table he would consider it an honour. I thanked him with tears in my eyes, and saluting them all I left the inn quickly, with the last sweet smile of that girl’s burning in my memory.

CHAPTER XI

A FEAST OF THE GODS

I sped through the streets to our house as swiftly, I am sure, as that ancient messenger of the Pagan gods – he that had the wings tied to his feet that he might travel the faster. My dear mother was rejoiced at the Captain’s kindness, but she would by no means hear of coming with me. She bade me return with speed, that I might not keep the company waiting, and to thank the Captain for her with all my heart for his kindness and condescension.

When I got back to the Noble Rose I found our little company all assembled in the Dolphin. No one stayed my entrance this time, for though the same fellow that I had tussled with before saw me enter he made no objection this time, and even saluted me in a loutish manner; for I was the Captain’s friend, and as such claimed respect.

Lancelot was leaning against the mantelpiece, and Marjorie and my Captain were sitting by plying him with questions and listening eagerly to his answers. Lancelot had drawn off his travelling boots and spruced himself, and looked a comely fellow. When I entered he broke off in what he was saying to clasp my hand again, while the Captain rang for dinner, expressing as he did so the civilest regrets at my mother’s absence. Then we all sat to table and dined together in the pleasantest good-fellowship.

Never shall I forget that dinner, not if I live to be a hundred – which is not unlikely, for I come of a long-lived race by my mother’s side, and winds and waters have so toughened me that I ought to last with the best of my ancestors. There was a Latin tag Mr. Davies used to tease me with about the Feasts of the Gods. Feasts of the Gods, forsooth! They could not compare, I’ll dare wager, with that repast in the Dolphin Room of the Noble Rose, on that crisp spring day when I and the world were younger.

I might well be excused, a raw provincial lad, if I did feel shyish in the presence of such gentlefolk. But they were such true gentlefolk that it was impossible for long not to feel at ease in their society. So when I learnt that Lancelot had not changed one whit in his love for me, and when I found that not the Captain alone, but his beautiful niece too, did everything to make me feel happy and at home – why, it would have been churlish of me not to have aided their gentleness by making myself as agreeable as might be.

The Captain had so much to say of his scheme or dream, and we were so content to listen like good children, that we did not rise from table till nigh three o’clock. It was such a happy dream, and so feelingly depicted by the Captain, that it never occurred to me for a moment to doubt in any wise its feasibility, or to feel aught but sure that I was engaged in the greatest undertaking wherein man had ever shared. When we did part at last, on the understanding that I was to attend upon the Captain daily, I shook hands with Marjorie as with an old friend. I was for shaking hands with Lancelot, too, but he would not hear of it. He would walk home with me, he said; he could not lose me so soon after finding me again. So we issued out of the Noble Rose together, arm-in-arm, in very happy mind.