The Pirate Story Megapack. R.M. Ballantyne

declaring he would rather see her for two minutes now and again peering through a bush, though she should never cast a glance his way, than have her treat him as if she were not his child and ceased to feel any love for him. But seeing the peril of such ways, I would by no means consent to his hanging about the Court like a thief, and told him plainly that unless he would undo us all and ruin Moll, he must come openly as before or not at all.

      Without further demur he consents to be guided by me, and then, very eagerly, asks when it will be proper for him to come; and we agree that if he come in a week’s time, there will be no thought in anybody’s mind of our having conspired to this end.

      As the fates would have it, Mr. Godwin finished his painting on the Saturday following (the most wonderful piece of its kind I ever saw, or any one else, in my belief), and being justly proud of his work and anxious Sir Peter Lely should see it soon, he resolved he would carry it to Hatfield on Monday. Moll, who was prouder of her husband’s piece than if it were of her own doing, was not less eager it should be seen; yet the thought that she must lose him for four days (for this journey could not well be accomplished in less time) cast down her spirits exceedingly. ’Twas painful to see her efforts to be cheerful despite of herself. And, seeing how incapable she was of concealing her real feeling from him whom she would cheer, she at length confessed to him her trouble. “I would have you go, and yet I’d have you stay, love,” says she.

      “’Tis but a little while we shall be parted,” says he.

      “A little while?” says she, trembling and wringing one hand within the other. “It seems to me as if we were parting for ever.”

      “Why, then,” returns he, laughing, “we will not part at all. You shall come with me, chuck. What should prevent you?”

      She starts with joy at this, then looks at him incredulous for a moment, and so her countenance falling again, she shakes her head as thinking, I take it, that if it were advisable she should go with him, he would have proposed it before.

      “No,” says she, “’twas an idle fancy, and I’ll not yield to it. I shall become a burden, rather than a helpmate, if you cannot stir from home without me. Nay,” adds she, when he would override this objection, “you must not tempt me to be weak, but rather aid me to do that which I feel right.”

      And she would not be persuaded from this resolution, but bore herself most bravely, even to the moment when she and her husband clasped each for the last time in a farewell embrace.

      She stood where he had left her for some moments after he was gone. Suddenly she ran a few paces with parted lips and outstretched hands, as if she would call him back; then, as sharply she halts, clasping her hands, and so presently turns back, looking across her shoulder, with such terror in her white face, that I do think her strong imagination figured some accusing spirits, threatening the end of all her joys.

      I followed her into the house, but there I learnt from Mrs. Butterby that her mistress was gone to her own chamber.

      As I was sitting in my office in the afternoon, Jack Dawson came to me in his seaman’s dress, his hand still wrapped up, but his face more healthful for his long ride and cheerful thoughts.

      “Why, this could not have fallen out better,” says I, when we had exchanged greetings; “for Moll is all alone, and down in the dumps by reason of her husband having left her this morning on business, that will hold him absent for three or four days. We will go up presently and have supper with her.”

      “No, Kit,” says he, very resolutely, “I’ll not. I am resolved I won’t go there till tomorrow, for this is no hour to be a-calling on ladies, and her husband being away ’twill look as if we had ordered it of purpose. Besides, if Moll’s in trouble, how am I to pretend I know nothing of the matter and care less, and this Mother Butterby and a parcel of sly, observant servants about to surprise one at any moment? Say no more—’tis useless—for I won’t be persuaded against my judgment.”

      “As you will,” says I.

      “There’s another reason, if other’s needed,” says he, “and that’s this plaguey thirst of mine, which seizes me when I’m doleful or joyful, with a force there’s no resisting. And chiefly it seizes me in the later part of the day; therefore, I’d have you take me to the Court tomorrow morning betimes, ere it’s at its worst. My throat’s like any limekiln for dryness now; so do pray, Kit, fasten the door snug, and give me a mug of ale.”

      This ended our discussion; but, as it was necessary I should give some reason for not supping with Moll, I left Dawson with a bottle, and went up to the house to find Moll. There I learnt that she was still in her chamber, and sleeping, as Mrs. Butterby believed; so I bade the good woman tell her mistress when she awoke that Captain Evans had come to spend the night with me, and he would call to pay her his devoirs the next morning.

      Here, that nothing may be unaccounted for in the sequence of events, I must depart from my train of present observation to speak from after-knowledge.

      I have said that when Moll started forward, as if to overtake her husband, she suddenly stopped as if confronted by some menacing spectre. And this indeed was the case; for at that moment there appeared to her heated imagination (for no living soul was there) a little, bent old woman, clothed in a single white garment of Moorish fashion, and Moll knew that she was Mrs. Godwin (though seeing her now for the first time), come from Barbary to claim her own, and separate Moll from the husband she had won by fraud.

      She stood there (says Moll) within her gates, with raised hand and a most bitter, unforgiving look upon her wasted face, barring the way by which Moll might regain her husband; and as the poor wife halted, trembling in dreadful awe, the old woman advanced with the sure foot of right and justice. What reproach she had to make, what malediction to pronounce, Moll dared not stay to hear, but turning her back fled to the house, where, gaining her chamber, she locked the door, and flung herself upon her husband’s bed; and in this last dear refuge, shutting her eyes, clasping her ears, as if by dulling her senses to escape the phantom, she lay in a convulsion of terror for the mere dread that such a thing might be.

      Then, at the thought that she might never again be enfolded here in her husband’s arms, an agony of grief succeeded her fit of maddening fear, and she wept till her mind grew calm from sheer exhaustion. And so, little by little, as her courage revived, she began to reason with herself as how ’twas the least likely thing in the world that if Mrs. Godwin were in England, she should come to the Court unattended and in her Moorish clothes; and then, seeing the folly of abandoning herself to a foolish fancy, she rose, washed the tears from her face, and set herself to find some occupation to distract her thoughts. And what employment is nearer to her thoughts or dearer to her heart than making things straight for her husband; so she goes into the next room where he worked, and falls to washing his brushes, cleaning his paint-board, and putting all things in order against his return, that he may lose no time in setting to work at another picture. And at dinner time, finding her face still disfigured with her late emotions and ashamed of her late folly, she bids her maid bring a snack to her room, under the pretence that she feels unwell. This meal she eats, still working in her husband’s room; for one improvement prompting another, she finds plenty to do there: now bethinking her that the hangings of her own private room (being handsomer) will look better on these walls, whereas t’others are more fit for hers, where they are less seen; that this corner looks naked, and will look better for her little French table standing there, with a china image atop, and so forth. Thus, then, did she devote her time till sundown, whereabouts Mrs. Butterby raps at her door to know if she will have a cup of warm caudle to comfort her, at the same time telling her that Mr. Hopkins will not sup with her, as he has Captain Evans for his guest at the lodge.

      And now Moll, by that natural succession of extremes which seems to be a governing law of nature (as the flow the ebb, the calm the storm, day the night, etc.), was not less elated than she had been depressed in the early part of the day—but still, I take it, in a nervous, excitable condition. And hearing her father, whom she has not seen so long, is here, a thousand mad projects enter her lively imagination. So, when Mrs. Butterby, after the refusal of her warm caudle, proposes she shall bring Madam a tray of victuals, that she may pick something