Medusa Page 4

  From this it was plain he desired me to stay in-doors until I was to deliver his letter; and so I did, reading in Captain Dampier’s Voyages (that I did often delight to read in after), which moved me to dream of strange adventures, that (as I imagined) Mr Huxtable would bring to pass; although in an exploration I afterward made of the house, the void chambers and passages and the view of the deserted farm, did somewhat dash my expectations; nor could I but wonder that Mr Huxtable, who did not seem to be an ordinary farmer, should dwell thus in this bare farmhouse, what manner of man he was, and what his business with the vagabond sailor could be.

  At the appointed hour, I set forth with the letter, which was inscribed to Mr. Obadiah Moon. The evening was fair; but dusk was fallen when I arrived the court.

  The sailor was not yet come, and I took up my station in a corner. It was a small mean place, lying between the back of the old tavern and the churchyard, in the Ropemakers’ quarter, and looked very meagre under the yellow moon. There stood another ancient tavern, called The Crab's Well, over against the Shakespeare, and, being both of them infested already with the evening drinkers, they gave forth continually a roaring sound.

  Now, although this kind of adventure is well enough to read of in a story, it is very little agreeable in the actual experience; as I have heard soldiers say, complaining of the privations and miseries of the wars; and either our romantic authors know little, or nothing at all, of the adventures and exploits they relate, or, if they do, they know by art to extract the fangs of horror. A sense of foreboding began to oppress my thoughts. I eagerly expected the sailor’s coming, that I might be done with the business, and yet I feared him, too; not, indeed, lest he should offer me any actual violence, but of something shadowy and undefined; and if I had not taken so strong an assurance of Mr Huxtable (and I never once conceived any doubt or mistrust concerning him), my dismal thoughts might have tempted me to make off; but then, where could I have gone? for sure I could never have taken the face to return, with my errand unaccomplished, to the farm.

  While I thus stood oppressed with these dismal thoughts, sometimes a roisterer, issuing from the tavern, passed by to enter the churchyard. Once an ancient woman passed, stooped and walking with a staff, the moonlight shining upon her face, that was consumed with some dreadful disease; which nigh turned me sick with horror. Soon after, I saw the sailor enter the court. I immediately stepped to him with Mr Huxtable’s letter in my hand.

  “What cheer, messmate ?” cried he after a jovial manner while he took the letter. “Hove to, was you? Well, thank’e for standing by.”

  I immediately made off; but he called to me, bidding me to stand and stay. He spoke in a horrid snarling voice; so that I dashed forward wildly, scarce escaping him as he made pass upon me with his stick.

  Thereupon, he began to chase me with furious and dreadful, savage threatenings; but I only run the faster, and left him quite behind. At length, looking fearfully back while I took breath, I observed he had yielded the pursuit, and was fallen into his ordinary pace. But he raised a shout at me which put me to my heels, again, and I was soon come to the skirts of the town, and presently in view of the farmhouse; a light in the window making a comfortable signal across the dark meadow.

  Mr. Huxtable opened to me even while I knocked; and, when I had contented him by telling him I had delivered his letter, he took me into the room, where my supper was set.

  “But you did not need to have made such haste,” said he; for I still breathed short with running. “Did the man say anything to you?”

  And when I told him, "I am heartily sorry for it”, said he. “I can’t understand why he should chase you. But it is no matter. Sit you down and eat. But what was his intent, I wonder.”

  He began to pace up and down in the room, with his brows bended together sometimes plucking at his beard. I wondered, while I ate, if he would tell me anything of the matter; and as though he perceived my thoughts, he said presently:

  “You shall hear my story, lad; but not now. Let it suffice that I am about to embark in an adventure over the sea, and my ship lies in the river. I go to seek my son, my little son. Look! there be his picture hung up upon the wall, over against his mother’s!”

  His voice quavered while he spoke, and dwindled to a desolate sound. A weight of sadness came over me, and the tears started in my eyes; which perceiving, he looked affectionately on me, saying:

  "But I shall find my son. You two are of an age. If God send that he be restored to me, you both shall be as brothers. "

  I suppose I was still distract with my miserable adventures; for I began to weep outright. He started up upon this, and, setting his hand upon my head and stroking my hair. “Nay, nay, lad!” said he. “You must not weep. But, indeed, you are like my son. Come! you shall go with me. I'll take you to sea with me in my ship.”

  This stopped my tears effectively; and I told him how glad I was for it, and asked him eagerly when it would be. He told me in a few days; and thereupon, after I had helped him remove the supper things, and he had set the candles on the table, he began to entertain me with his travels to foreign parts, describing strange, outlandish places that he had seen, and far peoples, their manners and customs, and the like, which increased my delectable expectations.

  Yet there came in the midst, as a sad shadow, the thought of my grandmother, that in my late alarms and distresses I had scarce once remembered. My heart sunk and my mind was overcast in a moment. But he, perceiving my dejection and enquiring the occasion of it, when I had told him, said that I should write a letter to my grandmother, acquainting her with what had passed at the Academy, how I had escaped and fallen in with a good Samaritan, and that, though the time might needs be something protracted, I would certainly go to her as soon as I possibly could.

  In these terms I did write to her; and it comforted me.

  In the next three days, Mr Huxtable was away upon the business of his ship. I stayed close indoors, diverting myself by reading, especially Don Quixote, which was among those books in the chest.

  But I was formed to distil the sadness of things; at least, so conditioned by the character of my childhood. I did weep beside the death-bed of the Pathetic Knight as passionately as any that in the story knelt there, and saw the laughter of the foregoing acts through a misty glass. It is a faithful parable; for every man, worthy of the name, is a Don Quixote, or a Sancho Panza (the rest are dull, scoffing fools); he is wrought true by his delusions; his heroic antics and blunders move no mocking laughter.

  Sometimes I went to look out at the window. But the prospect of the bare countryside, extended large in the bright sun, and the deserted farmyard and windmill, affected me with loneliness, and I soon returned to my book. Indeed, on the last occasion (being on the third day), I suffered something worse; for, as it seemed to me, while I looked forth upon the mill, a dark, terrible face did gaze on me at the upper window.

  The appearance passed shadowy; and setting it down to phantasy, I did not tell Mr Huxtable when he returned after noon, lest he should think me timorous.

  Soon after sunset, he took me with him to the riverside, which lay about two miles distant, to help him convey some things aboard the ship; I bearing some baggage, he carrying those portraits of his wife and child.

  The ship, that lay hauled close beside the bank, was but ordinary in size; being 200 tons burden, somewhat old-fashioned, with her high, sloping poop. But much of the upper part had been cut down, especially all the heavy carved work belonging to the stern, which made her, in some sort, of a maimed appearance. I was much taken with the figurehead, all glistening white, in the form of a woman extended above the waters, her neck and head outstretched, and her great protuberant eyes fast closed, as if she prayed, with her clasped hands, and sped ever onward.

  I became sensible that Mr Huxtable also stood gazing on it.

  “Look, ’tis a type of our state and condition in this world,” said he solemnly. “The ship is the toiling, manful part; the woman,
retired in stillness and contemplation, is the speeding soul.”

  We went on board as he spoke, and betook ourselves to the forecastle; wherein, after entering, we beheld, in the lamplight, two seamen reclined upon the floor on either side, with their heads resting against the lockers.

  “Is this how they keep their watch?” said Mr. Huxtable, “What do they mean?" cried he, laying hold of one of them by the shoulder. “He is drunk,” said he, giving him a shake; for the man, did not come to his senses, though he did shake him sufficiently, but only murmured in his beard.

  “Well, this is strange,” said Mr. Huxtable; “for it seems they’ve drunk but little, if this is all they had.”

  While he spoke, he pointed with his finger to a bottle that stood on a locker beside a cup. “Rum,” said he, taking and smelling of it. It was three parts full.

  Hereupon, he went to work with the other fellow, who proved not so deep; for his eyes opened soon after, and he woke up, though very lumpish and stupid.

  “How come you to be in this drunken drench?” asked Mr. Huxtable sternly, when the man was sufficiently in his wits to understand him. “Is this how you keep your watch, sirrah?”

  “I be not drunk," answered the sailor, who was a great burly fellow, and repeated “I be not drunk,” while he staggered to his feet; but immediately after sank back upon the locker. “I knows not what we ail,” said he, glancing his eyes aside at his fellow, who now shifted his posture and began to breathe very hard. “We did drink no more’n a noggin between us, with water in it. It was never so afore; for every evening we took a dram, your honour, what time we was changing watch. I swear to ye, ’twas no more, and by token, you can see the bottle. Look, ’tis nigh full! “

  “That's true,” said Mr Huxtable, looking hard at him. “Where did you get this bottle of rum?”

  “I had it off a hawker, your honour,” said he, “as come and hailed the ship yesterday soon after dark fell. Sure, there must be something amiss with it, which has put us in a distemper, though it tasted good.”

  “A hawker?” said Mr Huxtable, handing his beard. “What was his appearance? Can you describe him particularly?”

  “Nay,” said the man, “he seemed but a common or ordinary hawker, but I never thought to take any particular notice of him. He was summit of a tall man, and spoke thick in his beard, muttering hoarse, which is all as I can mind me of.”

  "Well," said Mr. Huxtable, after taking a pace up the forecastle, “it looks as though the rum had been meddled with, and it’s possible an attempt will be made to rob the ship. This puts me in a quandary; for I must return to the farm to-night - nay, as soon as I can, yet I am not willing to leave you by yourselves. Your mate seems to breathe easier. Let us see if we can wake him. Go, fetch some water to lave his face.”

  Upon this, the big seaman rose up from the floor, and went, with unsteady steps, to the further end of the forecastle, whence he returned with a bowl full.

  “Begging your pardon, your honour,” said he, “I knows on a powerful remedy in such a case as this. I had it from one of the old privateer. Give me leave.”

  Hereupon, he went down on his knees, raised the bowl to his lips,and made as if he would drink it down. Then, with his mouth full, he turned himself to his mate, and began to blow it out in a thin, small spray in his eyes and ears. After he had done this a second time, the sleeper presently sighed and opened his eyes, and in no long time he was as much recovered as the other.

  Mr. Huxtable, nevertheless, seemed still in doubt what he should do.

  “It were all one,” said he, “if they had found you sleeping. I mean, if this hawker should be one of some thieving gang. They would get but little on the ship, and less that I should lack. Not that I think there’s any likelihood of an attempt; but it looks strangely. Let us get out in the fresh air.”

  He stepped to the door while he spoke; but observing that the night was become pitch dark, he returned, desiring one of those seaman to provide him with a lamp from a cabin in the tween-decks, against our return to the farmhouse. So the man went and brought one, and kindled it; and Mr. Huxtable bade me take it and lead the way, which I accordingly did; but, coming out on the deck, I stood stock still, glaring; for, chancing to look towards the river bank, that dreadful apparition I saw, or thought I saw, at the window of the mill, was looking upon me above the gunnel. ’Twas but for a moment in a glancing flare; for I let go of the lantern, that fell cluttering upon the deck, and the light went out.

  “The face!” cried I, clutching hold on Mr Huxtable by the arm, “the dreadful face. I saw it at the mill and in the wood. ‘Twas there yonder above the bulwarks.”

  “Why, what do you mean?” said he, stepping up and down in the darkness. “There’s no one at the mill. ’Tis shut up. This is your phantasy - but hark!” cried he, standing still; for a harsh savage cry was heard - whether of man or beast was obscure, and there came a small sound as of running. It was on the river-bank, towards the town.

  “Come on, my lads!” said Mr Huxtable; and, not staying to kindle the lantern, he mounted to the gunnel and leapt over upon the bank, being followed by the seamen and me.

  “Scatter, and make a wide sweep,” said he, while we ran, “but not so as to beyond call. ’Tis clear open country this way, so you need not fear to run upon an obstacle.”

  But though it was as said he, and our eyes, also, were become accustomed to the darkness, ’twas no pleasant manner of running; and glad was I when, after cruising along some distance without seeing or hearing anything of our quarry, he yielded the attempt, and we returned to the ship.

  He told us that he would now return with me to the farm, and bad the two seamen to betake themselves thither betimes in the morn, to help him convey some things to the ship.

  “You may rest easy in the ship,” added he. “Very like ’twas a false alarum; but if there was anybody, he will attempt nothing further after the scare we have given him. But sink the bottle of rum into the river.”

  “Aye, your honour that I will,” said the big sailor. “May perdition take it!”

  He stepped on board the ship while he spoke; and the other followed. Soon, he appeared at the side with the bottle in his hand.

  “If there be a woman goddess to this-here river,” said he, “as I have heard tell there be in some rivers, here be summat for her to drink me a health,” and cast the bottle overboard. The other seaman kindled the lamp, which was not broken by the fall, and brought it to Mr Huxtable. A few moments after, I heard another sound in the river close under the ship. I told Mr Huxtable, but he said it would be but a whirl in the tide, or, mayhap, a water rat.

  “And what else do you think it should be?” asked he. “Do you suppose it is the robber absconding himself in the river?” said he, laughing at me.

  But, however, he took a turn along by the river side, lowering his lamp so as to sine upon the sluggard black pool.

  “Let us begone,” said he, with a weary voice, turning his eyes away from the melancholy waters; and, nothing loth (for I began to shiver acold) I started off beside him.

  The night was chill, with a shrewd, rising, east wind; and, being both weary and hungry, I was glad when we arrived at the farmhouse; where we made all snug and broiled some beef.

  By the time we had finished supper, the wind was increased to a gale the roared wild about the house, shaking the doors and windows, or shifted about, moaning in the chimney. When we had removed out chairs beside the hearth, I asked Mr Huxtable if he would tell me a traveller’s tale. But “Nay”, said he, “hearken rathe to the tale of the wind! Hearken now!”

  He leant forward, gazing on the pale glowing embers; and I heard it lonesome and remote and very solemn, whiffling in the chimney, crooning and circling in a rustling dance, dying insensibly away, and coming again, with a ghostly sound.

  “It's like the still small voice in the Bible,” said I; and he nodded gravely.

  “And hark!” said he, as it rose with a furious blustering sound, “
there comes the whirlwind.”

  He fell silent after that, seeming to brood in his mind, with a heavy brow and his eyes fixed sad and dreamy upon the glowing coals, and soon, becoming drowsy, I left him to take up my repose.

  The wind now blew more steady, yet with no less force. The night was clear and shiny with stars; and, coming into my bed-chamber, I saw the sails of the windmill whirling round. This scared me, I know not how, and put me in haste to get in between the bed-clothes, as if,forsooth, they were a protection against any terror in the world.

  But I slept presently, and was translated to a region of brightness and efficacy inexpressible, from which enchanting dream I awoke in a wavering light that appeared brighter than day. ‘Twas the glare of some conflagration near the house; and Mr Huxtable stood at the lattice looking out.

  I got quickly out of bed; and saw that it was the mill; for at the small lower window, a great flame streamed, waving and curling in the night; and thick smoke issued from the higher window mingled with sparks , that were instantly dispersed by the wind. The sails turned with a great clacker. But as I looked, I saw, to my astonishment, the sailor, Moon, and another with him, being a tall man, running along beside the further end of the wall. I did see them but for an instant; and, as it seemed to me, there was yet another with them, but being ahead, he whipped out of sight too soon to be descried.