Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman

by Stanley J Weyman

  For he was safe nowhere. On the Bench where he had brow-beaten so many, did one colleague whisper to another, he lost countenance, suspecting that they jested at his expense. In church his stately port lacked something of its dignity, his flowing robes, as he passed from reading-desk to chancel, a part of their grace. He felt the joint in his armour, and was ever conscious, Achilles-like, of his heel. Not for a moment could he forget the enemy that lurked amid his congregation, the enemy smiling, disdainful, triumphant in his villainy, who listened and criticised.

  Even in the quiet walled garden where he might have counted on a respite, he had no enjoyment, though his trouble wore a different guise. For there a shadow walked with him and darkened his path. The whisper of malicious tongues was silent but the spectre of his child was present — the child who had been so gay, so merry, so vital a thing, whose laughter had brightened his house and lightened his hours. He saw her shabby and careworn, flitting through mean places, ashamed and degraded. And his steps flagged, and his heart was sad. Against her, as he began to see, he could not always keep his anger hot.

  At such times he told himself that he had forgiven her, and that his only feeling for her was pity. He did not doubt that she had before this discovered her mistake, and had repented, bitterly repented of it. He did not doubt that her low-lived husband had lost no time in dispelling the glamour of the lover, and that poverty and commonness had opened the eyes that passion had blinded. But she had made her bed, and here or elsewhere her fate must be ever to sink lower, fretted by squalid surroundings, shocked by vulgar habits, her refinement daily and hourly chafed by coarse speech. She might be pitied, she was to be pitied, but she could not be saved. Yet in the peace of his walled garden the father sighed as the man pronounced judgment.

  She could not be saved; unless — unless, indeed, by some means that did not benefit the man she could be parted from him? That was a thought that came late into the Rector’s mind; that came in truth only when the heat of his wrath had sunk to a cold fury. But once admitted it grew, and loomed larger and larger. To be rid of both would be an unspeakable relief, though that relief, he began to see, might be attended by after-pains, by prickings of conscience, and the stirrings of a love far from dead. But to be rid of the man! To be rid of the man! That were unmixed good. It meant not only a prodigal taken back, chastened and forgiven, into the fold, but a victory over the powers of darkness that had seduced her. The Rector grasped the thought and turned it and turned it in his mind. The old and obvious plan of a bribe recurred more than once, but he discarded it. A bribe would not serve, for that way lay no victory. He could not lower himself to buy his daughter back, and so to enrich that man.

  And then as he sat one evening, brooding sadly over his wine, he was told that Budgen wished to see him. His first impulse was to bid the man call at a more fitting hour; his second to order lights to be put in the room that he used for parish purposes. But before Wignall had closed the door, “Stay,” the Rector said, reviewing the position — even on such a bear as Budgen the dining-room with its dark, shining table and sparkling glass might have an influence. “Stay! It’s a cold night. You may show him in here, Wignall. And bring another glass.” It was a rare condescension on the Rector’s part.

  But eyeing his visitor closely as he entered he was persuaded that his thought was a good one. Whatever might be the cause of the change, Budgen was in a subdued mood, and seeing this his host bent himself to be genial. He waved the boat-builder to a chair. “Sit down, man,” he said. “It’s a cold evening, and a glass of wine will not hurt you. Another glass, Wignall? Good.” Then, when the butler, after filling Budgen’s glass, had withdrawn, “What is it, Budgen?” the Rector asked.

  “It is about the brig, your reverence.”

  “Good. You have made up your mind at last, I hope?”

  Budgen fingered his glass, his eyes wavering from object to object, his manner uneasy. ‘Pretty much I have,” he said, civilly for him. “I’ll fit her out — as soon as may be.”

  “The sooner the better. There’s not a day to be lost, if you are to make the most of her. I’ve no doubt that we are in sight of peace, and the late spring may see it. And peace once made—” the Rector shook his head pregnantly.

  “I’ve given the orders,” Budgen muttered, his eyes glued to the glass that he turned between his fingers. “And I’ve seen some of the men. But you’ll have to find the ready, sir.”

  “I said I would, and I will,” the Rector rejoined. “I’ll be as good as my word, though I fear that the margin is small. Very small,” he repeated, shaking his head. “You’ve persuaded Copestake to take her out, then?”

  Budgen shook his head. “He’ll have none of it!” he said.

  “Then you must talk to him, man!”

  “No good,” Budgen spoke with a touch of his old obstinacy. “He won’t go, Ozias won’t. I’ve tried and no use at all. He’ve married a lass, and he be set on her, and she’ll not hear of it. We’ve got to find another, and it’s not many the Jacks will ship with, nor their women let them.”

  “What do you propose, then?” The Rector looked grave. He was ready to risk money, and of Copestake he knew the best and worst. But to put his stake in the hands of one whom he did not know was another matter.

  “To be sure—” Budgen’s gaze moved shiftily from his glass to the Rector, and back again. “To be sure, that be the question. ’Tis the skipper it turns on more’n the craft or the fo’c’sle. There’s many as can navigate surprising in the snug o’ the Keppel as couldn’t make a landfall with Ameriky under their forefoot! And some as could hit the mark, but fire a gun a mile to wind ‘ard, and they’d be down wind so quick you’d marvel! The one’d lose the Lively Peggy and the other’d lose the prize! And there it is.”

  “A good man is hard to find, no doubt,” the Rector agreed. “But surely Copestake is not the only man that can sail and will fight, even if you go no farther than Plymouth.”

  Budgen grunted. “I’d not go so far to fare worse,” he said. “I’ve small thought o’ Plymouth, nor no love for foreigners.”

  The Rector was patient. “Well, you’ve someone in your eye, I suppose. Who is it?”

  Budgen’s fingers beat a gentle tattoo on the mahogany. “I’m not saying I’ve not,” he muttered. “No, I’m not saying that either.”

  But he stopped there, while the other wondered what ailed him that he did not speak. “Then who is it that you propose, man? Come, let us hear.”

  Budgen did everything but meet his eye. “We might do better,” he said darkly. “But then again we might do worse. It’s my thinking he’ll fight if need be, and navigate he must — being as he is. But whether he’s just according to your mind, sir, I won’t say.” And then, “I’ve insured my share,” he said, staring at the wall before him.

  The Rector was startled. He looked at the man. “Insured, have you? At last?”

  “To be sure.”

  “You never have before, Budgen?” The Rector looked thoughtful.

  “No,” Budgen shifted uneasily in his chair. “But your reverence has.”

  “Certainly, certainly I have, and made no secret of it. But the premium is high. I understood that that was why you would not do it.”

  “It’s my last stake,” the boat-builder muttered.

  It was a natural thing to say, and a good reason to give, but Budgen did not say it in an outspoken way, and his manner troubled the Rector. The man had never insured his share before. He had made light of the risk, and he had sneered at the other’s caution. The Rector had thought him a fool — penny wise and pound foolish; but he had not been surprised. He knew that the uneducated were loth to spend money where no immediate return was visible, and he had more than once pressed Budgen on the subject. But now that Budgen turned about and announced that he had insured — but with such an uneasy air and look, as betrayed his embarrassment, and with eyes that never met the other’s — the Rector did not like it. The reason the man gave was plausi
ble, yet he mistrusted it. A suspicion, a very strange one, crossed his mind.

  “Have you completed it?” he asked with a frown. “Have you paid the premium?”

  Budgen shook his head. “None so silly!” he said. “I’ll pay when the brig’s fitted. No, nor then, I won’t. I’ll not pay till the skipper’s aboard and the blue flag’s hoisted.”

  “Umph! Well, it’s your affair,” the Rector replied. But his face was grave. “You’ve a right to insure, of course.”

  “To be sure, I have.”

  “Just so. Just so. Well, that brings us back to the skipper. Who is it you propose?”

  “The one I’m thinking of?”

  “Of course, man. Who else?”

  “Well,” Budgen said, with a sidelong glance at him, “it’s one as you know. It’s young Bligh!” The Rector set down the glass he had raised to his lips. “Young Bligh!” he repeated, in a tone of anger and astonishment. He was taken aback. “And you’d trust him with that brig?”

  “As soon as another!” Budgen said doggedly. “Not as I’d trust Ozias, for I’ve tried Ozias and I’ve not tried this young sprig. But he’s hard put to it, it’s as much as he can do to scratch a living, and there’s no one fights harder than him as has his back to the wall. I’ve watched him, too, and he’s that way I’m thinking he’d like nothing better than hard knocks, and the harder the better.”

  “But he drinks!” the Rector protested. He was strangely moved. “He drinks, man! He was broke for it! Dismissed the Service, disgraced, ruined for it!”

  Budgen forgot himself so far as to bring his hand down on the table. “And how many King’s men,” he cried, “with the anchor on their buttons and the gold knobs on their shoulders would you get to take out a Letter o’ Marque! Tell me that, your reverence! Not one, by God! saving your presence. They’d spit in your face if you so much as opened it! Ay, and threaten to break your bones for it! There is precious little love lost ‘twixt them and poor Jack as lifts the prizes under their hawses. One here and there, that’s broke like this chap, may when it’s Hobson’s choice ‘twixt the trade and starving! But not another! Why, if they saw the Lively Peggy sinking at her moorings it’s much if they’d save the Jacks from drowning — and if they did they’d press them, though it’s again the law! All the same, for a desperate cruise, hit or miss, give, me a King’s man — broke!”

  The Rector was watching him intently. “You think it is a desperate cruise, then?” he said.

  Budgen’s tone when he replied was both dogged and reckless, but his eyes did not meet the other’s. “Well, it’s my last throw!” he said. “And it’s no olive branch I’d sending out, and no Quaker. He’ll have his orders, and it’s my thinking he’ll bide by them!”

  “He’s married,” the Rector said. He spoke in a colourless voice.

  “Sort o’ married!” Budgen allowed, looking woodenly at the wall before him. “And maybe not much harm done there — if he don’t come back.”

  The Rector flinched. He was helping himself to wine, and the decanter tinkled against the glass. There was a moment of pregnant silence. Then “I don’t approve,” he said. “Do you hear, I don’t approve. No man, you — you must find someone else! I won’t have it.”

  “I don’t see as it matters much, even if he don’t—”

  “I won’t have it!” The Rector raised his voice. He was strangely agitated. “I tell you I won’t have it!” His face was flushed, though he had not drunk his quantum.

  “Then you must find one yourself,” Budgen declared stubbornly. “I’ve done my best — I’ve picked my man, and the fittest as I can find. And I should ha’ thought ’twould have suited your reverence, too — and suited you well. But as it don’t — you must do the job yourself,” he added in his surliest tone.

  The Rector raised his glass and set it down untasted.

  “No, I don’t approve,” he repeated — but there was less finality in his tone. “You hear that?” It seemed as if, having hit on that phrase, he could say nothing else.

  Budgen shrugged his shoulders.

  “Then you must find your own man! I wash my hands of it.” He was once more the old Budgen, crabbed and rude.

  The Rector frowned. He drank, draining the glass thirstily, but his hand shook as he set it down. “Have you spoken to him?” he asked.

  “Spoken? To be sure I have, and he’s willing as a maid! Nor I don’t know as it’s anybody else’s business. He’s not a babby in arms, and it’s a new thing to me if you’re so much beholden to him. Do you think again, your reverence, and I’m fancying that you’ll see it another way. He’s willing and, Lord’s sakes, how many cruises has Ozias sailed on and nobody lain awake — as I’m aware on.”

  “He wasn’t married,” the Rector muttered, his face averted.

  “And there’s married as have little to lose — and no great loss,” Budgen replied. He had marked the drop in the Rector’s tone, and he stole a covert glance at him, of which the Rector was uncomfortably aware. “However,” he continued, shrugging his shoulders, “your reverence knows your own business best, and Ozias being as he won’t go, there’s no more to be said.”

  Dr. Portnal slid his glass up and down the polished table that reflected every object on its surface. His eyes followed the slow movement. “It might give him a chance,” he said, reluctantly. “There is that, of course, Budgen. There is that. It might be — the best thing for him. There is that, I cannot deny it.”

  Budgen agreed. “It would be,” he said. “And he sees it himself. To be sure he does.” His eyes were on the Rector now, and there was something like derision in them.

  But for the moment the other ignored him. He sat silent, his gaze still following the mechanical movement of his hand; and his brow was damp. At last, “Is he likely — to keep sober?” he asked in a troubled voice. “It’s a great responsibility.” He spoke as if he laboured under the weight of it himself.

  “For what I know,” the boat-builder replied, “he’s a Rechabite! Swore off, I hear, and the old man too. No one’s picked him up for a score of Sundays, and a score to that. Town talk goes he’s as good as a Wesleyan.”

  The Rector held a Wesleyan and a man who could not carry his liquor in about equal disdain, but that was not to the purpose now. He gave way, but it was with a sigh. “Well,” he muttered, “if you are sure that you know of no other.”

  “Not a soul that’s fit, and the men will follow.”

  “Are you sure that they will ship with him?”

  “I’ll answer for it, they will!”

  The Rector stared at his glass. “Then, so be it,” he said dully. “Though — though you understand, Budgen,” he added, “he’s not the man I’d choose myself.”

  “I understand,” Budgen replied. A smile flickered on his lips.

  “And I would not have him now,” the Rector repeated sharply, “if there were another. You understand that?”

  “To be sure. To be sure!”

  “Then” — the Rector moved uneasily in his chair— “we’ll hope it will turn out for the best. What — what do you pay him now?”

  “Fifteen shillings.”

  The Rector winced. “If he’s master he’ll have his share?”

  “To be sure. They have their risks down to the cook-boy.”

  That was something, the other thought. And what risk there was — and there was no gain without risk — was worth the man’s while. It was his chance — was anyone justified in withholding it from him?

  But when Budgen, after discussing money details, had taken himself away, the Rector walked up and down the room, and he was troubled — more troubled, he told himself, than he had any cause to be. He knew what ailed him, though he tried hard to persuade himself that there was no ground for his doubts. Only — only he wished with all his heart that Budgen had not said that word about the insurance.

  To suppose that the man had thought to tempt him was absurd; he could not think so ill of him as to suspect that he had an evil
purpose — either in the act or in the mention of it. But the doubt, slight as it was, clung to the Rector’s mind — clung like a burr, and he wished with all his heart that the insurance had not been named.

  For, putting that dark and certainly baseless thought aside, surely his consent was justified! It was the best thing for the young man that could happen. If fortune favoured him, he would be the gainer in money and character, he would stand before the world as something of a man again. And the risk? After all, it was no more than the risk that men in the Service ran every day, and that Bligh himself had run for years. So that if a mischance happened, it was no more than might have befallen him any day during the whole time he had served at sea! That was clear, demonstrable, not to be denied by anyone.

  And yet — he was troubled. That insurance effected at this late hour and for the first time — what did it mean? Why was a man as penurious and close-fisted as Budgen, and at this moment in sore straits for money — why was he insuring when he had never insured before? Because this was his last stake? Possibly — that seemed to be, and surely was a good reason. But the Rector, his misgivings once awakened, could not but see, though it was a shocking thing even to think of, that the man might have another object. With peace so near it might suit him to make sure of the war-value of the brig, and perhaps a good deal more. A shocking suspicion? Yes, a shocking, a revolting suspicion! Of a thing vile, criminal, black as hell!

  Yet the Rector had heard of such things. Of hints conveyed through the smugglers who passed to and fro at will: of vessels doomed before they left port, of Letters of Marque waylaid and captured on the day they reached their cruising-grounds.