A Ladder of Swords: A Tale of Love, Laughter and Tears. Gilbert Parker

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ Jerseymen rowed gallantly, and the seigneur, to give them heart, promised a shilling, a capon, and a gallon of beer to each if the rescue was made. Again and again the two men seemed to sink beneath the sea, and again and again they came to the surface and battled further, torn, battered, and bloody, but not beaten. Cries of, “We’re coming, gentles, we’re coming!” from the Seigneur of Rozel came ringing through the surf to the dulled ears of the drowning men, and they struggled on.

      There never was a more gallant rescue. Almost at their last gasp the two were rescued.

      “Mistress Aubert sends you welcome, sir, if you be Michel de la Forêt,” said Lemprière of Rozel, and offered the fugitive his horn of liquor as he lay blown and beaten in the boat.

      “I am he,” De la Forêt answered. “I owe you my life, monsieur,” he added.

      Lemprière laughed. “You owe it to the lady; and I doubt you can properly pay the debt,” he answered, with a toss of the head; for had not the lady refused him, the Seigneur of Rozel, six feet six in height, and all else in proportion, while this gentleman was scarce six feet.

      “We can have no quarrel upon the point,” answered De la Forêt, reaching out his hand; “you have at least done tough work for her, and if I cannot pay in gold I can in kind. It was a generous deed, and it has made a friend forever of Michel de la Forêt.”

      “Raoul Lemprière of Rozel they call me, Michel de la Forêt, and, by Rollo the Duke, but I’ll take your word in the way of friendship, as the lady yonder takes it for riper fruit! Though, faith, ’tis fruit of a short summer, to my thinking.”

      All this while Buonespoir the pirate, his face covered with blood, had been swearing by the little finger of St. Peter that each Jerseyman there should have the half of a keg of rum. He went so far in gratitude as to offer the price of ten sheep which he had once secretly raided from the Seigneur of Rozel and sold in France, for which he had been seized on his later return to the island and had escaped without punishment.

      Hearing, Lemprière of Rozel roared at him in anger: “Durst speak to me! For every fleece you thieved I’ll have you flayed with bowstrings if ever I sight your face within my boundaries.”

      “Then I’ll fetch and carry no more for M’sieu’ of Rozel,” said Buonespoir, in an offended tone, but grinning under his reddish beard.

      “When didst fetch and carry for me, varlet?” Lemprière roared again.

      “When the Seigneur of Rozel fell from his horse, overslung with sack, the night of the royal duke’s visit, and the footpads were on him, I carried him on my back to the lodge of Rozel Manor. The footpads had scores to settle with the great Rozel.”

      For a moment the seigneur stared, then roared again, but this time with laughter.

      “By the devil and Rollo, I have sworn to this hour that there was no man in the isle could have carried me on his shoulders. And I was right, for Jersiais you’re none, neither by adoption nor grace, but a citizen of the sea.”

      He laughed again as a wave swept over them, drenching them, and a sudden squall of wind came out of the north. “There’s no better head in the isle than mine for measurement and thinking, and I swore no man under eighteen stone could carry me, and I am twenty-five—I take you to be nineteen stone, eh?”

      “Nineteen, less two ounces,” grinned Buonespoir.

      “I’ll laugh De Carteret of St. Ouen’s out of his stockings over this,” answered Lemprière. “Trust me for knowing weights and measures! Look you, varlet, thy sins be forgiven thee. I care not about the fleeces, if there be no more stealing. St. Ouen’s has no head—I said no one man in Jersey could have done it—I’m heavier by three stone than any man in the island.”

      Thereafter there was little speaking among them, for the danger was greater as they neared the shore. The wind and the sea were against them; the tide, however, was in their favor. Others besides M. Aubert offered up prayers for the safe landing of the rescued and rescuers. Presently an ancient fisherman broke out into a rude sailor’s chantey, and every voice, even those of the two Huguenots, took it up:

      “When the Four Winds, the Wrestlers, strive with the Sun,

      When the Sun is slain in the dark;

      When the stars burn out, and the night cries

      To the blind sea-reapers, and they rise,

      And the water-ways are stark—

      God save us when the reapers reap!

      When the ships sweep in with the tide to the shore,

      And the little white boats return no more;

      When the reapers reap,

      Lord give Thy sailors sleep,

      If Thou cast us not upon the shore,

      To bless Thee evermore:

      To walk in Thy sight as heretofore

      Though the way of the Lord be steep!

      By Thy grace,

      Show Thy face,

      Lord of the land and the deep!”

      The song stilled at last. It died away in the roar of the surf, in the happy cries of foolish women and the laughter of men back from a dangerous adventure. As the seigneur’s boat was drawn up the shore Angèle threw herself into the arms of Michel de la Forêt, the soldier dressed as a priest.

      Lemprière of Rozel stood abashed before this rich display of feeling. In his hottest youth he could not have made such passionate motions of affection. His feelings ran neither high nor broad, but neither did they run low and muddy. His nature was a straight level of sensibility—a rough stream between high banks of prejudice, topped with the foam of vanity, now brawling in season, and now going steady and strong to the sea. Angèle had come to feel what he was beneath the surface. She felt how unimaginative he was, and how his humor, which was but the horse-play of vanity, helped him little to understand the world or himself. His vanity was ridiculous, his self-importance was against knowledge or wisdom; and Heaven had given him a small brain, a big and noble heart, a pedigree back to Rollo, and the absurd pride of a little lord in a little land. Angèle knew all this, but realized also that he had offered her all he was able to offer to any woman.

      She went now and put out both hands to him. “I shall ever pray God’s blessing on the Lord of Rozel,” she said, in a low voice.

      “ ’Twould fit me no better than St. Ouen’s sword fits his fingers. I’ll take thine own benison, lady—but on my cheek, not on my hand as this day before at four of the clock.” His big voice lowered. “Come, come, the hand thou kissed, it hath been the hand of a friend to thee, as Raoul Lemprière of Rozel said he’d be. Thy lips upon his cheek, though it be but a rough fellow’s fancy, and I warrant, come good, come ill, Rozel’s face will never be turned from thee. Pooh, pooh! let yon soldier-priest shut his eyes a minute; this is ’tween me and thee; and what’s done before the world’s without shame.”

      He stopped short, his black eyes blazing with honest mirth and kindness, his breath short, having spoken in such haste.

      Her СКАЧАТЬ