The Admirable Lady Biddy Fane Part 30

Then I cursed her for a cruel, unkind jade, and would try to think I was well rid of such a baggage--that all women were false alike for fools and boys to love, and fit only to be treated as men like Rodrigues treated them. "They make sport," says I, "of those who are fond enough to love them, and kiss the hand of a cruel, hardened wretch like Lewis de Pino. 'Tis the trick of a dog who snaps at loving children who would caress it, and cringes before the tyrant who spurns it with his foot.

Fear not that I shall seek to separate you from your lord--no, not though I saw him lift the whip to flog you as he would another slave. I trust no woman again; the friends.h.i.+p of Rodrigues is more stanch and loyal. I have done all a man could do in proportion to his means for the love of a woman; but I have come to an end of my folly. My body shall shed its blood no more for you--no, nor my heart a tear. And yet,"

thinks I, my rage abating as I perceived how dreary and barren my life must henceforth be, which seemed, as I looked back on it, to be all strewn with flowers and gladdened with suns.h.i.+ne--"yet, in truth, I do wish you had died before you writ that letter. Would that I could yet treasure that tender joy of love for you that has made a fool of me! Ay, would that you had died ere I knew you worthless, while I yet thought you all that was beautiful and good and kind! 'Twould have broke my heart to have lost you then; but better 'tis to live with ever-abiding sorrow for such loss than to find nothing in the world to weep for."

In this fas.h.i.+on did I pa.s.s from one fit to another--from rage to regret, from bitter hate to tender grief--till the stars shone brightly through the rifts above; but they came into sight and pa.s.sed away, marking the growing hours, without my heeding any longer the increasing distance between Lady Biddy and me; nor did I once think to make my escape. She was gone from me forever, and with her all my hopes and anxiety. I gave no thought as to what would happen on the morrow, or what my fate would be when Rodrigues got me again into his hands. If I had thought of it I should have welcomed the prospect of death itself even by the worst torture his cruel nature could devise.

Lady Biddy had appealed to my generosity and reason, but I had neither one nor the other, else had I perhaps brought myself to see that, after all, she had done no more than I should have bid her do if her fate had been in my hands. Could I have consented to her being carried back with me to Rodrigues? No! not though the alternative was to yield her to the mercy of Lewis de Pino. Then why was I so put about because she had done that which I would have had her do? Simply because she had not paid me the compliment to ask my advice? There may have been no time to appeal to my decision; she may, as she said, have depended on my good judgment to accept what was inevitable. These and many other arguments I could urge, never occurred to me then, for my reason was undone.

As I lay there on the ground with that pa.s.sionate turmoil in my breast, with my eyes turned away from the stars that seemed to look down on me through the night with a sweet, still sorrow that made my pain the more hard to endure, I saw a streak of light between the door and the footsill, and presently heard the bar being taken down very carefully, but after a pause, as if a.s.surance were being made that I was not astir.

"They are come to murder me in my sleep," thinks I; "is this the mercy she prayed Providence to bestow on me, or did she pray that mercy of Lewis de Pino?"

The bar being down, first one bolt grated slowly in the socket, and then the other.

"Now," thinks I, "will they come upon me cautiously, or will they do it with a sudden rush?"

But so little count did I make of my life that I did not stir nor take my arm from under my head.

The door creaked slowly on its hinges, and I saw the wall beyond through the widening opening, and a lantern set upon the ground. Then a great shock head came athwart the opening, dark against the light on the wall; and after peering in for a minute or so without seeing anything (for I lay far back in the dark), or hearing any movement, the man ventured in a little further, so that his figure blocked out the light still more; and thus he stood another minute, turning his head this way and that, as if to make sure I was not hidden against the wall, ready to spring on him. Then he draws back and picks up something which stood behind the door with his left hand, and then the lantern with his right, and, stepping sideways and very gingerly past the door, he comes into my chamber, so that I could see he carried in his left hand a pitcher, and under that arm a little bundle.

"So," thinks I, "it is to bring my food, and not to murder me, the fellow has come. 'Tis all the same to me. I would as soon have his knife as his food in me."

Setting down the pitcher and the bundle, he lifts the lantern high and looks about; but not seeing me for the shadow where I lay, and the feeble light of his candle, he puts up his hand, and, shoving his hat on one side, scratches his head, as if perplexed to know where I had got to. Then moving a couple of steps forward on his toes, he holds up the lantern again and peers around, and then, getting a glimpse of me, gives a nod of satisfaction, as much as to say, "Oh, you're there after all, are you?" and so he comes forward again towards me, but very cautiously setting down the lantern and turning the door of it towards me, that the light might not fall upon my eyes.

And now the idea seized me of a sudden that I might throw this fellow down and make my escape, whilst a wicked longing for vengeance burnt up my heart. I know not what b.l.o.o.d.y design lay at the bottom of my purpose, but I made up my mind I would escape and overtake Lady Biddy, though she was in the furthest corner of the earth. So with the cunning of a villain I closed my eyes, that the fellow might not see by their glitter I was awake (yet not so close but that I could watch him well), in order that he might get near to me before I sprang at him.

He seemed to have some ill forecast of my design, for more than once he stopped betwixt the lantern and me to scratch his head and consider of his safety. However, he ventures within about a couple of feet of me, and then squatting down reaches out his arm, as if he would wake me to let me know he had brought food for my use. And though this was a kindly office, deserving of a better return (for I took no heed of it because of the devilish wickedness in my heart), I suddenly caught hold of his extended arm, and, giving it a sharp jerk, threw him on his side.

Seeing a knife in his belt, I bethought me I would cut his throat, and so save myself from pursuit, for there is no vile murder a man will stop short of when he gives up his soul to the fiend of vengeance; and this purpose came so suddenly to my mind (even as he was rolling over, and the handle of his knife caught a ray of light from the lantern) that I had no time to consider what I was about. In a moment I had sprung up, and set my knee in his flank, and grasping him by his ragged shock of hair with my left hand, so that I drew his head back between his shoulders, I whipped out his knife with my right.

Surely in another moment I should have cut his throat, but that just then, raising his voice as well as he could for his position, he cries out, in very good English--

"Lord love you, master, would you murder your own countryman?"

CHAPTER XL.

I FIND AN EXCELLENT FRIEND IN PLACE OF A CRUEL ENEMY.

Hearing these words, I held my hand for amazement, though the knife was within a span of his throat. In that instant it came across my mind that the letter which had so distracted me was not of Lady Biddy's writing. I had not hitherto questioned this matter; for, firstly, I knew not her hand; and, secondly, neither Lewis de Pino nor any one else we had met since our coming on these sh.o.r.es had comprehended one word of our language. The letter was badly writ in a large and painful hand, but that might have been owing to ill accommodation for writing; and, indeed, I had not regarded the manner of it, but only the matter. But now, hearing this fellow speak in English, it did, as I say, cross my mind that he had penned it.

This took no longer to present itself to my intelligence than a flash of a musket.

"Fellow," says I hoa.r.s.ely, "was it you that wrote that letter to me."

"Ay," says he, "with a plague to it; for if I had not writ it I should not have got into this mess."

Whereupon I flung aside the knife, and, laying hold of his two hands, could have kissed him for my great delight, despite the suffering I had endured through his handiwork.

Then I covered my face with my hands for shame to think how I had wronged that pure sweet girl by leaping so quickly to an evil opinion of her; and to think she might have so fallen away from a n.o.ble condition, I burst out with tears, and sobbed like any child; and from that to think that she had not fallen away, and was still the same dear woman I had thought her, I fell to laughing; and, springing to my feet, cut a caper in the air like a very fool, and might have proceeded to further extravagances in my delirium but that my good angel (as I dubbed the fellow), laying his hands on me whispered:

"For Heaven's sake, master, contain yourself a bit, or I shan't come out of this business with a whole skin yet. I doubt but you have waked some of the cursed Portugals by your antics."

With this he creeps over to the door, and thrusting his head over the stairs stands there listening carefully a minute or two; after which, seeming satisfied that no one was astir, he closes the door gently, and creeps back to me, by which time I had come to a more sober condition, though still near choking with the bounding of my heart and the throbbing of the blood in my veins for excess of joy.

"'Tis all quiet below," says he in a whisper; "but betwixt getting my throat cut by you, and being fleaed alive by the Portugals for being here, I've had a narrow squeak. Howsomever, I suppose you bear me no ill-will?"

"Heaven forgive me for treating you as an enemy!" says I, grasping his hand again.

"As for that," says he, "I don't blame you for your intent to stick me if you thought I was one of those accursed Portugals; and how were you to know better, finding me crawling on you in their own manner. Let us drink a dram, master, to our better acquaintance; 'twill stiffen our legs and clear our heads, and mine are all of a jelly-shake with this late bout."

"Where is my cousin?" I asked him, as he was drinking from the jar.

"That's good," says he, taking the jar from his mouth and handing it to me. "Take a pull at it--asking your pardon for drinking first, but I've lost my good manners with twelve years of slavery."

"My cousin," says I--"the lady in whose name you wrote that letter?"

"Drink," says he. "We've got no time to lose if, as I do hope, you're minded to get away from this."

"Ay," says I; "but my cousin?"

"Drink," says he.

Seeing he was of a persistent sort, I lifted the jar to my lips to cut the matter short.

"The female," says he, "went on with De Pino and his train about ten minutes after you were brought up here. De Pino made her believe you had gone on ahead, being in a strange dull humor, and she, to overtake you, hurried away. Drink," he adds, seeing me still with the jar a little from my lips. So I drank; but betwixt two gulps I said:

"They are still gone on the road to Caracas?"

"Caracas!" says he. "Lord love you, master!" (an exclamation with which he larded his sentences continually), "when they get to their journey's end they won't be within a hundred leagues of Caracas."

"Whither is he carrying her, then, in Heaven's name?"

"To Quito, where De Pino spends his time when he is not trafficking.

Lord love you, master, don't spare the liquor."

I drank deeply to satisfy him, and that we might come more quickly to the matter I had a greater thirst for.

"Now," says I, "tell me how you came to write that letter."

He took the jar out of my hand and drank again in silence. At length he put it from his lips with a gasp.

"Have another turn; we may not have a taste of wine for many a long day hence," says he.

"I can drink no more. Would to Heaven I could get you to answer my questions!"

"Time enough for that," says he, "when we get where we can talk above a pig's whisper with no fear of being heard. Now, master, if you can drink no more, we'll set about getting out of this. We shall be all right if we tread light, and don't bungle till we get to the foot of the stairs.