The Hearts Highway | Page 4

it
like a pennant of victory, and looked at the ship wet with the ocean
surges, the sails stiff with the rime of salt, and the group of English
sailors on the deck, and those old ancestral instincts which constitute
the memory of the blood awoke. She was in that instant as she sat there
almost as truly that ardent Suffolkshire lad, Thomas Cavendish, ready
to ride to the death the white plungers of the sea, and send the Spanish
Armada to the bottom, as Mary Cavendish of Drake Hill, the fairest
maid of her time in the Colony of Virginia.
Then as suddenly that mood left her, as she sat there, the sailors having
risen, and standing staring with shamefaced respect, and covertly
wiping with the hairy backs of hands their mouths red with wine. But
the captain, one Calvin Tabor, stood before them with more assurance,
as if he had some warrant for allowing such license among his men; he
himself seemed not to have been drinking. Mistress Mary regarded
them, holding in Merry Roger with her firm little hand, with the calm
grace of a queen, although she was so young, and all the wild fire was
gone from her blue eyes. All this time, I being as close to her side as
might be, in case of any rudeness of the men, though that was not likely,
they being a picked crew of Suffolkshire men, and having as yet not
tasted more wine than would make them unquestioning of strange
happenings, and render them readily acquiescent to all counter currents
of fate.
They had ceased their song and stood with heavy eyes sheepishly

averted in their honest red English faces, but Captain Calvin Tabor
spoke, bowing low, yet, as I said before, with assured eyes.
"I have the honour to salute you, Mistress," he spoke with a grace
somewhat beyond his calling. He was a young man, as fair as a
Dutchman and a giant in stature. He bore himself also curiously for one
of his calling, bowing as steadily as a cavalier, with no trembling of the
knees when he recovered, and carrying his right arm as if it would
grasp sword rather than cutlass if the need arose.
"God be praised! I see that you have brought 'The Golden Horn' safely
to port," said Mistress Mary with a stately sweetness that covered to me,
who knew her voice and its every note so well, an exultant ring.
"Yes, praised be God, Mistress Cavendish," answered Captain Tabor,
"and with fine head winds to swell the sails and no pirates."
"And is my new scarlet cloak safe?" cried Mistress Mary, "and my
tabby petticoats and my blue brocade bodice, and my stockings and my
satin shoes, and laces?"
Mistress Mary spoke with that sweetness of maiden vanity which calls
for tender leniency and admiration from a man instead of contempt.
And it may easily chance that he may be as filled with vain delight as
she, and picture to himself as plainly her appearance in those new
fallalls.
I wondered somewhat at the length of the list, as not only Mistress
Mary's wardrobe, but those of her grandmother and sister and many of
the household supplies, had to be purchased with the proceeds of the
tobacco, and that brought but scanty returns of late years, owing to the
Navigation Act, which many esteemed a most unjust measure, and
scrupled not to say so, being secure in the New World, where disloyalty
against kings could flourish without so much danger of the daring
tongue silenced at Tyburn.
It had been a hard task for many planters to purchase the necessaries of
life with the profits of their tobacco crop, since the trade with the

Netherlands was prohibited by His Most Gracious Majesty, King
Charles II, for the supply being limited to the English market, had so
exceeded the demand that it brought but a beggarly price per pound.
Therefore, I wondered, knowing that many of those articles of women's
attire mentioned by Mistress Mary were of great value, and brought
great sums in London, and knowing, too, that the maid, though
innocently fond of such things, to which she had, moreover, the natural
right of youth and beauty such as hers, which should have all the silks
and jewels of earth, and no questioning, for its adorning, was not given
to selfish appropriation for her own needs, but rather considered those
of others first. However, Mistress Mary had some property in her own
right, she being the daughter of a second wife, who had died possessed
of a small plantation called Laurel Creek, which was a mile distant
from Drake Hill, farther inland, having no ship dock and employing
this. Mistress Mary might have sent some of her own