“My father had scarcely got hold of them, and the nurse had not yet missed them, when on the dark shore by the riverside, perhaps five fathoms under the gaiety, Parson Chouane came up to my father, and whispered, and gave orders. I know not what they said, for I had no sense of tongues then, nor desired it; for we knew what we wanted by signs, and sounds, and saved a world of trouble so. Only I thought that our master was angry at having the girl-child brought away. He wanted only the boy perhaps, who was sleepy and knew nothing. But the girl-child shook her hand at him, and said, ‘ ’E bad man, Bardie knows ’a.’
“I—every one of us—was amazed—so very small—Oh, sir, I can tell you no more, I think.”
“Indeed then, but you must, my friend,” cried Captain Foley, with spirit enough to set a dead man talking; “finish this story, you thief of the world, before you cheat the hangman. Two lovely childer stolen away from a first-rate family to give a ball of that kind—and devil a bit you repent of it!”
Poor dying Jack looked up at him, and then at the place where his legs should have been, and he seemed ashamed for the want of them. Then he played with the sheet for a twitch or two, as if proud of his arms still remaining; and checked back the agony tempting him now to bite it with his great white teeth.
“Ask the rest of us, Captain,” he said; “Joe, you know it; Dick, you know it; now that I am telling you. The boy was brought up with us, and you call him Harry Savage. I knew the great house when I saw it again. And I longed to tell the good old man there; but for the sake of our people. Chouane would have destroyed them all. I was tempted after they pelted me so, and the old man was so good to me; but something always stopped me, and I wanted poor Harry to go to Heaven—Oh, a little drink of water!”
Captain Foley was partly inclined to take a great deal of poor Jack’s confession for no more than the raving of a lightheaded man; but Rodney Bluett conjured him to take down every word of it. And when this young officer spoke of his former chief and well-known friend, now Commodore Sir Drake Bampfylde (being knighted for service in India), and how all his life he had lain under a cloud by reason of this very matter, not another word did our Captain need from him, but took up his pen again.
“I ought to have told,” said the dying man slowly; “only I could not bring myself. But now you will know, you will all know now. My father is dead; but Dick and Joe can swear that the boy is the baby. He had beautiful clothes on, they shone in the boat; but the girl-child had on no more than a smock, that they might see her dancing. Our master did not stay with us a minute, but pushed us all into a boat on the tide, cut the rope, and was back with the dancers. My father had learned just enough of a boat to keep her straight in the tideway, and I had to lie down over the babies, to keep their white clothes from notice. We went so fast that I was quite scared, having never been afloat before, so there must have been a strong ebb under us. And the boat, which was white, must have been a very light one, for she heeled with every motion. At last we came to a great broad water, which perhaps was the river’s mouth, with the sea beyond it. My father got frightened perhaps; and I know that I had been frightened long ago. By a turn of the eddy, we scrambled ashore, and carried the boy-baby with us; but the boat broke away with a lurch as we jumped, for we had not the sense to bring out the rope. In half a minute she was off to sea, and the girl-baby lay fast asleep in her stern. And now after such a long voyage in the dark, we were scared so that we both ran for our lives, and were safe before daybreak at Nympton.
“My father before we got home stripped off the little boy’s clothes, and buried them in a black moor-hole full of slime, with a great white stone in the midst of it. And the child himself was turned over naked to herd with the other children (for none of our women look after them), and nobody knew or cared to know who he was, or whence he came, except my poor father, and our master—and I myself, many years afterwards. But now I know well, and I cannot have quiet to die, without telling somebody. The boy-baby I was compelled to steal was Sir Philip Bampfylde’s grandson, and the baby-girl his granddaughter. I never heard what became of her. She must have been drowned, or starved, most likely. But as for the boy, he kept up his life; and the man who took us most in hand, of the name of ‘Father David,’ gave the names to all of us, and the little one ‘Harry Savage,’ now serving on board of the Vanguard. I know nothing of the buried images found by Father David. My father had nothing to do with that. It may have been another of Chouane’s plans. I know
