Across the Salt Seas. John Bloundelle-Burton
eye ranged over my habiliments; then he said, sharply:
"A hundred guineas. Fifty down, on the nail, the rest at the end of the journey. You to take all risks. That is, I mean, even though we get no further than the mouth of the Scheldt--which is like enough. Say, will you give it?"
"'Tis, indeed, a fancy price, yet, on conditions, yes," I answered promptly.
"Those conditions being----"
"That you weigh within twenty-four hours; that if we are chased you run, or even fight, till there is no further hope, and that if we escape capture you approach to the nearest point to Cadiz possible. Tavira to be that point."
He got up and went out of the door into the street, and I saw him looking up into the heavens at the clouds passing beneath the sun. Then he came back and resumed his seat, after which he said:
"If the wind keeps as 'tis now I will weigh ere twenty-four hours are past. The conditions to be as you say. And the fifty guineas to be in my hands ere we up anchor. They," he added, half to himself, "will be something for the home even though I lose my ship."
And this being settled and all arrangements concluded, we went off in his boat, which was lying at the steps of the Boömjes, to see the ship. Then, I having selected my cabin out of two which he had unoccupied, returned to the coffee house to write my Lord Marlborough word of what I had done, to dispose of my horse--which I was sorry enough to do, since it was a good, faithful beast that had carried me well; yet there was no use in keeping it, I not knowing if I should ever see Rotterdam again--to make one or two other preparations, and to write to my mother at home.
As to the hundred guineas--great as the demand was, I felt justified in paying it, since, if I succeeded in my task, the result might be splendid for England. Also I had a sufficiency of money with me, the earl having ordered two hundred guineas to be given me out of the regimental chest (which was pretty full, seeing that at Venloo eight great chests of French gold were taken possession of by us on gaining the town), and had also given me bills for three hundred more guineas, signed by his own hand, which the money changers would be only too glad to pay anywhere. And, besides this, I had some money of my own, and should have more from the sale of the horse.
There remains one thing, however, to mention, which I have almost forgot to set down, namely, that at the Indian Coffee House I had given my name accurately, his Lordship, who was perfectly acquainted with France--indeed, he had once served her under Turenne, in his capacity of colonel of the "English Regiment" sent out by King Charles the Second--having said that Crespin was as much a French as an English name. And although no questions had as yet been asked as to what my business was, there being, indeed, none who had any right or title to so ask, I had resolved that, if necessary, I would do this: namely, here in Holland I would be English, since, at the time, and we being allies, it was almost one and the same thing; and that in Spain I would be French, which was also at the period one and the same thing. And if we were to be captured by any of Louis' privateers or ships of war also I should be French, in that case possibly a Canadian, to account for any strangeness in my accent.
And with this all fixed in my mind I made my preparations for going to sea in La Mouche Noire.
CHAPTER IV.
AN ESCAPE.
The wind shifted never a point, so that, ere sunset the next day, we were well down the river and nearing the mouth, while already ahead of us we could see the waves of the North Sea tumbling about. Also, we could see something else, that we could have done very well without, namely, the topmasts of a great frigate lying about three miles off the coast, or rather cruising about and keeping off and on, the vessel being doubtless one of Louis' warships, bent on intercepting anything that came out of the river.
"Yet," said Captain Tandy, as he stood on the poop and regarded her through his perspective glass, "she will not catch us. Let but the night fall, and out we go, while, thanks to the Frenchman who built our little barky, we can keep so well in that she can never come anear us."
"She can come near enough, though, to send a round shot or two into our side," I hazarded, "if she sees our lights."
"She won't see our lights," the captain made answer, and again he indulged in that habit which seemed a common one with him--he winked at me; a steady, solemn kind of a wink, that, properly understood, conveyed a good deal. And, having favoured me with it, he gave orders that the light sail under which we had come down the river should be taken in, and, this done, we lay off the little isle of Rosenberg, which here breaks the Maas in two, until nightfall.
And now it was that Tandy gave me a piece of information which, at first, I received with anything but satisfaction; the information, to wit, that at the last moment almost--at eleven o'clock in the morning, and before I had come on board--he had been fortunate enough to get another passenger, this passenger being the man Carstairs--or Cuddiford, as he came to consider him--whom, at the opening of this narrative, you have seen in a delirium.
"I could not refuse the chance, Mr. Crespin," he said, for he knew my name by now. "Things are too ill with me, owing to this accursed fresh war, for me to throw guineas away. So when his blackamoor accosted me at the 'Indian' and said that he heard I was going a voyage south--God, He knows how these things leak out, since I had never spoke a word of my intention, though some of the men, or the ship's chandler, of whom I bought last night, may have done so--and would I take his master and him? I was impelled to do it! There are the wife and the children at home."
"And have you got another hundred guineas from him?" I asked.
"Ay, for him and the black. But they will not trouble you. The old gentleman--who seems to be something like a minister--tells me he is not well, and will not quit his cabin. The negro will berth near him; they will not interfere with you."
"Do they know there is another passenger aboard?"
"I have not spoken to the old man; maybe, however, some of the sailors may have told the servant. Yet none know your name; but I--it can be kept secret an you wish." And again he winked at me, thinking, of course, as he had done before, that my business was of a ticklish nature, as indeed it was, though not quite that which he supposed. Nay, he felt very sure it must be so, since otherwise he would have got no hundred guineas out of me for such a passage.
"I do not wish it known," I said. "It must be kept secret. Also my country. There must be no talking."
"Never fear," he replied. "I know nothing. And I do not converse with the men, most of whom are Hollanders, since I had to pick them up in a hurry. As for the old man, you need not see him; and, if you do, you can keep your own counsel, I take it."
I answered that I could very well do that; after which the captain left me--for now the night had come upon us, dark and dense, except for the stars, and we were about to run out into the open. But even as I watched the men making sail, and felt the little ship running through the water beneath me--I could soon hear her fore foot gliding through it with a sharp ripple that resembled the slitting of silk--I wished that those other passengers had not come aboard, that I could have made the cruise alone.
Yet we were aboard, he and I, and there was no help for it; it must be endured. But still I could not help wondering what any old minister should want to be making such a journey as this for; especially wondered, also, why he should be attended by a black servant; and why, again, it should be worth his while to pay a hundred guineas for the passage.
But you know now as well as I do that this man was no minister, but rather, if Tandy's surmises were right, some villainous old filibuster who had lived through evil days and known evil spirits; my meditations are, therefore, of no great import. Rather let me get on to what was the outcome of my journey.
When we were at sea we showed no light at all; no! not at foremast, main or mizzen; so that I very well understood now why the captain had winked as he said that the Frenchman, if she was that, would not see us; and especially I understood it when, on going below, I found that the cabin windows were fastened with dead lights so that no ray could steal out