Idonia: A Romance of Old London

by Arthur Frederick Wallis

  CHAPTER V

  PRINCIPALLY TELLS HOW SIR MATTHEW JUKE WAS CAST AWAY UPON THE HEBRIDES

  I awoke long before dawn on that memorable Wednesday which was to set aterm to my pleasant and not altogether idle life in the Combe. Yetearly as I had awakened, my father preceded me, and coming into myattic chamber where I had always slept in the tower, sat down by mybedside, fully dressed, while I was still rubbing the sleep out of myeyes. What passed betwixt us in that still hour I may not recount, butlet it suffice that it left me weeping. There be words spokensometimes that have the effect and impress of a passage of time, sopotently do they dissever us from the past, leading us into a suddenknowledge which by time only is generally acquired, and that painfully.Such an experience it was mine to gain then, so that my boyish folliesand the ignorant counterfeits which make up a boy's wisdom fell awaythe while my father discoursed gravely of this and that, and Imarvelled how I could ever have held such stock of vain opinions.Alas! for my presumption, and alas! too, that opinions as vain maybeset a man full as closely as a boy; and follies the more indecentthat they be wrought without ignorance.

  One thing I find it in my heart to speak of, because it exemplifies myfather's forbearance, though at a cost which he would well have spared.My uncle's name having been made mention of between us, my thoughtsflew from him to the mother I had never known, and in a luckless hour Idemanded whether my father had not any picture of her, that I mightcarry her image clear in my mind. His brow clouded as I begged thisfavour, and rising from his seat, he went to the window, where heseemed about to draw aside the shutters that closed it, but desisted.I could have bitten my tongue out for my imprudence, but could think ofno words to recover or mitigate it and so sat still, gazing upon histall figure all dim in the twilight, and wishing for my life that hewould refuse my request.

  But he did not. For with a strong motion he suddenly flung back theshutters, letting in the grey light, and turned upon me with a smile.

  "Why, that is a natural thing to desire, Denis," he said, "and one Iought to have thought to do without your asking." He put his hand intothe bosom of his doublet as he spoke, so that I certainly knew he hadworn her picture all these years against his heart. He plucked outpresently a little case of green leather clasped with silver, and ovalin shape, and, having first detached it from the silver chain by whichit was secured, he laid it in my hands and straightway left the room.

  'Twas a face very pale limned, in which there yet appeared eachminutest feature, hue, and lock of hair even, so ingeniously was alldone. Behind the face was a foil of plain blue to show it off; and soexact and perfect as the thing was, it lay in my palm no bigger than acrown piece. I examined it closely. There was a kind of pride in theeyes which looked at you direct, and the eyebrows descended a littleinwards towards the nose, as one sees them sometimes in a man thatbrooks not to be crossed, but seldom in a girl. Her mouth and chinwere small and shapely, yet otherwise of no particular account. Ijudged it to be the picture of one that saw swiftly and without fear,and moreover that the mere sight of things, and a quick apprehension ofthem, determined her actions. Somehow so (methought) looked thatscrupulous Saint that doubted his Lord without proof of vision; whereatcalling to mind his tardy and so great repentance, I felt a catch ofhope that my mother repented likewise, and by her repentance wasjustified.

  My father entering then, I gave up the locket, which he took from mequietly, saying it was by an Exeter youth that had since gone to Courtand painted many notable persons there; one N. Hillyard, whose fatherhad been High Sheriff of Exeter twenty years since, his mother being aLondon woman named Laurence Wall, and that the lady's father had been agoldsmith; moreover (which was singular) 'twas to one of the samefamily (I think a son) that I was directed to present my letters ofexchange. The hour then drawing towards the time I was to meet with myfather's friend, and there being many things to be attended to, Idressed hastily and was soon ready below, where I found my fatheragain, and Sprot, in the great hall, with my clothes and othernecessaries, which they bestowed in two or three deerskin wallets thatlay open on the floor. These were to go forward by the carrier, whoundertook to deliver them as far as to Devizes, whence I was to hiresuch means of carriage as seemed advisable, whether by sumpter-beastsor waggon, for the rest of my journey.

  A little after, and when I had taken breakfast, we heard a noise ofhorses in the forecourt, and knew it for Sir Matthew Juke, ofRoodwater, my companion, and his retinue. My father went at once tothe door and invited him in, but he would not dismount, he said,thinking indeed 'twas already time to set forward. He spoke in a quickpetulant fashion and was (as I since discovered) in a considerabletrepidation upon certain rumours of thieves in the wild country betwixtTaunton and Glastonbury, the which greatly daunted him. He wore acuirass over his doublet, and carried his sword loose in the scabbard,while his men bore their pieces in their hands openly. A wain with hisgoods in, that followed, had an especial guard; though they seemed tobe but mere patches spared from the farm, and I was assured, would havedropped their calivers and fled at the first onslaught.

  I was soon horsed, with a dozen hands to help, and a ring of womenbeyond, admiring and weeping and bidding me God speed; to whom Iaddressed myself, as I have said, with as much gratitude as littlemodesty; being strangely excited by the circumstance and noise whichattended our departure. I had a pair of great pistols in the holstersof my saddle which I could scarce forbear to flourish in either hand,and the sword at my belt delighted me no less, it being the first I hadyet worn.

  "'Tis the one you would have given to the cheat," my father had told meas he tightened my belt-strap. "But give it to none now, Denis, nordraw it not, save in defence of yourself (as I pray God you need drawit seldom), and of such as, but for you, be defenceless."

  At our parting, I bent at a sign, when he kissed me, and I him, and soset forward with our train. A great shout followed us, and at thehedge-end stood Simon Powell, his bonnet in his hand, which he waved aswe went by, crying out a deal of Welsh (having forgot the Queen'sEnglish altogether, he told me afterwards), and in so shrill a voice asset the knight's horse capering and himself in a rage of blasphemy.

  We fell in with Mr. Jordan, whom I had almost feared had given over hisenterprise, some mile or so distant, at a smith's in a little villagewe passed through, where he was having his armour eased about themiddle, and a basket hilt put upon his sword.

  "Who is this fellow?" asked Sir Matthew testily, when I hailed andaccosted him.

  "It is my old preceptor, sir," said I, "who is coming with us, if hehave your leave."

  "Hast heard of any robbers by the way, Doctor?" inquired the knight atthat, and I saw he was marvellous glad of this increase in hisauxiliaries.

  "I hear of nought else," replied the scholar sturdily, while the otherturned very pale. But continuing, the scholar said: "Seeing that in atreatise I wrote awhile since and caused to be printed, there is anotable paragraph hath been bodily seized upon by a beggarly student ofLeyden, and impudently exhibited to the world as his own. Heard youever such? Robbers quotha? How of my labour, and inquiry into thenature of the lost digamma----"

  "Hold!" cried Sir Matthew. "I see we talk athwart. This lost thing orperson of yours (for I understand no whit of what it may be) is nothingto the purpose. I spoke of robbers on the highway, villains andcutpurses."

  "Of them I reck little," said Mr. Jordan coolly, "seeing I have nopurse to be cut."

  "They are dangerous nevertheless," said the other loftily.

  "For which reason you go sufficiently attended," muttered the scholar,with a cursory eye backward upon the knight's warlike following; andwith that we all fell, although for different causes, into an uniformsilence. At length, being come to the top of a hill up which we hadascended painfully for near the half of an hour, and especially thewaggons found it hard to overcome, we stood out upon an open andcircular piece of ground, bordered about by noble great beech trees,but itself clear save for the sweet grass
that covered it; and the turfbeing dry and the air refreshing after our late labour, we were glad todismount there and rest awhile.

  Sir Matthew ordered one of his men to fetch cooked meat and two bottlesof wine from the cart, and showed himself very generous in inviting usto join him at this repast.

  "I have always gone provided in these matters," he told us as we sattogether thus, "since I went upon my first voyage to the Baltic, beingbut a boy then, although accounted a strong one." (I know notwherefore; for he must ever have been little, and his back not abovetwo hands' breadth.) "Howbeit," he continued, "we had the ill luck tobe cast away upon the Hebrides, the weather being very tempestuous andour ship not seaworthy; so that about the fourth day it broke in piecesutterly. I held to a piece of the keel," he said, looking anxiouslyfrom one to the other as his memory or invention helped him to theseparticulars, "upon which, too, clung our purser, whom I did my best tocomfort in this our common and marvellous peril. How we got to shore Inever understood, but we did, although half dead, and the purserraving."

  "Since which time," said Mr. Jordan, pausing in the conveyance to hismouth of a great piece of a fowl's wing, "you have, as you say, goneprovided against the repetition of such accidents, even upon the dryland."

  "And wisely, sir, as I think," added Sir Matthew.

  "Was there then no food to be had in Scotland?" asked Mr. Jordan simply.

  "Not where we landed, in the Hebrides," replied the knight tartly. "Asto the rest of that country I know nothing, save that 'tis a poorstarved foggy place, and the people savage, half naked and inclining toPresbytery, which is a form of religion I abhor, and to any thatprofesseth the same I am ready to prove it wholly erroneous and false."

  The knight's tale seeming likely to digress into theology, we ended ourdinner hastily without more words; albeit from time to time later, itwas evident that Sir Matthew's thoughts were still upon shipping andthe sea; so that scarce an accident we met with but he found in itoccasion for casting us naked on the Hebrides, or drowning us in theBaltic.

  We had halted, I say, upon a considerable eminence, and the groundfalling away in our front very steeply, the view thence was of anunparalleled breadth and variety. For stretched at our very feet, asit seemed, lay a fair and fertile champaign diversified here and therewith woodland and open heath. Beyond the vale rose the wild anduntracked downs all dark and clouded; and to the left hand (as westood) the bar of the Quantock Hills. Surely a man must travel far whowould behold a land more pleasant than this sweet vale of Taunton; nay,were he to do so, as indeed the exiled Israelites found pleasanterwaters in Babylon than they had left in Jewry, yet must he needs (asthey did) weep at the remembrance of it; for there is no beautyascendeth to the height of that a man's own country hath--I mean atleast if it be the West Country, as mine is.

  We continued our progress, going through two or three hamlets where theold folk and children stood about the doors to watch us pass, for wewere a notable spectacle, and Sir Matthew Juke a stern figure in thevan; travelling thus without any great fatigue, for we kept at a foot'space on account of the waggon, and of Mr. Jordan also, who had nohorse. I frequently besought him to ride my own mare, but he would notuntil we were within sight of the great belfry tower of St. Mary'sChurch in Taunton, when he consented, being indeed pretty faint bythat, and thanked me handsomely out of AEsop.

  In Taunton we dined, and there too I hired a beast for the scholarbecause (to speak the truth) I could not bear to be parted any longerfrom my holsters with the new pistols in. No adventure befell usworthy recording, or rather nothing of such magnitude as Sir Matthew'sshipwreck which I have above set down, until we reached Glastonbury,where we were to lie that night.

  On the morrow we departed early, observing still the same order, savethat we rode more closely before the baggage upon a persistent reportin the inn of a horrid robbery with murder on the Frome road: whichtown lay in our way to Devizes. Even the Baltic dried up at this, andwe kept a pretty close look-out as we crossed the flat marsh landsthereabout; and once Juke shot off his piece suddenly upon some alarm,but with so trembling and ill an aim that Mr. Jordan's high crowned hat(that he still wore) was riddled through the brim, and a verse ofOvid's which was in his mouth, cut off smartly at the caesura. Matterof ridicule though this were, I had been alert to note some othercircumstance of more gravity (as I conceived) though I spoke not of itthen; the cause of my anxiety being indeed too near for open conferencethereupon. For I had, by accident, observed certain becks and glancesto pass between two of the fellows of our guard; the one of whom, apikeman (by name Warren), trudged beside the cart wherein were laid upthe knight's goods, and his fellow in the plot (to call it as I fearedit) was the elder of the two horsemen that wore the knight's livery andwere particularly engaged in his defence. After two or three suchfurtive signals run up, as it were, and answered betwixt these twain, Icould be in no further doubt of their purpose, but studied what to do,should they fall upon us suddenly. That their main design was to seizeupon the contents of the waggon that was by all supposed valuable, Imade sure; but what I could not yet guess was the degree of complicityor indifference in which the rest of our company stood towards theprojected assault. I conceived them to be chiefly cowards, however,and resolved therefore, if I might, to enlist their aid upon the firstadvantage: for cowards ever succeed to the party that rises dominant,and protest their loyalty loudest when 'tis most to be questioned.

  Because I was a boy, I suppose, but at all events very impudently, myconspirators took small pains to hide their deliberations from my eyes,having first assured themselves that neither Juke nor the scholar hadany cognizance of their doings. And this disdain of me it was thatbrought matters to a head; for I could no longer brook it, but,wheeling my horse about, I faced them both, and drawing a pistol frommy holster shouted: "Halt, sirs! here be traitors amongst us."

  I never saw men so immediately fall into confusion as did all of them,but chiefly the rearward, that, every man of them, fled hither andthither with little squealing pitiful cries; some running beneath thewaggon or behind it; others leaping off the causeway amidst the fennyooze and peat-bogs that it wends through in these parts, where theywere fain to shelter themselves in the grasses and filthy holes thateverywhere there abound. I caught a sight of Sir Matthew, on theinstant, exceedingly white, and his sword half drawn; but he thenlosing a stirrup (as he told me afterwards he did) was borne from theconflict unwillingly a great way down the road ere he could recoverhimself. Only the younger serving man, whose name was Jenning, and Mr.Jordan, retained their courages, and both came at once to myassistance, which in truth was not too soon. For the footman (that isthe villain with the pike) ran in under my guard and dealt me a keenthrust into the thigh which sore troubled although it did not unhorseme. I returned upon him with my pistol, discharging it close to hisbody, and hurt him in the shoulder, as I knew, because he dropped hispike and clapped his hand there, grinning at me the while like a dog.

  Just then I heard the click of a snaphance, and perceived that thecaliver that Jenning carried had hung fire; and following upon this, agreat laughter from the elder man, whose name was Day, a hard-favouredfellow, having a wicked pursed mouth and little dull green eyes.

  "Shouldst 'a looked to thy priming, Master Jenning," he called outmockingly; by which I saw that he had tampered with the poor man'spiece while we lay at the inn in Glastonbury; and this much said, heraised his own piece and fired directly at him, who fell at once allhuddled upon his horse's neck, stark dead. Before I could draw forthmy second pistol, Mr. Jordan had rid forward very boldly, though armedbut with his antique broadsword, and laid about him with good swingingblows, the one of which happening upon his opponent's mare, it cut intoher cheek with a great gash, at the same time bursting the rein andheadstall, to the end she was quite unmanageable, and despite of Day'sfurious restraint (who, to do him credit, would have continued thecontest, two to one), charged away at a great pace, carrying him withher along the road until they were
fairly out of sight.

  When I had satisfied myself that the villain would certainly notreturn, I drew my sword and looked about for his companion, thepikeman, whom I had wounded; but whether he had crept into theconcealment of the high bog grass, as the most part of the guard haddone, or else had gone backward down the road, I could not get anycertainty; and Sir Matthew who now rode up said he had not gone thatway, else he would assuredly have met and slain him, which, seeing thatthe man was disabled, is likely; and so I gave over the search.

  It cost us some pains to rally our forces, but in the end we did, Mr.Jordan persuading them very cogently with his great sword wherever hefound them: he having groped for the digamma in stranger places, hesaid, and worn away the better part of his life in the prosecution ofthings more hard to come by than this, our bog-shotten escort.

  We reverently bestowed the body of poor Jenning upon the stuff in thewaggon, and with heavy hearts (though not without some thrill ofvictory in mine) set onward again towards Frome and Devizes, which lastplace the knight was now in a fever to attain to before sundown.

  "I think I have not been in such jeopardy," he said, "since I sufferedshipwreck off the barren coast of the Hebrides, as I related to youyesterday."

  "The dangers would be about upon an equality," quoth Mr. Jordan.

  Nothing occurred to renew our fears nor to cause us to assume a postureof defence for the remainder of our passage; the only accident any waymemorable being that through some mischance we got into the town ofDevizes at the wrong end of it, and were diligently proceeding quitecontrary to our purposed direction before we discovered our error. Iset this down because I have so done since also (in spite of clearinformation received), and have therefore cause to regard Devizes assomething extraordinary in the approaches thereto, although SirMatthew, to whom I spoke of it, said that such divergences were commonenough at sea, where a man might set his course for the Baltic andfetch up off the Hebrides, or indeed the devil knew where.