"You gipsy! You proper gipsy!" Puck shouted.
"Why not? "Twas fair buying and selling. Well, one thing leading to another, in a few years I had made the beginning of a worldly fortune and was in the tobacco trade."
"Ah!" said Puck, suddenly. "Might I inquire if you"d ever sent any news to your people in England--or in France?"
"O" course I had. I wrote regular every three months after I"d made money in the horse trade. We Lees don"t like coming home empty-handed.
If it"s only a turnip or an egg, it"s something. Oh yes, I wrote good and plenty to Uncle Aurette, and--Dad don"t read very quickly--Uncle used to slip over Newhaven way and tell Dad what was going on in the tobacco trade."
"I see--
"Aurettes and Lees-- Like as two peas.
Go on, Brother Square-toes," said Puck. Pharaoh laughed and went on.
"Talleyrand he"d gone up in the world same as me. He"d sailed to France again, and was a great man in the Government there awhile, but they had to turn him out on account of some story about bribes from American shippers. All our poor _emigres_ said he was surely finished this time, but Red Jacket and me we didn"t think it likely, not unless he was quite dead. Big Hand had made his peace treaty with Great Britain, just _as_ he said he would, and there was a roaring trade "twixt England and the United States for such as "ud take the risk of being searched by British and French men-of-wars. Those two was fighting, and just _as_ his gentlemen told Big Hand "ud happen--the United States was catching it from both. If an English man-o"-war met an American ship he"d press half the best men out of her, and swear they was British subjects. Most of "em was! If a Frenchman met her he"d, likely, have the cargo out of her, swearing it was meant to aid and comfort the English; and if a Spaniard or a Dutchman met her--they was hanging on to England"s coat-tails too--Lord only knows what _they_ wouldn"t do! It came over me that what I wanted in my tobacco trade was a fast-sailing ship and a man who could be French, English, or American at a pinch. Luckily I could lay my hands on both articles. So along towards the end of September in the year "99 I sailed from Philadelphia with a hundred and eleven hogshead o" good Virginia tobacco, in the brig _Berthe Aurette_ named after mother"s maiden name, hoping "twould bring me luck, which she didn"t--and yet she did."
"Where was you bound for?" Puck asked.
"Er--any port I found handiest. I didn"t tell Toby or the Brethren. They don"t understand the inns and outs of the tobacco trade."
Puck coughed a small cough as he shifted a piece of wood with his bare foot.
"It"s easy for you to sit and judge," Pharaoh cried. "But think o" what _we_ had to put up with! We spread our wings and run across the broad Atlantic like a hen through a horse-fair. Even so, we was stopped by an English frigate, three days out. He sent a boat alongside and pressed seven able seamen. I remarked it was hard on honest traders, but the officer said they was fighting all creation and hadn"t time to argue.
The next English frigate we escaped with no more than a shot in our quarter. Then we was chased two days and a night by a French privateer, firing between squalls, and the dirty little English ten-gun brig which made him sheer off had the impudence to press another five of our men.
That"s how we reached to the chops of the Channel. Twelve good men pressed out of thirty-five; an eighteen-pound shot-hole close besides our rudder; our mainsail looking like spectacles where the Frenchman had hit us--and the Channel crawling with short-handed British cruisers. Put _that_ in your pipe and smoke it next time you grumble at the price of tobacco!
"Well, then, to top it off, while we was trying to get at our leaks, a French lugger come swooping at us out o" the dusk. We warned him to keep away, but he fell aboard us, and up climbed his jabbering red-caps. We couldn"t endure any more--indeed we couldn"t. We went at "em with all we could lay hands on. It didn"t last long. They was fifty odd to our twenty-three. Pretty soon I heard the cutla.s.ses thrown down and some one bellowed for the _sacre_ captain.
""Here I am!" I says. "I don"t suppose it makes any odds to you thieves, but this is the United States brig _Berthe Aurette_."
""My aunt!" the man says, laughing. "Why is she named that?"
""Who"s speaking?" I said. "Twas too dark to see, but I thought I knew the voice.
""Enseigne de Vaisseau Estephe L"Estrange," he sings out, and then I was sure.
""Oh!" I says. "It"s all in the family, I suppose, but you _have_ done a fine day"s work, Stephen."
"He whips out the binnacle-light and holds it to my face. He was young L"Estrange, my full cousin, that I hadn"t seen since the night the smack sank off Tels...o...b.. Tye--six years ago.
""Whew!" he says. "That"s why she was named for Aunt Berthe, is it?
What"s your share in her, Pharaoh?"
""Only half owner, but the cargo"s mine."
""That"s bad," he says. "I"ll do what I can, but you shouldn"t have fought us."
""Steve," I says, "you aren"t ever going to report our little fall-out as a fight! Why, a Revenue cutter "ud laugh at it!"
""So"d I if I wasn"t in the Republican Navy," he says. "But two of our men are dead, d"ye see, and I"m afraid I"ll have to take you to the Prize Court at Le Havre."
""Will they condemn my "baccy?" I asks.
""To the last ounce. But I was thinking more of the ship. She"d make a sweet little craft for the Navy if the Prize Court "ud let me have her,"
he says.
"Then I knew there was no hope. I don"t blame him--a man must consider his own interests--but nigh every dollar I had was in ship or cargo, and Steve kept on saying, "You shouldn"t have fought us."
"Well, then, the lugger took us to Le Havre, and that being the one time we _did_ want a British ship to rescue us, why o" course we never saw one. My cousin spoke his best for us at the Prize Court. He owned he"d no right to rush alongside in the face o" the United States flag, but we couldn"t get over those two men killed, d"ye see, and the Court condemned both ship and cargo. They was kind enough not to make us prisoners--only beggars--and young L"Estrange was given the _Berthe Aurette_ to re-arm into the French Navy.
""I"ll take you round to Boulogne," he says. "Mother and the rest"ll be glad to see you, and you can slip over to Newhaven with Uncle Aurette.
Or you can ship with me, like most o" your men, and have a turn at King George"s loose trade. There"s plenty pickings," he says.
"Crazy as I was, I couldn"t help laughing.
""I"ve had my allowance of pickings and stealings," I says. "Where are they taking my tobacco?" "Twas being loaded on to a barge.
""Up the Seine to be sold in Paris," he says. "Neither you nor I will ever touch a penny of that money."
""Get me leave to go with it," I says. "I"ll see if there"s justice to be gotten out of our American Amba.s.sador."
""There"s not much justice in this world," he says, "without a Navy."
But he got me leave to go with the barge and he gave me some money. That tobacco was all I had, and I followed it like a hound follows a s.n.a.t.c.hed bone. Going up the river I fiddled a little to keep my spirits up, as well as to make friends with the guard. They was only doing their duty.
Outside o" that they were the reasonablest o" G.o.d"s creatures. They never even laughed at me. So we come to Paris, by river; along in November, which the French had christened Brumaire. They"d given new names to all the months, and after such an outrageous silly piece o"
business as _that_, they wasn"t likely to trouble "emselves with my rights and wrongs. They didn"t. The barge was laid up below Notre Dame church in charge of a caretaker, and he let me sleep aboard after I"d run about all day from office to office, seeking justice and fair dealing, and getting speeches concerning liberty. None heeded me.
Looking back on it I can"t rightly blame "em. I"d no money, my clothes was filthy mucked; I hadn"t changed my linen in weeks, and I"d no proof of my claims except the ship"s papers, which, they said, I might have stolen. The thieves! The doorkeeper to the American Amba.s.sador--for I never saw even the Secretary--he swore I spoke French a sight too well for an American citizen. Worse than that--I had spent my money, d"ye see, and I--I took to fiddling in the streets for my keep; and--and, a ship"s captain with a fiddle under his arm--well, I _don"t_ blame "em that they didn"t believe me.
"I come back to the barge one day--late in this month Brumaire it was--fair beazled out. Old Maingon, the caretaker, he"d lit a fire in a bucket and was grilling a herring.
""Courage, mon ami," he says. "Dinner is served."
""I can"t eat," I says. "I can"t do any more. It"s stronger than I am."
""Bah!" he says. "Nothing"s stronger than a man. Me, for example! Less than two years ago I was blown up in the _Orient_ in Aboukir Bay, but I descended again and hit the water like a fairy. Look at me now," he says. He wasn"t much to look at, for he"d only one leg and one eye, but the cheerfullest soul that ever trod shoe-leather. "That"s worse than a hundred and eleven hogshead of "baccy," he goes on. "You"re young, too!
What wouldn"t I give to be young in France at this hour! There"s nothing you couldn"t do," he says. "The ball"s at your feet--kick it!" he says.
He kicks the old fire bucket with his peg-leg. "General Buonaparte, for example!" he goes on. "That man"s a babe compared to me, and see what he"s done already. He"s conquered Egypt and Austria and Italy--oh! half Europe!" he says, "and now he sails back to Paris, and he sails out to St. Cloud down the river here--_don"t_ stare at the river, you young fool!--and all in front of these pig-jobbing lawyers and citizens he makes himself Consul, which is as good as a King. He"ll _be_ King, too, in the next three turns of the capstan--King of France, England, and the world! Think o" that!" he shouts, "and eat your herring."
"I says something about Boney. If he hadn"t been fighting England I shouldn"t have lost my "baccy--should I?
""Young fellow," says Maingon, "you don"t understand."
"We heard cheering. A carriage pa.s.sed over the bridge with two in it.
""That"s the man himself," says Maingon. "He"ll give "em something to cheer for soon." He stands at the salute.
""Who"s t"other in black beside him?" I asks, fairly shaking all over.
""Ah! he"s the clever one. You"ll hear of him before long. He"s that scoundrel-bishop, Talleyrand."