The Middy and the Moors Part 14

"Yes. Two horses, quick!"

Peter went off to the stables in hot haste, remarking as he ran--

"_What_ a hyperkrite I is, to be sure!"

CHAPTER NINE.

HESTER INTRODUCED TO A NEW HOME AND NEW FRIENDS UNDER PECULIAR CIRc.u.mSTANCES, AND A NEW NAME.

Long before their flight was discovered Hester Sommers and Dinah had penetrated into a dense thicket, where the negress proceeded to produce a wonderful metamorphosis.

"Now, my dear," she said, hastily undoing a large bundle which she carried, while Hester, panting and terrified, sat down on the gra.s.s beside her, "don't you be frighted. I's your fri'nd. I's Dinah, de sister ob Peter de Great, an' de fri'nd also ob Geo'ge. So you make your mind easy."

"My mind is quite easy," said Hester; "and even if you were not Peter's sister, I'd trust you, because of the tone of your kind voice. But who is Geo'ge?"

Dinah opened her eyes very wide at this question, for Peter had already enlightened her mind a little as to the middy's feelings towards Hester.

"You not know Geo'ge?" she asked.

"Never heard of him before, Dinah."

"Geo'ge Foster?"

"Oh, I understand! It was your way of p.r.o.nouncing his name that puzzled me," returned the girl, with a faint smile. "I'm glad you are his friend, too, poor fellow!"

"Well, you _is_ a babby!" exclaimed Dinah, who had been mixing up what appeared to be black paint in a wooden bowl. "Now, look yar, don't you be frighted. It's a matter ob life an' deaf, you know, but _I's_ your fri'nd! Jest you do zackly what I tells you."

"Yes, Dinah," said Hester, alarmed, notwithstanding, by the earnestness and solemnity of her new friend, "what am I to do?"

"You come yar, an' don't moob whateber I does to you. Dere, I's goin'

to make you a n.i.g.g.e.r!"

She applied a large brush to Hester's forehead, and drew it thence down her left cheek, under her chin, up the right cheek, and back to the starting point, thus producing a black band or circle two inches broad.

"Now shut your bootiful eyes," she said, and proceeded to fill up the circle.

In a quarter of an hour Hester was as black as the ace of spades--neck, hands, and arms, as well as face--her fair hair was effectually covered and concealed by a cotton kerchief, and then her dress was changed for the characteristic costume of negro women.

"Now your own mudder wouldn't know you," said Dinah, stepping back to survey her work, and, strange to say, putting her black head quite artistically a little on one side. "You's a'most as good-lookin' as myself--if you was on'y a little fatter. Now, mind, you's a dumb gal!

Can't speak a word. Don't forgit dat. An' your name's Geo'giana. Come along."

Leaving her fine clothes concealed in a deep hole, Hester followed her companion as fast as she could. On returning to the road Dinah took her friend by the hand and helped her to run for a considerable distance.

Then they walked, and then ran again, until poor Hester was almost exhausted.

Resuming their walk after a short rest, they gained the main road and met with several people, who paid no attention to them whatever, much to Hester's relief, for she had made sure of being detected. At last they reached the city gate, which was still open, as the sun had not yet set.

Pa.s.sing through unchallenged, Dinah at once dived into a maze of narrow streets, and, for the first time since starting, felt comparatively safe.

Fortunately for the success of their enterprise, the negress costume fitted loosely, so that the elegance of Hester's form was not revealed, and her exhaustion helped to damage the grace of her carriage!

"Now, dearie, you come in yar an' rest a bit," said Dinah, turning into a dark cellar-like hole, from which issued both sounds and smells that were not agreeable. It was the abode of one of Dinah's friends--also a negress--who received her with effusive goodwill.

Retiring to the coal-hole--or some such dark receptacle--Dinah held her friend in conversation for about a quarter of an hour, during which time several hearty Ethiopian chuckles were heard to burst forth. Then, returning to the cellar, Dinah introduced her friend to Hester as Missis Lilly, and Hester to Missis Lilly as Miss Geo'giana.

Wondering why her friend had selected for her the name--if she remembered rightly--of one of Blue Beard's wives, Hester bowed, and was about to speak when Dinah put her flat nose close to hers and sternly said, "Dumb."

"Moreober," she continued, "you mustn't bow like a lady, or you'll be diskivered 'mediately. You must bob. Sally!"

This last word was shouted. The instant effect was the abrupt stoppage of one of the disagreeable sounds before referred to--a sound as of pounding--and the appearance of a black girl who seemed to rise out of a pit in the floor at the darkest end of the cellar.

"Sally, show dis yar stoopid gal how to bob."

The girl instantly broke off, so to speak, at the knees for a moment, and then came straight again.

"Now, Geo'giana, you bob."

Hester entered into the spirit of the thing and broke off admirably, whereat Dinah and Lilly threw back their heads and shook their sides with laughter. Sally so far joined them as to show all her teeth and gums. Otherwise she was expressionless.

"Now you come yar wid me into dis room," said Dinah, taking Hester's hand and heading her along a pa.s.sage which was so profoundly dark that the very walls and floor were invisible. Turning suddenly to the left, Dinah advanced a few paces and stood still.

"You stop where you is, Geo'giana, till I gits a light. Don't stir,"

she said, and left her.

A feeling of intense horror began to creep over the poor girl when she was thus left alone in such a horrible place, and she began almost to regret that she had forsaken the comfortable home of the Moor, and to blame herself for ingrat.i.tude. In her agony she was about to call aloud to her negro friend not to forsake her, when the words, "Call upon Me in the time of trouble," occurred to her, and, falling on her knees, she cast herself upon G.o.d.

She was not kept waiting long. Only a minute or two had elapsed when Dinah returned with a candle and revealed the fact that they stood in a small low-roofed room, the brick floor of which was partially covered with casks, packing-cases, and general lumber.

"Dis am to be your room, Geo'giana," said her friend, holding the candle over her head and surveying the place with much satisfaction.

Poor Hester shuddered.

"It is an awful place," she said faintly.

"Yes, it am a awrful good place," said Dinah, with satisfaction. "Not easy to find you yar; an' if dey did git dis lengt' widout breakin' dere legs, dere's a nice leetil hole yar what you could git in an' larf to youself."

She led the poor girl to the other end of the room, where, in a recess, there was a boarded part of the wall. Removing one of the boards, she disclosed an opening.

"Das a small hole, Geo'giana, but it's big enough to hold _you_, an'

when you's inside you've on'y got to pull de board into its place, and fix it--so."

Setting down the candle, the woman stepped into the hole, and went through the performance that would devolve upon Hester in case of emergency.

"But why leave me here at all?" pleaded Hester, when Dinah had exhausted her eulogy of the hiding-place. "Why not take me to your own home?"

"Cause it's not so safe as dis," answered Dinah. "P'r'aps in time you may come dere--not now. Moreober, Missis Lilly is a fuss-rate creetur, most as good as myself, if her temper was a leetil more 'eavenly. But she's a winged serubim wid dem as don't rile 'er, an' she'll be awrful good to you for my sake an' Peter's. You see, we was all on us took by the pints at de same time, and we're all Christ'ns but ob course we don't say much about dat yar!"

"And am I to be always dumb--never to speak at all?" asked Hester, in a rather melancholy tone.