A Gentleman-at-Arms: Being Passages in the Life of Sir Christopher Rudd, Knight

  headpiece to First Part]

  *I*

  I was a lank youth of sixteen years when I fell into the hands of theSpaniards of Hispaniola--an accident wherein my grandam saw the hand ofProvidence chastising a prodigal son; but of that you shall judge.

  In the summer of the year 1587, riding from school home by way ofSouthampton, I was told there of a brigantine then fitting out, toconvey forth a company of gentlemen adventurers to the Spanish Main inquest of treasure. Sir Francis Drake had lately come home from spoilingthe Spaniards' ships in the harbour of Cadiz, and the ports of our southcoast were ringing with the tale of his wondrous doings; and I, beingknown for a lad of quick blood and gamesome temper, was resolved to gowhere Francis Drake had gone aforetime, and gain somewhat of the wealththen lying open to adventurers bold to pluck the King of Spain's beard.Wherefore one fine night I stole from my bed-chamber, hied me to thequay at Southampton, and bestowed myself secretly aboard the good ship_Elizabeth_.

  Of my discovery in the hold, and the cuffs I got, and the probation Iwas put to, and my admission thereafter to the company of gentlemenadventurers, I will say nothing. The _Elizabeth_ made in due time thecoast of Hispaniola, and when Hilary Rawdon, the captain, sent a partyof his crew ashore to fill their water-casks, I must needs accompanythem; 'twas the first land we had touched for two weary months, and Ifelt a desperate urgency to stretch my legs. And while we were aboutour business, up comes a posse of Spaniards swiftly out of the woods,and there is a sudden onfall and a sharp tussle, and our party, beingoutnumbered three to one, is sore discomfited and utterly put to therout, but not until all save myself and another are slain, and I findmyself on my back, with a Spanish bullet in my leg. And you see me nowborne away among the victors, and when I am healed of my wound, I learnthat I am a slave on the lands of a most noble hidalgo of Spain, one DonAlfonso de Silva de Marabona, and an admiral to boot.

  Now I had left home to spoil the Spaniards and with no other intent;wherefore to toil and sweat under a hot sun on the fields of a Spanishadmiral, however noble, was no whit to my liking. Moreover, Don Alfonsoproved an exceeding hard taskmaster, and bore heavily upon me hisprisoner, a thing that was perhaps no cause for wonder, seeing that ofall who had suffered when Master Drake sacked San Domingo, he hadsuffered the most. His mansion had been plundered and burnt; his pridehad been wounded by the despite done to his galleons; and when aSpaniard is hurt both in pride and in pocket, he is not like to provehimself a very generous foe. And so I was in a manner the scapegoat forMaster Drake's offences, and had in good sooth to smart for it. Mynoble master made no ado about commanding me to be flogged if he werenot content with me; and to rub the juice of lemons, laced with salt andpepper, into the wounds made by the lash, is a marvellous shrewd way(though nowise commendable) of fostering penitence and remorse.

  But in this unhappy plight I was not left without a friend. One midday,when I was resting from my toil in the fields, there came to me a spareand sallow boy, somewhat younger than myself, and spoke courteously tome in a kind of French, the which I, being by no means without myrudiments, made shift to understand. I soon perceived that we had asomething in common, namely, a heavy and grievous grudge against DonAlfonso de Silva de Marabona, the which became a bond of unity betwixtus. Antonio (so was he named) was nephew to the admiral, and dependenton him--though his father had been a rich man,--by him, moreover,treated with great rigour. Ere long I was well acquainted withAntonio's doleful case. It was eleven years since his father the elderAntonio had sailed away for Spain, being summoned thither about somequestion of law concerning his estates in Castile. He took with him, inthe galleon _San Felipe_, a store of treasure belonging to his brotherthe admiral, together with a yet costlier freight for behoof of hisCatholic Majesty of Spain. And there was Antonio, a motherless infantof four years, left in his uncle's charge, his father purposing toreturn for him in the following summer, by the which time he hoped tohave set his affairs in order.

  The stormy season of the year was at hand when he departed, and diversof his friends had warned him against the perils of the long voyage.But Don Antonio feared the elements less than the French and Englishrovers who then infested the seas, and he had indeed chosen this timeadvisedly, for that it was little likely to tempt the pirates from theirlairs. It fell out, however, that he had not left port above three dayswhen a great tempest arose, suddenly, as the manner is in those regions,and to the wonted terrors of the tornado was added an earthquake, withfierce rumblings and vast upheavals of the soil, so that the admiralmade great lament about his brother and the wealth he had in charge.Don Antonio came no more to Hispaniola; the galleon _San Felipe_ washeard of never more; and his son had remained under the austeregovernance of Don Alfonso, who showed him no kindness, but ever seemedto look upon him as a burthen. When Antonio came to the age of twelve,he inquired of his uncle whether the estates of his late father wouldnot one day be his; but the admiral made answer that he had long sincepurchased the property from his brother, who had purposed sometime toquit the island and spend the remnant of his days in Spain.

  Such was Antonio's story, as he told it to me. He called his uncle afiend; as for me, I called him, in the English manner, Old Marrow-bones;we both signified one and the same thing--that we held him in loathingand abhorrence. This was our bond of union, and soon it became ourcustom to meet daily and rehearse our woes in consort. Antonio was evercareful to keep these our meetings secret, since he knew that, comingperchance to the admiral's ears, they would be deemed a cause ofoffence, and be punished, beyond doubt, with many stripes.

  But to dub your enemy with opprobrious names brings you no contentment,and does him no hurt. In no great while I began to consider of somemeans whereby I might contrive to slip the leash of my illustriousmaster. Having made Antonio swear by all his saints that he would notbetray me, I took counsel with him; indeed, I essayed to persuade theboy to put all to the hazard, and make his escape with me. But Antoniocould not screw his resolution to this pitch. He was content to throwhimself with right good-will into the perfecting of my plans. And so itcame to pass that one fine day, about sunset, I took French leave (asthe saying is) and set off on my lonely way to liberty. I had nothingupon me save my garments, and a long machete (so their knives arecalled) given me by Antonio; but as Samson slew countless Philistineswith the jawbone of an ass, and David laid Goliath low with a pebblefrom the brook; so I, though I did not liken myself to those heroes ofold, yet knew myself to be a fellow-countryman with Francis Drake, andneeded no doughtier ensample to inspire me.

  Following Antonio's wise and prudent counsel I set my face towards thenorth-west angle of the island, for the reason that, parted from it byonly a narrow strip of sea, there lay the smaller island of Tortuga,where it was possible that some countrymen of my own might be. Tortugahad been at some time a settlement of the Spaniards, but they had nowabandoned it, and if an English ship should chance to have put in towater there, or to burn the barnacles off its hull, I might light uponthe crew and join myself to them, and so bring my tribulations to anend. And after near a week's trudging--with herbs for my meat and waterfrom the streams for my drink--I came one day to the further shore ofHispaniola, and with great gladness beheld the strange hump-backedisland, like a monstrous tortoise floating on the sea, for which causeit was named Tortuga.

  A day or two I spent in roaming to and fro, gazing hungrily seawards fora ship. And when none appeared, I bethought me that I should certainlybe none the worse conditioned--nay, I might be a great deal thebetter--if I should cross to the smaller island and there make my abode.Having once been the habitation of Christian folk, methought it wouldretain some remnants of its former plantations, so that I need not wantfor food; and of a surety, with a wider expanse of sea before me, Ishould be in better case to spy a passing vessel than if I remained onHispaniola. I was minded at first to swim the channel--'twould be nogreat feat--but, observing at the water's edge a pair of ground-sharksly
ing in wait for a toothsome meal, I gave up this design very readily,and considered of some safer way.

  There were woods growing almost to the shore. To a boy with his mindset on it, and a sharp knife to his hand, the making of a raft is a taskof no great labour or hardship. 'Twas the work of two days to lopbranches meet for my purpose, strip them, and bind them together withstrands of bejuca, a climbing plant of serviceable sort; and on thethird day I launched my raft, and oared myself across the still water,being companied by a disappointed shark the better part of the way. Iwent ashore in some fear and trembling lest I should meet Spaniards, orother hostile men; but I saw no sign of present habitation, and wanderedfor near a day without lighting on any traces of mankind. But at lengthin my course I spied a heap of wood ashes, and some rinds of fruit, anda little beyond a broken hen-coop, whereby I knew that men sometimesresorted to the island, as Antonio had said. It came into my mind thatmy late companions of the _Elizabeth_ had perchance set foot here nolong while before me, and I felt a great longing to look on them again.I wondered where they might be, whether they had fought the Spaniards onthe Main and gained great treasure, or whether they had given up theirquest and sailed away for home.

  Some days I spent in solitude, never straying far from the coast, lest Ishould be out of sight if a ship came near. There was food inplenty--such is the bounty of Providence in those climes; and of nightsI ensconced myself in a little hut I built of branches in a nook on theshore.

  One evening as I roamed upon the cliff, and with vain longing scannedthe sea, on a sudden I espied, moving among the tree trunks on my righthand, a patch of red. In great perturbation of spirit I sprang behind atree. I had not seen clearly what the object was: it might be a man, itmight be a beast. In the wildernesses about the middle of Hispaniolathere were, I knew, herds of wild dogs and boars, a terror to humankind; and a fear beset me lest Tortuga also were the haunt of savagecreatures, which might come upon me in the night. Meseemed I must atthe least resolve my doubts, wherefore I went forward stealthily,bending among creeping plants, skipping from trunk to trunk, strainingmy eyes for another glimpse of that patch of red. For some little whileI sought in vain, and I was in a sweat of apprehension lest I shouldstumble into danger; but after stalking for near half-an-hour, as Isupposed, of a sudden I saw some moving thing among the trees within ahundred paces of me. Even as I watched, a quaint and marvellous figurecame forth into a little open space--the form of a man, arrayed fromdoublet to shoes in garments of bright red. His head was bare; a rapierhung at his side; and as I looked he plucked the weapon by the hilts,and made sundry passes in the air, going from me slowly into thewoodland. Never in my life had I beheld a man so oddly apparelled, andto find such an one here, on this lone island of Tortuga, set me athrillwith admiration. I deemed that I should have no security of mind untilI had learnt somewhat of this stranger, and whether there were otherswith him; wherefore with stealthy steps I followed him into thewoodland, and there, after near losing him, I saw him enter a little hutset in the midst of a narrow laund. From behind a tree I watched thered man. He kindled a fire, and I looked for him to cook his supper;but instead, he laid himself down on a bed of dried grass, so that thesmoke from the fire might be carried by the light wind across him, thewhich in a moment I guessed to be his device for warding off theinsects; I had suffered many things from their appetite in the nights Ihad slept in the woods of Hispaniola.

  Seeing that the red man had composed himself to sleep, I returnedquietly to my hut on the shore, and when I fell asleep dreamed that Ibeheld him defending at the rapier's point young Antonio against thewhip of the noble admiral Don Alfonso de Silva de Marabona. I rose withthe sun and stole back to the woodland, in hope to see the man quit hissleeping-place and to gain some light upon his manner of life and hisdoings upon this lone island. But the hut was empty; its inhabitant wasalready astir. Not that day nor for several days after did I set eyeson him again; but one high noon I had a glimpse of him roaming along thecliff, and while I was following, a great way off, he suddenly vanishedfrom my sight as 'twere into the earth.

  The numbness of terror seized upon me; I stood fixed to the ground,never doubting (being then but a boy) that 'twas the foul fiend in hisvery person who had descended into the bowels of the earth. Butbethinking me that I had discerned no horns upon his head, nor the tailthat was his proper appendage, but, instead, a rapier such as mortal menuse, I plucked up heart to draw nigh to the spot where he haddisappeared. And when I came to it, 'twas not, as I feared, a chasm,horrid with blue flame and sulphurous fume, but a short, steep path inthe cliff-side.

  Gathering my courage, I trod with wary steps until I came to a smallopening in the cliff. And when I had overcome my tearfulness andventured to peep in, I was struck with a great amazement, for I beheld avast vaulted chamber. There came some little daylight into it throughfissures in its further wall, and when my eyes had grown accustomed tothe twilight, and comprehended the whole space, I saw there, before andbelow me, the hull of a galleon, lying somewhat upon its side, with alittle water about its keel. And as I looked, I beheld the red man howhe waded to the vessel, whose side he ascended by a ladder of rope, andthen, having gained the deck, he was no more to be seen.

  I stood rooted in amazement. I durst not follow the red man further,conceiving that in a land where all save Spaniards were intruders, theodds were that he was of that race, and that to accost him, even todiscover myself to him, might put my life in jeopardy. Besides, theman's aspect, and my remembrance of the fierceness of his sword-play asI saw it in my dream, counselled wariness: he was not a man to approachbut with caution. Moreover, I was in presence of a great marvel,perceiving no means whereby the galleon had come into this vault. Savefor the narrow entrance, and the jagged rents in the walls, the chamberwas wholly enclosed; nor was there any passage whereby so great a vesselcould have been hauled in from the sea.

  Perplexed and bewildered, I waited long, but vainly, for the red man toshow himself again. Then, when from sheer weariness and hunger I was ina mind to return to the cliff, I beheld him rise from below deck,descend by the ladder, and, again wading through the water, make towardsme. Incontinently and in silence I fled, but halted when I gained thecliff, and lay hid until the man had come forth and gone his way.Whereupon I stole back and descended to the floor of the vault, toquench, if I might, my burning curiosity.

  I LAY HID UNTIL THE MAN HAD COME FORTH AND GONE HIS WAY]

  I walked about the vessel, and when I came to the stern, I started back,smitten with stark amazement. Her name was painted in great goldenletters there; I read it: 'twas SAN FELIPE, the name of the galleonwherein the father of my friend Antonio had sailed from San Domingoeleven years since, and which had never more been heard of.

  I thought of witchcraft, and questioned whether 'twere not the very workof the devil, for sure no mortal hands had brought the vessel throughsolid walls into this rock-bound chamber. But the galleon itself was intruth a thing of substance; thee were real shells at the brink of thewater; the water itself (when I dipped my finger and licked it) wassalt; beyond doubt the vault had communication with the sea. And evenwhile I stood there I perceived the water to be rising; 'twas deeper nowthan when the man had first waded through it to the vessel. In haste Imade the full circuit of the place, searching for an entrance, but invain. Save the fissures letting in the light, there was not a holethrough which a rat might wriggle, nor could I find the passage by whichthe water came.

  In much perplexity, oppressed by the wonder of it, I left the place byand by and returned to my hut. But I could not long withhold myselffrom the cavern, the which lured and (in a manner) beckoned me by somestrange spell. Next day I came again to it, and did as I had seen thered man do--to wit, waded through the water and climbed on board. Myfeet had scarce touched the deck when I beheld the red form standing inthe narrow entrance at the further end of the vault. Quick as thought Islipped into hiding on the lofty poop and there kept watch. The mancame aboard an
d descended by the companion, and a little after I heardthe tinkling of metal. I was drawn as by strong cords to learn what hewas doing, and crept silently as a mouse after him to the cabin. As Idrew near I heard again the clink of metal, and when I came to the doorI beheld the man kneeling before an open chest, gloating over it,plunging his hands into it, bathing them in the pieces of eight thatfilled it to the brim.

  I BEHELD THE MAN KNEELING BEFORE AN OPEN CHEST, GLOATINGOVER IT, PLUNGING HIS HANDS INTO IT]

  Spellbound, I stood and gazed. This discovery did but deepen thewonder. I questioned whether this were Antonio's father, who had neversailed to Spain at all, but by some strange means, belike with the helpof demons, had brought the vessel hither. And then, as I mused, the redman seemed to become aware by some subtle sense that he was not alone.Suddenly he turned his head, espied me, sprang to his feet, and,whipping out his rapier, leapt with a fierce cry towards me. I turnedto flee, being unarmed save for my machete, the which was no match for arapier. But I was a thought too late. The red man was upon my heelsere I could slip overboard, crying out upon me in words which I was toobusy saving my life to heed.

  Then began a hot chase round the deck of the galleon, the which mighthave continued until the pursuer, being the elder, became exhausted, hadnot I espied, in my running, a half-pike lying over against thebulwarks. This I snatched up, and put myself in a posture of defence."Voleur! voleur!" cried the red man, glaring at me; and now I hadcertainty he was no Spaniard. We fought, and doubtless I had fared illbut for my youth and the exercise I had had in this very opposition ofpike against sword upon the voyage in the _Elizabeth_. I was butsixteen; the Frenchman wore the grave aspect of a man of fifty; andthough he fought as one well practised in the handling of his weapon,'twas with a stiffness and want of sureness that bespoke disuse.

  Yet 'twas a desperate fight. Once and again I came very near to lose mylife, and escaped the Frenchman's point solely by my nimbleness. Twice,indeed, the weapon found my flesh; there was blood upon my sleeve. Andthen came my opportunity. The Frenchman in lunging at me over-reachedhimself, and I brought my pike down with all my strength upon his arm.His rapier fell to the deck, and before he could recover himself Isprang upon him, and, by a trick of wrestling I had learnt in bouts atour country fairs, threw him upon his back.

  And there were we two, he stretched on the deck, I pinning him down, andboth of us breathing hard, and gazing each into the other's eyes. Then Ispoke in French: what I said I know not; but he smiled, a vacant smilethat made me sorry I had hurt him.

  "Thou art one of my children," he said. "How didst thou escape?"

  By this, and the strangeness of his smile, I knew that his wits werewandering, and deemed it best to humour him.

  "Yes, one of your children," I made answer, understanding the word_enfants_ as doubtless he intended, as meaning his company, or crew."You were mistaken, sir; and I hope I have not broken your arm."

  "It is bruised, not broken," said the man, lifting it and smiling uponme again. "I do not remember thy name, but thou shalt be my corporal."

  "Wherein I am mightily favoured," said I. "Marvellously, too, I haveforgotten your name, mon Capitaine."

  "My name!" he said, in manifest puzzlement. "My name!" And then,smiling once more, he said, "I cannot tell. It is so long, so longsince I heard it. My children called me Captain, but that was beforethe storm. I forget many things; my children left me; they were reftfrom me by the storm; they died--all but you; and I cannot remember yourname! They called me Captain; and in truth I am Captain, by the choiceand election of the great Conde. Yes, the great Conde made me Captain, astripling from Quimperle."

  "Captain Q," said I, on the spur of the moment.

  He looked puzzled; then the same smile, like the empty smile of a babe,beamed upon his face, and he said--

  "Captain Q; and thou shalt be Corporal R. Is it not so?"

  "And so it is," I said. "My name is Rudd; I am an Englishman."

  "And we will fight the Spaniards together, shall we not? They mustnever get my gold--never!"

  "Indeed they shall not!" I replied. "And now let us go out into theopen, and I will bathe your arm at a brook. 'Tis pity we did notremember each other sooner."

  "Ah, but it is such a long time!" said Captain Q.

  We went out together, and after I had bathed his arm ('twas bruised fromelbow to wrist) the Captain invited me to his hut, and to a share of hisdinner of herbs.

  Such was the strange beginning of a friendship that endured for nearforty years. Though he was by so much my elder, he dealt with me asthough I had been his brother. We roamed the shore together, togetherfished and snared animals in the woods, and would have shared the samelodging but that I preferred to keep my little hut on the shore, where Ihad fresher air and was within close call of any ship that should chanceto pass in the night. Little by little I pieced together the story ofthe rock-girt galleon and of Captain Q. He could not talk in orderlysequence for long together, but whatsoever the subject of our discourse,he would break off to prattle of his childhood in the little village ofQuimperle, and of his youth and manhood to the time when destiny broughthim to Tortuga. He was a Huguenot, and had fought under Conde at St.Denis, and under Admiral Coligny at Jarnac. After the dread day of St.Bartholomew he fled from France, and became a corsair in his own vessel,haunting the coasts of the Spanish Main. One day he fell in with thegalleon _San Felipe_, and took it after a long fight. His own shipbeing small, he put his crew aboard the galleon, and the crew andcompany of the galleon upon his ship, and then sailed away for Tortuga,designing to land there and divide the spoil. And his little vessel,with the Spaniards on board, had gone down before his very eyes, havingreceived sore damage in the action.

  Before the _San Felipe_ made Tortuga she was caught in a great storm,which swept upon her suddenly and sent her masts by the board. During alull she was warped into a cove on the Tortuga coast, and thererefitted. Then, as she was being towed out, all hands busy in the work,the sea was cast up by a great earthquake; the cliffs on either handwere upheaved and flung sheer upon the vessel, killing outright everyman upon it and in the boats save only the Captain and two or threebeside. The Captain was struck on the head by a fragment of rock, andthrown senseless to the deck. (And here, as he told the story, helifted his long, grizzling locks and showed a great seam upon hisskull.) When he came to himself all was at first mere blankness to him.He got upon his feet, lost in amaze to behold the galleon encompassed bya vault of rock, and tended the few men that had survived the cataclysm,but they lingered for a little and then all died, leaving him alone.

  Little by little the past came back to him, and he was not aware of anychange in himself save that his memory played him tricks. But Iperceived that the shock and the blow on the head had done hisintellects more harm than he knew. He had long fits of silence, whereinhe would sit and gaze vacantly out to sea, or would march with drawnsword into the woodland, seeking an enemy that had come to steal hisgold. Other whiles he would weave baskets of grass, humming littlesongs, or babbling in the manner of children. He never ceased to regardme as one of his whilom crew, and in my pity I said nought to undeceivehim.

  He knew not how long he had dwelt upon the island. I asked him whetherhe had been alone all the time, and why he had not discovered himself tothe French and English pirates who had doubtless sometimes come ashore.

  He smiled cunningly, and said, "Could I trust them? They were not myfriends. Say that I told them of the ship, and the great treasure itcontained, think you they would not have desired it for their own, andtaken it from me, and left me poor? I trusted La Noue" (his thoughtswere straying to his youth and the siege of La Rochelle): "all mentrusted him. He was saved at Jarnac."

  And then he fell a-musing. At another time he told me that he had beenminded once to join a party that had landed, telling them nothing, withintent to return at some convenient season for his treasure. But hefeared lest during his absence it should be discove
red, and he mightreturn only to find that the vessel had been stripped bare. Thetreasure was the sole thing he clung to; he could not bring himself topart from it even for a day; once a day at the least he descended intothe cabin and feasted his eyes on the great store of gold and jewels.He had become a miser. And so he carefully shunned such men as had comeashore; and once he had been near to starving, when a crew encampedbeneath the cliff wherein was the entrance to his cavern, and remainedthere for several days, he not daring to issue forth for food, lest heshould be seen.

  I marvelled often that the Captain never showed any distrust of me. Hetook me often into the cabin, and sometimes set me to count the moneypiece by piece, and to display the jewels on the lids of the chests.Indeed, he took, methought, a childish pleasure in thus exhibiting hiswealth, and when the precious things were all set in array before him,he would gaze from them to me with a simple pride and contentation whichI found infinitely moving.