The Tory Lover 43

The Tory Lover 43

"And it is all clear between you? I see,—there was some

misunderstanding, my dear. Remember that my boy is sometimes very

quick; ’t is a hasty temper, but a warm and true heart. Is it all clear

now?"

 

Mary wished to answer, but she could not, for all her trying, manage to

speak a word; she did not wish to show the deep feeling that was moving

her, and first looked seaward again, and then took up her needlework.

Her hand touched the bosom of her gown, to feel if the letter were there

and safe. Madam Wallingford smiled, and was happy enough in such a

plain assurance.

 

"Oh yes!" Mary found herself saying next moment, quite unconsciously,

the wave of happy emotion having left her calm again. "Oh yes, I have

come to understand everything now, dear Madam, and the letter was

written while the Ranger lay in the port of Brest. They were sailing

any day for the English coast."

 

"Sometimes I fear that he may be dead; this very sense of his living

nearness to my heart may be only— The dread of losing him wakes me from

my sleep; but sometimes by day I can feel him thinking to me, just as I

always have since he was a child; ’t is just as if he spoke," and the

tears stood bright in Madam Wallingford’s eyes.

 

"No, dear, he is not dead," said Mary, listening eagerly; but she could

not tell even Roger Wallingford’s mother the reason why she was so

certain.

 

 

 

 

*XXXIII*

 

*THEY COME TO BRISTOL*

 

"The wise will remember through sevenfold births the love of those who

wiped away their falling tears."

 

 

Miss Mary Hamilton and the captain of the Golden Dolphin walked together

from the busy boat landing up into the town of Bristol. The tide was

far down, and the captain, being a stout man, was still wheezing from

his steep climb on the long landing-stairs. It was good to feel the

comfort of solid ground underfoot, and to hear so loud and cheerful a

noise of English voices, after their four long weeks at sea, and the

ring and clank of coppersmiths’ hammers were not unpleasant to the ear

even in a narrow street. The captain was in a jovial temper of mind; he

had some considerable interest in his cargo, and they had been in

constant danger off the coast. Now that he was safe ashore, and the

brig was safe at anchor, he stepped quickly and carried his head high,

and asked their shortest way to Mr. Davis’s house, to leave Mary there,

while he made plans for coming up to one of that well-known merchant’s

wharves.

 

"Here we are at last!" exclaimed the master mariner. "I can find my way

across the sea straight to King’s Road and Bristol quay, but I’m easy

lost in the crooked ways of a town. I ’ve seen the port of Bristol,

too, a score o’ times since I was first a sailor, but I saw it never so

dull as now. There it is, the large house beyond, to the port-hand

side. He lives like a nobleman, does old Sir Davis. I ’ll leave ye

here now, and go my ways; they ’ve sarvents a plenty to see ye back to

the strand."

 

The shy and much occupied captain now made haste toward the merchant’s

counting-room, and Mary hurried on toward the house, anxious to know if

Madam Wallingford’s hopes were to be assured, and if they should find

Mistress Davis not only alive and well, but ready to welcome them. As

she came nearer, her heart beat fast at the sight of a lady’s trim head,

white-capped, and not without distinction of look, behind the panes of a

bowed window. It was as plain that this was a familiar sight, that it

might every day be seen framed in its place within the little panes, as

if Mary had known the face since childhood, and watched for a daily

greeting as she walked a Portsmouth street at home. She even hesitated

for a moment, looking eagerly, ere she went to lift the bright knocker

of the street door.

 

In a minute more she was in the room.

 

"I am Mary Hamilton, of Berwick," said the guest, with pretty eagerness,

"and I bring you love and greeting from Madam Wallingford, your old

friend."

 

"From Madam Wallingford?" exclaimed the hostess, who had thought to see

a neighbor’s daughter enter from the street, and now beheld a stranger,

a beautiful young creature, with a beseeching look in her half familiar

face. "Come you indeed from old Barvick, my dear? You are just off the

sea by your fresh looks. I was thinking of cousin Wallingford within

this very hour; I grieved to think that now we are both so old I can

never see her face again. So you bring me news of her? Sit you down; I

can say that you are most welcome." Her eyes were like a younger

woman’s, and they never left Mary’s face.

 

"She is here; she is in the harbor, on board the Golden Dolphin, one of

her own ships. I have not only brought news to you; I have brought her

very self," said the girl joyfully.

 

There was a quick shadow upon the hostess’s face. "Alas, then, poor

soul, I fear she has been driven from her home by trouble; she would be

one of the Loyalists! I ’ll send for her at once. Come nearer me; sit

here in the window seat!" begged Mistress Davis affectionately. "You

are little Mary Hamilton, of the fine house I have heard of and never

seen, the pride of my dear old Barvick. But your brother would not

change sides. You are both of the new party,—I have heard all that

months ago; how happens it that the Golden Dolphin brought you hither,

too?"

 

Mary seated herself in the deep window, while Mistress Davis gazed at

her wonderingly. She had a tender heart; she could read the signs of

great effort and of loneliness in the bright girlish face. She did not

speak, but her long, discerning look and the touch of her hand gave such

motherly comfort that the girl might easily have fallen to weeping. It

was not that Mary thought of any mean pity for herself, or even

remembered that her dear charge had sometimes shown the unconscious

selfishness of weakness and grief; but brave and self-forgetful hearts

always know the true value of sympathy. They were friends and lovers at

first sight, the young girl and the elderly woman who was also

Berwick-born.

 

 

"I have had your house filled to its least garrets with Royalists out of

my own country, and here comes still another of them, with a young

friend who is of the other party," Mistress Davis said gayly; and the

guest looked up to see a handsome old man who had entered from another

room, and who frowned doubtfully as he received this information.

Mary’s head was dark against the window, and he took small notice of her

at first, though some young men outside in the street had observed so

much of her beauty as was visible, and were walking to and fro on the

pavement, hoping for a still brighter vision.

 

"This is Miss Mary Hamilton, of Barvick," announced the mistress, "and

your old friend Madam Wallingford is in harbor, on one of her ships."

She knew that she need say no more.

 

Mr. John Davis, alderman of Bristol and senior warden of his parish

church, now came forward with some gallantry of manner.

 

"I do not like to lay a new charge upon you," said his wife, pleading

prettily, "but these are not as our other fugitives, poor souls!" and

she smiled as if with some confidence.

 

"Why, no, these be both of them your own kinsfolk, if I mistake not,"

the merchant agreed handsomely; "and the better part of our living has

come, in times past, from my dealings with the husband of one and the

good brother of the other. I should think it a pity if, for whatever

reason they may have crossed the sea, we did not open wide our door; you

must bid your maids make ready for their comfortable housing. I shall

go at once to find the captain, since he has come safe to land in these

days of piracy, and give so noble a gentlewoman as his owner my best

welcome and service on the ship. Perhaps Miss Hamilton will walk with

me, and give her own orders about her affairs?"

 

Mary stepped forward willingly from the window, in answer to so kind a

greeting; and when she was within close range of the old man’s

short-sighted eyes, she was inspected with such rapid approval and happy

surprise that Mr. Alderman Davis bent his stately head and saluted so

fair a brow without further consideration. She was for following him at

once on his kind errand, but she first ran back and kissed the dear

mistress of the house. "I shall have much to tell you of home," she

whispered; "you must spare me much time, though you will first be so

eager for your own friend."

 

"We shall find each other changed, I know,—we have both seen years and

trouble enough; but you must tell Mrs. Wallingford I have had no such

happiness in many a year as the sight of her face will bring me. And

dear Nancy Haggens?" she asked, holding Mary back, while the merchant

grew impatient at the delay of their whispering. "She is yet alive?"

And Mary smiled.

 

"I shall tell you many things, not only of her, but of the gay major,"

she replied aloud. "Yes, I am coming, sir; but it is like home here,

and I am so happy already in your kind house." Then they walked away

together, he with a clinking cane and majestic air, and kindly showing

Miss Hamilton all the sights of Bristol that they passed.

 

"So you sailed on the Golden Dolphin?" he asked, as they reached the

water side. "She is a small, old vessel, but she wears well; she has

made this port many a time before," said John Davis. "And lumber-laden,

you say? Well, that is good for me, and you are lucky to escape the

thieving privateers out of your own harbors. So Madam Wallingford has

borne her voyage handsomely, you think? What becomes of her young son?"

 

 

 

 

*XXXIV*

 

*GOOD ENGLISH HEARTS*

 

"’T is all an old man can do, to say his prayers for his country."

 

 

Late that evening, while the two elder ladies kept close together, and

spoke eagerly of old days and friends long gone out of sight, John Davis

sat opposite his young guest at the fireplace, as he smoked his

after-supper pipe.

 

The rich oak-paneled room was well lit by both firelight and candles,

and held such peace and comfort as Mary never had cause to be grateful

for before. The cold dampness of the brig, their close quarters, and all

the dullness and impatience of the voyage were past now, and they were

safe in this good English house, among old friends. It was the

threshold of England, too, and Roger Wallingford was somewhere within;

soon they might be sailing together for home. Even the worst

remembrance of the sea was not unwelcome, with this thought at heart!

 

The voyagers had been listening to sad tales of the poverty and distress

of nearly all the Loyalist refugees from America, the sorrows of

Governor Hutchinson and his house, and of many others. The Sewalls and

Russells, the Faneuils, and the Boutineaus, who were still in Bristol,

had already sent eager messages. Mistress Davis warned her guests that

next day, when news was spread of their coming, the house would be full

of comers and goers; all asking for news, and most of them for money,

too. Some were now in really destitute circumstances who had been rich

at home, and pensions and grants for these heartsick Loyalists were not

only slow in coming, but pitiful in their meagreness. There was a poor

gentleman from Salem, and his wife with him, living in the Davises

house; they had lodged upward of thirty strangers since the year came

in; it was a heavy charge upon even a well-to-do man, for they must

nearly all borrow money beside their food and shelter. Madam

Wallingford was not likely to come empty-handed; the heavy box with

brass scutcheons which the captain himself had escorted from the Golden

Dolphin, late that afternoon, was not without comfortable reassurance,

and the lady had asked to have a proper English waiting-maid chosen for

her, as she did not wish to bring a weight upon the household. But

there were other problems to be faced. This good merchant, Mr. Davis,

was under obligations to so old a friend, and he was not likely to be a

niggard, in any sense, when she did him the honor to seek his hospitality.