University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.
AGONIES OF A LOST HOPE.

Jack Belcher led the way for his superior into that close
covert where we have followed the former once before. Here the
captain threw himself down upon the little sea-chest which carried
all Jack's stores, while the latter leaned against one of the great
trees that helped to pillar and roof his sylvan habitation.

“Well, Jack,” said Calvert, impatiently, “you have seen the
governor? Does he write?”

“No indeed, sir; I think he's a little afraid of putting things to
paper. He's scary! — says `the devil 's to pay!' that the king's
been bullied by the Spaniard, and our business is to be stopped
altogether. There 's to be no more winking at our work in the
West Indies. The Spanish embassador demands that when an
English sailor shouts out, `No peace beyond the line,' he 's to be
tucked up, out of sight, in a jiffy, and made to swing, just where
you find him, whether on sea or land. There 's to be no more
fair trading on any account, and the governor seems half disposed
to close accounts with you for ever.”

The fellow paused.

“Well — well! go on.”

“Well, sir, there's little more to tell you. I had some work to
get to a private talk with the governor. But when I showed him
your ring, and gave him the letter, he let out free enough. Only,
I could n't get him to write. He says the council watches him.
But he 'll wink, I 'm a-thinking, and not look too closely where he
should n't. That is, if your honor takes care to give him the
right kind of eye-water.”

“Yes! yes! I understand him! But how are the citizens?
You went among them? You saw Stillwater and Franks?”

“All right in that quarter. Stillwater says the governor's a
cross between a fool and rogue. He has the conscience for the
trade, but wants the pluck. Frank says: “Come on; there's
just as good custom now as when the king had Christian bowels.
As for the people, I see no difference. They do n't see the harm
or the wrong in riddling a Spanish galleon, or, for that matter, a
Frenchman; they hate 'em both, and look upon 'em, sensibly, as
natural enemies. They will buy whatever you 've got to sell, and
ask no question about the sort of flag you pulled down to get at
the goods. I do n't see that you 'll have any trouble from them.”

“Then we 've nothing to fear from the governor. If such be
the temper of the people, Quarry will give us no trouble. As for
Charles Stuart, he 's a fool. As if the Spaniard and Frenchman
were not the natural enemies of England. As if every captured
galleon was not gain of strength as well as wealth to us. Fool!
fool! like his father; and, like him, bought and sold, to the shame
and loss of England. But what said the governor to my coming
into port?”

“He hemmed and hawed — said it was very dangerous; he
could n't say; you might take the risk if you pleased, but 't was
your own risk. He could n't say what would be the upshot of it;
he said council was monstrous prying into the business.”

“Any armed vessel on the station? — king's ship, I mean?”

“I know, sir. No, not that I could hear. The Lime, Pearl,
and Shoreham, were all on the Virginia coast; the Phœnix and
Squirrel at New York; the Rose at Boston; the Winchelsea—”

“At Jamaica, we know — and so is the Adventure; did you
hear nothing of the Scarborough?”

“She's a thirty-gun ship? There was a report of one that had
been on the coast, but I did n't get her name. It's certain there
was no king's ship on the Carolina coast when I left; but the
governor said one might be expected soon. He was scary enough,
and talked a good deal about character, and responsibility, and
dignity, and his office, as if he hadn't buttoned 'em up long ago,
and covered 'em out of sight with Spanish doubloons. I reckon
there's some change in the council, sir, that makes him so scary;
there's one person in the council now, sir, that wa' n't in it before;

and the name is one, sir, that 'll raise your hair a little. It's a
Major Berkeley.

“Major Berkeley!” cried the captain, starting up and approaching
the subordinate.

“Yes, sir; but what Berkeley I could n't find out. I could
n't get to see him, and the governor never told me of him at all.
Of course, I thought directly of your own brother, and how curious
't would be if he was removed to Carolina. But I could find
out nothing but this, that he 's an Edward Berkeley too; they
call him Sir Edward, seeing that he 's made a cassique, or lord, in
this country, and he 's got a family — wife and children!”

“Edward Berkeley! and wife! and — did you say children?”

“Yes, sir, he 's got children — or a child — one or more. They
told me wife and children.”

“Children! and by her! O God! and I have lived for this!
and Olive is a mother! a mother! and her children are not mine!
And what am I, and where am I! after all these struggles, this
toil and danger in a doubtful service; denounced by the laws;
deserted by my sovereign; an exile — perhaps an outlaw! Ah!
God! But this, this might have been spared me!”

And our cruiser strode the wood as he thus passionately spoke,
and his fingers were thrust into his hair and clenched with violence,
while his whole frame shook with the convulsions of his
soul.

“Do n't, sir; do n't, your honor; do n't take on so, dear master.
It may not be your brother, after all.”

“'Tis he! I feel it! They were wedded, I know. That ancient
Jezebel, her mother! She has done it all. She has torn
us asunder for ever. Olive's heart was mine — mine only. But
what are hearts to selfish mothers? What a woman's heart to a
mother's ambition? What a younger brother's heart, when he
who claims the birthright requires its sacrifice? It is he — it is
Edward Berkeley; and he is come hither now, having robbed
me of all that made life precious, perhaps to rob me of life
also — to bring me to an ignominious death! Poor Olive! with
thy depth of soul, with thy singleness of passion, to be thus bartered.
And — children too! His children! his children! Oh!
Edward Berkeley, thou hast robbed me of something more than
life!”

“Master, dear master, remember — you have now a wife of
your own.”

“Ah! do I not know it, Belcher? Great Heavens! and such
a wife! a doll! a painted baby! a poor child-creature, whose very
smile mocks me with a cruel memory of all that is lost to me for
ever. True, Olive was lost ere I wedded her. Yet why should
I have wedded her? Better to have made the heart live on the
bitter memory. Yet, there was excuse. I owed much to this
child's care of me. And in what madness of soul did I seek in
another the recompense for that most miserable loss!”

“Alas, your honor, is n't it too late now to—”

“Ah! as if that were not the worst agony of all! There is the
venom in the wound. It is too late. No more, Jack! no more!
Olive Masterton has children, and they are not mine; and these
children will beget that love which did not beget themselves.
I must not think. Poor, poor Olive! But I will see her! I
will see her once more!”

“Oh! sir, better not!”

“I will see her, if I die for it! I can not help it. The Fates,
if she is indeed in Charleston, have thrown her in my way. They
decree that we shall meet once more. I will gaze upon her face,
though she may not see mine. I will startle her soul with my
voice, though I may not listen to hers. I will look upon the face
of her child — her child! Oh! Olive Masterton, hadst thou been
firm, strong, devoted — hadst thou kept thy faith, and had faith in
mine — this had never been! The cruel arts of thy cruel mother
had never prevailed to tear our hearts asunder, to blight hope and
heart, and yield thee, and yield me, to embraces which are loathsome
to both. Ay, loathsome to thee, I swear it; unless, indeed,
thou wert all a lie, like that artful fiend, thy mother!”

“Master, dear master!”

“Oh! Jack, I am weak — weak unto death!” cried the strong
man, throwing himself upon the ground, while a deep groan issued
from his chest. The faithful follower hung over him.

“Dear master, give not way.”

“I will not, Jack. I will be strong. It is too late. Ay, something
is too late. But, I must and will see her. Do not fear me,
Jack, I will be calm — calm as the grave when it closes its heavy
jaws over the wreck of best affections. Olive! Olive Masterton!

thou hast crushed me to the earth, in thy own wretched lack of
love.”

“Oh! Master, she lacked not that! But what could she do?
You gone — lost, perhaps — and that old one at her from morning
till night. A mother too! and so cunning. You do n't think what
the poor girl had to suffer. I know something of it, master. I
heard — I saw! and it is n't for a young girl to stand a mother's
prayers and pleadings long. And they were very poor: and you
do n't know how they were made to feel it — and they who had
been used to live in such grandeur.”

“Ay! she was sold; and that Edward Berkeley should be
the man to take advantage of her poverty, her dependency, her
mother's arts, and my absence.”

“Oh, sir, as I 'm a living man, I do n't believe your brother
ever knew of your love for her.”

“He must have known — must have heard!”

“He might suspect, but I do n't think he knew, and that old hag
never let him know. She kept the truth from him. I 'm sure of
it. You recollect, he was on the continent all the while when you
were with her. You were gone before he came home.”

“But my letter?”

“Ten to one he never got it. You never got any answer.
Oh! sir, do not suspect your brother.”

“Why was the marriage so hurried, before I could return?”

“'T was his passion, sir, and the mother's arts. Besides,
't wa' n't so much hurry, either, since you remember, we were
eleven months getting across from Panama, owing to your dreadful
sickness.”

“Ah! that horrid time! and its more horrid consequences!
'T was the terrible news from England that broke me down, and
made me deplore the cares that saved me in spite of that pestilential
fever. And then it was, that, in a fatal hour — in my despair
and vexation on the one hand, and in a false notion of gratitude
on the other — I committed the worst of all my errors: gave
my hand to this foolish child; married a woman who could move
passion, but not love — a toy, not a woman; a mere trifler with
the heart that would like to honor — if nothing more — like to
believe her worthy of some sympathy, if not of mine.”

“But she loves you, sir. Believe me, sir, she loves you!”

“Ay, perhaps, as far as she can know to love; but what a
child — how weak, how vain, how frivolous! a continual caprice,
that vexes even in its fondness; that makes you revolt, even
when passion most persuades to tenderness. Ah! Jack, I have
sacrificed a solace in a frenzy. I might have cherished pride
even in disappointment. I have shut myself out from the consolations
which a cherished faith might have brought me even in
moments of despair. What had I to do with a child passion,
when I was sure of a noble woman's love?”

“But that was lost and gone, my dear master.”

“No! I had lost a hope, but not the life in which the hope had
birth. I had lost the woman I had loved — not her affections.
Her heart was mine — never less mine than when she was wrapt
in the embraces of another. And upon this I might have lived.
To brood upon the precious memory would have been a solace,
when passion could proffer none. And that I should be so led by
passion — I that had suffered in such a school of suffering! — that
a mere whim, a caprice, a fancy, should have led me thus into a
bondage whose galling chains eat into the very soul, and make
every thought a torture.”

“'T was gratitude, sir — 't was a good feeling that made you
marry the señora.”

“Tell me nothing of gratitude, Jack Belcher; as if any gratitude
should justify such a sacrifice — justify vows which neither
can keep or value.”

“Oh, sir, I do think the señora loves you. She 's true to you,
sir.”

“Ah, yes! to be sure she 's true!”

“How she did watch your sick-bed! how she did nurse you
when your life hung upon a thread — when even I gave up —
when nobody had a thought you could live, and only thought how
to save you pain in your dying hours! How she watched and
hoped through all, and was never wearied; and kept bathing your
head and hands in the vinegar; and kept the cooling plantain-leaf
upon your forehead; and, when her mother said you would die,
who wept and swore you should n't die; and who made all others
bend to her — and she still nothing but a child. Oh! sir, that
was love — and it saved you; and though she has n't the ways of
our English, yet, sir, I do think her heart is full of love for you,

and she 's as true to you, though she does vex you so much, as
any woman of England could be.”

“No doubt! no doubt! But oh! Jack Belcher, though I feel
and believe all that you say, yet it brings no relief. There is no
consolation in it. Better were she wholly the idle butterfly creature
that she seems; better false, hollow, heartless, as she is vain,
vexing, weak, and capricious. Then, I could fling her off —
whistle her down the wind with scorn — and surrender myself
wholly to the bitter memory of that early passion, which was a
truth, a faith, a sweet reality of love, no matter what the denial
and the loss, instead of fruit and blossom! But leave me for a
while, Jack. I must be alone. Let me lie here in the solitude.
I would think — think until I forget, if that be now possible.”

“Will you take some of the Jamaica, sir? It 's a good thing
for a solitary man.”

Jack's ideas of solace had something in them very decidedly
English. He honestly believed that the seat of the soul is the
abdomen, and that Jamaica was the divining power which could
reach it.

“No, thank you, Jack. Nothing. Leave me for a while.
Join me in an hour, when I shall be better able to talk with you
of ship's affairs.”

The subordinate said no more, but, with a look that still lingered,
the faithful fellow made his way out of the thicket, leaving
his superior to brood, with what philosophy he might, over the
rash impulses which, in a moment of weakness, had led him to
voluntary fetters, which now, to use his own strong phraseology,
were eating into his very soul. He had simply done what is done
by thousands daily —