THE NIGHT ATTACK ON THE COACH.
"The sound of hoof, the flash of steel,
The robbers round her coming."
"The road robbers, by all that's devilish!" gasped Jones, falling back
in his seat.
"Good gracious!" cried Smith.
And all the brave "bum-baillies" who had so gallantly bullied and
brow-beaten Sybil and her sole defender, dropped panic-stricken,
paralyzed by terror.
"Get out of this, you vermin!" ordered a stern voice at one of the
windows.
"Ye--ye--yes, gentlemen," faltered Jones.
"Ta--take, all we have, but spa--spa--spare our lives!" pleaded Smith.
"Well, well, get out of this, you miserable cowards! Empty your pockets,
and you shall be safe! It would be crueler than infanticide to slay such
miserably helpless wretches!" laughed the same voice, which poor Sybil,
as in a dream, recognized as belonging to Captain "Inconnu."
The trembling bailiffs descended from the coach and gave up their
pocket-books and watches, and then submitted to be tied to trees.
The coachman and the guard yielded to the same necessity.
The horses were taken from the coach and appropriated to the use of the
victors.
And lastly, Sybil, who was rendered by despair indifferent to her fate,
was lifted from her seat by the strong arms of Moloch, who held her a
moment in suspense, while he turned to his chief and inquired:
"Where now, Captain?"
"To the rendezvous! And look that you treat the lady with due
deference!"
"Never you fear, Captain! I'm sober to-night!" answered the giant, as he
threw the half-fainting form of the lady across his shoulders and strode
up a narrow foot-path leading through the mountain pass.
Indifferent to fate, to life, to all things, Sybil felt herself borne
along in the firm embrace of her rude abductor. As in a dream she heard
his voice speaking to her:
"Now don't you be afeard, darlint! We an't none on us agwine to hurt a
hair o' your head, or to let anybody else do it! Bless your purty face,
if we didn't carry you off you'd spend this night and many more on 'em
in the county jail! and end by losing your liberty and your life for
that which you never did! But you's safe now! And don't you go to
mistrusting on us 'pon account o' that night! Why, Lord love ye! we was
all drunk as dukes that night, else we never would a mislested you!
Lord! if you'd seen the lots of liquor we'd took aboard, you wouldn't
wonder at nothing! But we's sober now! And so you's safe! Where's your
little dog? Lord bless my life and soul how that little creetur did take
hold o' my throat, to be sure! Where is she?"
Sybil could not answer. Indeed, though she heard the voice, she scarcely
comprehended the question.
"What! you won't speak to me, eh? Well, that's natural too, but precious
hard, seeing as I risked my life to save your'n; and mean you so well
into the bargain," continued the ruffian, as he strode onward to a place
where several horses were tied.
He selected the strongest of the group, mounted and lifted the helpless
form of the lady into a seat before him, and set off at full speed,
clattering through the rugged mountain pass with a recklessness of life
and limb, that at another time would have frightened his companion half
out of her senses.
But now, in her despair of life, there was even a hope in this mad
career--the hope of a sudden death.
But the gigantic ruffian knew himself, his horse, and his road, and so
he carried his victim through that fearful pass in perfect safety.
They reached a deep, narrow, secluded valley, in the midst of which
stood an old red sandstone house, closely surrounded by trees, and only
dimly to be seen in the clouded night sky.
Here the robber rider slackened his pace.
The deep silence that prevailed, the thick growth of leafless weeds
and briars through which their horse had to wade, all showed that this
house had been long uninhabited and the grounds long uncultivated.
Yet there was some one on guard; for when Moloch rode up to the door and
dismounted, and holding Sybil tightly clasped in his left arm, rapped
three times three, with his right hand, the door was cautiously opened
by a decrepit old man, who held a lighted taper in his withered fingers.
"Ho, Pluto! who is here?" inquired Moloch, striding into the hall, and
bearing Sybil in his arms.
"No one, sir, but the girls and the woman; and they have just come,"
answered the old man.
"No one but the girls and the woman! and they have just come! And no
fire made, and no supper ready? And this h--ll of an old house colder
and damper than the cavern! Won't the captain be leaping mad, that's
all! Come, bestir yourself, bestir yourself, and make a fire first of
all. This lady is as cold as death! Where is Iska?"
"In this room, sir," answered the old man, pushing open an old
worm-eaten door that admitted them into a large old-fashioned
oak-pannelled parlor, with a wide fireplace and a high corner cupboard,
but without other furniture.
On the hearth knelt Gentiliska, trying to coax a little smouldering fire
of green wood into a blaze.
"What the d----l is the use of puffing away at that? You'd just as well
try to set fire to a wet sponge," impatiently exclaimed Moloch.
And he went to one of the windows, wrenched off a dry mouldering
shutter, broke it to pieces with his bare hand, and piled it in among
the green logs. Then from his pocket he took a flask of whiskey, poured
a portion of it on the weak, red embers, and in an instant had the whole
mass of fuel in a roaring blaze.
Meanwhile Sybil, unable to stand, had sunk down upon the floor, where
she remained only until Gentiliska saw her by the blaze of the fire.
"You are as cold as ice!" said the kind-hearted girl taking Sybil's
hands in her own, and trying to warm them. "Come to the fire," she
continued, assisting the lady to rise, and drawing her towards the
chimney. "Sit here," she added, arranging her own red cloak as a seat.
"Thanks," murmured Sybil. "Thanks--you are very good to me."
"Moloch, she is nearly dead! Have you got any wine? If you have, give it
to me!" was the next request of the girl.
The giant lumbered off to a heap of miscellaneous luggage that lay in
one corner, and from it he rooted out a black bottle, which he brought
and put in the hands of the girl, saying:
"There! ha, ha, ha! there's some of her own old port! We made a raid
upon Black Hall buttery last night, on purpose to provide for her."
"All right. Now a tin saucepan, and some sugar and spice, old Moloch!
and also, if possible, a cup or tumbler," said Gentiliska.
The giant went back to the pile in the corner, and after a little search
brought forth all the articles required by the girl.
"Now, good Moloch, go and do for old Hecate what you have done for me.
Make her a fire, that she may have supper ready for the captain when he
comes," coaxed Gentiliska.
"Just so, Princess," agreed the robber, who immediately confiscated
another shutter, and carried it off into the adjoining back room to
kindle the kitchen fire.
"You were wrong to leave us! You got into trouble immediately! You would
have been in worse by this time, if we had not rescued you! Don't you
know, when the laws are down on you, your only safety is with the
outlaws?" inquired Gentiliska, as soon as she found herself alone with
her guest.
"I don't know. I don't care. It is all one to me now. I only wish to
die. If it were not a sin, I would die by suicide," answered Sybil with
the dreary calmness of despair.
"'Die by suicide!' Die by a fiddlestick's end! You to talk so! And you
not twenty years old yet! Bosh! cut the law that persecutes you and come
with us merry outlaws who protect you. And whatever you do, don't run
away from us again! You got us into awful trouble and danger and loss
when you ran away the last time; did you know it?"
"No," sighed Sybil, wearily.
"Well, then, you did; and I'll tell you how it all happened: the secret
of your abode at Pendleton Park was known to too many people. It
couldn't possibly be kept forever by all. It is a wonder that it was
kept so long, by any. They kept it only until they thought you were safe
from pursuit and arrest. Then some of Captain Pendleton's people--it is
not known whom--let it leak out until it got to the ears of the
authorities, who set inquiries on foot; and then the whole thing was
discovered, and as usual misinterpreted and misrepresented. You got the
credit of voluntarily consorting with us, and of purposely blowing up
the old Haunted Chapel. And the new warrants that were issued for your
arrest charged you with that crime also."
"Good Heaven!" exclaimed Sybil, forgetting all her indifference; "what
will they not heap upon my head next? I will not rest under this
imputation! I will not."
"Neither would I, if I were you--that is, if I could help it," said the
girl, sarcastically.
But Sybil sat with her thin hands clasped tightly together, her deathly
white face rigid as marble, and her large, dilated eyes staring into the
fire heedless of the strange girl's irony.
"But now I must tell you how all this hurt us. In the first place, when
your flight from the cavern was discovered, we felt sorry only on your
account, because you ran into imminent danger of arrest. We had no idea
then that your arrest would lead to the discovery of our retreat; but it
did. When _our_ detectives brought in the news of the warrants that were
out against you, they also warned us that the authorities had the clue
to our caverns, and that there was no time to be lost in making our
escape."
With her hands still closely clasped together, with her pallid features
still set as in death, and with her staring eyes still fixed upon the
fire, Sybil sat, heedless of all that she heard.
The girl continued her story.
"We let no time be lost. We gathered up the most valuable and portable
of our effects, and that same night evacuated our cavern and dispersed
our band; taking care to appoint a distant place of rendezvous. Satan
watched the road, riding frequently to the way-side inns to try to
discover the coach by which you would be brought back. He was at Upton
this evening, when the stage stopped to change horses. He recognized
you, and immediately mounted, put spurs to his fast horse and rode as
for life and death to the rendezvous of his band, and got them into
their saddles to intercept the stage-coach. He also gave orders that we
should come on to this deserted house, which he had discovered in the
course of his rides, and which he supposes will be a safe retreat for
the present. That is all I have to tell you, and I reckon you know all
the rest," concluded Gentiliska.
But still Sybil sat in the same attitude of deep despair, regardless of
all that was said to her.
While Gentiliska's tongue was running, her hands were also busy. She had
prepared a cordial of spiced and sweetened port wine, and had set it in
a saucepan over the fire to heat. And now she poured it out into a
silver mug and handed it to Sybil, saying:
"Come, drink: this will warm and strengthen you. You look like death,
but you must not die yet. You must drink, and live."
"Yes, I must live!" said Sybil. "I must live to throw off this horrible
imputation from the fame of my father's daughter."
And she took the goblet and drank the cordial.
And soon a new expression passed into her face; the fixed despair rose
into a settled determination, a firm, active resolution.
"You look as if you were going to do something. What is it?" inquired
Gentiliska.
"I am going to give myself up! I am guiltless, and I will not longer act
the part of a guilty person!" said Sybil, firmly.
"Your misfortunes have turned your head. You are as mad as a March
hare!" exclaimed Gentiliska, in consternation.
"No, I am not mad. On the contrary, it seems to me that I have _been_
mad, or I never could have borne the fugitive life that I have been
leading for the last two months! I will bear it no longer. I will give
myself up to trial, come what will of it. I would even rather die a
guiltless death than lead an outlaw's life! I will give myself up!"
"After all the pains we have taken, and risks we have run, to rescue
you?" exclaimed Gentiliska, in dismay.
"Yes, after all that! And yet I thank you all the same. I thank you all,
that you have set me at liberty, and by so doing have given me the
opportunity of voluntarily delivering myself up."
"Just as if Captain Inconnu would let you do it. I tell you he has his
own reasons for saving your life," angrily retorted the girl.
"And I have my reasons for risking my life upon the bare chance of
rescuing my good name," said Sybil, firmly; "and your captain would
scarcely detain me here as a captive, against my will," she added,
smiling strangely.
"Well, may be he would, and may be he wouldn't! but here he comes, and
you can ask him," said the girl, as the galloping of a horse's feet was
heard in the front yard.
A moment passed, and then the robber chief, with three or four of his
men, entered the room, bringing with them the mail bags and other booty
taken from the stage-coach.
"Good-evening, Mrs. Berners! You are welcome back among your devoted
slaves!" was the greeting of Captain Inconnu, as half in deference, half
in mockery, he raised his cap and bowed low before the lady.
For an instant Sybil was dumb before the speaker, but she soon recovered
her self-possession and said:
"I ought to thank you for your gallantry in rescuing me from the custody
of those rude men; especially as the freedom you have given me affords
me the opportunity of voluntarily doing that which I should not like to
be forced into doing."
Captain Inconnu bowed in silence, and in some perplexity, and then he
said,
"I am not sure that I understand you, madam, as to what you would do."
"I would go freely before a court of justice, instead of being forced
thither," explained Sybil.
"I trust you would never commit such a suicidal act!" exclaimed the
captain, in consternation.
"Yes, I would, and I will. I care nothing for my life! I have lost all
that makes life worth the living! All is gone but my true honor--for its
mere semblance has gone with everything else. I would preserve that true
honor! I would place myself on trial, and trust in my innocence, and in
the help of Providence," said Sybil, speaking with a stoical firmness
wonderful to see in one so young.
Captain Inconnu, who had listened in silence, with his eyes fixed upon
the ground, now lifted them to her face and replied:
"Sleep on this resolution before you act, Mrs. Berners; and to-morrow we
will talk further on this subject."
"I must of necessity sleep on it before acting," said Sybil, with a
dreary smile, "since nothing can be done to-night; but also I must tell
you that nothing can change my resolution."
"Thus let it stand over until to-morrow," replied the captain. Then with
a total change of tone and manner, he turned to Gentiliska and said:
"Now let us have supper, my little princess, and afterwards we will open
the mail bags and see what they have brought us."
Gentiliska clapped her hands together, to summon the old woman of the
band, who quickly made her appearance at the door.
"Supper immediately, Hecate!" said the girl.
The woman nodded and withdrew. And in a few moments she reappeared and
summoned them in to the evening meal.
The supper was served in the rudest possible fashion. There was neither
table nor chairs. A fine table-cloth not too clean was spread upon the
floor, and on it were arranged a few plain articles of food such as
could be quickly prepared.
"You will excuse our imperfect housekeeping, I hope, Mrs. Berners. The
fact is we have just moved in, and have not got quite comfortably
settled yet," laughed the captain as he folded his own cloak as a seat
for Sybil, and led her up and placed her on it, and sat himself down by
her side.
Other members of the band joined them at the meal, and Captain Inconnu
and Gentiliska did the honors.
Fortunately there was nothing stronger than wine set before the men, and
not much of that; and upon those who had been accustomed to strong
brandy, and a great deal of it, this lighter beverage had but little
effect. So, to Sybil's great relief, she perceived that they continued
sober to the end of their repast.
"Come in now, and let us take a look at the contents of the mail bags!
That may afford some amusement to our lady guest," said Captain Inconnu,
when they all arose from the supper.
They passed into the front parlor, where the robber chief with his own
hands opened the mail bags, and turning them up side down, emptied all
their contents in a heap in the middle of the floor.
The robbers came and sat down around the pile, and began to seize and
tear open the letters.
"Hallo, there, my men! When you open a letter with money in it, hand
over the money to Gentiliska; she will gather and keep it all until we
have gone entirely through this pile, and then we will divide it
equitably, if not equally, among you," commanded the captain as he
himself took a seat in the circle and began to assist in "distributing
the mail." He also set the example of scrupulously handing over the
money he found in the letters he opened, to the keeping of Gentiliska,
who collected it all in a little pile on her lap.
Some of the letters he read aloud to the company for their amusement,
such, for instance, as sentimental letters from city swains to their
country sweethearts, begging letters from boys at college to their
parents and guardians on the plantations, and dunning letters from
metropolitan merchants to their provincial customers. Of these last
mentioned, the captain said:
"Look sharp, boys! Here are the New Year's bills coming down! They won't
be answered by return mail this time; but they will be sent down again.
After which remittances will begin to go up! We must keep a bright
look-out for the up coaches about New Year's time! And we shall bag some
neat thousands!"
"If we are not all bagged ourselves before that!" growled Moloch.
"Oh, raven! hush your croaking! If we should listen to it long, we would
never venture upon an enterprise of spirit! Halloa, what's this?
Something that concerns you, Mrs. Berners!" exclaimed the captain,
breaking off his discourse with his band and turning to Sybil, who was
sitting quietly apart; and he held in his hand an open letter, from
which he had taken a bright ribbon.
"Something that concerns me!" echoed poor Sybil, as a wild, irrational
hope that the letter might contain news of her husband flashed across
the dark despair of her soul.
"Yes," answered the captain. "This letter is from Miss Beatrix Pendleton
to her brother. It acknowledges the safe receipt of her valuable India
shawl, and sends love and thanks to _you_ for recovering it from _us_
and dispatching it to _her_. Moreover she sends kind remembrances and
this gay ribbon to some old nurse of the name of Margy! Here is the
letter! Would you like to read it?" he laughingly inquired, as he
offered it to Sybil.
"No!" she answered, in strongly marked disapprobation; "that letter is a
private one! not intended for my perusal, nor for yours!"
"No? And yet you see I read it! Here Gentilly! here is a
"'Bit of bright ribbon
To bind up your bonny black hair!'"
laughed the captain, tossing the gay remnant to the girl, who caught it
up and immediately twisted it in coquettishly among her ebon locks.
It occupied the band for nearly an hour to open and examine all the
letters. When they had done so, and had taken everything that was
valuable out of them, they gathered the whole refuse mass of papers
together, and ruthlessly committed them to the flames.
Then they divided the money among themselves, the captain and his men
having each an equal, instead of a graduated share.
"And now," said Captain Inconnu, "we will bid each other good-night, and
try to get some rest. Princess, take our guest up-stairs to the large
room immediately over this. She, you, and the other women will occupy
that room to-night. Hecate has had my orders to that effect, and I hope
you will find that she has made the place as comfortable as
circumstances will permit."
And so saying, he stuck a stump of a tallow candle in a scooped-out
turnip and handed it to Gentiliska, and motioned her to conduct their
guest from the room.
Sybil very willingly left the company of the robbers, and followed her
hostess to the chamber above.
It was a large bare room, warmed and lighted by a fine wood fire, and
furnished only with a few pallets made of dried leaves, with blankets
thrown over them.
The old crone called Hecate and the pale girl nicknamed Proserpine stood
basking before the blaze of the fire.
Sybil felt pleased to know that she might sleep in peace that night,
protected by the presence of other women.
"This is the new lady's bed, this best one in the corner here by the
fire," old Hecate explained, pointing to a pallet that, in addition to
its dried leaves and warm blankets, was graced with clean sheets and
pillow-cases.
Sybil thanked the old woman for her favor; and being very weary, took
off her upper garments and laid down to rest, committed herself to the
kind care of Heaven, and soon sank into a deep sleep, that lasted until
morning.