“Go back again thou slave, and fetch him home.”
COMEDY OF ERRORS.
It was not until an early hour of the morning, when Mrs. Wilmington
recovered from her swoon, that it was possible to give any alarm of the
outrage that had been committed at the villa of James Willmington.
When the lady recovered from her state of insensibility, and saw before
her the scattered and disordered furniture, the flickering wax candles
that had now burnt down to the very sockets, and her children, who,
after the departure of the pirate party, had fallen asleep around her,
recollections of the supposed apparition, and of the terror of her
husband, flashed across her mind. Alarmed at the silence that reigned
around, and not being able to understand why she had been permitted
to remain in the same place where she had fainted away, she rushed
impulsively to the bell, that lay on the sideboard, and rang it violently.
No one came.
She rang again—no one came: she rang again, and again, more and more
violently; still no one came.
She then looked out of the parlour, and beheld the whole house still
lighted up. She ventured out a little, and still a little farther, until
she summoned sufficient courage, traversed the court yard, and entered
the servant’s apartments.
In the principal room nothing was to be seen. Mrs. Willmington raised the
light high up, while she stood at the entrance, and looked into every
corner and hole. She could see nothing.
“Good God! can I be abandoned here with my children,” she said in a low
tone, fearful to hear even her own voice, in such a silent and deserted
situation.
She entered the room, and proceeded towards a door, which opened into
another apartment. She turned the handle, and went into that room also;
nothing was to be seen. She was turning to leave, when a low groan was
heard. Mrs. Willmington started two paces backwards, but raised the light
and looked back intently towards the part from which the groan came. In
a dark recess, that lay in a remote corner of a room, two white shining
balls seemed to glare upon her. She started still farther back: another
groan was heard; she raised the light still higher; it fell upon a part
of the recess, and discovered the shining face of the individual to whom
the eyes belonged and from whom the groans proceeded.
“It is Jack, it is Jack!” cried Mrs. Willmington, and walked up towards
the recess.
It was, indeed, Jack, who had his mouth as well filled with grass and
cloths as it could possibly hold, and whose arms were as tightly tied
behind his back, as mortal arms could be: and whose short legs were
stretched straighter than they had ever been stretched before in Jack’s
life. He was lying on his side, and his eyes were playing in their
sockets like those fierce-looking things which German ingenuity has
designed to represent the visual apparatus of man, and which are to be
seen every day in some of the back streets of London in full play, to the
infinite excitement and gratification of the awe-struck and wondering
urchins.
“Jack, cook!” cried Mrs. Willmington, “what state is this you are in?”
“Jack, cook,” groaned, and his eyes played still more rapidly.
“How can I assist?” said Mrs. Willmington, “I think of it!” she ran
hastily out of the room, and returned a few moments afterwards, with a
large knife.
With this, she cut the cords which bound the limbs of the unfortunate
Jack. A task of no little labour, for those who secured him, had done so
with a marvellous amount of skill and success.
“Do the rest for yourself, now,” she said, when she had completed part of
the work.
Jack required no exhortation, but as soon as his arms were free, he began
with all his might to pluck out the number of things, with which his not
incapacious mouth had been filled.
“Tenk Gad,” he cried, as he nimbly jumped on his legs, and shook himself
like a newfoundland dog coming from the water.
“Where is your master?” quickly inquired Mrs. Willmington.
“Me massa, ma’am!” answered Jack in the manner that is rather peculiar to
his class.
“Yes, your master; and where are the other servants?” Mrs. Willmington
asked again.
“Dem gane?” asked Jack again, in his turn.
“Who, gone?” inquired Mrs. Willmington.
“De paniole, ma’am:” answered Jack.
“Tell me, Jack, will you; tell me quickly,” said Mrs. Willmington, now
waxing impatient, “where is your master and the other servants?”
“Let me see if dey gane,” said Jack, and he walked on tiptoe towards the
door, then carefully and cautiously peeped out, then ventured a little
way into the courtyard, then ran hurriedly towards the great gate, and
bolted it and rebolted it.
“Awh!” he cried, “Garamighty! Dey gane now! awh! me, neber see such ting
in all my barn days. Wha dat? Me hab time foo blow now: put big, big,
bundle so nan me mout! tap my breath, awh! But me can blow now—tshwh,
tshwh!” and Jack took along breath in the fashion which seems to be
peculiar to his people—a fashion which compresses a vast quantity of
air, and sends it vehemently forth, so that the same hissing noise which
the steam makes when it comes through the valve of a railway engine, is
produced. A fashion which, be it said within parentheses, may be very
economical, inasmuch as it affords a certain large amount of respiration
within a certain small period of time.
This soliloquy, in the making of which, the illustrious cook by no means
limited himself as to time, being over, and after having cast searching
glances about the gate, and having looked and relooked above, below,
sideways, before, and behind, Jack then, and not till then, deemed it
proper to return to his mistress, who had also come to the door, and was
endeavouring to discover what the cook was about.
“Me shet it, ma’am, me shet it,” cried Jack, as he returned.
“Now, perhaps, you will tell me what I ask,” said Mrs. Willmington,
getting still more excited and angry, “where is your master?”
“Tap, missus,” answered Jack, “I’ll tell you all bout it.”
“Make haste, then.”
“Yes, missus,” said Jack, and began to tell all about it. He had the
preliminary caution, however, of looking carefully round to see if no
more “paniole,” as he called the pirates, were concealed thereabouts.
Being for the time satisfied on that point, he proceeded—
“Last night, ma’am—no, the night before the night, ma’am, ee already dis
ma’aning, Bekky come in, and find me da smoke me pipe. ‘Good night.—’”
“What has that to do with Mr. Willmington, Jack? Tell me where your
master is, will you,” said Mrs. Willmington, still more angry.
“Me da tell you, missus,” answered Jack. “‘Good night, buddee Jack,’
say Bekky, says she. ‘Good night, sissee Bekky,’ me say, says I. ‘Awh!
Jack!’ Bekky say, ‘wha tobacca you da smoke dey Jack, ee smell bad! da——’”
“No more of this, Jack,” said Mrs. Willmington; “tell me.”
“Tap, missus, tap, if you plase; me da come to it, me da come to it now,”
said Jack.
Mrs. Willmington looked resignation itself.
“‘Da tobacca I buy dis ma’aning, Bekky,’ me say ma’am,” continued Jack;
“and dat was all. Last night wen me finish de fowl, and bin da clean the
kitchen, who me see, but Bekky. ‘Good even, buddee Jack,’ she said, says
she. ‘Good even, sissee,’ I say, says I. ‘Look, some good tobacca a bring
foo you, Jack,’ she say; and give me a bundle tobacca. So last night,
when I sen in the dinna, I went into the garden foo try dis tobacca.
“Me sit down unda de bread-fruit tree; me tink me see somebody walk in
de garden. Garamighty! me say, wha jumbee want early, early so. Me look
agin, and me see de purson hab big, big beard like Paniole. Me frieghten!
Da who you, me bin go halla out, and bin da go run away, when somebody
hold me fram behind, and chucked grass and ivery ting into my mout, tie
me han an foot, and trow me into the little room way you fin’ me ma’am.”
“And where is your master?” asked Mrs. Willmington.
“Me no know, ma’am,” answered Jack.
“And where are the servants?”
“Me no know, ma’am,” again answered Jack.
“Rummage the house, you simpleton,” said Mrs. Willmington, and lighted
him the way to the other parts. Jack went cautiously, and turned his head
round in all directions.
They entered another room. “Garamighty! Jim, dey tie you, too,” exclaimed
Jack, as his eyes alighted upon the “Jim” who was exactly in the same
predicament from which Jack himself had but a short time ago been
delivered.
The only intimation of intelligence that Jim could make was, rolling his
eyes about.
All the apartments were now searched, and the servants were found,
one here, the other there, among them. They said that they were all
simultaneously laid hold of by a number of “panioles,” and were gagged,
bound hand and foot, and deposited separately in the different rooms.
“And where is your master; and your young master?” asked Mrs. Willmington.
“Dey carry old massa away pon their shoulders, ma’am, and dey took young
massa up-stairs.”
“Heavens!” cried Mrs. Willmington, “and was it not then a spirit?” she
asked.
“He looked more like a paniole than a pirit, ma’am,” said the individual
who gave the information, who was the chief servant in the house, and
whose especial destiny it had been to be gagged and otherwise dealt with
in his pantry, wherein he was at the moment busy about some particulars
connected with his avocation.
“Run up stairs. Go you, Edward, to—to—Mr. ——, the magistrate; alarm the
town; tell the soldiers at the fort,” exclaimed Mrs. Willmington, while
she herself rushed up-stairs with a servant.
Young Willmington was found duly gagged and tied in the favourite style
of the pirates. He was immediately released, and he got up from the bed
on which the kind consideration of the unwelcome visitors had laid him.
He exhibited less pleasure at his freedom than one would have expected to
see.
“What is the matter with you, James?” said Mrs. Willmington, not a little
surprised at the strange calmness of her son. “Do you know that your
father has been carried away from his house?”
“Yes, mother, I know it.”
“Then why not make more haste, James, and go to see about it?” rejoined
Mrs. Willmington.
No answer.
“I shall go,” said young Willmington, after a pause, “but my mind
misgives me about this whole affair. My father ought not to have
concealed the truth from us. The man who came into the house, last night,
is my brother.”
“Your brother!”
“Yes, dear mother; he possesses the family peculiarity,” answered James.
“However, I shall go and alarm the authorities.”
The magistrates were awakened, the alarm was given at the forts, and the
whole town was shortly in commotion. The streets were searched, but no
pirates could be found. A body of soldiers was then marched down to the
wharf, as the reader already knows.
* * * * *
At early dawn the magistrates went alongside the English man-of-war, and
related to the commander what had taken place.
“There is not much mystery about all this, gentlemen,” said the
commander, after he had reflected a moment, “I shall promise you,
that when it is clear, you will be able to see a long, sharp, and
strange-looking schooner in these waters. I have, unfortunately, been
made too familiar of late with the boldness of that set of pirates. I
am so certain of what I am telling you, that I shall at once give orders
for weighing anchor: so that I shall be ready, as soon as it is light, to
give chase, and I shall see,” muttered the commander to himself; “if I
cannot get to windward of those fellows this time.”
True enough, the pirate schooner was seen in the light of the morning
opposite the harbour of Port-of-Spain, but at an immense distance out at
sea.
The heavy sails of the large ship then began leisurely to ascend its
encumbered masts, in preparation for the chase of the pirate vessel.