By special concession from the Haitian government, the blacks still
maintaining a prejudice against white people owning real estate in Haiti,
John Dunlap had purchased several acres of land lying in the outskirts of
Port au Prince, and had built a commodious house thereon, constructed in
accordance with the requirements of the warm climate of the island.
To-night with impatient manner he is walking up and down the veranda
which surrounds the house, accompanied by Captain Jack Dunlap, to whom he
says:
“I do not like the monotonous sentence that, without change, has come
to me daily for two weeks past. It is not like my brother James, and
something, that I cannot explain, tells me that all is not well at home
in Boston.”
“Don’t you think that this presentiment is only the result of anxiety;
that you are permitting imaginary evils to disturb you, sir?” put in Jack
respectfully.
“No, Jack, I do not. From boyhood there has existed an indescribable bond
of sympathy between my brother and myself that has always conveyed to
each of us, no matter how far apart, a feeling of anxiety if trouble or
danger threatened either one. For days this feeling has been increasing
upon me, until it now has become unbearable. I regret that I did not take
passage on the steamer that sailed today for New York. Now I must wait a
week.” As Mr. Dunlap came to the end of his sentence, a chanting, croning
kind of sound was heard coming from some spot just beyond the wall around
his place.
“Confound that old hag!” cried the impatient old gentleman, as he heard
the first notes of the weird incantation, “for the last month, night and
day, she has been haunting my premises, wailing out some everlasting
song about Tu Konk, white cows, black kids, and such stuff, all in that
infernal jargon of the mountain blacks. She looks more like the devil
than anything else. I tried to bribe her to go away, but the old witch
only laughed in my face. I then ordered her driven away, but the servants
are all afraid of her and can’t be induced to molest her.”
“She probably is only some half-witted old woman, whom the superstitious
negroes suppose possessed of supernatural power. I don’t think the matter
worthy of your notice,” said Jack.
“I suppose it is foolish, but her hanging about my place just now, makes
me nervous; but never mind the hag at present. I was going to say to you,
when that howling stopped me, that so strong has become my feeling of
apprehension within the last few hours that could I do so, I should leave
Port au Prince tonight and hurry straight to Boston and my brother. This
cursed Haitian loan, for which the English and American bankers hold our
house morally, if not legally, responsible, has held me in Haiti this
late in the hot season, and, tonight, I would gladly assume the entire
obligation legally, to be placed instantly on Boston Common.”
The positiveness and seriousness with which his kinsman spoke caused even
Jack’s steady nerves to become somewhat shaken. Just then footsteps were
heard coming rapidly up the walk that led to the roadway. As the two
Dunlaps reached the top step of the veranda a telegraph messenger sprang
up the stairs and handed an envelope to Mr. John Dunlap. With trembling
fingers he opened the paper and going to a lamp that hung in the hallway
read it. Then with a cry of pain he would have fallen to the floor had
not Jack’s strong arms been around him.
“I knew it, I knew it,” he moaned.
Jack took the message from the cold, numb hand of the grief-stricken man
and read:
“Come immediately; your brother dying, Lucy in great danger. David
Chapman.”
Jack almost carried the groaning old man to a couch that stood in the
hall, placing him upon it he hurried to the side-board in the dinner-room
for a glass of wine or water; when he returned he found Mr. Dunlap
sitting up, with his face hidden in his hands, rocking back and forward
murmuring.
“A million dollars for a steamer; yea! all I am worth for a ship to carry
me to Boston! Oh! Brother, Brother!”
Jack, though stricken to the heart by what the message said, still held
firm grip upon his self-command for the sake of the kind old man before
him. When he heard the muttered words of his suffering friend, for one
instant he stood as if suddenly struck by some helpful idea, then cried,
“You have the fastest sailing ship on the Atlantic, Cousin John. The
‘Adams’ has only half a cargo aboard. She can beat any steamer that sails
from Haiti to America, if there be breeze but sufficient to fill her
canvas. My crew is aboard. Within one hour my water casks can be filled,
the anchor up, the bow-sprit pointing to Boston, and, God send the wind,
we’ll see the Boston lights as soon as any steamer could show them to us,
or I’ll tear the masts out of the ‘Adams’ trying.”
Like the revivifying effect of an electric shock, the words of the seaman
sent new life into John Dunlap. He sprang to his feet, grabbed for a
hat and coat lying on the hall-table and, ere Jack realized what was
happening, was racing down the pathway, leading to the road, calling
back:
“Come on, my lad, come on!”
Soon Jack was by the old man’s side, passing his arm through that of his
godfather, and thus helping him forward, their race toward the water was
continued.
Not one word was said to the house-servants. The Dunlaps saw no one
before they dashed from the premises; no, not even the evil, flashing
eyes of the old black hag, who, listening to what they said, peered at
them through the low window case.
“Mr. Brice, call all hands aft,” commanded Captain Dunlap as he stepped
upon the deck of his ship, half an hour after leaving the house of Mr.
Dunlap in Port au Prince.
“Men,” said the skipper, when the astonished crew had gathered at the
mast and were waiting.
“Most of you have sailed with me for months, and know I ‘crack on’ every
sail my ship can carry at all times. Now, listen well to what I say.
This old gentleman at my side, my kinsman and friend, and I have those
in Boston whom we love, and we have learned tonight that one of them is
dying and one is in danger. We must reach Boston at the earliest moment
possible. Within the hour I’ll heave my anchor up and sail, such carrying
of sail, in weather fair or foul, no sailor yet has seen as I shall do.
My masts may go. I’ll take the chance of tearing them out of the ship
if I can but gain one hour. No man must sail with me in this wild race
unwillingly or unaware of what I intend to do. Therefore, from mate to
cabin-boy, let him who is unwilling to share the perils of this trip step
forward, take his wages and go over the side into the small boat that
lies beside the ship.”
The skipper Stopped speaking and waited; for some seconds there was a
scuffling of bare feet and shoving among the knot of seamen, but no man
said aught nor did any one step forward. At last the impatient master
cried out,
“Well, what’s it to be! Can no man among you find his tongue?”
Then came more shuffling and shoving and half audible exclamations of
“Say it yourself!” “Why don’t you answer the skipper?” Finally old Brice
moved around from behind the captain and stood between him and the men.
Then addressing the master but looking at the crew, he said,
“I think, sir, the men wish to say, that they are Yankee sailors, and see
you and Mr. Dunlap half scuttled by your sorrow and that they will stick
by you, and be d——n to the sail you carry! Is that it, men?”
A hoarse hurrah answered the first officer’s question.
“The mate says right enough; we’ll stick to the ship and skipper,” came
in chorus from the brazen lungs of the crew.
Such scampering about the deck was never seen before on board the “Adams”
as that of the next thirty minutes. When the crew manned the capstan and
began hoisting the anchor a strange black bundle, with gleaming eyes,
came tumbling over the bow. The startled crew sprang away from what they
took to be a huge snake, but seeing, when it gathered itself together and
stood upright, that it was an old witch of a black woman, they bawled out
for the mate.
The old termagant fought like a wild-cat, scratching and tearing at the
eyes of the men as they bundled her over the ship’s side and into the
canoe in which she had come from the shore. All the time the hag was
raving, spitting and swearing by all kinds of heathenish divinities that
she would go to Boston to see “my grandchild,” and muttering all sorts of
imprecations and incantations, in the jargon of the West Indies, upon the
heads of all who attempted to prevent her.
As the ship gathered headway and swung around, Mr. John Dunlap, who
stood in the stern, heard a weird chant, which he recognized as coming
from below him. He looked over the railing and saw old Sybella standing
upright in the canoe in which she had been thrust by the crew, waving her
skinny bare arms, and chanting,
“Tu Konk, the great one
Send her the Black Goat
White cow, Black kid
White teat, Black mouth
Tu Konk, Oh, Tu Konk
Black Blood, Oh, Tu Konk
Call back, Oh! Tu Konk.”
When Sybella saw Mr. Dunlap she ceased her song, and began hurling savage
and barbarous curses upon him and his, which continued until the tortured
old gentleman could neither hear nor see the crone longer.
There was just enough cargo aboard the “Adams” to steady her and give
her the proper trim. As soon as Jack secured enough offing, in sailors’
parlance he “cut her loose.” Everything in shape of sail that could draw
was set, the skipper took the deck nor did he leave it again until he
sprang into a yawl in Boston harbor.
On the second day out from Port au Prince, the wind increased to the fury
of a gale, but still no stitch of cloth was taken from the straining
masts and yards of the “Adams.” Two stalwart sailors struggled with the
wheel, the muscles of their bared and sinewy arms standing out taut, as
toughened steel. The ship pitched and leaped like a thing of life. The
masts sprang before the gale as if in their anguish they would jump clear
out of the ship.
With steady, hard set eyes, the skipper watched each movement of his
ship. He knew her every motion as huntsman knows the action of his
well-trained hound. His jaws were locked, the square, firm, Anglo-Saxon
chin might have been modeled out of granite, so rock-like did it look.
Away goes a sail, blown into fragments that wildly flap against the yard.
Will the skipper ease her now?
Old Brice looked toward the master, saw something in his eyes, and saw
him shake his head—
“Lay along here to clear up the muss, and set another sail!” bawled
Brice, and again he looked toward the skipper; this time Jack nodded.
Brave old John Dunlap scarcely ever left the deck. He had a sailor’s
heart and he had mingled with those of the sea from babyhood. He saw the
danger and going to his namesake, said,
“Carry all she’ll bear Jack. If you lose the ship, I’ll give you ten; get
me to Boston quickly, lad, or wreck the ship.”
“I will,” was all the answer that came from Jack’s tightly pressed lips,
nor did he change his gaze from straight ahead while answering—yet the
old man knew that Jack would make his promise good.
He, who in the hollow of His hand doth hold the sea, knew of their need
and favoring the object of such speed, did send unto that ship safety
through the storm and favoring winds thereafter.
No yacht, though for speed alone designed, ever made such time, or ever
will, or ever can, as made the good ship “Adams” from Port au Prince to
Boston harbor.
* * * * *
During the two weeks that succeeded the birth of Lucy’s baby, her
grandfather never left the house, but like some wandering spirit of
unrest, moved silently but constantly, in slippered feet, from room to
room, up and down the broad flight of stairs, and back and forth through
the halls.
Maids and serving men stepped aside when they saw the bent and faltering
figure approaching; James Dunlap had aged more within two weeks than
during any ten years of his life before. His kind and beaming eyes of
but yesterday had lost all save the look of troubled age and weariness.
The ruddy glow bequeathed by temperate youth had vanished from his
countenance in that short time, as mist beneath the rays of the rising
sun. The strong elastic step of seasoned strength had given place to the
shambling gait of aged pantaloon.
Burton in moody silence kept his room, or venturing out was seen a
changed and altered man, with blood-shot eyes, as if from endless tears,
and haggard, desperate face deeply traced by lines of trouble’s trenches
dug by grief.
Mrs. Church, the physician, nurse and even the buxom black woman, who
came to give suck to the babe, all, seemed awe struck, distraught, as if
affrighted by some ghostly, awful thing that they had seen.
And then, too, all seemed to hold some strange, mysterious secret in
common, that in some ways was connected with the recently arrived heir
to the Dunlap proud name and many millions. The frightened conspirators
held so sacred the apartments blessed by the presence of the Dunlap heir,
that none but themselves might enter it, or even, in loyal love for all
who bear their old master’s name, see the babe. One poor maid in loving,
eager curiosity had ventured to peep into the sacred shrine and when
discovered, though she had seen naught of the child, was quickly driven
from the house and lost her cherished employment.
Lucy Burton from the first hour after the birth of the child was very
ill. For two whole days she hovered, hesitatingly, between life and
death, most of the time entirely unconscious or when not so in a kind of
stupor. But finally, after two days of anxious watching, the physician
and Mrs. Church noticed a change. Lucy opened her eyes and feebly felt
beside her as if seeking something, and finding not what she sought,
weakly motioned Mrs. Church to bend her head down that she might whisper
something in her ear. As her old friend bent over her, she whispered
softly,
“My baby, bring it.”
Mrs. Church’s face became so piteous as she turned her appealing eyes
toward the Doctor that, that good man arose and coming to the bedside
took Lucy’s soft white hand in his. He had known her as an infant, and
guessing from Mrs. Church’s face what Lucy wished, he said,
“Not yet, dear child, you are too ill and weak, and the excitement might
be dangerous in your condition.”
But Lucy would listen no longer; she shook her head and cried out quite
audibly:
“Bring me my baby! I want to see it. Every mother wishes to see her
baby.” Tears came rolling from her sweet eyes.
“But child, the baby boy is not well and to bring him to you might cause
serious conditions to arise.”
Well did that Doctor know the mother heart. How ready that heart ever
is to suffer and to bleed that the off-spring may be shielded from some
danger or a single pang.
“I can wait; don’t bring my darling if it will do him harm. A boy! A boy!
My boy! I’ll wait, but where is Walter?”
The Doctor told the nurse to summon Mr. Burton, but cautioned Lucy not to
excite or agitate herself as she had been quite ill.
Let him who has seen the look on the condemned felon’s face, when the
poor wretch gazes on the knife within the guillotine, recall that look.
Let him who has seen the last wild, desperate glance of a drowning man,
recall that look, and mingle with these the look of Love at side of
Hope’s death-bed, and thus find the look on Burton’s face when he entered
his wife’s bedroom.
With arms outstretched she called to the faltering man,
“Walter, it is a boy! My baby! Your baby! My husband!”
The man fell, he did not drop, upon his knees by the bedside and burying
his face in the covering wept bitterly. He took her hands, kissed them,
and wet them with his tears.
“Oh! Don’t weep so, darling. I will soon be well, and Oh! my husband we
have a precious baby boy.” Then she said, as if in the joy of knowing
that her baby was a boy, she had forgotten all else,
“Tell grandfather to come here. Tell him the boy shall bear his name.”
The Doctor went himself to bring her grandfather to her. She never
noticed that strange fact.
James Dunlap, never had you in your seventy-three years of life more need
of strength of mind than now!
Her grandfather came to her leaning heavily upon the Doctor’s arm. He
bent and kissed her brow, and in so doing dropped a tear upon her cheek.
Quickly she looked up and seeing pain and grief in the white face above
her, she started and in the alarmed voice of a little child, she cried,
“Am I going to die? Are you all so pale and weep because I am dying? Tell
me Doctor! Why Mamma Church is crying too.”
She so had called Mrs. Church when a wee maid and sometimes did so still.
The Doctor seeing that she was flushed and greatly excited hastened to
the bedside and said calmly but most earnestly,
“No, my dear. You will not die, they are not weeping for that reason, but
you have been very ill and we all love you so much that we weep from
sympathy for you, my dear. Now please lie down. You must my child, and
all must leave the room but nurse and me,” and speaking thus, he gently
pressed the gold-brown head back on the pillows and urged all to leave
the room immediately.
That night the nurse and Doctor heard the patient often murmur both while
awake and while she slept,
“My baby, my baby, it’s a boy, my baby.”
For two or three days after this night Lucy was quite ill again. Her mind
seemed wandering all along the path of her former life, but always the
all over-shadowing subject in all the wanderings of her thoughts was, “My
baby,” “My baby.” Sometimes she called for Jack saying, “Come Jack, and
see my baby,” and then for her uncle, laughing in her sleep and saying
“See, Uncle John, I’ve brought into the world a boy, my baby.”
When the fever again abated and once more she became conscious her first
words were “My baby, bring it now.”
For several days the mental resources of the nurse, Doctor and Mrs.
Church were taxed to their utmost in finding excuses for the absence of
the baby. He was not well. He was asleep, she was not well enough and
many other things they told her as reasons for not bringing her baby to
her.
But, Oh! the piteous pleading in her voice and eyes, as with quivering
lips and fluttering hands extended toward them she would beg,
“Please bring my baby to me. Every mother wishes to see her baby, to
press it to her breast, to feel its breath upon her cheek, to hold it to
her heart; Oh! Please bring my darling to me.”
Poor Mrs. Church, no martyr ever suffered more than did that
tender-hearted woman, who loved Lucy with a mother’s heart.
The Doctor, when he had reassured and quieted, for a little while, his
patient, would leave the room and standing in the hall would wring his
hands and groan, as if in mortal agony.
One night when Lucy seemed more restful than usual, and was slumbering,
worn out by emotion and watching, the Doctor, lying on a couch in the
hall, fell fast asleep. The nurse, seeing all about her resting, her
charge peacefully and regularly, first became drowsy, nodded and then
slept.
The gold-brown head was raised cautiously from its pillows, the hazel
eyes wide opened looked about, and seeing that the nurse was sleeping and
that no one was looking, then two little white feet slipped stealthily
from beneath the coverlet, the slim figure rose, left the bed and glided
along the well remembered passage that led from her chamber to that bower
of beauty made for her baby. As she, weak and trembling, stole along, she
smiled and whispered to herself:
“I will see my baby! I will hold him in my arms, I am his own mother.”
In the room, that with loving, hopeful hands she had helped to decorate,
the faintest flame gave dim, uncertain light, yet quick she reached the
silver shell-like crib and feeling found no baby there. Hearing a steady,
loud breathing of some one asleep and seeing the indistinct outline
of a bed in one corner of the room, she softly crept to its side and
feeling gently with her soft hands found a tiny figure reposing beside
the snoring sleeper. To gather the baby to the warm breast wherein her
longing, loving heart was beating wildly was the work of only an instant.
With her babe clutched close to her, she opened her gown and laid its
little head against her soft and snowy bosom, then she stole back,
carrying her treasure to her own chamber.
Like child that she was, women have much of childish feeling ever in
them. In girlish happiness she closed her eyes and felt her way to the
gas-light, and turned it up full blast, laughing to herself and saying as
she uncovered the baby’s face,
“I won’t peep. I’ll see my baby’s beauty all at once.”
She opened her eyes and looked!
Now, Oh! Mother of the Lord look down! Oh! Christ, who hanging on His
cross for the thief could pity feel, have pity now!
The thing she held upon her milk white breast was Black—Black with
hideous, misshapen head receding to a point; with staring, rolling eyes
of white set in its inky skin; and features of an apish cast, increased
the horror of the thing.
My God! That shriek! It pealed through chamber, dome and hall. Again,
again it rang like scream of tortured soul in hell. It roused the horses
in the barn, they neighed in terror, stamped upon the floor and struggled
to be free. The doves in fright forsook their cot. The dogs began to
bark. Yet high above all other sound, that wild, loud scream rang out.
When the nurse sprang up she dared not move so wild were Lucy’s eyes. The
Doctor, Burton, her grandfather found her standing, hair unbound, glaring
wildly at what crying, lay on the floor.
“Away, you thieves!” she screamed, and motioned to the door.
“You have robbed me of my babe, and left that in its stead.” She pointed
at the object on the floor.
Her grandfather pallid, tottering, moved toward her.
“Back, old man, back! You stole my child away,” she yelled, her blazing
eyes filled with insane rage and hate.
“My God! She is mad,” the Doctor cried, and rushing forward caught her as
she fell.
“Thank God! She has fainted; help me place her on the bed.”
Burton, petrified by the awfulness of the scene had until that moment
stood like some ghastly, reeling statue, now in an automatic manner he
came forward and helped the Doctor place her on the bed.
“Look to Mr. Dunlap,” cried the Doctor but ere anyone could reach him the
old man fell forward, crashing on the floor; a stroke of paralysis had
deadened and benumbed his whole right side.
Chapman was told next day that James Dunlap was dying. Then, for the
first and only time in the life of David Chapman, he disobeyed an order
given by a Dunlap and sent the message to Haiti.