CHAPTER VI

TABLE-TALK AT MODBURY MANOR.

At this same time, while Gilbert and Timothy were continuing their journey homeward through the darkness and the driving sleet after their encounter with the unknown robbers in Beddington Dingle, Lord Champernoun and his household were seated at the supper-table in the great dining-hall of Modbury Manor. Some friends were with them--high-born ladies and noble gentlemen who had been of a hawking party that day, and had come back very weary and full of the enjoyment of the sport. Chief among the ladies, both for her beauty and wit and for her noble birth, was the Lady Elizabeth Oglander--or Lady Betty, as she was familiarly called--who, as the widow of the Honourable Edmund Oglander, was now the mistress of Modbury Manor; and among the men, Sir Walter Raleigh and those two gallant seamen, Sir Francis Drake and Sir Richard Grenville.

It was a very large and splendid hall, with a high arched roof and tall embrasured windows, whose broad panes were rich with heraldic devices in coloured glass. The walls were panelled with carved oak and adorned with stags' horns, suits of armour, halberds, swords, and crossbows. The lower parts of the windows and the heavy clamped doors were covered with tapestry to keep out the draught, and in the huge red cavern of the fireplace the flaming logs roared and crackled, sending forth strange moving shadows across the rush-strewn floor, and casting a bright flicker of light upon the wings of the brass pelicans that stood gazing out from either side of the hearth.

At the head of the long table sat the aged baron himself, Gilbert Oglander's grandfather, a kindly, white-haired, white-bearded gentleman, wearing a doublet of black velvet with gold chains and a snowy white ruff. His guests and the members of his household were all grown-up persons, with the one exception of Drusilla Oglander; and Drusilla, who was still scarce more than a little girl and had but lately left the nursery, seemed to be very lonely in consequence. She had no companion near her at the table saving the family bloodhound, Nero, whose ponderous head rested upon her knee, ready to gobble such morsels of meat as the girl might pick from her plate and give to him. There was a vacant seat at her side, but her brother Gilbert, who had gone into Plymouth that afternoon, had not returned to occupy it, and she was perforce content to listen silently to the talk that was going on among her elders at the upper end of the table. Yet quite as often did she find entertainment in listening to the men and women who sat below the great salt-cellar--the barrier which separated them from those who were above them in station.

One of the men, a rosy-faced young falconer who had been with the hawking party, was boasting of how Sir Walter Raleigh had deigned to hold speech with him, and to ask his opinion concerning the possibility of stopping a falcon in its full flight and making the bird return obediently to the lure. The fact that the great courtier had thus honoured him seemed to have given the man the right to speak with authority on all matters with which Sir Walter Raleigh was personally concerned.

"Wait until the meal is over," Drusilla heard him say; "wait and you shall see him taking tobacco. 'Tis a wonderous sight, my masters. I have seen him at it with mine own eyes. He can blow the smoke out through his nostrils in two long tubes, or drink it down into his inside as one might drink a cup of malmsey. Ay, 'tis a marvellous habit, is it not, Christopher Pym?"

He glanced across the table at a pale, abstracted-looking man, with straight black hair and lack-lustre eyes. Christopher Pym seemed to feel himself out of place among these his table companions, for in spite of his threadbare cloak and his ragged wristbands he was still a ripe scholar and a born gentleman. He smiled faintly and answered:

"Ay, truly, Master Hawksworth, 'tis a marvellous habit--marvellous in that it is indulged in by gentlefolk. For my own part, I like it not. As well might you make a chimney of your throat at once, and call in the chimney-sweep o' mornings to sweep out the black soot."

"'Tis plain to see that thou hast never tried it," remarked Hawksworth. "But after all, 'twas never intended for poor schoolmasters."

Christopher Pym quietly broke off a few crumbs from his piece of bread, and holding them in his thin fingers proceeded slowly to cleanse his platter.

"No," he said with another faint smile. "There be few such luxuries that a poor tutor can afford out of five marks a year. But I am well content to live without the vile herb and let others take it who may."

"'Tis a right gentlemanly accomplishment, I warrant you," pursued Hawksworth; "ay, and one which may gain a man great fame if he but exercise it with skill. Look at young Sir Anthony Killigrew, for example; he hath made himself famous in Plymouth by his skill, for he can not only blow the smoke from his nose, but he hath performed a much more wondrous trick; for on a day in last week he took three long whiffs from his tobacco-pipe, drank three cups of canary on the top of them, then took horse, and brought forth the smoke, one whiff at Burrington, the second at Bickley, and the third at Tamerton. 'Twas he who first taught Master Gilbert Oglander to drink tobacco, although 'tis true the lad misliked it and hath since abandoned it."

"Master Gilbert hath shown greater wisdom in abandoning it than in taking to it," observed Christopher Pym, shaking his head with regret at his pupil's weakness.

Hearing her brother's name, Drusilla leaned over across the salt-box and said:

"I pray you, Master Pym, can you tell me what hath kept my brother so late in Plymouth?"

"My lord sent him into the town on some private business, Mistress Drusilla," answered the poor tutor. "I know of naught else that can have detained him. He hath taken Timothy Trollope to bear him company, however, and you may be assured no harm will come to him."

Drusilla leaned back in her chair, refusing the plate of roasted pheasant that was offered to her by one of the blue-coated serving-men. Her eyes rested upon the cheerful countenance of Sir Francis Drake, and then upon the proud cold face of Sir Walter Raleigh, who sat next to him. She had never, before this same day, seen Sir Walter Raleigh, and his courtly manners seemed somehow to give him a dignity which made it that she dared not have approached him. Even his gay apparel, his jewelled doublet, his stiffly-starched ruff, and his white be-ringed fingers placed him at such a distance from her that he appeared to be far too grand and proud ever to think of taking notice of a little girl.

With Sir Francis Drake it was very different. She had known him to come to Modbury more than once on purpose to see her, as he had said; he had come into the nursery and played with her and told her stories; and once, when Gilbert had been making a toy ship to sail in the lake, Sir Francis had sat down on the nursery floor and taken out his knife and some string and helped to rig the little vessel. They had called the boat the _Revenge_, which was the name of the ship that Sir Francis had commanded when he went out to fight against the Spanish Armada, and on board of which he had won such glory for himself and for England. As Drusilla looked across at him now his eyes met hers, and he raised his tall glass of canary wine, bowing to her with as much polite grace as if she had been a full-grown lady. She returned his greeting with a smile, raising her little silver tankard of new milk and saying:

"To your good health, Sir Francis."

Then the voice of Lord Champernoun was heard from the head of the table.

"So it seemeth, Sir Francis, that thou hast once more been incurring Her Majesty's displeasure?"

"How so, baron?" questioned Drake, looking up in surprise.

"Marry! In the matter of the King of Spain," returned Lord Champernoun. "It doth appear from what I have lately heard that Her Majesty's government have received information that King Philip, knowing how you had fallen into disgrace with Queen Elizabeth, hath been secretly making overtures to you to enter the Spanish service and lead a new armada against England. Zounds, man, we shall soon be hearing that thou hast turned Papist also, I suppose!"

Drake laughed, and playfully stroked his full and curly beard. There was a merry twinkle in his large clear eyes.

"'Tis not the first time that His Majesty of Spain hath so approached me," said he. "Her Majesty (God bless her!) is at liberty to believe, if she so listeth, that I am about to accept Spain's generous offers. 'Tis her gracious habit to think ill of me. But methinks the people of England will still believe me incapable of such treachery."

Sir Walter Raleigh's silvery voice interposed:

"Thou hast given but a half-denial of the matter, Drake," said he as he reached his hand to the middle of the table and picked an apple from one of the plates. "And I do assure thee that Her Majesty will require a fuller proof ere she consent to forgive thee. All thy endeavours to win her favour by the building of flour-mills and the making of water-conduits for this town of Plymouth will go for little against this suspicious rumour."

"And, prithee, what punishment doth Her Majesty intend to mete out to me withal?" questioned Drake. "Hath she given orders that I am to be clapped into the Tower, or held to ransom like our Spanish prisoners?"

"Scarcely that," answered Raleigh. "She hath but decided to give thee the command at Plymouth, with orders to keep the town in a state of defence, and so resist any attempt by the Spaniards to invade our western ports."

"There is small consolation in that," returned Drake. "I had hoped, as ye all know, that I might be deemed worthy to take the command of the great expedition against Panama that hath been in contemplation so long. 'Tis mine by right, and it hath been the dream of my life."

"That same command hath been graciously reserved for myself," said Sir Walter Raleigh. And he seemed to smile at the mortification that came into his rival's face.

There was silence for a few moments, and then the gruff voice of Sir Richard Grenville broke in.

"Thou'lt not forget me, cousin Walter, when 'tis question of Panama?" said he. "'Twould suit my disposition well to be made thy vice-admiral."

"And touching that same matter, Raleigh," interposed Lord Champernoun as he pushed back his great chair and crossed his legs, "I would ask you to reserve a place on board your ship for my grandson Gilbert. The lad hath long been beseeching me to launch him upon the world of action."

"I'll think on't, baron," said Raleigh with a slight nod of his head that showed he had no great desire to favour the young heir of Modbury.

"The boy shall come with me, my lord, if Sir Waiter takes him not," cried Sir Richard Grenville. "I promise you that."

"I had rather see Gilbert Oglander under mine own wing," declared Drake in an undertone.

"Ay, if that wing be not already broken," suggested Raleigh.

The Lady Betty glanced at Lord Champernoun with anxiety in her eyes.

"Surely Gilbert is yet too young to be trusted upon the sea," she objected. "Hath not his family already sacrificed enough to the Spaniards that thou shouldst consent to this thing? Thine own two sons have given up their lives in foreign lands. I pray thee spare me mine."

Lord Champernoun made no answer, for at that moment one of the serving-men had come to his side and whispered some message into his ear. Drusilla saw her grandfather start back as if in alarm. His face, in the light of the table-candles, was seen to have become suddenly very pale. Drusilla instantly thought of her brother Gilbert, and feared that some great ill had happened to him. She looked towards the door behind her grandfather's chair.

It opened, and there came into the hall, not her brother nor even Timothy Trollope, but a tall dark man who was a complete stranger to her. He removed his wide slouched hat as he entered, and his long cloak, which was besprinkled with snow-flakes, fell from his shoulders, revealing a much-worn and faded doublet with tarnished braid and ominous stains. He was followed by a much younger man, whom Timothy Trollope, had he chanced to be present, would doubtless have recognized as the foreign-looking youth he had encountered at the door of the Three Flagons.

Drusilla noticed that the youth's cloak was bespattered with mud, but she remembered that the roads were bad, and opined that he had had some trifling accident. He took off the garment and laid it with his hat and sword upon one of the oak benches that were against the wall. He seemed to be exceedingly modest, for he stood in the background like one who had been suddenly brought into a strange place, and had not yet mustered the courage to raise his eyes and see for himself what manner of place it happened to be.

Lord Champernoun rose from his chair but did not advance to meet the strangers.

"Jasper Oglander, did you say?" he cried in astonishment, turning aside to the serving-man. "Jasper Oglander? 'Tis impossible!"

"Ay, 'tis Jasper Oglander," said the stranger, stepping forward and standing in front of the old baron. "Dost not know me, father?"

Lord Champernoun raised his trembling hand and ran his fingers nervously through his thin locks of white hair.

"I understand you not," he faltered. "Jasper Oglander is dead--dead these many years. They have told me so. And yet--"

"Haply the news was more welcome to your lordship than my presence here just now," interrupted the stranger with a dark frown on his brow. "Believe me, sir, I had not wished to break in upon your merriment. But having only this afternoon arrived in the port of Plymouth, I deemed it my duty to present myself before you without further loss of time."

"Your better duty would have been to acquaint me of your existence a score of years ago," his lordship returned with stern rebuke. And then, his eyes falling upon the figure of the bashful youth, he added: "Prithee, who is the stripling at your heels?"

"Your grandson, my lord--Philip Oglander to wit--born in Brazil in the year fifteen hundred and seventy-four."

"And his mother?" pursued the baron questioningly.

The stranger twirled his newly-trimmed moustachios and answered:

"His mother, so please you, is now resting in Plymouth town, at the sign of the Three Flagons. The weather is somewhat inclement for a lady to travel, and she is weary after our long voyage. In good time, when she hath been furnished with new apparel--apparel more befitting her appearance among such fine ladies as I do see here now,--I shall give myself the pleasure of presenting her in her English home."

Lord Champernoun bit his lip. It was evident that his newly-returned son was not to be heartily welcomed.

By this time the servants at the lower end of the table, having finished their supper, had retired from the hall. The ladies, too, had risen, and Sir Walter Raleigh, with courtly gallantry, had opened the door leading out into the adjoining hall, whence already the sounds of music could be heard.

Lady Betty passed out, followed by her lady guests, glancing as she did so towards the intruder with something akin to indignation in her beautiful blue eyes.

"'Tis some impostor, I'll avow," she whispered to Raleigh as she came near him, "or else some Spanish spy, masquerading in the character of the long-lost Jasper. Thou'lt join us presently, Sir Walter?"

"Gladly, my lady, so you promise us a song," said he, bowing low. And when the ladies had all retired, leaving only Drusilla behind them, he strolled back into the hall and made his way to the fireplace, where, seating himself, he proceeded to fill his tobacco-pipe.

Sir Francis Drake had apparently paid but slight attention to the entrance of Jasper Oglander and his son Philip, but had remained at the table cracking nuts. He had cracked about a dozen of them and cleared the kernels of all remnants of shell and rough skin, and now he gathered them in his hand and rose, beckoning to Drusilla.

"These be for you, sweetheart," said he as he offered them to her. "And now I must hie me back to Plymouth. Wilt kiss me?"

She held up her face, and he put his two hands upon her shoulders and held her from him at the full length of his strong arms. Then he bent down and pressed his lips upon her white forehead. "Give you good-night," he added, "and God be with you always!"

"Good-night!" she answered, and her eyes followed him as he went away, limping slightly in his walk. She saw him stop suddenly as he came near to where her grandfather and Jasper Oglander were still standing. He drew back a step, looking up into Jasper's face, and, as it seemed, fixing his gaze upon the old wound on the man's cheek.

"'Sdeath! Captain Drake, you here?" cried Jasper Oglander in a tone of astonishment and no less of annoyance. "Art thou a wizard?" And he hesitatingly held out his hand.

Drake affected not to notice this offer of friendship, but stood unmoved, his round head with its short curly brown hair held proudly back, his great broad chest expanded, and his muscular figure poised with easy grace. Compared with the tall man in front of him he seemed to be of very low stature; but there was a dignity about him which the other entirely lacked.

"A wizard?" he repeated. Then shrugging his shoulders he added: "That is as it may be. But I thank God in that I am at least an honest Englishman, who hath no cause to go skulking about the world as thou hast been doing, Master Oglander." He turned to Lord Champernoun. "Give you good-night, my lord!" he said as they shook hands, and then he went round for his cape and hat, which were hanging up near the fireplace, where Sir Walter Raleigh and some others were already regaling themselves amid a cloud of tobacco smoke.

Lord Champernoun had bidden his new-found son and Philip Oglander sit down at the table and take some supper. Meat and drink had been brought in for them, and they were eating with an appetite which betrayed that they had long been unaccustomed to such goodly fare.

Meanwhile Drusilla had withdrawn to one of the window embrasures, where she sat munching her Brazilian nuts. Sir Richard Grenville stood near her, examining a suit of armour that was propped up in the corner.

"'Tis the armour that was worn by Sir Stephen Oglander in the wars of the Roses," the girl informed him. "And the curved sword that is hanging near it on the next panel was taken by my grandfather in a certain battle against the Turks--not this grandfather, you know, but the other one, my mother's father, the Earl of Dersingham."

"Ah! so thine ancestor fought against the Infidels, eh?" said Grenville, and pushing aside Philip Oglander's cloak, which lay on the bench, he sat down beside her. "Didst know that I too have been in battle against them?"

"No," she answered, open-eyed. "Prithee, tell me of it. Was it by sea or by land?"

"By land for the most part," he returned; "but the greatest battle was by sea, and it took place in the Gulf of Lepanto. 'Twas the most glorious engagement and the most honourable victory I have ever taken part in, saving only the late fight which you wot of against the dons of Spain. I will tell thee of it if thou'rt not too weary. 'Twill pass the time until your brother comes in."

As he spoke he took up Philip Oglander's rapier, and in mere idleness he drew the long narrow blade from its leathern scabbard, held the weapon out in front of him and glanced along it with critical eye, examined its curious basket hilt of twisted metal, then pressed his thumb against the sharp point, took the point end in one hand and the hilt in the other, and bent the blade to test its flexible spring, and finally held the weapon out once more at arm's-length.

"The battle was betwixt the Turks and the Christians," he went on. But here he was abruptly interrupted. Philip Oglander had risen from the table and crossed the floor towards him.

"Your pardon, my master, but that rapier is mine!" cried the lad in strange excitement, speaking with his mouth full of food.

Sir Richard Grenville glanced up at him in surprise, still retaining the weapon.

"A goodly blade too, o' my conscience," he muttered with a grim smile. "Fashioned in Toledo, I warrant me. 'Tis not often we see its like in England, save in the hands of our country's foes. But I would warn you, young sir, that 'tis a good three inches too long to suit Queen Elizabeth's regulations. I should counsel you to have it clipped ere you venture to carry it again through English streets."

He handed the rapier to its owner, holding it by the end of the blade. Philip Oglander received it, sullenly returned it to its scabbard, and strode back to the table, there to continue his supper.

Grenville was about to proceed with his narrative of Lepanto fight when Drusilla laid her fingers upon his arm.

"See!" she cried. "Thou hast wounded thy hand, 'tis bleeding!"

"Nay, but I felt no cut," said he. "And yet," he added, looking at his opened palms, "there is surely blood there. However, Mistress Drusilla, to go on with our story. I was saying that 'twas a fight betwixt the Christians and the Infidels--the Cross against the Crescent--"

"Wait," interrupted the girl. "I heard but this moment the sound of a horse's feet in the courtyard. It must surely be Gilbert returned. I pray you tarry here till I come back." And so saying she tripped lightly to the end of the hall and flung open the door by which her uncle and cousin had lately entered.

There was a murmur of voices from without. The further door at the end of the outer hall stood open, and by the aid of the large hanging lamp in the great arched porchway she could see the form of a horse, with Timothy Trollope and Bob Harvey by its side. They were helping Gilbert down from the horse's back. Drusilla saw his face, and it was very pale; she saw that when they lifted him down to the ground he could scarcely stand, but was obliged to lean for support on Trollope's shoulder.

"I might even have guessed that some ill had happened to thee since thou art so late in coming home, Gilbert," she said, disguising her inward alarm. "Art badly hurt? Hast thou been thrown from thy horse?"

"Nay, 'tis nothing, good my sister," answered Gilbert as cheerily as his weakness allowed. "'Tis naught but a sprained ankle."

"Ay, but the blood!" said she, touching him on his right arm. "What doth this bode?"

"A scratch he got in a tussle we have had with some vagabond gypsies down in the dingle," explained Timothy Trollope, well-nigh breathless after his long run by the horse's side. "Prithee, be not alarmed, Mistress Drusilla." He signed to Bob Harvey. "Take you his heels, Bob, while I take him by the shoulders. We had best carry him within."

Drusilla went before them while they carried him into the dining-hall. She was met on the threshold by Sir Francis Drake, who was then on the point of leaving, a saddled horse being already in waiting for him outside to carry him back to Plymouth. On being hurriedly told what had happened he returned into the hall, threw off his cape and hat, turned up his cuffs, and prepared to exercise his surgical skill in attending to Gilbert's hurts.

"A knife, if you please, Mistress Drusilla," he said, when Timothy had laid the wounded lad upon one of the settles near to the fire. And when the knife was brought he quietly ripped open Gilbert's sleeve, discovering the wound.

"'Tis nothing serious," he said reassuringly to Lord Champernoun, who stood near with Raleigh, Grenville, and many others who had crowded round. "Let him have a warm potion to drink and some food, an he will but take it, and when I have bound up the arm he had best be put to bed."

Timothy Trollope moved to the table to get a cup of mulled sack. As he was passing behind where Drusilla stood he caught sight of Jasper Oglander and his son, both of whom, having risen from their supper, were looking over the girl's shoulders at Gilbert. There was a subdued look of enmity in Jasper Oglander's eyes, which Timothy did not understand. He remembered it long afterwards, however, when circumstances and a better knowledge of the man's nature explained its meaning.