CHAPTER VI
In which we Go to Jamestown
It was early morning when we set out on horse-back for Jamestown. I rodein front, with Mistress Percy upon a pillion behind me, and Diccon onthe brown mare brought up the rear. The negress and the mails I had sentby boat.
Now, a ride through the green wood with a noble horse beneath you, andaround you the freshness of the morn, is pleasant enough. Each twig hadits row of diamonds, and the wet leaves that we pushed aside spilledgems upon us. The horses set their hoofs daintily upon fern and moss andlush grass. In the purple distances deer stood at gaze, the air rangwith innumerable bird notes, clear and sweet, squirrels chattered, beeshummed, and through the thick leafy roof of the forest the sun showeredgold dust. And Mistress Jocelyn Percy was as merry as the morning. Itwas now fourteen days since she and I had first met, and in that time Ihad found in her thrice that number of moods. She could be as gay andsweet as the morning, as dark and vengeful as the storms that came up ofafternoons, pensive as the twilight, stately as the night--in her theremet a hundred minds. Also she could be childishly frank--and tell younothing.
To-day she chose to be gracious. Ten times in an hour Diccon was offhis horse to pluck this or that flower that her white forefinger pointedout. She wove the blooms into a chaplet, and placed it upon her head;she filled her lap with trailers of the vine that swayed against us, andstained her fingers and lips with the berries Diccon brought her; shelaughed at the squirrels, at the scurrying partridges, at the turkeysthat crossed our path, at the fish that leaped from the brooks, at oldJocomb and his sons who ferried us across the Chickahominy. She wascurious concerning the musket I carried; and when, in an open space inthe wood, we saw an eagle perched upon a blasted pine, she demanded mypistol. I took it from my belt and gave it to her, with a laugh. "I willeat all of your killing," I said.
She aimed the weapon. "A wager!" she declared. "There be mercers inJamestown? If I hit, thou'lt buy me a pearl hatband?"
"Two."
She fired, and the bird rose with a scream of wrath and sailed away. Buttwo or three feathers came floating to the ground, and when Diccon hadbrought them to her she pointed triumphantly to the blood upon them."You said two!" she cried.
The sun rose higher, and the heat of the day set in. Mistress Percy'sinterest in forest bloom and creature flagged. Instead of laughter, wehad sighs at the length of way; the vines slid from her lap, and shetook the faded flowers from her head and cast them aside. She talked nomore, and by-and-by I felt her head droop against my shoulder.
"Madam is asleep," said Diccon's voice behind me.
"Ay," I answered. "She'll find a jack of mail but a hard pillow. Andlook to her that she does not fall."
"I had best walk beside you, then," he said.
I nodded, and he dismounted, and throwing the mares bridle over his armstrode on beside us, with his hand upon the frame of the pillion. Tenminutes passed, the last five of which I rode with my face over myshoulder. "Diccon!" I cried at last sharply.
He came to his senses with a start. "Ay, sir?" he questioned, his facedark red.
"Suppose you look at me for a change," I said. "How long since Dale camein, Diccon?"
"Ten years, sir."
"Before we enter Jamestown we'll pass through a certain field andbeneath a certain tree. Do you remember what happened there, some yearsago?"
"I am not like to forget, sir. You saved me from the wheel."
"Upon which you were bound, ready to be broken for drunkenness, gaming,and loose living. I begged your life from Dale for no other reason, Ithink, than that you had been a horse-boy in my old company in the LowCountries. God wot the life was scarcely worth the saving!"
"I know it, sir."
"Dale would not let you go scot-free, but would sell you into slavery.At your own entreaty I bought you, since when you have served meindifferently well. You have showed small penitence for past misdeeds,and your amendment hath been of yet lesser bulk. A hardy rogue thou wastborn, and a rogue thou wilt remain to the end of time. But we have livedand hunted, fought and bled together, and in our own fashion I think webear each other good will,--even some love. I have winked at much, haveshielded you in much, perhaps. In return I have demanded one thing,which if you had not given I would have found you another Dale to dealwith."
"Have I ever refused it, my captain?"
"Not yet. Take your hand from that pillion and hold it up; then sayafter me these words: 'This lady is my mistress, my master's wife, to beby me reverenced as such. Her face is not for my eyes nor her hand formy lips. If I keep not myself clean of all offence toward her, may Godapprove that which my master shall do!'"
The blood rushed to his face. I watched his fingers slowly looseningtheir grasp.
"Tardy obedience is of the house of mutiny," I said sternly. "Will you,sirrah, or will you not?"
He raised his hand and repeated the words.
"Now hold her as before," I ordered, and, straightening myself in thesaddle, rode on, with my eyes once more on the path before me.
A mile further on, Mistress Percy stirred and raised her head from myshoulder. "Not at Jamestown yet?" she sighed, as yet but half awake."Oh, the endless trees! I dreamed I was hawking at Windsor, and thensuddenly I was here in this forest, a bird, happy because I was free;and then a falcon came swooping down upon me,--it had me in its talons,and I changed to myself again, and it changed to--What am I saying? I amtalking in my sleep. Who is that singing?"
In fact, from the woods in front of us, and not a bowshot away, rang outa powerful voice:--
"'In the merry month of May, In a morn by break of day, With a troop of damsels playing Forth I went, forsooth, a-maying;'"
and presently, the trees thinning in front of us, we came upon a littleopen glade and upon the singer. He lay on his back, on the soft turfbeneath an oak, with his hands clasped behind his head and his eyesupturned to the blue sky showing between leaf and branch. On one kneecrossed above the other sat a squirrel with a nut in its paws, and halfa dozen others scampered here and there over his great body, like somany frolicsome kittens. At a little distance grazed an old horse, grayand gaunt, springhalt and spavined, with ribs like Death's own. Itssaddle and bridle adorned a limb of the oak.
The song went cheerfully on:--
"'Much ado there was, God wot: He would love and she would not; She said, "Never man was true." He said, "None was false to you."'"
"Give you good-day, reverend sir!" I called. "Art conning next Sunday'shymn?"
Nothing abashed, Master Jeremy Sparrow gently shook off the squirrels,and getting to his feet advanced to meet us.
"A toy," he declared, with a wave of his hand, "a trifle, a silly oldsong that came into my mind unawares, the leaves being so green and thesky so blue. Had you come a little earlier or a little later, you wouldhave heard the ninetieth psalm. Give you good-day, madam. I must havesung for that the very queen of May was coming by."
"Art on your way to Jamestown?" I demanded. "Come ride with us. Diccon,saddle his reverence's horse."
"Saddle him an thou wilt, friend," said Master Sparrow, "for he and Ihave idled long enough, but I fear I cannot keep pace with this faircompany. I and the horse are footing it together."
"He is not long for this world," I remarked, eyeing his ill-favouredsteed, "but neither are we far from Jamestown. He'll last that far."
Master Sparrow shook his head, with a rueful countenance. "I bought himfrom one of the French _vignerons_ below Westover," he said. "The fellowwas astride the poor creature, beating him with a club because he couldnot go. I laid Monsieur Crapaud in the dust, after which we compounded,he for my purse, I for the animal; since when the poor beast and I havetramped it together, for I could not in conscience ride him. Have youread me AEsop his fables, Captain Percy?"
"I remember the man, the boy, and the ass," I replied. "The ass came togrief in the end. Put thy scruples in thy pocket, man, and mount thypale horse."
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sp; "Not I!" he said, with a smile. "'Tis a thousand pities, Captain Percy,that a small, mean, and squeamish spirit like mine should be cased likea very Guy of Warwick. Now, if I were slight of body, or even if I wereno heavier than your servant there----"
"Oh!" I said. "Diccon, give his reverence the mare, and do you mount hishorse and bring him slowly on to town. If he will not carry you, you canlead him in."
Sunshine revisited the countenance of Master Jeremy Sparrow; he swunghis great body into the saddle, gathered up the reins, and made the mareto caracole across the path for very joy.
"Have a care of the poor brute, friend!" he cried genially to Diccon,whose looks were of the sulkiest. "Bring him gently on, and leave him atMaster Bucke's, near to the church."
"What do you do at Jamestown?" I asked, as we passed from out the gladeinto the gloom of a pine wood. "I was told that you were gone toHenricus, to help Master Thorpe convert the Indians."
"Ay," he answered, "I did go. I had a call,--I was sure I had a call. Ithought of myself as a very apostle to the Gentiles. I went fromHenricus one day's journey into the wilderness, with none but an Indianlad for interpreter, and coming to an Indian village gathered itsinhabitants about me, and sitting down upon a hillock read and expoundedto them the Sermon on the Mount. I was much edified by the solemnity oftheir demeanour and the earnestness of their attention, and hadconceived great hopes for their spiritual welfare, when, the reading andexhortation being finished, one of their old men arose and made me along speech, which I could not well understand, but took to be one ofgrateful welcome to myself and my tidings of peace and good will. Hethen desired me to tarry with them, and to be present at someentertainment or other, the nature of which I could not make out. Itarried; and toward evening they conducted me with much ceremony to anopen space in the midst of the village. There I found planted in theground a thick stake, and around it a ring of flaming brushwood. To thestake was fastened an Indian warrior, captured, so my interpreterinformed me, from some hostile tribe above the falls. His arms andankles were secured to the stake by means of thongs passed throughincisions in the flesh; his body was stuck over with countless pinesplinters, each burning like a miniature torch; and on his shaven crownwas tied a thin plate of copper heaped with red-hot coals. A little toone side appeared another stake and another circle of brushwood: the onewith nothing tied to it as yet, and the other still unlit. My friend, Idid not tarry to see it lit. I tore a branch from an oak, and I becameas Samson with the jaw-bone of the ass. I fell upon and smote thosePhilistines. Their wretched victim was beyond all human help, but Idearly avenged him upon his enemies. And they had their pains for naughtwhen they planted that second stake and laid the brush for their hellfire. At last I dropped into the stream upon which their damnablevillage was situate, and got safely away. Next day I went to GeorgeThorpe and resigned my ministry, telling him that we were nowherecommanded to preach to devils; when the Company was ready to send shotand steel amongst them, they might count upon me. After which I camedown the river to Jamestown, where I found worthy Master Bucke well-nighdespaired of with the fever. Finally he was taken up river for change ofair, and, for lack of worthier substitute, the Governor and Captain Westconstrained me to remain and minister to the shepherdless flock. Wherewill you lodge, good sir?"
"I do not know," I said. "The town will be full, and the guest house isnot yet finished."
"Why not come to me?" he asked. "There are none in the minister's housebut me and Goodwife Allen who keeps it. There are five fair large roomsand a goodly garden, though the trees do too much shadow the house. Ifyou will come and let the sunshine in,"--a bow and smile for madam,--"Ishall be your debtor."
His plan pleased me well. Except the Governor's and Captain West's, theminister's house was the best in the town. It was retired, too, beingset in its own grounds, and not upon the street, and I desired privacy.Goodwife Allen was stolid and incurious. Moreover, I liked Master JeremySparrow.
I accepted his hospitality and gave him thanks. He waved them away, andfell to complimenting Mistress Percy, who was pleased to be gracious tous both. Well content for the moment with the world and ourselves, wefared on through the alternating sunshine and shade, and were happywith the careless inhabitants of the forest. Oversoon we came to thepeninsula, and crossed the neck of land. Before us lay the town: to theouter eye a poor and mean village, indeed, but to the inner thestronghold and capital of our race in the western world, the germ fromwhich might spring stately cities, the newborn babe which might in timeequal its parent in stature, strength, and comeliness. So I and a fewbesides, both in Virginia and at home, viewed the mean houses, the poorchurch and rude fort, and loved the spot which had witnessed muchsuffering and small joy, but which held within it the future, which waseven now a bit in the mouth of Spain, a thing in itself outweighing allthe toil and anguish of our planting. But there were others who saw onlythe meanness of the place, its almost defencelessness, its fluxes andfevers, the fewness of its inhabitants and the number of its graves.Finding no gold and no earthly paradise, and that in the sweat of theirbrow they must eat their bread, they straightway fell into the dumps,and either died out of sheer perversity, or went yelping home to theCompany with all manner of dismal tales,--which tales, through my LordWarwick's good offices, never failed to reach the sacred ears of hisMajesty, and to bring the colony and the Company into disfavour.
We came to the palisade, and found the gates wide open and the wardergone.
"Where be the people?" marvelled Master Sparrow, as we rode through intothe street. In truth, where were the people? On either side of thestreet the doors of the houses stood open, but no person looked out fromthem or loitered on the doorsteps; the square was empty; there were nowomen at the well, no children underfoot, no gaping crowd before gaoland pillory, no guard before the Governor's house,--not a soul, high orlow, to be seen.
"Have they all migrated?" cried Sparrow. "Are they gone to Croatan?"
"They have left one to tell the tale, then," I said, "for here he comesrunning."