“Why do you follow me about, Pierre? Can I not have a moment’s peace?”
There was a nervous petulance in his voice.
Pierre Dominique smiled, albeit with commiseration, as he looked at his
brother. Jean Lafitte had indeed changed in the past week, changed for
the worse. There were hollow circles under his lustrous coal-black eyes,
which afforded a startling contrast to his unusual fairness of skin. But
it was the aspect of the eyes themselves which gave Pierre cause for
concern, now dull, now sparkling, but ever brooding—two silent pools of
apathy.
Pierre Dominique answered shortly, his own lips drawn together.
“Because I cannot trust you alone.”
Jean did not answer, but stared at the sea, its waters gleaming in
the sunlight. He well knew why Pierre did not trust him to himself,
for he had attempted suicide in the first ecstasy of his grief. But
a week had passed since then, and, if his brother had known, he no
longer contemplated self-extermination. The law of youth and nature
forbade it—and the young Frenchman was but human. But he disliked Pierre
Dominique’s watchfulness. He wished to be alone, to sit and brood;
to commune with the invisible; to give vent to his aching grief, his
loneliness; to let his emotional nature run the gamut of his varied
sensations.
Jean Lafitte’s was a most unusual character, which was understood by
no one, himself least of all. Temperamental, imaginative, impulsive,
together with other strange mixtures of characteristics, he might perhaps
be called a genius in the embryo. But time alone could tell what form
that genius would take. At the present he was but a crucible, containing
an assortment of ingredients that would sooner or later take tangible
form. And now this crucible of emotions had been prematurely stirred.
But Pierre Dominique could not know this, nor understand it if he did.
In Jean he saw a masculine counterpart of their long-dead mother, and
lavished all the affection that his nature was capable of on his younger
brother.
“Jean,” said he, breaking the silence, “I wish to leave this accursed
island. Come, rouse yourself out of this lethargy. Pining and brooding
will not bring back the dead.”
“Perhaps not, my brother.”
“Come then, Jean, let’s sail for Bordeaux. You will soon forget this. We
will go into trade, as our father wishes us to do, and meanwhile you can
read and study to your heart’s content.”
Jean stared across the sea, his gaze wandering across the spacious blue
purity of the Indian Ocean.
“I cannot go back—Pierre. It is impossible.”
“But you cannot mean to stay, boy. It will not profit you and you surely
cannot forget, here.”
“I do not wish to forget!”
“I know, I know, _mon pauvre garçon_, but you must leave; this is no
place for you.”
“Well, _mon frère_, if it will add to your happiness, I will tell you; I
do intend to leave Mauritius.”
“_Bon!_ That’s the way to talk, Jean. We will—”
“_Mais non_, you are wrong. I am not going back to Bordeaux.”
“Why not?” puzzled.
“I go elsewhere.”
“Very well; we will go elsewhere if that is your desire. There are—”
“But you do not understand, Pierre. Our ways must part, from now on.”
“_Ventre-saint-gris!_ The boy is mad!”
“Perhaps. But I have a duty to perform ... and you have not!”
“What do you mean?” The older Lafitte looked vaguely uneasy.
“Why, pretend, _mon frère_? You know that I must find—and punish—the
murderer of Lizette!”
“Oh, that?” But his seeming indifference did not fool Jean. He could see
that Pierre was troubled in reality, now.
“Just that! If I have to spend the rest of my life hunting him, I shall
find Brouillard; the coward, the base scoundrel!”
Here Jean paused and cursed the absent Brouillard, thoroughly, bitterly.
For a few moments Pierre listened quietly, making no comment, but he was
thinking hard. At last the younger man subsided, his store of invective
exhausted, but still seething with rage. For the moment his grief was
forgotten, and it was not long before he regained control of himself.
Jean glanced shamefacedly at his brother, expecting some remark of
surprise ... displeasure. But none came. He wondered. It was one of the
very rare moments of his life that he had given way to his passion, and
he was ashamed, for, unconsciously, perhaps, he was very proud of his
self-control. He glanced at his brother and looked away again.
Pierre Dominique spoke, quietly, authoritatively:
“Very well, then, Jean. We shall first find Brouillard and then give him
up to justice.”
“No, no, Pierre; you are too noble. I will not draw you into my quarrel;
you must not come!”
“We will go together, _garçon_.”
“We will not! Don’t forget you owe some one else a duty, Pierre. Do you
forget your Margot?”
Pierre Dominique turned away his face.
“No, I do not forget Margot, brother mine. But we will forget her.”
“We will not!”
“Margot will not miss one gallant; she has enough and to spare!”
“Is that the Lafitte spirit?” demanded Jean, rather irrelevantly, but
glad to be able to take the offensive.
Pierre looked chagrined.
“Perhaps not, but there are many fair women in this world, and but one
brother. And besides, Jean, I am not the marrying kind. But enough of
this foolish talk. We—”
“You are right, _mon frère_. Enough of this foolish talk! As for you,
Pierre Dominique, you will return home—to Bordeaux. Go into trade, and
marry your Margot.”
“What do you mean to do?”
“What will I do? I shall be my own master, with my own ship. I have
thought it over, Pierre. No doubt Brouillard will go far away—to the
West Indies, or the Caribbean. Therefore I shall go there. Sooner or
later I shall meet him!”
“And then you must turn him over to the authorities, for trial. You
should want no more revenge than that, Jean. In reality, Lizette’s death
was an accident.” Apparently Pierre had assented to Jean’s determination
to hunt out Brouillard.
“Perhaps,” said Jean, enigmatically.
“I see you are determined, Jean. But I tell you, I do not approve of your
intention. Brouillard will be caught, sooner or later, never fear. Leave
it to justice.”
Jean stared down at the sand, watching the swift flight of a
sand-fiddler. In a single moment it seemed he had become a man—with
mature thoughts and mature determination. The youth had disappeared
forever.
“You do not understand, Pierre! I loved—” In his glistening eyes was an
immeasurable anguish—the fires of an ecstatic mental torture.
“No, Jean, you did not. You are but a boy. You do not know what real love
is.”
“Nonsense! _Nom de Dieu!_ It is Brouillard himself that I want—to meet
again! To punish him—to make him pay.”
“But he was really not to blame,” Pierre pleaded, half frightened at the
vindictiveness of his young brother.
“Not to blame—not to blame?” cried Jean Lafitte, furious, unreasoning.
“_Dieu!_ Not to blame, you say? Can’t you understand, _mon frère_? Can’t
you realize?” There was a strained note in his voice. “No, he will not
be punished for killing Lizette—for that alone he might be pardoned! But
do you forget that he dared to insult her? That he called her a ‘wanton’?
‘Wanton’! Hear me, Pierre, I shall send him to hell with my own hand, if
I hang for it! By Our Lady I swear it!”
Pierre Lafitte crossed himself, almost unconsciously.
The younger Lafitte, his face pale, his eyes flashing in the way that
later became characteristic, made a striking picture.
And his brother realized that this was not mere boyish heroics, that this
was a little more than a dramatic pose. Jean was fiercely in earnest,
even if his earnestness was theatrical. He was dedicating his life to a
purpose which, whether laudable or open to criticism, was yet a definite
purpose. He was a man, now, to think and act for himself.
Pierre Dominique stared at his brother for a long time, his own face
impassive and impersonal. But in his eyes was a searching, probing gaze.
What he saw apparently satisfied him.
“I think I understand, Jean,” he said, quietly, and dropped his gaze.
Together they stared at the sea, silently, broodingly.