"Those may deal with them who desire to live side-by-side with whites.
As for me, I quarrel with none who avenge our centuries of wrong."
"Would to God my father had known that this was in your heart! You
would not then have been a wretched prisoner here. Moyse, the moment
you are free, let us fly to the mornes. I told you how it would be, if
we parted. You will do as I wish henceforward; you will take me to the
Mornes?"
"My love, where and how should we live there? In a cave of the rocks,
or roosting in trees?"
"People do live there--not now, perhaps, under my father's government:
but in the old days, runaways did live there."
"So you would institute a new race of banditti, under your father's
reign. How well it will sound in the First Consul's council-chamber,
that the eldest daughter of the ambitious Commander-in-Chief is the
first bandit's wife in the mornes!"
"Let them say what they will: we must have peace, Moyse. We have been
wretched too long. Oh, if we could once be up there, hidden among the
rocks, or sitting among the ferns in the highest of those valleys, with
the very clouds between us and this weary world below--never to see a
white face more! Then, at last, we could be at peace. Everywhere else
we are beset with this enemy. They are in the streets, in the churches,
on the plain. We meet them in the shade of the woods, and have to pass
them basking on the sea-shore. There is no peace but high up in the
mornes--too high for the wild beast, and the reptile, and the white
man."
"The white man mounts as high as the eagle's nest, Genifrede. You will
not be safe, even there, from the traveller or the philosopher, climbing
to measure the mountain or observe the stars.--But while we are talking
of the free and breezy heights--"
"You are a prisoner," said Genifrede, mournfully. "But soon, very soon,
we can go. Why do you look so? You said there was no fear--that
nothing serious could happen--nothing more than disgrace; and, for each
other's sake, we can defy disgrace. Can we not, Moyse? Why do not you
speak?"
"Disgrace, or death, or anything. Even death, Genifrede. Yes--I said
what was not true. They will not let me out but to my death. Do not
shudder so, my love: they shall not part us. They shall not rob me of
everything. You did well to come, love. If they had detained you, and
I had had to die with such a last thought as that you remained to be
comforted, sooner or later, by another--to be made to forget me by a
more prosperous lover--O God! I should have been mad!"
"You are mad, Moyse," cried Genifrede, shrinking from him in terror. "I
do not believe a word you say. I love another!--they kill you! It is
all false! I will not hear another word--I will go."
To go was, however, beyond her power. As she sank down again,
trembling, Moyse said in the imperious tone which she both loved and
feared--
"I am speaking the truth now. I shall be tried to-night before a
court-martial, which will embody your father's opinion and will. They
will find me a traitor, and doom me to death upon the Place. I must
die--but not on the Place--and you shall die with me. In one moment, we
shall be beyond their power. You hear me, Genifrede? I know you hear
me, though you do not speak. I can direct you to one, near at hand, who
prepares the red water, and knows me well. I will give you an order for
red water enough for us both. You will come--your father will not
refuse our joint request--you will come to me as soon as the trial is
over; and then, love, we will never be parted more."
Genifrede sat long with her face hidden on her lover's shoulder,
speechless. After repeated entreaties that she would say one word,
Moyse raised her up, and, looking in her face, said authoritatively--
"You will do as I say, Genifrede?"
"Moyse, I dare not. No, no, I dare not! If, when we are dead, you
should be dead to me too! And how do we know? If, the very next
moment, I should see only your dead body with my own--if you should be
snatched away somewhere, and I should be alone in some wide place--if I
should be doomed to wander in some dreadful region, calling upon you for
ever, and no answer! Oh, Moyse! we do not know what fearful things are
beyond. I dare not; no, no, I dare not! Do not be angry with me,
Moyse!"
"I thought you had been ready to live and die with me."
"And so I am--ready to live anywhere, anyhow--ready to die, if only we
could be sure--Oh! if you could only tell me there is nothing beyond--"
"I have little doubt," said Moyse, "that death is really what it is to
our eyes--an end of everything."
"Do you think so? If you could only assure me of that--But, if you were
really quite certain of that, would you wish me to die too?"
"Wish it! You must--you shall," cried he, passionately. "You are
mine--mine for ever; and I will not let you go. Do not you see--do not
you feel," he said, moderating his tone, "that you will die a slow death
of anguish, pining away, from the moment that cursed firing in the Place
strikes upon your ear? You cannot live without love--you know you
cannot--and you shall not live by any other love than mine. This little
sign," said he, producing a small carved ivory ring from his
pocket-book, "This little sign will save you from the anguish of a
thousand sleepless nights, from the wretchedness of a thousand days of
despair. Take it. If shown at Number 9, in the Rue Espagnole, in my
name, you will receive what will suffice for us both. Take it,
Genifrede."
She took the ring, but it presently dropped from her powerless hands.
"You do not care for me," said Moyse, bitterly. "You are like all
women. You love in fair weather, and would have us give up everything
for you; and when the hurricane comes, you will fly to shelter, and shut
out your lover into the storm."
Genifrede was too wretched to remind her lover what was the character of
his love. It did not, indeed, occur to her. She spoke, however:--
"If you had remembered, Moyse, what a coward I am, you would have done
differently, and not have made me so wretched as I now am. Why did you
not bid me bring the red water, without saying what it was, and what
for? If you had put it to my lips--if you had not given me a moment to
fancy what is to come afterwards, I would have drunk it--oh, so
thankfully! But now--I dare not."
"You are not afraid to live without me."
"Yes, I am. I am afraid of living, of dying--of everything."
"You once asked me about--"
"I remember--about your spirit coming."
"Suppose it should come, angry at your failing me in my last desire?"
"Why did you not kill me? You know I should have been thankful. I wish
the roof would fall and bury us now."
She started and shrieked when she heard some one at the door. It was
her father's servant, who told her that Madame Dessalines had arrived,
and that L'Ouverture wished her to come and receive her friend. The
servant held the door open, so that there was opportunity only for
another word.
"Remember," said Moyse, "they are not to seduce or force you back to
Pongaudin to-day. Remember, you are not fit to travel. Remember," he
again said, holding up the ivory ring, and then thrusting it into her
bosom, "you come to me as soon as the trial is over. I depend upon
you."
He led her, passive and silent, to the door, where he kissed her hand,
saying, for the ear of any one who might be without, "For once, I cannot
accompany you further. Tell Madame Dessalines that I hope to pay my
respects to her soon." He added, to the servant--
"See that Julien is at Mademoiselle L'Ouverture's orders, till I need
his services myself."
The man bowed, pleased, as most persons are, to have a commission to
discharge for a prisoner. Before he had closed the door, Genifrede was
in the arms of Therese.