Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader by R. M. Ballantyne (guided reading books txt) 📕

boy went out. The one gave a roar, the other a shriek, of horror, and both turned and fled like the wind over a stretch of country, which, in happier circumstances, they would have crossed with caution.

Poopy helped to accelerate their flight by giving vent to a cry of fear, and thereafter to a yell of delight, as, from her point of view, she recognised the well-known outline of Corrie’s figure clearly defined against the sky. She ran after them in frantic haste; but she might as well have chased a couple of wild cats. Either terror is gifted with better wings than hope, or males are better runners than females. Perhaps both propositions are true; but certain it is that Poopy soon began to perceive that the succour which had appeared so suddenly, was about to vanish almost as quickly.

In this new dilemma, the girl once more availed herself of her slight knowledge of the place, and made a détour, which enabled her to shoot ahead of the fugitives and intercept them in one of the narrowest parts of the mountain-gorge. Here, instead of using her natural voice, she conceived that the likeliest way of making her terrified friends understand who she was, would be to shout with all the strength of her lungs. Accordingly, she planted herself suddenly in the centre of their path, just as the two came tearing blindly round a corner of rock, and set up a series of yells, the nature of which utterly beggars description.

The result was, that with one short wild cry of renewed horror, Bumpus and Corrie turned sharp round and fled in the opposite direction.

There is no doubt whatever that they would have succeeded in ultimately escaping from this pertinacious ghost, and poor Poopy would have had to make the best of her way to Sandy Cove alone, but for the fortunate circumstance that Corrie fell; and, being only a couple of paces in advance of his companion, Bumpus fell over him.

The ghost took advantage of this to run forward, crying out, “Corrie! Corrie! Corrie!—it’s me! me! ME!” with all her might.

“Eh! I do believe it knows my name,” cried the boy, scrambling to his feet, and preparing to renew his flight; but Bumpus laid his heavy hand on his collar, and held him fast.

“Wot did it speak?”

“Yes; listen! Oh dear! come, fly!”

Instead of flying, the seaman heaved a deep sigh; and, sitting down on a rock, took out a reddish brown cotton handkerchief wherewith he wiped his forehead.

“My boy,” said he, still panting; “it ain’t a ghost. No ghost wos ever known to speak. They looks, an’ they runs, an’ they yells, an’ they vanishes, but they never speaks; d’ye see? I told ye it was a sciencrific dolusion; though, I’m bound for to confess, I never heer’d o’ von o’ them critters speakin’, no more than the ghosts. Howsomedever, that’s wot it is.”

Corrie, who still hesitated, and held himself in readiness to bolt at a moment’s notice, suddenly cried—

“Why, I do believe it’s—No: it can’t be—yes—I say, it’s Poopy!”

“Wot’s Poopy?” inquired the seaman, in some anxiety.

“What, don’t you know Poopy, Alice’s black maid, who keeps her company, and looks after her; besides ‘doin’ her, and ‘undoin’ her, (as she calls it), night and morning, and putting her to bed? Hooray! Poopy, my lovely black darling; where have you come from? You’ve frightened Bumpus here nearly out of his wits. I do believe he’d have bin dead by this time, but for me!”

So saying, Corrie, in the revulsion of his suddenly relieved feelings, actually threw his arms round Poopy, and hugged her.

“O Corrie,” exclaimed the girl, submitting to the embrace with as much indifference as if she had been a lamp-post, “w’at troble you hab give me! Why you run so? sure, you know me voice.”

“Know it, my sweet lump of charcoal; I’d know it among a thousand, if ye’d only use it in its own pretty natural tones; but, if you will go and screech like a bottle-imp, you know,” said Corrie, remonstratively, “how can you expect a stupid feller like me to recognise it?”

“There ain’t no sich things as bottle-imps, no more nor ghosts,” observed Bumpus; “but hold your noise, you chatter-box, and let’s hear wot the gal’s got to say. Mayhap she knows summat about Alice?”

At this, Poopy manufactured an expression on her sable countenance, which was meant to be intensely knowing and suggestive.

“Don’t I? Yes, me do,” said she.

“Out with it then at once, you pot of shoe-blacking,” cried the impatient Corrie.

The girl immediately related all that she knew regarding the fugitives, stammering very much from sheer anxiety to get it all out as fast as she could, and delaying her communication very much in consequence,—besides rendering her meaning rather obscure—sometimes unintelligible. Indeed, the worthy seaman could scarcely understand a word she said. He sat staring at the whites of her eyes, which, with her teeth, were the only visible parts of her countenance at that moment, and swayed his body to and fro, as if endeavouring by a mechanical effort to arrive at a philosophical conception of something exceedingly abstruse. But at the end of each period he turned to Corrie for a translation.

At length, both man and boy became aware of the state of things, and Corrie started up, crying—

“Let’s go into the cave at once.”

“Hold on, boy,” cried Bumpus, “not quite so fast, (as the monkey said to the barrel-organ w’en it took to playin’ Scotch reels), we must have a council of war, d’ye see? That black monster Keona may have gone right through the cave and comed out at t’ other end of it, in w’ich case it’s all up with our chance o’ findin’ ’em to-night. But if they’ve gone in to spend the night there, why we’ve nothin’ to do but watch at the mouth of it till mornin’ an’ nab ’em as they comes out.”

“Yes; but how are we to know whether they’re in the cave or not?” said Corrie, impatiently.

“Ah! that’s the puzzler,” replied Bumpus, in a meditative way; “but, of course, we must look out for puzzlers ahead sometimes w’en we gets into a land storm, d’ye see; just as we looks out ahead for breakers in a storm at sea. Suppose now that I creeps into the cave and listens for ’em. They’d never hear me, ’cause I’d make no noise.”

“You might as well try to sail into it in a big ship without making noise, you Grampus.”

To this the Grampus observed, that if the cave had only three fathoms of water in the bottom of it he would have no objection whatever to try.

“But,” added he, “suppose you go in.”

Corrie shook his head, and looked anxiously miserable.

“Well then,” said Bumpus, “suppose we light two torches. I’ll take one in one hand, and this here cutlash in the other; and you’ll take t’other torch in one hand and your pistol in the other, and clap that bit of a broken sword ’tween yer teeth, and we’ll give a horrid screech, and rush in pell-mell—all of a heap like. You could fire yer pistol straight before you on chance, (it’s wonderful wot a chance shot will do sometimes), an’ if it don’t do nothin’, fling it right into the blackguard’s face—a brass-mounted tool like that ketchin’ him right on the end of his beak would lay him flat over, like a ship in a white squall.”

“And suppose,” said Corrie, in a tone of withering sarcasm, “suppose all this happened to Alice, instead of the dirty nigger?”

“Ah! to be sure. That’s a puzzler—puzzler number two.”

Here Poopy, who had listened with great impatience to the foregoing conversation, broke in energetically.

“An’ s’pose,” said she, “dat Keona and missy Alice comes out ob cave w’en you two be talkerin’ sich a lot of stuff?”

It may as well be remarked, in passing, that Poopy had acquired a considerable amount of her knowledge of English from Master Corrie. Her remark, although not politely made, was sufficiently striking to cause Bumpus to start up, and exclaim—

“That’s true, gal; come shew us the way to this here cave.”

There was a fourth individual present at this council of war who apparently felt a deep interest in its results, although he took no part in its proceedings. This was no other than Keona himself, who lay extended at full length among the rocks, not two yards from the spot where Bumpus sat, listening intently and grinning from ear to ear with fiendish malice.

The series of shrieks, howls, and yells, to which reference has been made, had naturally attracted the attention of that wily savage when he was in the cave. Following the sounds with quick noiseless step, he soon found himself within a few paces of the deliberating trio. The savage did not make much of the conversation, but he gathered sufficient to assure himself that his hiding-place had been discovered, and that plans were being laid for his capture.

It would have been an easy matter for him to have leaped suddenly on the unsuspecting Bumpus, and driven a knife to his heart, after which, poor Corrie and the girl could have been easily dealt with; but fortunately, (at least for his enemies, if not for himself), indecision in the moment of action was one of Keona’s besetting sins. He suspected that other enemies might be near at hand, and that the noise of the scuffle might draw them to the spot. He observed, moreover, that the boy had a pistol, which, besides being a weapon that acts quickly and surely, even in weak hands, would give a loud report and a bright flash that might be heard and seen at a great distance.

Taking these things into consideration, he thrust back the knife which he had half unsheathed, and, retreating with the slow gliding motion of a serpent, got beyond the chance of being detected, just as Bumpus rose to follow Poopy to the cave.

The savage entered its yawning mouth in a few seconds and glided noiselessly into its dark recesses like an evil spirit. Soon after, the trio reached the same spot and stood for some time silently gazing upon the thick darkness within.

A feeling of awe crept over them as they stood thus, and a shudder passed through Corrie’s frame as he thought of the innumerable ghosts that might—probably did—inhabit that dismal place. But the thought of Alice served partly to drive away his fears and to steel his heart. He felt that the presence of such a sweet and innocent child must, somehow or other, subdue and baffle the power of evil spirits, and it was with some show of firmness that he said—

“Come, Bumpus, let’s go in; we are better without a torch, it would only show that we were coming; and as they don’t expect us, the savage may perhaps kindle a light which will guide us.”

Bumpus, who was not sustained by any thoughts of the supposed power or influence of the little girl, and whose superstitious fears were again doing furious battle with his natural courage, heaved a deep sigh, ground his teeth together, and clenched his fists.

Even in that dreadful hour the seaman’s faith in his physical invincibility, and in the terrible power of his fists, did not altogether fail. Although he wore a cutlass, and had used it that day with tremendous effect, he did not now draw it. He preferred to engage supernatural enemies with the weapons that nature had given him, and entered the cave on tiptoe with slow cautious steps; his fists tightly clenched and ready for instant action, yet thrust into the pockets of his coatee in a deceptively peaceful way, as if he meant to take the ghosts by surprise.

Corrie followed him, also on tiptoe, with the broken sabre in his right hand, and the cocked pistol in his left, his forefinger being on the trigger, and the muzzle pointing straight at the small of the seaman’s back—if one may be permitted