Part 17 (2/2)
But whatever the frailties of Mr. Procter, he was a kind and forbearing tutor, and even succeeded in imparting to me also some portion of his own extravagant affection for his great leather-bound books of account; for he loved them so, as no man ever perceived more delicate beauties in his mistress than this fever-hot scrivener did in the nice adjustment of Debit to Credit; with all the entries, cross entries, postings and balancings (to use his own crabbed language) that went to it. He was, in sooth, a very Clerk-Errant, that ran up and down a paper world, detecting errors, righting wrongs, spitting some miscreant discount on his lance of goose-quill, or tearing the cloak from some dubious monster of exchange. I could not but admire him, and the way in which he regarded all things as mere matter for bookkeeping.
”They talk of their philosophies,” he would say, ”but what do they come to more than this, and what ethick goes beyond this: that every right hath a duty corresponding, and every fault its due reward? Ay, is it so? and what do we poor scribes, but set down each accident of our trading first on the left side and after on the right side, the one to countervail the other, and all at the end to appear justly suspended in the balance? We have no preferences, we accountants, we neither applaud nor condemn, but evenly, and with a cold impartiality, set down our good and bad, our profits and losses, our receipts and disburs.e.m.e.nts, first as they affect ourselves and our honourable Company, and after as they affect our neighbour. For consider,” he would proceed, leaping about on his stool, with the excitement that a defence of his art always engendered, ”consider this very item of the silk bales, upon which my pen chances at this moment to rest--you have it here to the credit of Mr. Andrea of Naples, seventy-nine pounds in his tale of goods sold to this house. But is the matter so disposed of? I trow not. For turn me to the accompt of goods purchased during this year of our Redemption, and what have you? Seventy-nine pounds upon the debtor. Philosophy, boy! There is nought beyond that, I say, nor, for conciseness of statement, aught to equal it. Mr. Andrea's rights become, transposed, our duties; and for the silk bales you wot of, they be a load of debt to us, to account for to our masters, and likewise a strengthening of the credit of this honest Neapolitan as any man may read.
”Notwithstanding, there be some,” said he in conclusion, with a sigh, ”and they divines of the Church, that call in question the avarice and hard-dealing of us that live by barter and the negotiation of merchandize! Yet where will you find (to ask but this one question, Mr. Denis), where do you find written more clearly than in these ledger-books of ours, that oft-disguised truth that what we own we do also and necessarily owe?”
In such mingling of high discourse and plain work, then, I continued with Mr. Procter a great while, in the dusty and ill-lighted counting-house in Chequer Lane; earning my small wages, and upon the whole not ill content with the changed life I now led, for all 'twas so far removed from the course I had planned, now many months past, but had already half forgotten. Sometimes my duties would take me to the wharves where a great barque or brigantine would be lying, about to leave upon our Company's business for Turkey or Barbary; or else some other vessel would be returning thence to London Pool, whither I repaired to the captain and supercargo to receive their schedules and sealed papers. It was this last employment I especially delighted in, and indeed I can scarce conceive any pleasure greater than I found going very early in the morning to one of the quays upon the River or as far as to Wapping Stairs, where I would watch the great s.h.i.+p slowly coming up upon the tide, between the misted grey banks and dim roofs of Limehouse and Rotherhithe; and could hear the rattle of the chains, and the joyful cries of the mariners that were now, after their perilous and long voyage, safely arrived at home. Then would I take boat and row out into the stream, hailing the master in the Company's name, who presently would let down a ladder by which I climbed aloft upon the deck, where the crew would gather round to hear news and to tell it; which telling of theirs I chiefly delighted in: the thousand adventures they had had, and the accounts of strange lands and mysterious rich cities beyond the seas. Thereafter, when the s.h.i.+p was berthed and our business settled, I would bear off the master and the other officers to Mr. Osborne, to be made welcome, when all was told o'er again, though with more observance paid to such matters as affected profit and loss than formerly I had heard the tale. The black little accountant was had in too, at such times, into Mr. Osborne's privy room, where we all sat round a great table, with Mr. Osborne at one end of it, very handsome and stately in his starched ruff and suit of guarded velvet; and the other princ.i.p.al persons of the Company about him on either side, to listen to what the s.h.i.+pmen related, as I have said.
Then, if the adventure had been profitably concluded (as sometimes it had not, though generally there was a fair sum cleared), oftentimes would the Governor invite us to supper with him, and me with the rest, I know not wherefore, save it were that Master Procter had praised me to him for my diligence in his service. And so we pa.s.sed many a merry evening.
Yet this so brief summary of that time doth not cover all, nor perhaps the greater part, since it leaves out my thoughts and hopes, which, all said, is more of a man's life than all the other; and by so much the more is noteworthy. And these thoughts of mine, particularly when I lay quiet in bed in my little chamber on the Bridge, were concerned about an infinite number of matters I had no opportunity to consider in the hurry and press of the day. So, I would think of my father, his evil estate, and the increasing pain he suffered, for I had lately received news of him by the hand of Simon Powell, who, honest lad, had bound himself to a smith of Tolland in order to be near his old master and comfort him. Of Idonia, too, you will guess I thought much, and the more that my business hindered our often meeting, though sometimes I saw her when I went early in the morning to meet my s.h.i.+ps; for later in the day she begged me not to come to the house, and greatly though this condition misliked me, I accepted it to please her. But, to be open, it was this consideration of all I dwelt upon which most held me in suspense, so that many a night I have slept scarce a wink, admiring what the secret were that compa.s.sed Idonia about, and the strangeness that clouded all her affairs.
”What is it goes on in that great still house?” I cried an hundred times, and would con over with myself the half hints I had already received; as of that swaggering Malpas, his attempted entrance; of the concealed Jesuit; of the way of communication between the part of the house Idonia lived in and the den of thieves where I had encountered with Andrew Plat. Then I would fall into a muse, only to be awakened on the sudden by the recollection of Guido Malpas, with his lean and crafty face pressed close against the window of the room I had sat in with Nelson and the Queen's yeoman, or by that older memory of my uncle Botolph who, I was a.s.sured, was also Skene the attorney. Why, by how great a rout of shadows was I compa.s.sed! and what a deal of infamy lay ready to be discovered upon the lightest hazard or unconsidered word!
Nay, had not my love for Mistress Avenon so wholly possessed me, I doubt I should have found in any the least strict review of her behaviour something covert, and diffident; as indeed she had already imparted from time to time much that a man more suspicious than I might have seized upon to her disadvantage. But such motes as those troubled me not, or rather troubled not the pa.s.sion of love I cherished for her; though, for the rest, I infinitely desired her removal from circ.u.mstances that I could not but fear to be every way perilous.
Now it befell one day, in the early summer, that all London was awakened with the news that the _Primrose_, Captain Foster, was coming up the Thames with the Governor of Biscay aboard, a prisoner. So admirable tidings had not often of late been ours to receive, and to pother one's head with business upon such a day was not to be thought on, at least not by the younger men; and thus I was soon running down to the Port to learn the whole history of that memorable adventure, wherein the _Primrose_, of all our s.h.i.+pping that lay upon the Spanish Coast, and that were suddenly seized upon by those Papist dogs without warning or possibility of escape--the _Primrose_, I say, not only got off free, but in a most b.l.o.o.d.y fight destroyed the soldiers that had privily got aboard her, and took prisoner their great Viceregent, or (as they call him) Corregidor.
A host of men and women pressed upon Master Foster about the hithe, applauding his so notable courage and triumph, and deriding the poor Corregidor, who nevertheless remained steadfast, nor seemed not to regard their taunts and menaces, but stood very quiet, and, I vow, was as gallant a gentleman to see as any man could be. Now, all this taking place about the Tower steps, whither for convenience the prisoner had been brought, it followed I was but a stone's cast from Idonia's dwelling, which no sooner had I remembered than I utterly forgot her admonition not to see her except early, whereas it was now high noon; but leaving the throng of idle cheering folk, I crept away at once to the desolate house in Thames Street, where I made sure of finding her.
As I went along, the bells were ringing from every steeple, which so filled the air with victory, as I was intoxicated with the sound of them, and on the sudden resolved that, come what would, I would tell Idonia I tired of this sleek clerk's life I led, and would be done with it straightway. Alas! for all such schemes of youth and stirrings of liberty! and yet not altogether alas! perhaps, since 'tis the adverse event of the most of such schemes that prepares and hardens us for bitterer battles to come, when the ranks are thinning and the drums are silent, and the powder is wasted to the last keg....
To my satisfaction I perceived the gate to be open, and as I came up I saw a flutter of white in the dark of the hall, and a moment later the mist of gold which was Idonia's hair.
”Good-morrow!” I bade her laughingly, as I entered and closed the door behind me, ”you did not look to have me visit you now, I warrant, when the bells be all pealing without, and a right success of our arms to acclaim!”
Idonia stood, one foot set upon the lowest stair, quite still. Not one word of greeting did she give me, nor was any light of welcome in her eyes, which were wide open and her lips parted as if to speak, though no word said she.
I hung back astonished, not knowing what to think, when I heard a rustle among the stuff beside me, and a man's voice that said very quiet: ”How now, master, methinks that is overmuch familiarity to use with one that is under my ward.”
I faced about instantly, laying my hand upon my sword, for this untoward interference startled me not a little. Even in the half dark I knew him; for 'twas none other than the attorney, John Skene.
CHAPTER XVI
THE SIEGE OF PETTY WALES
We had stood awhile fronting each other thus, when ”By the Ma.s.s!” cried Mr. Skene, clapping his open palm upon my shoulder, ”'tis Mr. Denis Cleeve or the devil is in it,” and so led me forward to the light.
”Are you two acquainted, then?” asked Idonia, her whole countenance of gravity exchanged for a bewildered expectancy. ”Oh, why knew I not of this sooner? Oh, I am glad,” she said, as she advanced to us, her bosom heaving, and such a light of pleasure in her eyes, as it seemed to lighten the very room itself, that had formerly showed so darksome and sinister.
”But tell me,” she went on eagerly, and came so close that I could feel the warmth of her breath on my cheek, ”is it a long while you have been friends?”
Now so struck with amazement was I, no less by the suddenness of this recognition than by the satire that Idonia's innocent speech implied, as I could answer nothing; but leaving the handling my sword, I stood resigned to what should follow.
”I think we be hardly friends yet,” said Skene, with a laugh of great good nature, ”and 'twould be a bolder coroner than I, who should p.r.o.nounce all enmity dead between us. Am I not in the right, Master Cleeve?” he ended, on a note of some sharpness.
I looked up at that, first at Idonia to see how she took the matter, and then at Skene.
<script>