Chapter I

It was pitch dark in Deptford Creek, neither moon nor star. Uneasily walking by the waterside on the squelching mud flats, or on the landing-stage among tuns and chests and beams and piles of stone ballast, you might just make out the mast and round hull of the cog _Rose Mary_, as she swung slowly at her moorings. On the one side, the broad flood of the Thames shone dully like molten lead or thick oil; on the other, one or two lights glimmered faintly from Deptford town. There was a smell of tar and bilge-water and stale beer.

Beneath the light of the lantern, which burned dimly on the poop of the _Rose Mary_, lay Peter the Shipman comfortably on a coil of rope. By his side was a stoup of the strongest French wine he had been able to find in the cog’s hold. He had reason to be merry that night, so he trolled jolly choruses to himself between his long draughts. The _Rose Mary_ had sailed from Bordeaux with the tide on the night of the last Wednesday, and here she was, gotten into Deptford Creek safe and sound by the Friday midnight. Never had he made such an easy and speedy passage. Besides, in his purse he bore certain pieces of silver, which he had gotten from the chapman of the Bordeaux ward at easy purchase, together with a rose noble, which he had picked from the purse of a young squire, who had taken passage with him to England. Peter chuckled. He thought to himself, ‘To-morrow early shall I leave these knaves, Thomas and Ralph, to unlade, and will I forth to the Golden Cock in Deptford to my leman Kate, to be jolly and to play me with her all the day, and I shall have great plenty of silver to buy me as much good ale as I want (curse this feeble French wine!), and as many delicate cakes and puddings and pies and ripe Kentish cherries as I can get into my belly. And the day after that shall I to Newington with that knave Ralph, to his wench’s by the Green, and stay there till all my money is spent, and then, heigho, for my pretty little Bette at Bordeaux. Beshrew my heart, how I love the girl, now I’ve left her a day or two.’

Then he burst out into a sailor’s catch.

‘Who leadeth so merry, so merry his life,
As the Shipman of Sandwich, who wanteth a wife.’

At the sound of his voice a woman came out of the darkness and stood at the edge of the landing-stage in the faint light cast by the ship’s lantern. She was clad in many-coloured and tawdry garments, and from his place on the poop Peter could discern the chalk and rouge plastered on her cheeks and the bright vermilion on her lips; he knew her for a wench of the town. She peered into the cog.

‘What, pretty Peter,’ she cried to him, ‘art home again, good fellow? Thou ’rt welcome, by my troth. Come now and sup with me at the Pair of Oars. There is pretty company there, I warrant thee, Lilias Lightbody, Martha Kittlelegs, and Cicely Shakesheets and other jolly wenches and their fellows, as merry a crew as one’s heart could desire. Convey me thither, my little pigsnye, for I did ever dote on thee.’

‘Nay, good Belle, I am fast,’ quoth Peter, ‘the Devil be damned for it. I cannot stir till morning, with the cog to be berthed and the hold to be cleared.’

‘The Devil damn thee for a liar,’ cried the woman. ‘Thou couldst if thou wouldst, I warrant. Hast thou worn thy rotten carcass out in France that thou art afeared to put foot ashore, thou whoreson fish-head, thou? Thou art a radish and no man, a filthy remnant, a dead dog----’

‘What, thou old beldame,’ cursed Peter in good set terms, ‘thou scarecrow, thou bundle of rags and bones and paint, thou whited sepulchre, thou old corruption, thou waiting gravewoman. Hook thyself to some dead-drunken land lubber, for thou makest me retch to look on thee. Go to, thou art past thy trade, get thee to a hospital, thou.’

The woman replied to him with another volley of abuse, and then turning, retreated slowly into the darkness whence she came. Peter howled jeers and ribaldry after her as long as he judged her within earshot; then he settled himself once more upon his coil of rope and applied himself to his wine-stoup.

He laughed aloud. He had suddenly called to mind how he and other good fellows in the _Holy Trinity_ had pillaged the Fleming barge off Gravelines, and how, after they had rummaged the vessel from stem to stern, they had hurled the mariners into the sea to swim their way home, if so they might. He remembered one fat Fleming in especial, who had made them almost burst with laughter, such comic antics did he cut when he understood what fate was to befall him. His face had turned pasty white and his eyes yellow with fear, he had pattered prayers like a priest in mortal terror of Hell Fire, and when they shoved him overboard into the sea, and he struck the water plump like a lump of lead, he had screamed out ‘Mother!’ ’Twas truly comical to hear such a fat old devil cry out for his mother as though he had been a two-years’ child. Peter fingered the dagger, which hung round his neck on a lanyard; it was a good dagger of fine Spanish steel, it had once hung from that same Fleming’s neck.

A bell began to toll from the town solemnly and dolefully.

It was the passing bell, rung that Christian men might pray for a soul upon the threshold of the great darkness. Peter listened for the mournful strokes, mechanically he counted them up till ten, and then began from one again.

Suddenly the bell ceased.

Peter knew that the soul had gone out into the darkness, and he crossed himself and said _Pater Noster_, as he had been taught to do as a child.

Then the fat Fleming recurred to his mind, but somehow he did not make him laugh this time. ‘Poor devil,’ he thought, and said _Pater Noster_ again. He pondered silently for a long time, and his mind began to be strangely disturbed.

‘Pah!’ quoth he, shaking himself, and took another draught of wine, but the liquor had no taste and he put the tankard down. He looked upward to the sky; there was still no moon or stars to be seen, only blackness overhead and blackness all round, save for a little lightening in the East where the day would presently break. He thought of the woman who had just left him; then he thought of his mother, whom he had not seen these five years--five years which he had spent in roving, smuggling and pirating from the Hanse Ports to the Holy Land. God knows how many more sins he had piled on his conscience since the day he had last bid her farewell in the tiny apple-orchard behind the house. Then she had had a mad notion of going on a pilgrimage with him to Saint Thomas at Canterbury, and he had told her to keep her old bones safe by the fireside and to leave such junketings to young wenches. ‘Ah,’ she had answered, ‘I should be easier in my mind had thou and I made vows together at the tomb of the Holy Thomas.’ He had replied to her roughly to keep house and to say her prayers at home, and had trudged away without more ado in his ill-temper. He remembered her now standing under the trees and looking sadly after him. He thought there had been tears in her eyes, and at the time he had been fain to whistle to make his mind the easier.

Peter was an evil fellow, and he knew it. There were few knavish trades asea or ashore to which he had not turned his hand. Many were the gallows that ached for him, many were those who had vowed to have their own by him again, and many were the souls who would accuse him before the Righteous Judge at the Dreadful Doomsday. Yet his mother had taught him _Ave_, _Pater Noster_, and _Credo_ as soon as he might run and talk, and had nurtured him in all good religion. Truly she was a godly woman, this mother of his, and she had borne a graceless son. Surely she would sit with the Saints at last around Our dear Lord’s feet, while he would have his portion in the Lake which burns with fire. If only with a word he could undo five years, why, then he might start again.

Through the darkness came the glimmer of moving lights and the sound of far-off voices singing in modulation and time. He propped himself on his elbow and strained his eyes and ears. The swinging lights approached, the singing came nearer; he heard the sound of feet on the rough causeway. A band of pilgrims, having risen before it was yet light, went on their way to Saint Thomas of Canterbury with their lanterns and staves in their hands, and their mouths filled with divine songs. In Gregorian cadence they sang the penitential psalms, and Peter listened as a man in a dream to their solemn chanting growing fainter and fainter in the distance, and watched their glimmering lanterns extinguished one by one in the obscurity.

It was as though he had seen a vision of the Saints of God going up with their lamps burning to the altar of the Most High, singing ‘Holy, holy, holy.’ He gazed after them, long after they had disappeared, with wide eyes and parted lips.

‘She was right,’ he said at length, speaking slowly to himself. ‘She is a godly woman. She shall go on pilgrimage with me, though it be to Rome itself.’

He thought of the blessed Saint Godric and how he had borne his mother Romewards on his back, and how an angel had come down from Heaven to help them on their way.

He waited for the morning to break.