IN WHICH THE GREAT SPIRIT COMES FROM THE SEA TO RECLAIM COYOCOP
Coyocop’s prediction was fulfilled at dawn. The year which Doña Julia
de Aquilar had passed in the City of the Sun had enabled her to read
aright the minds of the sun-worshippers after their moonlit attack upon
de Sancerre’s island had been repulsed. They had awaited the coming of
their gleaming god, and had been rewarded by a sunrise whose splendor
should have filled their childish souls with love and peace. But the
mounting orb of day was greeted by its idolaters not with gentle hymns
of praise, but with wild, warlike shouts, that echoed from the woods
and across the flood with a grim, menacing persistence that sent a
chill through the hearts of a maiden and her lover, and caused a
dare-devil from the northern woods to look with care to the priming of
his gun.
For the first time since Jacques Barbier, in a fit of temper caused
by some fancied slight put upon him by the haughty de la Salle, had
deserted the great explorer’s party, trusting confidently to his own
skill as a woodsman to carry him safely back to Canada, the _coureur de
bois_ had regretted, momentarily, his reckless self-confidence. Had he
remained with his captain, he might have been, at this time, half-way
up the river toward the forests which he knew and loved; and here he
was, at the dawn of a day made to give joy to a runner-of-the-woods,
surrounded by gigantic, fierce-eyed warriors, already raising hoarse
shouts of triumph for the easy victory which seemed to lie within their
reach.
“Gar!” exclaimed Barbier, as he raised his gun to his shoulder.
“Service with de la Salle was hard, but ’twas easier than death. But,
then, ’tis time for me to die. When a wandering outcast from the Court
of France comes here to tell me what will happen in the woods--and,
_pardieu_, he told me true--there’s nothing left in life for poor
Jacques Barbier!”
A few moments before the _coureur de bois_ had elevated his musket,
to begin a battle against overwhelming odds, de Sancerre had said
farewell to a heavy-eyed, pale-lipped maiden, who had spent the night
in prayer, fearful of the peril which the dawn would bring to a brave
knight-errant who had grown dearer to her loving heart with every day
that had passed. Well Doña Julia knew that captivity, not death, would
be her lot should the sun-worshippers reach the island, but that they
would grant mercy to de Sancerre she had no hope. The thought of life
without the man whose love had come to her as the rarest gift which
Heaven could bestow was a horror which drove the color from her face
and robbed her voice of everything save sobs.
“Remember, sweetheart, if the worst should come to me,” said de
Sancerre, with forced calmness, bending down to press his cold lips
to her trembling hand, “that your brave, earnest heart has taught me
how to live and how to die. Pray to the Virgin, who holds you in her
care, to keep me always worthy of your love, ’though death should come
between us for a time. Adieu, _ma chère_! God grant ’tis _au revoir_!”
The girl clung to his hand, wet with her tears, and strove in vain to
speak, to put into halting words the love and despair which filled her
soul. For an instant her white face looked up at him from the entrance
to the hut, and de Sancerre bent forward and kissed her hot, dry lips.
A moment later he had crawled through the tall grass toward the eastern
shore of the island and lay watching, once again, the two war-canoes of
the black-haired, black-eyed, black-hearted savages who had turned from
their adoration of the sun to begin anew their devil’s work. Suddenly
a shower of feathered, reed-made arrows whizzed above the gleaming
waves, deadly from the speed with which long acacia bows endowed them.
“_Ma foi_, the sun-wasps begin to sting!” exclaimed de Sancerre.
At that instant he heard Jacques Barbier’s gun, warning the
sun-worshippers’ land-force not to launch a canoe from the shore
nearest to the island.
The Count and the Canadian, an hour before sunrise, had divided the
store of bullets which remained to them, and had found that only a
dozen shots from each musket stood between them and certain death.
“I know how a miser feels as he counts his gold,” soliloquized de
Sancerre, as he aimed his gun at the canoe, from which a broadside of
arrows had been launched at his coigne of vantage. “Here goes number
one, _ma petite_! There are only eleven more to defend a Count of
Languedoc from the life to come! _Bon matin, monsieur!_”
To de Sancerre’s chagrin and dismay, the brawny, brown paddler at whom
he had aimed his musket had defied moon-magic at the dawn of day. The
Count’s precious bullet had done no harm to the oncoming canoe, nor
to the war-party which it held. Cold with the horrid possibilities
opened up by his indifferent marksmanship, de Sancerre, with hands
which trembled annoyingly, attempted to reload his gun in time to
prevent the imminent landing of the howling bowmen. That his shot would
have come too late the speed of the canoe made evident, when a crash,
almost at his very ear, nearly deafened the astonished Frenchman for
a time. Jacques Barbier, having checked momentarily by his marvellous
skill with his musket the attack from the main-land, had come to de
Sancerre’s defense in the nick of time. But the _coureur de bois_ paid
dearly for the support that he had given to the unnerved Frenchman.
An arrow, shot by a dusky warrior more daring than his companions,
had made answer to Jacques Barbier’s fatal bullet and had entered the
Canadian’s breast just below his dangling tobacco-pipe.
“Mother Mary, that is enough!” groaned the _coureur de bois_, writhing
upon the tousled grass by his horrified comrade’s side. “_Courage,
Monsieur le Comte!_ Let them have your charge! I have just life enough
left to load my gun again. Wait! Your hand trembles! _Bien!_ Fire!”
De Sancerre’s musket roared once again and his bullet found its way to
the heart of a foe.
“Take my gun, monsieur,” gasped Barbier. “I made shift to load it--but,
gar, this is death! Ugh!”
A hero at the end of his short, wild life, the _coureur de bois_ lay
dead upon the shore.
At that instant the waters of the gulf and the river’s mouth vibrated
with the thunder of an explosion which, to the ears of the startled
sun-worshippers upon the main-land and in the crowded war-boats,
sounded like moon-magic gone mad with victory.
“_Nom de Dieu_, it is the cannon of a ship or my ears are haunted by
Jacques Barbier’s gun!” exclaimed de Sancerre, eyeing the retreating
canoes as he stealthily raised his head above the underbrush and then
cast a searching glance toward the sun-kissed sea. To his amazement
and joy, his gaze rested upon a clumsy carack, loaded deep, coming to
anchor not half a mile below the island upon which he stood. A puff of
smoke arose from the great ship’s bow at that moment, and again the
astonished woods and waters reverberated with an uproar new to the
ears of a hundred terrified warriors, who had come forth to recover a
goddess and had been met with the awful chiding of the Great Spirit,
who had sent a mighty vessel, larger than their wildest dreams had
known, to carry Coyocop back again to God.
With his heart throbbing with many varied emotions, de Sancerre had
reluctantly turned his grateful eyes from the sea, no longer a lonely,
cruel waste of tossing waves, toward the forest to the westward,
into which the land-forces of the disorganized sun-worshippers were
scurrying in mad fear of an avenging deity, when he felt a light hand
upon his arm, and, turning quickly, gazed down into the dark, glowing
eyes of a maiden whose trust in the saints had not been betrayed.
“In the hut I knelt in prayer,” whispered Doña Julia, from whose face
shone the light of a soul that had known deep sorrow and great joy,
“when I heard my father’s voice, telling me that help was near. Oh,
señor, the wonder of it all!”
“It looks to me a miracle, indeed!” exclaimed de Sancerre. “There
seemed to be no hope when Barbier was hit! He died, señora, the death
of a true man.”
Hand in hand, they stood for a time gazing down at the brave,
liberty-loving runner of the woods, whose clean-cut, handsome face had
kept its firm, symmetrical outlines through the agony of sudden death.
“Give me back again my dagger, sweetheart,” said de Sancerre, turning
sadly away from a grim picture of manly vigor cut down in its youthful
prime. “I did Jacques Barbier a cruel wrong! He was too brave a man to
do a coward’s deed!”
[Illustration: “HE FELT A LIGHT HAND UPON HIS ARM, AND GAZED DOWN INTO
THE DARK EYES OF THE MAIDEN”]
“They’re manning a boat to come to us!” exclaimed the Frenchman a
moment later, as he and Doña Julia turned again to gaze at the great
carack, rising and falling upon the early morning tide. “It is a
Spanish vessel, sweetheart!”
“_Si_, señor. There is no doubt of that! I cannot read the flag she
flies, but ’tis some Spanish merchant-man bound west for Mexico.”
De Sancerre slipped an arm, covered with velvet rags, around the
slender waist of the girl, whose sweet face had gained new beauty from
the mighty miracle which the saints had wrought in her behalf.
“They heard our guns at dawn across the sea, and saw my canvas flapping
in the breeze,” he said, musingly. “At last, by chance, the King of
France has done me a good turn! He owed me one, señora. My sword has
served him well, but when it made a slip, which love itself forgave, he
turned his face away, and left me, sweetheart, with no land to call my
own!”
Doña Julia looked up at her lover with a bright smile upon her curving
lips, and her eloquent eyes told of a joyful heart, as she said:
“If so my countrymen in yonder boat are kind enough to take us, señor,
to the West, we’ll find a province which belongs to me. If you will
deign to make my realm the land of your adoption, I pledge my word to
be a gracious queen.”
Falling to one knee, with the airy grace of a courtier who had never
known the manners of the woods and wilds, de Sancerre pressed the
girl’s hand to his smiling lips.
“Here, within sight of a column bearing the arms of France and
Navarre,” he cried, gayly, “I forswear all allegiance to other kings
than Love, and hereby pledge my life and heart and sword to the service
of my queen, whose hand I kiss!”
The salt breeze from the playful sea, smiling beneath the bright June
sun, brought to their ears at that moment the sound of a small boat
scraping upon the beach, and the rumble of oars clattering against dry
wood.
* * * * *
The sun was sinking toward the West, and the King’s Column, after a
long interval of silence, spake complaining words to the Cross of
Christ. “’Twill be more lonely for us now than heretofore,” grumbled
the tall pillar, above which a shred of soiled canvas hung, heavy
and limp, flapping lazily now and again against the wooden sides of
the royal herald. “In yonder ship, whose sails resemble golden wings
against the background of the deep, a man and maiden, seemingly most
worthy of the blessings of this realm of mine, have taken flight and
treated me with strange ingratitude. I marvel that they should in such
wise spurn my royal master and the haughty arms of France.”
The Cross of Christ said nothing to soothe the wounded pride of the
pompous pillar, towering above the humble emblem of an all-conquering
faith in the crimson light of the waning day. Mayhap the Cross had no
time, at that sad moment, to give to happy lovers, sailing through the
glowing twilight toward a land of peace and joy. At its base lay a
newly-made grave, within which slept the body of a youth who had loved
God’s world and hated the tyranny of men.
THE END
BY H. G. WELLS
WHEN THE SLEEPER WAKES. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 50.
“This romance of the twenty-second century,” as the London _Daily
Telegraph_ says, “will prove absolutely enthralling. The hero goes
into a trance in 1900, and when he awakes two centuries later he
finds that his property has increased so greatly that he owns more
than half the world.”
THIRTY STRANGE STORIES. _New Edition._ Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 50.
Creepy, ingenious, original, and more than clever they all are. They
fascinate you like the eye of a snake.... It would be impossible to
find a group of stories that will give the reader more sensations, or
hold his attention more firmly.--_Boston Herald._
THE WAR OF THE WORLDS. With Illustrations. Post 8vo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1 50.
One of the conspicuous books of the year, from its striking
originality of title and plot.--_Washington Times._
THE INVISIBLE MAN. A Grotesque Romance. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 00.
In his audacious imaginative insight into the romantic possibilities
underlying the discoveries or the suggestion of modern science Mr.
Wells stands unrivalled.... It is just like a transcript from real
life, recalling the best work of Poe in its accent of sincerity and
surpassing it in its felicity of style.--_The Spectator_, London.
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
_Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid,
to any part of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the
price._
BY A. CONAN DOYLE
THE REFUGEES. A Tale of Two Continents. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1 75.
THE WHITE COMPANY. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 75.
MICAH CLARKE. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 75; 8vo,
Paper, 45 cents.
THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1 50.
Contents: A Scandal in Bohemia, The Red-headed League, A Case of
Identity, The Boscombe Valley Mystery, The Five Orange Pips, The Man
with the Twisted Lip, The Blue Carbuncle, The Speckled Band, The
Engineer’s Thumb, The Noble Bachelor, The Beryl Coronet, The Copper
Beeches.
MEMOIRS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 50.
Contents: Silver Blaze, The Yellow Face, The Stock-Broker’s Clerk,
The “Gloria Scott,” The Musgrave Ritual, The Reigate Puzzle, The
Crooked Man, The Resident Patient, The Greek Interpreter, The Navy
Treaty, The Final Problem.
THE PARASITE. A story. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 00.
THE GREAT SHADOW. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 00.
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
_Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid,
to any part of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the
price._
BY JOHN FOX, JR.
A MOUNTAIN EUROPA. With Portrait. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.
The story is well worth careful reading for its literary art and its
truth to a phase of little-known American life.--_Omaha Bee._
THE KENTUCKIANS. A Novel. Illustrated by W. T. SMEDLEY. Post 8vo,
Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.
This, Mr. Fox’s first long story, sets him well in view, and
distinguishes him as at once original and sound. He takes the right
view of the story-writer’s function and the wholesale view of what
the art of fiction can rightfully attempt.--_Independent_, N. Y.
“HELL FER SARTAIN,” and Other Stories. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1 00.
Mr. Fox has made a great success of his pictures of the rude life and
primitive passions of the people of the mountains of West Virginia
and Kentucky. His sketches are short but graphic; he paints his
scenes and his hill people in terse and simple phrases and makes
them genuinely picturesque, giving us glimpses of life that are
distinctively American.--_Detroit Free Press._
A CUMBERLAND VENDETTA, and Other Stories. Illustrated. Post 8vo,
Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.
These stories are tempestuously alive, and sweep the heart-strings
with a master-hand.--_Watchman_, Boston.
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
_Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid,
to any part of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the
price._
BY W. CLARK RUSSELL
A SEA QUEEN. 16mo, Half Cloth, $1 00.
JACK’S COURTSHIP. A Sailor’s Yarn of Love and Shipwreck. 16mo, Half
Cloth, 75 cents.
The present “Jack” is a lover who ships for Australia on board the
same vessel with his sweetheart, whom a stern father has sent off to
get her out of the way of his attentions. Shipwreck and a chapter
of Robinson Crusoe life on a desert island vary the fortunes of
“Jack’s Courtship,” all of which are related in Mr. Russell’s vivid
style.--_Literary World_, Boston.
A VOYAGE TO THE CAPE. 16mo, Paper, 25 cents.
AN OCEAN TRAGEDY. 8vo, Paper, 50 cents.
MAROONED. 8vo, Paper, 25 cents.
MRS. DINES’S JEWELS. Illustrated. 8vo, Paper, 50 cents.
MY DANISH SWEETHEART. Illustrated. 8vo, Paper, 60 cents.
MY SHIPMATE LOUISE. 8vo, Paper, 50 cents.
A novel by Mr. Clark Russell cannot fail to reach the strongest
interest, and to be characterized by the genius of one who, beyond
all writers, understands sailors and the sea.--_Graphic_, London.
As a writer on all subjects connected with the sea and those who live
on it, he is without a rival.--_Morning Post_, London.
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
_Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid,
to any part of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, on receipt of the
price._
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
Archaic or alternate spelling has been retained from the original.