The Bravest of the Brave — or, with Peterborough in Spain by G. A. Henty (beach read book txt) 📖

“So I suppose, Richard; I am no great head at a figures, but even I can reckon that. But as at present they are only fourteen and sixteen, I repeat that I do not see that it matters—at least not so very much. Alice, do you go to your room, and remain there till I send for you.”

The girl without a word rose and retired. In the reign of King William the Third implicit obedience was expected of children.

“I think, Richard,” Mrs. Anthony went on when the door closed behind her daughter, “you are not acting quite with your usual wisdom in treating this matter in so serious a light, and in putting ideas into the girl's head which would probably never have entered there otherwise. Of course Alice is fond of Jack. It is only natural that she should be, seeing that he is her second cousin, and that for two years they have lived together under this roof.”

“I was a fool, Mistress Anthony,” the mayor said angrily, “ever to yield to your persuasions in that matter. It was unfortunate, of course, that the boy's father, the husband of your Cousin Margaret, should have been turned out of his living by the Sectarians, as befell thousands of other clergymen besides him. It was still more unfortunate that when King Charles returned he did not get reinstated; but, after all, that was Margaret's business and not mine; and if she was fool enough to marry a pauper, and he well nigh old enough to be her father—well, as I say, it was no business of mine.”

“He was not a pauper, Richard, and you know it; and he made enough by teaching to keep him and Margaret comfortably till he broke down and died three years ago, and poor Margaret followed him to the grave a year later. He was a good man—in every way a good man.”

“Tut, tut! I am not saying he wasn't a good man. I am only saying that, good or bad, it was no business of mine; and then nothing will do but I must send for the boy and put him in my business. And a nice mess he made of it—an idler, more careless apprentice, no cloth merchant, especially one who stood well with his fellow citizens, and who was on the highway to becoming mayor of his native city, was ever crossed with.”

“I think he was hardly as bad as that, Richard. I don't think you were ever quite fair to the boy.”

“Not fair, Mary! I am surprised at you. In what way was I not quite fair?”

“I don't think you meant to be unfair, Richard; but you see you were a little—just a little—prejudiced against him from the first; because, instead of jumping at your offer to apprentice him to your trade, he said he should like to be a sailor.”

“Quite enough to prejudice me, too, madam. Why, there are scores of sons of respectable burgesses of this town who would jump at such an offer; and here this penniless boy turns up his nose at it.”

“It was foolish, no doubt, Richard; but you see the boy had been reading the lives of admirals and navigators—he was full of life and spirit—and I believe his father had consented to his going to sea.”

“Full of life and spirit, madam!” the mayor repeated more angrily than before; “let me tell you it is these fellows who are full of life and adventure who come to the gallows. Naturally I was offended; but as I had given you my word I kept to it. Every man in Southampton knows that the word of Richard Anthony is as good as his bond. I bound him apprentice, and what comes of it? My foreman, Andrew Carson, is knocked flat on his back in the middle of the shop.”

Mrs. Anthony bit her lips to prevent herself from smiling.

“We will not speak any more about that, Richard,” she said; “because, if we did, we should begin to argue. You know it is my opinion, and always has been, that Carson deliberately set you against the boy; that he was always telling you tales to his disadvantage; and although I admit that the lad was very wrong to knock him down when he struck him, I think, my dear, I should have done the same had I been in his place.”

“Then, madam,” Mr. Anthony said solemnly, “you would have deserved what happened to him—that you should be turned neck and crop into the street.”

Mrs. Anthony gave a determined nod of her head—a nod which signified that she should have a voice on that point. However, seeing that in her husband's present mood it was better to say no more, she resumed her work.

While this conversation had been proceeding, Jack Stilwell, who had fled hastily when surprised by the mayor as he was talking to his daughter at the back gate of the garden, had made his way down to the wharves, and there, seating himself upon a pile of wood, had stared moodily at the tract of mud extending from his feet to the strip of water far away. His position was indeed an unenviable one. As Mrs. Anthony had said, his father was a clergyman of the Church of England, the vicar of a snug living in Lincolnshire, but he had been cast out when the Parliamentarians gained the upper hand, and his living was handed over to a Sectarian preacher. When, after years of poverty, King Charles came to the throne, the dispossessed minister thought that as a matter of course he should be restored to his living; but it was not so. As in hundreds of other cases the new occupant conformed at once to the new laws, and the Rev. Thomas Stilwell, having no friends or interest, was, like many another clergyman, left out in the cold.

But by this time he had settled at Oxford—at which university he had been educated—and was gaining a not uncomfortable livelihood by teaching the sons of citizens. Late in life he married Margaret Ullathorpe, who, still a young woman, had, during a visit to some friends at Oxford, made his acquaintance. In spite of the disparity of years the union was a happy one. One son was born to them, and all had gone well until a sudden chill had been the cause of Mr. Stilwell's death, his wife surviving him only one year. Her death took place at Southampton, where she had moved after the loss of her husband, having no further tie at Oxford, and a week later Jack Stilwell found himself domiciled at the house of Mr. Anthony.

It was in vain that he represented to the cloth merchant that his wishes lay toward a seafaring life, and that although his father had wished him to go into the ministry, he had given way to his entreaties. Mr. Anthony sharply pooh poohed the idea, and insisted that it was nothing short of madness to dream of such a thing when so excellent an opportunity of learning a respectable business was open to him.

At any other time Jack would have resisted stoutly, and would have run away and taken his chance rather than agree to the proposition; but he was broken down by grief at his mother's death. Incapable of making a struggle against the obstinacy of Mr. Anthony, and scarce caring what became of himself, he signed the deed of apprenticeship which made him for five years the slave of the cloth merchant. Not that the latter intended to be anything but kind, and he sincerely believed that he was acting for the good of