BENICIA MAKES A BARGAIN
Except for the two unsightly objects that lay in the soft moonlight,
there was no sign of Herrero's boys when Ormsgill walked up the
stairway with a rifle in his hand. A little smoke curled from the
breech which he opened before he shook hands with Nares.
"It's fortunate I knew where you were, and came round to pick you up,"
he said, and turned to the head of the station, who leaned upon the
balustrade apparently shaken and bewildered by what had happened.
"I came up behind Herrero most of the way, and when there were signs
that we were getting closer I sent one of my boys on to creep in upon
his camp two or three days ago. From what he told me when he came back
I fancied there was mischief on foot, and I pushed on as fast as
possible. Considering everything, it seems just as well I did."
The other man appeared unwilling to let his gaze wander beyond the
veranda, which was in one way comprehensible. There was shrinking in
his face, and his voice was strained and hoarse.
"It was so sudden--it has left me a trifle dazed," he said. "I am
almost afraid the trouble is not over yet."
Ormsgill smiled reassuringly. "I scarcely think--you--have any cause
to worry. There is no doubt that Herrero inspired his boys, and
attempts of this kind, as no doubt you are aware, have been made on
mission stations before, but it's certain he would disclaim all
knowledge of what they meant to do, and will be quite content to let
the matter go no further. That is, at least, so far as anybody
connected with the Mission is concerned."
"I am afraid he may find some means of laying the blame on you."
"It is quite likely," and Ormsgill laughed. "After all, it's a thing
I'm used to, and, you see, I'm proscribed already. As it happens, so
is Nares. He should never have left me. I have no doubt Herrero, who
has friends in authority, will endeavor to make him regret his share
in to-night's proceedings."
Nares glanced at one of the rigid figures that lay beneath him in the
moonlight. He saw the naked black shoulders, and the soiled white
draperies that had fallen apart from the ebony limbs, and a little
shiver ran through him. The heat of the conflict had vanished now, and
the pale light showed that his face was drawn and gray.
"I struck that man," he said. "I don't know what possessed me, but I
think I meant to kill him. In one way, the thing is horrible."
"Well," said Ormsgill dryly, "it is also very natural. The impulse you
seem to shrink from is lurking somewhere in most of us. In any case,
the man is certainly dead. I looked at him as I came up."
He stopped a moment, and leaned somewhat heavily upon the balustrade
with his eyes fixed on the dusky form of the negro. "The meanest thing
upon this earth is the man who sides with the oppressor and tramples
on his own kind. Still, though I think what I did was warranted, that
was not why I shot those men. One doesn't always reason about these
matters, as I fancy you understand."
He turned, and looked at Nares who, after a momentary shrinking,
steadily met his gaze. The man was wholly honest, and the thing was
clear to him. He had struck at last, shrewdly, in a righteous cause,
and nobody could have blamed him, but, as had happened in his
comrade's case, human bitterness had also nerved the blow.
"Well," he said slowly, "you and I, at least, will probably have to
face the results of it."
Again Ormsgill laughed, but a little glint crept into his eyes. "As I
pointed out, we are both of us outlawed, with the hand of every white
man in this country against us, but we have still a thing to do, and
somehow I almost think it will be done."
Then he turned to the man in charge of the Mission. "Nares is coming
away with me. There are several reasons that make it advisable. It is
very unlikely that anybody will trouble you further about this affair,
and if the blame is laid on us it can't greatly matter. The score
against one of us is a tolerably long one already--and if my luck
holds out it may be longer. There is just another point. Shall I take
those two boys below away for you?"
"No," said the other man quietly. "There is, at least, one duty we owe
them."
Ormsgill made a little gesture. "The bones of their victims lie thick
along each trail to the interior, but, after all, that is probably a
thing for which they will not be held responsible. In the meanwhile,
there are one or two reasons why I should outmarch Herrero if it can
be done. When Nares is ready we will go on again."
Nares was ready in a few minutes, and shaking hands with the two men
who went down the veranda stairway with them, they struck into the
path that led up the steep hillside. Ormsgill's boys plodded after
them, but when they reached the crest of the ridge that overhung the
valley Nares sat down, gasping, in the loose white sand, and looked
down on the shadowy mission. He could see its pale lights blinking
among the leaves.
"It stands for a good deal that I have done with," he said. "It is a
strange and almost bewildering thing to feel oneself adrift."
"Still," said Ormsgill, "now and then the bonds of service gall."
Nares made a little gesture. "Often," he said. "Perhaps I was not
worthy to wear the uniform and march under orders with the rank and
file, but I think the Church Militant has, after all, a task for the
free companies which now and then push on ahead of her regular
fighting line."
"They march light," said Ormsgill. "That counts for a good deal. It
has once or twice occurred to me that the authorized divisions are a
little cumbered by their commissariat and baggage wagons."
Nares sighed. "Well," he said softly, "every one must, at least now
and then, leave a good deal that he values or has grown attached to
behind him." He stopped a moment, and then asked abruptly, "You have
heard from the girl at Las Palmas. Desmond would bring you letters?"
"No," said Ormsgill, "not a word. She had no sympathy with my
project--that she should have was hardly to be expected. One must
endeavor to be reasonable."
"There must have been a time when you expected--everything."
Ormsgill sat silent a minute or two, and while he did so a moving
light blinked among the trees below. It stopped at length, and negro
voices came up faintly with the thud of hastily plied shovels. It
seemed that the terrified converts were coming back and the
missionaries had already set them a task. Ormsgill knew what it was,
but he looked down at the rifle that glinted in the moonlight across
his knee with eyes that were curiously steady. The thing he had done
had been forced upon him. Then he turned to his companion, and though
he was usually a reticent man he spoke what was in his mind that
night.
"There certainly was such a time," he said. "No doubt it has come to
others. For five long years I held fast by the memory of the girl I
had left in England, and I think there were things it saved me from.
Somehow there was always a vague hope that one day I might go back to
her--and for that reason I kept above the foulest mire. One goes under
easily here in Africa. Then at last the thing became possible."
He broke off, and laughed, a curious little laugh, before he went on
again.
"I went back. Whether she was ever what I thought her I do not
know--perhaps, I had expected impossibilities--or those five years had
made a change. We had not an idea that was the same, and the world she
lives in is one that has grown strange to me. They think me slightly
crazy--and it is perfectly possible that they are right. Men do lose
their mental grip in Africa."
Nares made a little gesture which vaguely suggested comprehension and
sympathy before he looked at his comrade with a question in his eyes.
"Yes," said Ormsgill quietly, "I am going on. After all, I owe the
girl I thought she was a good deal--and to plain folks there is safety
in doing the obvious thing." His voice softened a little. "It may be
hard for her--in fact when I went back she probably had a good deal to
bear with too. One grows hard and bitter when he has lived with the
outcasts as I have done."
Nares understood that he meant what other men called duty by the
obvious thing, but the definition, which he felt was characteristic of
the man, pleased him. He was one who could, at least, recognize the
task that was set before him, and, as it happened, he once more made
this clear when he rose and called to the boys who had flung
themselves down on the warm white sand.
"Well," he said, "we have now to outmarch Herrero, and there is a good
deal to be done."
They went on, Ormsgill limping a little, for his wound still pained
him, and vanished into the shadows of the bush, two weary,
climate-worn men who had malignant nature and, so far as they knew,
the malice of every white man holding authority in that country
against them. Still, at least, their course was clear, and in the
meanwhile they asked for nothing further.
It also happened one afternoon while they pushed on through shadowy
forest and steaming morass that a little and very ancient gunboat
crept along the sun-scorched coast. Her white paint, although very far
from fresh, gleamed like ivory on the long dazzling swell that changed
to a shimmering sliding green in her slowly moving shadow, for she was
steaming eight knots, and rolling viciously. Benicia Figuera, who swung
in a hammock hung low beneath her awnings, did not, however, seem to
mind the erratic motion. She was watching the snowy fringe of
crumbling surf creep by, though now and then her eyes sought the far,
blue hills that cut the skyline. Her thoughts were with the man who
was wandering in the dim forests that crept through the marshes beyond
them.
By and by she aroused herself, and looked up with a smile at the man
who strolled towards her along the deck. She had met him before at
brilliant functions in Portugal where he was a man of importance, and
he had come on board in state a few hours earlier from a little
sweltering town above a surf-swept beach whose citizens had seriously
strained its finances to do him honor. He was dressed simply in plain
white duck, a little, courtly gentleman, with the look of one who
rules in his olive-tinted face. He sat down in a deck chair near the
girl.
"After all, it is a relief to be at sea," he said. "One has quietness
there."
Benicia laughed. "Quietness," she said, "is a thing you can hardly be
accustomed to Señor. Besides, you are in one way scarcely
complimentary to the citizens yonder."
"Ah," said her companion, "it seems they expect something from me and
it is to be hoped that when they get it some of them will not be
disappointed. I almost think," and he waved a capable hand, "that
before I am recalled they will not find insults bad enough for me."
Benicia felt that this was quite possible. Her companion was she knew
a strong man as well as an upright one, who had been sent out not long
ago with ample powers to grapple with one or two of the questions
which then troubled that country. It was also significant that while
he was known as a judicious and firm administrator his personal views
on the points at issue had not been proclaimed. Benicia had, however,
guessed them correctly, and she took it as a compliment that he had
given her a vague hint of them. Perhaps, he realized it, for he
watched her for a moment with a shrewd twinkle in his dark eyes.
"Señorita," he said, "I almost think you know what I was sent out here
to do. One could, however, depend upon Benicia Figuera considering it
a confidence."
The girl glanced out beneath the awnings across the sun-scorched
littoral towards the blue ridge of the inland plateau before she
answered him.
"Yes," she said, "it was to cleanse this stable. I almost think you
will find it a strong man's task."
Her companion made a gesture of assent. "It is, at least, one for
which I need a reliable broom--and I am fortunate in having one
ready."
"Ah," said Benicia, "you of course mean my father. Well, I do not
think he will fail you, and though he has not actually told me so, I
fancy he has, at least, been making preparations for the sweeping."
The man looked at her and smiled, but when a moving shaft of sunlight
struck him as the steamer rolled she saw the deep lines on his face
and the gray in his hair. He, as it happened, saw the little gleam of
pride in her eyes, and then the light swung back again and they were
once more left in the shadow. Yet in that moment a subtle elusive
something that was both comprehension and confidence had been
established between them.
"Dom Clemente," he said, "is a man I have a great regard for. There is
a good deal I owe him, as he may have told you."
"He has told me nothing."
The man spread his hands out. "After all, it was to be expected. He
and I were comrades, Señorita, before you were born, and there was a
time when I made a blunder which it seemed must spoil my career. There
was only one man who could save me and that at the hazard of his own
future, but one would not expect such a fact to count with your
father. Dom Clemente smiled at the peril and the affair was arranged
satisfactorily."
Again he made a little grave gesture. "It happened long ago, and now
it seems I am to bring trouble on him again. Still, the years have not
changed him. He does not hesitate, but I feel I must ask your
forbearance, Señorita. You have, perhaps, seen what sometimes happens
when one does one's duty."
Benicia smiled, a little bitterly. "Yes," she said, "I know that the
man who is so rash as to attempt it in this country is usually
recalled in disgrace. Still, it is not a thing that happens very
frequently. Dom Clemente is to be made the scapegoat."
"I think," said the man gravely, "I may be strong enough to save him
that. It is possible, as I have told him, that he will be
recalled--but what he has done will stand."
He spoke at last as a ruler, with authority, and a trace of sternness
in his eyes, but his face changed again.
"Señorita," he said, "if it happens, I think you will not grudge it,
or blame me."
The girl saw the opportunity she had been waiting for. "As you have
admitted, you owe my father something, and now you have asked
something more. Is it not conceivable that you owe me a little, too. I
am an influence here--and it would be different in Lisbon if Dom
Clemente was sent home again. Besides, sometimes he will listen to me.
Now and then a woman has made a change in a man's policy, and, though
it is a little more difficult when the man is one's father, it might
be done again."
"Ah," said her companion, "you wish to make a bargain."
"It would be too great a condescension, Señor," and Benicia laughed.
"I want a promise that is to be unconditional. Some day, perhaps, I
shall ask you to do something for me. Then you will do it whatever it
is."
The man looked up at her with a little dry smile, but, as he admitted,
he owed her father a good deal, and he was not too old for gallantry.
Besides that, he had the gift of insight, and a curious confidence in
this girl. He felt she would not ask him anything that was not
fitting.
"The request," he said, "is a little vague, and perhaps, I am a trifle
rash, but I almost think I can promise that what you ask shall be
done."
Benicia, reaching out from the hammock, touched him with her fan.
"Now," she said, "I know what you think of me. How shall I make my
poor acknowledgments? Still, there is another thing. You will discover
presently that the brooms of the State are slow. There are two men not
among its servants who have commenced the sweeping already. I think
Dom Clemente knows this, but you will not mention it to him."
Her companion glanced at her sharply with a sudden keenness in his
eyes, but he said nothing, and the girl smiled again.
"When you hear of them I would like you to remember that they are
friends of mine," she said. "You will, of course, recognize that
nobody I said that of could do anything that was really
reprehensible."
"I might admit that it was unlikely," said her companion.
"Then," said Benicia, "when the time comes I would like you to
remember it. That is another thing you will promise."
She flashed one swift glance at her companion, who smiled, and then
looked round as Dom Clemente and two of the gunboat's officers came
towards them along the deck. She roused herself to talk to them, and
succeeded brilliantly, now and then to the momentary embarrassment of
the officers, who were young, while the man with the gray hair lay in
a deck chair a little apart watching her over his cigar. She was
clever, and quick-witted, but he knew also that she was like her
father, one who at any cost stood by her friends. At the same time he
was a little puzzled, for, in the case of a young woman, friend is a
term of somewhat vague and comprehensive significance, and she had
mentioned that there were two of them. That appeared to complicate the
affair, but he had, at least, made a promise, and it was said of him
that when he did so he usually kept it, though it was now and then in
a somewhat grim fashion. There were also men in the sweltering towns
beside the surf-swept beach the gunboat crawled along who would have
felt uneasy had they known exactly why he had been sent out to them.