Athelstane Ford

CHAPTER XXI

COLONEL CLIVE’S MESSAGE

So now my career in the East Indies was over, and I set my face to return home.

The first person to whom I communicated my intention was Colonel Clive. He was at first astonished, and told me so.

“Why do you mean to leave me now, when all our affairs are prospering, and you have nothing to do but to stay on and enrich yourself? I have had it in my mind to promote you; indeed, I think you know that I am your good friend.”

“I do, indeed, sir,” I answered, “and I am most grateful for all your kindness to me. But it is right that I should tell you I am here in consequence of wrong-doing, which has, as I can now see, pursued my steps and caused me to be harassed with troubles and misfortunes from the very beginning to this hour.”

“Why, what wrong have you been guilty of?” asked the Colonel, much interested. “I could have sworn you were the most honest young man in my company.”

“I have run away from my home, sir. I have deceived and disobeyed my father and, I fear, caused great sorrow to my loving mother. I allowed myself to be tempted to leave them secretly, under cover of a falsehood, and to join a crew of privateers, who turned out to be pirates, the comrades of those whom you destroyed at Gheriah. In their company I fell into evil courses, and finally plunged into a murderous contest with one of my own flesh and blood. These things have long sat heavy on my mind. I have perceived their evil consequences, I have been visited with a bitter punishment, and I am now determined to go back to my parents and to obtain their forgiveness before it is too late.”

Colonel Clive looked at me with some sympathy, mingled with wonder.

“I believe you have decided rightly,” he said at last, when I had finished. “God forbid that I should keep you from making your peace with those who love you.” His tone softened as he added: “My story is different to yours. I didn’t run away; I was driven, pitchforked out of doors, and stuck into a miserable billet at Madras, where I nearly ate my heart out with loneliness and repining. When I returned to England it was not to ask forgiveness, but to give it, if a son can take it upon himself to forgive his parent. No matter, all that is past now, and I believe my family have found out that I am worth the love they have to give me. Look here, my boy, I have no business to talk like this to you; but, after all, we can’t be always thinking of rupees and Moorish tricks. Since you are bent on going to England, you shall start in the ship which I am sending from Calcutta with the news of our late proceedings, and I will give you a letter, which you are to deliver privately into the hands of Mr. Pitt.”

At this name I looked up with flushing cheeks.

“The great Mr. Pitt?” I exclaimed.

“Yes, the great Mr. Pitt,” returned Colonel Clive, with a slight inflection of bitterness in his tone. “But you are right, Ford, he is a very great man, and though his battles have been won within the four walls of St. Stephen’s Chapel, while we lesser men have to fight in very different scenes, far be it from me to grudge all honour to the man who was the first to do honour to me. He is fortunate in having for his theatre the senate of a great kingdom of Europe, I unfortunate in having for mine a remote country of which half Europe has never heard. Still, I recognise his merits, and it is for that reason I am addressing myself to him on a subject which is near to my heart.”

The Colonel paused for a few moments.

“But I cannot have you return to England empty-handed,” he resumed. “What is your share of the gratuity promised to the army I do not yet know, but I tell you what you shall do: go into the treasury, and help yourself while there is time.”

I stared at this permission, but Colonel Clive merely nodded his head, and turned to write the letter he had spoken of. Perceiving that he was in earnest, I went off to the Nabob’s palace, and made my way to the treasury, where I found Mr. Watts and some others busily engaged in taking an inventory of everything it contained, which was to be shipped down the river in boats to Calcutta.

I walked through the rooms looking about me. Never in my life have I seen, nor am I like to see such a sight again. So much treasure was there scattered around me, that I could scarce believe it when Mr. Watts told me that the whole was insufficient to meet the sums pledged by Meer Jaffier. In every room I feasted my eyes upon the light of countless jewels. Silver was heaped on every floor, and gold on every shelf. Great green jade jars contained nothing but uncut gems. All kinds of weapons were there, their very shapes disguised under the gold and jewel-work which loaded them. There were chairs of ivory, and a table of solid agate-stone. Massy chains of gold trailed from drawers, and bricks of silver were built up into banks along the walls. It was a confusion of magnificence, a very litter of precious things.

I informed Mr. Watts of the permission which Colonel Clive had given me to help myself, and he confirmed it.

“Take what you please,” he said carelessly. “You will find the emeralds run larger than any other stone, but some of them are flawed. There is a pretty string of rubies somewhere that it might be worth while to choose. The biggest diamond is already promised, but there are several lesser ones, uncut, which I should judge to be worth from twenty to forty thousand rupees each.”

He returned to his catalogue, and I to my exploration. After rejecting many necklaces and crowns that I did not deem to be of sufficient splendour, I finally fixed upon a tulwar, which I found in a box of mother-of-pearl by itself. The handle was set with an enormous sapphire, and the hilt incrusted with diamonds, some of them as big as my thumbnail. I was afterwards offered three thousand pounds for it by a Gentoo merchant in Calcutta, but preferred to bring it home with me, where it afterwards fetched more than double that sum at a goldsmith’s in Covent Garden.

Nor was this all that I brought away with me, for when I went to take leave of Meer Jaffier, he presented me, as a mark of his esteem, with a very handsome dress of gold cloth, and a string of pearls, valued afterwards at a thousand pounds. So that I was now become a rich man.

We buried Marian at night, by the Nabob’s permission, in a corner of the garden of the seraglio. The chaplain of the thirty-ninth regiment conducted the service, and I caused a slab of marble to be set up to mark the grave, inscribed simply with her name and the date of her death. This tomb, I have been told, still stands, and is pointed out to English visitors to Moorshedabad as the grave of the Englishwoman who was imprisoned in the Black Hole.

The following day, having received Colonel Clive’s letter, and bidden him an affectionate farewell, I embarked with Rupert upon one of the barges which were carrying the treasure down to Calcutta. The fleet started in procession, and went down the river, with music playing on deck, flying flags by day, and coloured lanterns by night, till we reached the English settlement. There I found old Muzzy, patiently waiting for me, and full of pride in the victory, in which he was prone to attribute a great share to me.

Five months later we sailed up the Thames, and set foot once more on English soil.

One thing only detained me in London. This was the delivery of the letter which Colonel Clive had entrusted to me for Mr. Pitt.

It was a privilege which I could not rate too highly to be thus made the intermediary between the two greatest Englishmen of my time, men of a type that seems now to be lost among us. Since Colonel Clive we have had no victorious captain, and since Mr. Pitt, no mighty minister, and hence it is that our country, which under the rule of a Cromwell or a Pitt, hath risen to be the arbiter of Europe, and held all nations in awe, is now sunk, under the sway of feeble intellects, to a precarious position, the mock of every power, and saved only by her fleets from absolute destruction.

I do not find it easy to describe my sensations when I was ushered into the presence of the Great Commoner, and saw before me that majestic figure, with the profile of a Roman conqueror, and a glance hardly less terrible to encounter than the full blaze of the sun. When I have stood before the Nabob of Bengal, throned in the midst of his Court, I have seen in front of me nothing but a peevish, debauched young man, but when I came into the room where Mr. Pitt was I felt that I was in the presence of a ruler of men. His attitude, his commanding gestures, and the stately manner he had of slowly moving his head round upon his neck to look at you, made a most tremendous impression; and I found it easy to believe the stories of men having risen to speak against him in the House of Commons, and then shrunk back miserably into their seats at a mere look from this extraordinary person.

Mr. Pitt’s manner of reading Colonel Clive’s despatch further impressed me. He broke the seals, seemed to do no more than give it a few devouring glances, and then laid it aside as though he were already master of its contents.

“You are Ensign Ford?” he demanded abruptly, fixing his eye upon me.

“I am, sir.”

“Colonel Clive tells me in this letter that you possess his confidence. Do you think, if I were to tell you my sentiments verbally, you could transmit them faithfully to your employer?”

“I will do my best, sir,” I replied, not a little astonished at this proposal. But I have considered the matter since, and I can see that there were many things which Mr. Pitt might not wish to write with his own hand, though he had no objection to their being repeated by me.

“In this letter,” he proceeded, “Colonel Clive makes a very startling proposal, which is no less than that English troops should be sent out sufficient to conquer the whole of Bengal, and that thereafter the administration of all the Indian territories should be taken out of the hands of the Company and brought immediately under the Crown. Now what I wish you to tell him from me in reply is this, that I am bound to consider his proposal not merely as it affects our situation abroad, but also as it bears upon our government at home. I am the minister, not of a despotic empire like France or Spain, but of a free people, and I must not suffer anything which may assist the Crown to encroach upon our liberties. Those liberties rest upon the necessity which our kings are under of asking us to tax ourselves for their support. Give them a foreign empire like that of Spain in the Americas, and you run a danger of rendering them independent. The wealth arising from the revenues of Indostan would enable the Crown to keep up a standing army in time of peace, without the consent of Parliament. Moreover, the administration of these territories would give occasion for the creation of great numbers of offices and pensions, by means of which our people might be fatally corrupted.

“I would have you further point out to Colonel Clive on my behalf,” continued Mr. Pitt, “that those Indians, whom he proposes to make our fellow subjects, are accustomed to be the slaves of a despot, and being such, they may become dangerous instruments to make slaves of us. I should dread to see the sovereigns of this country calling themselves emperors in the Indies, and valuing that character above that of kings of Great Britain. Believe me, young man, it is not easy for a nation to play the despot abroad without losing its freedom at home; as I have frequently observed that those who had returned to this country after holding great places in the East, have shown themselves indifferent to the rights of the subject here.”

All this, and much more, did Mr. Pitt say to me, of which I have preserved only these meagre recollections. But how feeble an image do the written words preserve of the eloquence with which he spoke, the enthusiasm which kindled in his eye when he touched upon our liberties, and the warning emphasis he laid upon his expressions about the power of the Crown! I felt almost as though I had been the bearer of propositions for some unnatural treason, and I was not a little relieved when Mr. Pitt finally concluded by bidding me thank Colonel Clive very heartily for his civility in writing to him, and promised to carefully consider of his suggestions.

To this he added some very high compliments to the Colonel’s great abilities and military glory, all of which I transmitted in a letter to Mr. Clive shortly afterwards. And I have set down the above warning of the great patriot minister in this place, for the instruction of posterity, in case a time should ever arrive when the people of this country, in their too eager grasping after foreign conquests contrary to the nature of an island, which is to rest content within the borders of its own seas, shall find they have bartered away the priceless heritage of their own freedom, and sunk into a mere unheeded fraction of a dominion which they no longer wield.

CHAPTER XXII

AFTER MANY DAYS

It was about the hour of five o’clock in the afternoon, and being winter it was already dusk, when I came at last to my native place, and rode up to the gate of my father’s house.

I had journeyed down as far as Norwich in company with my cousin Rupert, who was on his way to Lynn, and with my faithful friend, old Muzzy, who had sworn never to leave me, and whom I was not less loth to part with. And finding myself, as I came back into that country where I was born, utterly overmastered by a strong passion of home-sickness, I had no sooner procured comfortable lodgings for my companions in the Maid’s Head Inn, of Norwich, than I got upon horseback and rode over by myself to look upon my father and mother again.

But as I came towards the house, the greater my longing was to enter it again, so much the more was I daunted by a fearful apprehension of the reception I should meet with, as well as of the changes which might have been wrought during my absence. So that at the last I dared not ride up boldly to the door, but came along softly, and dismounted and tied my horse to the outer gate. After which I slipped inside quietly, and round the side of the house to the window of the great parlour, through which I could see the warm glow of a fire illuminate the wintry mist without.

When I had come to the window I raised myself up till my head was on a level with the bottom panes, and looked within.

The room held four persons. On one side of the fire sat my father, seeming to be much older than I remembered him, in his great arm-chair, with pillows at the back. Standing up on the opposite side of the hearth was a figure which I quickly recognised for Mr. Peter Walpole, though his back was towards me. It was Saturday night, and he had plainly arrived a short time before me, from Norwich. Between the two was my mother, sitting placidly as of old, and unchanged except for a wistful sadness in her eyes, which it smote me to the heart to notice, and beside her a young woman, scarce more than a girl, with a singular sweet expression on her face, who was at first strange to me.

Mr. Walpole was speaking when I first looked in upon them.

“We are like to have more news from the East Indies. The Norwich Journal announces that a Company’s ship has entered the Thames, bringing news of a great victory over the Moors of Bengal.”

My mother looked round sharply, and cried out —

“Tell me at once, Mr. Walpole, if you have heard anything of our boy?”

The good old man shook his head.

“No, no, ma’am, there is no news of that sort. I fear it will be long before we hear of him. Indeed, it is but a chance that he is out in the East Indies at all. We did but hear a rumour that he had been seen in Calcutta.”

My mother let her head droop upon her breast. The girl bent over to her and laid her hand upon my mother’s shoulder.

“Don’t let yourself think that Athelstane has come to harm,” she said in a sweet, clear voice. (And if I had not recognised the face I recognised the voice. It was my little playmate, Patience Thurstan.) “I have a faith which makes me sure that he is still alive, and will some day come back to us again.”

“No!” It was my father’s voice I heard, coming sternly from where he sat upright in his chair. “He will not come back here. He left this house of his own free will, left it in treachery and deceit. He has cast its dust from off his feet, and this is his home no more.”

My heart sank within me at these bitter words. But Patience pleaded for me still.

“Ah, but he will return, I know he will, and if he does you will forgive him, won’t you, Mr. Ford? After all he was but a boy when he ran away, too young to know what he was doing. How can we tell what suffering he has gone through since, how often he has repented of what he did, and longed to come back and be forgiven.”

Mr. Peter Walpole gave a groan.

“It is I was to blame, as much as the boy, come, brother Ford. Remember how I held out for that premium with him. Not but what the sum I named was just, mind you; but I loved the lad and would have taken him without a premium at all, rather than he should have gone wandering about the world, to be murdered by heathen men and cannibals.”

I cannot express how surprised and touched I was to hear Mr. Walpole speak thus of me. For I had ever regarded him as a cold, hard man, with no affections beyond money and religion. I looked anxiously for my father’s reply.

“Nay, you were in no wise to blame, if you considered that what you asked was your right, though to my mind it savoured of extortion. It is my unhappy son whom I cannot excuse. Had he but come to me, and told me what was in his heart, it would have gone hard but I would have provided for him in some honest career. But to let himself be enticed away by pirates, as there is little doubt they were, and to dissemble his flight with falsehood, that was unworthy of a son of mine, and cannot be atoned for.”

He gave a glance, half angry, half questioning, at my mother, as he concluded. I did the same, but was surprised to observe that her face was returned to its former placid composure, and she seemed not to heed my father’s stern expressions.

Poor little Patience took them more to heart, and the tears shone in her eyes.

“Don’t say you won’t forgive him!” she implored. “Think, for aught we know he may now be pining in a Moorish dungeon, or lying wounded on the battle-field. Oh, Mr. Ford, he was your only son, and you loved him – you must love him still!”

“Silence, girl!” cried my father, very fierce. “How dare you tell me I love a rebellious child! I should wrong my conscience, and be false to my profession as a Christian man, if I were weak enough to do what you say.”

Patience turned and appealed to my mother.

“Won’t you speak to him, mother? Why do you sit there so quietly? You love Athelstane as much as – as much as any one.”

My mother cast a tender glance at my father.

“Hush, child! There is no need to speak. Athelstane’s father forgave him long ago.”

I saw my father start and tremble.

“Woman! What is it you say? What do you know?” he exclaimed. “You saw me cross his name out of the Bible with my own hand!”

“Yes, dear,” my mother answered very softly, “but you wrote it in again that very night, when you thought I was asleep.”

And rising out of her chair she crossed over and took down the book from where it had lain those three years and more, and opened the page where, as I have often seen it since, my name was written in again in large letters, and underneath in a shaken hand, the words, “Oh, Athelstane, my son, my son!”

Then, whether because of the flickering of the firelight, or the steam of my breath upon the pane, I ceased to see very distinctly, and came away from the window, and went round to the door, where I gave a loud knock.

The door was opened by Patience, and seeing before her, as she thought, a stranger in a uniform coat, she uttered a cry of surprise.

“Who are you, sir?”

“I am an ensign in the East India Company’s service, as you see,” I answered, jesting to conceal the fullness of my heart.

But I suppose there was that within her which told her more quickly than her eyes who it was, for before I had spoken two words the little silly thing fell a-sobbing and crying, and I had to take her in my arms, without more ado, and bring her in with me.

My mother has always affirmed that she knew I was to return that night, even when I was outside by the window, and that the first step I made across the threshold told her all. But instead of running out to meet me, in her beautiful wisdom she went over to where my father sat still, and leant against his chair and put her arm round his neck.

So I found them when I came in alone, leaving Patience in the hall, and walked straight over, and would have knelt down before my father. But he prevented me, and rose out of his chair with a great cry, and drew me to him, and so stood holding me in silence, while my mother wept; and presently I saw his lips moving, and found that he was whispering to himself, “This my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.”

Afterwards we all knelt down together, while Mr. Walpole offered up a prayer; and then I sat in the midst and told them the whole story of my wanderings and perils as I have written it here. And later on, noting that Patience was dressed in black, I inquired, and found that she had lost her father nearly a year before, and was become my father’s ward till she should attain the age of twenty-one, or marry with his consent.

It was not for a long time after that I surprised her little secret, and discovered that depth of true affection which had been waiting for me all those years beside my own hearth, while I was pursuing phantoms far away. But being alone with her one day, and our talk turning on the riches I had brought back with me, and how I was to bestow them, I said to her —

“For one thing, I must buy you a fairing, Patience, like I used to do when we were children together. Have you forgotten, I wonder, the guinea which I gave you to spend, on the last day I ever spent at home?”

“No, indeed, I have not. I remember it very well,” she answered, blushing.

“Why, is that so? And pray what did you buy with it?” I asked smiling.

“Nothing at all,” said Patience shortly.

“Nothing! What then – ”

“I have it by me, somewhere.” She pretended to speak carelessly, but my suspicions were aroused.

“I insist on knowing where, Patience,” I said in a tone of command, such as I have never known her to resist.

“You must find out for yourself, then,” says she, trying to defy me. (For the first and last time, God bless her!)

I took her by the arms and held her firmly.

“Now, Patience, tell me what you have done with my guinea,” I demanded, quite stern.

“I kept it – for a keepsake. Oh, Athelstane, don’t laugh at me, I have it on the ribbon round my neck!”

I didn’t laugh at her. But I kissed her, and – well, well! – she kissed me back. And I was surprised to find how little anybody else was surprised when they heard of it, and how they all seemed to take it as a matter of course, and my father told me quite coolly that he intended me to marry as soon as Patience should be eighteen, and to live on Abner Thurstan’s farm, which she had inherited by his will.