DIDO.
Some little distance from the major's abode stood a long, low rambling
house on a slight rise. Surrounded by deep verandas, it was placed in
the middle of emerald green lawns, smoothly clipped; and these, lower
down, were girdled by a belt of ash and sycamores and poplars, which
shut out the house from the high road.
The mansion, with its flat roof and wide verandas, had a tropical
look, and indeed it had been built by a retired Indian nabob at the
beginning of this century. When he died the house had been sold, and
now it was occupied by Mrs. Dallas, who leased it because of its
suggestion of tropical habitation. She came from the West Indies, and
had lived in "The Wigwam," as the house was called, for over ten
years.
Mrs. Dallas was a large, fat and eminently lazy woman, who passed most
of her time in knitting or sleeping or eating. Her husband had died
before she had come to England, and it was the desire to preserve her
daughter's health which had brought her so far from the sun-baked
islands which her soul loved.
Her languid Creole nature and lethargic habits were unsuited to brisk,
practical England, and she hated the gray skies, the frequent absence
of sunlight and the lack of rich and sensuous coloring. Often she
threatened to return to Barbadoes, but she was too lazy to make the
effort of again settling herself in life. With all her longings for
the fairy islands of the West, it seemed as though she would end her
days in gray and misty England. But she was out of place in this
northern land, and so was Dido.
This latter was a tall and massively framed negro woman, with very
little of the traditional merry nature of the black about her. She
looked rather like a priestess, with her stern face and stately mien;
and, indeed, in the West Indies, it was known among the negroes that
Dido was high in power among the votaries of Obi. She could charm, she
could slay by means of vegetable poisons, and she could--as the
negroes firmly believed--cause a human being to dwindle, peak and
pine, by means of incantations.
This black Canidia had left a terrible reputation behind her in
Barbadoes; and though in skeptical England her powers were unknown,
and if they had been made manifest, would have been flouted at, yet
her looks, the tragic tones of her voice, inspired the white servants
of Mrs. Dallas with distrust. Dido was not a favorite in the servants'
part of The Wigwam, but for this unpopularity she cared little, being
devoted to Isabella Dallas. She adored her nursling.
The girl was about twenty years of age, tall and straight, with dark
hair and darker eyes, with a mouth veritably like Cupid's bow, and a
figure matchless in contour. With her rich southern coloring and
passionate temperament--she was of Irish blood on the paternal
side--Miss Dallas looked more like an Andalusian lady than a native of
the English-speaking race. She had all the sensuous loveliness of a
Creole woman; and bloomed like a rich tropical flower with poison in
its perfume amid the English briar roses of Surrey maidenhood.
If Mrs. Dallas was a bore--and her friends said she was--the daughter
was divine, and many young men came to The Wigwam to be spellbound by
her dark beauty. More men than the three who had dined at "Ashantee"
were in love with Isabella.
Upon her Dido exercised a powerful, and it must be confessed,
malignant influence. She had fed the quick brain of the girl with
weird tales of African witchcraft and fanciful notions of terrestrial
and sidereal influences. Isabella's nature was warped by this domestic
necromancy, and had she continued to dwell in the West Indies, she
might almost have become a witch herself. Certainly Dido did her best
to make her one, and taught her nursling spells and incantations, to
which the girl would listen fearfully, half-believing, half-doubting.
But her residence in England, her contact with practical English folk,
with the sunny side of life, saved her from falling into the terrible
abyss of African superstition; and how terrible it is only the
initiated can declare. It only needed that she should be removed from
the bad influence of the barbaric Sybil to render her nature healthy
and fill her life with pleasure.
But Dido was like a upas tree, and the moral atmosphere with which she
surrounded Isabella was slowly but surely making the girl morbid and
unnatural. Mrs. Dallas, versed in the negro character, half-guessed
this, but she was too indolent to have Dido removed. Moreover, strange
as it may appear, she was more than a trifle afraid of the negress and
her unholy arts.
Maurice had met with and had fallen in love with Isabella, and she
returned his affection with all the ardor of her passionate nature.
His handsome and frank face, his sunny nature and optimistic ideas
appealed strongly to the girl who had been environed from her earliest
infancy by the pessimism of Dido.
Maurice saw well how Isabella had deteriorated under the bad influence
of the negress, and he did his best to counteract her insidious
morality and morbid teachings. He laughed at Isabella's stories and
superstitions, and succeeded in making her ashamed of her weakness in
placing faith in such degraded rubbish. While with him Isabella was a
bright and laughing girl; quite another sort of being to the grave and
nervous creature she was while in the presence of Dido. She felt that
if she married Maurice his bright strong nature would save her from a
lamentable and melancholy existence; and as all her affections and
instincts inclined to the young man, she hoped to become his wife.
Dido saw her thoughts, and hating Maurice as one who scoffed at Obi,
she did her best to put evil ideas in the girl's head concerning the
young man. But as yet she had failed to sow dissension between the
lovers.
On the day after the major's dinner party, Isabella was sitting in the
veranda with a book open on her lap and Dido standing gravely near
her. Mrs. Dallas, in the cool depths of the drawing-room, was
indulging in an after-luncheon siesta. The sunlight poured itself over
the velvet lawns, drew forth the perfumes from the flower-beds, and
made the earth languorous with heat.
In the veranda all was cool and restful and pleasingly silent.
Isabella, in her white dress, looked beautiful and pensive; while
Dido, in a reddish-hued robe, with a crimson 'kerchief twisted round
her stately head, gleamed in the semi-gloom like some gorgeous
tropical bird astray in our northern climes. Both mistress and maid
were silent.
It was Dido who spoke first. She noticed that the eyes of her mistress
constantly strayed in the direction of "Ashantee," and with the
jealousy begotten of deep affection, she guessed that the girl's
thoughts were fixed upon the much-hated Maurice. At once she spoke
reproachfully, and in the grotesque negro dialect, which, however,
coming from Dido's mouth, inspired no one with merriment.
"Aha, missy," said she, in deep, guttural tones, "you tink ob dat
yaller-ha'r'd man!"
"Maurice! Yes, I am thinking about him; and you know why."
Dido's fierce black eyes flashed out a gleam of rage, and she cursed
Maurice audibly in some barbaric tongue which Isabella seemed to
understand. At all events she interrupted the woman's speech with an
imperious gesture.
"No more of that. Dido. You know that I love Maurice; I wish to marry
him. Why are you so bitter against him?"
"He take you from me."
"Well, if I marry anyone the same thing will happen," responded
Isabella, lightly; "and surely. Dido; you do not want me to remain a
spinster all my life."
"No, missy, no. You marry, an' ole Dido am berry pleased. But dat
yaller-ha'r'd man, I no like him; if he marry you, he take you away.
He a fool--a big fool!"
"Oh, you say that because he does not believe in Obi or Voodoo!"
Dido threw up one dark hand with an ejaculation.
"Not in de sunlight; dose am de names for de darkness, honey. In de
night dey--"
"No, no!" cried Isabella, with a shudder. "Don't tell me any more of
those horrible things."
"Aha, dat de yaller-ha'r who makes you fear!" cried Dido, bitterly.
"He hate Obi an' me. He will not marry you, missy!"
"Yes he will; we are engaged."
"Your mudder, she say no!"
"Nonsense! She likes Maurice herself," replied Isabella, uneasily.
"Maurice wants our engagement kept quiet for the present, but when I
do tell Major Jen and my mother, I am sure neither of them will
object."
"H'm, we see, missy, we see," said Dido, darkly. "But why you marry
dis man I no like?"
"Because I marry to please myself, not you," said Isabella, sharply.
"Oh, I know your thoughts, Dido; you would like me to marry David
Sarby. The idea; as if he can compare with Maurice!"
"Wrong, missy. I no wish dat man."
"Then Dr. Etwald--that horrid, gloomy creature!"
"Him great man!" said Dido, solemnly. "Him berry--berry great!"
"I don't think so," retorted Isabella, rising. "Of course, I know that
he is clever, but as to being great, he isn't known beyond this
place." She walked to the end of the veranda, and stood for a moment
in the glare of the sunshine. Suddenly an idea seemed to strike her,
and she turned toward the negress.
"Dido, you wouldn't like to see me the wife of Dr. Etwald?"
"Yes, missy. Him berry big great man!"
"But I hate him!"
"Um! He lub you. He told ole Dido so."
"He seems to have been very confidential," said Isabella, scornfully,
"and from what I have seen, Dido, he has some influence over you."
"No," said the negress. But while her tongue uttered the denial, her
eyes rolled uneasily around the lawn, as though dreading some
invisible presence. "No, missy. Dido a great one, you know. She no
'fraid ob dat doctor; but him big man, missy; you marry him."
"No, no, no! I would rather die. I love Maurice."
"You nebber marry him, missy. Nebber, nebber!"
"How do you know?"
"I make de spell. I know. De spell say dat doctor, he marry you!"
This time Isabella burst out into a girlish laugh of genuine
amusement.
"The spell seems to know more about me than I do myself," said she,
contemptuously. "I don't believe in your spells, Dido. I know from
Maurice that they are nonsense!"
"You take care, missy! Obi! dat not nonsense!" said Dido, in a
threatening tone.
"What does Dr. Etwald say about it?"
Dido looked sullenly at the fire.
"I no hear him say anytink about Obi," she replied; "but de spell; it
say you marry dat man and no de yaller-ha'r."
"Well, Dido, we shall see. And now--"
She never finished what she was about to say, for at that moment Dido
stretched out one arm, and uttered one name, "Batt'sea!"
Across the lawn there crept a wizen, gray-haired little man, with a
cringing manner. He was white, but darkish in the skin, and there was
something negroid about his face. This dwarfish little creature was a
tramp, who had become a pensioner of Isabella's. He had attached
himself to her like some faithful dog, and rarely failed to present
himself at least once a day.
What his real name was nobody knew, but he said that he was called
Battersea, after the parish in which he had been reared as a
foundling.
Battersea was cringing, dirty, and altogether an unpleasant object to
look upon; but Isabella was sorry for the creature, and aided him with
food and a trifle of money. It may be here mentioned that Battersea,
although he knew nothing of Obi, was terribly afraid of Dido. Perhaps
some instinct in the negro blood--for he undoubtedly had something
African in his veins--made him fear this unknown priestess of fetish
worship.
"Well, Battersea," said Isabella, kindly, "how are you to-day?"
"Very well, lady, very well, indeed. I met Mr. Alymer, and he gave me
half a crown."
"That was generous of him. But why?"
"Because I said that a certain lady was--"
"Now, now," laughed Isabella, "no more of that nonsense, Battersea."
She turned and ran along the veranda into the house. The tramp and the
negress were alone.
"What de doctor say?" asked Dido, in a low-voiced whisper.
"Two words. The devil-stick!"
The negress started and threw up her hands in surprise.