Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley (christmas read aloud .txt) 📕

Amyas hardly dare trust himself to speak, for fear of saying too much; but he could not help saying—

“You are going to certain death, Frank.”

“Did I not entreat,” answered he, very quietly, “to go alone?”

Amyas had half a mind to compel him to return: but he feared Frank’s obstinacy; and feared, too, the shame of returning on board without having done anything; so they went up through the wicket-gate, along a smooth turf walk, into what seemed a pleasure-garden, formed by the hand of man, or rather of woman. For by the light, not only of the moon, but of the innumerable fireflies, which flitted to and fro across the sward like fiery imps sent to light the brothers on their way, they could see that the bushes on either side, and the trees above their heads, were decked with flowers of such strangeness and beauty, that, as Frank once said of Barbados, even the gardens of Wilton were a desert in comparison.” All around were orange and lemon trees (probably the only addition which man had made to Nature’s prodigality), the fruit of which, in that strange colored light of the fireflies, flashed in their eyes like balls of burnished gold and emerald; while great white tassels swinging from every tree in the breeze which swept down the glade, tossed in their faces a fragrant snow of blossoms, and glittering drops of perfumed dew.

“What a paradise!” said Amyas to Frank, “with the serpent in it, as of old. Look!”

And as he spoke, there dropped slowly down from a bough, right before them, what seemed a living chain of gold, ruby, and sapphire. Both stopped, and another glance showed the small head and bright eyes of a snake, hissing and glaring full in their faces.

“See!” said Frank. “And he comes, as of old, in the likeness of an angel of light. Do not strike it. There are worse devils to be fought with tonight than that poor beast.” And stepping aside, they passed the snake safely, and arrived in front of the house.

It was, as I have said, a long low house, with balconies along the upper story, and the under part mostly open to the wind. The light was still burning in the window.

“Whither now?” said Amyas, in a tone of desperate resignation.

“Thither! Where else on earth?” and Frank pointed to the light, trembling from head to foot, and pushed on.

“For Heaven’s sake! Look at the negroes on the barbecue!”

It was indeed time to stop; for on the barbecue, or terrace of white plaster, which ran all round the front, lay sleeping full twenty black figures.

“What will you do now? You must step over them to gain an entrance.”

“Wait here, and I will go up gently towards the window. She may see me. She will see me as I step into the moonlight. At least I know an air by which she will recognize me, if I do but hum a stave.”

“Why, you do not even know that that light is hers!—Down, for your life!”

And Amyas dragged him down into the bushes on his left hand; for one of the negroes, wakening suddenly with a cry, had sat up, and began crossing himself four or five times, in fear of “Duppy,” and mumbling various charms, ayes, or what not.

The light above was extinguished instantly.

“Did you see her?” whispered Frank.

“No.”

“I did—the shadow of the face, and the neck! Can I be mistaken?” And then, covering his face with his hands, he murmured to himself, “Misery! misery! So near and yet impossible?”

“Would it be the less impossible were you face to face? Let us go back. We cannot go up without detection, even if our going were of use. Come back, for God’s sake, ere all is lost! If you have seen her, as you say, you know at least that she is alive, and safe in his house—”

“As his mistress? or as his wife? Do I know that yet, Amyas, and can I depart until I know?” There was a few minutes’ silence, and then Amyas, making one last attempt to awaken Frank to the absurdity of the whole thing, and to laugh him, if possible, out of it, as argument had no effect—

“My dear fellow, I am very hungry and sleepy; and this bush is very prickly; and my boots are full of ants—”

“So are mine.—Look!” and Frank caught Amyas’s arm, and clenched it tight.

For round the farther corner of the house a dark cloaked figure stole gently, turning a look now and then upon the sleeping negroes, and came on right toward them.

“Did I not tell you she would come?” whispered Frank, in a triumphant tone.

Amyas was quite bewildered; and to his mind the apparition seemed magical, and Frank prophetic; for as the figure came nearer, incredulous as he tried to be, there was no denying that the shape and the walk were exactly those of her, to find whom they had crossed the Atlantic. True, the figure was somewhat taller; but then, “she must be grown since I saw her,” thought Amyas; and his heart for the moment beat as fiercely as Frank’s.

But what was that behind her? Her shadow against the white wall of the house. Not so. Another figure, cloaked likewise, but taller far, was following on her steps. It was a man’s. They could see that he wore a broad sombrero. It could not be Don Guzman, for he was at sea. Who then? Here was a mystery; perhaps a tragedy. And both brothers held their breaths, while Amyas felt whether his sword was loose in the sheath.

The Rose (if indeed it was she) was within ten yards of them, when she perceived that she was followed. She gave a little shriek. The cavalier sprang forward, lifted his hat courteously, and joined her, bowing low. The moonlight was full upon his face.

“It is Eustace, our cousin! How came he here, in the name of all the fiends?”

“Eustace! Then that is she, after all!” said Frank, forgetting everything else in her.

And now flashed across Amyas all that had passed between him and Eustace in the moorland inn, and Parracombe’s story, too, of the suspicious gipsy. Eustace had been beforehand with them, and warned Don Guzman! All was explained now: but how had he got hither?

“The devil, his master, sent him hither on a broomstick, I suppose: or what matter how? Here he is; and here we are, worse luck!” And, setting his teeth, Amyas awaited the end.

The two came on, talking earnestly, and walking at a slow pace, so that the brothers could hear every word.

“What shall we do now?” said Frank. “We have no right to be eavesdroppers.”

“But we must be, right or none.” And Amyas held him down firmly by the arm.

“But whither are you going, then, my dear madam?” they heard Eustace say in a wheedling tone. “Can you wonder if such strange conduct should cause at least sorrow to your admirable and faithful husband?”

“Husband!” whispered Frank faintly to Amyas. “Thank God, thank God! I am content. Let us go.”

But to go was impossible; for, as fate would have it, the two had stopped just opposite them.

“The inestimable Senor Don Guzman—” began Eustace again.

“What do you mean by praising him to me in this fulsome way, sir? Do you suppose that I do not know his virtues better than you?”

“If you do, madam” (this was spoken in a harder tone), “it were wise for you to try them less severely, than by wandering down towards the beach on the very night that you know his most deadly enemies are lying in wait to slay him, plunder his house, and most probably to carry you off from him.”

“Carry me off? I will die first!”

“Who can prove that to him? Appearances are at least against you.”

“My love to him, and his trust for me, sir!”

“His trust? Have you forgotten, madam, what passed last week, and why he sailed yesterday?”

The only answer was a burst of tears. Eustace stood watching her with a terrible eye; but they could see his face writhing in the moonlight.

“Oh!” sobbed she at last. “And if I have been imprudent, was it not natural to wish to look once more upon an English ship? Are you not English as well as I? Have you no longing recollections of the dear old land at home?”

Eustace was silent; but his face worked more fiercely than ever.

“How can he ever know it?”

“Why should he not know it?”

“Ah!” she burst out passionately, “why not, indeed, while you are here? You, sir, the tempter, you the eavesdropper, you the sunderer of loving hearts! You, serpent, who found our home a paradise, and see it now a hell!”

“Do you dare to accuse me thus, madam, without a shadow of evidence?”

“Dare? I dare anything, for I know all! I have watched you, sir, and I have borne with you too long.”

“Me, madam, whose only sin towards you, as you should know by now, is to have loved you too well? Rose! Rose! have you not blighted my life for me—broken my heart? And how have I repaid you? How but by sacrificing myself to seek you over land and sea, that I might complete your conversion to the bosom of that Church where a Virgin Mother stands stretching forth soft arms to embrace her wandering daughter, and cries to you all day long, ‘Come unto me, ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest!’ And this is my reward!”

“Depart with your Virgin Mother, sir, and tempt me no more! You have asked me what I dare; and I dare this, upon my own ground, and in my own garden, I, Donna Rosa de Soto, to bid you leave this place now and forever, after having insulted me by talking of your love, and tempted me to give up that faith which my husband promised me he would respect and protect. Go, sir!”

The brothers listened breathless with surprise as much as with rage. Love and conscience, and perhaps, too, the pride of her lofty alliance, had converted the once gentle and dreamy Rose into a very Roxana; but it was only the impulse of a moment. The words had hardly passed her lips, when, terrified at what she had said, she burst into a fresh flood of tears; while Eustace answered calmly:

“I go, madam: but how know you that I may not have orders, and that, after your last strange speech, my conscience may compel me to obey those orders, to take you with me?”

“Me? with you?”

“My heart has bled for you, madam, for many a year. It longs now that it had bled itself to death, and never known the last worst agony of telling you—”

And drawing close to her he whispered in her ear—what, the brothers heard not—but her answer was a shriek which rang through the woods, and sent the night-birds fluttering up from every bough above their heads.

“By Heaven!” said Amyas, “I can stand this no longer. Cut that devil’s throat I must—”

“She is lost if his dead body is found by her.”

“We are lost if we stay here, then,” said Amyas; “for those negroes will hurry down at her cry, and then found we must be.”

“Are you mad, madam, to betray yourself by your own cries? The negroes will he here in