Part 10 (1/2)

”I spent three years at Tresillack, and all that while Mrs. Carkeek lived with me and shared the secret. Few women, I dare to say, were ever so completely wrapped around with love as we were during those three years. It ran through my waking life like a song: it smoothed my pillow, touched and made my table comely, in summer lifted the heads of the flowers as I pa.s.sed, and in winter watched the fire with me and kept it bright.

”'Why did I ever leave Tresillack?' Because one day, at the end of five years, Farmer Hosking brought me word that he had sold the house--or was about to sell it; I forget which. There was no avoiding it, at any rate; the purchaser being a Colonel Kendall, a brother of the old Squire.'

”'A married man?' I asked.

”'Yes, miss; with a family of eight. As pretty children as ever you see, and the mother a good lady. It's the old home to Colonel Kendall.'

”'I see. And that is why you feel bound to sell.'

”'It's a good price, too, that he offers. You mustn't think but I'm sorry enough--'

”'To turn me out? I thank you, Mr. Hosking; but you are doing the right thing.'

”Since Mrs. Carkeek was to stay, the arrangement lacked nothing of absolute perfection--except, perhaps, that it found no room for me.

”'_She_--Margaret-will be happy,' I said; 'with her cousins, you know.'

”'Oh yes, miss, she will be happy, sure enough,' Mrs. Carkeek agreed.

”So when the time came I packed up my boxes, and tried to be cheerful.

But on the last morning, when they stood corded in the hall, I sent Mrs.

Carkeek upstairs upon some poor excuse, and stepped alone into the pantry.

”'Margaret!' I whispered.

”There was no answer at all. I had scarcely dared to hope for one.

Yet I tried again, and, shutting my eyes this time, stretched out both hands and whispered:

”'Margaret!'

”And I will swear to my dying day that two little hands stole and rested--for a moment only--in mine.”

THE LADY OF THE s.h.i.+P

[_Or so much as is told of her by Paschal Tonkin, steward and major-domo to the lamented John Milliton, of Pengersick Castle, in Cornwall: of her coming in the Portugal s.h.i.+p, anno 1526; her marriage with the said Milliton and alleged sorceries; with particulars of the Barbary men wrecked in Mount's Bay and their entertainment in the town of Market Jew._]

My purpose is to clear the memory of my late and dear Master; and to this end I shall tell the truth and the truth only, so far as I know it, admitting his faults, which, since he has taken them before G.o.d, no man should now aggravate by guess-work. That he had traffic with secret arts is certain; but I believe with no purpose but to fight the Devil with his own armoury. He never was a robber as Mr. Thomas St. Aubyn and Mr. William G.o.dolphin accused him; nor, as the vulgar pretended, a l.u.s.tful and b.l.o.o.d.y man. What he did was done in effort to save a woman's soul; as Jude tells us, ”_Of some have compa.s.sion, that are in doubt; and others save, having mercy with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh_”--though this, alas!

my dear Master could not. And so with Jude I would end, praying for all of us and ascribing praise _to the only wise G.o.d, our Saviour, who is able to guard us from stumbling and set us faultless before His presence with exceeding joy_.

It was in January, 1526, after a tempest lasting three days, that the s.h.i.+p called the _Saint Andrew_, belonging to the King of Portugal, drove ash.o.r.e in Gunwallo Cove, a little to the southward of Pengersick.

She was bound from Flanders to Lisbon with a freight extraordinary rich--as I know after a fas.h.i.+on by my own eyesight, as well as from the inventory drawn up by Master Francis Porson, an Englishman, travelling on board of her as the King of Portugal's factor. I have a copy of it by me as I write, and here are some of Master Porson's items:--

8,000 cakes of copper, valued by him at 3,224 pounds.

18 blocks of silver, ' ' ' 2,250 '.

Silver vessels, plate, patens, ewers and pots, beside pearls, precious stones, and jewels of gold.

Also a chest of coined money, in amount 6,240 '.

There was also cloth of arras, tapestry, rich hangings, satins, velvets, silks, camlets, says, satins or Bruges, with great number of bales of Flemish and English cloth; 2,100 barber's basins; 3,200 laten candlesticks; a great chest of shalmers and other instruments of music; four sets of armour for the King of Portugal, much harness for his horses, and much beside--the whole amounting at the least computation to 16,000 pounds in value. [1] And this I can believe on confirmation of what I myself saw upon the beach.