Moonfleet

by John Meade Falkner

  CHAPTER 17

  AT YMEGUEN

  As if a thief should steal a tainted vest,Some dead man's spoil, and sicken of his pest--_Hood_

  'Tis bitterer to me than wormwood the memory of what followed, and Ishall tell the story in the fewest words I may. We were cast into prison,and lay there for months in a stone cell with little light, and only foulstraw to lie on. At first we were cut and bruised from that tussle andcudgelling in Aldobrand's house, and it was long before we were recoveredof our wounds, for we had nothing but bread and water to live on, andthat so bad as barely to hold body and soul together. Afterwards theheavy fetters that were put about our ankles set up sores and galled usso that we scarce could move for pain. And if the iron galled my flesh,my spirit chafed ten times more within those damp and dismal walls; yetall that time Elzevir never breathed a word of reproach, though it was mywilfulness had led us into so terrible a strait.

  At last came our jailer, one morning, and said that we must be brought upthat day before the _Geregt_, which is their Court of Assize, to be triedfor our crime. So we were marched off to the court-house, in spite ofsores and heavy irons, and were glad enough to see the daylight oncemore, and drink the open air, even though it should be to our death thatwe were walking; for the jailer said they were like to hang us for whatwe had done. In the court-house our business was soon over, because therewere many to speak against us, but none to plead our cause; and all beingdone in the Dutch language I understood nothing of it, except whatElzevir told me afterwards.

  There was Mr. Aldobrand in his black gown and buckled shoes withtip-tilted heels, standing at a table and giving evidence: How that oneafternoon in August came two evil-looking English sailors to his houseunder pretence of selling a diamond, which turned out to be but a lump ofglass: and that having taken observation of all his dwelling, and moreparticularly the approaches to his business-room, they went their ways.But later in the same day, or rather night, as he sat matching togethercertain diamonds for a coronet ordered by the most illustrious the HolyRoman Emperor, these same ill-favoured English sailors burst suddenlythrough shutters and window, and made forcible entry into hisbusiness-room. There they furiously attacked him, wrenched the diamondfrom his hand, and beat him within an ace of his life. But by the goodProvidence of God, and his own foresight, the window was fitted with acertain alarm, which rang bells in other parts of the house. Thus histrusty servants were summoned, and after being themselves attacked andnearly overborne, succeeded at last in mastering these scurvy ruffiansand handing them over to the law, from which Mr. Aldobrand claimedsovereign justice.

  Thus much Elzevir explained to me afterwards, but at that time whenthat pretender spoke of the diamond as being his own, Elzevir cut inand said in open court that 'twas a lie, and that this precious stonewas none other than the one that we had offered in the afternoon, whenAldobrand had said 'twas glass. Then the diamond merchant laughed, andtook from his purse our great diamond, which seemed to fill the placewith light and dazzled half the court. He turned it over in his hand,poising it in his palm like a great flourishing lamp of light, andasked if 'twas likely that two common sailor-men should hawk a stonelike that. Nay more, that the court might know what daring rogues theyhad to deal with, he pulled out from his pocket the quittance given himby Shalamof the Jew of Petersburg, for this same jewel, and showed itto the judge. Whether 'twas a forged quittance or one for some otherstone we knew not, but Elzevir spoke again, saying that the stone wasours and we had found it in England. When Mr. Aldobrand laughed again,and held the jewel up once more: were such pebbles, he asked, found onthe shore by every squalid fisherman? And the great diamond flashed ashe put it back into his purse, and cried to me, 'Am I not queen of allthe diamonds of the world? Must I house with this base rascal?' but Iwas powerless now to help.

  After Aldobrand, the serving-men gave witness, telling how they hadtrapped us in the act, red-handed: and as for this jewel, they had seentheir master handle it any time in these six months past.

  But Elzevir was galled to the quick with all their falsehoods, and burstout again, that they were liars and the jewel ours; till a jailer whostood by struck him on the mouth and cut his lip, to silence him.

  The process was soon finished, and the judge in his red robes stood upand sentenced us to the galleys for life; bidding us admire the mercyof the law to Outlanders, for had we been but Dutchmen, we should surehave hanged.

  Then they took and marched us out of court, as well as we could walk forfetters, and Elzevir with a bleeding mouth. But as we passed the placewhere Aldobrand sat, he bows to me and says in English, 'Your servant,Mr. Trenchard. I wish you a good day, Sir John Trenchard--of Moonfleet,in Dorset.' The jailer paused a moment, hearing Aldobrand speak to usthough not understanding what he said, so I had time to answer him:

  'Good day, Sir Aldobrand, Liar, and Thief; and may the diamond bring youevil in this present life, and damnation in that which is to come.'

  So we parted from him, and at that same time departed from our libertyand from all joys of life.

  We were fettered together with other prisoners in droves of six, ourwrists manacled to a long bar, but I was put into a different gang fromElzevir. Thus we marched a ten days' journey into the country to a placecalled Ymeguen, where a royal fortress was building. That was a wearymarch for me, for 'twas January, with wet and miry roads, and I hadlittle enough clothes upon my back to keep off rain and cold. On eitherside rode guards on horseback, with loaded flint-locks across thesaddlebow, and long whips in their hands with which they let fly at anylaggard; though 'twas hard enough for men to walk where the mud was overthe horses' fetlocks. I had no chance to speak to Elzevir all thejourney, and indeed spoke nothing at all, for those to whom I was chainedwere brute beasts rather than men, and spoke only in Dutch to boot.

  There was but little of the building of the fortress begun when wereached Ymeguen, and the task that we were set to was the digging of thetrenches and other earthworks. I believe that there were five hundred menemployed in this way, and all of them condemned like us to galley-workfor life. We were divided into squads of twenty-five, but Elzevir wasdrafted to another squad and a different part of the workings, so I sawhim no more except at odd times, now and again, when our gangs met, andwe could exchange a word or two in passing.

  Thus I had no solace of any company but my own, and was driven tothinking, and to occupy my mind with the recollection of the past. And atfirst the life of my boyhood, now lost for ever, was constantly presenteven in my dreams, and I would wake up thinking that I was at schoolagain under Mr. Glennie, or talking in the summer-house with Grace, orclimbing Weatherbeech Hill with the salt Channel breeze singing throughthe trees. But alas! these things faded when I opened my eyes, and knewthe foul-smelling wood-hut and floor of fetid straw where fifty of us layin fetters every night; I say I dreamt these things at first, but bydegrees remembrance grew blunted and the images less clear, and eventhese sweet, sad visions of the night came to me less often. Thus lifebecame a weary round, in which month followed month, season followedseason, year followed year, and brought always the same eternalprofitless-work. And yet the work was merciful, for it dulled the bitingedge of thought, and the unchanging evenness of life gave wings to time.

  In all the years the locusts ate for me at Ymeguen, there is but onething I need speak of here. I had been there a week when I was loosed onemorning from my irons, and taken from work into a little hut apart, wherethere stood a half-dozen of the guard, and in the midst a stout woodenchair with clamps and bands. A fire burned on the floor, and there was afume and smoke that filled the air with a smell of burned meat. My heartmisgave me when I saw that chair and fire, and smelt that sickly smell,for I guessed this was a torture room, and these the torturers waiting.They forced me into the chair and bound me there with lashings and acramp about the head; and then one took a red-iron from the fire upon thefloor, and tried it a little way from his hand to prove the heat. I hadscrewed up my heart to bear the pain as best I might,
but when I saw thatiron sighed for sheer relief, because I knew it for only a branding tool,and not the torture. And so they branded me on the left cheek, settingthe iron between the nose and cheek-bone, where 'twas plainest to beseen. I took the pain and scorching light enough, seeing that I hadlooked for much worse, and should not have made mention of the thing hereat all, were it not for the branding mark they used. Now this mark was a'Y', being the first letter of Ymeguen, and set on all the prisoners thatworked there, as I found afterwards; but to me 'twas much more than amere letter, and nothing less than the black 'Y' itself, or _cross-pall_of the Mohunes. Thus as a sheep is marked, with his owner's keel and canbe claimed wherever he may be, so here was I branded with the keel ofthe Mohunes and marked for theirs in life or death, whithersoever Ishould wander. 'Twas three months after that, and the mark healed andwell set, that I saw Elzevir again; and as we passed each other in thetrench and called a greeting, I saw that he too bore the _cross-pall_full on his left cheek.

  Thus years went on and I was grown from boy to man, and that no weak oneeither: for though they gave us but scant food and bad, the air was freshand strong, because Ymeguen was meant for palace as well as fortress, andthey chose a healthful site. And by degrees the moats were dug, andramparts built, and stone by stone the castle rose till 'twas near thefinish, and so our labour was not wanted. Every day squads of ourfellow-prisoners marched away, and my gang was left till nearly last,being engaged in making good a culvert that heavy rains had broken down.

  It was in the tenth year of our captivity, and in the twenty-sixth of myage, that one morning instead of the guard marching us to work, theyhanded us over to a party of mounted soldiers, from whose matchlocks andlong whips I knew that we were going to leave Ymeguen. Before we left,another gang joined us, and how my heart went out when I saw Elzeviramong them! It was two years or more since we had met even to pass agreeting, for I worked outside the fortress and he on the great towerinside, and I took note his hair was whiter and a sadder look upon hisface. And as for the _cross-pall_ on his cheek, I never thought of it atall, for we were all so well used to the mark, that if one bore it notstamped upon his face we should have stared at him as on a man born withbut one eye. But though his look was sad, yet Elzevir had a kind smileand hearty greeting for me as he passed, and on the march, when theyserved out our food, we got a chance to speak a word or two together.Yet how could we find room for much gladness, for even the pleasure ofmeeting was marred because we were forced thus to take note, as it were,of each other's misery, and to know that the one had nothing for his oldage but to break in prison, and the other nothing but the prison to eataway the strength of his prime.

  Before long, all knew whither we were bound, for it leaked out we wereto march to the Hague and thence to Scheveningen, to take ship to thesettlements of Java, where they use transported felons on the sugarfarms. Was this the end of young hopes and lofty aims--to live and die aslave in the Dutch plantations? Hopes of Grace, hopes of seeingMoonfleet again, were dead long long ago; and now was there to be nohope of liberty, or even wholesome air, this side the grave, but onlyburning sun and steaming swamps, and the crack of the slave-driver'swhip till the end came? Could it be so? Could it be so? And yet whathelp was there, or what release? Had I not watched ten years for anygleam or loophole of relief, and never found it? If we were shut incells or dungeons in the deepest rock we might have schemed escape, buthere in the open, fettered up in-droves, what could we do? They werebitter thoughts enough that filled my heart as I trudged along the roughroads, fettered by my wrist to the long bar; and seeing Elzevir's whitehair and bowed shoulders trudging in front of me, remembered when thathead had scarce a grizzle on it, and the back was straight as themassive stubborn pillars in old Moonfleet church. What was it hadbrought us to this pitch? And then I called to mind a July evening,years ago, the twilight summer-house and a sweet grave voice that said,'Have a care how you touch the treasure: it was evilly come by and willbring a curse with it.' Ay, 'twas the diamond had done it all, andbrought a blight upon my life, since that first night I spent inMoonfleet vault; and I cursed the stone, and Blackbeard and his lostMohunes, and trudged on bearing their cognizance branded on my face.

  We marched back to the Hague, and through that very street whereAldobrand dwelt, only the house was shut, and the board that bore hisname taken away; so it seemed that he had left the place or else wasdead. Thus we reached the quays at last, and though I knew that I wasleaving Europe and leaving all hope behind, yet 'twas a delight to smellthe sea again, and fill my nostrils with the keen salt air.