the monkey. If the monkey behaved itself and proved entertaining
when intoxicated, he might even keep it. The Minorcan fellow set a
good deal of store by it and laborers had no business keeping pets.
The monkey took the glass trustingly--Sebastian had taught it how to
drink from a glass, in the useless way men had. Now it swallowed a
gulp of what was inside the glass. The raw liquor stung its
throat--it coughed and spat in quaint loathing. Mr. Cave
roared--this was even more diverting than he had expected. Then he
felt the monkey's sharp teeth almost meet in his thumb, gave a squeal
of pain, and struck at it blindly with the bottle.
Even so, the monkey might have escaped, if it had not been for its
chain. But the chain tangled its feet as it dodged away--and Mr.
Cave's second blow was better aimed than his first.
He stood looking at the dead animal, stupidly. It bled like a man.
He hadn't really meant to kill it. But he had--and that Minorcan who
owned it was a sullen devil. Well, he'd just have to face it out, if
the ugly little swine tried any tricks on him.
He took the limp body of the monkey gingerly by one leg and threw it
out of the door. It was raining hard, now--the rain would wash some
of the blood off, he thought, inanely. He shivered. Killing an
animal wasn't much, but he wished its hands hadn't looked like a dead
baby's when he picked it up. He shut the door carefully, bolted it,
and returned to his bottle. Now and then he cast an uneasy glance at
the window. If the damn little brute hadn't bitten--it should have
known he had a quick temper and wouldn't stand biting-- His thoughts
trailed off uneasily, into a mist the color of liquor.
Sebastian got back to his hut just before the rain broke, and,
finding the monkey vanished, started to search for it at once. At
first he did not imagine that it could have gone very far and stood
in the doorway, calling, "Amigo! Amigo!" in a crooning voice, for
some time. But when no chattering answered from the darkness, he
became disturbed and started out to visit the huts nearest him. Even
the Greeks answered pleasantly enough--the monkey was quite a
favorite in the colony--but none had any news. A Minorcan woman said
that she had been awakened by the rattling of a chain outside her
window, but that was all.
The rain soaked Sebastian to the skin, as he proceeded on his quest,
but he did not notice it. He grew increasingly distraught and cursed
himself for not having seen that the monkey was securely chained,
before he left the hut. "Amigo! Amigo!" he called again and again,
with a dry throat, and promised his name-saint a candle for every
arrow that had stuck in his flesh. But there was no answer from
either saint or monkey.
He did not know what impulse drove him at last to Mr. Cave's cottage,
save that he hated the man and knew the man hated him. It was there,
however, in the dripping weeds near the house of his enemy, that he
stumbled at last upon the body of his friend. He took it up
silently, the head was still bloody in spite of the rain, and the
wrinkled face stiff and sad. Then, still in silence, with the dead
animal in his arms, he made the complete circuit of the cottage,
trying every door and window, noiselessly. But the doors and windows
were fastened and the house was dark.
He sat down upon the ground then, still holding the monkey, and burst
into a fit of dry sobbing, while the rain beat on him. Then he
returned to his hut.
When he got back, he lit two scraps of candle and placed the monkey's
body between them. Then he stripped himself to the waist, and, going
to the wooden chest that held his few possessions, took out of it a
small brass medal, tarnished green by the damp. On it was the image
of the Mother of God. Her face was quiet--she had seven swords in
her heart. This, together with the knife that Andrew had given him,
he also put on the table between the candles. He then knelt and
began to pray in Mahonese. The form of prayer was one peculiar to
the men of the islands and unacknowledged by Rome. Andrew would have
thought him even too alien, if he had seen him then--the muscles of
his stripped body trembled with the vehemence of his supplication--he
was dedicating Andrew's knife to Our Lady of Vengeance. After a time
had passed, he rose again, put on his soaked shirt, and went stiffly
out to dig the childish grave.
4.
Next morning, in spite of Andrew's resolve, the two friends did not
meet. Instead, Sparta had a wish to go riding through the new-washed
and freshly-scented countryside, and when they returned, Dr. Gentian,
a cloud on his brow, was dismissing a deputation of the elder
Minorcans from his study. He turned to Andrew sharply, the moment he
saw him.
"Was your ride a pleasant one, lad?" he said, abstractedly, "Come
with me a moment--there is something I would have your advice on."
"Certainly, sir," said Andrew, pleased at being consulted. He turned
to Sparta. "You'll excuse me, mistress?" he said lightly.
"I shall excuse you sir," said Sparta smiling, her fingers playing
with the lash of her riding-whip.
Dr. Gentian shut the door of his study. "The Minorcans are making
trouble," he said without preface. "I thought it best you should
know."
"Making trouble?" said Andrew, jarred. He somehow felt that trouble
at this time was an insult to his happiness and Sparta's.
"Yes," said Dr. Gentian. He hesitated. "'Tis a long story. The
gist of it's this. They say they've served their time for their
lands, under our agreement. Now they want them."
Andrew's mind reverted to his encounter with Caterina on that
yesterday that seemed so distant. "The Minorcans will never have
their lands now," she had said.
"Well, sir--" he began judicially.
Dr. Gentian cut him off. "Yes--that was the agreement," he admitted.
"Three years. But there's the religious difficulty. They're
Catholics, every man jack of them--Roman Catholics. Now listen to
me," he tapped his thumb on the table. "When I first took them on my
ships--would they have made conditions then? No. They were
starving. I took them because they were starving. I didn't think
then--They let me take the Greeks because the Greek Church to our
mind's a Protestant church--but if I'd proposed transporting twelve
hundred Catholics to the Floridas as settlers--giving them lands--the
men at Whitehall would have cracked my whole project like an egg. I
had to dissemble a little--how could I refuse starving men?--I
thought once they were settled here--but the present governor's my
enemy, as you know--"
"Even so, sir--" said Andrew, trying to put in a word.
"See here, lad," said Dr. Gentian, very firmly and gently, "Spain's
still plotting to recover the Floridas. If I yield to these men's
demands and give them their lands now--the governor can make a mare's
nest out of it--enough to link me up with any kind of a trumpery
Spanish plot he can bogy the men in England with. Then all New
Sparta falls to the ground--and who gains by it? Your friends, the
Minorcans? No. I must put them off for the present--till we have a
new governor--or--"
"I can see the logic in everything you say, sir," said Andrew, a
trifle stubbornly, "but nevertheless--"
The green stone in Dr. Gentian's ring flashed as he stretched out his
hand to Andrew.
"Have I treated you like a son, Andrew--yes or no?" he said quite
simply, and Andrew felt touched and humbled, but a little trapped as
well. After all, whether or not Dr. Gentian had treated him like a
son had little to do with his treatment of the Minorcans.
"You have always treated me most kindly, sir," he said, a bit
grudgingly, yet hating himself for being grudging. "And yet--"
Dr. Gentian looked hurt. He dropped his hand.
"And yet you are unwilling to take my word on this--even when I
assure you that one of my reasons for going to St. Augustine will be
my wish to remedy the matter with the governor?"
"Of course, I must take your word, sir--if you put it like that,"
said Andrew, in a sudden glow of self-reproach.
"Ah," said Dr. Gentian, and laid a hand on his elbow. "Ah--that's my
good lad!"
5.
Nevertheless, a tiny crack had come in the polished lacquer of his
relation with Dr. Gentian. Dr. Gentian's course of action might be
dictated by an expediency entirely honorable--but there must be a
Minorcan side, if only a mistaken one. Andrew respected the
Minorcans--they had great patience--he could not think of them as
lightly aroused. He intended to find out their side--have a long
talk with Sebastian--discuss things with some of the elders of the
colony. Indeed, he intended much, and as people will, remained
satisfied with the intent, while time drifted away, like a bough of
wild peaches floating on a lazy stream.
The bright retiarius had caught and bound him in a dazzling net--now
its trident poised above him and he did not fear the stroke. His
servitude was too happy--why should he be free?--he ran at a golden
heel.
He did not go so often to the fields, now, or to Sebastian's hut.
For one thing, Dr. Gentian thought he should begin to take up the
accounting and governing side of the plantation. Besides, there were
expeditions for turtle, down the inlet, to be made in Sparta's
company--she handled a boat like a man. There were rides through the
green woods and sandy pine-barrens, and once, a dance at a
neighboring plantation a day's journey away, where he saw divinity
move through the stately patterns of louvre and minuet with a jealous
joy. This was no New York courtship, done up in packthread stays,
but something hardy and wild as a journey up the face of a crag to
take the eggs from the nest of a mountain-eagle, and he rejoiced that
it could be so.
Yet it seemed to him, often enough, that now, in betrothal, he was
less sure of her heart than ever before. Before, she had seemed
strange since she could never be his; now she was to be his indeed,
but she still was strange. He could touch the hand, kiss the lips,
hear the voice speak love, but in the eyes something remained aloof,
a spectator who watched all that befell them both like an enchanter
shut in a tower of clouded glass, without love or hate or sin, with
only a dispassionate interest in the certain working of a spell. If
he could once break that glass with the silver hammer of his
desire--perhaps it would come with marriage and the incantation of
the flesh. But the days passed, and the enchanter watched, and the
glass remained unbroken.
Dr. Gentian went to St. Augustine at last. Andrew would hardly have
noticed his departure, save for one thing. The Pride of the Colonies
was expected with long-delayed mail from the North and might even
bring an answer to the letter he had written his father about his
betrothal. The letter had been written in March and it was nearly
the end of May now. Then he came back to the house, one evening,
after a day at the vats, as Dr. Gentian's deputy, to find his head
heavy and thick, and his hands hot. He had caught a little fever,
somehow, and was ill for several days.
The illness, after the first bad night had passed, gave him a chance
to consider a number of things he had not thought of for some while.
Sparta sent her maid to help nurse him, but did not come often
herself. He was glad of that--he did not want her to see him with
cracked lips and fever in his face. The maid was very quiet and
deft--she had cool hands, and moved without little irritating
creakings and rustlings, unlike most women.
They talked, now and then. She reminded him of Sebastian. He had
been remiss about Sebastian. Sebastian's monkey was dead--he
remembered that, now. He had gone to Sebastian to tell him the great
news and, while Sebastian had been appreciative enough, Andrew saw
that he was sad. He had asked about the monkey.
"Yes, Amigo is dead," said Sebastian, but would say no more, though
he looked at a little brass medal that hung around his neck on a
cord, and Andrew, who was bursting with talk, had felt rebuffed. He
asked the maid about Sebastian now.
"He is well, I think," said the maid, holding a cup to his lips.
Andrew drank of the bitter infusion within it gratefully.
"Don't you ever see him?" he said, smiling, when the cup had been
taken away.
"He asks for you often. He hopes you will be better soon." She
avoided the direct reply.
"Oh, I'll be up and around in no time," said Andrew. "Thanks to your
nursing," he added.
"I am glad if my nursing has helped you," said the maid, rather
haltingly, as if she had to hunt for the English words. "You are a
friend of the Minorcans--or you have been."
"Tell me," said Andrew suddenly. "What did you mean that time in the
corridor when you said the Minorcans would never get their lands?
Dr. Gentian is going to give them their lands as soon as the governor
lets him."
"They will never have their lands," said the girl, sombrely. Her
eyes fixed him. "Sometimes Dr. Gentian sits in his tall room with a
gold cap on his head," she said, abruptly. "He sits there like a
king--he thinks he is a king--_el rey--el rey_--" Her voice rose.
"When he thinks that--men are taken into the woods to have their
backs combed with steel as the coat of a horse is curried by its
servant. That has not happened since you have been here, but it has
happened. He had a madness in him, then--a madness that hides--the
madness of a drunken king. That is why the Minorcans will never have
their lands."
Andrew stared at her, wonderingly. The picture she presented was
wholly fantastic, but he could not doubt the sincerity in her face.
"You're mad!" he said, finally, "Mad or--where did you ever hear such
a crazy tale?"
"I should not have spoken," said the girl, relapsing into her amazing
calm, "You are going to marry my mistress. I should not have spoken."
"What about Mr. Cave?" said Andrew, on impulse. "What do you
Minorcans think of Mr. Cave?"
The girl shrugged her shoulders. "He is a dog," she said, quietly
enough, though a bitterness colored her voice like rust. "He is mad,
too--but only with the madness of a dog."
"You're not very cheerful today," said Andrew, with invalid
peevishness, "And where you ever got such a farrago of nonsense--God
knows I hate Cave as much as any of you can--but you make everything
sound cruel."
She shrugged again. "What do you want me to say?" she said, with
that even bitterness. "Life is cruel. Men that are cruel do no more
than copy life."
"Don't," said Andrew, wincing, "I'm sorry you're so unhappy. You
oughtn't to be so unhappy if you're Sebastian's sweetheart."
"So I am Sebastian's sweetheart?" said the girl and smiled.
"Well--aren't you?"
"Am I? I don't know. How do you know? You are a boy, sometimes--a
little, little boy. You must take your medicine."
"I don't want it," complained Andrew, childishly, "You just gave it
to me, anyhow."
"You must take it often." She approached him with the cup. "It
takes away the fever. See, you are much cooler, this afternoon."
She laid a hand on his forehead--the light touch was cool and firm as
if she had brushed his brow with a ringdove's feather, fallen upon
cool stones.
"There now. Go to sleep. Sleep mends the fever, too."
"Why do you say such things about Dr. Gentian?" said Andrew,
impatiently, but she turned away with her finger on her lips and sat
down again in her chair. He watched her through half-closed eyes,
seeing again the dark Madonna in the niche of the Spanish church, A
single lamp burned before it--the face was calm and secret--the face
of a gypsy saint--a mystery hung above it like a dove in chains. He
could feel the touch of fingers upon his brow, cool as the roots of
lilies, bathed in water from the hills. He lay for a long time
silent, half-drowsing, thinking of Dr. Gentian in a gold cap and a
lamp before an image, and the roots of lilies steeped in a clear,
cold stream.
Next morning the fever had gone; his body felt weak, but no longer
possessed. He lay alone all morning feeling his strength return to
him and listening with mild curiosity to the various noises of the
house. The day was hot and sultry, he could feel that inside his
skin, but his room was cool and he did not mind. He had a
convalescent's desire for visitors and talk, but the only person he
saw till noon was the body-servant who brought his breakfast, and the
boy slipped away before he could question him much.
He asked for Sparta--Miss Gentian was well, but occupied, she sent
her regrets at not being able to visit him till later. Then he asked
for the Minorcan maid. The boy stammered and said that she was
occupied too, on some work for Mrs. Gentian. He noticed that the boy
seemed uneasy and as if he were listening for something in the pauses
of his speech, but laid it to the heat. "Here," said Andrew, feeling
generous, and getting his purse from under his pillow, tossed him one
of the Spanish dollars that still passed current--the boy was a good
servant and deserved an occasional coin. The boy murmured his
thanks, pouched the dollar quickly, and disappeared, leaving Andrew
to idleness and musing.
After a while he fell asleep and woke much refreshed. The house was
very quiet and he began to consider getting up. He looked at his
watch--it had stopped--but, by the light in the room, it must be
mid-afternoon. A tray with food was beside him on the table--someone
must have come and gone without rousing him. He was disturbed at the
thought that it might have been Sparta. He called for his boy, and
no one answered. Then he gave it up and set to his lunch with the
first real hunger he had known in some days.
Later, he was wakened from another nap by an indefinite sound like
the soft closing of the door of his room. He stared at the door--the
curtains near it still moved, but if there had been a visitor, the
visitor had departed. He could have sworn that, in the first
confused instant of waking, he had seen a face staring in through the
closing crack of the door--a face like Sparta's, but not hers, for
the eyes in this face were hostile. A dream, probably--the shadows
had changed again and the air of the room was charged with a heavy,
groping twilight. But as soon as he was fully awake, his decision to
get up was taken. The bed had grown wrinkled and uncomfortable,
besides, he wanted to find out why nobody had been near him all day.
He dressed clumsily, taking a long time. He was not as well as he
had thought, he found--the fever had made him lax, and sweat came on
his hands when he bent to put on his shoes. However, he managed
things at last, and went over to look at himself in the mirror. His
cheeks were a little sunken, and his hair lanker than he would have
liked, but otherwise he seemed much as usual. The effort it was to
control his body properly did not tell in the glass. He would go
downstairs now. He would go down and surprise Sparta with the news
of his recovery.
It would be more difficult to get downstairs than he had supposed.
The main staircase looked long and formidable--he looked at it and
wondered. Then he remembered the other, easier staircase, at the
bottom of the corridor, that led directly to Dr. Gentian's
high-ceiled study. He found it and started going down--it was dark
and winding, but the steps were shorter. He went gingerly and
quietly, for fear of falling. At the landing he paused, remembering,
with a smile, Dr. Gentian's disquisition on the proposed planetary
map for the ceiling. The panel that slid back behind the moon, must
be about here--yes. His fingers found the catch. Mechanically, he
slid it open and peered through the little round opening into the
room below.
What he saw made his fingers shake on the latch of the panel. Sparta
Gentian and Mr. Cave were seated in the study, talking. On the table
between them was a pair of candles that burnt with a still flame,
glasses, and a half-emptied bottle of wine.
"There's no heat in this liquor, Sparta," Cave was complaining in his
grunting accents, "Why can't we have rum, you white doll?--you know
well enough I'd rather have rum." His coat was pushed back, his
shirt open at the throat--his whole face looked stupid and savage as
the mask of a boar. Andrew saw them both very plainly, in spite of
the gloom in the room. A taste like the taste of bitter aloes came
into his mouth, and he felt his heart turn slowly to a dull, hard,
gleaming stone.
"You can't have rum because I choose to talk to you, Charles--not
watch you fall asleep with your head in your arms," Sparta's lyric
voice had never been more flawed with crystal. "If the wine doesn't
suit you--spill it on the floor--I'll wipe it up with my kerchief and
wear it for a favor."
"By God, I believe you would," grumbled Mr. Cave, reaching out for
her hand, "You're a brave wench, Sparta. Come kiss me for a brave
wench."
"Not now," said Sparta steadily. "You smell too much of your wine.
You've had enough kisses from me till you master the world and make
me proud of you."
"You lie, you golden slut!" said Mr. Cave, and thumped his fist on
the table, "I've never had enough of your kisses yet--nor
likely--unless you've grown so finicky-fine this last month you'd
rather have that sick cat in yellow breeches squeeze you because he
sets up for a gentleman--the shopkeeping little snotty-nose! Come
kiss me, I say--I want to get the taste of him out of my mind."
"You're a sweet fool, Charles," said Sparta, and went around to him.
Then Andrew, glaring down at them from his spy-hole, could have
groaned aloud, for he saw divinity incarnate sit down on Mr. Cave's
knees like a barmaid, and Mr. Cave's red hand bend back the golden
head till his mouth could settle with thirsty violence on the lips
that Andrew had kissed in the anguish of a boy's first worship. The
sight made him sick and faint, but he could not move away. A bleak
fascination held him to the hole in back of the moon, through which
he beheld, with incredulous agony, the sky of his self-made universe
fall to pieces with a jangle of shattered glass and lie in broken
stars in the mud at the bottom of the world.
"There," said Mr. Cave, "And there" in the pauses of his noisy
embracements, "That's for every time he's paddled with your hand in
the dark--and that's for every pimping New York dolly-name he's ever
called you! Oh, kiss me, you jewel!" he squeaked in a sort of
ecstasy, "Kiss me and tell me who you love with all your body and
bones!"
"Enough, Charles, enough," said Sparta, drowsily, her voice very
golden. "You know I love no man but you."
"Well, it's time and more that I heard it," said Cave, releasing her.
He seemed to grow quite simple, of a sudden. His voice sank--his
mouth drooped like a child's. "Where do you think I've been since
you two were betrothed? In hell. In the pit of hell. They lie if
they say there's no hell--I know--I've smoked in it. To see him
walking with you, with his hand on your arm. You'd best be true with
me now, wench." He seemed almost pleading, "You'd best be true."
"I am true, Charles."
"But you betrothed--"
She made a gesture. "Father," she said.
"I know your father," said Cave sullenly. "He's a planny man, your
father. He's planned to marry you off to a fool with money ever
since you were husband-high."
She laughed sharply. "My father is a lucky gentleman," she said.
"He may have planned--but God sent him the perfect fool. How can
anyone be so utterly a fool as my Andrew, Charles?"
"He loves you," Cave admitted grudgingly. "A man's blinded, then."
He stared at his fist.
"Granted," she said, jeeringly. "But--if you think you have been in
hell Charles, these last weeks--to have to take that stammering boy
in my arms and give him his lollypop kisses--" Her eyes were bright
with hate, "I may have to marry him yet--but if I do--"
"If you do, he'll never bed you," said Cave, in a rigid voice. "I'd
have his guts on the floor first."
"No," said Sparta, with an edged and terrible smile, "He may bed me
yet, Charles--perhaps--but--he shan't marry me."
"And I tell you," said Cave, starting up, with his eyes little,
burning holes.
She stopped him with a gesture. "Hush, Charles," she said. "You
don't understand me yet, I'd do anything for you, Charles. Sit down
and give me some wine."
He obeyed, muttering. She drank the wine in a gulp and wiped her
lips.
"Tell me, Charles, how soon will you be ready?"
"I have my men picked now," said Cave, in a thick voice, "Italians
mostly. They're ripe. They hate the Mahonese as the devil hates
church-bells."
"And the Mahonese are ready to strike, themselves?"
"If they're not they have no bellies," said Cave, impatiently.
"They've been pushed to the wall. You'd think they'd have broken
before."