Lord Byron's Novel (14 page)
‘I am sorry to hear of your friend’s demise,’ said Lord Sane, as he studied his position upon the baize. ‘Yet
dulce et decorum est,
of course. I have been a Soldier myself, and asked for no such exemptions as he so easily had. As to his sister, I congratulate her. A fine Match—an old rich man who will make upon her few demands, and will strive by every means to keep her
good opinion
of himself. As I remember the man, he is somewhat deaf as well—he will observe little, and hear nothing. She may do as she likes—as all the world likes.’
‘Withdraw those words!’ Ali cried. ‘They are offensive, and shall not stand!’
His father, then busy chalking his cue, seemed to take no notice of this demand—indeed he regarded Ali as though nothing at all had been said to him. ‘I recommend her example to yourself,’ he then said. ‘You are now deeper in debt than before—your College expenses have been far beyond any present means I have to pay them—therefore I have had to sign certain instruments in your name, with persons in the City whom I have not liked to deal with, but to whom I have, in point of fact, had recourse myself in former times. These deficits shall be added to the other costs of your Minority, which (as I have said) have not been small.’
‘You have placed me in debt without my knowledge? How is that possible?’
‘You have no idea, Sir, of what is
possible
. Perhaps, however, upon reflection, you may now chuse to attend to my former instructions, and look for a
wife
who may unburden you. I have lately noted the appearance upon the stage of Society of several new-fledged Birds, among them a certain Miss Delaunay—Catherine Delaunay—of whom I have heard that she is chaste, demure, common-sensical and
rich
—attend me in my Study tomorrow, and you shall learn more of her.’
‘Indeed I shall not.’
His father now replaced his stick upon the rack, with slow care, and the air of a man who has at last decided to address an annoyance. ‘Failing that,’ he said, approaching his son, ‘you may apply at the Kirk, and be given a licence to
beg,
and a blue gown to wear—there are several of this parish who do well enough in the position—perhaps you may have a talent in that way.’ He had now drawn close to his son, and of a sudden, reaching inside his son’s coat, took hold of his clothes in a firm grip. ‘Or does your hesitation at the prospect of a
wedded life
perhaps turn on other fears—of an inadequacy of Body—if so, an examination may dispel them’—here his hands searched intimately his son’s person—‘Let us reassure ourselves you are
as other men
—Nay! Resist me not!’
‘Have done!’ cried Ali, thrusting him away. ‘Have done, or I will—’
‘What shall you do?
What shall you do?
Have a care, Sir! Remember—all in a moment, and in defiance of consequence, I gave thee life—all in a moment I can take it away again. “The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.” ’
‘Devil!’
‘Ah!’ said Lord Sane. ‘You know that exalted Being is said to have a knack for quoting Scripture to his own purposes. Here is another—“If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out”—therefore challenge me not, Sir, not though you be the
apple
of mine own!’
‘I warn you, provoke me not further,’ Ali said, lifting his balled fist before the great Lord’s face, ‘or indeed I know not what I may do. I have borne more than flesh can bear, and I am no more than flesh!’
‘Raise not your hand against me,’ said his father. ‘’Twould be a sin of dreadful note—moreover, ’twould be useless—for weapons can do nothing against me—no—I see you shudder to hear it, yet ’tis true—hanging also would be inefficacious—for, you see,
I cannot die
!’
Now he had come to
loom
over the slighter figure of his son—and the fire in the grate threw up his even greater shadow upon the wall—and he cried this in a loud voice—
I cannot die!
—and
laughed
in his son’s face—and went on laughing, as it were the laughter of his
cognomen
himself, at the futile resistance of Men—as Ali, amazed and furious, turned on his heel, and threw himself from the room.
It was that night, then, that Lord Sane summoned his carriage, and his Coachman, and without further intercourse with his son, betook him to a nearby Town, with what purposes he did not say. Ali would learn nothing further from him, not of his plans, nor his past actions, nor indeed of anything—for on the night of the following day, his son kept watch beneath the Moon upon the Abbey’s battlements, as has been here recounted—and went abroad in the deep midnight,
fast asleep,
to find ‘Satan’ Porteus dead, and hanged up within his own watchtower—a clear and irrefutable contradiction to that man’s awful claim to his son:—
‘It is useless to hang me
—
I cannot die!’
NOTES FOR THE 5TH CHAPTER
- Athens upon the Fens:
Lord Byron briefly attended Cambridge University, though he took no degree. There he met, among others, Mr Scrope Berdmore Davies, and Mr John Cam Hobhouse, who would be among his loyallest friends. Mr Davies will later appear in the person of Peter Piper, Esq., one of the story’s droller creations, though how much like life it may be, I know not. - still pool:
There is a weir of the river Cam above Grantchester that is still called ‘Byron’s pool’. I wonder if a guide to all these sites, from here to Constantinople, ought not to be gathered in one Almanac, not only the genuine but the supposed ones, for those who wish to make the pilgrimage conveniently. Though for all I know such a guide exists, and has escaped my notice. - my family:
It appears to me a notable thing that, in the entirety of this romance, there is not a family left whole—Father, Mother, and children. Authors, of course, have the right, as they have the power, to simplify their stories, by pruning the family trees they introduce, and by a convenient fall from a horse, or a sudden fever, to bring about what circumstance they need to advance them. Still I wonder if my father had the power to imagine a family unbroken, or other than eccentric, or incomplete. - chariot of Sisera:
I know not what is here referred to, and no book of reference upon which I can easily lay my hands can tell me. It does not burnish an author’s intended effect to employ
comparisons
to whose import the common reader has not a clue. - the letter D:
Disgrace, degeneration, distress, decline, despair, dread; disappointment, disgust, detriment, deprivation, disability, darkness (but also day!); dirt, dearth, desolation, desuetude, doubt, and death.
N
OW, GENTLE
P
ERUSER
of these ungentle pages, whosoever thou might’st be (and here I extend a ghostly Hand to thee, and a spiritual Salute to thy perceiving eye—my compliments, on thy perseverance!), Ali’s tale has all been told, to the moment of his Confinement, by the pitiless (and not altogether sober) Magistrate, within the dungeon of the Tolbooth that stands by the sea in the Royal and Ancient Burgh wherein the Abbey of the Sanes lay—and no doubt still lies. And surely it will not be wondered at, if Ali, lock’d up in his stone Apartment all alone, in the hours remaining of a darkness more utter than any he had known, should think it possible that, in his dream, he had truly
done
what he was charged with. Had he not slain Lord Sane a hundred times in his mind? Had he not arisen from his bed—armed himself—found his way
asleep
to the mountain’s height, before some good angel woke him? And might it not be that though in his dream he was on his way
upward
to the fatal tower, he was in actual fact
on his way down again,
having only just committed—Ah!—but no! Impossible! What—in sleep, struggle with a living man of more than normal strength, subdue, strangle, bind—hoist, like a calf in a butcher’s window—no! And yet the visions raced through his brain, and the utter darkness seemed almost to stroke his face with icy fingers, and night had no end. We may say, of a dreadful hour, that it
seemed a dream;
but though we may believe we are in waking life when we dream, when awake we know—we weep, we rage to know!—that we dream not. The cold and sweating walls were real—his dead father—all too real—the Turnkey’s footstep without—the farther sound of the sea on the rocks below. Oppressed with horror of the
real,
he groaned aloud, and at the sound the heavy tread without paused, and then commenced again.
At length on the meagre pallet allotted him he threw himself, and slept—but only struggled the more in dreams with his father—drew on him—slew him;
dreamed
that he awoke, and found his father before him, ‘in his habit as he lived’ and grinning upon him—awoke then in truth, and for a fearful time recked not where he was—in the grave—in Hell—in a ship’s hold (for the sea had risen toward the dawn, and beat against the prison’s base)—or nowhere—nonexistence—a blind eye only, and a beating heart. We would not, truly, live our lives again, except to regain some hour or two at the most of heightened life—but if to have those we must endure again one such night as Ali then endured, we would instead leave all our days where ever Saturn keeps them, and seek them not.
But now a clamour of some kind in the halls beyond his cell shook him from unhealthful sleep. The shackles upon him, dependent from a great staple in the wall, would not permit him quite to reach the tiny barred window in the oaken cell-door, past which he perceived the Turnkey’s terrified cries—crash and clatter of a stool, or a weapon—then no more cries—a silence. Then the rattle of the great ring of keys, just at his door, and Ali knew for certain that the lock of his cell was being tried, in a manner slow and methodical, with each iron key in turn. He waited and watched: and the door was pushed open.
The dull light of the lamp in the passage beyond illuminated the shape of a man in the doorway—a man, and not yet further to be known. He entered in, his step seeming certain, and yet blind, and Ali drew back from him in wonder, for now by the small moonlight entering in at the window-slit, he perceived the man before him to be a
Herculean Negro,
shirtless, in a long black and ragged surtout.
‘Who are you?’ Ali asked this dusky personage. ‘Who has sent you?’ But answer came there none—the black man was deaf, or seemed so—
blind,
too, for the great yellow eyes in his dark face look’d seemingly at nothing—and yet saw, as though by another sense. After a moment’s unmoving hesitation—when he seemed to
listen
for what he knew he must find within the cell—he knelt before Ali, and, as he had into the door’s lock, he began to fit in turn each of the keys of the great ring he carried into the locks of Ali’s shackles, until at length the cuffs fell open.
Before Ali could demand more of his strange saviour, the great black figure turned, and out the now-yawning door he went on bare feet; then he looked back, or
turned
back at any rate, as though his sightless eyes could tell if Ali followed or no—just as the bear who (as Ali dreamt) led him to his father’s corse had done—but Ali did not immediately follow.
Reason
was indeed far from him at that moment;
caution
and
prudence
he had none of; sweet
freedom
lay ahead the way the sable fellow led: and yet by some sense whose workings he could not perceive, he was at first held back—some apperception that by fleeing now he would certify to the world his guilt for the murder of Lord Sane. But then again—said this un-sensed sense to him—was he not now believed guilty by the world? And if not yet by
all
the world, enough of it to hang him thoroughly? And was he friended at all? Without the least pondering—of which he was at that moment incapable—Ali knew the right answer to all these questions, and others like them; and so he rose, a fire as though banked in his bosom flaring up, and went out.
Down the drear corridor they went, he and his guide. The Turnkey lay stunned in a corner, overcome, whether by Fear, or the force of a blow, Ali did not consider. The black’s naked feet fell upon the flags with no more sound than a cat’s pad; his stride was long and sure, and yet he held out his arms somewhat before him, as though to learn of obstacles in his path. The wide front doors of the Tolbooth whereat Ali had first come in stood heaved ajar, and they went out into the street, and along that street not a window of a house was lit. ‘Where do you take me?’ Ali whispered to his guide. ‘Whose man are you?’ But—without insolence, yet not turning back his look—the man went only on, down to the Harbour of the town, where the rising tide had lifted the crowd of small sail, which lay on the softly-heaving bosom of the sea asleep as kine. Unhesitating, the black man stept from the wharf into a small open boat, not waiting for Ali to precede him, and—as though remembering the use of tools he once upon a time knew well—he took the Oars, slipped them in the locks, and was already pulling as Ali climbed aboard.
Last bright stars of Morning! White thighs of Aurora, carelessly spread, created each day afresh by Apollo’s gaze from beneath the world’s edge! The small craft made for the Harbour’s mouth, and the breeze freshened; the Charon (as he might be, and Ali care not then) shipped his oars, made sail, and took the tiller and the boom. Ali knew his part—though the rôles he and the black might have been expected to play were reversed—and he lowered the oars and rowed with a will; and it may have been only the steady labour of his hands that stilled his heart, and made him glad. In not too long a while they were able to round the point that marked the Harbour’s limit, and it was not yet full day when they came in sight of a Ship at anchor in the farther cove—toward which the helmsman of their craft now guided them. And as they came near, a light winked in the forecastle, once, and then again.
Even as it became evident to Ali that the ship waited there upon his arrival, the mainsails rose to the arms, and tightened in the breeze—the anchor-chain could be heard ringing round the capstan as the anchor was weighed—and a ladder was dropt from the gunwales with a clatter, just when the small craft with Ali aboard was laid against it. There was no question what next he ought to do, and above him as he stood in the rocking boat to take the dangling ropes of the ladder, there appeared a pair of faces, each topped by a hat, and encouraging gestures were made. On that uncertain stair Ali lifted his body—his spirit arose
of itself
—and in a moment he was taken hold of by hands above, and pulled aboard. Looking down, he saw the Negro, sitting as though a carven figurehead, regarding nothing: till Ali was secure—whereupon he turned his tiller, swung round his sail, and was taken by the breeze from the ship’s side, with never a backward look. Ali was of a mind to call to him, but knew not
what
to call—nor
why
—nor whether the fellow would hear. He turned instead to the two Gentlemen who had made sure his boarding, and ‘Thank you,’ said he, knowing not what else he might add.
‘Thank us not, young sir,’ said the one; and the other said, ‘We have been compensated, well compensated; ’tis you ought to be thanked, for making ours a profitable
detour,
and therefore—’ Here the other chimed in as at a cue—‘Thankee, Sir, thankee!’
They were a tall and a short man, a long-faced and a round-faced, and to Ali’s eyes they closely resembled the two Officers of the Peace who had taken him before the Law. But these fine fellows were of the Irish race—and as such it may be that they spoke, and comported themselves, as Irishmen do in the pages of Miss Edge-worth’s admirable tales—or perhaps they did not—but I hope I may be forgiven if I do not attempt to reproduce that speech, and those manners, for I have not the
apostrophes
at hand properly to do the one, nor the heart to do the other.
‘You are welcome, I suppose,’ said Ali. ‘But compensated by whom?’
‘Why, by one who had the
desire
that you be accommodated,’ said one of the Hibernians—‘And,’ said the other, ‘who had the
means
to effect it.’
‘Will you tell me nothing more?’ Ali asked.
‘That personage of whom you inquire,’ said one, ‘has very definitely requested that we do not.’
Ali turned to look out over the sea—and saw the small bark of his black rescuer, drawing fast away toward a far cove, even as the ship Ali stood upon made out to sea, doubling their distance apart. ‘And was
he
—’
‘In the same personage’s employ? Indeed so, and so described to us.’
‘We were instructed specially—I should say we were
warned
—that he not be taken on board. For the which I am not sorry.’
Now to Ali there seemed to be no
succeeding
question he might ask, unless it be the ship’s name, or her masters’—for so his interlocutors appeared to be—or their Destination, which would now be his; but these seeming, in his circumstance, irrelevant to a high degree, he found he could ask nothing—and was only rescued from his predicament by the two Irishmen, who importuned him in chorus to come below, and refresh himself with a Potation—which he could hardly refuse to do.
T
HE SIGHT OF THAT
blackamore who conveyed you to this ship has put me in mind of another such, yet of a character entirely different.’ Thus spoke the Master of the
Hibernia,
his name being Patrick—and his brother Michael, the First Mate, nodded in agreement. ‘The faithful Tony,’ quoth Michael. ‘A paragon,’ said Master Patrick. ‘The mildest and best of men, as all who knew him would attest.’
Ali—who had been given a glass of golden Irish whisky tinct with honey, at which he sipt with care, as it were his own alarming freedom—had now an inquiry or two to put to these mariners, but held his tongue.
‘Tony,’ said Master Michael, ‘had, as I think, no other name. He was for years in the employ—yet more companion and mate—of the late and blessed Lord Edward Fitzgerald.’ At the speaking of this name, both brothers swept the hats from their heads, bent to their drink, and then replaced their hats. ‘Lord Edward—yet perhaps you know well his tale?’—here Ali shook his head—‘Lord Edward, I say, was but a youth, a junior officer in his Britannic Majesty’s army, his Regiment being then engaged with the American partisans of Carolina, in that late war. Eager to win his meed of honour, and blood his virgin sword, he champed (as ’twere) at the bit to be in the van of every engagement. In an encounter with the forces of General Harry Lee, among the ablest of the American leaders, young Lord Edward was so severely wounded that he fainted, and was left for dead upon the battlefield. But a Negro—by name, Tony—came upon him, and found him to be something
short
of dead—carried him to his own cabin—nursed him with great diligence and skill. When the young man was sufficiently recovered to rejoin his fellows, he had no reward he could offer his saviour but a place in his service, for as long as the valiant fellow desired—which the faithful Tony, as he would be known, accepted—and ever thereafter, the Lord and the black were inseparable.’
Here Ali—perhaps it was the whisky, little of it though he had imbibed—made bold to inquire, ‘Whither they were sailing, and what was their destination?’ He received smiles of gentle condescension from the brothers.
‘I meant not to step upon your tale,’ Ali said remorsefully, ‘if it be one.’
‘We are merchants,’ said Patrick. ‘We go about buying and selling, in our poor Vessel, and live by our profits, when we have any—after we have paid our Crew—and repaired our leaks and hurts—and mended our sail. We are harmless men, and mean naught but good to you.’
‘And why have you done these things? Be assured there is nothing I can do for you—would it were not so—I have nothing—I leave behind only the presupposition that I am guilty of a parricide, made a certainty by my flight.’
‘Ah no, young Sir,’ replied the younger brother, ‘we remove you from the Law’s purview, that you may, as the saying is,
live to fight another day
.’
‘Not,’ said his elder, ‘that we suggest you are one who
fights and runs away
. Ah no.’
Ali knew that they would answer no question about who it was that had employed them on his redemption. Who had that been?
Who?
No one had known of his incarceration—none save the townspeople, who were powerless to conceive, far less to effect, his escape, even if any of them had desired it. The thousand enemies of Lord Sane, one or several of whom might be supposed to have suborned his murderers, whoever they were, were not matched by a thousand friends to himself—indeed he knew of no guardians at all, since the death of Lady Sane.
