"The dusht off my shoosh, Loftish Vochan--I flingsh it back to you!
Gott for damsch! there wash a time when you would be glad for my two
hunder poundsh. Not for any monish? Bosh! Grand lady, Mish Kate--Mish
Quasheby! Ha! I knowsh a thing--I knowsh a leetle thing. Some day,
may be, yourshelf sell for lesh ash two hunder poundsh. Ach! I not
grudgsh twice the monish to see that day!
"The dusht off my shoosh to both of yoush!" he repeated, as he cleared
the gate-entrance. "I'sh off your grounds, now; and, if I hash you
here, I shay you something of my mind--something ash make you sell your
wench for lesh ash two hunder poundsh! I do so, some time, pleash gott!
Ach!"
Uttering this last exclamation with a prolonged aspirate, he raised
himself erect in his stirrups; and, half turning his mule, shook his
umbrella in a threatening manner towards Mount Welcome--his eye
accompanying the action with a glance that expressed some secret but
vindictive determination.
As he faced back into the road, another personage appeared upon the
scene--a female equestrian, who, trotting briskly up, turned her horse,
and rode along by his side.
She was a young girl, or, rather a young woman--a bright, beautiful
creature--who appeared an angel by the side of that demonlike old man.
She had evidently been waiting for him at the turning of the road; and
the air of easy familiarity, with the absence of any salutation as they
met, told that they had not long been separated.
Who was this charming equestrian?
A stranger would have asked this question, while his eye rested upon the
object of it with mingled feelings of wonder and admiration: admiration
at such rare beauty--wonder at beholding it in such rude companionship!
It was a beauty that need not be painted in detail. The forehead of
noble arch; the scimitar-shaped eyebrows of ebon blackness; the
dark-brown flashing pupils; the piquant prominence of the nose, with its
spiral curving nostrils; were all characteristics of Hebraic beauty--a
shrine before which both Moslem and Christian have ofttimes bent the
knee in humblest adoration.
Twenty cycles have rolled past--twenty centuries of outrage, calumny,
and wrong--housed in low haunts--pillaged and persecuted--oft driven to
desperation--rendered roofless and homeless--still, amid all, and in
spite of all, lovely are Judah's dark-eyed daughters--fair as when they
danced to the music of cymbal and timbrel, or, to the accompaniment of
the golden-stringed harp, sang the lays of a happier time.
Here, in a new world, and canopied under an occidental sky, had sprung
up a very type of Jewish beauty: for never was daughter of Judah
lovelier than the daughter of Jacob Jessuron--she who was now riding by
his side.
A singular contrast did they present as they rode together--this fair
maid and that harsh-featured, ugly old man--unlike as the rose to its
parent thorn.
Sad are we to say, that the contrast was only physical morally, it was
"like father like daughter." In external form, Judith Jessuron was an
angel; in spirit--and we say it with regret--she was the child of her
father--devilish as he.
"A failure?" said this fair she, taking the initiative. "Pah! I
needn't have asked you: it's clear enough from your looks--though,
certes, that beautiful countenance of yours is not a very legible index
to your thoughts. What says Vanity Vaughan? Will he sell the girl?"
"No."
"As I expected."
"S'help me, he won't!"
"How much did you bid for her?"
"Och! I'sh ashamed to tell you, Shoodith."
"Come, old rabbi, you needn't be backward before me. How much?"
"Two hunder poundsh."
"Two hundred pounds! Well, that is a high figure! If what you've told
me be true, his own daughter isn't worth so much. Ha! ha! ha!"
"Hush, Shoodith, dear! Don't shpeak of that--for your life don't shpeak
of it. You may shpoil some plansh I hash about her."
"Have no fear, good father. I never spoiled any plan of yours yet--have
I?"
"No, no! You hash been a good shild, my daughter!--a good shild, s'help
me gott, you hash."
"But tell me; why would the Custos not sell? He likes money almost as
well as yourself. Two hundred pounds is a large price for this
copper-coloured wench--quite double what she's worth."
"Ach, Shoodith dear, it wash not Vochan hishelf that refused it."
"Who then?"
"Thish very daughter you speaksh of."
"She!" exclaimed the young Jewess, with a curl of the lip, and a
contemptuous twist of her beautiful nostril, that all at once changed
her beauty into very ugliness. "She, you say? I wonder what next! The
conceited _mustee_--herself no better than a slave!"
"Shtop--shtop, Shoodith," interrupted the Jew, with a look of
uneasiness. "Keep that to yourshelf, my shild. Shay no more about it--
at leasht, not now, not now. The trees may have earsh."
The burst of angry passion hindered the fair "Shoodith" from making
rejoinder, and for some moments father and daughter rode on in silence.
The latter was the first to re-commence the conversation.
"You are foolish, good father," said she; "absurdly foolish."
"Why, Shoodith?"
"Why? In offering to buy this girl at all."
"Ay--what would you shay?" inquired the old Jew, as if the interrogatory
had been an echo to his own thoughts. "What would you shay?"
"I would say that you are silly, old rabbi Jacob; and that's what I do
say."
"Blesh my shoul! What dosh you mean, Shoodith?"
"Why, dear and worthy papa, you're not always so dull of comprehension.
Answer me: what do you want the Foolah for?"
"Och! you know what I wants her for, Thish prinshe will give hish twenty
Mandingoes for her. There ish no doubt but that she's his sister.
Twenty good shtrong Mandingoes, worth twenty hunder poundsh. Blesh my
soul! it'sh a fortune?"
"Well; and if it is a fortune, what then?"
"If it ish? By our fathers! you talk of twenty hunder poundsh ash if
monish was dirt."
"My worthy parent, you misunderstand me."
"Mishunderstand you, Shoodith?"
"You do. I have more respect for twenty hundred pounds than you give me
credit for. So much, as that I advise you to _get it_."
"Get it! why, daughter, that ish shoosht what I am trying to do."
"Ay, and you've gone about it in such a foolish fashion, that you run a
great risk of losing it."
"And how would you have me go about it, mine Shoodith?"
"By _taking it_."
The slave-merchant suddenly jerked upon the bridle, and pulled his mule
to a stand--as he did so darting towards his daughter a look
half-puzzled, half-penetrating.
"Good father Jacob," continued she, halting at the same time, "_you_ are
not wont to be so dull-witted. While waiting for you at the gate of
this pompous sugar-planter, I could not help reflecting; and my
reflections led me to ask the question: what on earth had taken you to
his house?"
"And what answer did you find, Shoodith?"
"Oh, not much; only that you went upon a very idle errand."
"Yesh, it hash been an idle errand: I did not get what I went for."
"And what matters if you didn't?"
"Mattersh it? Twenty Mandingoes mattersh a great deal--twenty hunder
poundsh currenshy. That ish what it mattersh, Shoodith mine darling!"
"Not the paring of a Mandingo's toe-nail, my paternal friend."
"Hach! what shay you, mine wise Shoodith?"
"What say I? Simply, that these Mandingoes might as well have been
yours without all this trouble. They may be yet--ay, and their master
too, if you desire to have a prince for your slave. _I_ do."
"Speak out, Shoodith; I don't understand you."
"You will presently. Didn't you say, just now, that Captain Jowler has
reasons for not coming ashore?"
"Captain Showler! He would rather land in the Cannibal Islands than in
Montego Bay. Well, Shoodith?"
"Rabbi Jessuron, you weary my patience. For the Foolah prince--as you
say he is--you are answerable only to Captain Jowler. Captain Jowler
comes not ashore."
"True--it ish true," assented the Jew, with a gesture that signified his
comprehension of these preliminary premises.
"Who, then, is to hinder you from doing as you please in the matter of
these Mandingoes?"
"Wonderful Shoodith!" exclaimed the father, throwing up his arms, and
turning upon his daughter a look of enthusiastic admiration. "Wonderful
Shoodith! Joosh the very thing!--blesh my soul!--and I never thought of
it!"
"Well, father; luckily it's not too late. _I_ have been thinking of it.
I knew very well that Kate Vaughan would not part with the girl Yola.
I told you she wouldn't; but, by the bye, I hope you've said nothing of
what you wanted her for? If you have--"
"Not a word, Shoodith! not a word!"
"Then no one need be a word the wiser. As to Captain Jowler--"
"Showler daren't show hish face in the Bay: that'sh why he landed hish
cargo on the coast. Besides, there wash an understanding between him
and me. He doeshn't care what ish done with the prinshe--not he.
Anyhow, he'll be gone away in twenty-four hours."
"Then in twenty-four hours the Mandingoes may be yours--prince,
attendants, and all. But time is precious, papa. We had better hasten
home at once, and strip his royal highness of those fine feathers before
some of our curious neighbours come in and see them. People will talk
scandal, you know. As for our worthy overseer--"
"Ah, Ravener! he knowsh all about it. I wash obliged to tell him ash we
landed."
"Of course you were; and it will cost you a Mandingo or two to keep
_his_ tongue tied: that it will. For the rest, there need be no
difficulty. It won't matter what these savages may say for themselves.
Fortunately, there's no scandal in a black man's tongue."
"Wonderful Shoodith!" again exclaimed the admiring parent. "My precious
daughter, you are worth your weight in golden guinish! Twenty-four
shlaves for nothing, and one of them a born prinshe! Two thousand
currenshy! Blesh my soul! It ish a shplendid profit--worth a whole
year's buyin' and shellin'." And with this honest reflection, the
slave-merchant hammered his mule into a trot, and followed his "precious
Shoodith"--who had already given the whip to her horse, and was riding
rapidly homeward.
Volume One, Chapter X.