Lochinvar: A Novel

When he had ordered them for the third time to bend the foresail, Scarlett turned on him and very curtly bade him do it himself and look spry. Jan, the self-satisfied one, could scarce believe his ears. He felt astounded, his pipe went out, his jaw began to fall and his mouth to open as it had done while he listened to Scarlett's eloquence on the shore.

But Scarlett was in a different mood this time. He simply repeated his advice in a louder tone.

Then Wise Jan Pettigrew grew sulky and pointedly declined, asserting that he had not come upon this particular cruise for the purpose of pulling ropes with two greenhorns to do it for him. As the words left his mouth he felt something cold touch his right temple. He turned rapidly, and the movement brought his entire cheek against the cold bell mouth of a horse-pistol. The self-satisfaction flickered out of his face. His gin-reddened cheek whitened to chalk, and he began to tremble violently in all his limbs.

"Get up and bend the foresail without a word more!" quoth Scarlett, sternly, "and remember for the remainder of this cruise you will do very precisely as you are bid."

Jan, being upon compulsion really wise, instantly and without a murmur complied. In a minute the foresail was properly bent and also a little square-sail in the stern – which last had a great effect in steadying the boat in the cross winds which were now whipping the tops off the waves and driving the spray over the boat, as they sat under the shelter of the windward side.

Presently Scarlett began to explain the situation to Jan Pettigrew. He told him that though he must be ready to work the boat in all matters of seamanship, yet both of the others would assist him to the best of their ability. He must, however, be willing to go where they wished and to obey their orders. In the event of their cruise being successful he was to receive ten gold pieces. And even if it were not, in the event of his proving faithful and silent, he should have five for his pains – which was a great deal more than he would have received on many voyages from Captain Smith of the Sea Unicorn.

At first Jan lay sulkily enough in the bow of the boat and pretended to pay no attention to Scarlett's words. But presently he grumbled, "How can I or any man take a boat to England without so much as a compass or a chart?"

"That is not my business," said Scarlett; "it is surely a strange seaman that cannot keep a boat to its course for a few miles by the stars. All I know is that if you do it not I shall be compelled most reluctantly to blow your brains out, and let your carcass drop overboard to feed the fishes."

He pronounced this in so matter-of-fact a voice that the lad came instantly aft, and began to search carefully in the side lockers and drawers. Two of these were locked and had to be opened with the blade of Scarlett's dagger. Wat cut away part of the wood round the wards of the lock, into which aperture Jan inserted an iron spike that lay in the bottom of the boat, whereupon the locks gave sharply in both cases. In one compartment was a small compass, and in the other a sheaf of charts.

* * * * *

When the morning broke on the third day of their cruise a long, low island was in sight immediately in front. Then a flat coast with rolling country stretched away behind, with many woods shining palely green, and looking newly washed as the morning sun sucked the night dews from the leaves. An ancient castle stood gray and stern on the left, and far to the right the tower of a noble church took the sun and gleamed like the white sail of a ship.

Wise Jan Pettigrew, who had long since composed himself to all his duties and become the devoted slave of Jack Scarlett (whom his eyes followed with a kind of rapt adoration), pointed with his finger.

"Branksea!" he cried, with pride both in voice and gesture.

And indeed he had some reason for self-congratulation. For the cross channel voyage in an open boat, together with a long trip down the coast, had not often been so successfully undertaken.

Keeping the boat well to the left, they rounded a low spit of shingle and turned in sharply towards a tiny landing-place, from which a neat path extended up into the woods.

A flag was flying among the trees and making a splash of brave color among the greenery.

CHAPTER XXIV

MADCAP MEHITABEL

The long-boat grated on the beach and Wise Jan was the first ashore. Scarlett and Wat disembarked in more leisurely fashion, and stretched themselves luxuriously after their long and cramped boat voyage.

They were employing themselves in taking out of the stern such articles as they had stowed there, when a challenging voice rang out clear and high from the woods above.

"Jan Pettigrew! Jan Pettigrew!" it cried, "what do you here with our long-boat? Why are you not in the Low Countries, making love to the little Dutch maids with faces like flat-irons?"

"No, they ain't neither," cried Wise Jan, apparently not at all astonished, making a face in the direction of his unseen querist; "they're a sight better-looking than you be – and they comb their hair!"

He looked apologetically at Scarlett.

"Heed her not," he said, in a low voice, "'tis but crosspatch Mehitabel Smith, our master's daughter. He has spoilt her by sparing of the wand to beat her with when she was young, and now that she is grown – and well grown, too – she will be forever climbing trees and crying uncivil words to decent folk as they go by, and all, as she counts it, for merriment and mischief-making."

"Ah, Jan! Wise Jan Pettigrew," the voice went on, "Jan that drank the cow's milk and gave the calf water, because it was better for its stomach – you are right early astir. And who are the brisk lads with you? I know not that my father will be pleased to see strangers on Branksea. Hold up your head, Jan, and learn to answer a lady civilly. You have surely forgot or mislaid all the manners you ever had. Shut your mouth, Jan – I do advise it; and do not, I pray you, so mump with your chin and wamble with your legs!"

"Madcap!" cried Jan, stung by the pointed allusions to his defects of person, "my legs are as straight as yours be, and serve me well, albeit I wrap them not, as women do, in clouts and petticoats. And at least if my legs are crooked and my jaw slack my eyes are straight set in my head."

"And if eyes do look two ways," retorted the voice out of the unseen, "'tis only with trying to keep them on the antics of both Jan Pettigrew's legs at once; for your knees do so knock together like Spanish castanets, and your legs so jimble-jamble in their sockets, that 'tis as good as a puppet-with-strings dancing at the fair just to watch 'em!"

Jan looked still more apologetically at Scarlett.

"I am black ashamed," he said; "but, after all, she means no harm by it. She has never had any one to teach her religion or good manners, but has run wild here on Branksea among the goats and the ignorant sailormen."

"I hear thee, Wise Jan," cried the voice again; "tell no lying tales on your betters, or I in my turn will tell the tale of how Wise Jan went to Portsmouth – how the watch bade him go in and bathe, because that the lukewarm town's-water was good for warts. And when he had gone in, glad at heart to hear the marvel, being exceedingly warty, the watch stole his clothes, and then put him a week in Bridewell for walking of the streets without them in sight of the admiral's mother-in-law!"

"'Tis a lie!" shouted Jan, looking up from the boat, out of which he had carefully extracted all the various belongings he had brought with him; "a great and manifest lie it is! It was, as all men know, for fighting with six sailormen of the fleet that I was shut up in Bridewell."

"Wise Jan, Wise Jan, think upon what parson says concerning the day of judgment!" replied the voice, reproachfully. "For if thus you deny your true doings and confess them not, you will set all the little devils down below to the carrying of firewood to be ready against the day of your hanging."

Wise Jan did not deign to reply. He resigned the unequal wordy fray, and taking a back-load of stuff on his shoulders, he led the way up the neatly gravelled path, which wound from the little wooden landing-stage into the green and arching woods.

As Scarlett and Wat followed after and looked about them with much interest, a tall maid, clad in a blue skirt and figured blouse, and with her short tangles of hair blowing loose about her ears, dropped suddenly and lightly as a brown squirrel upon the path before them. Whereat Wat and Scarlett stopped as sharply as if a gun had been loosed off at them; for the girl had handed herself unceremoniously down from among the leaves, and there she stood right in their path, as little disconcerted as if that were the customary method of receiving strangers upon the Isle of Branksea.

"I bid you welcome, gentlemen," she said, bowing to them like a courteous boy of the court. Indeed, her kirtle was not much longer than many a boy's Sunday coat, and her hair, cropped short and very curly, had a boy's cap set carelessly upon the back of it.

Scarlett stared vaguely at the pleasant apparition.

"The Lord have mercy!" he said, as if to himself; "is this another of them? 'Tis indeed high time we found that runaway love."

But Wat Gordon, to whom courtesy to women came by nature, placed himself before the old soldier. He had his cap in his hand and bowed right gracefully. Scarlett might cozen Wise Jan an he liked; but he, Wat Gordon, at least knew better how to speak to a woman than did any ancient Mustache of the Wars.

"My Lady of the Isle," he said, in the manner of the time, "I thank you for your most courteous and unexpected welcome. We are two exiles from Holland, escaping from prison. This good gentleman of yours has helped us to set our feet again upon the shores of Britain, and in return we have aided him to restore his master's property."

The girl listened with her head at the side, like a bird making up its mind whether or not to fly. When Wat was half-way through with his address she yawned.

"That is a long sermon and very dull," she said; "one might almost as well have been in church. Come to breakfast."

So, much crestfallen, Wat followed meekly in the wake of Scarlett, whose shoulders were shaking at the downfall of the squire of dames. At the corner of the path, just where it opened out upon a made road of beaten earth, Jack Scarlett turned with the obvious intention of venturing a facetious remark, but Wat met him in the face with a snarl so fierce that for peace' sake he thought better of it and relapsed into covertly smiling silence.

"If you crack so much as one of your rusty japes upon me, Jack Scarlett, I declare I'll set the point of my knife in your fat back!" he said, viciously.

And for the rest of the way Scarlett laughed inwardly, while Wat followed, plodding along sullenly and in an exceedingly evil temper.

The house to which they went was a curious one for the time and country. It was built wholly of wood, with eaves that came down five or six feet over the walls, so that they formed a continuous shelter all about the house, very pleasant in hot weather. A wooden floor, scrubbed very white and with mats of foreign grasses and straw upon it, went all around under these wide eaves. Twisted shells, shining stones, and many other remarkable and outlandish curiosities were set in corners or displayed in niches.

At the outer door the girl turned sharply upon them.

"My name is Mehitabel Smith," she said, "and this is my father's house. I like your looks well enough, but I would also know your degree and your business. For Branksea is for the nonce in my keeping, and that you have come with Wise Jan Pettigrew is no recommendation – since, indeed, the creature takes up with every wastrel and run-the-country he can pick up."

Wat had not got over the rebuff of his first introduction, and sulkily declined to speak; but Scarlett hastened to assure Mistress Mehitabel of the great consideration Wat and he enjoyed both at home and abroad.

"And for what were you in prison in Holland?" she said. "Was he in prison?" she continued, without waiting for any answer, looking at Wat.

Scarlett nodded. He had it on the tip of his tongue to say that it had been owing to a brawl in a tavern. But at the last moment, seeing Wat's dejected countenance, he made a little significant gesture of drawing his hand across his throat.