University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.

Leonora.

Albert Verheyden, at the appointed signal from
the Cripple, had sprung into the surf, at the moment
when it broke with its greatest violence against the
bow of the boat, and, almost without an effort, was
swept in upon the hard beach. His first motion, on
gaining his breath, was to hasten to the hut, seize the
clothes that had been stripped from him, as well as
his weapons, and to speed, at the full measure of his
strength,—now animated by his mysterious and almost
miraculous deliverance,—northwardly along
the margin of the bay; keeping sufficiently remote
from it, however, to screen himself by the thickets,
which grew a short distance from the water's edge,
from detection by those who might, perchance, be
on the watch to observe his course. His limbs were
chilled, and it was only by violent and unintermitted
motion that he was able to preserve himself from the
dangerous consequences which were likely to attend
his exposure. By degrees, exercise threw a glow

over his frame, and he soon found himself recovering
his suppleness of limb and power of enduring the
toilsome walk by which he laboured to reach the
friendly shelter indicated by Rob's hurried instruction
in the hut. After what seemed a progress of
at least twice the space in which he was told he
should find the dwelling of Jarvis, he was, at length,
greeted with the cheerful sight of an humble homestead,
seated so near the shore that the fence, which
bounded the curtilage of the dwelling, actually bordered
upon the confines of the tide-mark. He staid
not to consider how he were best to claim admittance,
but walked at once to the door and rapped
loudly, as a distressed man is apt to feel it his right
to do in a Christian land.

“I pray you, good people, open your door to me,”
he said; “rise, Master Jarvis, and admit a friend.
Rise, kind sir: in the name of charity, I intreat the
shelter of your roof.”

In a moment the door was ajar, and a sleepy voice
heard from within challenging the comer—

“Who are you that strays so late, in so lonely a
region?”

“A friend, good Master Jarvis.”

“Is it shipwreck?” inquired the master of the
house, as he opened the door and admitted the wanderer.
“Stand a moment, sir, until I get you a light.
Are you alone?”

Before an answer could be given to either of these
queries, the questioner had departed, and in a few
moments returned with a candle, whose light disclosed
to the Secretary a comfortable family room,

furnished according to the primitive but useful fashion
of a substantial tiller of the soil of that era. It took
but little time for Albert to rehearse the eventful
story of the night, and his narrative was answered
with a kindness that gave him assurance of being
now under the protection of a friend. The good man
of the house seeing that nothing was so necessary to
his guest as sleep, detained him no longer than was
requisite to enable his dame to prepare a couch, to
which the Secretary, upon the housewife's summons,
eagerly repaired, and soon turned his sufferings to a
happy account, as, in self-felicitation at his escape,
and in rendering thanks to God for the mercy that
had raised him up a friend in his extreme need, he
sank into sweet oblivion of all the past.

At the dawn of day, he rose refreshed and invigorated,
and, being provided with a horse by the hospitable
farmer, staid only to express his gratitude to
his host for the favours he had received, and then,
with as much expedition as he could command,
pricked onward to the town.

The rising sun gilded the chimney-tops of the
dwelling of the Rose Croft, as the Secretary turned
a delighted eye upon that quiet scene, whilst he descended
from the distant hill which gave him a
glimpse of, what he deemed, that happy homestead,
through the embowering trees. The atmosphere
was instinct with a keen and bracing healthfulness
which gave a cheerful tone to the feeling of all animated
nature. As Albert stood in his stirrups and
looked around him, it was with an unwonted gladness
that he contemplated his near advance to his

home; and he had already resolved that his first moments,
after refitting his disordered person, should be
spent in a visit to the mistress of his heart, to whom,
with an impassioned delight natural to the romance
of his mind, he hoped to tell his perilous and startling
adventure.

The roofs and bowers of the Rose Croft sank from
his view, as he hastened onward; and he, at length,
found himself on the skirts of the little city. There
were ominous gatherings of the burghers in the
street; and the speakers shook their heads, and
seemed to the Secretary to converse with a mysterious
gravity:

“They have heard,” he said to himself, “of my
mischance in losing my way, and are fancying that
I have encountered the Indians. No,—they see me
riding here, yet no one comes to greet me:—there
are other tidings in the wind.”

And with this conclusion, anxious to know what
had occasioned this early commotion in the little
mart of news, he pressed forward to the Proprietary
mansion.

An hour before the arrival of the Secretary, Rob
of the Bowl, mounted on a sober-paced horse,—his
thighs grasping the saddle with more security than
one might expect from his diminished quantity of
limb, his trencher hanging by a strap like a huge
shield at his back, (this being his customary mode of
travel when his occasions required him to assume the
equestrian,) entered the town. He had run the Escalfador
into the little inlet of Mattapany, just inside the
Patuxent, where he left her under the guns of the

Fort which the Proprietary maintained at this post;
and repairing immediately on shore, he communicated
to the commander of the garrison the circumstances
which induced his visit, requesting that the
brigantine should be detained at her present mooring
until his Lordship's pleasure might be known.
Then, having procured a horse, he set forth, long
before day-light threw its flush upon the eastern sky,
upon his journey to St. Mary's, not doubting to hear,
upon his arrival there, a story of outrage (though
against whom or how perpetrated he could not guess)
done by the band of the Wizard's Chapel. Without
stopping to notice the wondering gaze of the towns-folk
at the strange, though not altogether unfamiliar
spectacle he exhibited to them, he made his way directly
to the dwelling of father Pierre.

By the aid of the good father himself, he was dismounted
from his horse and straightway conducted
into the study of the churchman.

“You have reason to be amazed at this early
visit, reverend father,” he said, “but my errand will
brook no ceremony.”

“Thou comest to tell somewhat of the ruffians,”
hastily answered father Pierre, with a look and tone
of sorrow, which informed the Cripple, at the outset,
that some deed of horror had already been done,—
“who last night violated the sanctuary of the worthy
Collector's roof, and stole away his daughter—”

“Hah!” exclaimed Rob, kindling with sudden wonder;
“was that the drift of Dickon Cocklescraft's
venture! He has stolen the damsel? Viper! hell-hound!

I heard it not, holy father: but I guessed no
less an outrage. I have hastened hither, faster than
these crippled limbs are wont to travel, to tell thee
where the robber may be found. I knew his purpose
of mischief, though not against whom it tended—ha,
ha, ha! I have baulked him! I have baulked him!”

“Speak, old man, more coherently: we are lost in
doubt, and overcome with grief,—say, where has the
ravisher fled?”

“To the Heron islands, at the mouth of the river.
There he hopes to find his brigantine—but I have
cheated him, father Pierre! Lose no time—but set
pursuit on foot.”

“The town is wild with conjecture,” returned the
priest; “Master Warden's servants have told the
dreadful tale: but whither to search, no one yet has
told. Come instantly with me to the Proprietary's.
He who can point out the path of rescue will be a
welcome guest.”

The priest lost no time in causing Rob to be again
set in his saddle; and walking beside the horse across
the plain which separated the dwelling of the Proprietary
from the city, father Pierre soon halted with
his companion at the door.

Previous to the arrival of the Cripple, and afterwards,
during the conference between him and the
Proprietary, in which measures were debated for the
pursuit of the pirates, the excitement of the inhabitants
of St. Mary's was aroused to the most intense
agitation. The tidings brought from the Rose Croft
had awakened the town at the dawn of day, and
rumour told in every dwelling the sad history of the

Skipper's onslaught. The fate of Blanche was bewailed
by all with bitter lamentation. Old and young
grew frantic at the thought of a delicate and defenceless
maiden, torn from her parent bower, in the dead
of the night, and abandoned to the custody of miscreants,
in whose bosoms not one sentiment of pity
or remorse mitigated the fury of their brutal passions;
and they uttered deep imprecations as they dwelt
upon the dreadful fate which had befallen their
cherished favourite, the Rose of St. Mary's. All
were astir to do something for her rescue, yet none
seemed to know what was proper to be done. The
women wrung their hands and wept, running wildly
from place to place; the elder burghers conversed in
doubting and dilatory consultations; and the young
men of the Port vented their anger in loud cries for
vengeance against the perpetrators of the outrage,
—suggesting as many plans of pursuit as there were
varying rumours of the retreat of the invaders, and
calling loudly to be led into immediate action.

“The Olive Branch did not slip off so quietly on
a harmless flight,” said Nicholas Verbrack, the lieutenant
of the fort, as he stood in the midst of some
eight or ten companions, on a bluff bank which, near
the middle of the town, gave a view of the whole
extent of the river. “I ever thought that there was
something too saucy both in the craft and in her
Skipper, to have either of them accounted honest
dealers in the Port.”

“Honest dealers!” exclaimed Master Wiseman,—
one of the five aldermen who were elected every
two years to preserve the corporate franchise of

the city, and who contrived to make up for the
want of official duty by a redundancy of official importance;
“Honest dealers, forsooth! That fellow
Cocklescraft hath ever been under the suspicion of
the board. We have noted him, masters: but what
could we do when his Lordship hath ever been personally
present in the city, and hath, I may say, encouraged
the fellow as a trader,—because, forsooth,
his custom helped to fill the exchequer of the province.
Morals before money has always been my
song; but it is preaching to a degenerate age—what
have we to expect?”

“And the women,” added Peregrine Cadger, “the
women ran away with the man's wits. Why, mark
you, sirs—what man, I would ask, but would grow
bold and freakish,—ay, and wicked,—who has wife,
maid, and widow ever at his heels, singing and saying
all manner of flatteries, till, at last, one would
think they had no other note.”

“Oh, but it was horrible,—most aggravating and
miserable,—this taking off!” groaned Willy, the
fiddler. “Proudly and gladly would I have felt to
be taken in her stead! I would suffer every misfortune,—”

“And the worst of it is, Master Willy,” interrupted
Wise Watkin, “they have taken Mistress Bridget
Coldcale—that's a loss to the province:—I should
not lie if I said to the whole town.”

“Why stand prating and grieving like gossips at a
funeral,” said John Firebrace, the smith, “whilst all
the time the rascal thieves are putting more land and
water between them and us. I think their worships

of the council are somewhat tedious over the matter;
they talk longer than is necessary,—or else that old
crop-limbed, vinegar-face, Rob of the Bowl, hath
more to tell, than commonly it is his habit. It is
special matter that has brought him to the Port
this morning. He knows more devil's-dealing than
it pleases him, at all times, to let his neighbour hear.
Yonder rides Master Verheyden, the Secretary,” he
added, as Albert now appeared at a distance directing
his course towards the mansion of the Proprietary;
“he may hasten matters. I would that they
would put us in the way of doing something to save
our poor young lady from the jaws of these sharks!”

The smith had scarcely ceased speaking when
Captain Dauntrees was seen coming towards the
group. Whilst he was yet some fifty paces off, he
called out to the Lieutenant,—

“Master Verbrack,—quickly get thee to the fort,
and march me instantly twenty men down to the
quay. See that they be provided, Lieutenant, with
all things necessary for service. Lose no time; but
away.”

The Lieutenant instantly departed, and the Captain
approaching the assemblage, continued,—

“John Firebrace, get thy horse, man, and thy
weapon. Colonel Talbot rides down the opposite
bank of the river, with a score of good fellows at his
heels. He counts upon you and your friends. Meet
him quickly on the common behind the Town House.”

These orders, hastily given, separated the company;
and every one now hied towards the places
appointed for these gatherings.

Already Colonel Talbot was on horseback collecting
some of the more active young men of the town:
and in an incredibly brief space—for in truth most
of them were expecting the summons—a troop of
some twenty were assembled, ready to follow wherever
he should command. Amongst these were
Arnold de la Grange and old Pamesack, both equipped
and mounted after their accustomed fashion, in a
manner that might have provoked a smile from the
furred, and laced, and feathered cavalry of more
orderly armies, but which, we may venture to believe,
was quite as effective as a more gaudy furniture.
Last in this marshaled array, came Albert Verheyden,
pale, breathless, and almost frenzied with the
narrative he had just heard of the disasters of the
night. He staid at the mansion but long enough to
substitute a more active horse for the clumsy animal
on which he had made his journey to the town; and
then hastened to join the party who were about to
be ferried across the river, and to scour the country
along the opposite shore.

Meantime the musqueteers arrived at the quay,
where two barges being in readiness, the men were
separated into equal divisions, and, very soon after
sunrise, were embarked under the respective charge
of Dauntrees and the Lieutenant, who, with all expedition,
shaped their course towards the islands at the
mouth of the river.

Talbot despatched a half dozen of the party to
scour the shore of the Potomac below St. Inigoe's:
the rest, under his own command, and attended by
Albert, were transported to the opposite side of St.

Mary's river, by every boat that could be mustered
for such a service: and being now collected on the
further bank, sprang forward, at the orders of their
leader, on their career of duty, with an alacrity which
showed how deeply they took to heart the outrage
which it was now their purpose to chastise.