The Maid of Sker

For a while the power of the lightning seemed to quench the wind almost, and one continuous roar of thunder rang around the darkness. Then, with a bellow, the wind sprang forth (like a wild bull out of a mountain), and shattered the rain and drowned the thunder, and was lord of everything. Under its weight the flat sea quivered, and the crests flew into foam, and the scourge upon the waters seemed to beat them all together. The whirlwinds now were past and done with, and a violent gale begun, and in the burst and change of movement there appeared a helpless ship.

She was bearing towards Pool Tavan, as poor Bardie's boat had done, but without the summer glory and the golden wealth of waves. All was smooth and soft and gentle, as the moonlight in a glass, when the little boat came gliding with its baby captain. All was rough and hard and furious as a fight of devils, when that ship came staggering with its load of sin and woe. And yet there had not been so much as twenty-four hours between the two.

Not one of our little coasting vessels, but a full-rigged ship she loomed, of foreign build, although at present carrying no colours. I saw at once what her business was, to bring from the West Indies sugar, rum, and suchlike freight, to Bristol, or to the Dutchmen. This was in her clearance-bill; but behind that she had other import not so clearly entered. In a word, she carried negroes from the overstocked plantations, not to be quite slaves (at least in the opinion of their masters), but to be distributed, for their own Christian benefit, at a certain sum per head, among the Bristol or Dutch merchants, or wherever it might be. And it serves them right, I always say; for the fuss that we now make about those black men must bring down the anger of the Creator, who made them black, upon us.

As the gale set to its work, and the sea arose in earnest, and the lightning drifted off into the scud of clouds, I saw, as plain as a pikestaff, that the ship must come ashore, and go to pieces very likely, before one could say "Jack Robinson." She had been on the Sker-weather sands already, and lost her rudder and some of her sternpost, as the lift of the water showed; and now there was nothing left on board her of courage or common seamanship. The truth of it was, although of course I could not know it then, that nearly all the ship's company acted as was to be expected from a lot of foreigners; that is to say, if such they were. They took to the boats in a kind of panic when first she struck among the sands in the whirlwind which began the storm. There could have been then no great sea running, only quiet rollers; and being but two miles off the shore, they hoped, no doubt, to land well enough, after leaving the stupid negroes and the helpless passengers to the will of Providence.

However, before they had rowed a mile, with the flood-tide making eastward, one of the boats was struck by lightning, and the other caught in a whirl vorago (as the Spaniards call it), and not a soul ever came to land, and scarcely any bodies. Both these accidents were seen from Porthcawl Point by Sandy Macraw through a telescope: and much as he was mine enemy, I do him the justice to believe it; partly because he could look for no money from any lies in the matter, and still more because I have heard that some people said that they saw him see it.

But to come back to this poor ship: the wind, though blowing madly enough (as a summer gale is often hotter for a while than a winter one), had not time and sweep as yet to raise any very big rollers. The sea was sometimes beaten flat and then cast up in hillocks; but the mighty march of waters fetched by a tempest from the Atlantic was not come, and would not come in a veering storm like this. For it takes a gale of at least three tides, such as we never have in summer, to deliver the true buffet of the vast Atlantic.

Nevertheless the sea was nasty and exceeding vicious; and the wind more madly wild, perhaps, than when it has full time to blow; in short, the want of depth and power was made up by rage and spite. And for a ship not thoroughly sound and stanch in all her timbers it had been better, perhaps, to rise and fall upon long billows, with a chance of casting high and dry, than to be twirled round and plucked at, thrown on beam-ends, and taken aback, as this hapless craft was being, in the lash of rocky waters and the drift of gale and scud.

By this time she was close ashore, and not a man (except myself) to help or even pity her. All around her was wind and rocks, and a mad sea rushing under her. The negroes, crouching in the scuppers, or clinging to the masts and rails, or rolling over one another in their want of pluck and skill, seemed to shed their blackness on the snowy spray and curdled foam, like cuttle-fish in a lump of froth. Poor things! they are grieved to die as much, perhaps, as any white man; and my heart was overcome, in spite of all I know of them.

The ship had no canvas left, except some tatters of the fore-topsail, and a piece of the main-royals; but she drifted broadside on, I daresay five or six knots an hour. She drew too much water, unluckily, to come into Pool Tavan at that time of the tide, even if the mouth had been wide enough; but crash she went on a ledge of rocks thoroughly well known to me, every shelf of which was a razor. Half a cable's length below the entrance to Pool Tavan, it had the finest steps and stairs for congers and for lobsters, whenever one could get at it in a low spring-tide; but the worst of beaks and barbs for a vessel to strike upon at half-flow, and with a violent sea, and a wind as wild as Bedlam.

With the pressure of these, she lay so much to leeward before striking (and perhaps her cargo had shifted), that the poor blackies rolled down the deck like pickling walnuts on a tray; and they had not even the chance of dying each in his own direction.

I was forced to shut my eyes; till a grey squall came, and caught her up, as if she had been a humming-top, and flung her (as we drown a kitten) into the mashing waters.

Now I hope no man who knows me would ever take me for such a fool as to dream for a moment – after all I have seen of them – that a negro is "our own flesh and blood, and a brother immortal," as the parsons begin to prate, under some dark infection. They differ from us a great deal more than an ass does from a horse; but for all that I was right down glad – as a man of loving-kindness – that such a pelt of rain came up as saved me from the discomfort – or pain, if you must have the truth – of beholding several score, no doubt, of unfortunate blacks a-drowning.

If it had pleased Providence to drown any white men with them, and to let me know it, beyond a doubt I had rushed in, though without so much as a rope to help me; and as it was, I was ready to do my very best to save them if they had only shown some readiness to be hawled ashore by a man of proper colour. But being, as negroes always are, of a most contrary nature, no doubt they preferred to drift out to sea rather than Christian burial. At any rate, none of them came near me, kindly disposed as I felt myself, and ready to tuck up my Sunday trousers at the very first sight of a woolly head. But several came ashore next tide – when it could be no comfort at all to them. And such, as I have always found, is the nature of black people.

But for me it was a sad, and, as I thought, severe, visitation to be forced on a Sabbath-day – my only holiday of the week – to meditate over a scene like this. As a truly consistent and truth-seeking Christian (especially when I go round with fish on a Monday morning among Nonconformists), it was a bitter trial for me to reflect upon those poor negroes, gone without any sense at all, except of good Christians' wickedness, to the judgment we decree for all, except ourselves and families.

But there was worse than this behind; for after waiting as long as there seemed good chance of anything coming ashore, which might go into my pocket, without risk of my pension, and would truly be mine in all honesty – and after seeing that the wreck would not break up till the tide rose higher, though all on board were swept away – suddenly it came into my head about poor Bardie and Bunny. They were worth all the niggers that ever made coal look the colour of pipeclay; and with a depth of self-reproach which I never deserved to feel, having truly done my utmost – for who could walk in such weather? – forth I set, resolved to face whatever came out of the heavens. Verily nothing could come much worse than what was come already. Rheumatics, I mean, which had struck me there, under the rock, as a snake might. Three hours ago all the world was sweat, and now all the air was shivers. Such is the climate of our parts, and many good people rail at it, who have not been under discipline. But all who have felt that gnawing anguish, or that fiery freezing, burning at once and benumbing (like a dead bone put into the live ones, with a train of powder down it) – all these will have pity for a man who had crouched beneath a rock for at least three hours, with dripping clothes, at the age of two-and-fifty.

For a hero I never set up to be, and never came across one until my old age in the navy, as hereafter to be related. And though I had served on board of one in my early years, off La Hague and Cape Grisnez, they told me she was only a woman that used to hold a lantern. Hero, however, or no hero, in spite of all discouragement and the aching of my bones, resolved I was to follow out the fate of those two children. There seemed to be faint hope, indeed, concerning the little stranger; but Bunny might be all alive and strong, as was right and natural for a child of her age and substance. But I was sore downcast about it when I looked around and saw the effect of the storm that had been over them. For the alteration of everything was nothing less than amazing.

It is out of my power to tell you how my heart went up to God, and all my spirit and soul was lifted into something purer, when of a sudden, in a scoop of sand, with the rushes overhanging, I came on those two little dears, fast asleep in innocence. A perfect nest of peace they had, as if beneath their Father's eye, and by His own hand made for them. The fury of the earth and sky was all around and over them; the deep revenge of the sea was rolling, not a hundred yards away; and here those two little dots were asleep, with their angels trying to make them dream.

Bunny, being the elder and much the stronger child, had thrown the skirt of her frock across poor little Bardie's naked shoulders; while Bardie, finding it nice and warm, had nestled her delicate head into the lap of her young nurse, and had tried (as it seemed), before dropping off, to tell her gratitude by pressing Bunny's red hands to her lips. In a word, you might go a long way and scarcely see a prettier or more moving picture, or more apt to lead a man who seldom thinks of his Maker. As for me, I became so proud of my own granddaughter's goodness, and of the little lady's trust and pure repose therein, that my heart went back at once to my dead boy Harry, and I do believe that I must have wept, if I could have stopped to look at them.

But although I was truly loath to spoil this pretty picture, the poor things must be partly wet, even in that nest of rushes, which the whirlwinds had not touched. So I awoke them very gently, and shook off the sand, while they rubbed their eyes, and gaped, and knew no more of their danger than if they had been in their own dear beds. Then, with Bardie in my arms, and Bunny trotting stoutly with her thumb spliced into my trousers, I shaped a course for Sker farmhouse, having a strong gale still abaft, but the weather slightly moderating.

CHAPTER XI.

A WRECKER WRECKED

Near the gate I met Evan Thomas, the master of the house himself, at length astir, but still three-parts drunk, and – if I may say so with due compassion for the trouble then before him – in a very awkward state of mind. It happened so that the surliness of his liquor and of his nature mingled at this moment with a certain exultation, a sense of good-luck, and a strong desire to talk and be told again of it. And this is the nature of all Welshmen; directly they have any luck, they must begin to brag of it. You will find the same in me perhaps, or, at any rate, think you do, although I try to exclude it, having to deal with Englishmen, who make nothing of all the great deeds they have done until you begin to agree with them. And then, my goodness, they do come out! But the object of my writing is to make them understand us, which they never yet have done, being unlike somehow in nature, although we are much of their fathers.

Having been almost equally among both these nations, and speaking English better perhaps than my native tongue of the Cymry – of which anybody can judge who sees the manner in which I do it – it is against my wish to say what Evan Thomas looked like. His dark face, overhung with hair, and slouched with a night of drinking, was beginning to burn up, from paleness and from weariness, into a fury of plunder. Scarcely did I know the man, although I had so many recollections of evil against him. A big, strong, clumsy fellow at all times, far more ready to smite than smile, and wholly void of that pleasant humour, which among almost all my neighbours – though never yet could I find out why – creates a pleasing eagerness for my humble society as punctual as my pension-day.

But now his reeling staggering manner of coming along towards us, and the hunching of his shoulders, and the swagging of his head, and, most of all, the great gun he carried, were enough to make good quiet people who had been to church get behind a sandhill. However, for that it was too late. I was bound to face him. Bardie dropped her eyes under my beard, and Bunny crept closer behind my leg. For my part, although the way was narrow, and the lift of the storm gave out some light, it would have moved no resentment in me if he had seen (as rich men do) unfit to see a poor man.

However, there was no such luck. He carried his loaded gun with its muzzle representing a point of view the very last I could have desired – namely, at my midships; and he carried it so that I longed to have said a little word about carefulness. But I durst not, with his coal-black eyes fixed upon me as they were, and so I pulled up suddenly. For he had given me an imperious nod, as good as ordering me to stop.

"Wreck ashore!" he cried out in Welsh, having scarce a word of English – "wreck ashore! I smell her, Dyo. Don't tell me no lies, my boy. I smelled her all the afternoon. And high time to have one."

"There is a wreck ashore," I answered, looking with some disgust at him, as a man who has been wrecked himself must do at a cruel wrecker; "but the ebb most likely will draw her off and drift her into the quicksands."

"Great God! speak not like that, my boy. The worst you are of everything. If those two children came ashore, there must have been something better." And he peered at the children as if to search for any gold upon them.

"Neither child came from that wreck. One is my granddaughter Bunny. Bunny, show yourself to black Evan." But the child shrank closer behind me. "Evan black, you know her well. And the other is a little thing I picked up on the coast last night."

"Ha, ha! you pick up children where you put them, I suppose. But take them indoors and be done with them. Cubs to come with a wreck ashore, a noble wreck ashore, I say! But come you down again, fisherman Dyo." He used the word "fisherman" with a peculiar stress, and a glance of suspicion at my pockets. "Come you down again, Dyo dear. I shall want you to help me against those thieves from Kenfig. Bring my other gun from the clock-case, and tell the boys to run down with their bando-sticks. I'll warrant we'll clear the shore between us; and then, good Dyo, honest Dyo, you shall have some – you shall, you dog. Fair-play, Dyo; fair share and share, though every stick is mine of right. Ah, Dyo, Dyo, you cunning sheep's head, you love a keg of rum, you dog."

This I knew to be true enough, but only within the bounds of both honesty and sobriety. But so much talking had made his brain, in its present condition, go round again; and while I was thinking how far it might be safe and right to come into his views, his loaded gun began wagging about in a manner so highly dangerous, that for the sake of the two poor children I was obliged to get out of his way, and, looking back from a safer distance, there I beheld him flourishing with his arms on the top of a sandhill, and waving his hat on the top of his gun, for his sons to come over the warren.

Moxy Thomas was very kind; she never could help being so, and therefore never got any thanks. She stripped the two wet children at once, and put them in bed together to keep each other warm. But first she had them snugly simmering in a milk-pan of hot water with a little milk for the sake of their skins. Bunny was heavy and sleepy therein, and did nothing but yawn and stretch out her arms. Bardie, on the other hand, was ready to boil over with delight and liveliness, flashing about like a little dab-chick.

"Old Davy," she said, as I came to see her at her own invitation, and she sate quite over Bunny, "'Ill 'a have a ickle dop?" With the water up to her neck, she put one mite of a transparent finger to my grizzled mouth, and popped a large drop in, and laughed, until I could have worshipped her.

Now, having seen these two little dears fast asleep and warmly compassed, I began, according to Evan's orders, to ask about the boys, not having seen any sign of them. Moxy said that Watkin went out to look for his five brothers about an hour after I had left, and in spite of the rain and lightning. She had tried in vain to stop him: something was on his mind, it seemed; and when she went up to attend on his father, he took the opportunity to slip out of the kitchen.

Now Moxy having been in the house, and the house away from the worst of the storm, being moreover a woman, and therefore wholly abroad about weather, it was natural that she should not have even the least idea of the jeopardy encountered by her five great sons in the warren. Enough for her that they were not at sea. Danger from weather upon dry land was out of her comprehension.

It wanted perhaps half an hour of dusk, and had given over raining, but was blowing a good reef-topsail gale, when I started to search for the sons of Sker. Of course I said nothing to make their mother at all uneasy about them, but took from the clock-case the loaded gun (as Evan had commanded me), and set forth upon the track of young Watkin, better foot foremost. For he was likely to know best what part of the warren his five great brothers had chosen for their sport that day; and in the wet sand it was easy to follow the course the boy had taken.

The whirlwinds had ceased before he went forth, and the deluge of rain was now soaked in, through the drought so long abiding. But the wind was wailing pitifully, and the rushes swaying wearily; and the yellow baldness, here and there, of higher sandhills, caught the light. Ragged clouds ran over all, and streamers of the sunset; and the sky was like a school let loose, with the joy of wind and rain again. It is not much of me that swears, when circumstances force me; only a piece, perhaps, of custom, and a piece of honesty. These two lead one astray sometimes; and then comes disappointment. For I had let some anger vex me at the rudeness of black Evan, and the ungodliness of his sons, which forced me thus to come abroad, when full of wet and weariness. In spite of this, I was grieved and frightened, and angry with no one but myself, when I chanced upon boy Watkin, fallen into a tuft of rushes, with his blue eyes running torrents. There he lay, like a heap of trouble, as young folk do ere they learn the world; and I put him on his legs three times, but he managed to go down again. At last I got his knees to stick; but even so he turned away, and put his head between his hands, and could not say a word to me. And by the way his shoulders went, I knew that he was sobbing. I asked him what the matter was, and what he was taking so much to heart; and, not to be too long over a trifle, at last I got this out of him: —

"Oh, good Mr Llewellyn, dear, I never shall see nothing more of my great brothers five, so long as ever I do live. And when they kicked me out of bed every Sunday morning, and spread the basins over me, it was not that they meant to harm – I do feel it, I do feel it; and perhaps my knees ran into them. Under the sands, the sands, they are; and never to kick me again no more! Of sorrow it is more than ever I can tell."

"Watty," said I, "why talk you so? Your brothers know every crick and corner of this warren, miles and miles; and could carry a sandhill among them. They are snug enough somewhere with their game, and perhaps gone to sleep, like the little ones."

Of the babies' adventures he knew nothing, and only stared at me; so I asked him what had scared him so.

"Under the sands, the sands, they are, so sure as ever I do live. Or the rabbit-bag would not be here, and Dutch, who never, never leaves them, howling at the rabbit-bag!"

Looking further through the tussocks, I saw that it was even so. Dutch, the mongrel collie, crouched beside a bag of something, with her tail curled out of sight, and her ears laid flat and listless, and her jowl along the ground. And every now and then she gave a low but very grievous howl.

"Now, boy, don't be a fool," I said, with the desire to encourage him; "soon we shall find your brothers five, with another great sack of rabbits. They left the bitch yonder to watch the sack, while they went on for more, you see."

"It is the sack; the sack it is! And no other sack along of them. Oh, Mr Llewellyn, dear, here is the bag, and there is Dutch, and never no sign at all of them!"

At this I began to fear indeed that the matter was past helping – that an accident and a grief had happened worse than the drowning of all the negroes, which it has ever pleased Providence (in a darkness of mood) to create for us. But my main desire was to get poor Watty away at once, lest he should encounter things too dreadful for a boy like him.

"Go home," I said, "with the bag of rabbits, and give poor Dutch her supper. Your father is down on the shore of the sea, and no doubt the boys are with him. They are gone to meet a great shipwreck, worth all the rabbits all the way from Dunraven to Giant's Grave."

"But little Dutch, it is little Dutch! They never would leave her, if wreck there was. She can fetch out of the water so good almost as any dog."

I left him to his own devices, being now tired of arguing. For by this time it was growing dark; and a heavy sea was roaring; and the wreck was sure to be breaking up, unless she had been swallowed up. And the common-sense of our village, and parish, would go very hard against me for not being on the spot to keep the adjacent parish from stealing. For Kenfig and Newton are full of each other, with a fine old ancient hatred. So we climbed over the crest of high sand, where the rushes lay weltering after the wind; and then with a plunge of long strides down hill, and plucking our feet out hastily, on the watered marge we stood, to which the sea was striving.

Among the rocks black Evan leaped, with white foam rushing under him, and sallies of the stormy tide volleying to engulf him. Strong liquor still was in his brain, and made him scorn his danger, and thereby saved him from it. One timid step, and the churning waters would have made a curd of him. The fury of his visage showed that somebody had wronged him, after whom he rushed with vengeance, and his great gun swinging.

"Sons of dogs!" he cried in Welsh, alighting on the pebbles; "may the devil feed their fathers with a melting bowl!"