great confusion, shouting and swearing kept robert bluett wakeful for some time, and next morning he learned the reason of it. as he walked early upon the quay before breakfast, tried to master the intricate coast-line at a glance and longed to be afloat that he might get a wider and juster view of the red and honeycombed cliffs, a woebegone figure approached him—a bent and hobbling creature that crawled on two sticks, wore a three-cornered hat and had his right eye concealed by a big black patch. only the flowing beard of johnny cramphorn proclaimed him.
“god save you, master bluett, or i should say ‘cap’n bluett,’” he began. “the very man i wanted for to see.”
“who’s been clawing you?” asked the excise officer.
“who but the dowl’s own anointed? you heard the tantara in the tap-room? well, ’twas upon an aged piece like me they varmints falled like heathen wolves. look here!”
he lifted his patch and showed a pale blue eye p. 334set in a bruise as black as ink. thus seen it suggested a jackdaw’s.
“jonathan godbeer’s hand done that—the lord judge un! wi’ his bullock’s fist he knocked me down, ’cause i withstood un to his face, like the prophet withstood david.”
“ban’t no quarrel of mine,” said mr. bluett, “though if all i hear be true, me an’ godbeer may fall out afore the world’s much older.”
“ess—if you’m honest, you’ll fall out wi’ him. ’twas honesty brought me these cruel bruises. when you’d gone, i rose in my wrath an’ axed un how he dared to lie to you so open; then he smote me.”
mr. bluett’s natural probity here led him into unwisdom.
“to be plain,” he said, “i haven’t heard no very good account of you neither.”
“ah, ’tis so hard to get away from one’s sins! i’ll be honest, cap’n, same as you be,” answered mr. cramphorn. “i doan’t deny but i’ve been a free-trader in my time, though ’twas little enough ever i made by it but a score on the wrong side of the book o’ life. but i’ve long been weary of ill-doing and be set ’pon the right road this many years, as parson yates will tell ’e. ’twas for the cause of right i got these blows—same as paul his stripes—an’ though i’ve been that man’s friend in time past, now i’m gwaine to take vengeance p. 335against un, an’ next time i hears tell of his games, you’ll be the fust to know it.”
“that will suit me very well,” answered bluett.
“an’ i ax you to back me up an’ protect me henceforth in the king’s name,” continued johnny. “to think of a man as would wallop an old blid like me! no better’n a murderer—there he is now! doan’t you go away from me till he’ve passed us by.”
jonathan godbeer walked along the quay to the boats. he scowled at old cramphorn and touched his hat to the officer.
“marnin’, sir! i see thicky old rat have got ’e by the ear. i thrashed un last night, ancient though he be, for calling me a smuggler afore the company; an’ i’ll thrash un every time he dares to do the like. take care how you put your trust in him, for the faither of lies be a fule to that man. he never done nobody a gude turn in’s life; though he’ll get a gude turn yet hisself when the cart goes from under him an’ leaves him dancin’ ’pon a rope. i warn ’e against un for all his white beard!”
jonathan grinned at his own prophecy and departed; cramphorn shook his fist and chattered curses; and mr. bluett went upon this way. he was puzzled but not ill-pleased.
“when thieves fall out, honest men come by theer own,” he reflected, and returned to breakfast.
p. 336jenifer pearn waited upon him at his meal and took occasion to give mr. bluett yet another version of the brawl that had troubled his slumbers over night; but as she loved merry jonathan, her story redounded little to the smuggler’s discredit.
“they all want to be your friends,” she explained; “but, except my jonathan, theer ban’t a pin to choose among ’em. he’m honest as daylight.”
mr. bluett thereupon changed the subject and trusted that jenifer was none the worse for her fright. the girl had a dark, keen face, was built generously and evidently enjoyed unusual physical strength for a woman. yet the old sailor recollected that she had been no more than a pleasant armful for her future husband.
“i be well again,” she said, “yet i wish i hadn’t seen no such dreadful contrivance, i’m sure. ’tis a very sad thing, an’ mother sez how parson yates did ought to be axed to faace they phantoms in the name of the lord wi’ a bell, a book an’ a cannel, ’cordin’ to the right an’ holy way in such matters. but gran’faither newte an’ toby pearn, my great-uncle, an’ a gude few other auld parties say that lady emma’s funeral be the chiefest glory of daleham an’ ’twould be a thousand pities to go an’ lay it wi’ a bit of parson’s work.”
the officer was interested.
“for my part,” he said, “i think if the poor soul p. 337killed herself two hundred years ago, ’tis time her was laid peaceful an’ reg’lar as by law appointed. ’tis all us can do for ghostes; to lay ’em; an’ even then it axes a clergyman. an’ the holiest have got to mind theer p’s an’ q’s, for, make a mistake, an’ so like as not they’m tored to pieces for their trouble.”
“i’d rather not hear tell no more about it,” answered jenifer, shivering and looking uneasily about her. “but this i knaw; parson yates ban’t the man for the job—so meek as moses he be, an’ would run from a goose, let alone a ghostey.”
“if ’tis proved his duty, he’ve got to faace it, however,—same as all of us has got to faace our duty,” declared mr. bluett.
