"A HALF-BREED NAMED ZARA."
To describe Julian as being startled--amazed--would not convey the
actual state of mind into which the answer given by the man who said
that his name was Sebastian Leigh Ritherdon, plunged him.
It was indeed something more than that; something more resembling a
shock of consternation which now took possession of him.
What did it mean?--he asked himself, even as he stood face to face
with that other bearer of the name of Ritherdon. What? And to this
question he could find but one answer: his uncle in England must, for
some reason--the reason being in all probability that his hatred for
the deceit practised on him years ago had never really become
extinguished--have invented the whole story. Yet, of what use such an
invention! How could he hope that he, Julian, should profit by such a
fabrication, by such a falsehood; why should he have bidden him go
forth to a distant country there to assert a claim which could never
be substantiated?
Then, even in that moment, while still he stood astounded before the
other Ritherdon, there flashed into his mind a second thought, another
supposition; the thought that George Ritherdon had been a madman. That
was--must be--the solution. None but a madman would have conceived
such a story. If it were untrue!
Yet, now, he could not pursue this train of thought; he must postpone
reflection for the time being; he had to act, to speak, to give some
account of himself. As to who he was, who, bearing the name of
Ritherdon, had suddenly appeared in the very spot where Ritherdon was
such a well-known and, probably, such an influential name.
"I never knew," the man who had announced himself as being the heir of
the late Mr. Ritherdon was saying now, "that there were any other
Ritherdons in existence except my late father and myself; except
myself now since his death. And," he continued, "it is a little
strange, perhaps, that I should learn such to be the case here in
Honduras. Is it not?"
As he spoke to Julian, both his tone and manner were such as would not
have produced an unfavourable impression upon any one who was witness
to them. At the gaming-table, when seated behind the half-caste girl,
his appearance would have probably been considered by some as
sinister, while, when he had fallen upon the disputatious gambler, and
had commenced--very roughly to hustle him towards the door, he had
presented the appearance of a hectoring bully. Also, his first address
to Julian on discovering him in the room had been by no means one that
promised well for the probable events of the next few moments. But
now--now--his manner and whole bearing were in no way aggressive, even
though his words expressed that a certain doubt in his mind
accompanied them.
"Surely," he continued, "we must be connections of some sort. The
presence of a Ritherdon in Honduras, within an hour's ride of my
property, must be owing to something more than coincidence."
"It is owing to something more than coincidence," Julian replied,
scorning to take refuge in an absolute falsehood, though acknowledging
to himself that, in the position in which he now found himself--and
until he could think matters out more clearly, as well as obtain
some light on the strange circumstances in which he was suddenly
involved--diplomacy if not evasion--a hateful word!--was necessary.
"More than coincidence. You may have heard of George Ritherdon, your
uncle, who once lived here in the colony with your father."
"Yes," Sebastian Ritherdon answered, his eyes still on the other.
"Yes, I have heard my father speak of him. Yet, that was years ago.
Nearly thirty, I think. Is he here, too? In the colony?"
"No; he is dead. But I am his son. And, being on leave from my
profession, which is that of an officer in her Majesty's navy, it has
suited me to pay a visit to a place of which he had spoken so often."
As he gave this answer, Julian was able to console himself with the
reflection that, although there was evasion in it, at least there was
no falsehood. For had he not always believed himself to be George
Ritherdon's son until a month or so ago; had he not been brought up
and entered for the navy as his son? Also, was he sure now that he was
_not_ his son? He had listened to a story from the dying man telling
how he, Julian, had been kidnapped from his father's house, and how
the latter had been left childless and desolate; yet now, when he was
almost at the threshold of that house, he found himself face to face
with a man, evidently well known in all the district, who proclaimed
himself to be the actual son--a man who also gave, with some
distinctness in his tone, the name of Isobel Leigh as that of his
mother. She Sebastian Ritherdon's mother! the woman who was, he had
been told, his own mother: the woman who, dying in giving birth to her
first son, could consequently have never been the mother of a second.
Was it not well, therefore, that, as he had always been, so he should
continue to be, certainly for the present, the son of George
Ritherdon, and not of Charles? For, to proclaim himself here, in
Honduras, as the offspring of the latter would be to bring down upon
him, almost of a surety, the charge of being an impostor.
"I knew," exclaimed Sebastian, while in his look and manner there was
expressed considerable cordiality; "I knew we must be akin. I was
certain of it. Even as you stood in that doorway, and as the ray of
sunlight streamed across the room, I felt sure of it before you
mentioned your name."
"Why?" asked Julian surprised; perhaps, too, a little agitated.
"Why! Can you not understand? Not recognise why--at once? Man alive!
_We are alike!_"
Alike! Alike! The words fell on Julian with startling force. Alike!
Yes, so they were! They were alike. And in an instant it seemed as if
some veil, some web had fallen away from his mental vision; as if he
understood what had hitherto puzzled him. He understood his
bewilderment as to where he had seen that face and those features
before! For now he knew. He had seen them in the looking-glass!
"No doubt about the likeness!" exclaimed one of the gamblers who had
remained in the room, a listener to the conference; while the
half-breed stared from first one face to the other with her large eyes
wide open. "No doubt about that. As much like brothers as cousins, I
should say."
And the girl who (since Julian's intrusion, and since, also, she had
discovered that it was not the constabulary from Belize who had
suddenly raided their gambling den), had preserved a stolid
silence--glancing ever and anon with dusky eyes at each, muttered also
that none who saw those two men together could doubt that they were
kinsmen, or, as she termed it, _parienti_.
"Yes," Julian answered bewildered, almost stunned, as one thing after
another seemed--with crushing force--to be sweeping away for ever all
possibility of George Ritherdon's story having had any foundation in
fact, any likelihood of being aught else but the chimera of a
distraught brain; "yes, I can perceive it. I--I--wondered where I had
seen your face before, when I first entered the room. Now I know."
"And," Sebastian exclaimed, slapping his newly found kinsmen somewhat
boisterously on the back, "and we are cousins. So much the better! For
my part I am heartily glad to meet a relation. Now--come--let us be
off to Desolada. You were on your way there, no doubt. Well! you shall
have a cordial welcome. The best I can offer. You know that the
Spaniards always call their house 'their guests' house.' And my house
shall be yours. For as long as you like to make it so."
"You are very good," Julian said haltingly, feeling, too, that he was
no longer master of himself, no longer possessed of all that ease
which he had, until to-day, imagined himself to be in full possession
of. "Very good indeed. And what you say is the case. I was on my
way--I--had a desire to see the place in which your and my father
lived."
"You shall see it, you shall be most welcome. And," Sebastian
continued, "you will find it big enough. It is a vast rambling place,
half wood, half brick, constructed originally by Spanish settlers, so
that it is over a hundred years old. The name is a mournful one, yet
it has always been retained. And once it was appropriate enough. There
was scarcely another dwelling near it for miles--as a matter of fact,
there are hardly any now. The nearest, which is a place called 'La
Superba,' is five miles farther on."
They went out together now to the front of the inn--Julian observing
that still the negro slept on in the entrance-hall and still the
dog slept on in the sun outside--and here Sebastian, finding the
good-looking horse, began to untether it, while Julian did the same
for his mustang. They were the only two animals now left standing in
the shade thrown by the house, since all the men--including he who had
stayed last and listened to their conversation--were gone. The girl,
however, still remained, and to her Sebastian spoke, bidding her make
her way through the bypaths of the forest to Desolada and state that
he and his guest were coming.
"Who is she?" asked Julian, feeling that it was incumbent on him to
evince some interest in this new-found "cousin's" affairs; while, as
was not surprising, he really felt too dazed to heed much that was
passing around him. The astonishment, the bewilderment that had fallen
on him owing to the events of the last half-hour, the startling
information he had received, all of which tended, if it did anything,
to disprove every word that George Ritherdon had uttered prior to his
death--were enough to daze a man of even cooler instincts than he
possessed.
"She," said Sebastian, with a half laugh, a laugh in which contempt
was strangely discernible, "she, oh! she's a half-breed--Spanish and
native mixed--named Zara. She was born on our place and turns her hand
to anything required, from milking the goats to superintending the
negroes."
"She seems to know how to turn her hand to a roulette wheel also,"
Julian remarked, still endeavouring to frame some sentences which
should pass muster for the ordinary courteous attention expected from
a newly found relation, who had also, now, assumed the character of
guest.
"Yes," Sebastian answered. "Yes, she can do that too. I suppose you
were surprised at finding all the implements of a gambling room here!
Yet, if you lived in the colony it would not seem so strange. We
planters, especially in the wild parts, must have some amusement, even
though it's illegal. Therefore, we meet three times a week at the inn,
and the man who is willing to put down the most money takes the bank.
It happened to me to-day."
"And, as in the case of most hot countries," said Julian, forcing
himself to be interested, "a servant is used for that portion of the
game which necessitates exertion. I understand! In some tropical
countries I have known, men bring their servants to deal for them at
whist and mark their game."
"You have seen a great deal of the world as a sailor?" the other
asked, while they now wended their way through a thick mangrove wood
in which the monkeys and parrots kept up such an incessant chattering
that they could scarcely hear themselves talk.
"I have been round it three times," Julian replied; "though, of
course, sailor-like, I know the coast portions of different countries
much better than I do any of the interiors."
"And I have never been farther away than New Orleans. My mother ca--my
mother always wanted to go there and see it."
"Was she--your mother from New Orleans?" Julian asked, on the alert at
this moment, he hardly knew why.
"My mother. Oh! no. She was the daughter of Mr. Leigh, an English
merchant at Belize. But, as you will discover, New Orleans means the
world to us--we all want to go there sometimes."