The tapping, I reflected, must be caused by some person or thing. A ghost is a spirit, and insubstantial, and I had never heard that the ghost which some of the townsfolk (chiefly servant maids) had seen in St. Alkmund's Churchyard had done more at any time than glide silently among the tombs. And even as I decided that the sound must have a natural cause, I had startling confirmation of my conclusion in a new sound--nothing else than a sneeze, sudden, and short, and stifled. The tapping ceased, and while I was still trying to collect my wits I heard a groan, and immediately afterwards a voice calling my name, and then a new tapping, only quicker.

It was now clear to me that some one was at my window, though, seeing that my room was some twenty feet above the ground, I was at a loss to imagine how the tapper had mounted there.

My fears now being merged in surprise, I got out of bed, stole to the window, and pulled the blind an inch aside.

"Master Bold! Master Bold!" came the voice again, and, venturing a little more, I put my head between the blind and the window, and saw a dark form against the clear summer sky.

"Master Bold, 'tis me, Joe Punchard," said the voice in a whisper.

"Canst let me in, lad, without making a noise?"

Without more ado I lifted the sash gradually, for it was heavy and creaked, and I feared to rouse the household. When it was high enough for Joe's bulky form to pa.s.s through he clambered over the sill, and stood in my room.

"How did you get up, Joe?" I asked in a whisper.

"Got a ladder from the rick yard, lad. I bin tapping for nigh half an hour, I reckon. You be one of the seven sleepers, for sure."

"But what do you want, Joe? You can't stay here, you know."

"Nor don't want to. I be come to tell you, lad, I be going away."

"Going away, Joe?"

"Yes. No one knows it but you, and I wouldn't ha' telled you only the old mother will be in a rare taking when she finds me gone, and I want you to tell her as I've come to no harm."

"But why, Joe?"

"Vetch--that's why. 'Tis no place for me now, lad. He bin cursing and swearing he'll send me to the plantations for that business with the barrel, and he'll keep his word. And so I be going to run for it."

"But where, Joe? And what about your 'dentures?"

"That's where it is: my 'dentures must go too. If I be catched, there's a flogging and prison for that. But I don't mean to be catched. Before the sun's up I'll be on my way to Bristowe."

"That's ever so far."

"So 'tis, but not further than a pair of legs can walk."

"And will you get a place with a cooper there?"

"No, no; no more coopering for me; I be done with barrels for good and all. I be going to sea."

"To sea! What ever made you think of such a thing?"

"One thing and another. And I won't be the first, not even from such an upland place as Shrewsbury. Why, haven't we heard Mistress Hind tell time and again how her brother John Benbow ran away to sea nigh upon thirty years ago?"

"True, and so did Sam Blevins, and hasn't been heard of since, Joe."

"Well, if Vetch ships me to the plantations you may be sure no more will be heard of Joe Punchard, so 'tis as broad as 'tis long."

"'Tis all my fault, Joe. If I hadn't run into the shop this wouldn't have happened, and you'd have worked out your 'dentures, and maybe risen to be a partner with Mr. Mark. I wish I had let them catch me, Joe, I do."

"Now don't you take on, Master Humphrey. As for partners, I be sick of making barrels for other folks' beer, that's the truth, and by what I've heard there's riches to be picked up in the Indies, and many a sea captain is a deal better off than Matthew Mark. And I'm set on trying it, lad, the more so as, by long and short, I dursn't stay in Shrewsbury no longer. So you'll be so good as go and see the old mother tomorrow, and tell her I be gone to sea, and I'll send her home silks, and satins, and diamonds, too, maybe, and I'll come home some day rich as creases, as I heard parson say once."

"I hope you will, Joe. Will you write to me and tell me how you are getting on?"

"Bless your life, I can do no more than make my mark. But maybe I'll light on some scholard who'll write down out of my mouth, and I'll make him limn a barrel on the paper, and then you'll know for sure 'tis me."

This conversation had proceeded in whispers, but Joe's whisper was sonorous, and I was in some fear lest Mistress Pennyquick, whose room was hard by, should hear the rumble and take alarm. Yet I could not refrain from keeping him while I told of the matter so near my heart--the offer of Captain Galsworthy to take me as a pupil. Joe listened very sympathetically.

"'Tis an ill wind blows no one good," he said. "That there barrel makes a sailor of me; maybe 'tis to make a sojer of you."

"And what of Cyrus Vetch?" I could not help saying.

"Ah! Cyrus Vetch!" muttered Joe, looking troubled. "I be afeared 'twill make him a downright enemy to you, lad. But you'll grow, and captain will learn you how to ply your fists, and when it comes to a fight, mind of my fighting name, and punch hard."

Then, having promised to see his mother and do what I could to console her, I wrung his hand and wished him well, and he climbed out again by the window, and in the starlight I watched him carry the ladder across the yard; and then with a final wave of the hand he vanished into the night.

Chapter 3: I Meet The Mohocks.

At breakfast I said nothing of Joe's midnight visit, reckoning that it would not be long before the news of his flight got abroad. It was indeed the subject of a great buzz of talk among my schoolfellows, who flocked about me as I walked down Castle Street, demanding to hear the full story from my own lips. I could tell them nothing that they did not know, save only my leave-taking with Joe Punchard, which, of course, I had resolved to keep very close.

I learned from them that Cyrus was abed, and like to stay there, said Mr. Pinhorn, for a week or more. His father was in a desperate rage, and had sent hors.e.m.e.n along all the roads in pursuit of the runaway, and I had some fear that my good friend would be caught and brought back to receive his punishment.

However, nothing had been heard of him by the time school was over, so that I had great hopes that he had got himself clean away. I went to see his mother as I had promised, and said what I could to comfort her; but the good woman was mightily upset, and declared in a pa.s.sion of weeping that she was sure she would never see her Joe again.

That evening at supper my father was even more quiet than his wont.

Mistress Pennyquick told me afterwards that he had been to see his sister Lady Cludde and her husband at Cludde Court, and given them a piece of his mind. What pa.s.sed between them I know not, but I do know that my father never set foot in Cludde Court again, nor did his sister come any more to the farm, even when her brother lay a-dying. His visit had this good effect, however, that I suffered no more bullying at the hands of d.i.c.k Cludde or Cyrus Vetch. d.i.c.k eyed me with a malignant scowl whenever he met me, and as for Cyrus, who did not come back to school for a good ten days, he looked over my head as though I did not exist, which gave me no discomfort, you may be sure. At the end of that year they were both taken from school, Cludde going to Cambridge, and Vetch to a.s.sist his father, who was a grain merchant in a substantial way, as all Shrewsbury supposed.

It would be a tedious matter were I to tell all the little happenings of the next few years. Whether it was due to my constant exercise under Captain Galsworthy's tuition, I know not, but certainly, from that very summer, I grew at an amazing rate, shooting up until I was as tall as boys three or four years older, yet hardening at the same time. Twice a week regularly I betook myself to the captain's little cottage on the Wem road, and spent an hour with him in mastering the principles and practice of what he called the n.o.ble arts of self defense. He was pleased to say that I was quick of eye and nimble of body, and, being on my side very eager to learn, I was speedily in his good books, and he seemed to take a special pleasure in teaching me.

At first I found our bouts at fisticuffs a severe tax. The captain, though well on in years, was still hale and active, and, being tall and spare, he had a great advantage of me. With the long reach of his arms he could pummel me without giving me the least chance of reprisal, and many's the day I crawled home after our encounters bruised and sore, provoking indignant remonstrances from Mistress Pennyquick. But I refused to let her coddle me, and as my appet.i.te never failed, and I throve amazingly, the good woman at last ceased to lament, and, as I discovered, was wont behind my back to vaunt my growing manliness.

By the time I was fifteen I was as tall as the captain himself, and then my share of bruises ceased to be so disproportionate. In skill, whether with the fists or the foils, he was always vastly my superior; indeed, to this day I have never met his equal. But I had youth on my side, and sometimes the old man at the end of a particularly arduous bout would sigh, and wish he were younger by a score of years.

No one could have been more generous in encouragement and praise.

It would have amused an onlooker, I am sure, to see him, when I had had the good fortune to tap claret, mopping the injured feature and all the time maintaining a flow of complimentary remarks.

"Capital, my lad!"--after fifty years I can hear him still--"on my life, a neat one, Humphrey; I shall make something of you yet, my boy."

And then we fall to it again, and, being somewhat overconfident, perhaps, after my success, I fail a little in my guard, and the captain sees his opportunity and lands me such a series of staggerers that I see a thousand stars, and there am I dabbing my nose while he cries again: "Capital, my lad! A Roland for an Oliver! And now we'll wash away the sanguinary traces of our combat and allay our n.o.ble rage with a mug of cider."

And thus, giving and receiving hard knocks, we continued to be the best of friends.

These years brought changes in their train. One day Joshua Vetch, Cyrus' father, died suddenly of an apoplectic fit, brought on, folk said, by disappointment at Mr. Adderton the draper being elected mayor over his head. And then it was found that, so far from being wealthy as was supposed, he had been for years living beyond his means, being ably a.s.sisted in his expenditure by Cyrus. His affairs were in great disorder; Cyrus himself was totally unprovided for, and but for his uncle, John Vetch, a reputable attorney of our town, who took pity on him, and gave him articles, G.o.d knows what would have become of him.

At this change of fortune I could not but remember how, years before, he had sneered at me as a "charity brat." I fancy he remembered it too, for when I met him face to face one day, as I returned from school, coming out of his uncle's office, he flushed deeply and then gave me such a look of hatred that I felt uneasy for days after.

Cyrus had never borne a good name in Shrewsbury, and after his father's death he seemed to grow reckless. d.i.c.k Cludde was still at college, though I never heard that he did any good there, and in the vacations he and Cyrus consorted much together, and became in fact the ringleaders of a wild set whose doings were a scandal in Shrewsbury for many a day. Cludde, it seemed, had made a jaunt to London with other young bloods at the end of the term in the December of this year 1694, to see the great pageant of Queen Mary's funeral.