JASPER BEGG MEETS HIS OLD MISTRESS, AND IS WATCHED
I had made up my mind to take every proper precaution before going up
to the house where my mistress lived; and with caution in my head I
left Seth Barker, the carpenter, up on the hill path, while I set Peter
Bligh at the gate of the garden, and posted Dolly Venn round at the
northern side, where the men who had looted the Santa Cruz might be
looked for with any others that I had no knowledge of. When this was
done, and they understood that they were to fire a gun if the need
arose, I opened the wicket-gate and crept up the grass path for all the
world like an ill-visaged fellow who had no true business there. Not a
sound could I hear in all that place; not a dog barked, nor a human
voice spoke. Even the wind came fitful and gusty about the sheltered
house; and so quiet was it between the squalls that my own footfall
almost could scare me. For, you see, a whisper spoken at the wrong time
might have undone all--a clumsy step have cost us more than a man cared
to count. We were but four, and, for all I know, there might have been
four hundred on Ken's Island. You don't wonder therefore, if I asked
myself at times whether to-morrow's sun would find us living or what
our misfortune might spell for one I had come so far to serve.
It was very dark in the garden, as I have told you, but two of the
windows in the house were lighted up and two golden rings of light
thrown out upon the soft grass I trod. I stood a long time debating
which window to knock open--for it was a fearful lottery, I must
say--and when I'd turned it over and over in my head, and now made out
that it was this window and now plumped for the other, I took up a
pebble at last and cast it upon the pane nearest to the door--for that
seemed to me the more likely room, and I'd nothing else but common
sense to guide me. You may judge of my feelings when no notice was
taken of my signal except by a dog, which began to yap like a pup and
to make such a scare that I thought every window and every door must
be opened that very instant and as many men out on top of me. I said,
surely, that it was all up with Jasper Begg that journey; but odd to
tell it, the dog gave over at last, and no one showed himself, neither
was there any whistle from my company; and I was just making ready to
throw another stone when the second light was turned out all of a
sudden and, the long window being opened, Ruth Bellenden--or, to be
more correct, Mme. Czerny--herself came out into the garden, and stood
looking round about as though she knew that I was there and had been
waiting for me. When at last she saw me she didn't speak or make any
sign, but going about to the house again she held the window open for
me, and I passed into the dark room with her, and there held her hand
in mine, I do believe as though I would never let it go again.
"Jasper," says she, in a whisper that was pretty as the south wind in
springtime; "Jasper Begg, how could it be any one else! Oh, we must
light a candle, Jasper Begg," says she, "or we shall lose ourselves in
the dark."
"Miss Ruth," said I, "light or dark, I'm here according to my orders,
and the ship's here, and as I said to you before the yellow boy to-day,
we're waiting for our mistress to go aboard."
She had her back to me when I said this, and was busy enough drawing
the curtains and lighting the lamp again. The light showed me that she
wore a rich black gown with fluffy stuff over it, and a bit of a
sparkle in the way of diamonds like a band across her parted hair. The
face was deceiving, now lighted up by one of the old smiles, now hard
set as one who had suffered much for her years. But there was nothing
over-womanish in her talk, and we two thrashed it out there, just the
same as if Ken's Island wasn't full of devils, and the lives of me and
my men worth what a spin of the coin might buy them at.
"You mustn't call me Miss Ruth," says she, when she turned from the
lamp and tidied up her writing on the table; "of course you know that,
Jasper Begg. And you at my wedding, too--is it really not more than
twelve long months ago?"
A sigh passed her lips, such a sigh as tells a woman's story better
than all the books; and in that moment the new look came upon her face,
the look I had seen when the yellow man changed words with her in the
morning.
"It's thirteen months three weeks since you went up with Mr. Czerny to
the cathedral at Nice," was my next word; "the days go slow on this
out-of-the-way shore, I'll be bound--until our friends come, Miss Ruth,
until we're sure they haven't forgotten us."
I had a meaning in this, and be sure she took it. Not that she answered
me out and away as I wished; for she put on the pretty air of wife and
mistress who wouldn't tell any of her husband's secrets.
"Why, yes," she said, very slowly, "the days are long and the nights
longer, and, of course, my husband is much away from here."
I nodded my head and drew the chair she'd offered me close to the
table. On her part she was looking at the clock as though she wished
that the hands of it might stand still. I read it that we hadn't much
time to lose, and what we had was no time for fair words.
"Miss Ruth," says I, without more parley, "from what I've seen to-night
I don't doubt that any honest man would be glad to get as far as he
could from Ken's Island and its people at the first opportunity. You'll
pardon what a plain seaman is going to say, and count him none the less
a friend for saying it. When you left money in the banker's hands to
commission a ship and bring her to this port, your words to me were, 'I
may have need of you.' Miss Ruth, you have need of me--I should be no
more than a fool if I couldn't see that. You have sore need of me, and
if you won't say so for yourself, I take leave to say it for you."
She raised a hand as though she would not hear me--but I was on a clear
course now, and I held to it in spite of her.
"Yes," I said, "you've need of your friends to-night, and it's a lucky
wind that brought them to this shore. What has passed, Miss Ruth, in
these months you speak of, it's not for me to ask or inquire. I have
eyes in my head, and they show me what I would give my fortune not to
see. You're unhappy here, Miss Ruth--you're not treated well."
I waited for her to speak; but not a word would she say. White she was,
as a flower from her own garden, and once or twice she shivered as
though the cold had struck her. I was just going on to speak again,
when what should happen but that her little head went down on the table
and she began to sob as though her heart would break.
"Oh, Jasper Begg, how I have suffered, how I have suffered!" said she,
between her sobs; and what could I do, what could any man do who would
kiss the ground a woman walks upon but has no right or title to? Why,
hold his tongue, of course, though it hurt him cruelly to do any such
thing.
"Miss Ruth," said I, very foolish, "please don't think of that now. I'm
here to help you, the ship's here, we're waiting for you to go aboard."
She dried her tears and tried to look up at me with a smile.
"Oh, I'm just a child, just a child again, Jasper," cries she; "a year
ago I thought myself a woman, but that's all passed. And I shall never
go away on your ship, Jasper Begg--never, never. I shall die on Ken's
Island as so many have died."
I stood up at this and pointed to the clock.
"Little friend," I said, "if you'll put a cloak about your shoulders
and leave this house with me I'll have you safe aboard the Southern
Cross in twenty minutes by that clock, as God is my witness."
It was no boast--for that I could have done as any seaman knows; and
you may well imagine that I stood as a man struck dumb when I had her
answer.
"Why, yes," she said, "you could put me on board your boat, Captain
Jasper, if every step I took was not watched; if every crag had not its
sentinel; if there were not a hundred to say 'Go back--go back to your
home.' Oh, how can you know, how can you guess the things I fear and
dread in this awful place? You, perhaps, because the ship is waiting
will be allowed to return to it again. But I, never, never again to my
life's end."
A terrible look crossed her face as she said this, and with one swift
movement she opened a drawer in the locker where she did her writing,
and took from it a little book which she thrust, like a packet, into my
hands.
"Read," she said, with startling earnestness, "read that when you are
at sea again. I never thought that any other eyes but mine would see
it; but you, Jasper, you shall read it. It will tell you what I myself
could never tell. Read it as you sail away from here, and then say how
you will come back to help the woman who needs your help so sorely."
I thrust the book into my pocket, but was not to be put off like that.
"Read it I will, every line," said I; "but you don't suppose that
Jasper Begg is about to sail away and leave you in this plight, Miss
Ruth! He'd be a pretty sort of Englishman to do that, and it's not in
his constitution, I do assure you!"
She laughed at my earnestness, but recollecting how we stood and what
had befallen since sunset, she would hear no more of it.
"You don't understand; oh, you don't understand!" she cried, very
earnestly; "there's danger here, danger even now while you and I are
talking. Those who have gone out to the wreck will be coming home
again; they must not find you in this house, Jasper Begg, must not,
must not! For my sake, go as you came. Tell all that thought of me how
I thank them. Some day, perhaps, you will learn how to help me. I am
grateful to you, Jasper--you know that I am grateful."
She held out both her hands to me, and they lay in mine, and I was
trying to speak a real word from my heart to her when there came a low,
shrill whistle from the garden-gate, and I knew that Peter Bligh had
seen something and was calling me.
"Miss Ruth," says I, "that's old Peter Bligh and his danger signal.
There'll be some one about, little friend, or he wouldn't do it."
Well, she never said a word. I saw a shadow cross her face, and
believed she was about to faint. Nor will any one be surprised at that
when I say that the door behind us had been opened while we talked, and
there stood Kess Denton, the yellow man, watching us like a hound that
would bite presently.