The Path of the King [59]
of my mother's brother." The man spoke, like Raleigh, in a Devon accent, with the creamy slur in the voice and the sing-song fall of West England.
"Ah, I remember. Your mother was Cecily Coffyn, from Combas on the Moor at the back of Lustleigh. A pretty girl--I mind her long ago. I would I were on the Moor now, where it is always fresh and blowing. . . . And your father--the big Frenchman who settled on one of Gawain Champernoun's manors. I loved his jolly laugh. But Cecily sobered him, for the Coffyns were always a grave and pious race. Gawain is dead these many years. Where is your father?
"He died in '82 with Sir Humfrey Gilbert."
Raleigh bowed his head. "He went to God with brother Humfrey! Happy fate! Happy company! But he left a brave son behind him, and I have lost mine. Have you a boy, Jasper?"
"But the one. My wife died ten years ago come Martinmas. The child is with his grandmother on the Moor."
"A promising child?"
"A good lad, so far as I have observed him, and that is not once a twelvemonth."
"You are a hungry old sea-dog. That was not the Coffyn fashion. Ned was for ever homesick out of sight of Devon. They worshipped their bleak acres and their fireside pieties. Ah, but I forget. You are de Laval on one side, and that is strong blood. There is not much in England to vie with it. You were great nobles when our Cecils were husbandmen."
He turned on a new tack. "You know that Whitney and Wollaston have deserted me. They would have had me turn pirate, and when I refused they sailed off and left me. This morning I saw the last of their topsails. Did I right?," he asked fiercely.
"In my judgment you did right."
"But why--why?" Raleigh demanded. "I have the commission of the King of France. What hindered me to use my remnant like hounds to cut off the stragglers of the Plate Fleet? That way lies much gold, and gold will buy pardon for all offences. What hindered me, I say?"
"Yourself, Sir Walter."
Raleigh let his head fall back on the couch and smiled bitterly.
"You say truly--myself. 'Tis not a question of morals, mark ye. A better man than I might turn pirate with a clear conscience. But for Walter Raleigh it would be black sin. He has walked too brazenly in all weathers to seek common ports in a storm. . . . It becomes not the fortune in which he once lived to go journeys of picory. . . . And there is another reason. I have suddenly grown desperate old. I think I can still endure, but I cannot institute. My action is by and over and my passion has come."
"You are a sick man," said the captain with pity in his voice.
"Sick! Why, yes. But the disease goes very deep. The virtue has gone out of me, old comrade. I no longer hate or love, and once I loved and hated extremely. I am become like a frail woman for tolerance. Spain has worsted me, but I bear her no ill will, though she has slain my son. Yet once I held all Spaniards the devil's spawn."
"You spoke kindly of them in your History," said the other, "when you praised their patient virtue."
"Did I? I have forgot. Nay, I remember. When I wrote that sentence I was thinking of Berreo. I loved him, though I took his city. He was a valiant and liberal gentleman, and of a great heart. I mind how I combated his melancholy, for he was most melancholic. But now I have grown like him. Perhaps Sir Edward Coke was right and I have a Spanish heat. I think a man cannot strive whole-heartedly with an enemy unless he have much in common with him, and as the strife goes on he gets liker. . . . Ah, Jasper, once I had such ambitions that they made a fire all around me. Once I was like Kit Marlowe's Tamburlaine:
"'Threatening the world with high astounding terms, And scourging kingdoms with his conquering sword.'
But now the flame has died and the ashes are cold. And I would not revive them if I could. There is nothing under heaven that I desire."
The seaman's face was grave and kindly.
"I think you have flown too high, Sir Walter. You have aimed at the moon and forgotten the merits of our earthly hills."
"Ah, I remember. Your mother was Cecily Coffyn, from Combas on the Moor at the back of Lustleigh. A pretty girl--I mind her long ago. I would I were on the Moor now, where it is always fresh and blowing. . . . And your father--the big Frenchman who settled on one of Gawain Champernoun's manors. I loved his jolly laugh. But Cecily sobered him, for the Coffyns were always a grave and pious race. Gawain is dead these many years. Where is your father?
"He died in '82 with Sir Humfrey Gilbert."
Raleigh bowed his head. "He went to God with brother Humfrey! Happy fate! Happy company! But he left a brave son behind him, and I have lost mine. Have you a boy, Jasper?"
"But the one. My wife died ten years ago come Martinmas. The child is with his grandmother on the Moor."
"A promising child?"
"A good lad, so far as I have observed him, and that is not once a twelvemonth."
"You are a hungry old sea-dog. That was not the Coffyn fashion. Ned was for ever homesick out of sight of Devon. They worshipped their bleak acres and their fireside pieties. Ah, but I forget. You are de Laval on one side, and that is strong blood. There is not much in England to vie with it. You were great nobles when our Cecils were husbandmen."
He turned on a new tack. "You know that Whitney and Wollaston have deserted me. They would have had me turn pirate, and when I refused they sailed off and left me. This morning I saw the last of their topsails. Did I right?," he asked fiercely.
"In my judgment you did right."
"But why--why?" Raleigh demanded. "I have the commission of the King of France. What hindered me to use my remnant like hounds to cut off the stragglers of the Plate Fleet? That way lies much gold, and gold will buy pardon for all offences. What hindered me, I say?"
"Yourself, Sir Walter."
Raleigh let his head fall back on the couch and smiled bitterly.
"You say truly--myself. 'Tis not a question of morals, mark ye. A better man than I might turn pirate with a clear conscience. But for Walter Raleigh it would be black sin. He has walked too brazenly in all weathers to seek common ports in a storm. . . . It becomes not the fortune in which he once lived to go journeys of picory. . . . And there is another reason. I have suddenly grown desperate old. I think I can still endure, but I cannot institute. My action is by and over and my passion has come."
"You are a sick man," said the captain with pity in his voice.
"Sick! Why, yes. But the disease goes very deep. The virtue has gone out of me, old comrade. I no longer hate or love, and once I loved and hated extremely. I am become like a frail woman for tolerance. Spain has worsted me, but I bear her no ill will, though she has slain my son. Yet once I held all Spaniards the devil's spawn."
"You spoke kindly of them in your History," said the other, "when you praised their patient virtue."
"Did I? I have forgot. Nay, I remember. When I wrote that sentence I was thinking of Berreo. I loved him, though I took his city. He was a valiant and liberal gentleman, and of a great heart. I mind how I combated his melancholy, for he was most melancholic. But now I have grown like him. Perhaps Sir Edward Coke was right and I have a Spanish heat. I think a man cannot strive whole-heartedly with an enemy unless he have much in common with him, and as the strife goes on he gets liker. . . . Ah, Jasper, once I had such ambitions that they made a fire all around me. Once I was like Kit Marlowe's Tamburlaine:
"'Threatening the world with high astounding terms, And scourging kingdoms with his conquering sword.'
But now the flame has died and the ashes are cold. And I would not revive them if I could. There is nothing under heaven that I desire."
The seaman's face was grave and kindly.
"I think you have flown too high, Sir Walter. You have aimed at the moon and forgotten the merits of our earthly hills."