CHAPTER XXXVII

JUST IN TIME

Moments are precious at such a time. The negro, goaded by shame, rage, and alcohol, had drawn his breath for a spring, when a loud cheer was heard outside, followed by two or three dropping shots, and the ring of a hearty English voice exclaiming—

“Hold on, mates! Don’t ye shoot wild a-cause of the ladies. It’s yard-arm to yard-arm, this spell, and we’ll give these here black devils a taste of the naked steel!”

In another moment Slap-Jack was in the passage, leaving a couple of wounded ruffians on the stairs to be finished by his comrades, and cutting another down across the very door-sill of the Marquise’s bed-chamber. Ere he could enter it, however, his captain had dashed past him, leaping like a panther over the dead negroes under foot, and flashing his glittering rapier in the astonished eyes of the Coromantee, who turned round bewildered from his prey to fight with the mad energy of despair.

In vain. Of what avail was the massive iron crowbar, wielded even by the strength of a Hercules, against the deadliest blade but one in the Great Monarch’s body-guard?

A couple of dazzling passes, that seemed to go over, under, all round the clumsier weapon—a stamp—a muttered oath, shut in by clenched, determined teeth, and the elastic steel shot through Hippolyte’s very heart, and out on the other side.

Spurning the huge black body with his foot, Captain George withdrew his sword, wiped it grimly on the dead man’s woolly head, and, uncovering, turned to the ladies with a polite apology for thus intruding under the pressure of so disagreeable a necessity.

He had scarcely framed a sentence ere he became deadly pale, and began to stammer, as if he, too, was under the influence of some engrossing and incontrollable emotion.

The two women had shrunk into the farthest corner of the room. With the prospect of a rescue, Madame de Montmirail’s nerves, strung to their utmost tension, had completely given way. In a state of mental and bodily prostration, she had laid her head in the lap of Cerise, whose courage, being of a more passive nature, did not now fail her so entirely.

The girl, indeed, pushing her hair back from her temples, looked wildly in George’s face for an instant, like one who wakes from a dream; but the next, her whole countenance lit up with delight, and holding out both hands to him, she exclaimed, in accents of irrepressible tenderness and self-abandonment, “_C’est toi!_” then the pale face flushed crimson, and the loving eyes drooped beneath his own. To him she had always been beautiful—most beautiful, perhaps, in his dreams—but never in dreams nor in waking reality so beautiful as now.

He gazed on her entranced, motionless, forgetful of everything in the world but that one loved being restored, as it seemed, by a miracle, at the very time when she had been most lost to him. His stout heart, thrilling to its core from her glance, quailed to think of what must have befallen had he arrived a minute too late, and a prayer went up from it of hearty humble thanksgiving that he was in time. He saw nothing but that drooping form in its delicate white dress, with its gentle feminine gestures and rich dishevelled hair; heard nothing but the accents of that well-remembered voice vibrating with the love that he felt was deep and tender as his own. He was unconscious of the cheers of his victorious boat’s crew, of the groans and shrieks uttered by wounded or routed negroes, of the dead beneath his feet, the blazing rafters overhead, the showers of sparks and rolling clouds of smoke that already filled the house; unconscious even of Madame de Montmirail’s recovery from her stupor, as she too recognised him, and raising herself with an effort from her daughter’s embrace, muttered in deep passionate tones, “C’est lui!”

But it was no time for the exchanges of ceremonious politeness, or the indulgence of softer emotions. The house was fairly on fire, the negroes were up in arms all over the island. A boat’s crew, however sturdy, is but a handful of men, and courage becomes foolhardy when it opposes itself voluntarily at odds of one against a score. Slap-Jack was the first to speak. “Askin’ _your_ pardon, ladies,” said he, with seamanlike deference to the sex; “the sooner we can clear out of this here the better. If you’ll have the kindness to point out your sea-chests, and possibles, and such like, Bottle-Jack here, he’ll be answerable for their safety, and me an’ my mates we’ll run you both down to the beach and have you aboard in a pig’s whisper. The island’s getting hot, miss,” he added confidentially to Cerise, who did not the least understand him. “In these low latitudes, a house afire and a hundred of blacks means a bobbery, just as sure as at home four old women and a goose makes a market!”

“He is right,” observed the Captain, who had now recovered his presence of mind. “From what I saw as I came along, I fear there is a general rising of the slaves through the whole island. My brigantine, I need not say, is at the disposal of madame and mademoiselle (Cerise thanked him with a look), and I believe that for a time at least it will be the only safe place of refuge.”

Thus speaking, he offered his hand to conduct the Marquise from the apartment, with as much courtliness and ceremony as though they had been about to dance a minuet at Versailles, under the critical eye of the late king. Hers trembled violently as she yielded it. That hand, so steady but a few minutes ago, while levelling its deadly weapon against the leader of a hundred enemies, now shook as if palsied. How little men understand women. He attributed her discomposure entirely to fright.

There is a second nature, an acquired instinct in the habits of good-breeding, irrepressible even by the gravest emergency. Captain George, conducting Madame de Montmirail down her own blazing staircase, behaved with as ceremonious a politeness as if they had been descending in accordance with etiquette to a formal dinner-party. Cerise, following close, hung no doubt on every word that came from his lips, but it must be confessed the conversation was somewhat frivolous for so important a juncture.

“I little thought,” said the Captain, performing another courtly bow, “that it was Madame la Marquise whom I should have the honour of escorting to-night out of this unpleasant little _fracas_. Had I known madame was on the island, she will believe that I should have come ashore and paid my respects to her much sooner.”

“You could not have arrived at a more opportune moment, monsieur,” answered the lady, whose strong physical energy and habitual presence of mind were now rapidly reasserting themselves. “You have always been welcome to my receptions; never more so than to-night. You found it a little hot, I fear, and a good deal crowded. The latter disadvantage I was remedying, to the best of my abilities, when you announced yourself. The society, too, was hardly so polite as I could have wished. Oh, monsieur!” she added, in a changed and trembling voice, suddenly discarding the tone of banter she had assumed, “where should we have been now, and what must have become of us, but for you? _You_, to whom we had rather owe our lives than to any man in the world!”

He was thinking of Cerise. He accepted the kind words gratefully, happily; but, like all generous minds, he made light of the service he had rendered.

“You are too good to say so, madame,” was his answer. “It seemed to me you were making a gallant defence enough when I came in. One man had already fallen before your aim, and I would not have given much for the life of that ugly giant whom I took the liberty of running through the body without asking permission, although he is probably, like myself, a slave of your own.”

The Marquise laughed. “Confess, monsieur,” said she, “that I have a steady hand on the pistol. Do you know, I never shot at anything but a playing-card till to-night. It is horrible to kill a man, too. It makes me shudder when I think of it. And yet, at the moment, I had no pity, no scruples—I can even imagine that I experienced something of the wild excitement which makes a soldier’s trade so fascinating. I hope it is not so; I trust I may not be so cruel—so unwomanly. But you talk of slaves. Are we not yours? Yours by every right of conquest; to serve and tend you, and follow you all over the world. Ah! it would be a happy lot for her who knew its value!”

The last sentence she spoke in a low whisper and an altered tone, as if to herself. It either escaped him or he affected not to hear.

By this time they were out of the house, and standing on the lawn to windward of the flames, which leaped and flickered from every quarter of the building; nor, in escaping from the conflagration, had they by any means yet placed themselves in safety. Captain George and the three trusty Jacks, with half-a-dozen more stout seamen, constituting a boat’s crew, had indeed rescued the ladies, for the moment, from a hideous alternative; but it was more than doubtful, if even protected by so brave an escort, they could reach the shore unmolested. Bands of negroes, ready to commit every enormity, were ere now patrolling all parts of the island. It was too probable that the few white inhabitants had been already massacred, or, if still alive, would have enough to do to make terms for themselves with the infuriated slaves.

A slender garrison occupied a solitary fort on the other side of the mountains, but so small a force might easily be overmastered, and even if they had started on the march it was impossible they could arrive for several hours in the vicinity of Port Welcome. By that time the town might well be burned to the ground, and George, who was accustomed to reason with rapidity on the chances and combinations of warfare, thought it by no means unlikely that the ruddy glare, fleeting and wavering on the night-sky over the blazing roof of Montmirail West, might be accepted as a signal for immediate action by the whole of the insurgents.

Hippolyte had laid his plans with considerable forethought, the result, perhaps, of many a crafty war-path—many a savage foray in his own wild home. He had so disposed the negroes under his immediate orders, that Madame de Montmirail’s house was completely surrounded in every direction by which escape seemed possible. The different egresses leading to the huts, the mills, the cane-pieces, were all occupied, and a strong force was posted on the high road to Port Welcome, chiefly with a view to prevent the arrival of assistance from that quarter. One only path was left unguarded; it was narrow, tangled, difficult to find, and wound up through the jungle, across the wildest part of the mountain.

By this route he had probably intended to carry off Mademoiselle de Montmirail to some secure fastness of his own. Not satisfied with the personal arrangements he had made for burning the house and capturing the inmates, he had also warned his confederates, men equally fierce and turbulent, if of less intelligence than his own, that they should hold themselves in readiness to take up arms the instant they beheld a glare upon the sky above _Cash-a-crou_; that each should then despatch a chosen band of twenty stout negroes to himself for orders; and that the rest of their forces should at once commence the work of devastation on their own account, burning, plundering, rioting, and cutting all white throats, without distinction of age or sex.

That this wholesale butchery failed in its details was owing to no fault of conception, no scruples of humanity on the part of its organiser. The execution fell short of the original design simply because confided to several different heads, acted on by various interests, and all more or less bemused with rum. The ringleader had every reason to believe that if his directions were carried out he would find himself, ere sunrise, at the head of a general and successful revolt—a black emperor, perhaps, with a black population offering him a crown.

But this delusion had been dispelled by one thrust of Captain George’s rapier, and the Coromantee’s dark body lay charring amongst the glowing timbers of Madame de Montmirail’s bed-chamber.

The dispositions that he had made, however, accounted for the large force of negroes now converging on the burning house. Their shouts might be heard echoing through the woods in all directions. When George had collected his men, surrounded the two ladies by a trusty escort of blue-jackets, and withdrawn his little company, consisting but of a dozen persons, under cover of the trees, he held a council of war as to the best means of securing a rapid retreat. Truth to tell, the skipper would willingly have given the whole worth of her cargo to be once more on her deck, or even under the guns of ‘The Bashful Maid.’

Slap-Jack gave his opinion unasked.

“Up foresail,” said he, with a characteristic impetuosity: “run out the guns—double-shotted and depressed; sport every rag of bunting; close in round the convoy; get plenty of way on, and run clean through, exchanging broadsides as we go ahead!”

But Smoke-Jack treated the suggestion with contempt.

“That’s wot I call rough-and-tumble fighting, your honour,” he grumbled, with a sheepish glance at the ladies; for with all his boasted knowledge of their sex, he was unaccustomed to such specimens as these, and discomfited, as he admitted to himself, by the “trim on ’em.” “Them’s not games as is fitted for such a company as this here, if I may make so bold. No, no, your honour, it’s good advice to keep to windward of a nigger, and it’s my opinion as we should weather them on this here tack; get down to the beach with a long leg and a short one—half-a-mile and more below the town—fire three shots, as agreed on, for the boat, and so pull the ladies aboard on the quiet. After that, we might come ashore again, d’ye see, and have it out comfortable. What say _you_, Bottle-Jack?”

That worthy turned his quid, and looked preternaturally wise; the more so that the question was somewhat unexpected. He was all for keeping the ladies safe, he decided, now they had got them. Captain Kidd always did so, he remembered, and Captain Kidd could sail a ship and fight a ship, &c.; but Bottle-Jack was more incoherent than usual—utterly adrift under the novelty of his situation, and gasping like a gudgeon at the Marquise and her daughter, whose beauty seemed literally to take away his breath.

George soon made up his mind.

“Is there any way to the beach,” said he, addressing himself rather to Cerise than her mother, “without touching the road to Port Welcome? It seemed to me, as we marched up, that the high road made a considerable bend. If we could take the string instead of the bow we might save a good deal of time, and perhaps escape observation altogether.”

The Marquise and her daughter looked at each other helplessly. Had they been Englishwomen, indeed, even in that hot climate, they would probably have known every by-road and mountain path within three leagues of their home; but the ladies of France, though they dance exquisitely, are not strong walkers, and neither of these, during the months they had spent at _Cash-a-crou_, had yet acquired such a knowledge of the locality as might now have proved the salvation of the whole party.

In this extremity a groan was heard to proceed out of the darkness at a few paces’ distance. Slap-Jack, guided by the sound, and parting some shrubs that concealed her, discovered poor Fleurette, more dead than alive, bruised, exhausted, terrified, scarcely able to stand, and shot through the ankle by a chance bullet from the blue-jackets, yet conscious enough still to drag herself to the feet of Cerise and cover them with kisses, forgetting everything else in her joy to find her young mistress still alive.

“You would serve me, Fleurette, I know,” said Mademoiselle de Montmirail, in a cautious whisper; for, to her excited imagination, every shrub that glistened in the moonlight held a savage. “I can trust you; I feel it. Tell me, is there no way to the sea but through our enemies? Must we witness more cruelties—more bloodshed? Oh! have we not had fighting and horrors enough?”

The black girl twined herself upwards, like a creeper, till her head was laid against the other’s bosom; then she wept in silence for a few seconds ere she could command her voice to reply.

“Trust me, lilly ma’amselle,” said she, in a tone of intense feeling that vouched for her truth. “Trust poor Fleurette, give last drop of blood to help young missee safe. Go to Jumbo for lilly ma’amselle now. Show um path safe across Sulphur Mountain down to sea-shore. Fleurette walk pretty well tank you, now, if only buckra blue-jacket offer um hand. Not so, sar! Impudent tief!” she added, indignantly, as Slap-Jack, thoroughly equal to the occasion, at once put his arm round her waist. “Keep your distance, sar! You only poor foretopman. Dis good daddy help me along fust.”

Thus speaking, she clung stoutly to Bottle-Jack, and proceeded to guide the party up the mountain along a path that she assured them was known but to few of the negroes themselves, and avoided even by these, as being the resort of Jumbo and several other evil spirits much dreaded by the slaves. Of such supernatural terrors, she was good enough to inform them, they need have no fear, for that Jumbo and his satellites were fully occupied to-night in assisting the “bobbery” taking place all over the island; and that even were they at leisure they would never approach a party in the centre of which was walking such an angel of light as Ma’amselle Cerise.