Wild Life in the Land of the Giants: A Tale of Two Brothers

Chapter Seven
Alone on the Moor – Adventure in the Cave

On looking back through a long vista of years, and considering all the pros and cons of the case, and remembering that Jill and I were only boys, I do not think it any wonder we ran away from the dear old Thunderbolt hulk. I have always accused myself to myself, for the folly of having given way to a sudden romantic impulse – for which I, being the elder of the three on board, am alone accountable – playing at pirates, firing at a flag-ship, and all the rest of it.

But when our little game was over, and the full enormity of the offence stared us in the face, and after what the officer of the tug-boat had told us, I repeat, it is no wonder we ran away. We were not to know the officer was, figuratively speaking, laughing in his sleeve at us. We believed him. We were convinced it would end in a drum-head court-martial, with, next day, poor Jack swung up at one end of the fore-yard, and poor dear Jill at the other. A pretty sight that would have been on a summer’s morning. Romantic? Oh, yes, I own there would have been a good deal of romance about it. Rather much indeed. Our position would have been far too exalted to suit even my ambition.

Some one has said that hanging is the worst use you can put a man to, so it cannot be good for a boy.

That officer of the tug-boat, too, made so awfully light of the matter.

When I had asked him if hanging was very, very, dreadful, —

“Oh, dear me, no, my lad,” he replied, laughing, “not half so bad as having a tooth pulled.”

Our darling mother told us never to hate anybody, but I do not think I loved that officer very much just then.

Well, how did we get away? The fact is our escape was effected far more safely and easily than I had anticipated. I had expected that there would be a considerable deal of romance about that I felt sure they would fire shot and shell and shrapnel at the boat that was bearing us off, and if after throwing ourselves into the water we reached shore safely, they would send a regiment or two of soldiers at the very least to pursue us.

The old Thunderbolt, when she ran away, “showed a pair of clean heels,” so I heard that tug-boat fellow say, because wind and tide was hurrying her on. But it was no such easy matter to get her back; so the whole morning had fled before she was once more alongside her moorings. Then the bustle and din and the loud talking were shocking, for nearly an hour.

Mattie – I was so glad of this – got very sleepy, so we took her into Mrs Moore’s room and placed her on the bed. She bade us both good-night prettily, but sleepily, and I was glad of this too, for the “good-nights” did for the “good-byes.” Ah! little did Mattie think we were going to leave her, but she did not feel the tear that fell on her beautiful hair as I bent over her. It was best. After this I suppose it was activity that made us feel brave. We had to look sharp, I assure you. We hurried into our cabin – ours, alas! no more – and exchanged our hats for caps, and put on our monkey jackets – our winter ones. This would not look odd, because there was quite a raw air over the water. We went and packed our one portmanteau, taking nothing lumbersome, and no books, except our little Bibles that mamma had given us.

Then I sat down and wrote a letter, a very brief one, to Mattie. It only said, in a boy’s scrawling hand —

“Dearest Mattie, – Please always pray for Jack and poor Jill. – Your loving and affectionate Jack.”

I folded this up, and glided away into the child’s room and laid it on her pillow. She was sound asleep, but I kissed her brow. If I had stopped to look at her, I believe my heart would have broken in two.

Jill was waiting with the bag, and the difficulty was now to get a boat. We had thought of getting into the dinghy and paying a man to return it. It was better we didn’t.

I opened the port. The fresh morning air blew in and calmed me, and just at that moment, as if a good fairy had sent him, a shore boatman rounded the stern of the hulk, and was close beneath us.

“Boatman,” I said, “can you take us on shore?”

He looked about him a bit and nodded. Then I dropped my bag, and he caught it so neatly.

“We’ll get in from a lower port,” I said.

The man nodded again. Off Jill and I went down below to poor Tom Morley’s quarters. Nobody saw us, for everybody was on the upper deck forward, and making a terrible din. In three minutes more we were well away from the ship, but I made Jill lie down for fear of the shot and shell and shrapnel which I expected to be flying about our ears soon, and I myself pulled up the neck of my monkey jacket.

The man rowed right away up the harbour, and, to my intense joy, we had soon put a wall between us and the ships of war.

My heart had been thumping violently, and I dare say so was poor Jill’s.

When we landed, and I was diving for my purse to pay the mail, he held up his hand deprecatingly.

“Look here, youngsters,” he said, “I was a boy myself once. You’ve got into a little scrape, and you’re going to stop away from school till the little storm blows over. I won’t take a penny for this job, and I’ll take you both on board free and for nothing. My name’s Joe Saunders; you can ask for me.”

Then we thanked him and shook hands with him, with the tears in our eyes – in fact I think some rolled over. Next moment we were off and away.

We walked very fast and took the quietest streets. We met some marines, and our hearts began to beat again; but they hardly looked at us.

When we had gone some distance we were on high ground, and paused to look back. We could see the forest of masts rising over the walls and yards, and the smoke curling up from the chimneys. And as we gazed two bells rang out almost simultaneously from all the ships, while immediately afterwards, sweet and clear in the still morning air, rose the music of the band on the flag-ship’s quarter-deck.

It was very beautiful, but to us inexpressibly saddening.

We hurried on now, and were soon thankful to find ourselves out in the green country, with music of another kind falling on our ears – the happy songs of the birds.

We did not stay to listen then, however; we were in far too great a hurry to put as many miles as the day would admit of between us and the scenes of our wild piratical escapades. For we had not a doubt that, as soon as the Thunderbolt was once safely moored, the hue and cry would go out for the capture of the daring pirates who had threatened to blow one of Her Majesty’s flag-ships, with a tame admiral on board of it, out of the water.

So we went on, and on, and on, bearing away to the north, the country becoming wilder and more desolate at every turn of the road. When it was long past midday we began to feel very hungry, and, spying smoke rising from a little roadside inn not far off, we determined to halt and refresh ourselves.

A very quiet-looking, motherly sort of woman showed us into a neat little parlour, and making her acquainted with our desires, she went out and soon returned with a dinner fit for a king. Indeed I am sure that King Charles, when he was in hiding, did not fare half so well. Here were new potatoes, and boiled bacon and beans, and a jug of table beer, to say nothing of the white cloth and the wild flowers. What more could a king desire?

We felt exceedingly comfortable after dinner, and much bolder. Indeed we felt so far braced up that I determined forthwith to write to Auntie Serapheema and our darling mother. We had brought with us our little writing-cases, so, with Jill looking over my shoulder, I began writing.

Auntie’s letter did not take long. We expressed our sorrow, thanked her for all her kindness, and told her we were determined to be sailors if not captured; and that we hoped one day to return to England laden with jewels and gold, and come back and live happy ever after in Trafalgar Cottage. We sent our love to Sally and Robert, and our very dearest love to little Mattie; and we signed the letter with our names in full.

That last was a stroke of policy, we thought.

Next we commenced writing to papa and mamma. I wrote letter after letter and tore them all up, carefully stowing away the pieces in our bag, lest if left about they might lead to our capture.

I hardly remember what sort of a tear-blotched, loving, and penitent epistle the last was, but perhaps it would have answered as well as a longer one. Just then a postman hove in sight. He stopped to refresh himself, and I ran out and gave him the letters. I had not even forgotten to put the correct number of stamps on poor mamma’s.

So we had crossed the Rubicon.

But having sent the letter to mamma, a load appeared to have fallen off my mind, all in a heap as it were.

When we asked the landlady how much was to pay, she looked at us and said, “Sixpence each.”

“Which way are you going?” she added.

“North,” I answered.

“You’ll be on a walking tour, young sirs?”

I nodded.

“Well, you better not walk farther the night. There isn’t another house now for seven miles. You’re on the moor. I can give you a clean, nice bed, and breakfast any time you like in the morning.”

I consulted with Jill and we concluded to stay.

When alone again we counted our money. Financial ruin did not stare us in the face, for our united fund from the savings of many a lucky penny – dear aunt was so good to us – came to a few shillings over seven pounds. We thought ourselves rich, but determined to be very cautious nevertheless.

We slept well and did not dream once. Our bedroom was a little attic, the window of which looked over the front causeway. The sound of many voices awoke us next morning. I sprang out of bed, and peeped cautiously out from under a corner of the blind.

To my horror and dismay the roadway was crowded with soldiers, and I could distinctly see the glitter of fixed bayonets. Pale and trembling were both of us now, but we dressed and waited. After about an hour’s terrible suspense the party broke up, one half – who, by the way, had a prisoner – going south, and the rest going on in the direction of the moor.

The men were only hunting for deserters, after all, so our appetite returned, and we did ample justice to the good things set before us by the kind landlady. Then we bade her good-bye, and started.

We had to move with great caution now, for we knew the soldiers were on ahead, and we did not know what might happen. However, nothing did happen all that forenoon. We must have missed our way somehow, for instead of coming to the one house the woman spoke of, we came to quite a little hamlet, with a shop or two, and here, not knowing what might be before us, we bought provisions enough in the shape of bacon, butter, bread, and red herrings – we were not dainty – to last us for a week at least.

Then cautiously inquiring our way north, and after making a hearty lunch at a small inn, we set out once more, and, feeling very buoyant and fresh, walked on as straight as the road would take us till nearly sundown.

We never came to an eminence, however, without getting up and gazing round us, and when we came to a wooded turn in the road we deserted it altogether and took to the bush.

Just about sundown we heard voices on ahead, and Jill and I leapt like deer behind a hedge, and lay as still as snakes do. We soon saw the gleam of scarlet. It was the soldiers returning, and with them, between men with fixed bayonets, a poor dejected-looking lad with his fatigue jacket open and soiled, and his head bare. He was handcuffed.

When right opposite us they all stopped.

“Give us a light, Bill,” said one.

They had only stopped to light their pipes, though Jill and I trembled like aspen leaves. I noticed that one of the men, after he had taken a draw or two himself, wiped the pipe-stem and thrust it friendly-like into the the prisoner’s mouth. He must have been a good man.

But we gathered enough from their conversation, brief as it was, to quite frighten us.

“He’s on the moor,” said one, “and they’re bound to have him.”

“A desperate character, isn’t he?”

“Rather. Kill you as soon as wink.”

Then they went on.

Who was this desperate character, abroad on the moor?

“Surely they can’t refer to me, Jill?” I said.

“Oh no,” said Jill; “certainly not. They would have mentioned me, you know.”

“I don’t think so, Jill. You are not such a desperate character as I am.”

“Oh yes; I’m ten times worse,” said Jill, awfully.

We soon after came into a country high, bleak, and desolate, with only here and there a clump of trees. Hills there were in plenty, but houses none.

And night was falling fast, and both of us were getting very tired. We would have to sleep out, that was evident, and so determined to take the first available shelter. So on coming to a bushy gully, with a tiny streamlet going singing down the centre of it, we left the road and followed the water upwards, and were soon at the foot of a rock. To my surprise, on pulling some bushes aside I found a cave.

Some shepherd’s, evidently, we thought, for here was a bed of withered ferns, soft and dry; and not far from the mouth of the cave a place where a fire had been.

So we camped at once and lit a fire, for I had forgotten nothing. We made the fire between some stones, and placed thereon our tin billy with water to boil for tea.

We soon had made an excellent supper, and Jill’s dear eyes sparkled as he sipped his tea.

“What a splendid bushman you are, Jack!” he said. “This is a first-rate sort of a life, and, don’t you know, I wouldn’t mind living this way for a month.”

“Well,” I said, “it seems pretty safe; and I propose we do stop here for a few days. By that time they will think we are far away, and never look here for us.”

“Agreed,” said Jill.

Then we went and gathered a quantity of fern, so that we had quite a delightful bed in the cave; and as night was now over all the wastes around us, we determined to retire. The stars were out and glimmering down, and bats wheeling about, and every now and then the tu-whit – tu-whoo! of the brown owl made us start. It sounded so close to us, and oh, it was so mournful!

Other than that there was not a sound to be heard. We crept in, and I lit a candle as coolly as if I had been an old campaigner. I stuck it between two stones. Then I read a bit from mother’s Bible, and down we lay after that, leaving the candle burning for company’s sake. We did not like to be quite in the dark in so eeriesome a place.

But tired as we were, we lay and talked and planned for hours, and when I looked at my watch – yes, we each had a watch – I was surprised to find it was nearly twelve o’clock.

“We needn’t hurry up in the morning though, Jill.”

“Assuredly not,” said Jill.

Five minutes after we were sound asleep.

It might have been an hour afterwards, or it might have been two. I know not. But I do know we both awoke with a start at the same moment, and sat up shaking and trembling with fear.

A terrible-looking man stood in the cave gazing down at us.

Chapter Eight
Good Advice from a Strange Quarter – Midnight and Anxiety

The state of my mind at this moment must have been akin to that of a snake-charmed bird. I felt utterly, abjectly helpless. Had the apparition taken a knife out and proceeded to kill us, I do not think I should have lifted a hand or uttered a cry, except a frightened moan like a person in a nightmare.

He stood and looked down at us long and earnestly. A strangely haggard, but not an evil face, black beard of a week’s growth perhaps, and short dark hair hardly seen for the napkin that bound his head instead of a hat or cap.

We found voice at last, both at the same time. “Oh, sir,” we said, beseechingly, “do not kill us!” He started as we spoke the last two words, started as if stung, and gazed behind him with quick dramatic action, his black eyes all ablaze for the moment. So have I often since seen a hunted wolf look when at bay.

The first words he spoke betrayed him to be a foreigner.

“Kill!” he said, “what for I kill you? You alone? All alone?”

“Yes,” we replied, “yes, sir, quite alone.”

“’Tis goot. Do not fear me. Where go you to-morrow day? What you do here?”

I glanced at him for a moment before I spoke, and the truth flashed across my mind. This was the terrible convict we heard the soldiers say was abroad on the moor. He was not in convict dress, and though his coat was in rags, his boots were good. We learned from him, afterwards, that he had exchanged clothes, strange though it appeared, with a scarecrow. There was some humour here, though sadly blended with deepest pathos.

No, this man might rob, but he would not kill us. He was in trouble like ourselves. So we told him we were running away from school.

He looked at us again, and I saw he believed us. “Angleese, I not speak much. I am Español. I am a convict. Do not fear. I have never kill one. No – no – no.”

He sat down beside the candle and took out a knife and a turnip.

Something told me the poor fellow was famishing. I jumped up and went to my bag, and placed bread and bacon in his hand. He ate ravenously and thanked me. Perhaps it was only fancy, but I thought I saw tears in his eyes.

While he ate, much to our astonishment, a little black mouse ran down his sleeve, and sat on the back of his left hand, which he took care to keep still. The creature ate hungrily of the crumbs he gave it, and when finished, he held out his little finger, around which the mouse entwined both its little arms, while it licked it as lovingly as a dog would have done. Then, at a sign from the convict, it once more retreated.

I am sure, even now, that it was his love for the gentle wee mouse that made Jill and I take to this man, and believe what he told us. Briefly, his story was this:

“Many years ago, one, two, ten perhaps, I am cast away on this shore. My mate and me alone live. We trabel much. We seek for friend. No find. Then we come to big town, Cardeef, you call it. Here we find goot friend. We go seek for ship then to take us to Cadeeth. It is night. All my money in my belt. Bad men come out, kill my mate. I hear voices, footsteps. I run up to my mate. I pull out the ugly knife. I am caught there. I am taken to preeson, tried before justice – justice, ha! ha! I not kill my poor mate. All same. No one speak my language well. I not can speak Angleese den. I get angry, wild, mad. They put me away to preeson. Twenty year they say. But now I am free. They never get me more. I die first.”

“And the mouse?” said Jill.

“That is my preeson mate. I think ’tis the speerit of Roderigo, my friend, in dat little mouse. The warder want to kill him. Den I say, I escape or die. You may believe me. ’Tis all true. What for I tell little chaps like you lie. I have good friend at home. I will tell all dere. The Español Government will make de Angleese restitute. But dey cannot bring back Roderigo.”

“Did you love Roderigo very much?”

“He was best of friend. All same as brother. Yes, I love him. And you? What you do?”

Then, boy-like, we told this man all our terrible tale. We expected him to be visibly affected; perhaps, convict though he was, to shrink from us.

He certainly was visibly affected, but in a way we little expected. He laughed outright.

“For ten long year,” he said, “I never laugh before.”

The little mouse came down his sleeve again and sat on his wrist to wash his face and blink at the candle. The convict pointed to it with a forefinger and laughed again.

“Even Roderigo,” he cried, “is much amoose. Ha, ha, ha! Ah, boys,” he added, almost immediately getting serious; “you have a home. Go back to dat home. Go back, I say, go back. I speak as an all unworthy friend.”

“But they will hang us for piracy.”

“Do not make me laugh more. It does not become rags and grief to laugh. See, I am widout money, and naked, still I laugh. Poor boys, go back!”

I considered for a moment, then abruptly changed the subject.

“How do you expect to get away? We saw soldiers to-day on the moor. They were talking about you, and said you could not escape.”

His face grew darker and sadder.

Then, with all a boy’s generous abandon, I pulled out my purse and showed him my money. Even little Roderigo – Jill afterwards declared – paused in the act of washing his ears and gazed at the glittering coins.

“This is all we have,” I said.

“You unwise boy! I might take all. I will not refuse de offer of kindness. See, I take two. No more. This has save my life.”

He dipped a finger and thumb into the coins in my palm and took two sovereigns, and I put away the rest. He sat a long time silent after this. Then he got up, and going out, soon returned with an armful of ferns, which he placed in a corner.

“I sleep now,” he said. “To-morrow day we talk.”

Strange that now we felt no fear of this strange being. We slept soundly and well, and daylight was streaming into the cave when we were aroused. The convict had lightly touched me on the shoulder.

He was smiling, and looked now neither so haggard nor so terrible as on the evening before.

“No warm breakfus,” he said, smiling. “Soldiers have pass ’long de highway. Think you they seek for de convict to put in preeson, or de pirate boys to hang? Eh?”

We both trembled. But the keen air of the hill gave us an appetite and we did not miss the tea.

“Now we talk,” said the convict. “I have been think.”

“And,” I said, firmly, “I have also been thinking. It may not be so bad as we thought. They may not want to hang us. But they would disgrace and laugh at us, and I am a soldier’s son. I will not go back. Would you, Jill?”

“Assuredly not.”

“Den what else you do?”

“Go to sea before the mast.” The convict laughed again before he replied – “Boys, I speak as your friend. Do not be fools. Go to sea? What? Who take you? Though I have been long in preeson, I know all de law. At sea what can you do? No dings. No capitan will have runaways. Suppose you do hide, what you calls stowaway. Den they make you for to work – ”

“We don’t mind that.”

“Stop till I speak. Dey bring you back to de same port. Ha, ha!”

It had never struck us before in this light. Not that we intended to stow away, but little goslings that we were, we fancied we had only to make our way to a seaport and choose a ship, and that any captain would be delighted to have us without asking any questions.

This convict was speaking sense, but he had already cast down our idols and banished every morsel of sentiment from our situation.

I could have cried with vexation.

I almost hated the poor fellow now. Why could he not have left us to go on a little longer in the flowery lane of our romance? Presently he spoke again.

“You have to me been a friend. Now to you I will be a friend. I will go to your aunt.”

“No, no, no.”

“Stop, my friend. I will tell her what you do wish me to speak. No dings more. Shall I go?”

“Tell her,” I said, “that we are well and happy. No, tell her we are wretched. No, no. Jill, what shall we tell her?”

“Well,” said Jill, with his old smile, “you can’t say we’re jolly. Just say we won’t come back. That we want to get a ship to go to mother.”

“No, Jill, not like that, a ship to go to sea. They will not take us without aunt’s leave – then, we must get it.”

“Ah!” cried the convict, “dat is sensibeel now. You speak like one young man. I go to-night. You stay in de cave. Do not be seen. I will quickly return.”

“But you will not bring Aunt Serapheema!”

I felt angry at the time for speaking thus, but I could not help it. To have been dragged back now would have broken both our hearts, of this I am convinced.

“No,” said the convict. “As I am a good Catholic – no.”

This was enough for me. I took out once more my little writing-case, and feeling more happy and hopeful now, I wrote a long letter to auntie. It might have been but a repetition of the last, but it breathed even more emphatically than before our firm determination not to return till we had been to sea, adding that if this dream – that is the very word I used – were denied to us, we would work for our daily bread with the sweat of our brow.

It may have been a foolish boyish letter, and I dare say was, but it spoke our feelings, and no letter can do more than that.

This I entrusted to our friend the Spaniard, and he put it in his breast.

We kept close to the cave all that day, and several times heard voices in the distance, but no one came near us.

At night, as soon as the stars shone out, the convict left us, and we now felt very lonely indeed, but made the best of it, eating a hearty supper and talking till long past midnight.

As I write, poor Auntie Serapheema’s diary lies before me, and as the following entry refers to Jill and me, I take the liberty of transcribing it in full.

“July 25, 18 – . Last night, being the fourth since the disappearance of the dear foolish boys, and just as Sarah was bringing the Book, there came a knock to the hall door. Poor Mattie and I both started. Every knock makes us start now. It was only Robert, but he came to say a strange man wanted to see me on business. I made Sarah re-light the lamp in the drawing-room and retire. He stood near the mantelpiece as I entered, and bowed with almost stage politeness. I could see at once he was a foreigner. Englishmen are not urbane. He was clean shaved with the exception of the moustache, which was long and tinged with grey like his hair – also long. His eyes were very dark and piercing, and he looked altogether interesting and like a man who had come through some grievous sorrow. He handed me the bill of the reward of 50 pounds for the dear lads. ‘Yes, it was I who offered it,’ I said. Speaking in broken English, he told me I must take the bills in to-morrow, and issue others saying the lads were found. He knew where they were, and could arrange for me to meet them. ‘Where?’ – ‘At Bristol.’ – ‘No, nearer?’ – ‘Not a mile,’ he said. Did he want the reward then? I said this to try him. He did not speak. He appeared about to faint. I made him sit down, and caused Sarah to bring wine and a little food. While he ate he handed me a letter from my most foolish of lads. I watched him while he refreshed himself. Strange to say, a little mouse he called Roderigo came from his sleeve and sat in his hand, and he fed it. It then retired. I knew then I had a strange being to deal with, but I also felt I could trust him. But he would give me none of his own history; yet if he had asked me then for the whole of the money I would have handed it over. He only asked for twenty pounds to carry out his plans on the morrow. Yes, in answer to his question, he could sleep under my roof and welcome. Would I forgive him if he retired soon. Yes, again; he looked tired and was so polite. He said, was I the boys’ eldest sister. I am often taken to be very young. While we talked Mattie came in. I was surprised to see the child turn red and white by turns as he looked at her. Then she advanced and held out her hand. She said, ‘I am glad you have come.’ I said, ‘What do you say, child?’ Her reply was a strange one as she gazed from my face to the man’s. ‘Is that not – oh, I cannot call you to name. But I saw you – and oh, it must have been in a dream.’ She looked half in a dream now, and I was about to call Sarah, fearing she might be ill, when she smiled, and was soon after talking with the mysterious stranger as if they had long known each other. She marvelled much at the little mouse. He called it his friend, his mate, his brother, and though she laughed, she seemed to understand him.

“This morning he went away, and soon returned improved in habiliment. Poor fellow, he does not look well off. Now he has gone, and to-morrow I start for Bristol. But though Mattie would fain come, I must go all alone. That is the agreement.”

Here the extract ends.

On the day after the Spaniard left us, nothing occurred till near evening, when we were much frightened by the sudden appearance at the cave mouth of a huge dog. We thought it was a bloodhound, and that we were to be tracked thus, or our friend the Spaniard. The dog gave one startled look and retired, and presently, on venturing to look through the bushes, we found, much to our relief, he was running behind a man on horseback.

Nothing happened all that night, and next day we felt very uneasy as hour after hour went by and our new friend never returned. What could have occurred? False I felt he would not prove. But was he re-taken or dead? Oh, that would indeed have been dreadful.

The time went wearily, wearily on. We never ventured out of the cave, lest we might be seen, for once again we saw soldiers pass and repass.

When the evening star appeared shining bright and clear over the valley far beneath us, we felt more safe. Then the bats went wheeling past and past, and the mournful cry of the brown owl sounded drearily over the moor again.

We thought we should pray for our friend. We did this, lit our candle, and read from the Book, as dear auntie always called it. While we were yet reading we heard the distant sound of wheels, and speedily put the light out lest it might betray us.

We were badly frightened again when the carriage stopped down on the bridge. We ran inside the cave, for we had come out to look, but just then we heard the owl’s cry three times repeated, and this was the signal.

We got our bag and ran down the brook-side, and there stood the Spaniard – for he spoke – but so changed we did not know him.

We were so happy then. And we had more questions to ask than the faithful man could easily answer.