Sir Mortimer | Page 2

Heigho! The sun shineth hotter here
than in the doldrums!"
"Well, go thy ways for a sprightly crack!" said the citizen, preparing to
go his. "I know them now, for my cousin Parker hath a venture in the
Mere Honour, and that is the great ship the Queen hath lent Sir John,
his other ships being the Marigold, the Cygnet, and the Star, and they're
all a-lying above Greenwich, ready to sail on the morrow for the
Spanish Main."
"You've hit it in the clout," yawned the boy. "I'll bring you an emerald
hollowed out for a reliquary--if I think on't."
Within-doors, in the Triple Tun's best room, where much sherris sack
was being drunk, a gentleman with a long face, and mustachios twirled
to a point, leaned his arm upon the table and addressed him whose
pledge had been so general. "Armida gardens and silver-singing
mermaiden and Aphrodite England quotha! Pike and cutlass and good
red gold! saith the plain man. O Apollo, what a thing it is to be learned
and a maker of songs!"
Athwart his laughing words came from the lower end of the board a
deep and harsh voice. The speaker was Captain Robert Baldry of the

Star, and he used the deliberation of one who in his drinking had gone
far and fast. "I pledge all scholars turned soldiers," he said, "all
courtiers who stay not at court, all poets who win tall ships at the point
of a canzonetta! Did Sir Mortimer Ferne make verses--elegies and
epitaphs and such toys--at Fayal in the Azores two years ago?"
There followed his speech, heard of all in the room, a moment of
amazed silence. Mortimer Ferne put his tankard softly down and turned
in his seat so that he might more closely observe his fellow adventurer.
"For myself, when an Armada is at my heels, the cares of the moon do
not concern me," went on Baldry, with the gravity of an oracle. "Had
Nero not fiddled, perhaps Rome had not burned."
"And where got you that information, sir?" asked his host, in a most
courtier-like voice.
"Oh, in the streets of Rome, a thousand years ago! 'Twas common
talk." The Captain of the Star tilted his cup and was grieved to find it
empty.
"I have later news," said the other, as smoothly as before. "At Fayal in
the Azores--"
He was interrupted by Sir John Nevil, who had risen from his chair,
and beneath whose stare of surprise and anger Baldry, being far from
actual drunkenness, moved uneasily.
"I will speak, Mortimer," said the Admiral, "Captain Baldry not being
my guest. Sir, at Fayal in the Azores that disastrous day we did what
we could--mortal men can do no more. Taken by surprise as we were,
ships were lost and brave men tasted death, but there was no shame. He
who held command that lamentable day was Captain--now Sir
Mortimer--Ferne; for I, who was Admiral of the expedition, must lie in
my cabin, ill almost unto death of a calenture. I dare aver that no wiser
head ever drew safety for many from such extremity of peril, and no
readier sword ever dearly avenged one day's defeat and loss. Your news,
sir, was false. I drink to a gentleman of known discretion, proved

courage, unstained honor--"
It needed not the glance of his eye to bring men to their feet. They rose,
courtiers and university wits, soldiers home from the Low Countries,
kinsmen and country friends, wealthy merchants who had staked their
gold in this and other voyages, adventurers who with Frobisher and
Gilbert had sailed the icy seas, or with Drake and Hawkins had gazed
upon the Southern Cross, Captain Baptist Manwood, of the Marigold,
Lieutenant Ambrose Wynch, Giles Arden, Anthony Paget, good men
and tall, who greatly prized the man who alone kept his seat, smiling
upon them from the head of the long table in the Triple Tun's best room.
Baldry, muttering in his beard that he had made a throw amiss and that
the wine was to blame, stumbled to his feet and stood with the rest. "Sir
Mortimer Ferne!" cried they all, and drank to the seated figure. The
name was loudly called, and thus it was no slight tide of sound which
bore it, that high noon in the year 158-, into the busy London street.
Bow Bells were ringing, and to the boy in blue and silver upon the
bench without the door they seemed to take the words and sound them
again and again, deeply, clearly, above the voices of the city.
Mortimer Ferne, his hand resting upon the table before him, waited
until there was quiet in the tavern of the Triple Tun, then, because he
felt deeply, spoke lightly.
"My lords and gentlemen," he said,