The Great Captain Part 2

Then after a few minutes of silence he went on:

"Your secret is left to no such blind chance as may befall such an one as I. If aught happen to me, Master Boyle holds it safe, and will reveal it in proper time."

"You will not tell me?" I broke out.

"To have it known would bring me some steps nearer the Tower," he said, "and I wend that way already."

"Then keep it silent forever," I cried out.

"Nay; that would be hardly fair to you. Besides, you forget that Master Boyle hath it."

"I like not Master Boyle."

"Nor do I, overmuch, Wat. He is one of your still, secret men, with the lawyer's craft and cunning. What should there be between us?"

"I hate his peaked face and his yellow eyes, and the way he hath of watching you and peering like a cat that sees in the dark."

"You are hard on Master Boyle, Wat. There is too much of the lawyer in him, and he treads soft as a cat. Yet there is a man behind his greed and his cunning. He is better framed for times like these than such an one as I. I could never walk warily."

"He has your secret and can use it against you."

"He would do me no more harm than beggar me if he might so enrich himself. My head would be no use to him, little Wat."

"'Tis a poor warranty for holding a secret," said I, bitterly.

"I am well-disposed to Master Boyle," my lord went on. "He is a man of substance, Wat, and a useful friend for one like myself, who can keep nothing. We shall not pluck the jewels from the gold-trees of Guiana without money and s.h.i.+ps. I am nearly sucked dry, and the Queen hath lost faith in me."

Then I knew that my lord was not so contented as he had seemed of late, and that further voyages were afoot. In the joy and excitement of the prospect I forgot to fret about my namelessness. Besides, my lord knew that I was n.o.ble; and Master Boyle knew it, and treated me with a consideration which should have won my regard if it were not that I distrusted his dealings with my lord.

And as the autumn of that year came on I noticed that my lord ceased to care for his gardens and orchards and plantations, and would be forever poring over maps and charts, and had long conversations with the master of the Bon Aventure, which good s.h.i.+p lay yet in Youghall Harbor, and the master did seem nigh as weary of idleness as Sir Walter himself. And sometimes he had Master Boyle privily. Indeed, though I speak of him as Master Boyle, 'tis from old habit; for about this time he had been created my Lord Boyle for his services to the Queen's Majesty in the better governance of Ireland.

At last the word came that we were to sail; and it was as if the quiet, sleeping town of Youghall had started awake. Such a burnis.h.i.+ng of arms and armor; such a getting out of old materials of war; such a polis.h.i.+ng of decks and making of sails and mounting of guns on the good s.h.i.+p Bon Aventure as never was known. All day long the singing of the sailors in the harbor floated to us through the still air. And my lord's swarthy face smiled once again as I had known it when I was a little lad, before he was like a led eagle that is chained beyond hopping a little way.

My Lord Boyle had found us the funds; so much I knew, but liked him no better. The evening before we were to sail there was a great banquet, and many gentlemen came even from so far off as Dublin to wish the Great Captain G.o.dspeed. We were to sail at blink of the morning star, and there was to be no sleeping for us till we were on s.h.i.+pboard. Never have I seen my lord but once so magnificently clad. His doublet was of white silk, so sewn with diamonds that the silk was hardly to be seen. His hose were of white silk, his trunk-hose of silk with slas.h.i.+ngs of gold.

Over one shoulder he wore a short cloak of yellow velvet clasped with diamonds; and the rosettes of his shoes were a blaze of diamonds. Seeing his face in the midst of such splendor I marvelled how the Queen could harden her heart against him-for never have I seen him in any a.s.semblage, however honorable, that he did not make the other gentlemen seem mean and dull beside him.

When the gayety was at its highest and he feared not to be missed, I saw him slip from the table with my Lord Boyle, and retire with him into the oriel. The banquet had been set in the oriel-chamber because it was lighter and more s.p.a.cious.

When my lord had left the table I too went away. Looking at the horologe my lord had given me, I saw that it lacked yet two hours of the time when we should be aboard.

I went down stairs to the lower chamber, which was dark and silent. Once more I thought I should endeavor to find the secret way through which the death-damp came, and my midnight visitor of more than a year ago. If he had sought me since he had not found me, for I had avoided being alone there since that night.

There was neither moonlight nor rushlight in the room, so that I could only grope with my fingers for the secret the panel must contain. For some time I groped in vain. Then my nails seemed to have found a crack in the wood, a mere notch in which they fitted. It gave me no promise, for the oak had warped here and there, and had left a few furrows. I was sure I had been over all the place before, yet now as I drew a little way the whole panel began to move. I did not know then, nor could I see, the cunning by which that door was devised so that none should discover it. I have said that the chamber was quite dark.

Feeling now before me with my hands, I found a vacant square wide enough for one to creep through. Through it the wind blew strongly, and it was a cold, earthy, evil-smelling wind, such as I knew full well. Where might it lead? There was a report amongst us that the house had secret ways to the harbor; but it was no honest sea-wind, however confined and far from its source, that blew my way, but something far more villanous.

I know not how it was that I seemed to forget that in less than two hours we must embark. The present adventure held me to the exclusion of all else. I stepped within the narrow pa.s.sageway-crept within it, for I had to go on hands and knees. I had no light nor aught else to guide me; but if I thought at all it was that if the monk could come this way in safety, I could go as he had come. But to leave a gaping panel was not in my thoughts. Having entered I drew the panel to. Then feeling with my hands I came upon a lock. Had I moved it by my touch, or had it been left unlocked of design? There was no time for answering of riddles, and having pushed the panel to I turned to pursue the adventure.

CHAPTER IV.-THE DEAD HAND.

After a little I found that I could stand upright in the pa.s.sage.

Stretching up my hands I could feel a solid roof above my head. The walls on either side of me were of earth, held back by stout balks of timber. If one were to give way the pa.s.sage had been a grave indeed; but so far as I could feel with my feet the clay had not fallen at all. Else indeed there could not have been so much air in the pa.s.sage as to give me breath; and I breathed freely enough, albeit with a certain oppression, and a loathing of the dank smells.

For a time the pa.s.sage went down into the bowels of the earth as it seemed to me. I guessed by the direction it took from the dining-hall that it must grope under the graveyard-and thinking on this I realized how that indeed the wind that blew from it was a wind of death. And at that time I was too ignorant and too vain to rebuke myself by the thought that this was a burying-place of saints.

Presently my foot stumbled against a step, and much relieved I was to find on ascending it that there was another step and yet another; for I liked not this burrowing among graves like the mole; and the steps seemed to promise a speedy end to my journey. Taking them in the dark there seemed to me a prodigious number of them; yet I was not gone very far when I perceived agreeably a lightening and sweetening of the air. I could have taken but a little while in coming, for I had met with no obstacles; yet it seemed long since the time I had plunged into that pit of blackness ere I came up against a stout door, with a grating in it, designed no doubt to give air to the pa.s.sage.

To my great joy it was held only by a latch, and even before I had made this happy discovery I felt the sweet air of heaven blow into my face; and I think I never before knew how sweet it tasted.

Undoing the latch and drawing the door to me I stepped within a stone tower. The moon had arisen on the eastward side of the tower, and looking through the crumbling lancet window I saw below me, serene and beautiful, the quiet, terraced graveyard of St. Mary's.

I could have laughed aloud to think that the journey had seemed to me so long. In truth it had occupied some five minutes, as I discovered, holding my horologe to the moon, and had not occupied so long if it were not for my groping and pausing.

But the floor was solid under my feet. I had to think a minute before I knew where I was. I was in that blind tower of St. Mary's to the eastward corner, in the bas.e.m.e.nt whereof were deposited the brooms and pails for cleaning of the church.

Playing hide and seek therein with a boy's irreverence I had marvelled why, since the tower was blind-nothing but a roof of stone above the chamber-that they should have troubled to pierce it with lancets like any honest belfry. The upper portion of the tower was in ruins, as you could see from the graveyard without. Ah, and so the blind tower had its uses; as a hiding-place it might be for some one who had lived in the Manor-house in old wild days. For, as to any manner of egress from the tower, that I could not see at all.

The chamber where I stood was full of the drifted leaves and the nests of birds. Except for the shaft of light from the lancet it was in blackness, and I began to wonder if the tower went no further.

I groped about the walls, however, till I came upon a staircase, which went up, not in the middle, as is usual in towers, but at one corner, so that each story formed a room.

'Twas three stories' climb to the upper room. Here it was that the ruin had befallen the tower; for where the lancet had been there was a great gap, and somewhat of the roof had fallen away.

I was now clear of the low trees, and the half-veiled moon looked within the chamber. Then I saw to my amazement that at the side of it, yet roofed over, there was a bed, a chair, a table, all of the rudest. But little of this I saw till afterwards, for on the bed lay the figure of that monk who had spoken with me, now nearly fifteen months ago.

His face was in shadow, yet I never thought for a moment that he slept.

One lean hand dangled from his great sleeve over the side of the bed; it hung helplessly; and young as I was I had looked on death often enough to know that this was the hand of the dead. The habit was composed decently about the figure. Either the monk had so composed himself for death or he had had some companion who had fled away leaving him to the eye of heaven.

Standing there, a great awe and compa.s.sion fell upon me. Something of yearning and tenderness afflicted me as though the dead man had been of my blood: the tears rushed from my eyes, and I trembled so that I was forced to my knees; yea, as though invisible hands had bent me. I knew little of praying, but something of wordless pet.i.tion to the Great Father of us all stirred in my dull and proud spirit. In that moment I had indeed the heart of a child.

When I had arisen from my knees I went to the side of the pallet and looked upon the sleeper's face. In the shadow it gleamed like polished ivory, and as I looked the moon, climbing higher, touched the still mouth with a sweet and sanctified light, making it as though it smiled.

I touched the hand that swung by the side of the pallet. It was scarcely cold. I knew not how I thought of such a thing, except that I was familiar with the knights and ladies who sleep in stone in St. Mary's Church, but I composed the sleeper's hands in the manner of Christ's cross upon his breast; and afterwards turned away from the patient, smiling mouth like one who hath sinned and been forgiven.

Then I did what I believed he would have me do: I made a search for any letters and papers he might have left; for I could not think he had left me ignorant of what he would have me know. I searched busily; and there were not many places wherein to look. There was nothing anywhere. But my search was not yet over till I had examined the monk's person. I went back to his side, and with a prayer to him for forgiveness, I groped gently in his habit for anything in the nature of papers, and doing so I felt his body to be by wasting scarcely greater than a child's. Yet 'twas not starvation, I knew, for a loaf of bread and a pitcher of water stood on the table.

I had not far to seek. The papers were within the folds of his habit, where they met upon his breast, and were confined with the claspings of his leathern belt.

I drew them forth and went to the full flood of the moonlight. By it I read the superscription:

"_To Walter Devereux Fitz-Hugo Fitz-Theobald Fitz-Maurice_"-

As I read it my heart leaped up. What a proud name it was, and telling of a glorious ancestry!

"-commonly known as Walter Munster, the ward and page of Sir Walter Raleigh."