CHAPTER XXXIX
HOW I WAS LED ON BY PASSION TO CUT A MAN'S THROAT
As soon as I had got the better of my ecstasy, I held the letter again up to the light, yet could not make out one word of it, for the tears of gladness in my eyes. However, I brushed these away with my hand impatiently, and so held the letter up again, but still with the knife in my hand, for I was now more eager than ever to accomplish my design and overtake my lady, who, I doubted not, had writ me some comforting words to let me know how I might best come at her. And now, my eyes being clear, I read her letter, which I can repeat word for word; for, sure, I read it a hundred times, and each word did engrave itself into my memory.
"We are overtaken," the letter began, "by soldiers charged to carry us back to Castello Lagos, and surrender us into the hands of Rodrigues. To save me from such a fate, which was worse than death tenfold, Senhor de Pino has offered to convey me to Caracas. I have tried, but in vain, to obtain the same favor for you; but he dare not venture upon it. Indeed, he endangers his own life in saving me, wherefore I look to you to support the story he has given out to account for not obeying the governor's orders to the letter – to wit, that I have perished by the way. I know you are too reasonable and too generous to bear me ill-will for abandoning you, for sure you will own I have no choice but to do so. Farewell, Benet. Oh, may Providence be merciful to you!"
When I had came to the end, and turned it about, to see if there was not some little kind word that I had overlooked and could find none, the knife dropped from my hand; and truly all vigor and power seemed gone from my body, so that my limbs trembled under me as if I had just risen from a bed of sickness.
Then I could not believe I had read aright, and so went through it again and again and again; after that, pondering each word, to see if I could not make it appear a little better than it looked.
At last, when I could no longer see the writing for want of light, I flung myself prone on the ground, and gave myself up to the most miserable reflections ever man endured. It was as if a miser had suddenly discovered all his gold turned to fine ashes; for no miser ever prized his pieces for their true ring and bright lustre more than I valued Lady Biddy for her loyalty, and generous, loving disposition; and now I could find nothing but heartless ingratitude and careless cruelty in her nature, to abandon me thus, without a word of regret or comfort. It seemed to me as if her chief end in writing was to obtain security for herself and Lewis de Pino, by persuading me to support the story of her death; and with such a cold, cruel heart, to invoke the mercy of Providence towards me was nothing but hypocrisy, with a taint of blasphemy.
"Had she studied to crush the love out of my heart she could not have writ more unkindly," says I to myself. Then it came to my mind that this cruelty was studied to that end, in order that my passion might not give me the power to escape and rejoin her. And the more I thought of this, the more likely it appeared. "She has Lewis de Pino," says I, grinding my teeth in rage, "and has no further need of me."
Then I cursed her for a cruel, unkind jade, and would try to think I was well rid of such a baggage – that all women were false alike for fools and boys to love, and fit only to be treated as men like Rodrigues treated them. "They make sport," says I, "of those who are fond enough to love them, and kiss the hand of a cruel, hardened wretch like Lewis de Pino. 'Tis the trick of a dog who snaps at loving children who would caress it, and cringes before the tyrant who spurns it with his foot. Fear not that I shall seek to separate you from your lord – no, not though I saw him lift the whip to flog you as he would another slave. I trust no woman again; the friendship of Rodrigues is more stanch and loyal. I have done all a man could do in proportion to his means for the love of a woman; but I have come to an end of my folly. My body shall shed its blood no more for you – no, nor my heart a tear. And yet," thinks I, my rage abating as I perceived how dreary and barren my life must henceforth be, which seemed, as I looked back on it, to be all strewn with flowers and gladdened with sunshine – "yet, in truth, I do wish you had died before you writ that letter. Would that I could yet treasure that tender joy of love for you that has made a fool of me! Ay, would that you had died ere I knew you worthless, while I yet thought you all that was beautiful and good and kind! 'Twould have broke my heart to have lost you then; but better 'tis to live with ever-abiding sorrow for such loss than to find nothing in the world to weep for."
In this fashion did I pass from one fit to another – from rage to regret, from bitter hate to tender grief – till the stars shone brightly through the rifts above; but they came into sight and passed away, marking the growing hours, without my heeding any longer the increasing distance between Lady Biddy and me; nor did I once think to make my escape. She was gone from me forever, and with her all my hopes and anxiety. I gave no thought as to what would happen on the morrow, or what my fate would be when Rodrigues got me again into his hands. If I had thought of it I should have welcomed the prospect of death itself even by the worst torture his cruel nature could devise.
Lady Biddy had appealed to my generosity and reason, but I had neither one nor the other, else had I perhaps brought myself to see that, after all, she had done no more than I should have bid her do if her fate had been in my hands. Could I have consented to her being carried back with me to Rodrigues? No! not though the alternative was to yield her to the mercy of Lewis de Pino. Then why was I so put about because she had done that which I would have had her do? Simply because she had not paid me the compliment to ask my advice? There may have been no time to appeal to my decision; she may, as she said, have depended on my good judgment to accept what was inevitable. These and many other arguments I could urge, never occurred to me then, for my reason was undone.
As I lay there on the ground with that passionate turmoil in my breast, with my eyes turned away from the stars that seemed to look down on me through the night with a sweet, still sorrow that made my pain the more hard to endure, I saw a streak of light between the door and the footsill, and presently heard the bar being taken down very carefully, but after a pause, as if assurance were being made that I was not astir.
"They are come to murder me in my sleep," thinks I; "is this the mercy she prayed Providence to bestow on me, or did she pray that mercy of Lewis de Pino?"
The bar being down, first one bolt grated slowly in the socket, and then the other.
"Now," thinks I, "will they come upon me cautiously, or will they do it with a sudden rush?"
But so little count did I make of my life that I did not stir nor take my arm from under my head.
The door creaked slowly on its hinges, and I saw the wall beyond through the widening opening, and a lantern set upon the ground. Then a great shock head came athwart the opening, dark against the light on the wall; and after peering in for a minute or so without seeing anything (for I lay far back in the dark), or hearing any movement, the man ventured in a little further, so that his figure blocked out the light still more; and thus he stood another minute, turning his head this way and that, as if to make sure I was not hidden against the wall, ready to spring on him. Then he draws back and picks up something which stood behind the door with his left hand, and then the lantern with his right, and, stepping sideways and very gingerly past the door, he comes into my chamber, so that I could see he carried in his left hand a pitcher, and under that arm a little bundle.
"So," thinks I, "it is to bring my food, and not to murder me, the fellow has come. 'Tis all the same to me. I would as soon have his knife as his food in me."
Setting down the pitcher and the bundle, he lifts the lantern high and looks about; but not seeing me for the shadow where I lay, and the feeble light of his candle, he puts up his hand, and, shoving his hat on one side, scratches his head, as if perplexed to know where I had got to. Then moving a couple of steps forward on his toes, he holds up the lantern again and peers around, and then, getting a glimpse of me, gives a nod of satisfaction, as much as to say, "Oh, you're there after all, are you?" and so he comes forward again towards me, but very cautiously setting down the lantern and turning the door of it towards me, that the light might not fall upon my eyes.
And now the idea seized me of a sudden that I might throw this fellow down and make my escape, whilst a wicked longing for vengeance burnt up my heart. I know not what bloody design lay at the bottom of my purpose, but I made up my mind I would escape and overtake Lady Biddy, though she was in the furthest corner of the earth. So with the cunning of a villain I closed my eyes, that the fellow might not see by their glitter I was awake (yet not so close but that I could watch him well), in order that he might get near to me before I sprang at him.
He seemed to have some ill forecast of my design, for more than once he stopped betwixt the lantern and me to scratch his head and consider of his safety. However, he ventures within about a couple of feet of me, and then squatting down reaches out his arm, as if he would wake me to let me know he had brought food for my use. And though this was a kindly office, deserving of a better return (for I took no heed of it because of the devilish wickedness in my heart), I suddenly caught hold of his extended arm, and, giving it a sharp jerk, threw him on his side.
Seeing a knife in his belt, I bethought me I would cut his throat, and so save myself from pursuit, for there is no vile murder a man will stop short of when he gives up his soul to the fiend of vengeance; and this purpose came so suddenly to my mind (even as he was rolling over, and the handle of his knife caught a ray of light from the lantern) that I had no time to consider what I was about. In a moment I had sprung up, and set my knee in his flank, and grasping him by his ragged shock of hair with my left hand, so that I drew his head back between his shoulders, I whipped out his knife with my right.
Surely in another moment I should have cut his throat, but that just then, raising his voice as well as he could for his position, he cries out, in very good English —
"Lord love you, master, would you murder your own countryman?"
CHAPTER XL
I FIND AN EXCELLENT FRIEND IN PLACE OF A CRUEL ENEMY
Hearing these words, I held my hand for amazement, though the knife was within a span of his throat. In that instant it came across my mind that the letter which had so distracted me was not of Lady Biddy's writing. I had not hitherto questioned this matter; for, firstly, I knew not her hand; and, secondly, neither Lewis de Pino nor any one else we had met since our coming on these shores had comprehended one word of our language. The letter was badly writ in a large and painful hand, but that might have been owing to ill accommodation for writing; and, indeed, I had not regarded the manner of it, but only the matter. But now, hearing this fellow speak in English, it did, as I say, cross my mind that he had penned it.
This took no longer to present itself to my intelligence than a flash of a musket.
"Fellow," says I hoarsely, "was it you that wrote that letter to me."
"Ay," says he, "with a plague to it; for if I had not writ it I should not have got into this mess."
Whereupon I flung aside the knife, and, laying hold of his two hands, could have kissed him for my great delight, despite the suffering I had endured through his handiwork.
Then I covered my face with my hands for shame to think how I had wronged that pure sweet girl by leaping so quickly to an evil opinion of her; and to think she might have so fallen away from a noble condition, I burst out with tears, and sobbed like any child; and from that to think that she had not fallen away, and was still the same dear woman I had thought her, I fell to laughing; and, springing to my feet, cut a caper in the air like a very fool, and might have proceeded to further extravagances in my delirium but that my good angel (as I dubbed the fellow), laying his hands on me whispered:
"For Heaven's sake, master, contain yourself a bit, or I shan't come out of this business with a whole skin yet. I doubt but you have waked some of the cursed Portugals by your antics."
With this he creeps over to the door, and thrusting his head over the stairs stands there listening carefully a minute or two; after which, seeming satisfied that no one was astir, he closes the door gently, and creeps back to me, by which time I had come to a more sober condition, though still near choking with the bounding of my heart and the throbbing of the blood in my veins for excess of joy.
"'Tis all quiet below," says he in a whisper; "but betwixt getting my throat cut by you, and being fleaed alive by the Portugals for being here, I've had a narrow squeak. Howsomever, I suppose you bear me no ill-will?"
"Heaven forgive me for treating you as an enemy!" says I, grasping his hand again.
"As for that," says he, "I don't blame you for your intent to stick me if you thought I was one of those accursed Portugals; and how were you to know better, finding me crawling on you in their own manner. Let us drink a dram, master, to our better acquaintance; 'twill stiffen our legs and clear our heads, and mine are all of a jelly-shake with this late bout."
"Where is my cousin?" I asked him, as he was drinking from the jar.
"That's good," says he, taking the jar from his mouth and handing it to me. "Take a pull at it – asking your pardon for drinking first, but I've lost my good manners with twelve years of slavery."
"My cousin," says I – "the lady in whose name you wrote that letter?"
"Drink," says he. "We've got no time to lose if, as I do hope, you're minded to get away from this."
"Ay," says I; "but my cousin?"
"Drink," says he.
Seeing he was of a persistent sort, I lifted the jar to my lips to cut the matter short.
"The female," says he, "went on with De Pino and his train about ten minutes after you were brought up here. De Pino made her believe you had gone on ahead, being in a strange dull humor, and she, to overtake you, hurried away. Drink," he adds, seeing me still with the jar a little from my lips. So I drank; but betwixt two gulps I said:
"They are still gone on the road to Caracas?"
"Caracas!" says he. "Lord love you, master!" (an exclamation with which he larded his sentences continually), "when they get to their journey's end they won't be within a hundred leagues of Caracas."
"Whither is he carrying her, then, in Heaven's name?"
"To Quito, where De Pino spends his time when he is not trafficking. Lord love you, master, don't spare the liquor."
I drank deeply to satisfy him, and that we might come more quickly to the matter I had a greater thirst for.
"Now," says I, "tell me how you came to write that letter."
He took the jar out of my hand and drank again in silence. At length he put it from his lips with a gasp.
"Have another turn; we may not have a taste of wine for many a long day hence," says he.
"I can drink no more. Would to Heaven I could get you to answer my questions!"
"Time enough for that," says he, "when we get where we can talk above a pig's whisper with no fear of being heard. Now, master, if you can drink no more, we'll set about getting out of this. We shall be all right if we tread light, and don't bungle till we get to the foot of the stairs. There I must put out the lantern. But you lay hold of my shoulder and get ready for a bolt if needs be. Are you got a knife?"
"No," says I.
"Then I must manage to get you one when we are below. A couple of swords won't be an inconvenience to us, neither. You won't have another dram?"
"No," says I; "and you have had enough."
"That's as may be," says he. "I could drink a tun of it. Howsomever, I'll take it you're right, so far as our safety is concerned. Now, master, you take my knife and follow close. Keep your questions till we get a league on our way. I'll carry the lantern and this bag of victuals, and if I'd got another hand, hang me if I'd leave the jar behind. Here goes, master. Remember, if we are caught we shall be fleaed alive. Now, then – softly does it! Not a word!"
CHAPTER XLI
A DISCOURSE WITH MY NEW-FOUND FRIEND MATTHEW PENNYFARDEN
When we got to the foot of the stairs my comrade put out the light, and I, laying my hand on his shoulder, as he bade me, followed softly at his heels in the dark for some paces, when we came to a door that stood ajar. Here he paused and peered out carefully; then, pushing the door open, he passed out into the open.
He gave me the bag of food to hold, lifted up his finger as a sign to me to wait there, and then entered the tower again by another door in that part where the guard lay; and so I stood, with the drawn knife in my hand and my eyes on the lookout for a foe, till he returned with a sword in each hand and a knife stuck in his belt. He seemed to have been gone an age, but I believe he was no more than ten minutes at the outside; but I was consumed with impatience.
He put one of the swords in my hand, and signed to me to follow. Then we threaded our way betwixt the tower and the huts, and coming to the end of a little alley he again peers out into the space beyond, first to the right and then to the left, very carefully, and seeing no one (for the Portugals here lay within doors because there was no turf, as in the other stations, but only hard, rocky ground), he nudged me with his elbow and struck out pretty briskly to the gate he had previously set ajar, which we passed, and so got out without discovery, to our great comfort.
Our road lay up the hills on the other side of the valley, and a rough and troublesome way it was by reason of the loose stones and deep holes which in certain parts, where the rocks shut out the light of the stars on either hand, were like so many pitfalls. Yet I was too light of heart to heed the bruising of my shins a farthing, though my comrade did curse prodigiously, spite of his saying he would not speak for a league, as I have told.
When we had gone about an hour, my comrade, as I call him, after coming nigh to break his neck over a rock, sits him down on a rock, saying we might now well afford to fetch our breath and rub our shins for a space. So now, sitting down beside him, I begged he would loose his tongue to satisfy my earnest anxiety.
"Well," says he with a sigh, "I am not used to this business, and 'tis a long story. Howsomever, as you desire it, here goes. My name is Matthew Pennyfarden, and I was born in the village of Newlyn, near Penzance, in Cornwall, in the year of our Lord one thousand five hundred and ninety-four."
"Nay," says I, "you may skip thirty-three years of your adventures, and come to what took place when, you first saw my cousin, Lady Biddy Fane."
"Lord love you, master," says he, "that simplifies the job vastly" (he was a sly rogue of some humor). "Well, then, you must know that when I came to the station yesterday afternoon with four other slaves, burdened with gold muck from that part of the valley where the mines lie, our factor tells me that the merchant Senhor de Pino would speak with me; whereupon I goes to the factor's office with him, and there De Pino asks me if I could write English and would earn a jar of wine; to which I made reply that I could do the one as readily as I would the other, seeing I was two years an attorney's clerk before I was so foolish as to quit my employ and run away to sea, and was now as dry as any limekiln. On this he sets me down before a table, with an inkhorn and a sheet of paper for my work, and tells me in his own tongue what he would have writ in mine. When I had done this, he goes over the writing with me a dozen times, questioning as to this word and doubting as to that, scratching out here and writing in there, till we could find no further room for improvement, when he gives me a fresh sheet of paper and has it all writ out again for fair. So, having come to an end of the business, he orders the factor to give me a jar of wine, as he had promised, and send me back to the mine. Now a man can not serve the devil without learning the smell of brimstone, and I had been long enough with my attorney to get a pretty keen scent for mischief; wherefore, as I went back to my accursed mine, turning this affair over in my mind, I came to a pretty fair understanding of what lay at the bottom of this letter-writing. Yet, to make sure, I turns out of my way (being alone, for the rest had gone back with their empty baskets while I was writing the letter) – I goes about, I say, to sneak up among the rocks to where I could get a fair view of the station without being seen. There I had just posted myself when I see the Portugals bearing a man tied up neck and crop to the guardhouse, and says I to myself, 'That's Cousin Pengilly, or I'm a Dutchman.' When you were clapped up and the Portugals had come back from the guardhouse, the mules were brought out and packed, and one part of the train was sent on, while the other waited in readiness to start, which perplexed me somewhat till ten minutes later, when a female was led out by De Pino and seated on a mule, and that part of the cavalcade set out pretty briskly, as if to overtake the other. Then I hit upon it that De Pino had practiced this stratagem to make your cousin believe you had gone on first, and hasten her departure from the station. But I pray you, master," says he, breaking off and opening the bag of victuals, "do pick a bit, for I warrant you have had nothing betwixt your lips since you was clapped up – have you, now?"
"You are right," says I, falling to with a relish; "but go on."
"Ay," says he, "I guessed as much. They served me that same way when I first came into captivity, starving me till I was too weak to make resistance, and glad enough to accept the work of a slave that I might fill my belly. And surely that was the fate they intended for you. And this did put me in mind not to touch a drop of the wine, lest a taste might tempt me to drink all, but to leave it hid up in that rock and go back to my work dry, and also to set aside my supper when it was served out to us at sunset."
"Good Heavens!" I exclaimed, "no wonder you drank so heartily when we were in the tower."
"Ay," says he, "I overcame the flesh as long as I could, but I could hold out no longer."
"And you have fasted full as long as I have, by the same token," says I.
"You've hit it again," says he; "but that did not call for such courage as t'other, for I would rather fast a whole day than go dry an hour."
This fellow's generosity touched my heart, and I would not eat another morsel, nor let him speak, till he had eaten his fair share of the food. And now I saw why he had been so loth to begin a long history with the bag of victuals untouched.
When we had come to the end of our meal, my comrade proposed we should move on; "for," says he, "I care not how I knock my ribs against the rock now that I have something within me to resist the shock."
When we had got on our way again, and were come to a fairly level part of the road where we could converse without inconvenience, I asked my comrade if there was any truth in that letter concerning soldiery being sent by Dom Sebastian to recover us.
"Lord love you!" says he, "not a word; 'twas all a plan of De Pino's invention. But tell me, master, how you came to fall into the hands of such a villain."
When I told him briefly my history, he considers awhile, and then says he:
"You have naught to fear from Sebastian; for though he is as treacherous as any other Portugal, and not one of them is a true man, yet have these rogues a certain kind of fair dealing amongst themselves, and having sold you to De Pino he would not go back on his bargain, though Rodrigues should offer twice as much to get you back as Dom Sebastian received for parting with you."
"Then," says I, "you believe Dom Sebastian sold us to De Pino?"
"I am as certain of that as I am that De Pino sold you to our factor."
"And how are you certain of that, my friend?" says I.
"Because he did not stick his dagger into you when you were asleep. But for his avarice, you would not be alive now, you may be sure. A pretty taking our factor will be in when we find you flown; 'tis as good as twenty pieces of eight out of his pocket. We must look to it, master, that he doesn't catch us, for certain it is he will hunt us."
"What would he do if he caught us?"
"You might get off with a flogging and a pretty long spell of starvation; but he'd flea me, as he has before; and once is enough for a lifetime, as you would agree if you knew what it was like."
"You have spoken before of this fleaing," says I; "what do you mean?"
"If there was light I would show you my back for a sign. I've had a piece of skin stripped off my body an ell long and an inch wide."
"Good God!" says I, "is such barbarity possible?"
"Ay," says he, "and worse. I'll be fleaed rather than have the soles of my feet roasted if he gives me my choice."
Only to hear of this wickedness made me sick, and I could say nothing for some minutes.
"Tell me, Matthew," says I, when I had got over my qualm, "why you risked such a fearful punishment to liberate a man you had never seen?"
"Because you was an Englishman," says he stoutly. "Lord love you, master, I knew I should find you a true man and a kind friend."
"But," says I, "couldn't you as well have made your escape without me as with me?"
"No," says he, "for I'd as leave hang myself on a tree ere I started as be brought to that end by the misery of wandering alone in the woods. Look you, master, afore you go any further," stopping me, "there's time to get back to the station, and return to the guardhouse, while the Portugals are still in a log-sleep, and I would have you understand what escape means. It means hardships, and suffering, and solitude. We daren't go near a town, for fear of the Portugals; and we daren't go near the Indian villages, for every white man is hated by them, with a very good reason. There's fleaing on one hand, and death on the other; and we've got to live betwixt 'em as best we may. Take time for reflection and choose without concern for me."
"Nay," says I, "it needs no reflection to choose between freedom and slavery"; and taking him by the hand, I drew him onwards.
"You are an Englishman, master, and I love you," says he, "and I shall love you still more when your hair grows a bit, and you look less like a Portugal; for I do loathe the very resemblance of those accursed men."
"Surely," says I, "there must be some good men amongst them?"
"Not to my knowledge," says he. "There was one that I thought a decent sort of a fellow; and he grumbling every day to me of his estate, which was little better than a slave's, I opened to him a design for escaping together. He betrayed me; for he was naught but a spy set to that purpose by our factor, who would test me. And so I got fleaed for trusting a Portugal; but I trust none henceforth. As for that," adds he, "we shall have no need to trust 'em, for we two shall be company enough for each other, I warrant."
"We two?" says I; "nay, we shall be three."
"As how?" says he.
"Why," says I, "are we not on our road to rescue my cousin from the hands of Lewis de Pino?"
"No," says he, stopping again; "that are we not. For we're giving De Pino as wide a berth as I can contrive. Our factor will set out on that path as soon as he finds you flown."
"Friend," says I, "'tis for you to choose betwixt going on with me to the rescue of my cousin or taking me back to the station."
He tilted his hat forwards, and, scratching his head, was silent a minute; then, in a grumbling kind of voice, he says:
"What a plague do we want with a female?"
"Would you suffer her to go into slavery?" says I.
"They like it," says he sullenly. "Not at first, but after a bit. She'll be treated well, and I count she won't thank you from taking her away from a fine house and rich gowns to wander about in the woods without a roof to her head or a whole rag to her back."
"Nor matter for that," says I; "she shall be taken out of the Portugal's hands if I live."
"Well," says he, a little more cheerfully, "if it is to rob the Portugal, I shall be less loth; and to oblige you, more willing. We must turn back, howsomever, to those horrid rocks again."
We turned about, and retraced our steps in silence for a while.
"Don't take it amiss, master," says he presently, "if I'm a little bit downhearted at the prospect of having a lady's society; but I've had so much of that sort of thing these last ten years that I shouldn't be sorry if I never saw another female."
"How's that?" says I.
"Why, master," says he, "I'm married."
"And you can quit your wife without regret?" says I.
"It ain't a wife I'm quitting without regret," says he; "it's twenty or thirty."
I asked him to explain this matter; which he did forthwith, telling me that all the slaves in those mines were women, and that when one wounded herself, or fell sick by overwork, so that to save her life it was necessary she should lay up for a time, she was forthwith married to him. This strange custom perplexed me until I came to perceive the motive.
"Have you any children?" says I.
"Children!" says he; "Lord love you, I've got sixty if I've got one. But you can't expect a father to be very partial to his children when there so many of 'em. I give you my word, I don't know Jack from Jill; and they're all orange-tawney."