The Tory Lover 51

The Tory Lover 51

He kissed her hand and let it go; his old hope went with it; there must

be a quick ending now. A man must always resent pity for himself, but

his heart was full of most tender pity for this overburdened girl.

There had been few moments of any sort of weakness in all the course of

her long bravery,—he was sure enough of that,—and only loved her the

more. She had been the first to show him some higher things: it was not

alone her charm, but her character, her great power of affection, her

perfect friendship, that would make him a nobler lover to his life’s

end.

 

She watched him as he went away down the nave toward the open door; the

poverty of such disguise and the poor sailor’s threadbare dress could

not hide a familiar figure, but he was alert no more, and even drooped a

little as he stood for one moment in the doorway. He did not once look

back; there were people in the church now, and his eyes were bent upon

the ground. Then he lifted his head with all the spirit that belonged

to him, stepped out boldly from the shadow into the bright daylight

beyond, and was gone.

 

The old verger crossed over to speak with Mary; he had learned to know

her by sight, for she came often to the abbey church, and guessed that

she might be one of the exiles from America.

 

"’T was some poor sailor begging, I misdoubt. There ’s a sight o’

beggars stranded in the town. I hope he would not make bold to vex you,

my lady?" asked the dim-eyed old man, fumbling his snuffbox with

trembling hands. "I fell asleep in the chapter room.

 

"’T was some one I had known at home," Miss Hamilton answered. "He is a

good man." And she smiled a little as she spoke. It would be so easy

to cause a consternation in the town. Her head was steady now, but she

still sat where the captain left her.

 

"’T is a beautiful monyment,—that one," said the verger, pointing up to

the kneeling figures in their prim ruffs. "’T is as beautiful a

monyment as any here. I ’ve made bold to notice how you often sits here

to view it. Some o’ your Ameriky folks was obsarvin’ as their forbears

was all buried in this abbey in ancient times; ’t would be sure to make

the owd place a bit homely."

 

The bells were still chiming, and there were worshipers coming in. Mary

Hamilton slipped away, lest she should meet some acquaintance; she felt

herself shaken as if by a tempest. Paul Jones had gone into fresh

danger when he left her side; his life was spent among risks and

chances. She might have been gentler to him, and sent him away better

comforted.

 

She walked slowly, and stood still once in the street, startled by the

remembrance of her frank confession of love; the warm color rushed to

her pale face. To have told the captain, when she had never told Roger

himself, or his mother, or any but her own heart! Yet all her sorrows

were lightened by these unconsidered words: the whole world might hear

them now; they were no secret any more.

 

There were busy groups of people about the taverns and tobacco shops, as

if some new excitement were in the air; it might be that there was news

from America. As Mary passed, she heard one man shout to another that

John Paul Jones, the pirate, had been seen the day before in Bristol

itself. An old sailor, just landed from a long voyage at sea, had known

him as he passed. There was word, too, that the Ranger had lately been

sighted again off Plymouth, and had taken two prizes in the very teeth

of the King’s fleet.

 

 

 

 

*XL*

 

*THE WATCHER’S LIGHT*

 

"There’s no deep valley but near some great hill."

 

 

Late that night Mary Hamilton sat by the window in her sleeping closet,

a quaint little room that led from the stately chamber of Madam

Wallingford. Past midnight, it was still warm out of doors, and the air

strangely lifeless. It had been late before the maid went away and

their dear charge had fallen asleep; so weak and querulous and full of

despair had she been all the long day.

 

The night taper was flickering in its cup of oil, but the street outside

was brighter than the great room. The waning moon was just rising, and

the watcher leaned back wearily against the shutter, and saw the

opposite roofs slowly growing less dim. There were tall trees near by

in the garden, and a breeze, that Mary could not feel where she sat, was

rustling among the poplar leaves and mulberries. She heard footsteps

coming up the street, and the sound startled her as if she had been

sitting at her window at home, where footsteps at that time of night

might mean a messenger to the house.

 

The great town of Bristol lay fast asleep; it was only the watchman’s

tread that had startled the listener, and for a moment changed her weary

thoughts. The old man went by with his clumsy lantern, but gave no cry

nor told the hour until he was well into the distance.

 

There was much to think about at the end of this day, which had brought

an unexpected addition to her heart’s regret. The remembrance of Paul

Jones, his insistence upon Wallingford’s treachery, a sad mystery which

now might never be solved, even the abruptness of the captain’s own

declaration of love, and a sense of unreality that came from her own

miserable weakness,—all these things were new burdens for the mind. She

could not but recognize the hero in this man of great distinction, as he

had stood before her, and yet his melancholy exit, with the very poverty

of his dress, had somehow added to the misery of the moment. It seemed

to her now as if they had met each other, that morning, with no thoughts

of victory, but in the very moment of defeat. Their hopes had been so

high when last they talked together. Again there came to her mind the

anxiety of that bright night when she had stood pleading with Roger

Wallingford on the river shore, and had thrown down her challenge at his

feet. How easy and even how happy it all seemed beside these dreadful

days! How little she had known then! How little she had loved then!

Life had been hardly more than a play beside this; it was more dramatic

than real. She had felt a remote insincerity, in those old days, in

even the passionate words of the two men, and a strange barrier, like a

thin wall of glass, was always between her heart and theirs. Now,

indeed, she was face to face with life, she was in the middle of the

great battle; now she loved Roger Wallingford, and her whole heart was

forever his, whether he was somewhere in the world alive, or whether he

lay starved and dead among the furze and heather on the Devon moors.

She saw his white face there, as if she came upon it in the shadows of

her thoughts, and gave a quick cry, such was the intensity of her grief

and passion; and the frail figure stirred under its coverlet in the

great room beyond, with a pitiful low moan like the faint echo of her

own despair.

 

The sad hour went by, and still this tired girl sat by the window, like

a watcher who did not dare to forget herself in sleep. Her past life

had never been so clearly spread before her, and all the pleasant old

days were but a background for one straight figure: the manly,

fast-growing boy whom she played with and rebuffed on equal terms; the

eager-faced and boyish man whom she had begun to fear a little, and then

to tease, lest she should admire too much. She remembered all his

beautiful reticence and growing seriousness, the piety with which he

served his widowed mother; the pleading voice, that last night of all,

when she had been so slow to answer to his love. It was she herself now

who could plead, and who must have patience! How hard she had been

sometimes, how deaf and blind, how resistant and dull of heart! ’T was

a girl’s strange instinct to fly, to hide, to so defeat at first the

dear pursuer of her heart’s love!

 

Again there was a footstep in the street. It was not the old watchman

coming, for presently she heard a man’s voice singing a country tune

that she had known at home. He came within sight and crossed the

street, and stood over the way waiting in shadow; now he went on softly

with the song. It was an old Portsmouth ballad that all the river knew;

the very sound of it was like a message:—

 

"The mermaids they beneath the wave,

The mermaids they o’er my sailor’s grave,

The mermaids they at the bottom of the sea,

Are weeping their salt tears for me.

 

"The morning star was shining still,

’T was daybreak over the eastern hill"—

 

He began the song again, but still more softly, and then stopped.

 

Mary kept silence; her heart began to beat very fast. She put her hand

on the broad window-sill where the moonlight lay, and the singer saw it

and came out into the street. She saw the Spanish sailor again. What

had brought the captain to find her at this time of night?

 

She leaned out quickly. "I am here. Can I help you? Is there any

news?" she whispered, as he stood close under the window, looking up.

"You are putting yourself in danger," she warned him anxiously. "I heard

the people saying that you have been seen in Bristol, this morning as I

came home!"

 

"God be thanked that I have found you awake!" he answered eagerly, and

the moon shone full upon his face, so that she could see it plain. "I

feared that I should have to wait till daylight to see you. I knew no

one to trust with my message, and I must run for open sea. I have

learned something of our mystery at last. Go you to the inn at Old

Passage to-morrow night,—do you hear me?—to the inn at Old Passage, and

wait there till I come. Go at nightfall, and let yourself be unknown in

the house, if you can. I think—I think we may have news from

Wallingford."

 

She gave a little cry, and leaned far out of the window, speaking

quickly in her excitement, and begging to hear more; but the captain had

vanished to the shadows whence he came. Her heart was beating so fast

and hard now that she could not hear his light footsteps as he hurried

away, running back to the water-side down the echoing, paved street.

 

 

 

 

*XLI*

 

*AN OFFERED OPPORTUNITY*

 

"Neither man nor soldier.

What ignorant and mad malicious traitors!"

 

"License, they mean, when they cry Liberty."

 

 

The Roscoff fishing smack lay in the Severn, above Avon mouth, and it

was broad day when Captain Paul Jones came aboard again, having been

rowed down the river by some young Breton sailors whom he had found

asleep in the bottom of their boat. There would be natural suspicion of

a humble French craft like theirs; but when they had been overhauled in

those waters, a day or two before, the owner of the little vessel, a

sedate person by the name of Dickson, professed himself to be an

Englishman from the Island of Guernsey, with proper sailing papers and

due reverence for King George the Third. His crew, being foreigners,

could answer no decent Bristol questions, and they were allowed to top

their boom for the fishing grounds unmolested, having only put into harbor for supplies.