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One arose restlessly and looked out upon the star-rimmed sea, then in haste turned back to the lit cabin and passed his hand before his eyes. "I thought I saw the Phoenix," he said, "huge and tall, with Robert Baldry leaning over the side." Another groaned, "I had rather see the Cygnet that was the best-loved ship!" At the mention of the Cygnet they looked towards a door.
Baldry, muttering in his beard that he had made a throw amiss and that the wine was to blame, stumbled to his feet and stood with the rest. "Sir Mortimer Ferne!" cried they all, and drank to the seated figure. The name was loudly called, and thus it was no slight tide of sound which bore it, that high noon in the year 158-, into the busy London street.
He broke off, and turning from the Star, now very near her death, swept with his gaze the billowing ocean. "I would we might see the Mere Honour and the Marigold," he said, impatiently. "What is lost is lost, and Captain Baldry as well as we must stand this crippling of our enterprise. But the Mere Honour and the Marigold are of more account than the Star."
"I dreamed of home," quoth Baldry, "and of my mother's calling me, a little lad, when at twilight work was done. 'Robert, Robert! she called." "I had no dreams," said Sir Mortimer. "Now sounds John Nevil's trumpets our guests have made entry."
"All that a man hath will he give for his life," quoth Arden, somewhat grimly, for he was no lover of Baldry, and he was now ashamed of the emotion he had shown. "To go down with her," said Ferne, slowly, "that had been the act of a madman. And if to live is a thing less fine than would have been that madness, yet "
I am not mad nor do I lie to you.... Before the sunset, when I had borne torment through the day, I bore it no longer. They loosed me and dashed water in my face, and Luiz de Guardiola said over to me the words that I had spoken. Then he went forth and laid his snares.... And so Robert Baldry is lost, he and a hundred men besides?
The latter thrust himself between the two who had bared their weapons. "What is this, gentlemen? Mortimer Ferne, put up your sword! Captain Baldry, your valor may keep for the Spaniards! Obey me, sirs!" "Let be, John Nevil," said Ferne. "To-morrow I become your sworn man. To-day my honor is my Admiral!" "Will you walk, Sir Mortimer Ferne?" demanded Baldry.
Now on the instant he wheeled, swooped with all his might upon the disordered vanguard of the English. Baldry and those with him fought madly, the English on foot made all haste; the prostrate figure, pinned beneath the dying bay, became the centre of a wild melee, the hotly contested prize of friend and foe! Then burst from the tunal, came at a run down the hill, re-enforcements for Mexia....
Well, with our hand at his throat we do not bid the highest?" Now as he raised his tankard to thirsty lips, suddenly from the square below, shattering all the languid stillness of the tropic dawn, brayed a trumpet, arose a noise of hurrying steps and hasty voices. Baldry, at the window, wheeled, color in his cheeks, light in his deep eyes. "War is my mistress!
The four, talking together, started towards the waterside where they were to take boat for the ships that lay above Greenwich, but ere they had gone forty paces Baldry felt his sleeve twitched. Turning, he found at his elbow the blue and silver sprig who served Sir Mortimer Ferne. "Save you, sir," said the boy.
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