"God preserve you, Master Harry2. No, I am not weeping. 'Tis— No matter. Remember always that so long as my heart beats there is room in it for you—and forget not that your mother would be hungry for pride in you if she were but with us."
She drew away anxiously.
"You do not mind that I say that, who was her servant?"
I swept her into my arms.
"I love you for it, granny. Never shall I forget your kindness and the welcome you gave to the stranger from the night."
She kissed me tenderly.
"I am an old woman, Master Harry," she said, "and I may not live to see it; but the day will come when you will be no longer a fugitive3 from justice. So be not disheartened."
"And how could I be disheartened," I demanded, as I set her down, "with two friends such as I may boast of?"
There was a mist before my eyes, and I was not sorry when Juggins broke in upon our farewells.
"Come, come," says he. "You will be unmanning the lad, granny——"
"'Tis to his credit he hath so much sentiment," she returned, wiping clear her eyes with a shaky hand. "But 'tis time he went, Robert."
"Aye, John Waterman will be waiting us at the Temple Stairs, and we have little time to spare if we are to get aboard before the other passengers. This de Veulle would recognize him, I fear, even in his disguise."
I could not forbear a grimace4 at the reference to my get-up, a linsey-woolsey shirt, with homespun jacket and breeches and a bobbed scratch-wig, the whole designed to give me a rustic5 appearance, which there can be no doubt that it did.
"Never mind, Master Harry," admonished6 Juggins as he clapped an ugly beaver7 of ancient style upon my head. "In New York you will rig yourself in forest-runner's garb8, and forget that you ever played the bumpkin. Give granny a last kiss, and——"
She flew at me, light as a bird; her arms clasped momentarily about my neck; I felt her kiss on my cheek; and then she was gone from the room. I may as well say here that I never saw her again, although many a night as I lay under the stars I was to remember her quaint9 ways, her sweet, shrill10 voice and loving smile.
But I had no opportunity for such thoughts as Juggins and I hurried through the streets toward the river, where a wherry was awaiting us. All the way he kept up a running fire of last-minute advice and instructions.
"Guard well the letters I have given you, the one to Corlaer no less than those to Governor Burnet and Master Colden. Corlaer, though he be only a rude, unlettered woodsman, is none the less of importance in the wilderness11 country. He hath the confidence of the Indians of the Six Nations, a mighty12 tribe, or rather confederacy of tribes, Master Harry. They were recently but five nations in their league, but the Tuscaroras, after troubles with the colonists13 in the Carolinas, came north several years ago and were accepted at the Council-Fire at Onondaga."
"Are they friendly to Murray?" I asked as we reached the river and climbed aboard the wherry.
"Nay14, I think not. But you will learn beyond question in New York. I have writ15 as strongly as a man may to Governor Burnet, but I would have you say to him all that you can think of to urge him to a vigorous course. 'Tis no hour for half-way measures. We must crush Murray once and for all. If legal measures may not suffice, then let us go without the bounds of the law."
We came presently to Greenwich reach, and steered16 a passage through the river traffic to the side of the New Venture, a slovenly17 craft of fair burthen, whose loose rope-ends and frazzled rigging emphasized the confusion on her decks.
Master Abbot, her captain, a melancholy18 man in a tar-stained coat, met us at the rail.
"The young man is not sure of himself afloat, and would seek his berth19," said Master Juggins, after the preliminaries had been passed.
"As he pleases," agreed Captain Abbot indifferently "Y'are the first aboard, lad, and may choose your quarters."
"What choice have I?"
"Why, you may bunk20 with the second mate or one of the other passengers. But no," he corrected himself; "I should have said with one of two of the other passengers. The lady hath a cabin to herself."
"The lady!" I exclaimed.
Master Juggins pursed his lips in a soundless whistle.
"So you carry a lady," he commented.
"Aye," replied Abbot, lapsing21 into his customary manner of indifference22, "and a sore nuisance it is, too, although it makes but one in the cabin."
"Who is she?"
"I know not."
He turned to me.
"And now, young sir, what do you say? Will it be the second mate or a passenger for companion!"
"The second mate," I said.
Master Juggins drew me back to the rail.
"'Tis best I should not wait," he said. "Stay below till you be safe out of Thames mouth, Master Harry. You should be safe enough now, but care is a sure precaution."
"I will not forget," I promised.
"And one thing more, lad. Do not stint24 your wants for money. Governor Burnet will aid you to draw whatever you may desire through the bankers in New York. Remember, you spend on my behalf. I would willingly use all I have to thwart25 Murray. You will require trade-goods for the savages26, and perhaps equipment for yourself. Purchase the best. Spend—and spare not."
"Say rather your father was too kind. 'Tis little enough I have been able to do for you—sending you away, an exile, on a mission of danger. Yet I would have you look upon it as a privilege, if you will, Master Harry. When all is said and done, we are at war with France. 'Tis no war of generals and armies and admirals and fleets, I grant you. But war it is.
"True, there is the Peace of Utrecht, with all its ponderous28 provisions sullying so many square inches of white parchment. It proclaims peace. And nevertheless I say to you that we are at war."
"What kind of a war?" I asked.
"Why, a war for the right to grow and to flourish, a war for trade. At other times, mark you, nations clash over questions of honor or territory. So their statesmen say. Actually there is a question of trade or merchantry at the bottom of every war that has been fought since the world began.
"The Romans crushed the Carthaginians—because they wanted another corner of Africa? Never! Because only by so doing could they make the Mediterranean30 a Roman lake and insure its control by their shipping31.
"And so today we are fighting with France for control of the trade of the Atlantic—and control of the Atlantic trade means control of the Western Plantations32, America. We are fighting, Master Harry, with laws and tariffs33 and manufacturing skill and shipping instead of with men and deadly weapons."
"What is the immediate34 stake for which we fight?" I questioned, interested as always when this extraordinary man unloosed himself in conversation.
"The fur-trade. The country which wins the fur-trade will win control over the greatest number of savages. And the country which is so placed, especially if it be England, will win the military struggle which some day will have to be fought for dominion35 in America. So I would have you feel yourself a soldier, a general of trade, sent out upon a venture of great danger and importance. It may be, Master Harry, that you carry on your shoulders the future of England and of nations yet unborn."
He fired me so that I forgot my clumsy garments and outward character. I felt, I think, as any young knight36 who rides forth37 upon a deed of errantry and adventure.
"All that I can, I will do!" I exclaimed.
"Good. I can not ask more."
"I see a wherry approaching from up-river. I had best be gone. Good luck to you, lad, and write as occasion serves."
He went over the side with his lips pursed as if to whistle and a look of doleful pleasure on his face. Him, too, as it happened, I was never to see again. In fact, I wonder whether I should not have leaped over the vessel's side at that moment had I realized how complete was to be the severance39 of my life from all that I had known before.
But I did not know. I walked away from the rail with a light heart, inspired by Master Juggins' parting words and the vision he had called up before my eyes. I cast only a casual glance at the approaching wherry, which was still too far for me to observe whom she contained.
By the cabin entrance under the poop I found the seaman who had collected my scanty40 baggage, and he escorted me down the shallow stairs into a dark passage, which led to the main cabin, a room at the stern which ran the width of the ship and was lighted by three windows. It was mainly occupied by a table and four benches clamped to the deck. Off the passage itself, opened four doors, two on either side.
"Where do you berth?" the seaman asked me, pausing at the foot of the ladder-stairs.
"With the second mate."
He opened the first door on the right-hand, or starboard, side, revealing a space so tiny that I marveled how two men could force themselves into it at once. It was so low that I could not stand upright, so cramped41 that there was room only for one person outside the two short, shallow bunks42 which occupied two-thirds of its area.
When he had gone I curled up in the lower bunk, which the second mate obviously had surrendered to me, and spent the remainder of the day in dozing45 and finishing off the shore-food Granny Juggins had prepared for my hours of seclusion46. I listened long for the other passengers, but they kept the deck, probably watching the work of getting under way and taking a last look at the shores of England—as I should have liked to do myself.
I had not known my country much in recent years, and truth to tell, she did not seem to care for me. None the less I loved the emerald-green countryside, the soft sunshine through low-hanging clouds, even the turgid reek47 of smoky, crowded old London.
At last I must have dozed48, for I was awakened49 suddenly by the strangest of sounds—a woman's voice singing. Clear and true, the soprano notes came through the bulkhead at the foot of my bunk. It was a song I had never heard before, with a Scots accent to the words and a wonderful lilting melody that was somehow very sad all the while it was pretending to merriment. I had never been in Scotland—except for the sad venture of the '19; and that had left no pleasant memories, God knows—but the song set me to mourning for the heather-clad moors50 and the gray bens and the black lochs which its words lamented52.
I rose from my bunk, and, stealing to the door, set it open, so that I might hear the better. The passage outside was empty, and the salt sea-air blew down the open companionway an occasional gust53 of talk. But I paid no attention to that.
I was so interested in the song and the singer's voice that I forgot even to watch the door of the cabin next to mine where she was singing. And judge to my surprize, as I leaned with my head bowed by the low lintel and my eyes fixed54 on the gently heaving deck, when the singer's door swung open and she stepped into the passage, almost at my side.
Her surprize, as was but natural, was greater than mine. So we stood there a moment within a long yard of each other, gazing mutely into each other's eyes. She was a slim, willowy lass, in a sea-green cloak that clung to her figure in the slight draft that eddied55 through the passage.
Her face, flower-white in the dim light that came down the companionway, had a sweetness of expression that belied56 the proud carriage of her head and an air of hauteur57 such as I had seen about the great ladies of King Louis' Court. Her hair was black and all blown in little wisps that curled at her forehead and neck. Her eyes were dark, too. Afterward58 I learned that they were of a dark brown that became black in moments of anger or excitement.
"I heard you singing," I said.
She turned and made to reënter her cabin. But I raised my hand involuntarily in a gesture of appeal.
"I am sorry," I went on quickly. "I did not mean to be rude. I—I could not help it."
She regarded me gravely, evidently puzzled by the incongruousness of my voice and my plowboy garments.
"You are never Scots, sir!" she answered finally.
"No, but I know Scotland."
A light dawned in her eyes with the words.
"Ah, then you will be knowing the song that I sang! 'Lochaber No More' 'tis called, and a bitter lament51 of exiles out of their own homeland."
"No, I never heard it before—but I have a brother buried on a hillside far north of Lochaber, in the Clan59 Donald country."
The sorrow that came into her face was beautiful to see. None but a person who had Gaelic blood could have sympathized so instantly and so generously with a stranger's grief.
"That will have been the great sadness upon you," she cried in the odd way that the Highland60 Scots have of using English. "Oh, sir, your woe61 will have been deep! So far from his own home!"
In that moment I felt for the last time all the old raging hatred63 of the Hanoverian usurper64, the hatred that springs from blood spilled and unavenged; and even though the reason within me stilled the tempest that memory had stirred, I knew, or something within me knew, that I never could be happy under the immediate rule of King George.
"An exile!"
She leaned toward me, her eyes like stars.
"You will be one of the Good People!"
I did not answer her, too confused in my wits to know what to say; and suddenly my confusion spread to her.
"It is wild I am talking, sir!" she exclaimed. "Never heed65 my words. Sure, who would be trusting his heart's blood to the stranger that stepped in his path!"
"I think I would trust mine to you," I answered boldly.
She smiled faintly
"From your manner you would be no Englishman, sir, saying such pretty things without consideration."
"I have been long out of England."
"Then your sorrow will not be so great for parting with all you have held dear. Lucky is your lot."
"You have never been to America?" I asked.
"I had never been out of Scotland until I came south to take ship today. Ah, sir, there is a great sorrow at my heart for the country I love."
We said nothing while you might have counted ten, and in the silence she looked away from me.
"I sing as the feeling comes to me," she retorted.
She gathered her cloak around her, and shut her cabin door.
"And you go with us to New York?" I asked—no less fatuously.
Her eyes danced with a glint of humor.
"Pray, sir, will there be any other stopping-place in the ocean!"
I laughed.
My name at present was William Juggins, and I had a feeling of reluctance68 at practising deceit upon this girl at our first meeting. But she saved me from my quandary69.
"You will not be what you might seem, sir," she said gravely. "That I can see, and perhaps you will not think me indiscreet if I say so much."
"'Tis true," I assented eagerly. "Indeed——"
"But you will be meeting my—" she hesitated ever so little—"my father presently, no doubt, and he will make us known to one another. Now I must go on deck."
And she walked by me with a faint swish of skirts that sounded like an echo of far-off fairy music.
Her father! Who could he be? And then realization70 smote me.
Plainly, she could not be de Veulle's daughter—nor Captain Abbot's. She was Murray's.
I went back into my cabin and shut the door, feeling not altogether satisfied, despite the fragrance71 of her person which still lingered in my nostrils72, the recollection of her dainty charm, the indefinable tone of high breeding which had emanated73 from her.
Murray's daughter! I rebelled against the idea. It could not be. It ought not to be. What right had he to a daughter—and such a maid as this? 'Twas absurd! Manifestly absurd!
Why, I must hate the man. I had no other recourse. And he had a daughter! And above all this daughter!
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收听单词发音
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1
puckered
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| v.（使某物）起褶子或皱纹( pucker的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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harry
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| vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼 | |
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fugitive
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| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
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grimace
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| v.做鬼脸，面部歪扭 | |
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rustic
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| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
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admonished
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| v.劝告( admonish的过去式和过去分词 )；训诫；（温和地）责备；轻责 | |
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beaver
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| n.海狸，河狸 | |
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garb
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| n.服装，装束 | |
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quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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colonists
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| n.殖民地开拓者，移民，殖民地居民( colonist的名词复数 ) | |
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nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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writ
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| n.命令状，书面命令 | |
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16
steered
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| v.驾驶( steer的过去式和过去分词 )；操纵；控制；引导 | |
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slovenly
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| adj.懒散的，不整齐的，邋遢的 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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berth
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| n.卧铺，停泊地，锚位；v.使停泊 | |
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bunk
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| n.(车、船等倚壁而设的)铺位；废话 | |
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lapsing
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| v.退步( lapse的现在分词 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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seaman
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| n.海员，水手，水兵 | |
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24
stint
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| v.节省，限制，停止；n.舍不得化，节约，限制；连续不断的一段时间从事某件事 | |
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thwart
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| v.阻挠，妨碍，反对；adj.横(断的) | |
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savages
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| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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27
mumbled
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| 含糊地说某事，叽咕，咕哝( mumble的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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ponderous
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| adj.沉重的，笨重的，(文章)冗长的 | |
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smote
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| v.猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去式 ) | |
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Mediterranean
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| adj.地中海的；地中海沿岸的 | |
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shipping
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| n.船运（发货，运输，乘船） | |
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plantations
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| n.种植园，大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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tariffs
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| 关税制度； 关税( tariff的名词复数 )； 关税表； （旅馆或饭店等的）收费表； 量刑标准 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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dominion
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| n.统治，管辖，支配权；领土，版图 | |
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knight
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| n.骑士，武士；爵士 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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wringing
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| 淋湿的，湿透的 | |
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severance
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| n.离职金；切断 | |
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scanty
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| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
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cramped
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| a.狭窄的 | |
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42
bunks
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| n.（车、船等倚壁而设的）铺位( bunk的名词复数 )；空话，废话v.（车、船等倚壁而设的）铺位( bunk的第三人称单数 )；空话，废话 | |
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43
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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44
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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45
dozing
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| v.打瞌睡,假寐 n.瞌睡 | |
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seclusion
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| n.隐遁，隔离 | |
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reek
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| v.发出臭气；n.恶臭 | |
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dozed
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| v.打盹儿，打瞌睡( doze的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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49
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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moors
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| v.停泊，系泊（船只）( moor的第三人称单数 ) | |
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51
lament
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| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
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52
lamented
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| adj.被哀悼的，令人遗憾的v.（为…）哀悼，痛哭，悲伤( lament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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53
gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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54
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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55
eddied
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| 起漩涡，旋转( eddy的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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56
belied
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| v.掩饰( belie的过去式和过去分词 )；证明（或显示）…为虚假；辜负；就…扯谎 | |
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57
hauteur
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| n.傲慢 | |
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58
afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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59
clan
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| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
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60
highland
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| n.(pl.)高地，山地 | |
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61
woe
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| n.悲哀，苦痛，不幸，困难；int.用来表达悲伤或惊慌 | |
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62
assented
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| 同意，赞成( assent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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63
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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64
usurper
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| n. 篡夺者, 僭取者 | |
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heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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fatuously
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| adv.愚昧地，昏庸地，蠢地 | |
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67
abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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reluctance
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| n.厌恶，讨厌，勉强，不情愿 | |
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quandary
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| n.困惑，进迟两难之境 | |
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realization
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| n.实现；认识到，深刻了解 | |
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fragrance
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| n.芬芳，香味，香气 | |
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72
nostrils
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| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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emanated
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| v.从…处传出，传出( emanate的过去式和过去分词 )；产生，表现，显示 | |
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