"Ay, ay, shipmate, I will so,—but only on condition you close your peepers now and try to get some sleep like the bold seadog you are."
"Then you don't mind me a-laying yere, sir?"
"No, Smidge, not if you sleep and obey orders as a seaman should."
"Why then I will, sir, and thankee kindly ... for I be ... main weary." And to prove his words, the little fellow was presently fast asleep.
Then, soft-treading, forth went Adam to see what harm the Bold Adventuress had suffered in the fight, and was surprised to find this so much less than he had feared.
Bo'sun Ned, this so capable man and dutiful ship's nurse, himself taut and trim as ever, was already on duty to oversee the swabbing of decks and repair of damaged rigging, while the carpenter and his mates were hard at work to mend riven timbers and plug shot-holes, and all greatly to Adam's expressed admiration, so that the men grinned and the work went the more merrily. But after some while Joel Bym came limping to say, knuckling an eyebrow:
"Cap'n's sarvice, Must' Adam, and will ee step into the roundhouse, sir?"
"Ay, but art hurt, Joel,—thy leg?"
"My starboard spar, sir, a bit of a cut though irksome, by cock."
Absalom, his armour laid by, was sitting alone with papers on the table before him and a wide belt of soft leather wherein showed many small pockets. He beckoned Adam to the chair beside him and so soon as Joel had departed closing the door, he turned with the question:
"What of ... her?"
"Safe, Absalom, and now below in the cockpit to aid Perks and his mates."
"She should not be there, Adam, 'tis ghastly place!"
"This is why she went."
"Lord!" murmured Absalom. "Now God love her! Adam, 'tis very angel o' mercy."
"Yet a woman, Absalom, to cherish and honour."
"And ... love, Adam!"
"Ay verily."
"Adam, hast spoke aught of ... of thy love?"
"No."
"Hast ever loved afore, Adam?"
"Never."
"I have, alas! And so often, the memory shames now, for I am wiser. She hath learned me how love is no idle toy, no mere pastime but a very ... holy thing, ay, so purely sacred that I know myself all unworthy."
"Since when, Absalom?"
"That moment she looked on me with her clean maid's eyes and vowed to kill me. Which is marvellous strange yet true as death, Adam. So, I know I have never loved afore in all my days, and, loving now, shall never love any other ... for in all this world can be no other for me. And though she despise me I honour her therefor, since I do so truly merit her disdain."
"And art so very sure that she despiseth thee?"
"Ay, I am ... she hath made it very sufficiently evident. And no wonder, for blind fool that I was, I have shown her ever the worst of me,—almost! But, Adam, I never believed such love could be and ... when it came ... I was ashamed and hid it 'neath a galliard lightness, fool talk and smirking gallantries ... yet all the while True Love crying shame on me—even as you did, Adam. And when we fought, though meaning not to kill thee, I did my best to shed thy blood because I knew she loved thee."
"And now, Absalom?"
"Why now.... Love hath so changed me thou'rt dearer to me for her sake ... so her choice o' thee is mine also. And this bringeth us to the matter in hand, to wit,—this treasure belt and these papers which were the property of Lord Perrow who was killed fighting beside me. Now hidden in this belt, Adam, is treasure of jewels, all that is left of the great Perrow heritage, being family heirlooms, the half of which I shall give to thee for——"
"To me?" exclaimed Adam, in stammering amazement. "But how ... how can you...?"
"Ay, to be sure," sighed Absalom. "I should ha' told thee ... Lord Perrow was my only brother."
"Your ... brother?" Adam repeated.
"Here are these papers to prove it."
"Then you ...you are now ... Lord Perrow!"
"Ay, verily, Adam,—lord of an acre or so and old, ruined house in Sussex, all the rest was confiscate in my father's time. We were family of power and great wealth ... all gone like vanished dream, save for these jewels that, according to my brother's papers, are valued in London at fifty odd thousand pounds, and this now mine. For by law I am Jocelyn, Lord Perrow, but by choice I shall remain to the end o' my days Absalom Troy, mariner."
"I pray you why?"
"A title, Adam, must be lived up to, so I'll none of it. And I've even less love for my family name than I had for my poor brother, God forgive me. But you must know that my brother Eustace lived up to his title, ay and beyond it, and being some years my elder, lorded it over me all my days until at last, our mother being dead, I went to sea as gentleman adventurer and left him to lord it over others,—the which he did to such effect that he drew on him King Jamie's disfavour, though for this I nothing blame him,—was attained with other gentlemen and doomed to banishment, as you know. But girt about him was this our treasure o' family jewels, the half of which, as I say, I shall bestow on you, my Old Adam."
"But why should you give me so great a fortune?"
"Adam, thou'rt my friend ... and she loves thee. This money shall make thee bold to woo and wed, so shall it be my wedding gift. Well now are you answered?"
"So well, Absalom, that I must as truly answer thee. For indeed, though most truly grateful, I can nowise accept this gift ... having no least need of it by reason that I shall never ... be so blest ... to have a ... wedding."
With the word he arose, and when Absalom would have questioned him further, he but smiled and shook his head. So presently back went Adam to his cabin and there, seated before his books and charts, saw instead of these, the haunting beauty of Antonia's face and this gradually misted by slow-gathering, painful tears.
CHAPTER XX
OF NO PARTICULAR IMPORT
Blazing sun, tempered by a gentle following wind that urged the Bold Adventuress through calm seas of colour so deep and wonderfully blue that yet seemed daily to become more beautiful, a very joy to the eyes and one that Adam never wearied of beholding, as he was doing in this warm and slumberous afternoon from shady corner, the decks all deserted save for the customary watch; thus solitary stood Adam, and so lost in meditation that at sound of Antonia's voice and light footstep he started, almost guiltily, for it was of her he was thinking,—tormenting himself with such dream as went beyond all hope of realization, and therefore ineffably dear. Thus, as he watched her coming towards him, what wonder if his heart leapt painfully because of her warm and vivid beauty. For these weeks of sea air, of brine and glowing sunshine have deepened the colour in cheek and lip, her step is quick and firm, her every movement instinct with vigorous, new life and the pure joy of it.
"Goodness me, Adam!" she exclaimed, leaning beside him, "Each day seems hotter than the last."
"And will be," he answered, "for soon we shall be crossing the Line."
"Oh! What line?"
"The equinoctial."
"Why, whatever is that?"
"An imaginary circle in the heavens running with and above the earth's equator, and called the equinox because when the sun crosses it, days and nights are equal."
"And both equally hot!" she sighed.
"Indeed!" he nodded. "I wonder you are not sleeping like the rest o' the folk."
"I tried, yet could not, so instead went a-visiting my school."
"Eh, school?"
"The gunroom, Adam, where now my schoolboys lie, the wounded men. 'Tis well for them you got the man Troy to suffer they should be brought there, I think they'd have died else. I call them my scholars because I read to them every day then question 'em to know how much they remember. And they are all my children because all men are always children, and very babies when they're sick. And a marvellous strict parent I am ... though in their weakness I love them all. And they are so patient, Adam, so very grateful for what little I can do ... smiling on me through their pain, so that sometimes I could weep, but then it is that I grow stern, very bluff and gruff and swear my best at 'em ... yet with tears o' pity in my heart. And, for their comfort, a flask of rum in my pocket to temper Mr. Perks' bitter nostrums, the biggest nip for my brightest scholar! Oh, and here's a wonder,—the man Troy can trouble his proud magnificence to visit them, and frequently o' late! He came again to-day while I was reading to them, and sat there meek as a mouse, the odious wretch!"