AND LAST.
And so it was all over. The mission of De Gourgues was ended. However
bloody the retribution he had wrought upon his enemies, France was
avenged. I was thankful that my flight into the woods had spared me
much of the butchery at Fort San Mateo; what we saw in the forest was
horrible enough, and though by the time we returned the Fort had been
cleared, a dreadful climax to this grim tragedy was being enacted.
As we entered the postern gate we saw De Gourgues standing,--menacing,
sinister and pitiless,--before the ranks of trembling, haggard wretches
who had been spared from the massacre. They were not many; and the
slenderness of their number was a dire augury of the punishment which
was to be theirs. They did not know what was to come. They scanned the
merciless man who stood before them, seeking to find in the lines of
his face one trace of sorrow or pity. But the eyes where pity might
have been were set and fixed; hard as the lines of the nose and mouth.
The brows had lost their melancholy and were drawn into a tangle and
snarl of wrinkles, which took away every vestige of the man I knew and
loved. He returned their look with a glance from which they cowered as
though he had struck them; a glance that meant but one thing, and that
was--the end. A few of them stood upright and fearless; others fell
down upon their knees, whimpering. The end--Holy Virgin! What end? What
death? When the Avenger spoke, his voice was dry and hard as flint.
“Did you think,” he said, “that so vile a treachery, so detestable a
cruelty, against a King so potent and a nation so fearless, would go
unpunished? Hell knows no viler traitor than your master, Menendez
de Avilés, of whom you are but the spawn! No! I am only one of the
humblest of the subjects of my King, but I have charged myself with
avenging the deeds of this Menendez--and yours--against my hapless
countrymen. There is no name base enough to brand your actions, no
punishment sharp enough to requite them. But though you cannot suffer
as you deserve, you shall suffer all that an enemy can honorably
inflict, that your example may teach others to observe the peace and
alliance between our Kings which you have so perfidiously violated.”
Then he waved his hand, and the wretches were marched out through
the gate down to the river. Some of them cried aloud that they would
not go. Others clasped the knees of the French arquebusiers, sobbing
out like women in their degradation that they had helped to hang the
Frenchmen of Fort Caroline, that they had confessed and hoped for
mercy. These were rudely dragged to their feet and prodded with pikes
until they followed the others, trembling in an agony of fear. When
they had come to a place near the river, the Indians pointed out to De
Gourgues the trees upon which the Frenchmen of Fort Caroline had hung.
De Brésac and I knew them well. And upon these same trees without other
speech or ceremony, the Spaniards were hanged.
After it was over, De Gourgues caused tablets of pine to be nailed
over their heads where all men might read. Upon these tablets were
inscriptions burned with a hot iron which read:--
“NOT AS TO SPANIARDS,
BUT AS TO TRAITORS, ROBBERS AND
MURDERERS.”
His vengeance was complete.
* * * * *
That night, when it was dark, De Brésac, Job Goddard and another,
buried De Baçan deep in a sand-dune. Indian messengers were sent to the
river of Tacatacourou to bring the _Vengeance_ and others’ vessels into
the River of May. But at dawn the following morning we saw them passing
the forts at the river’s mouth and we knew that the anxiety of François
Bourdelais had got the better of him. When those on the vessels saw the
standards of France waving upon the battlements of the lower forts,
their cannon boomed forth a joyous salute which was answered there and
at San Mateo. Before noon they anchored near the Fort and I was carried
aboard to Mademoiselle.
I could not suffer her to go ashore while traces of the slaughter were
in such ghastly evidence. For there were sights to cloud and torment
throughout all recollection a mind innocent of the indecencies of life.
Already the vultures were wheeling high over the forest and I prayed
that the business which still kept the Avenger would soon be concluded.
We were sick of the place, and Mademoiselle and I had no desire to go
upon the shore.
In the afternoon Maheera came aboard. Unable to stay at the Tacatacourou
River while these great events were going forward, she had followed us
and lain in concealment since the attack. To Mademoiselle she brought a
message from Olotoraca, who was at the Indian encampment--not dead, but
very sorely wounded from the thrust De Baçan had given him--and who
wished Mademoiselle to go to him.
I would have deterred her, for I knew not what design he might
cherish. Maheera understood me, but she smiled as she had not smiled
since I had seen her.
“The White Giant has no need to fear. Olotoraca knows all, and it is
well. He has a great friendship for the White Giant.”
Mademoiselle started up.
“I must go, Sydney. There will be no harm, and if he wishes me I cannot
leave this land without seeing him. Maheera would not give me bad
counsel.”
“The Moon-Princess will take no hurt.”
I could not be satisfied to have her out of my sight, but asked
Cazenove to take some men and go with her. They were gone a long time,
and when they returned Mademoiselle was smiling and tranquil. Olotoraca
was very weak, but would recover. He said that I, the White Giant, had
parried the blow which had wounded him and so had saved his life. He
wished to live fair in the memory of the White Giant,--he was glad that
the Moon-Princess was safe with me.
“It is not well,” he had said at last, taking Maheera’s hand in his,
“that a man should love at all unless of the people of his own race.”
Had I been able to go to him I would have clasped him heartily by the
hand. But they told me I must lie quiet for fear of setting loose an
artery, and so I stayed on my pallet fanned by the cool breezes of
the sea and blessed by the sight of Diane, who sat near at hand with
beaming eyes, ministering to me.
The capture of the Spanish Fort had in one way been a great godsend
to her. For in the quarters of the women, De Brésac had found a box
full of linen and silks and a few things even that had been brought to
Florida by Mademoiselle herself. These the Chevalier sent to her with
a gracious word as her share of the spoils. The silks were of no very
recent fashion to be sure, but all the gold and silver in the world
could not have contributed so much as these to Mademoiselle’s content.
Nor were they of any particular kind of shape, hanging about her
slender figure like lean biscuit-bags. But with ready grace and wit she
made shift to fasten and tuck them, so that after all they were none
so bad as they might have been. She was so sweet and graceful a sight
to my eyes that I feared should I close them I would lose not only the
vision but the reality, and find myself again upon the sand-spit,--at
Paris,--or in the forest,--seeking her ever with new hopes which were
born only to be blasted again and again.
At last I slept; and the morning sun was breaking across the narrow
cabin as I wakened. When I had eaten, I felt so strong and well that I
would have risen, but Diane pressed me quietly by the shoulders and
would not permit it. After awhile, when all was ready, my pallet was
carried up on the after-castle, in the shadow of an awning, where I
lay with several others and watched the fellows upon the shore. They
were busy as bees and I felt a lazy dolt to be lying there twiddling my
thumbs.
Two or three times the unruly and riotous spirit, engendered by
shedding of blood, broke forth among the Frenchmen; but so complete was
the control and discipline which De Gourgues had put upon them that
little harm was done. Once they had broken into a wine cask without
his knowledge, and there was like to be a repetition of the affair of
Cabouche. It is a strange thing that Cabouche himself, who had often
made good his boast of bully of the fore-castle, should have been the
one to put this small mutiny down. For he stood in the doorway of the
wine room pointing his arquebuse toward his companions and vowing he
would shoot the one who advanced. It was said, when it was done and
they had retreated, that he disappeared into the darkness and took a
good paunch-full himself, coming forth with a strong smell of alcohol
hanging about him.
In the afternoon there was a wonderful scene. De Gourgues gathered all
the Indians about him under the battlements and, through Dariol, made
them a long speech. From time to time they uttered loud cries which
broke in upon his words. When he had done, a prolonged yell came from
the savages and they swarmed over the ill-fated Fort, looking not
unlike a swarm of ants upon a hill of their own. They rushed through
the living quarters and the barracks and out upon the roofs tearing
and rending until it seemed as though some movement of the earth or
elements were splitting the buildings to pieces. In two hours the
corps-de-garde was razed to the ground. Meanwhile a great number had
mounted the battlements and with pikes, pieces of iron, and any rough
implements that came to hand, began prying the stones from their
places. With savage cries of exultation they tossed these out into the
river or threw them in the ditch or thicket. A dust arose which hid
them from our sight, but they worked on, as though maddened, in the
heat and glare until sundown, when not one stone was left upon another.
It was a whirlwind of ruin.
That night when I heard the preparations above me for sailing on the
morrow, it seemed impossible that only a week and three days had
passed since we had come to anchor in the Tacatacourou--since we had
made our league--found Mademoiselle--passed the hardships of the march
and attack, and come to the successful ending of our expedition. De
Gourgues said little. When he had finished speaking to the Indians
he had come aboard and set all the seamen to work stowing the vessel
and breaking out the spars and sails for the voyage. That night
Mademoiselle and Maheera bade a tearful good-by, for they had come to
love each other with a fond affection; and to this day I cannot forget
the services the Indian maiden did for me and mine. On the morrow the
anchors were broken out, and with a favoring breeze we moved slowly
down the river toward the sea; while the Indians, shouting messages
of good will to us, ran along the banks until the freshening wind had
driven us from their sight.
When the ships passed the smaller forts I could see that there too the
work of destruction had been complete; for the stones and fascines were
scattered in all directions, and only a few overturned and broken gun
rests showed where the bastions had been. We sailed out over the bar at
high tide and with a last salute to our friendly hosts we set our prow
squarely abreast the broad surges, for France. In a few days I could
almost crawl about the decks without an arm to steady me. In two weeks
I went about some simple duties; and in the long summer twilights,
Mademoiselle and I would sit high up on the slanting after-castle near
the lanthorns, looking back down the pink, swirling wake toward the
land where we had both suffered so much. Of De Baçan we spoke but once.
I let fall a word of regret that so gallant and splendid a fighter
should have been of so ill-favored a disposition. But Mademoiselle
made me no reply. With the thought how near she had come to falling
into his hands after the capture of Fort Caroline, she shuddered, drew
closer to me and would hear of him no more. We had too many present
joys to conjure up the miseries that were past. We had been born into
a new world of our own and we peopled it with fancies as blithe as
ourselves. Under the laughing stars we were creatures of unreality,
unconscious of all save the great love which had conquered everything.
De Gourgues sat with us sometimes, but not for long; for there is no
pain keener than that which comes from seeing a forbidden joy through
the eyes of another.
My tale is soon ended. We reached Rochelle after a voyage of little
event, and were greeted with great honor. So soon as it could be
accomplished,--and that was with such speed of habit and frock making
as was never known before or since,--Diane and I were married. The
endurance and strength of heart which bore her up in all her sufferings
among those wild western forests has, to this day of our age and
contentment, been my sturdiest prop in time of stress. I need not tell
at length how, through Coligny, the prize money for the _San Cristobal_
was turned over at last to Captain Hooper; and how upon a certain
successful voyage from Plymouth I came to be his second in command, nor
how I owned my own vessel before my mistress had Domenique and little
Diane well out of their swaddling clothes. The Chevalier de Brésac
has come back from his voyage with Sir Walter Raleigh. M. de Teligny
is dead, leaving the Chevalier a great fortune, and he is now out
upon a venture of his own. Job Goddard, hoary headed and staunch, but
convincing and windy-worded as ever, sits smoking at his window in the
Pelican with Martin Cockrem. And the two rogues, gathering the growing
youth of the docks about them, with easy elaboration, tell wonderful
yarns of voyages to strange countries where people walk upside down,
and of a preference use their toes for fingers, to which the urchins
listen, their wide mouths agape and their eyes agog with curiosity. Job
has set about planting a patch of tobacco at Plymouth; but his pursuit
has fared ill, and so he gets the leaf in bales from the ships that
come laden to Plymouth from the western main.
It is history how De Gourgues was spurned at Paris by that weakling,
Charles; how our own good Queen Bess of England offered him a command,
and how Charles thereupon relented, and would have given him a position
of authority. But De Gourgues was never a stranger to adversity; and
through it all, his great grief has ever been that Menendez de Avilés
escaped the vengeance at San Mateo, of which he had been the dearest
object. This malefactor died full of honor and riches, high in the
favor of Philip of Spain, who, had he lived, would have given him
command of the great Armada.
That Spanish fleet, so long threatened, has come and gone. Through
the good offices of Sir Francis Drake and Lord Howard, for both of
whom my father had performed some service, I was given considerable
responsibility and command upon Drake’s own _Revenge_, acquitting
myself to the great Admiral’s satisfaction. So that I came into the
royal service again as commander of the _White Bear_, and gained for
myself many emoluments and honors. By great good fortune I thus won
my way into the notice of the Queen, and so, through her generosity,
was enabled in some sort to restore my family to the prestige it had
enjoyed before the imprudences and generosities of my grandfather and
father had depleted the value of the estates. I lay no claim to credit
for these achievements. Had it not been for Diane, I should have made
no attempt to regain the position of my family before the Court. Her
soft influences, strong and womanly, have weaned me away from the
boisterous habits of my wild young life, and have shown me the value
of the refinements which come of gentle living: With the death of the
Queen Mother, in France, there came, too, a change in the fortunes of
Diane and the great Henry--the greatest, Henry of Navarre,--with that
rare grace which has ever distinguished him, has given back again the
estate of La Notte, at Villeneuve, to my wife. Thither, at certain
seasons, we go; forming thus another link, not without a certain value,
between two great Christian monarchs.
Diane has built a summer-house on her estate, and she has fashioned it
after the lodge of Olotoraca, where during those long months she waited
for me. It is not in a wild pine forest, where every night the winds
may sing their grand and lonely psalms. It is on the borders of a quiet
lake, where soft sweeping willows whisper with the rippling water, and
tall poplars, like sentinels, guard us against the legions of unrest.
When the sun has set, and the slender moon has sailed out across the
deep green vault above us, then we sit, hand-in-hand, dreaming and at
peace, I--and Mademoiselle.
THE END.
Transcriber’s Notes:
--Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
--Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
--Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
--Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.
--Incorrect chapter numbers for Chapters XXIV (p. 329), XXV (p. 344)
and XXVI (p. 361) were adjusted to match the Table of Contents.
End of Project Gutenberg's In Search of Mademoiselle, by George Gibbs