CHAPTER XIV. A DRINK OF SHERBET
I took what handkerchiefs I could find into the pantry with me.
"There's no danger," I said. "The ship's all right. How are you
now? Let me give you some more brandy." I gave her a little more
brandy; then I helped her on to the top of the locker. Pouring
out some water into the basin I bathed the cut on her head. It
was a clean long cut which would probably have gone through the
bone had not her hair been so thick. I dressed it as well as I
could with balsam, then bound it tightly up with a white
handkerchief. The hand was a good deal more, difficult to manage;
it was nastily crushed; though no bones were broken. The wrist
was so much swollen that I had to cut open the sleeve of her
man's riding jacket. Then I bathed the hand with cold water mixed
with vinegar (which I had heard was cooling) till I felt that the
time had come to bandage it, so that the patient might lie down
to rest. She had been much shaken by her fall. I don't think it
ever once occurred to me to think of her as my enemy. I felt too
much pity for her, being hurt, like that. "Look here," I said.
"You'll have to wear that arm in a sling. I'll bandage it up for
you nicely." She bore my surgery like the hero she was; it didn't
look very wonderful when it was done; but she said that the pain
was a good deal soothed. That was not the end though. I had to
change cabins with her, since I could not let a hurt woman sleep
in that bunk in the pantry; she might so easily be flung from it
a second time. So I shifted her things into my cabin, where I
made all tidy for her. As for the precious slush can, I stowed
that carefully away, at the back of some lumber in one of the
pantry lockers, where it would not be found. Altogether, it took
me about twenty minutes to make everything ready, by which time
the little accident on deck had been forgotten, except by those
who had to do the work of sending up a new topmast; a job which
kept all hands busy all night. The ship was making a steady three
knots. under her reduced sail when I helped Aurelia across to her
new room. There was no more thought of danger.
As I paused at the cabin door, to ask if there was anything more
which I could do for her, the lady turned to me.
"What is your name?" she asked. I am ashamed to say that I
hesitated, being half inclined to give her a false name; for my
time of secret service had given me a thorough distrust of pretty
nearly everybody. She noticed my hesitation. "As a friend to
another friend," she added. "Life isn't all the King's service."
"My name is Martin Hyde," I said.
"Mine is Aurelia," she replied, "Aurelia Carew. Will you remember
that?" I told her that I should certainly remember that. "We seem
to have met before," she said, "more than once."
"Yes," I answered, smiling. She, too, smiled, but she quickly
became grave again.
"Mr. Martin Hyde," she said, with a little catch in her voice,
"we two are in opposite camps. But I don't know. After this, it's
difficult. I warn you." Here she stopped, quite unable to go on.
"I can't," she continued, more to herself than to me, "I can't.
They oughtn't to have put this on me. They oughtn't. They
oughtn't." She laid her unhurt hand on my shoulder for a moment.
"Let me warn you," she said earnestly, "that you're in danger."
"In danger from you?" I asked.
"Don't ask me more," she said, "I hate myself for telling you
even that. Oh, it's terrible to have to do it. Go now. Don't ask
me more. But I had to warn you. But I can't do it myself." I did
not know what to make of this; but I gathered that her task
(whatever it was) from which she had shrunk so bitterly in the
Dutch town only the night before, was now to be deputed to
another, probably to the captain, perhaps to the Dartmouth
justices. I did not like the thought; but I thanked her for
warning me, it was generous of her to warn me. I took out the
dagger with which she had tried to stab me. "You said we were in
opposite camps, Miss Carew," I said. "But I wouldn't like to keep
this. I mean I wouldn't like to think that we were enemies,
really." I daresay I said other foolish things as well, at the
same time.
"Yes, keep it," she said. "I couldn't bear to have it again. But
be warned. Don't trust me. While we're in opposite camps you be
warned. For I'm your enemy, then, when you least expect it."
Nothing much happened the next day until the evening, by which
time we were off the Isle of Wight. With the aid of the mate, I
doctored Aurelia's hand again; that was the only memorable event
of the day. In the evening, the captain (who had been moody from
his drunkenness of the night before) asked me to sing to him in
the great cabin. I was surprised at the request; but I knew a few
ballads, so I sang them to him. While I was singing, Aurelia
entered the cabin; she sat down on one of the lockers below the
great window. She looked very white, in the gloom there. She did
not speak to me; but sat there restlessly, coughing in a dry
hacking way, as though one of her ribs had been broken in the
fall. I lowered my voice when I noticed this, as I was afraid
that my singing might annoy her; I thought that she was suffering
from her wound. The captain told me to pipe up; as he couldn't
hear what my words were. I asked Aurelia if my singing worried
her; but instead of answering she left the cabin for a few
minutes. When she came back, she sat with her face in her hand,
seemingly in great pain. I sang all the ballads known to me. When
I had finished, the captain grunted a note of approval. "Well,"
he said, "so there's your ballads. That's your treat. Now you
shall have mine." A little gong hung in the cabin. He banged upon
it to summon his boy, who came in trembling, as he always did,
expecting to be beaten before he went out. "Bring in a jug of
cool water," he said. "Then fetch them limes I bought." As the
boy went out, the captain turned to me with a grin. "Did you ever
drink Turk's sherbet?" he said.
"No," I answered. "I've never even heard of it. What is it?"
"Why," he said, "it's a drink the heathen Turks make out of
citron. A powder which fizzes. I got some of it last autumn when
I made a voyage to Scanderoon. It's been too cold ever since to
want to drink any, as it's a summer drink mostly. Now you shall
have some." He took down some tumblers from the rack in which
they stood. "Here's glasses," he said. "Now the sherbet is in
this bottle here." He produced a pint glass bottle from one of
the lockers. It was stopped with a wooden plug, carved in the
likeness of a Turk's head. It was about three parts full of a
whitish powder. A label on the side of the bottle gave directions
for its preparation.
When the boy returned with his tray, the captain squeezed the
juice of half a lime into each of the three tumblers. "That's the
first thing," he said. "Lime juice. Now the water." He poured
water into each glass, till they were nearly full. "White of egg
is said to make it better," he said to me. "But at sea I guess we
must do without that. Now then. You're the singer, so you drink
first. Be ready to drink it while it fizzes; for then it's at its
best. Are you ready?" I was quite ready, so the captain filled
his spoon with the soft white powder. Glancing round at Aurelia I
saw that she had covered her eyes with her hand. "Won't Miss
Carew drink first?" I asked.
"I don't want any," she said in a low voice. Before I could speak
another word the captain had poured his heaped spoonful of powder
into my glass. "Stir it up, boy," he cried. "Down with it while
it fizzes." Aurelia rose to her feet, catching her breath
sharply.
I remember a pleasant taste, as though all of the fruits of the
world had been crushed together into a syrup; then a mist surged
all about me, the cabin became darker, the captain seemed to grow
vast, till his body filled the room. My legs melted from me. I
was one little wavering flame blowing about on great waves.
Something was hard upon my head. The captain's hand (I could
feel) was lifting my eyelid. I heard him say "That's got him."
Instantly a choir of voices began to chant "That's got him," in
roaring, tumultuous bursts of music. Then the music became, as it
were, present, but inaudible; there were waves of sound all round
me, but my ears were deafened to them. I had been put out of
action by some very powerful drug, I remember no more of that
evening's entertainment. I was utterly unconscious.
I came to, very sick, some time in the night. I was in the bunk
in the pantry; but far too helpless in my misery to rise, or to
take an account of time. I lay half-conscious till the morning,
when I fell into a deep sleep, which lasted, I may say, till the
evening; for I did not feel sufficiently awake to get up until
about half-past five. When I did get up, I felt so tottery that I
could hardly keep my feet. Someone, I supposed that it was
Aurelia, had placed a metal brandy flask, with a paper roll
containing hard-boiled eggs, on my wash-hand-stand. I took a gulp
of the brandy. In the midst of my sickness I remember the shame
of it; the shame of being drugged by those two; for I knew that I
had been drugged; the shame of having given up like that, at the
moment when I had the cards in my hand; all the cards. I was
locked into the pantry; all my clothes were gone. I found myself
dressed in a sailor's serge-shirt. All my other property had
vanished. I remember crying as I shook at the door to open it; it
was too strong for me, in my weak state. As I wrestled with the
door, I heard the dry rattling out of the cable. We had come to
anchor; we were in Dartmouth; perhaps in a few minutes I should
be going ashore. Looking through the port-hole, I saw a great
steep hill rising up from the water, with houses clinging to its
side, like barnacles on the side of a rock. I could see people
walking on the wharf. I could see a banner blowing out from a
flagstaff.
A few more gulps of brandy brought me to myself I was safe
anyhow; my cartridges had not been found. I dropped them one by
one into the metal-flask. Whatever happened, no one would look
for them there. Then I banged at the door again, trying to make
people hear. Nobody paid any attention to me; I might have spared
myself the trouble. Long afterwards, I learned that I was
detained while Captain Barlow spoke to a magistrate about me,
asking if I might be "questioned," that is, put to the
thumbscrews, till it could be learned whether I carried a verbal
message to my uncle, Mr. Blick. The magistrate to whom he first
applied was one of the Monmouth faction as it happened, so my
thumbs escaped; but I had a narrow escape later, as you shall
hear. About an hour after the ship came to anchor, the cabin-door
was opened by a sailor, who flung in an armful of clothes to me,
without speaking a word. They were mostly not my own clothes; the
boots were not mine; my own boots, I guessed, had been cut to
pieces in the letter-hunt. All the clothes which were mine had
had the seams ripped up. All my cartridges had been taken. About
half of my money was gone. The only things untouched were the
weapons in the belt. I laughed to myself to think how little
reward they had had for all their baseness. They had stooped to
the methods of the lowest kind of thieves, yet they had failed.
They had not found my letters. My joy was not very real; I was
too wretched for that. Looking back at it all long after, I think
that the hardest thing to bear was Aurelia's share in the work. I
had not thought that Aurelia would join in tricking me in that
way. But while I thought bitterly of her deceit, I thought of her
tears on the balcony in the Dutch city. After all, she had been
driven into it by that big bully of a man. I forgave her when I
thought of him; he was the cause of it all. A brute he must have
been to force her into such an action. Presently the mate came
down with orders to me to leave the ship at once. I asked him for
my own clothes; but he told me sharply to be thankful for what I
had, since I'd done no work to earn them; by work he meant the
brainless manual work done by people like himself. So going on
deck I called a boatman, who for twopence put me ashore on the
Kingswear side of the river. He gave me full directions for
finding Mr. Blick's house, telling me that in another five
minutes I should come to it, if I followed my nose. As I started
from the landing place I looked back at the barquentine, where I
had had so many adventures. She was lying at anchor at a little
distance from the Dartmouth landing place, making a fair show,
under her flag, in spite of her jury foretopmast. As I looked,
the boatman jogged my elbow, pointing across the river to the
strip of road which edges the stream. "A young lady waving to
you," he said. Sure enough a lady was waving to me. I supposed
that it was Aurelia, asking pardon, trying to show me that we
parted friends. I would not wave at first; I was surly; but after
about a minute I waved my hat to her. Then I set off up the road
to Mr. Blick's. Ten minutes later, I was in Mr. Blick's house,
telling him all that I have now told you.
Mr. Blick kept me in his house for a day or two less than four
weeks, when business took him to Exeter. I went with him; for he
gave out that he was taking me to school there, as his dead
sister had wished. His real reason was to pass the word through
the country that King Monmouth was coming. He was one of the few
men in full knowledge of the Duke's plans; but as we went about
from town to town, spreading the word among the faithful, I saw
that the Duke was expected by vast numbers of the country folk.
Our clients were not much among the gentry; they hung by
themselves, as, in this country, they always will, in times of
popular stir. But among the poorer people, such as small farmers,
or common labouring men, we were looked for as men sent from on
high. At more than one little quiet village, when we went into
the inn-parlour, we saw the men looking at us, half frightened,
half expectant, as though we, being strangers, must needs have
news of the King for whom they longed. Often some publican or
maltster would tell us that Gyle (their name for the unfortunate
Argyle, then a defeated man in Scotland, if not already put to
death for his rebellion) was taken, looking at us carefully as he
spoke, for fear lest we should be of the wrong side. Then, if we
seemed sympathetic, he would tell us how perhaps another would
have better luck elsewhere. After that, we would tell our news.
It was dangerous work, though, carrying that message across the
country. In many of the towns we found guards of the Devon red
regiment of militia. I am quite sure that if Mr. Blick had not
had me by his. side, as an excellent excuse for travelling to
Exeter, he would have been lodged in gaol as a suspicious
character. The soldiers had arrested many travellers already; the
gaols were full. King James's great man in those parts, the Earl
of Albemarle, knew very well that something was in the air; but
as he was a great lord the hearts of the poor were hidden from
him. He had no guess of what was planning. In a way, the Duke's
affairs were very well planned. The eastern end of Devon, all
Somerset, with the western end of Dorset, were all ripe to rise,
directly he appeared. They knew that he was coming; they were
prepared to join him; they knew at about what time he would come,
at about a fortnight from hay-harvest. Already, quite unknown to
the authorities, we had men picked out to carry the news of the
landing to different parts of the country. So far, I think, the
Duke's affairs were well planned. But though we had all this
enthusiasm in three counties, besides promises of similar risings
in London, we were in no real case to take the field. Our
adherents, however numerous, however brave, were only a mob, when
all is said; they were not an army. The Duke thought that the
regular army, or at least some regiments of it, would desert to
him, as happened some years later, when the great Prince William
did what my master attempted. But my master forgot that he had
neither the arms nor the officers to make his faction a likely
body for regular troops to join.
