 | CHAPTER XIV.
SCENES ON ST. MICHAEL'S EVE. The quadroone, or, St. Michael's day |  |
14. CHAPTER XIV.
SCENES ON ST. MICHAEL'S EVE.
Scene First.
Osma and the Assassin.
It had just fallen dark on the eve of St. Michael
when the Count of Osma left his cabinet; and, after
cautiously guarding against observation, entered the
faintly-illuminated anteroom, where, stretched upon
his pallet, Rascas still lay, weak and in pain, yet hourly
convalescing under the daily application of the healing
unguent of the sorceress.
“How fares it with thee?” he asked, closing the
door and approaching the pillow.
“Ill at ease, my lord, ill at ease. Is to-morrow
St. Michael's?”
“It is, and seems as it would never come for my
impatience. Each hour I am deprived of my charming
quadroone is a loss of bliss no future time can restore.
Had I not given my knightly word to this hag,
and that the trial is in all men's mouths, I would, ere
now, have put an end to this mummery. I trust thou
wilt be afoot again soon, man.”
“The day after the morrow will be the seventh
day!” murmured the wounded man. “If she fail me!”
“What is this thou art muttering within thy lips—
prayers? Be not so pious withal; thou art not so
near death as thou fearest. By the rood, I would not
and have come hither to bid thee point out to me some
trusty villain of thy comrades who may take thy place
till thou art on thy legs again. I would have his service
this night.”
“I do know of none save Paul Carra, and I think
he hath of late taken to the lakes.”
“Canst thou call to mind none other?”
“Not a man, my lord, who hath a true hand and
eye; not one that can strike the steel home at a blow.”
“Out upon thee, villain! Thou art so full of iniquity,
that thou canst talk of nothing but foul murders.
If men say `steel,' thou dost fancy it sheathed in a
man's ribs. I want no blood-service to-night. Some
one hath purloined from my escritoir the parchment
of manumission on which I would base my claim upon
this Renault and his sister. I believe it to be the handiwork
of my daughter. But if I can bring about
what I have in contemplation, this theft shall be turned
to good account, and whoever took it will pray the
saints they had left it. Knowest thou this outlaw, Jules
Caronde, who made havoc of my men-at-arms, and
since lieth sorely wounded in some place without the
town?”
“I know him, my lord. He hath lost a hand in
the affray, and hath become savage as a wounded lion.”
“I would find him. Direct me to his den.”
“Wilt thou go thyself?”
“Thou canst find me no one else. Sulem, of late,
I have begun to suspect of treachery, which, if I make
clear, he shall answer for with his head ere sunset tomorrow.
Give me the direction to find this Caronde.
I will see him in person.”
“After issuing from the Pontchartrain gate, ride
forward a quarter of a league, and take the first left-hand
path that offers through the forest. Continue
along the by-road until you come to a rivulet, which
follow a few hundred yards to its outlet in a small
mere. On the shore of this mere, upon a small promontory,
you will discover a dilapidated square tower.
you will find, hanging within reach of a horseman's
hand, a chasseur's horn. Sound this sharply twice.
You will then be admitted.”
“Thou hast given it plainly, good Rascas. Adieu.
I commend thee to sleep in my absence.”
SCENE SECOND.
Gobin and Boviedo.
The Count of Osma left the gloomy apartment of
the invalid. A few moments afterward, a horseman,
disguised so as to defeat the closest scrutiny, rode forth
from the palace yard, and galloped in the direction of
the eastern gate. He soon arrived in sight of the
barrier, and, answering the distant challenge of the
sentinel, rode up, and was about to demand to see the
officer of the guard, when a noise of clamorous voices
without the gate, in altercation with the soldier within,
both surprised him and excited his curiosity. He listened
an instant, and thought he detected the voice of
Boviedo, his disgraced trumpeter.
“By the valour of an Aragonese trumpeter! by
the fear of an Aragonese knock o' the head wi' an
Aragonese fist, let me in, thou coward! Dost thou
fear two men will take thy city, that thou guardest the
gate o't so closely? Wilt thou keep two cavaliers
standing without to be scalped by the heathenish salvages?
Let down thy bars and admit us, thou son of a
Philistine's daughter.”
“Thou mayst hammer with thy tongue till day-dawn,
Signor Boviedo. All men know the governor
hath disgraced thee for suffering thyself to be discomfited
with the loss of horse and colours,” replied the
soldier. “Get in as thou didst get out.”
“I did get out when the gates were open for the
soldiers to go forth to gather the dead slain by the
away, inasmuch as I have won another steed at the
sword's point.”
“Thy sword's point should be stuck i' thy throat
for that lie,” said a harsh voice, which the count recognised
as Gobin's; “he got him grazing i' the field after
the fight, gossip o' the inside there; and he caught
him only by climbing a tree, and letting himself down
upon his back, to keep clear of his heels and teeth.
Marry come up! he did win him like a true man.”
“Friend Gobin, dost thou vilify thy friend, that hath
escaped with thee from yonder heathenish salvages,
that would ha' made broth o' our bones?” said Boviedo,
in an under tone. “Let me lie, so I but get in at the
gate by it, and hold thy peace. When I get restored
to mine office again, I will remember thee.”
“Let gossip Boviedo in, cousin,” said Gobin, aloud,
“and he will teach thee marvels! He will tell thee
the art o' lying till thou art black i' the face, and then
lying thyself white again! He will prove to thee how
that a soldier's valour lieth in his wind, and he of the
king's army who is the most valiant is his trumpeter.
Then playing thee a tune for an ensample o' his own
wind, marry! will he make thee believe he is the most
valorous man in Spain! But bid him defend himself
wi' his sword, and he will cry peccavi, and show thee
naught but an arrant Aragonese coward hath been
this braggadocio.”
“Ho, signor! what is this uproar?” demanded
Osma of the captain of the post, who now made his
appearance from the guardroom.
“I know not, my lord,” answered the officer, instantly
by the voice recognising the commander-in-chief;
“'tis but some idle conference with some paysans without
and my soldiers.”
“See if there be more than two, and, if not, admit
them.”
The officer surveyed them through a slide in the
side of the gate, and then, turning to the chief, said,
“There be but two men, signor, both mounted upon
one steed.”
“Dost thou know either of them?”
“One is the trumpeter Boviedo, and the other, by
his motley dress, is the natural I have seen in the town.”
“Let them in.”
The gate was immediately thrown open, and Boviedo
and Gobin, both mounted astride a sorry-looking
animal, were admitted within the barrier.
“How now, sirrah! what means this mummery?”
demanded Osma of his quondam trumpeter, with more
of a smile than a frown.
“High and mighty excellency,” answered Boviedo,
who had evidently lost both fat and wind in his exile
from the presence of his master, whose presence he
now hailed with the proud confidence of one who has
achieved a praiseworthy deed, and feels satisfied with
his own conduct, “it was by thy just displeasure that I
was dismissed from thy service, until I had recovered
by mine own valour a steed for that of which I was
so feloniously despoiled. Behold me mounted upon a
charger won by mine own prowess from the enemy!
Lo! this saddle! is it not of the fashion of the courreur
du bois? Lo! this bridle of hide! is it not like
the bridle of the enemy? Dost thou not see the evil
eye and hang-dog look of the animal himself? Doth
he not bear himself as if he knew he were i' the presence
of the governor his master hath rebelled against?”
“What is the end of this, sirrah?” demanded the
count.
“The end o' it, cousin Spain, should be hemp! He
hath stolen a horse, and sweareth he hath won him.
He deserveth hanging, and, were I thou, gossip, I'd
bid these knaves here, with harquebuses to their shoulders,
swing him to the gate-arch. He hath been lying
all his life, an' it were a mercy to let him hang i' his
death.”
“Thou art a merry knave,” said the governor;
“and, now it bethinks me, I have somewhat against
thee. Didst thou not take service with me, and the
next day run away?”
“I did fear, if I stayed with thee longer, thou
in disguise, and so have me tried and shot.”
“Thou art a shrewd knave. Perez,” he said to the
officer of the guard, “place this jester under gentle
arrest until morning, and then give him his liberty. I
am going forth a while, and his knowledge of my absence
may work mischief. Boviedo, remain thou in
the guardhouse till morning, and then go to the palace
and be reinstated in thy office! Let me forth,
capitano, and see that no one passes either out or in, on
any pretence, during my absence. Good-evening to
thee, fair jester. It grieves me to put thee under
guard, but Perez hath both wine and viands to amuse
thee withal, though, by'r lady! I doubt much if thou
wilt find here gold or silver flagon to purloin.”
With this quiet allusion to Gobin's former peccadilloes,
the count sallied from the gate, and, putting
spurs to his horse, was soon riding at a round rate in
the direction of the forest.
Scene Third.
Osma and the Chasseur Chief.
By the open window of a large vaulted apartment,
situated in a lonely tower by the water-side, and on the
same eve of St. Michael, leaned a tall, graceful young
man, who had risen from a pallet that stood near. He
was remarkable for the symmetry of his figure, and,
notwithstanding a languor pervaded his whole person,
also for the elegance and flexile ease of every motion
of his limbs. His hair was black as the raven's wing;
his eyes were large and equally black; while his complexion
was remarkable for the brilliancy of the red
that mingled with and redeemed the natural brown of
his skin.
His features, lighted by an iron lamp that stood near
him, on a projection of the rough stone wall against
which he leaned, were aquiline and singularly regular
outline, but their expression, which marks the man
more than the features upon which it is called up, was
decidedly low and sensual, as if the mind that governed
the face was base and wicked, and the soul that illumined
it was subtle and suspicious, crafty and designing.
They now wore a look of physical pain, rage,
and deep mortification. One arm was suspended in a
sling against his breast, while with the other he supported
himself as if from bodily weakness. He was
looking forth upon the water, which reflected a thousand
stars in its sable mirror, seemingly another Heaven.
His thoughts were not in the scene; they were
ferociously brooding upon the misery of his own condition,
planning vengeance and bloody retribution.
Suddenly the sound of a horse galloping rapidly along
the shore caused him to start, and instantly change
his position so as to command the approach to the tower.
Through the gloom he caught a glimpse of a man
on horseback, riding at full speed towards the portal,
but the next moment lost sight of him behind an angle
of the building.
“If this be that false traitor De Thoyras, come to
laugh again at my mutilated limb, while he bids me
rise and draw sword to recover Azèlie from the Spaniard,
by the blood of St. Stephen! he shall die on the
threshold. It is not enough for him that he hath left
me here with two miserable slaves, and, at the head of
my band, gone playing the traitor by siding with this
Ethiopian Renault! What excuse is it that he is only
uniting against this Osma? I would rather be sworn
brother with Osma against the haughty and insufferable
quadroon-slave, than side with him were his sister to
be the price of my alliance! There sounds the horn!
If it be he, he shall die ere he can deliver the first sentence.
I have yet a hand remaining that can send a
bullet to a traitor's heart.”
Thus speaking, he took up (with his left hand) a
pistol that lay near, and, cocking it with his teeth, stood
with his eye fixed upon the entrance to the hall, and
commanded his servant to admit. He saw at a glance
that the stranger, whose face was concealed by the falling
front of his hat, was not De Thoyras. To the bearing
and height of the intruder, he perceived also that
he was wholly a stranger. Without changing his hostile
attitude nevertheless, he waited his advance to the
middle of the apartment in silence; and then, in a
stern and menacing tone, demanded his business.
“If thou art the young Marquis Caronde,” answered
the Count of Osma, firmly, and in a tone to invite confidence,
“my business lies with thee.”
“Deliver thy words speedily and begone, for I would
be left alone,” answered the young man morosely, nay,
savagely, as if his whole soul was imbittered against
his fellow-men on account of his degrading dismemberment.
“I pray thee, noble sir, listen to me with patience,”
said the count, in a bland and soothing tone of voice;
“I know of thy sad loss, and—”
“May thy tongue be torn from thy throat by the foul
fiend! Hast thou come hither to cast it into my teeth!”
“Nay, pardon my inadvertence; I would discourse
with thee on a matter touching thine own interest, and,
as I well know, thy revenge!”
“Out with it,” cried Caronde, impatiently.
“Wouldst thou have in thy power the man who—”
and the count completed his sentence with a glance at
his arm.
“Would I? am I not human? Askest thou would
I? Ha, ha, ha!” and he gave so demoniacal a laugh
that the count stepped back appalled, and the old tower
echoed with it, as if a legion of imps were mocking
and deriding.
“I will give thee thy wish!”
“How?”
“Which dost thou love to gratify most, thy vengeance
or thy passion?”
“Vengeance, such as I meditate on the accursed
slave who hath done this—this!” and he tore his arm
the eyes of the count; “who hath thus maimed a Caronde,
swallows up all other feelings,” he answered,
with a deep and settled implacability of revenge that
was horrible to contemplate, while it showed how
keenly he felt his condition.
“Thou hast loved the sister of thy enemy,” asserted,
rather than asked, the count, venturing with caution,
but yet with boldness, upon his subject.
“Loved her! Yes, if that be love which begot hatred,
which makes the sister the instrument of revenge,
and, through her infamy, makes the barb of that hatred
triple-edged, and dipped in poison for the brother's
soul! If this be love, then Jules Caronde loved the
haughty sister of the quadroon Renault,” he said, with
a laugh of derision.
Osma looked upon him with wonder while giving
utterance to these sentiments, and confessed in his
heart that he had found a rival in wickedness. He
seemed now fully to understand with whom he had to
do; and, a degree of kindred feeling inspiring him, he
pursued with less embarrassment the object for which
he had sought the interview.
“This is as I would have it!” he said to himself,
reflectingly, but so loud as to be heard by the other.
“And who art thou that wouldst have things so!”
demanded Jules, scornfully and haughtily. “Thou
shouldst be a Spaniard by thy complexion and carriage.”
“Answer me first, Signor Marquis, one question, and
I will tell thee who I am. Wilt thou resign all claim
to the affections of this Azèlie for a price!”
“Am I a slave-merchant?” he fiercely demanded;
“if I am poor, yet am I noble! By the bright heaven,
there is a price I would sell her for, soul and body—”
“And that price is—”
“The quadroon Renanlt!”
“He is thine!”
“Who art thou, that darest to kindle a hope thou
mayst not have the power to feed with the fuel of
revenge?”
“I am Garcia of Osma!” answered the count, removing
his sombrero, and throwing back the folds of
his mantle from his breast.
“I did half suspect that thou wert he!” said Jules,
surveying him with surprise and curiosity. “There
is then no mystery between us. Azèlie, rumour hath
it, is to be tried on the morrow for her liberty. Had
I the parchments that thou hast obtained from that female
fiend Ninine, she had been my slave and mistress
ere this. I need not doubt, Sir Count, what will
be the result of the trial. Yet thy possession of the
sister will not place the brother in my hands—Hands?
demon incarné! does my own false tongue mock me?”
“Renault is my prisoner, in keeping for the trial!”
observed the count, with a smile.
“Thine—thy prisoner?” interrogated Caronde, with
the most eager interest.
“Under a close guard with the beautiful Azèlie.
Both are my prisoners.”
“Thou hast blessed me, count, with these tidings.
Azèlie is thine so thou give me the brother!”
“He shall be placed in thy ha—I would say in thy
power to-morrow, in the presence of the tribunal that
transfers his sister to mine.”
The young man looked an instant into the count's
face with suspicion, to discover if his allusion to his
lost hand had been only accidental, and, being apparently
satisfied that it was, he said,
“Wouldst thou have me appear there, signor, to be
the butt of scornful laughter, of finger-pointing, and
nodding heads?”
“I have lost, in a most mysterious manner, noble
marquis, the parchment which you heard that I received
from the quadroone-mother—”
“Lost it! Then are they both my slaves by right of
inheritance,” he cried, with sudden exultation. “Vengeance
will be doubly mine.”
“Nay, Signor Marquis,” interrupted Osma, with cutting
coolness, “they are, nevertheless, in my power,
not in thine! Thou canst have revenge of neither but
my words with patience. In desiring the possession
of Azèlie, thou hast only Renault's pride and
arrogance to humble! Am I right?”
“My passion for her had its birth in no other feeling.”
“And this would be gratified by degrading the sister,
whom the brother, as well as her own ambition,
has elevated above her condition, scorning for her all
beneath honourable and wedded love. Is it not so?”
“It is.”
“Then, if this degradation be effected,” pursued the
count, “and Renault thereby humbled, it will matter
little to thee who is the instrument of it. I swear to
thee thou shalt have thy desire in the result. Wilt
thou give me the sister for the brother?”
“Hast thou not said that thou hast her already, Sir
Count, as well as the brother? Wherefore do you put
an empty question to me?”
“It hath this end,” answered Osma, coming closer
to him; “the loss of the parchment leaves me no
ground for claiming them as my slaves, save by an
open act of power and will. This I do not wish to
exercise in the present state of popular feeling, if I
may bring it about otherwise. Without doubt, Signor
Marquis, the title rests in you from the neglect of your
noble father to record the manumission. It is through
yourself, therefore, that I would have the title come to
me.”
“Darest thou insult me, Sir Count of Osma, with the
proposition to use me as a tool of thy lust?”
“Am I not made a tool of thy vengeance?” demanded
the wily Spaniard.
“Be it so,” answered Jules, after a moment's gaze
at the collected face of the count; “and here is my
—Sceleret! the incarnate fiend hath my tongue,” he
cried, with a torrent of fearful execrations, hastily
withdrawing the mutilated stump, which he had involuntarily
and impulsively extended to seal the compact.
The Count of Osma smiled with malicious pleasure.
party of horse to escort him to the city and to his
palace before midnight, he took his leave of the young
man, and was soon galloping with an exulting spirit
on his return to the town.
If Jules Caronde had entertained any other feelings
than those of deadly revenge against him who had so
terribly mutilated him, a revenge grafted upon years
of previous hatred, he would have borne himself with
the hostile bearing of an enemy towards the new
governor on discovering him in the person of his visiter;
or, in promising to enter the city, and place himself
in his power after the slaughter of his ambassador
and his body-guard, he would, at least, have apprehended
treachery and retribution. But he had no
room for any emotion or thought but that which so
completely filled his dark and bitter soul.
Scene Fourth.
The Camanchee Prince and Courreur Chef.
About the same time that Jules Caronde rose from
his restless pallet to gaze from the window upon the
quiet lake, so contrasted in its stillness and repose to
the unquiet of his own bosom, a young man made his
appearance in a turret upon the outer wall of the
island-fortress of the courreurs du bois, which was situated
a league to the north of the lonely tower of
the chasseur chief, in the centre of a broader link of
the same chain of lagoons. His glance was directed
towards the northern outlet of the lake, which, through
a succession of others, ultimately gave egress into the
Mississippi many leagues distant. He listened as if
he expected to hear distant sounds from the water,
and, with a night-telescope, surveyed, long and intensely,
the lengthened “reach” beyond him. A sound
at length arrested his ear. He listened doubtfully
a while, and then spoke to a sentinel near.
“Didst thou not hear a sound, like the dashing of
paddles, or the steady rush of barges through the
water?”
“I have heard it often to-night, Sieur De Thoyras,”
answered the man; “it is the evening wind bending
the tops of the forest trees on the main as it passes
over them. There, it ripples along the smooth water;
and now I feel it!”
“You are right, Leroy!” answered the young man,
with a tone of disappointment, as the wind blew his
locks about his cheeks.
At this moment Charleval joined him.
“If you look up the lake until dawn, De Thoyras,
you will not see your allies. A thousand Camanchee
mounted warriors will scarce row when they can
ride.”
“The same pirogues that will take them to this
side, will easily enter the inlet to the first of the chain
of lakes, and so reach us with less distance. It is
twenty leagues farther by the shores; and, as the runner
Lassatchee, on his return, bade us look for them tonight,
they will, to get here in time, take water. If
they disappoint us, we must be sacrificed along with
Renault to-morrow, or rescue him.”
“Did I not tell thee I had once seen this noble Camanchee
chief, and also the young prince his son,” observed
Charleval. “Mark me! He will not disappoint
us! When, three years ago, he heard that the
Count of Osma had arrived to govern the province
under Spain, he came from his fastnesses, accompanied
by several of his chiefs and by his son, a princely
youth, and in the most distinct terms offered his services
against the Spaniard should he again return.
Since that period he has kept himself in readiness to
obey our call. From some cause, hostility to Spain
is deeply rooted in his breast. He will not disappoint
us. Lassatchee reports that he received the message
of the arrival of the Spaniards with a kindling eye;
and, forthwith gathering his warriors, bade him return,
and say that he would not be long behind him.
the river on horseback. The Camanchee, like the
Arab of the desert, is ever in the saddle, and it will
not be a slight reason that will induce him to exchange
his horse for a barge. Listen! That was a horse's
neigh from the main land! Carondelet and Marigny,
thy two penitent frères, De Thoyras, who seek to
atone, by the most vigilant duty now, for their folly in
being led astray by Jules, I have posted on the shore;
Marigny's bugle will give us the signal of their approach.”
“Hark!” cried De Thoyras, catching him by the
arm.
“And there it sounds, the sweetest music ears ever
listened to,” continued Charleval, with gratitude and
triumph. “Now, Osma, is the day of thy power
ended.”
Ere the notes of the glad bugle which was sounded
from the land ceased to float across the lake, Charleval
sent back an answering blast that awakened a
thousand echoes from the wooded shores, and caused
five hundred hearts within the fortress to bound with
warlike enthusiasm.
Instantly the whole island-garrison was in life and
motion. Charleval, now the chef courreur in Renault's
place, leaving De Thoyras in command, sprang
into a barge, accompanied by the three remaining
frères that had followed De Thoyras to Renault's
standard, and whom he had made his lieutenants, and
crossed the lake to the main to meet his allies.
As he left the island, the diminished moon, with tardy
rising, at length appeared above the trees of the
forest, and, as he approached the shadowy line of the
shore, began to illumine its recesses and penetrate
aslant into its glades. Standing upright in his barge,
with his keen gaze fixed on the gloomy banks, he was
borne towards them with rapid oars. All was still
and motionless along the land; and, as he came nearer,
he began to fear his joy was premature, and that
Marigny had been deceived. At this moment he discovered
with a beating heart he sprang to the shore to meet
him.
“What tidings, Carondelet? Are they not arrived?”
“Look along the curving edge of the forest, which,
receding, leaves a wide lawn between it and the lake,”
said the young man, the elegance of whose figure was
finely set off by the richness of the chasseur costume
which he wore, conducting him, at the same time, to a
small mound, upon which grew a gigantic and wide-spreading
oak.
“I see nothing.”
“Dost thou hear nothing?”
“No.”
“Yet there are more than a thousand mounted warriors
lining it. Come with me, Charleval,” he added,
laying his hand lightly upon the wrist of his young
friend. “Their leader hath just marshalled them there
in covert, as is the practice of these forest warriors;
and now, surrounded by his stately chiefs, awaits your
coming in yonder spot where the moonlight is falling
like silver mist upon the sward.”
Charleval followed the poetic Carondelet from the
water, and, crossing the edge of the forest, came suddenly
upon the left of a line of savage warriors hid
within its shades. Passing in silence along their front,
not without admiration at the barbaric splendour of
their costume and the fierceness of their aspects, he
came to a space in the centre of the wood all open to
the sky, save that a sycamore, towering from the midst,
flung above its hoary arms, between which the moon
made its way in many a broken beam of light. Beneath
the branches of this tree Charleval discovered a
group of savage warriors, plumed and painted, and arrayed
in the gorgeous costumes of the chiefs of the
Camanchees, to which his eye was familiar. They
were mounted on fiery horses richly caparisoned; the
skins of wild beasts, that constituted their housings,
dyed scarlet and orange; while gold and silver ornaments
saddle-bows.
They were seven in number, armed with battle-axes;
and five of them, in addition, carried long-feathered
spears in their hands. The latter were drawn up in
stern silence a few feet in the rear of the remaining
two, as if they formed a guard of honour to their prince
rather than constituted a part of his council. The
chief himself, distinguished by his noble and kingly
bearing, as well as the war-eagle's feather that adorned
the coronet of barbaric gold, was seated in his saddle,
with his face turned towards Charleval, who had
paused to view his countenance ere he proceeded.
The light of the moon shone full upon it, and betrayed
distinctly each lineament, while it, at the same time,
softened the harsher outlines. It was that of a man
nearly sixty years of age. The features were noble,
and he thought of that haughty Castilian character
which he had observed in Spanish nobles of high birth.
Benevolence and firmness pleasingly marked the expression
of his well-shaped mouth, and a smile of great
sweetness animated his face as he slightly turned his
head to reply to some remark made by the young chief
at his side, in whom Charleval recognised his son.
There was a seriousness stamped on his brow by care
and years till it had assumed the fixed impression of
sternness, to which the bronzed complexion and the
warlike garniture of his temples gave additional severity.
Charleval read in his face the preponderance of
the more humane and gentle qualities of mankind over
the savage and vindictive. His carriage was marked
by an air of commanding dignity, that became the native
majesty of his whole person.
About his neck was a circlet of plain gold, small chains
of silver, and an imposing and barbarous necklace,
composed of talons of eagles and the glittering claws
of beasts of prey: the records of his own personal
achievements in the savage chase. He wore a sort of
surcoat without sleeves, made of the glossy skin of the
panther, bound to his body by a belt of hide fastened with
deer's hide, highly ornamented, with sandals
of the same, elegantly and tastefully wrought with
brilliant beadwork, and his shirt was of mountain goat-skin.
Over his shoulders was worn a scarlet mantle
or ponta, which fell in graceful folds about his person.
It was garnished with quills of the porcupine, and bordered
with the long hair of human scalps. His stirrups
were of solid gold, and his bridle was plated with
the same precious metal. In his hand he held a shining
battle-axe, which, with a broad two-edged dagger
stuck in his belt, comprised his arms.
The young chief, his son, was mounted on a black
horse of great firmness of limb and matchless beauty
of proportion, whose fiery impatience he could hardly
restrain, yet governing him with that careless indifference
of touch (beneath which is concealed the mastery
of skill) characteristic of a man to whom the saddle is
a familiar seat. He was not more than seventeen
years of age, yet tall and graceful; shaped like a youthful
Apollo, remarkable for the natural ease of his carriage,
and the unstudied grace of all his movements.
His eye was bright and fearless; his brow open and ingenuous;
and the expression of his face, which was
dark but handsome, was resolute and fearless. A
circlet of the plumes of the war-eagle bound his brows,
ornamented with the beak of the kingly bird placed in
front, like the visor to a helm. His black hair was
braided, and hung in long plaits to his saddle, the ends
tied with gay cords of silver thread and tassels. Over
his shoulder was thrown the skin of a young buffalo-bull;
and on the soft, white texture of the dressed hide,
which served as an ornamental lining of the shaggy
hide, and of which he ostentatiously displayed outwardly
as much as could appear, were painted or emblazoned
in scarlet colours the battles in which, young as
he was, he had already distinguished himself. His
leggins were of the same gay colours; while gaitermoccasins
of exceedingly beautiful workmanship covered
his feet and legs. His breast was ornamented
of birds and tiger's claws; while on his breast hung a
circular shield made of the skin of the bull's neck, on
which were blazoned, singularly enough, the crest of
the house of Osma, as if the young warrior would defy
the Spanish chief on the morrow by the open appropriation
of his own arms. A quiver and a short bow
were slung at his back; in his belt was stuck a long
dagger; and, like his sire, he carried in his right
hand a naked battle-axe. Near him stood the young
chasseur Marigny.
“Ihuahua! the young courreur leader is here,”
said Carondelet, advancing, and addressing the elder
chief.
“On foot?” exclaimed the prince, in French, courteously
dismounting with native politeness; and, throwing
the rein of his horse to his son, he walked forward
to meet Charleval.
The young man received him with that warmth of
grateful feeling which his prompt coming had inspired.
Then, without losing for him that reverence his age
and commanding presence, as well as his powerful
rank challenged, he entered immediately into the subject
of the alliance.
“Hast thou seen this Count Osma?” inquired the
Camanchee warrior, after Charleval had given him, in
answer to question upon question (as if the minutest
detail was to him of the deepest moment), a full and
connected narrative of the circumstances that had
transpired within his knowledge, from the night of the
landing of the Spaniards to that moment; to all of
which he had listened with stern and wondering attention.
“I have not seen him, Ihuahua. Yet men say he
hath a noble countenance, and looks less the villain
than he is,” answered Charleval.
“Hath he a daughter who is fair and virtuous, said
you?”
“Gentle and lovely above her sex, rumour has it.”
“ 'Tis a pity; I would it were not so,” observed
gray?”
“The count?”
“Yes, this count,” he repeated, with a strong ironical
emphasis on the last word.
“I have not yet seen him, prince!” answered Charleval.
“Ah! no—no, thou hast not,” he answered, abstractedly,
and then gave himself up to musing.
Charleval noticed his manner with surprise; but,
not being able to account for it to his satisfaction, entered
into conversation with the young prince, who
spoke French like a native, until the father should
rouse himself from his deep thought and again address
him. Suddenly Ihuahua turned to him and said, in a
commanding tone,
“Conduct me to thy fortress! I would pass the
night with thee. My warriors shall encamp here on
the main, and with the dawn be ready to move towards
the town. My son Opelouza will accompany
me. These chiefs will also remain with my warriors.”
Thus speaking, and giving a few orders to his chieftains
in their own martial tongue, the dignified warrior,
accompanied by his son, both leaving their horses
in the charge of their men, followed Charleval to the
beach, and, entering the boat with him, were rapidly
borne across the lake to the fortress.
Scene Fifth.
The Sorceress and the Quadroone-mother.
On the same eventful eve of St. Michael, ere yet the
moon had risen, the beautiful yet wicked quadroone-mother
sat alone by the trellised casement of her chamber.
The gentle airs from the garden, into which it
opened, came to her through the open lattice laden
Her brow was as queenly, her noble black eye as
large and lustrous, and her dark, majestic, yet voluptuous
beauty still as striking as before. Yet thought
was busy as she leaned musingly upon her arm and
looked vacantly into the deep blue of the starry heaven.
But her thoughts were not in the direction of her
gaze. She had taken her seat by the window as twilight
stole over the scene, and insensibly became meditative.
Her thoughts, as at that hour they irresistibly
will, soon took a sad and serious complexion, and, ere
she was aware, she found herself acting over again in
imagination the deeds of her guilty life.
She had other cause, too, for sad and gloomy reveries.
Renault had cast off the filial reverence which
had hitherto so distinguished him; and, though a prisoner
in his own house, and daily in her presence,
treated her with cold and stern indifference; within
the hour she had encountered his silent, reproving, yet
contemptuous glance as he passed in and out of her
apartment. Azèlie, too, shuddered at her approach,
and avoided her.
Both, indeed, had kept aloof from her during the six
days of their imprisonment, not only to express thereby
their feelings at her criminal compact with Osma,
but to enjoy each other's society sacred from her intrusion.
The safety of the concealed Don Henrique,
as well as the privacy of Estelle's disguised visits to
their little circle, also rendered such retirement necessary.
This neglect, by throwing her upon herself and
her own resources, naturally produced in her a morose
and bitter spirit, and at times a melancholy that she
would gladly have banished. She was a guilty woman;
and the angel of sadness, which to the good and
virtuous is the parent of gentle devotion, to the bad
and vicious becomes the author of guilty fears, that
fill the remorseful mind with dismal contemplations of
its present state, and offer it dark and menacing pictures
of the future. As she sat and reflected, her soul
was filled with forebodings she could not shake off.
Thought maddened her.
She remembered, with singular distinctness, among
other reminiscences that forced themselves upon her,
an event of years long passed, as if it had taken place
but yesterday. The more she strove to divest her
mind of this unpleasant current of thought, the more
perseveringly would it flow on again in the same channel,
gathering fresh impetus from the temporary diversion
of its course; till at length, giving way to it, she
experienced a despairing pleasure in indulging the
dark and turbid torrent to its full bent. She remembered
the time—the hour—the place! Twenty-three
years had passed away, yet the whole was written in
fadeless letters of undying memory upon her mind.
She was then young—beautiful—a favoured mistress!
The Marquis de la Caronde adored her, and lavished
upon her the wealth of his heart and his hand. The
Marchioness of Caronde wore only his name. Ninine
held the cords of his will, and governed him as her
caprice pointed. At length the marchioness became a
mother, and the marquis, from paternal pride, paid to
her who had given an heir to his house the respect that
his love had hitherto denied her. Ninine felt the neglect
and jealousy that now first poisoned her love.
Thrice she attempted the infant boy's life, and thrice
the marquis detected, yet forgave her; for the child
was not many weeks old ere he yielded himself again
captive to her fascinations. A fourth time, when the
boy was half a year old, the shaft was aimed at the
fountain of its nourishment: the subtlest poison that is
was conveyed to the mother in a rose-bud! With the
opening flower, she inhaled the invisible principle of
death. Like that flower, she faded and soon died.
But the boy lived. The father's suspicions were
aroused, and he removed him secretly to a foster-mother.
Yet his love for the siren who had thrown
about him her fatal net was stronger than his horror at
the crime. In vain she set on foot every secret inquiry.
She was unable to discover the infant; and, in a
few months afterward, becoming herself a mother, in
the joy of that event forgot the cause of her disquiet.
now aspired to the title and estates of the father for her
illegitimate son. Her hatred to the true heir was again
revived, and she gave herself no rest, night or day, in
her desire to discover his retreat. At length—for
what will not jealousy, envy, and ambition, united in a
woman's heart, accomplish?—when her own boy was
two years old, she discovered the object of her search,
now a fine child nearly three years of age. It was
found by one of her hirelings many leagues in the interior.
She had him secretly brought to her. The
two boys were wonderfully like each other, both bearing
their father's looks. Hers, being tall for its age,
although nearly a year younger, was equal with the
other in height. Suddenly this resemblance suggested
a thought upon which she immediately acted. The
box of poisoned sweetmeats she had prepared to give
the child was cast aside, and, drawing it to her, she
taught it to call her “Ma.” Her own son she sent
back to the hamlet in his stead, knowing that the marquis
had not seen his child for a year, and would easily
be deceived by the likeness between the two, while
the alteration that he would discover when he should
visit him would be attributed to the natural effect of
time and growth; and, lest the face of the other should
betray her, she guardedly kept him out of his sight
until she could present him without suspicion. At
length, satisfied, from her manner (studied to bring
about this very result, and establish, without farther
uncertainty, her object), that Ninine would not harm
him, he sent for the son of the marchioness, now four
years of age, and received to his arms instead that of
the quadroone.
Such was the field over which the quadroone-mother's
thoughts ranged as she sat by the window. She
had often sighed; but it was because she did not find
the fulfilment of her ambitious hopes in her son a reward
sufficient to compensate her for her guilt.
With the embrace with which he received the child,
the marquis had detected the deception she had put
though she suspected his knowledge of it even up to
the day of his death. But, so long as he winked at
her wickedness, which he did, perhaps, either from fear
of her poisoning the true heir, or on account of the
blindness of his attachment to her, she paid no regard
to his knowledge of it, and, with a feeling of security
in her guilt, continued to feed ambitious hopes for her
son; and thus, until the day of their father's death,
did these two brothers grow up to manhood, nature
alone making the just distinction between the base coin
and that which was of the legitimate ore.
The thoughts of the quadroone-mother still flowed
on, downward the tide of time, and unsparing memory
again held the mirror of the past to her mental
gaze.
She remembered that, fourteen years before, she was
walking through the slave-mart, when a beautiful female
child, scarcely three years old, held in the lap of
a tall, stern woman, arrested her eye; that, pleased
with its infantine beauty, she purchased both mother and
child, and took them to her dwelling. That, at length,
as the child grew in beauty, she conceived the thought
of adopting it as her own, and by the refinements of
education fitting her to be the companion even of
princes; so that, through her promised loveliness,
when her own charms and power should fail, and her
favour with the marquis be diminished, she might live
again in her protégée, and by her powerful alliance
hold the consideration and rank her ambition coveted.
She remembered how the child's mother doted upon
it; how she refused to resign it from her own devoted
care to hers; and how, fearing her for a secret power
she possessed over her mind, she at length gave
her to drink of an herb, the property of which is to
drive those who take it to seek self-destruction in the
water.
As Ninine recalled the wild shrieks of the woman
rushing forth at midnight to plunge into the river, they
seemed to come again with startling distinctness to her
as if to shut out from every sense the fearful curse
upon the murderess with which her victim's last cries
were mingled. But in vain. The curse was repeated
sterner and closer to her ear, as uttered by a living
voice. She looked up. 'Twas not imagination!
It was real! The murdered woman stood before
her, and a deep and solemn curse, thrice repeated, as
she heard it fourteen years before, fell from her lips.
The murderess gazed upon this appearance from the
dead with mortal horror in her glazed stare, with parted
lips, and with the fixed and rigid immobility of stone.
The sorceress stood contemplating her a moment
with a steady look of contempt, and a triumphant
smile in her eyes, which showed it to be a moment of
the most gratifying exultation to her. At length she
spoke:
“Woman, dost thou remember me?”
Ninine slowly brought her hands together, and
clasped the fingers supplicatingly; then sinking to her
knees with a pallid countenance, in which awe, and
fear, and remorse were blended, twice in vain essayed
to move her bloodless lips in reply.
“What hast thou done with her I left with thee?”
demanded the sorceress, in a stern voice.
“She—she is—is here!” faintly articulated Ninine.
“She is thine!”
“Thou wicked woman! I know thy guilt and thy
acts of iniquity, and have watched over the child thou
wouldst have made the victim of thy ambitious heart!
Repent thee of thy crimes, for thy hour is near!”
“Mercy, mercy, dread being!”
“Didst thou remember mercy when the maiden
pleaded to thee?” demanded the sorceress, with reproving
sternness.
“Mercy, mercy! thou spirit of another world!” she
repeated, with unsubdued terror.
“Be thou in the hall of trial on the morrow to answer
truly what may be required of thee, and thou
mayst have space for repentance.”
“I will answer even to my own hurt, if thou wilt give
me hope of mercy in Heaven!”
“Mercy in Heaven ask thy priests for,” she answered,
derisively. “Mercy on earth I alone promise
thee.”
“This will give me space for obtaining Heaven's; I
will obey thee.”
“Know that thou art there to assert thine own dishonour.
Wilt thou go?”
“I will.”
“To publish thine own infamy! Wilt thou go?”
“I will, dread being!”
“Then farewell till we meet in the Judgment Hall.”
With this parting salutation, spoken in a warning
tone of voice, the sorceress disappeared as suddenly as
she had appeared, and left the quadroone-mother to reflect
upon an event which, to her guilty and superstitious
soul, seemed to have been directed by the anger of
an avenging Heaven, and portended sudden and just retribution.
That she had seen an inhabitant of the
world of spirits was the deep and abiding impression
upon her mind, already by its previous train of thought
fully open to the reception of supernatural influences.
| CHAPTER XIV.
SCENES ON ST. MICHAEL'S EVE. The quadroone, or, St. Michael's day | |