THE OUTLAW'S WIFE.
For some moments Pet continued to struggle violently, but finding all
her efforts vain--worse than vain--and being half-suffocated for want of
air, she fell back in her captor's arms, and lay perfectly still and
quiet.
In that dreadful moment, she lost not one particle of her customary
self-possession. She realized all her danger and peril vividly. She knew
she was completely in the power of her worst enemy, and beyond all hope
of extricating herself. Her whole appalling danger burst upon her at
once; and though for one instant her very heart seemed to cease its
beating, she neither fainted nor gave herself up to useless tears or
hysterics, according to the usual custom of young ladies, when in real
or imaginary danger. Not she, indeed! Pet's thoughts as she lay quietly
in her captive's arms, ran somewhat after the following fashion:
"Well, Pet, child, you've went and put your foot in it beautifully,
haven't you? Ain't you ashamed of yourself, to let Rozzel Garnet catch
you, and lug you along like this? I wonder where they're going to bring
me to, anyway, and what they're going to do with me next? Oh! won't
there be weeping and gnashing of teeth, and pulling off of wigs at home
when they find I've gone, vanished, evaporated, made myself 'thin air,'
and no clue to my whereabouts to be found? Phew! this _villainous_ shawl
is fairly smothering me. I wish I could slip it off for about five
minutes; and the way I'd yell would slightly astonish Mr. Garnet. I
suppose papa will have flaming posters stuck up all around Judestown, in
every color of the rainbow. I fancy I'm reading one of them: 'Lost,
strayed, stolen, or run off with some deluded young man, a small, brown,
yellow and black girl, not quite right in her head, wearing a
red-and-green silk dress, with black eyes, a pair of gaiter boots, and
black hair. Any person or persons giving information concerning the
above will be liberally rewarded with from five to ten cents, and
possess the everlasting gratitude of the community generally.' That's
it! I wonder where they're taking me to? We're down on the beach now,
for I can hear the waves on the shore. Good gracious! If they should
carry me off to sea, the matter would be _sea_rious. 'Pon my word and
honor! if I ever get out of this scrape, if I don't make Mr. Rozzel
Garnet mind what he's up to, then my name's not Pet--Ur-r-r! I'm
strangling, I declare. Suffocation must be a pleasant death, if I may
judge by this specimen!"
While Pet was thus cogitating, Rozzel Garnet and his companion were
rapidly striding over the wet, slippery beach. A being more perfectly
guileless than Pet, in some ways, never existed, and this may in some
measure account for the light manner in which she treated her captivity.
Saucy, spirited, daring, full of exuberant life, fun, freedom and
frolic, she was; but, withal, in some matters her simplicity was
perfectly wonderful. For instance, she knew now she was a prisoner; she
fancied she might be taken off somewhere, or held captive for a while.
But she had the most perfect faith in her own wit, cunning and courage
to ultimately escape. She feared no worse fate; she knew of none; she
never even dreamed of any. She knew Rozzel Garnet pretended to love
her--might urge her again to marry him; but that gave her not the
slightest uneasiness in the world. In fact, Pet's love of adventure made
her almost like this scrape she had got into. It would be something to
talk about for the rest of her life; it made her quite a heroine, this
being carried off; it was really like something she had so often read of
in novels, or like a tragedy in a play.
With these sentiments, Pet lay quite still, listening intently, and
wondering what was to come next. It seemed to her they must have walked
nearly half an hour, when they came to a dead halt, and she heard Rozzel
Garnet say:
"Now, Bart, give the signal quick!"
A low, shrill, peculiar whistle followed; and then Pet, whose ears would
have run themselves into points to hear the better, if she could, heard
a rustling, as if of bushes pushed aside; a heavy sound, as if of rocks
removing; and then Garnet, gathering her tighter in his hated embrace,
stooped down, and passed through something which she knew must be a
narrow aperture, and thence, carefully guiding himself with one hand
while he held her with the other, he descended a short flight of steps.
Then he paused, and, to the great relief of our half-stifled heroine,
removed the thick shawl in which he had enveloped her. Pet's first use
of her breath was to burst out angrily with:
"Well, it's a wonder you took the blamed thing off until you choked me
dead! You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Mr. Garnet, smothering a
young lady this way, in a big blanket like that. I wish you'd let me go.
I don't want to be carried like a baby any longer."
"Not so fast, pretty one," said Garnet, in a low tone of mocking
exultation. "Be in no haste to quit these arms, for they are to be your
home for the future."
"Humph! a pretty home they would be!" said Pet, contemptuously. "You'll
have to consult me about that, Mr. Rozzel Garnet. Let me go, I tell you!
I want to walk. A body might as well let a bear carry them as you!"
"As you please, my pretty lady-love!" said Garnet. "I do not think you
will escape so easily this time as you did the last! That was your hour
of victory: this is mine. Then you said neither earth, air, fire, nor
water could hold you. Perhaps stout walls of rock can?"
"Don't be too sure, Mr. Garnet. There is such a thing as blowing up
rocks, or an earthquake might happen, or the sea might overflow, or you
and all your brothers in villainy might get paralytic strokes, or Satan
might come and carry off the whole of you bodily to your future home.
I'm sure I wish he would. You'll be an ornament to it when you get
there--a 'burning and shining light,' in every sense of the word! Ain't
you proud of yourself to have carried off a little girl so beautifully?
When you found you couldn't do it alone you got another to help you,
and so you bravely won the battle. Two great, big men to carry off one
little girl! What an achievement! What a victory! You ought to have a
leather medal and a service of tin plate presented to each of you! Oh
my!" said Pet, in tones of withering irony.
Had it not been pitch dark where they stood, Pet would have seen his
sallow face blanch with anger; but subduing his rage in the comforting
thought that this little double-refined essence of audacity was
completely in his power, he smiled an evil and most sinister smile, and
replied:
"Jet, flash, and sparkle, little grenade! Dart fire, little stiletto,
but you can do no more! Snarl and show your white teeth, little kitten;
but your claws are shielded--you cannot bite now. Expand your wings, my
bright little humming-bird; but you will find them clipped. Try to soar
to your native heaven, my dazzling, glorious bird of paradise; and your
drooping plumes will fall, fluttering and earth-stained, to the dust."
"Well, that all sounds mighty fine, Mr. Garnet, and is a grand flourish
of rhetoric on your part. I made no doubt but you'll excuse me if I
don't understand a single blessed word of it. You're a schoolmaster,
and, of course, ought to understand what's proper; but your grand tropes
and figures of speech are all a waste of powder and shot when addressed
to me. Just talk in plain English, and don't keep calling me names, and
I'll feel greatly obliged. What a grenade and all them other things are
I haven't the remotest idea; but I expect they're something dreadful
bad, or you wouldn't keep calling me them. It's real impolite in you to
talk so; and I wonder you ain't ashamed of yourself, Rozzel Garnet!"
"No, you don't understand, Miss Lawless," he said slowly, and with the
same evil smile. "Shall I tell you in plainer words my meaning?"
"No, you needn't bother yourself," said Pet, shortly. "The less you say
to me the better I'll like it. I'm not in the habit of talking to the
offcasts of society, such as you are, Mr. Garnet; and, like frog-soup,
though it does well enough for a time, one doesn't like it as a constant
thing."
"Here, push on! push on!" said the gruff voice of Black Bart behind
them. "No use standing palavering here all night. Get along, Rozzy,
boy, and taking this little snapping-turtle along with you. Up with the
glim, Jack, till ma'm'selle sees where she's going."
All this time they had been wrapped in the blackness of Tartarus, but
now the two men descended the stone steps, and one of them, holding up a
dark-lantern, let its rays stream round. Pet curiously cast her eyes
about and saw she was in a narrow, rocky passage, with her head not more
than an inch from the top. How far it led she could not tell, for the
rays of light penetrated but a few feet, and beyond that stretched a
black, yawning chasm that might have been the entrance into Pandemonium
itself.
"Now, in we goes," said Black Bart, giving Pet a slight push forward.
"Go first, Rozzy, lad, and show little mustard-seed, here, the way. Jack
and I will keep in your wake."
"Mustard-seed and snapping-turtle," muttered Pet, as she prepared to
follow Garnet. "Pet, my dear, you will have as many _aliases_ before
long as the most notorious blackleg from here to the Cannibal Islands.
Well, if I'm not in a fix to-night! What will they say at home?"
As they went on the passage grew wider and broader, until at last Pet
found herself in a spacious rock-bound apartment, well lighted, rudely
furnished, and occupied by some half-dozen rough, hard-looking men in
the garb of sailors. They were lying in various attitudes about the
floor, with the exception of two, who sat at a rough deal-table playing
cards.
They turned their eyes carelessly enough as Rozzel Garnet entered; but
as their eyes fell upon Pet each man sprung to his feet, and stared at
her in undisguised wonder.
There she stood, in the full glare of the light; her slender, girlish
form drawn up to its full height; her brilliant silk dress flashing and
glittering in the light; her short, dancing, flashing curls of jet
falling around her crimson cheeks; her bright, undaunted black eyes wide
open, and returning every stare as composedly as though she were sitting
in her father's hall, and these men were her servants. Very much out of
place looked Pet, in her rich, sheeny robes and dazzling beauty, amid
those roughly-clad, savage-looking men, and in that dismal under-ground
apartment.
"Where is she?" asked Rozzel Garnet, unheeding their blank stare of
surprise.
"Who?--the missis?" asked one of the men, without removing his eyes from
Pet.
"Yes--of course."
The man pointed to the remote end of the room; and Pet, turning her eyes
in that direction saw a sort of opening in the wall, serving evidently
for a door, and covered by a screen of thick, dark baize.
Garnet went toward it and called:
"Madame Marguerite."
"Well," said a woman's voice from within, with a strong foreign accent.
"Can I see you a moment, on business?"
"Yes--enter." And Pet saw a small, delicate-looking hand push aside the
screen, and Garnet disappeared within.
"Here, little nettle, sit down," said Black Bart, pushing a stool toward
Pet, gallantly, with his foot. "How do you like the looks of this here
place, young woman?"
"Well," said Pet, "I should say there was no danger of thieves breaking
in at night; and by the look of things, I don't expect they would find
much for their pains, if they did break in. There's no danger of its
blowing down windy nights--is there?"
"Well, no, I reckon there isn't," said Black Bart with a grin, "seeing
it's right under a hill, and nothing but solid rocks above and below."
"A strong foundation," said Pet; "Like the true Church it's built on a
rock. I should think it would be damp, though, when the tide rises and
fills it; and I am subject to rheumatism--"
"No danger," said Bart. "I'll risk your drowning. There! Garnet's
calling you. Go in there."
Pet arose, and Garnet, holding back the baize screen, motioned her to
enter. She obeyed and looked curiously around.
The room was smaller than the one she had left and better furnished. The
rocky floor was covered with India matting, and chairs, couches, and
tables were strewn indiscriminately around. A bed with heavy curtains
stood in one corner, and a stand containing books, writing materials,
and drawing utensils stood opposite. Pet gave all these but a fleeting
glance, and then her whole attention was caught and occupied by the
person who stood between them, with one hand resting on the back of a
chair, and her eyes fixed with a sort of stem, haughty scrutiny on Pet.
It was a woman of some five-and-thirty years of age, of middle size, and
dressed in a solid and frayed black satin dress. Her face had evidently
once been very handsome; for it still bore traces of former beauty; but
now it was thin, sallow, and faded--looking still more faded in contrast
with the unnaturally large, lustrous black eyes by which it was lit up.
Her hair, thick and black, hung disordered and uncombed far over her
shoulders, while jewels flashed from the pendants in her ears, and
sparkled on the small, beautiful hands. Something in that face moved Pet
as nothing had ever done before--there was such a look of proud, sullen
despair in the wild, black eyes; a sort of fierce haughtiness in the
dark, weird face; a look of passionate impatience, hidden anguish,
undying woe, in the slumbering depths of those gloomy, haunting eyes,
that Pet wondered who she could be, or what great sorrow she had ever
endured. There was an air of refinement about her, too--a lofty,
commanding hauteur that showed she was queen and mistress here, and as
far above the brutal men surrounding her as heaven is above the earth.
"This is the girl, Madame Marguerite," said Garnet, respectfully, "I
entrust her to your care until the captain comes."
"She shall be cared for. That will do," said the woman, waving her hand
until all its burning rubies and blazing diamonds seemed to encircle it
with sparks of fire.
Garnet bowed low, cast a triumphant glance on Pet as he passed, and
hissed softly in her ear: "Mine own--mine own, at last." And then he
raised the screen and disappeared.
The cold, proud, black eyes were fixed piercingly on Pet; but that young
lady bore it as she had done many another stare, without flinching.
"Sit down," said the woman, with her strong foreign intonation, pointing
to a seat.
Pet obeyed, saying, as she did so:
"I may as well, I suppose. Am I expected to stay here all night?"
"Yes," said the woman, curtly, "and many more nights after that. You can
occupy my bed; I will sleep on one of these lounges while you remain."
"Well," said Pet, "I would like to know what I am brought here for
anyway. Some of Rozzel Garnet's capers, I suppose. He had better look
out; for when I get free, if the gallows don't get their due it won't be
my fault."
"Rozzel Garnet had nothing to do with it; he was but acting for another
in bringing you here."
"For another?" said Pet, with the utmost surprise; "who the mischief is
it?"
"That you are not to know at present. When the proper time comes, that,
what many other things, will be revealed."
"So I'm like a bundle of goods, 'left till called for,'" said Pet; "now,
who could have put themselves to so much unnecessary trouble to have me
carried off, I want to know? I thought I hadn't an enemy in the world,
but his excellency, the right worshipful Rozzel Garnet. It can't be
Orlando Toosypegs, surely--hum-m-m. I do wonder who can it be," said
Pet, musingly.
While Pet was holding converse with herself, the woman, Marguerite, had
gone out. Pet waited for her return until, in spite of her strange
situation, her eyes began to drop heavily. A little clock on a shelf
struck the hour of midnight, and still she came not. Pet was sleepy,
awfully sleepy; and, rubbing her eyes and yawning, she got up, and
holding her eyes open with her fingers, knelt down and said her usual
night-prayers, and then jumped into bed, and fell into a sound sleep, in
which Rozzel Garnet, and Marguerite, and the under-ground cave, and her
previous night's adventure, were one and all forgotten.
When Pet awoke she found herself alone, and the apartment lit up by a
swinging-lamp, exactly as it had been the night before. She glanced at
the clock and saw the hands pointed to half-past ten. A little round
stand had been placed close to her bed, on which all the paraphernalia
of a breakfast for one was placed. On a chair at the foot of the bed
was a basin and ewer, with water, combs, brushes, and a small
looking-glass.
Pet, with an appetite not at all diminished, sprung out of bed, hastily
washed her face and hands, brushed out her silken curls, said her
morning-prayers, and then, sitting down at the table, fell to with a
zest and eagerness that would have horrified Miss Priscilla Toosypegs.
The coffee was excellent, the rolls incomparable, the eggs cooked to a
turn, and Miss Pet did ample justice to all.
As she completed her meal, the screen was pushed aside, and the woman
Marguerite entered.
"Good-morning," said Pet.
The woman bent her head in a slight acknowledgment.
"I suppose it's daylight outside by this time?" said Pet.
"Yes, it was daylight five hours ago," was the reply.
"Well, it's pleasant to know even that. What am I to do for the rest of
the day, I want to know?"
"Whatever you please."
"A wide margin; the only thing I would please to do, if I could, would
be to go out and walk home. That, I suppose, is against the rules?"
"Yes; but there are books and drawing materials; you can amuse yourself
with them."
"Thankee; poor amusement, but better than none, I expect Who is
commander here, the captain I heard them speak of?"
"My husband," said the woman, proudly.
"And where is he now? I should like to have a talk with him, and have
things straightened out a little if possible."
"He is absent, and will not be back for some days."
"Hum! this is, then, the hiding-place of the smugglers they make such a
fuss about--eh?" said Pet.
"Yes, they are smugglers--worse, perhaps," said the woman, sullenly.
"There! I knew I'd find it; I always said so!" exclaimed Pet,
exultantly. "Oh, if I could only get out! See here, I wish you would let
me escape!"
The woman looked at her with her wild, black eyes for a moment, and then
went on with her occupation of cleaning off the table, as if she had not
heard her.
"Because," persisted Pet, "I'm of no use to any one here, and they'll be
anxious about me up home. They don't know I'm out, you know."
The woman went calmly on with her work without replying, and Pet, seeing
it was all a waste of breath, pleading, got up and went over to the
shelf where the books were, in search of something to read. A number of
pencil-drawings lay scattered about. Pet took them, and little as she
knew of art, she saw they had been sketched by a master-hand.
"Oh, how pretty!" she exclaimed; "was it you drew these?"
"No; my husband," answered the woman. "They are all fancy sketches, he
says."
There was a sort of bitterness in the last words, unnoticed by Pet, who
was eagerly and admiringly examining the drawings. One, in particular,
struck her; it represented a large, shadowy church, buried in mingled
lights and shades, that gave a gloomy, spectral, weird appearance to the
scene. At the upper end, near the grand altar, stood a youth and a
maiden, while near a white-robed clergyman, book in hand. A dying bird
seemed fluttering over their heads, and ready to drop at their feet. The
face of the youth could not be seen, but the lovely, childlike face of
the girl was the chief attraction of the drawing. Its look of
unutterable love, mingled with a strange, nameless terror; its rare
loveliness, and the passionate worship in the eyes upturned to him who
stood beside her, sent a strange thrill to the very heart of Pet. A
vague idea that she had seen a face bearing a shadowy resemblance to the
beautiful one in the picture somewhere before, struck her. The face was
familiar, just as those we see in dreams are; but whether she had
dreamed of one like this, or had really seen it, she could not tell. She
gazed and gazed; and the longer she gazed, the surer she was that she
had really and certainly seen, if not that face, some one very like it,
before.
"Can you tell me if this is a fancy sketch?" said Pet, holding it up.
"My husband says so. Why?" asked the woman, fixing her eyes, with a
keen, suspicious glance, on Pet.
"Oh, nothing; only it seems to me as if I had seen that face before. It
is very strange; I cannot recollect when or where; but I know I have
seen it."
"You only imagine so."
"No, I don't. I never imagine anything. Oh, here's another; what a
pretty child! why--why, she looks like you!"
It represented a beautiful, dark little girl, a mere infant, but
resplendently beautiful.
"She was my child," said the woman, in a low, hard, despairing voice, as
she looked straight before her.
"And where is she?" asked Pet, softly.
"I don't know--dead, I expect," said the woman, in that same tone of
deep, steady despair, far sadder than any tears or wild sobs could have
been.
Pet's eyes softened with deep sympathy; and coming over, she said,
earnestly: "I am so sorry for you. How long is it since she died?"
"It is seven years since we lost her; she was two years old then. I do
not know whether she is living or dead. Oh, Rita! Rita!" cried the
woman, passionately, while her whole frame shook with the violence of
emotion.
No tear fell, no sob shook her breast, but words can never describe the
utter agony of that despairing cry.
There were tears in Pet's eyes now--in those flashing, mocking, defying
eyes; and in silent sympathy she took the woman's hand in her own little
brown fingers, and softly began caressing it.
"It was in London we lost her--in the great, vast city of London. I was
out with her, one day, and seeing a vast crowd at the corner of the
street, I went over, holding my little Marguerite by the hand, to see
what was the matter. The crowd increased; we were wedged in, and could
not extricate ourselves. Suddenly some one gave her a pull; her little
hand relaxed its hold; I heard her cry out; and shrieking madly, I burst
from the crowd in search of her; but she was gone. I rushed shrieking
through the streets until they arrested me as a lunatic, and carried me
off. For a long, long time after, I remember nothing. My husband found
me out, and took charge of me; but we never heard of our child after
that. I nearly went mad. I was mad for a time; but it has passed. Since
that day, we never heard of Rita. I heard them say she was stolen for
her extraordinary beauty; but, living or dead, I feel she is forever
lost to me--forever lost--forever lost!"
She struck her bosom with her hand, and rocked back and forward, while
her wild, black eyes gazed steadily before her with that same rigid look
of changeless despair.
"I loved her better than anything in earth or heaven, except her
father--my heart was wrapped up in hers--she was the dearest part of
myself; and, since I lost her, life has been a mockery--worse than a
mockery to me. Girl!" she said, looking up suddenly and fiercely, "never
love! Try to escape woman's doom of loving and losing, and of living on,
when death is the greatest blessing God can send you. Never love! Tear
your heart out and throw it in the flames sooner than love and live to
know your golden idol is an image of worthless clay. Girl, remember!"
and she sprung to her feet, her eyes blazing with a maniac light, and
grasped Pet so fiercely by the arm that she was forced to stifle a cry
of pain, "never love--never love! Take a dagger and send your soul to
eternity sooner!"
She flung Pet from her with a violence that sent her reeling against the
wall, and darted from the room.