THE FLIGHT OF THE FEU FOLLETTE.
Dolores, flinging herself down upon Craik Tomlin, seized his face
between her hands and raised his head, placing her knee beneath it. She
panted like an exhausted doe, yet the fire that leaped from her eyes
gave the lie to her attitude of sorrowing humility. Her lips moved
feverishly, but she could not or would not speak aloud. Tomlin's eyes
were closed in agony, his teeth were clenched tightly upon his under
lip; he gave no sign that he knew of her presence. And a sudden fury
seized her at his irresponsiveness. She shook his head between her hands
savagely.
"Wake! Speak!" she cried hoarsely. "Art indeed dead, at the moment of my
triumph?"
Tomlin's eyelids flickered, and his lips strove to speak. One hand went
weakly to his face, to grasp her fingers. And into her anxious ear he
managed to whisper:
"Evil luck fought with me, Dolores. Yet I die content if you care."
"Care!" she echoed, shaking his fingers loose impatiently. "Care? Yes,
this I care, bungler: I care because of all three of thee, thou alone
wert covetous enough to obey my conditions. With thee alive, there was
hope of thy friends' speedy death. With thee dead, which of the others
will wipe his fellow from his path for me? Why, think ye, did I fawn on
John Pearse? But to arouse in thee the demon of jealousy; why did I
smile on Venner, and call him my Rupert? To steel thy arm against him.
And for what?"
She suddenly laid his head down on the floor, leaned over him with her
lips almost brushing his cheek, and whispered fiercely: "Speak! Canst
live?"
Tomlin's face lost some of its pain. The thin lips straightened into the
semblance of a faint smile. His glazing eyes opened slightly.
"I am done for," he whispered. "Dolores, kiss me again. I die for you."
The beautiful fury sprang to her feet, spurning him. She glared down at
his chalky face in utter scorn.
"Kiss thee? Thou die for me? Pah! I kiss no carrion. A half-hundred men
have died for me this day, I hope. I kiss him who lives for me and
conquers, not the weakling who dies!"
Without deigning another glance at her victim, she turned away and went
to meet Milo. He now entered with his slaves.
"Where are the two strangers?" she demanded harshly.
Milo returned her stare with a look of simple surprise. He had seen
nothing of them, and had thought of them being yet with his mistress.
"I saw them not, Sultana," he replied.
"Saw them not, great clod!" she blazed at him, clenching her hands in
rage. "Are they here, then?"
Milo looked around in bewilderment. In all her life Dolores had been his
especial care; in her many moments of temper she had perhaps pained his
devoted heart, but never had she used to him the tone she now used. It
seemed to his simple soul that the foundations of his faith were being
wrenched loose.
"I will find them, Sultana," he said quietly, and turned to leave by the
tunnel.
"Stay here, thou blind fool!" she commanded him. "I will find them
myself. Here is work more fitting for a slave. How many chests are going
to the ship?"
"Three."
"And how many have ye yet empty here?"
"Three, lady."
"Then get them quickly. Until I return, bid thy fellows replace the
treasure that is still in the powder store. And haste, for I will leave
this place this day, though all the fiends say no."
She ran along the tunnel, and Milo set his men to their task. As he
passed along to the powder chamber, a low moan arrested him, and he
halted in sudden remorse for Pascherette, whom he now felt he had judged
harshly. He left his fellows and went to the tiny alcove where the
little octoroon lay, and his great heart leaped in response to the
worship that shone in her dark eyes. He saw the dry and cracked lips,
the flushed face, and fetched water and wine before he would speak to
her. Then, with her small head and slender shoulders against his immense
chest, he gave her drink, soothing her pain with soft speech and
caressing hand.
Pascherette's wound was deep, and bleeding internally; a fever already
burned in the tiny maid's veins. She peered up at him wistfully, all of
her mischief, all her piquancy gone and replaced by a softened, humbled
expression that wrung Milo's heart-strings.
"Will ye not kiss me now, Milo?" she whispered, with a pearly drop
brimming from each eye, where laughter had so lately dwelt.
"Pascherette, thy fault was great," he answered, yet in his face was a
look so forgiving, so excusing, that the girl shivered expectantly and
closed her eyes with a happy sigh.
Yet the kiss was not given. From the great chamber the angry voice of
Dolores rang out.
"Milo! Where art thou, slave!"
And the giant tenderly laid Pascherette down again, and ran in answer.
"Sultana?"
"Blind, idle dolt! While thou art fondling that serpent of thine, thy
mistress's affairs may go hang! Haste with the treasure, or feel my
anger. While thy useless eyes were mooning on nothing, the strangers
have escaped. They are even now getting sail on the white vessel. Carry
the chests down to the Point as soon as ye may. I will stay them yet,
and they shall learn the cost of flouting Dolores! Hasten, I tell ye!"
Milo winced at her address; his black eyes, usually holding the utter
devotion of a noble dog, glittered with tiny sparks of resentment; yet
the habit of years could not be lightly cast off, and he bowed low, even
while Dolores had turned her back on him, and picked up a great empty
chest to carry it to the powder store. Here in the flickering light of a
pine splinter the slaves worked feverishly, their abject eyes sparkling
with borrowed radiance from the riches they handled.
And while they worked, Dolores emerged from the tunnel, flashed one long
glance of derision at the moving schooner, and sped down the cliff to
stop her flight.
The Feu Follette was poorly enough manned with Peters and his four men.
With the ready help of Venner and Pearse the getting of the anchor and
the hoisting of the heavy fore and main sails was an arduous job, but it
was accomplished under the tremendous urge of remembrance. None wished
to have the experiences of the past days repeated; Peters was anxious to
get his beautiful vessel into safer waters; the Feu Follette's owner and
his guest were doubly anxious to drop those blue hills of ominous memory
below the horizon forever. They gave scant attention to the three great
iron-bound chests that stood between the guns along the waist; getting
clear occupied every faculty.
The tide setting directly on the Point, with a breeze dead in from
seaward, forced the schooner perilously close to the bar that had been
her undoing before; but, with the lead going, Peters speedily found that
his previous mishap must undoubtedly have been due to clever misleading.
After touching lightly once, and getting deeper water at the next cast
over the lee side, he understood the trick of the extended false Point
and stood boldly along shore.
And as the schooner gathered steerage-way, hugging the Point closely,
Dolores ran out along the sandy beach and plunged into the sea abreast
the moving vessel.
"Here's that vixen woman, sir!" cried Peters angrily, looking toward
Venner for instructions. Peters had the helm, and owner and guest stood
against the companion, ready to lend a hand at the sheets, forward or
aft.
Venner and Pearse stared at the swimmer, then turned and gazed
searchingly at each other. In the face of each lingered a trace of the
subjection they had fallen under; neither could quite so quickly forget
the allurements of this woman. Her kisses had been as sweet as her fury
had been terrible; and the absence of Craik Tomlin was an additional
incentive to memory.
"Shall we take her away?" asked Venner, avoiding Pearse's eye as he put
the question.
"Can't you make more sail, Peters?" was Pearse's reply.
Venner laughed softly, agreeably; and the next moment Dolores hailed
them. She swam swiftly, with effortless ease, slipping through the sea
like a sparkling nymph in her native element. But the schooner traveled
fast, and, though she lost no ground, she gained but slowly. She hailed
again.
"Rupert, my Rupert!" and finished the cry with a rippling laugh. "Art
stealing my treasure and leaving me?"
"By Heavens, Pearse, I had forgotten these chests," said Venner
uneasily. Pearse regarded him closely, fearing that Dolores's spell was
yet powerful. He gripped Venner tightly by the arm, leaned nearer, and
said:
"Venner, so long as that blood-polluted treasure is on your deck, so
long will you be unable to settle your mind. Bid the hands pitch it into
the sea, for God's sake!"
A lull in the wind slowed the schooner down, and Dolores gained a
fathom. Her fair face was set toward them in a bewitching smile, and she
waved a gleaming arm at them. Venner fought with himself in silence for
a brief while, then with a shudder stepped to the wheel.
"Get the hands, Peters," he told the sailing-master, "and heave those
chests overboard. Quickly! You shall lose nothing by this, but don't
delay a moment!"