Podstrony
|
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
admission, twas you, Ormerod, who drove me to the practise of
what you call piracy.
Tis like you to take that tone, said my father. I drove you from
the practise of what amounted to piracy on the land.There is no dif-
ference in the way you earn your livelihood today, Murray. You were
an outlaw, and you are an outlaw.
I fear you are incapable of doing me justice, sighed Murray. You
should know that I have always labored to serve higher ends than
the mere sordid pursuit of money, such as has possessed you and
those like you.
He wagged his head sadly.
I had hoped better of you, Ormerod.You are of good blood, man.
Sdeath, do you never think on what you lose by playing the small
colonial merchant here?
I think better of the estate I won unaided, with my bare hands
and wits, than of the manor I lost in England through youthful folly,
rejoined my father. But I never thought to hear a pirate prate of the
blessings of birth. Phaugh!
Murray s face purpled, and a Scots burr crept into his speech.
No man challenges my birth, he shouted. I am of better blood
than you. I trace my lineage to James V. I quarter my arms with the
Douglases, the Homes, the Morays, the Keiths, the Hepburns, aye, and
with the oldest clans beyond the Highland Line!
I have heard so before, commented my father dryly.
Murray breathed deeply, obviously fighting for self-control.
Let it pass! he exclaimed with a magnificent gesture. What doth
it signify? I am what I am, sir and the day comes when I shall stand
as high as the highest.
38 PORTO BELLO GOLD
He drew himself up very erect in his chair, but my father answered
with the same dry scorn:
That too I have heard before. Once, I mind, you expected to be
a duke by exploiting ill-gotten gains with Jacobite intrigue. Aye, you
would have ruined your country, sold her to the French like enough,
all for a peerage. Now, I suppose, you would do it again.
What would you?
Murray flicked a pinch of snuff into his nostrils.
The luck was against me, although you, yourself, and silent Peter
there, know how close to success I came.
Ja, squeaked Peter, still busy crushing nuts and slowly crunching
their meats.
I have had the Devil s own luck, Murray went on, heedless of the
Dutchman. In the 45 I was half the world away, for there were too
many cruisers abroad in the Caribbees for my comfort. Before I could
get back the Prince had played and lost. A shame! With me
With you he would have been sold to Government for the thirty
thousand pounds reward that Cumberland offered, said my father.
Murray looked hurt.
I have been accused of much, he replied; but never of disloyalty
to King James or his sons.
True, assented my father; you could never earn anything by it.
Your opportunities all came from the other direction.
Your words are unjust, sir, said Murray with a hauteur he had not
shown previously. Indeed, if matters fall out, as I anticipate, I shall
soon give proof which can not be ignored of my devotion to the
Good Cause. I am preparing a combination which
He swung around suddenly upon me.
But I am forgetting my main purpose! he cried. Stand up, grand-
nephew, and let me have a look at you.
I would not have heeded him, but my father said quickly:
Do as he asks you, Robert. I d not have him think you are crooked
in the legs.
So I stood.
A likely build, he remarked warmly. You favor your father, I see
save in the face, it may be. There you are your mother, my maid
PORTO BELLO GOLD 39
Marjory. Ah, sweet chit, would she were with us now! A sad loss; a
sad loss, lad!
The expression which came to my father s face was terrible in its
intensity of passion. He leaned closer to Murray, white to the cheek-
bones, his nostrils pinched in.
Murray, he said, make an end of such talk! As you value your life,
mention her not again. I know not what cards you hold up your
sleeve here, but if we all die in the next moment I will slay you as
you sit if you profane her memory with your foul tongue.
Murray stared up at him coolly and took a pinch of snuff.
Ah, well, you were always prejudiced, he answered. I But it
serves no purpose to reopen old wounds. I am of one mind with you
there.Yet tell me this: Have you poisoned the boy s mind against me?
My father dropped back into his seat with a sour grimace.
Poisoned his mind? he repeated. I told him no more recently
than yesterday who and what you were.You brought that upon your-
self by pursuing your rascally trade in these seas. Until then the boy
did not so much as know that you existed as his relative.
My great-uncle I was gradually beginning to think of him as
such pondered this news, head on one side, peering from my father
to me and back again.
I see, I see, he murmured. Humph! I fear his mind hath been cor-
rupted. But I am not surprized. No, no! I prepared for this.
For what? demanded my father.
Murray leaned abruptly across the table.
I will be frank with you, Ormerod and with Nephew Robert
here. I am somewhat in difficulties
If tis money began my father.
My great-uncle s gesture was sufficient check to this.
I am not in difficulties for money, although I am like to be in dif-
ficulties shortly in connection with an embarrassing quantity of it. In
fine, sir, I am upon the point of launching the coup of my career, one
which will entail consequences of a stupendous character, and in the
end, I venture to predict, echo in throne-rooms and chancelleries.Aye,
kingdoms shall
He broke off.
40 PORTO BELLO GOLD
It is not necessary that I should go into that. Suffice it for the pre-
sent if I say that I am in the position of a man who has partially tamed
an unwieldy band of wild animals. My own ship I can rely upon up
to a certain point, but I have associated with me
That would be Flint? interjected my father.
I am flattered by the knowledge of my affairs which you display,
replied my great-uncle with one of his courtly inclinations. Yes; I had
occasion, when I first went to sea, for a competent navigator. Flint
served me in that capacity until I became independent, and I then
fitted him out with his own ship.We have cruised in company since.
I am not betraying a professional secret when I add that he is a man
whose undoubted force of personality is offset by a certain turbu-
lence and crudeness of wit which make him difficult to handle
increasingly difficult to handle, I may say. I foresee trouble with him
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pldoc.pisz.plpdf.pisz.plkskarol.keep.pl
|
