Latitude 19 degree Part 65

Sometimes the shriek of the great cannon ball sounded near to us, then again farther away; sometimes the clouds of smoke arose so that we could not see the plain, and anon the sweet trade wind, made only to send the good s.h.i.+p flying on her course, or in its baby breeze to caress the cheek of a gentle maid, parted the columns of smoke, and we saw flames bursting through the roofs of the dwellings of the valley, and caught a glimpse of contending armies as they advanced or retreated, won victory or succ.u.mbed to defeat.

We fought there all the morning, but at last we found ourselves the victors, although with some loss on our side. Our victory was owing to the small numbers of the attacking force, as well as to the impregnability of the fortress. The Smith had been killed. He did not die at once, and Cynthia sat with his head in her lap and gave him water until his lips stiffened, so that he could speak no more. He gave her messages for "the misses," and you have heard, son Adoniah, how well she delivered them, going to England herself in '29, and to Cornwall, where she saw young Trevelyan again. But I am getting ahead of my story. The Bo's'n, too, was wounded, and Cynthia was bending toward him when suddenly he rolled over, helpless as he was, and away as far as he could get from his kind nurse.

"Is the Bo's'n mad?" asked Cynthia of me. I had gone to get them both some water, and was returning along the esplanade when I saw this motion of the Bo's'n.

"Yes, on a certain subject," said I, and I laid my finger on the magic symbol, which I saw dangling from the opening at the throat of her dress. It was hanging upon the baby chain in company again with my portrait. But the eyes, those wondrous...o...b.. of flame, were gone! It was upon that eyeless bit of mystery that you cut your teeth, Adoniah, and all of your children after you.

"I found it," said Cynthia, "when I went back to the mahogany tree that evening. It was lying in the gravel. My foot struck something, and I stooped to pick it up, and found that it was that serpent ring."

"That ring has had a strange history," said I. "Hide it now, or the Bo's'n will let you do nothing for him."

"We can escape now, Jones," said the Skipper. "At least the enemy are dying or running away, and our captors seem to have followed suit. Let us start at once."

"We can't leave this poor man, Uncle," said Cynthia, pointing to the Bo's'n. Of course, we could not leave him! The dear girl was, as ever, right.

I saw the disappointment of the Skipper's face.

"Staying may imperil all our lives," he said; "but I suppose it's human to stay."

"I think he'll be able to walk after a night's rest," said Cynthia.

"It's getting late now to make a start," said I. "The early morning will be better."

"I shall have to start quite early," said Cynthia. "I want to stop at the beach and get that palm for Aunt Mary 'Zekel."

We were almost alone on the esplanade. The soldiers had disappeared with their officers into the interior of the building. They seemed to have forgotten us, and we were left free to follow our own devices.

It seemed so strange to be free once again, for habits are quickly formed, and not so quickly broken. I could not get accustomed to the fact that I was free as G.o.d's air, and that there was none to molest or to make me afraid.

Cynthia had not mentioned William Brown to me now for some time, and I felt quite sure that whether he was glued to the dock in antic.i.p.ation of her coming, or whether he had given up all hope, that the latter course would be wisest and best for William himself.

"You mustn't forget the palm tree for Aunt Mary 'Zekel," said Cynthia.

"There is the dearest little one down by the cave. I wonder if we shall go that way?"

"Whichever way we go, we must be cautious," said I. "I think that General Boyer would protect us if we could find him, but the opposing parties will fight to-morrow as they did to-day, and they are between us and him. Fortunately for us, the battle is waged at a distance back from the coast, and in front of Sans Souci."

"Mr. Jones, sir," said the Bo's'n, "Zalee says we'll have to slip down to the right, sir. All the natives have rushed up to the different palaces for their share of the plunder, and the coast line is left almost deserted."

"Then I can certainly get the palm," said Cynthia, sticking persistently to her point, as women will.

"Well, well, Cynthy, girl," said the Skipper impatiently, "if you want to try it, I'll see what we can do for you, but I reely can't see how you can bear to look at anything from this d.a.m.n black kingdom ever again. If Mary 'Zekel so much as carries a palm-leaf fan to church along with her bunch of fennel, darn me if I don't throw it into the aisle!"

As we were thus talking, some of the soldiers came hurrying from the interior of the fortress. Their arms were heaped with loads of treasure.

So greedy had they been that gold, silver, jewels, and glittering napoleons spilled from their clutches as they ran.

Following them came officers, themselves laden with booty. They fired upon the soldiers as they ran in front of them, calling to them to drop these treasures of Christophe's, which they themselves were taking only to restore to the King. Some of the plunderers dropped dead at our very feet. Some turned and fired on their officers, saying that the game was over, and that they might as well have the spoil as Boyer's men. They ran to the stable yard, and, mounting mules and horses, rode away, many of them with hands and sashes full of treasure. The officers returned again and again, each one carrying all that he could hold in his arms.

They made bundles of the stuff and piled it upon the mules in the courtyard. They seemed to have forgotten us, and when they had seized all that they could find by breaking in, they, too, rode away down the mountain side, leaving us the sole inhabitants of that impregnable fortress, which, properly invested with men and munitions of war, would have withstood siege for a lifetime.

We moved the Bo's'n into the shade, and searched the place for food and drink. This we found in plenty. We washed our faces and hands clean from the grime of battle, and retreated to a far corner of the esplanade, which overlooked the palace, but where we were out of sight of the dreadful results of the carnage. There we rested in the cool, sweet air of evening. Far, far away I could see a little fleck of white on the waters of the bay, which I thought might be the American s.h.i.+p waiting to take us back to Belleville. But we could not go to-night. We could only watch and wait. The sun was sinking fast in the west, the night coming on apace.

And now a strange and distant sound like the wail of the mourner broke the stillness of this peaceful evening hour. What new event this betokened I could not forecast. So much had come and gone that nothing out of heaven or h.e.l.l would have caused me surprise. The moaning continued, and I went to the edge of the parapet to see what more there was of the unexpected. Cynthia trembled and begged me not to go. The poor girl, so brave when courage was needed, was now nervous and anxious, and said many times, "Oh, if we were only at the coast!"

I stood at the edge of the parapet and looked downward. There came, winding along up through the forest, a funeral procession. So I could not help but judge, for four persons were carrying a hammock containing a heavy load between them, and several others walked behind. Of those who followed, four were women and one was a man. There was an incongruousness about the procession, for behind the mourners lounged a small figure, who apparently was not at all interested in the sad group which preceded him. He halted and looked upward at the trees, and threw stones at the birds. I could but smile. It was total depravity exemplified in the person of the Minion. I could not but feel a disappointment that he had not been captured, or slaughtered, or left behind in some way, but here he was, and we must make the best of him, which, indeed, was very little.

The Skipper had joined me, and was gazing curiously at the small procession as it wound upward toward the summit.

"You might know it," said the Skipper, looking wearily at the ubiquitous Minion. "As usual, in everybody's mess and n.o.body's watch."

As the mourners approached the great gates, which had been left open by the retreating soldiery, the wailing became louder, the women moaned and beat their bodies, raised their hands to Heaven, as if calling maledictions down upon an enemy, and then again beat their b.r.e.a.s.t.s and wailed in long and solemn cadence, as if for a loved one gone. The procession entered the courtyard at a slow pace. The bearers rested their load, as if they must have a breathing spell; but almost at once, at an imperious signal from the foremost figure of the group, they again lifted their burden and walked upward until they came out upon the open esplanade. I saw now that Zalee was among the carriers, and I also perceived that the burden which he aided in carrying was a very ponderous one. When the bearers had reached the centre of the esplanade, she who led, one of tall stature and graceful mien, ordered them with a gesture that was regal in its command, to rest their burden upon the ground. When this was done, and the bearers had withdrawn to a little distance, the four mourners surrounded the giant form and, bending low above it, wailed in despairing monotony. So he had come to this! That great King! For it was our enemy Christophe himself thus come to an end of all his power! I saw Lacelle among the few faithful who surrounded the family of the King, and as they withdrew at a respectful distance she and Zalee caught sight of us. They came eagerly forward to greet us.

They told us how Christophe, finding that his enemies were upon him, had retired to his chamber, and almost within sight of the valley of dry bones, where thirty thousand of his victims lay, he had had the courage to take his own life, as ruthlessly as he had taken the lives of thousands.

The interpreter was there, as well as Lacelle's relatives--a poor little remnant of those who had served Christophe while he was all-powerful.

Lacelle ran to Cynthia and begged her not to leave her here; if she were going away, to take her with her. Zalee pointed to the distant bay, and told us, through the interpreter, that the s.h.i.+p would be there, he thought, on the morrow; that the Captain dared not tarry long for fear of a dash at his vessel by some of the pirates who infested the Isle of Pines.

It was growing quite dark now. I had been conscious for some time that a figure was lingering in one of the angles of the wall looking our way. I spoke to Cynthia.

"I think that is your friend," said I. I motioned toward the shadow.

Cynthia uttered an exclamation and started toward the place. The girl stepped forth to meet her, and I recognised at once the young daughter of the King.

"I wanted to see you once more," she whispered. "Our lives are finished, but I wanted to say good-bye. Oh, if I could but live in a country such as yours, where you are a princess, where there is no killing, no bloodshed! I remember nothing else in all my life!" And now the other sister approached. She opened her hand, and disclosed to Cynthia's astonished eyes the diamond which she had sent as a gift to Christophe but a few days before.

"His last gift to my dear mother," she said. "He was a King, a great, great King, a powerful warrior, but his last thought was of her."

Cynthia closed the girl's fingers over the glittering gem.

"It was G.o.d-given, after all," she said to me, "since it will be the fortune of those who would have saved us."

The Bo's'n, overhearing part of our conversation, expressed it as his opinion that we should at once demand the jewel from the daughter of the dead King.

"O Bo's'n!" said Cynthia, "don't talk about money! That has brought much of this trouble upon us. Let us once get home, and I care not if I live on a crust a day. Let us get home, to free, G.o.d-fearing America!"

"I'll see how I feel to-morrow, Mrs. Jones, ma'm," said the Bo's'n stubbornly.

The citadel was ours! The grand, great fortress, with its mult.i.tude of apartments and secret interiors, was as absolutely given over to us as if we had fought for its possession with the army who held it, and had vanquished its occupants.

After the last one of the guard had disappeared, with all the booty that he could carry, we left the little band of mourners upon the terrace and went with the Skipper in search of a comfortable shelter for Cynthia. I found one apartment well secluded from the others, which seemed as if provided to withstand a siege--something which Christophe had always apprehended. These rooms were designated as "the Queen's chambers," and here we brought Cynthia and Lacelle, and for the first time in many long weeks the two were together in absolute comfort and safety, wrapped, I hoped, in dreamless sleep. The Skipper ensconced himself in the sacred bed of the King, and the others of our party found lodgment both commodious and magnificent. As for me, the excitement of the day had told upon me. I felt smothered inside the walls, and could not forget so soon the hurried march of events. Nor could I prevent myself from dwelling on the thought that we at last were free to go as we listed. It had all come about in a moment, as it were, by means which no man could have foreseen, and I mused upon this fact, and the evolving of what I had considered my wise and wily plans, and their defeat and overthrow by that Providence who had but to say, "Go! thou art bound no more." I sat myself down outside upon the terrace and leaned against the great stone wall, where from an angle I could overlook the palace of Sans Souci and the little town of Millot, now black and smoke-stained, or charred and burned by fire. My eyes endeavoured to penetrate the cloud of war that overhung that valley, which smiled but yesterday, but beyond an occasional flame which shot upward from a still burning sugar house or the villa of some one of Christophe's court, all was still. There was no clash of arms. The opposing warriors were resting from their days of slaughter, to begin afresh on the morrow.

To me, as I sat, came Zalee, and with many halting words, broken speech, and explanatory signs, he conveyed to me an astounding piece of news.

If you will go back with me to the night of the burial of the skeletons, you will recall that the Skipper had said to me, as we were carrying our grewsome burdens down the hillside, that there was a tall figure walking between us. I had felt unpleasantly over his words, but I found from what Zalee told me that the Skipper's eyesight had not been so uncertain as at the time I hoped it was. There had been a third person present with us, and that person was Zalee himself. From a coign of vantage in the cavern, of which we were ignorant, he had observed the secreting of the jewels by the Bo's'n. And surmising from the Skipper's actions what his intentions were, he had joined us in the dark to render us another of those remarkable and generous services of which he had ever been so prodigal. As we left each poor bundle of bones upon the sh.o.r.e to return after another, Zalee had busied himself in extricating the parcels of jewels from the interiors of the skeletons. Three of these he rifled. The fourth naturally, as it was the last, and we did not return to the cavern, he could not secure. But, after all, there was a large part of the treasure--three quarters, at the very least--intact, and in some place of safe keeping, of which Zalee knew. But to say that I scarce listened, is to tell the exact and unvarnished truth. Our troubles and sorrows had been so great, our fears so overwhelming, that the one great possession of freedom was the only thing for which I cared. We were going home, safe as when we started, all but the poor Smith, who, though not of our kith, kin, or people, had shared our hards.h.i.+ps and had aided us with his knowledge and advice.

I shook my head sadly, but with a well spring of hope rising in my breast.

"Let us talk no more of riches, or wealth, or gems, or jewels," I said.

"All that we desire now is to get away from this savage land, to tread once more the deck of an American s.h.i.+p, to breathe the air of our free country, and see Belleville once again."

I lay all night out under the stars, scarce sleeping, scarce waking, in that strange, glad state which the sudden certainty of relief from anxiety brings. The morning was yet dark when I called the others. They came out one by one, with strange, dazed faces, but looking refreshed from their long hours' sleep. As we sat there waiting for day, we talked of home and the prospect of our soon seeing Aunt Mary 'Zekel and Belleville.

Zalee had said that he would guide us by a near way; he had begged that he and Lacelle might accompany us to our country. They had found us better than their own country folk; he hoped to find our native land the same, and make it his. You know how they did accompany us, Adoniah, and what faithful creatures they have proved themselves to us and to our children and our children's children.