Kitabı oku: «The Vicar's People», sayfa 28
Chapter Fifty Nine
Jonah
The threatening storm was giving abundant promise that it would soon visit Carnac; and warned by its harbingers, the various red-sailed luggers were making fast for the little port. Several had made the shelter behind the arm of masonry which curved out from the shore, and one of the last to run in was the boat owned by Tom Jennen and three more.
They had just lowered the last sail, and, empty and disappointed, they were about to make a line fast to one of the posts, when John Tregenna ran quickly down to where Tom Jennen stood upon the stone pier, rope in hand.
“Stop,” he cried.
“What’s the matter?” growled Jennen.
“I want you to take me across to – ”
He whispered the rest.
“Storm coming. There’ll be a gashly sea on directly, master. Pay out more o’ that line, will you?” he bellowed. “Don’t you see she’s foul o’ the anchor?”
“Ten pounds if you’ll put off directly, and take me,” said Tregenna, glancing uneasily back.
“Wouldn’t go for twenty,” growled Jennen.
“Thirty, then, if you’ll put off at once.”
“Hear this, mates?” growled Jennen.
“No – er.”
“Here’s Master Tregenna says he’ll give us thirty poun’ if we’ll take him across to – ”
“Hush!” cried Tregenna. “Yes, I’ll give you thirty pounds, my men.”
“There’ll be quite a big storm directly,” said another of the men. “Thirty poun’s a lot o’ money, but life’s more.”
“Fifty, then. Here, fifty!” cried Tregenna, desperately. “Fifty pounds, if you start at once.”
He took the crisp, rustling bank-notes from his pocket-book, and held them out, and it was too much for the men. They glanced at one another, and then their decision was made.
“Here, hand it over, and jump in,” cried Tom Jennen; and, thrusting the notes into his pocket, he pointed to the boat, and no sooner had Tregenna leaped in than, shortening his hold of the line, he began to pull, while his mates handled their hitchers to set the lugger free.
Another minute, and Tom Jennen had leaped aboard, and they were hauling up one of the sails, which began to flap and fill. Then one of them ran to the tiller, the lugger gathered way, and rode round to the end of the pier, rising to the summit of a good-sized wave, and gliding down the other side, as a little mob of people came running down the pier, shouting to them to stop.
“Take no notice. Go on,” cried Tregenna, excitedly.
“Why, what’s the matter?” said Tom Jennen, who, like his companions, was in profound ignorance of the events that had taken place while they were away.
“Keep on, and get out to sea,” cried Tregenna, fiercely. “I have paid you to take me, and you have the money.”
“Stop that boat,” roared old Prawle, who was now shouting and raving at the end of the pier. “Come back – come back.”
“Don’t listen to the old madman,” cried Tregenna. “Haul up the other sail.”
“We know how to manage our boat,” said Jennen, sulkily; but he seized the rope, one of the others followed his example, and the second sail rose, caught the wind, and the lugger lay over and began to surge through the wares.
“Stop that boat! Murder!” shouted old Prawle, gesticulating furiously, while those who were with him waved their hands and shouted as well.
“Why, there’s old Master Vorlea, the constable,” said one of the men; “and he seems to have gone off his head, too. What’s the matter ashore, Master Tregenna?”
“Matter? I don’t know,” cried Tregenna, hoarsely. “Keep on, and get me to Plymouth as quickly as you can.”
“We’ll try,” said Tom Jennen; “but with this gashly storm a-coming on we’ll never get out of the bay to-day.”
“But you must,” cried Tregenna, excitedly. “A man does not pay fifty pounds unless his business is urgent.”
“Or he wants to get away,” said Tom Jennen, surlily, as he looked back at the pier, now getting indistinct in the haze formed by the spray.
For the sea was rising fast, and as the fishers, who had made fast their boats within the harbour, joined the crowd staring after the lugger that had just put off, they shook their heads, and wondered what could have tempted Tom Jennen and his mates to go.
They were not long in learning that old Prawle had been after John Tregenna, charging him with the murder of the child, and the attempt to kill her he supposed to be its mother; but Tregenna seemed to have been seized by a horror of encountering Prawle, and he had fled as if for his life, while, with all the pertinacity of a bloodhound, the old man had tried to hunt him down, following him from place to place, where he sought for refuge, till, with the dread increasing in force, the guilty man had fled to the harbour, and, as the coach would not leave again till the next day, he had bribed the crew of the lugger to take him within reach of the railway.
As Prawle saw the boat get beyond his reach, he looked round for one to go in pursuit; and he turned to hurry back home, with the intent of putting off in his own, but as he did so his eyes swept the horizon, his life of experience told him what would follow, and he sat down upon one of the mooring posts with a low, hoarse laugh.
“Does Tom Jennen think he’s going to get out of the bay to-day?” he said.
“He’ll have hard work,” shouted the man nearest to him.
“Hard work? He’ll be running for home ere two hours are gone, if his boat don’t sink, for they’ve got Jonah on board yonder, and the sea’s a-rising fast.”
Chapter Sixty
The Lugger Ashore
By this time half the town was out to watch the lugger in which John Tregenna was trying to make his escape, and, the story of his wrong-doing having passed from lip to lip, the crowd upon the harbour wall and the cliff began rapidly to increase.
Geoffrey heard of what had taken place, and hurried down to the cliff, and old Prawle was pointed out to him seated upon the pier, where the sea was already beginning to beat furiously as the wind rapidly gathered force.
“Why, Prawle,” he cried, when he had hurried down to his side, “what have you been doing?”
“Doing, lad? Trying to do to him as he did to me and mine. He’s got away,” cried the old man, hoarsely; “but I’ll have him yet.”
“Yes, but you must leave him to the law,” cried Geoffrey. “Come: walk home with me. You must not take this into your own hands.”
“Come home!” said the old man, with a fierce look in his eye. “Yes, when I have seen him drown, for it will come to that before many hours are past.”
Finding him immovable, Geoffrey stayed by the old man’s side till they were driven back to the head of the harbour by the waves that now dashed right over the wall where they had been standing but a few minutes before; and from thence Prawle, after some three hours’ watching, climbed to the cliff, where he leaned over the iron rail and gazed out to sea through his hands, held telescope fashion.
“She’s labouring hard,” he said, with a grim chuckle, “and they’ve taken in all sail they can. Look yonder, Trethick: see. There, I told you so. Tom Jennen’s give it up, and he’ll run for the harbour now.”
Geoffrey strained his eyes to try and make out what the old man had described; but he could only dimly see the two-masted vessel far out in the hazy spray, and that she was tossing up and down, for the sea was rising still, and the wind rapidly increasing to almost hurricane force.
Old Prawle was right, as the excitement upon the cliff showed, for, after hours of brave effort, the crew of the lugger had proved the hopelessness of their task, and were now running for home.
What had been a long and weary fight in the teeth of the wind resolved itself into quite a short run, with scarcely any sail hoisted, and the great white-topped waves seeming to chase the buoyant lugger as she raced for shelter from the storm.
The fishermen stood watching her through the haze, and shook their heads as they glanced down at the harbour, where the rocks were now bare, now covered by the huge waves that thundered amidst them, tossing the great boulders over and over as if they had been pebbles, and leaving them to rumble back with a noise like thunder, but only to be cast up again. All the eastern side of the bay was now a sheet of white foam, which the wind caught up and sent flying inland like yeast; and so fierce was the wind now in its more furious gusts, that posts, corners, rocks, and the lee of boats were sought by the watchers as shelter from the cutting blast.
Old Prawle seemed to mind the furious gale no more than the softest breeze, and at length he descended the cliff slope towards where the waves came tumbling in a hundred yards or so beyond the end of the huge wall of masonry that formed the harbour; and as he saw the sturdy fishermen taking the same direction, with coils of rope over their shoulders, Geoffrey needed no telling that the lugger would come ashore there, for, if expected to make the harbour, the men would have made no such preparations as these.
As they went down along the rugged slope Geoffrey touched the old man on the shoulder, and pointed to the harbour.
“No,” shouted old Prawle, in his ear; “she can’t do it, nor yet with three times her crew.”
The crowd had rapidly increased, for it was known now that Tom Jennen’s “boot” must be wrecked, and quite a hundred men had gathered on the shore ready to lend a hand to save. No vessel could have lived in the chaos of foam between them and the lugger unless it were the lifeboat, and that was seven miles away, while the lugger was now not as many hundred yards.
Through the dim haze Geoffrey could make out the figures of the men on board when the lugger rose to the top of some wave, but for the most part they were hidden from his sight; and as he stood there, drenched with the spray, he shuddered as he thought of the fate of these, now so full of vigour, if their seamanship should really prove unavailing to guide them into a place of safety.
“Is there danger, Trethick?” said a voice at his ear; and, turning, there stood the Reverend Edward Lee, his white face bedewed with the spray, and his glasses in his hand, as he wiped off the thick film of salt water.
“I fear so. Poor fellows!” was the reply.
“Is it true that that unhappy man is on board?”
Geoffrey nodded, and their eyes met for a few moments.
“God forgive him!” said the vicar, softly. “Trethick, can we do any thing to save his life?”
As he spoke, Geoffrey for answer pointed to one of the huge green rollers that now came sweeping in, curled over, and broke with a roar like thunder upon the rocky beach.
“Nothing but stand ready with a rope,” was the reply; and then the two young men stood watching the lugger till one of the fishermen came up with a great oilskin coat.
“Put it on, sir,” he roared to the vicar. “It’ll keep some of it off.”
The vicar was about to refuse, but his good feeling prompted him to accept the offer, and a few minutes later another came up and offered one to Geoffrey, who shook his head, and, in place of taking it, stripped off his coat and moved farther down to meet the waves.
The vicar followed him quickly, for the crucial time had come. As far as those ashore could make out, the crew of the lugger had hoisted their fore-sail a few feet higher, and, as they raced in, there was just a chance that she might obey her rudder and swing round into shelter; but it was the faintest of chances, and so it proved.
On she came, light as a duck; and, as she neared the shore, she seemed almost to leap from wave to wave, till at last, when she came in, riding as it were upon one huge green wall of water, nearer and nearer, with the speed almost of a race-horse.
“Now – now – now, Tom!” rose in chorus, heard for a moment above the wind; and, as if in obedience to the call, the head of the lugger was seen to curve round, and in another minute she would have been in shelter, when, as if fearful of missing their prey, the waves leaped at her, deluging her with water; she was swept on and on towards where the crowd had gathered; and then there was a shriek as the lugger was seen to be lifted and dashed down upon the rocks – once, twice – and there was something dark, like broken timbers, churning about among the yeasty foam. The boat was in a hundred pieces tossing here and there.
For a few moments the fishermen ashore stood motionless, and then a man was seen to run out, rope in hand, into the white foam towards something dark, catch at it, and those ashore gave a steady haul, and one of the crew was brought in, amidst a roar of cheers, to where Geoffrey and the vicar stood.
Again there was a dark speck seen amongst the floating planks, and another man dashed in with a rope, and a second member of the little crew was dragged ashore.
Again another, who was stoutly swimming for his life, was fetched in; and almost at the same moment Geoffrey saw something that made his blood course fiercely through his veins.
“I can’t help it,” he muttered; “villain as he is, I cannot stand and see him drown.”
There was no momentary hesitation; but, drawing a long breath, he dashed into the foam that seethed and rushed up the shore, for his quick eye had detected a hand thrust out from the surf for a moment, and his brave effort was successful, for he caught the sleeve of one of the drowning men. Then they were swept in for a time but sucked back; and but for the aid lent by one of the fishermen with a rope, it would have gone hard with them, though, in the excitement, Geoffrey hardly realised the fact till he found himself standing in the midst of a knot of fishermen and the vicar clinging to his hand, but only for the clergyman to be roughly thrust aside by Tom Jennen, for it was he whom Geoffrey had saved; and the rough fellow got hold of his hand and squeezed it as in a vice.
“Where’s Mr Tregenna?” cried Geoffrey, hoarsely, as soon as he could get breath, for he had caught sight of the rough, dark figure of old Prawle running to and fro in the shallow white water where the waves broke up.
“Hasn’t he come ashore?” said Tom Jennen, with his face close to Geoffrey’s.
The latter shook his head and looked inquiringly at the rough fisherman; but Tom Jennen staggered away to sit down, utterly exhausted by his struggle.
Planks, a mast with the dark cinnamon sail twisted round it, the lugger’s rudder, a cask or two, a heap of tangled net, a sweep broken in half, and some rope – bit by bit the fragments of the brave little fisher-vessel came ashore, or were dragged out by one or other of the men; but though a dozen stood ready, rope in hand, to dash in amongst the foam and try to rescue a struggling swimmer, John Tregenna’s hand was never seen stretched out for help, nor his ghastly face looking wildly towards the shore. And at last, as the fragments of the lugger were gathered together in a heap, the crowd melted away, to follow where the half-drowned fishermen had been half-carried to their homes, and Geoffrey gladly accepted the hospitality offered to him by Edward Lee.
Tom Jennen had fared the worst, for he had been dashed once against a part of the lugger, and his ribs were crushed; but he seemed patient and ready to answer the questions of a visitor who came to him after he had seen the doctor leave.
“Were he aboard, Tom Jennen, when you tried to make the harbour?”
“Aboard? Who? Tregenna?”
“Ay.”
“Of course.”
“And he was with you when you struck?”
“Holding on by the side, and screeching for help like a frightened woman,” said Jennen.
“And where do you think he’d be now?” said the other.
“Drowned and dead, for he hadn’t the spirit to fight for his life,” said Jennen, “and I wish I’d never seen his face.”
“I’d like to have seen it once more,” said Tom Jennen’s visitor, grimly. “Just once more;” and he nodded and left the cottage.
“I don’t feel as if I ought to face my Bess till I’ve seen him once again,” he muttered, as he went on along the cliff path; “but I don’t know – I don’t know. He was too slippery for me at the last;” and old Prawle went slowly and thoughtfully homeward to the Cove.
Chapter Sixty One
After Many Days
“She’s better, Trethick, much better,” said Uncle Paul. “Poor child! I thought it was going to be a case of madness. But sit down, man, I’ve just got a fresh batch of the old cheroots.”
Geoffrey seated himself in the summer-house opposite to the old gentleman, with the soft sea-breeze blowing in at the open window; and for a time they smoked in silence.
“Mrs Mullion is going away, Trethick,” said the old man at last.
“Going away?”
“Yes; it will be better for Madge. Let them go somewhere to a distance. The poor girl wants change, and she’ll never be happy here.”
“No,” said Geoffrey, “I suppose not. Then you go with them?”
“I? No, my lad, I seem to be so used to this house that I don’t want to make a change. I can’t live much longer, Trethick, and I thought, perhaps, you would come back to the old place. There’ll be plenty of room for both of us, and we can smoke and quarrel in the old style.”
Geoffrey shook his head.
“I should like it,” he said; “but it won’t do, Uncle Paul. My career’s over here in Carnac, and I ought to have been off long enough ago, instead of idling away my time, and growing rusty.”
“Only you feel that you can’t leave the place, eh?”
Geoffrey frowned, and half turned away his head.
“Well,” said the old man, “Rhoda Penwynn is a fine girl, and full of purpose and spirit. There, sit down, man, sit down,” he cried, putting his cane across the door to prevent Geoffrey’s exit. “Can’t you bear to hear a few words of truth?”
Geoffrey looked at him angrily, but he resumed his place.
“I shouldn’t have thought much of her if she hadn’t thrown you over as she did, my lad.”
“Where was her faith?” cried Geoffrey.
“Ah, that’s sentiment, my lad, and not plain common-sense. Every thing looked black against you.”
“Black? Yes; and whose lips ought to have whitened my character?”
“Ah! it was an unlucky affair, Geoffrey, my boy, and we all owe you an apology. But look here: go and see her, and make it up.”
“I? Go to see Miss Penwynn, and beg her to take me on again – to be her lover, vice that scoun – Tchah! how hot-brained I am. De mortuis! Let him rest. But no, Uncle Paul. That’s all over now.”
“Don’t see it, my boy. She never cared a snap of the fingers for Tregenna.”
“But she accepted, and would have married him.”
“After she believed you to be a scoundrel, Trethick.”
“What right had she to consider me a scoundrel?” cried Geoffrey, hotly. “My character ought to have been her faith.”
“Yes,” said the old man, dryly; “but then she had the misfortune to be a woman of sense and not of sentiment. I think she did quite right.”
“Then I don’t,” said Geoffrey, hotly.
“Ah, that’s better,” said the old man; “it’s quite a treat to have a bit of a row, Trethick. It’s like going back to old times. I like Rhoda Penwynn better every day; and the way in which she helps the old man is something to be admired, sir. But how he – a clever, sharp fellow – allowed that Tregenna to involve him as he did, I don’t know.”
“I suppose he is very poor now,” said Geoffrey, who could not conceal his interest.
“Poor? I don’t believe he has a penny. The girl’s as good or as bad as destitute.”
Geoffrey did not speak, but sat with his eyes fixed upon a white-sailed fishing-boat far out upon the blue waters of the bay.
“She would have sacrificed herself for the old man, and I dare say have married Tregenna to save him, if she had not found out all that about poor Madge. I say, Trethick, if you really care for the girl, I think I should see her and make it up.”
“But I don’t care for her,” cried Geoffrey, hotly. “I detest – I hate her.”
“Humph!” said Uncle Paul, taking a fresh cheroot, and passing over the case to Geoffrey; “and this is the fellow who boasted that he had never told a lie?”
Just then there was a step on the gravel path, and Geoffrey shrank back in his place, the old man looking at him mockingly.
“There she is,” he said.
“You knew she was coming,” cried Geoffrey, in a low voice.
“Not I, boy. I knew that, like the good angel she is, she comes to see poor Madge; and if you won’t have her, I think I shall propose for her myself.”
As he spoke the old man got up and went to meet the visitor, taking her hand, drawing it through his arm, and leading her into the summer-house, where she stood, pale as ashes, on seeing it occupied by Geoffrey Trethick.
“This is no doing of mine, Miss Penwynn,” said Geoffrey, sternly, making a movement towards the door.
“Stop a minute, Trethick,” said the old man. “I must go in first and find whether Madge can see Miss Penwynn.”
They heard his step upon the gravel, and the stones flying; as he stamped down his cane, and then they stood in silence looking in each other’s eyes.
Geoffrey was the first to speak, and it was in a bitter, angry voice that he exclaimed, —
“I never thought to have stood face to face with you again; but as we have met, Rhoda Penwynn, ask my pardon.”
Rhoda’s eyes flashed angrily, but the look was subdued on the instant by one that was full of emotion, and, with half-closed eyes, she joined her hands together, and was about to sink upon her knees, but Geoffrey caught her arms and stopped her.
“No,” he said, sharply; “I do not ask you to degrade yourself. Ask my pardon.”
“Forgive me, Geoffrey; my love for you had made me mad.”
Anger, bitterness, determination, promises never to speak, all were gone like a flash of light as Geoffrey Trethick heard those words; and Rhoda Penwynn was clasped tightly to his breast.
The next moment – minute – hour – it might have been either for aught the occupants of the little look-out knew – they became aware of the presence of Mr Paul, who stood in the open doorway, leaning upon his cane.
“Well, Trethick,” he said, mockingly, “when are you going away?”
“Heaven knows,” cried Geoffrey. “When I have turned Cornwall upside down, I think.”
“Hah!” ejaculated the old man, quietly, as he looked from one to the other. “It’s a wonderful thing this love. It’s all right, then, now?”
As he spoke he took Rhoda’s hand, and patted it. “I’m very glad, my dear,” he said, tenderly, “very glad, for he’s a good, true fellow, though he has got a devil of a temper of his own. Now go in and see poor Madge, and I wish you could put some of the happiness I can read in those eyes into her poor dark breast.”
He kissed her hand as he led her to the house with all the courtly delicacy of a gentleman of the old school; while, unable to believe in the change, Geoffrey walked up and down the little summer-house like a wild beast in a cage:
He was interrupted by the return of Uncle Paul, who took his seat and looked at the young man in a half-smiling, half-contemptuous fashion.
“Laugh away,” cried Geoffrey. “I don’t mind it a bit.”
“I’m not laughing at you, boy. But there, light your cigar again, or take a fresh one. I want to talk to you.”
Geoffrey obeyed. He would have done any thing the old man told him then, and they sat smoking in silence, Geoffrey’s ears being strained to catch the murmurs of a voice he knew, as it came from an open window, for Rhoda was reading by the invalid’s couch.
“There, never mind her now,” said the old man. “Look here, do you know that she won’t have a penny?”
“I sincerely hope not,” said Geoffrey.
“And you’ve got none,” said the old man. “How are you going to manage?”
“Set to work again now that I have something to work for,” cried Geoffrey, jumping up and again beginning to pace the summer-house.
“Sit down, stupid, and do husband some of that vitality of yours. You’ll drive me mad if you go on in that wild-beast way.”
Geoffrey laughed.
“Ah, that’s better,” said the old man. “I haven’t seen that grin upon your face for months. But now look here, boy, what are you thinking of doing?”
“I don’t know,” said Geoffrey. “A hundred things. First of all I shall try once more to hunt out the people who bought Wheal Carnac, and see if they will take me on.”
“What, to lose their money?”
“No, sir, but to make money for them.”
“Then you don’t know who bought it?”
“No; I tried the agents in town, but they were close as could be.”
“Of course,” said the old man. “They were told to be. He did not want it known.”
“How do you know?” said Geoffrey.
“Because I told them.”
“Then you know who bought the mine?”
“Well, yes, of course. It was I.”
Geoffrey’s cigar dropped from his hand, and he sank back, staring.
“Do you know what you have done?” he cried.
“Yes, made a fool of myself, I suppose; but I thought I’d have it, and you shall realise all you can for me out of the place. I got it very cheaply. Perhaps I shall build a house there – if I live.”
“Build! House!” cried Geoffrey. “Why, if old Prawle is right, the mine is rich in copper to a wonderful extent.”
“And the water?”
“Can easily be led away.”
“Then take it, my boy, and do with it the best you can,” said the old man. “I bought it for the merest song, and money has ceased to have any charms for me.”
“Mr Paul!”
“Geoffrey, my dear boy, I’ve never forgotten those words of yours. You said you were sure that I had a soft spot in my hearty and – God bless you, my lad!” – cried the old man fervently, “you were about the only one, with your frank, bluff way, who could touch it. I’d have given you something, Geoffrey, if you could have married Madge; but there, that’s over, and I’m only an old fool after all.”
