DOOM OF DONA LUCIA.
"I went into the storm,
And mocked the billows of the tossing sea;
I said to Fate, What wilt thou do to me?
I have not harmed a worm!
"Thy dim eyes tell a tale--
A piteous tale of vigils; and the trace
Of bitter tears is on thy beauteous face;
Beauteous, and yet so pale!"
"Thus it ever is, _caballeros_, and ever will be," went on Captain
Brand, in rather a reflecting strain. "There is a point to begin
and stop, and an end to joy as well as grief. We should, however,
take the world as it comes and as it goes. I do, and so do you,
_compadre_!"--pitching a cigar spear fashion at Don Ignacio to
attract his attention--"and, therefore, we should never look too
far ahead, and live only for the present.
"Indulging then in this train of thought, as I set down my lovely burden
here, and the cloak fell from her shoulders, I was prepared for any
thing which might happen. I wore a slightly different costume at the
time than that she had been accustomed to see me in, as I always do when
I think there might be a chance of a surprise or trap laid for us in
entering the inlet. So, instead of fine linen and velvet, I had on a red
flannel shirt, canvas trowsers, with a cutlass slung to my side, and a
pair of pistols in my belt. I don't think I appear handsome in that rig,
but the fellows at my back somehow think it is becoming to me,
especially when we are engaged in a hand-to-hand fight! What say you,
_compadre_?"
The Don said nothing, and merely waved his fore finger, as if dress was
not a matter to which he devoted much attention. He thought, however,
that sleeves should be cut loose for knives when the pockets were not
too small for pistols; but he uttered no word.
"_Bueno!_ There I stood"--pointing to the corner of the room as he
spoke--"drenched with rain, and there stood my tall and lovely wife!
"The saloon was brilliantly lighted; a profusion of plants and flowers
were clustered here, there, and every where, on cabinets and tables, in
striking contrast to the display exhibited yonder in that armory, where
pikes, muskets, and knives were gleaming through the open door.
"Quick as the lightning which was piercing deep into the inmost crevices
of the rocks and lighting up the crag without, Lucia's dark eyes flashed
around the apartment from floor to ceiling, from flower to blade,
resting an instant on the frame of miniatures there--hers was not among
the collection _then_; it is the one in the middle, doctor--"
There were no knives on the table, or else, from the deadly look the
doctor gave, he might have perhaps sprinkled the narrator's heart's
blood on the floor.
"--Until at last her gaze of terror rested on _me_! No one, I fancy, can
tell the power of Spanish girls, who has never seen them when the whole
passion of their souls, either in love or hate, comes pouring in a black
blaze of jet from their gleaming eyes.
"Advancing a step toward me, with her white hands clasped together, she
said, in a hurried, beseeching voice--and low as was the sound, I heard
it distinctly during the crashing thunder which shook the rocks of the
crag to their foundations--
"'_Senor!_ where am I? My father! Who--who--in the name of the Blessed
Virgin, art _thou_?'
"Again giving a look of the utmost horror around the room, she pressed
her hands to her eyes, and said, in the same low, distinct tone,
"'Speak, _senor_! For the love of our holy Savior, speak!'
"I felt that the girl had saved me, by her own instinctive perception, a
world of painful explanations, and I replied,
"'Lucia! I divine that all farther concealments are useless; you are in
the haunt of the most noted pirate of these seas, and that man stands
before you.'
"_Caballeros!_" continued Captain Brand, "had my pretty prize swooned
away, or fallen down in a fit, or gone into hysterics and torn her
hair out by the roots, I should not have been greatly surprised; but
she did none of those things. On the contrary, she became as calm as
marble--frightfully so, in fact--and pushing back the bands of her
magnificent tresses from her pale forehead, she raised her round
white arm aloft, with her slender fore finger quivering like the tongue
of a viper in mid air, and then poured forth such a torrent of
awfully impressive words that I quailed before her.
"Yes, _senores_, I am no coward, take me when you will; but on this
occasion I must honestly admit that I stood powerless before the gaze
and gesture of that slight, delicately-formed woman.
"'Pirate--wretch--monster! may the curses of hell be heaped upon thee!
Murderer--betrayer! may thy heart be burned, and thy soul blasted
forever!'
"I need not pain you, _senores_, by reciting the cruel words that came
hissing through her closed teeth, nor yet farther describe the terrible
concentrated gaze of hate and fury which streamed from those gleaming
eyes. Suffice it to say, that though often afterward I was treated in
the same manner, yet, on the occasion alluded to, I cut short the
interview by summoning Babette to see her mistress to her chamber, and
then, glad to escape, I went out of the house and attended to the duties
which required my presence."
The padre, with his flat lips half open, eagerly drinking in--with his
Santa Cruz punch--the words of his patron; the doctor, calm, unmoved
now, and thoughtful; the one-eyed old rascal, still puffing his
cigarettes and allowing no rest to his uneasy, suspicious optic, all sat
listening, with each an interest peculiarly his own, to the fate of Dona
Lucia. The narrator leisurely arose and held his hourly confab with the
man at the signal-station, and then returning to his place, proceeded
with his discourse:
"I shall pass rapidly over, my friends, many little incidents of a
rather unpleasant nature which occurred here, in this my rocky retreat,
for some months after the interview which I have described. I tried
every argument and persuasion I was master of to bring my proud bride to
reason, but to all my entreaties she turned a cold and chilling stare of
obdurate hate. Day by day the intensity of her detestation grew stronger
and stronger, and seemed to have become a part of her nature. Yes; the
gentle, yielding girl I had won on board the 'Centipede' had now become
as stern and unbending as a rock, and my controlling power over her mind
and love was gone. I left her entirely to herself for some weeks, until
one day I thought her passion might have subsided, and once more,
attired in a rich and splendid suit, I came in here, as she sat like a
marble statue at table. She never looked up at my entrance, but her eyes
shone like stars as she mechanically went through the forms of the
dinner laid before her.
"'Lucia!' I said, gayly. No answer by word or look. 'Lucia! _querida
mia!_' I repeated, and, sinking on one knee beside her, attempted to
take her hand.
"By all the saints, _senores_, that came near--very near--being the last
time that I ever should kneel to a woman; for with a movement so sudden
that I had barely time to leap aside, she snatched a long pointed
carving-knife from the table and lunged full at my throat! The blade
just grazed my jugular artery, inflicting a slight wound. But she never
turned round to see the extent of her effort, and again sat calm and
rigid at the table.
"This was my last visit save one. I had long before abandoned these
comfortable quarters entirely, and occupied the rooms you do, _mi
padre_, out there among the men. In fact, my stern young bride was in
entire command of the island; and even my good Babette here stood in
such awe of her that she always crossed herself when called to approach
her mistress.
"Month by month matters went on in this way, until the rainy season had
gone, and I was preparing for another cruise in the schooner; but hour
by hour the consuming passion which flamed in the veins of Lucia was
doing its work. I sometimes beheld her standing out on the veranda, tall
and stately as ever; and when the moon was at the full, it threw its
light upon her wan and sunken cheeks, and thin, wasted frame. Ay, there
she stood, like an almost transparent statue of alabaster, with her dark
eyes shining with an unearthly light, turned in one long tearless gaze
upon the ledge and combing breakers to seaward. It was singular, too,
the effect she produced even upon the horde of these brave fellows of
mine, for no persuasion could induce a man of them to come within
pistol-shot of that part of the house while she was thus keeping her
nightly vigils. And as for Pedillo, he acquired such a superstitious
dread of the girl he had married, and lived in such a state of abject
terror, that I had serious thoughts of shooting him through the head to
avoid the contaminating influence he exercised over his comrades.
"Well, _caballeros_, late one Saturday night, while the men were
carousing and drinking success to the coming cruise--we were to sail on
the following Monday--and while I was returning from my usual stroll to
the Tiger's Trap to see the battery in order and the look-outs wide
awake, I met Babette toddling along, nearly out of breath.
"'What is it, old lady?' You know, _amigos_, that Babette never spoke a
word in her life, but she made signs to let me know that I was wanted at
the crag, and that there was no time to be lost. I quickened my pace,
and, preceded by Babette, I once more darkened my own threshold. The
curtains and hangings were all closely drawn in the saloon here, and it
was dark as a tomb; but there was a light burning yonder in the passage
leading to the chamber, and I made my way to the door.
"I shall never forget what I saw, though I should like to, as it comes
to me sometimes in the night, or when I am left much alone by myself."
The pirate passed his hands over his eyes as if he saw something while
he spoke, and then, letting his voice drop to an almost sepulchral
pitch, he went on hurriedly:
"I stood at the door, _caballeros_, and looked in. On the bed, which was
drawn to the middle of the chamber to get the air through the narrow
loopholed windows, with the gauze curtains falling square on all sides,
lay Lucia. Her attenuated frame scarcely presented an uneven surface
beneath the snowy sheet which covered it. Her superb hair was spread in
great black masses on the pillow, and her pale marble face reposed
there like an ivory picture in an ebony setting. Her eyes were wide
open, large and luminous, and her thin delicate hands were clasped
around a silver and pearl crucifix, which rested on her hollow breast. A
single taper in a silver lamp threw a lurid, flickering ray about the
room, and beside it was Babette on her knees quivering with terror,
while from one of the loopholed windows a broad white band of moonlight
streamed directly across the pillow and face of the dying girl."
Captain Brand's face assumed a deathly pallor, and, with his icy blue
eyes fixed on vacancy, and his voice sunk to a hoarse whisper, he went
on:
"As I appeared in the portals of the door, Lucia slowly raised her fore
finger, and beckoned me to approach. I could no more have resisted the
summons than if a chain cable to a frigate's anchor had caught me in its
iron coils, and was dragging me to the bottom of the sea. I moved to the
foot of the bed.
"'_Pirato!_' came from her slightly-parted lips, in her old low and
distinct tones. '_Pirato_, behold your cruel work! Destroyer of mother
and child--of soul and body--may the curses of a dying woman and her
unborn child haunt you by day and by night!' I was dumb, and my pulse
stopped beating.
"'_Ave Maria purissima!_' were the last words that came in a sweet, pure
whisper from her parted lips; she clasped the crucifix tighter, and the
spirit departed. I tore aside the gauze net to lay my hand on her heart,
when, on my soul! her right hand slowly relaxed its death-grasp on the
crucifix, and, rising to a vertical line, with the fore finger pointing
upward, quivered in the light of the waning moon, like, as it was, a
supernatural warning! Yes, that finger--"
[Illustration: "A SUPERNATURAL WARNING! YES, THAT FINGER--"]
"Mamma! mamma!" came in a weak, plaintive voice from the piazza, while
the villain, with his hands before him as if to shut out a frightful
vision, and eyeballs starting from their sockets, was hoarsely
whispering to his horror-stricken audience the last warning of the dead
Lucia.
As the low moaning cry in the stillness which reigned around the saloon
struck his ear, he sprang with a bound to his feet, and, quick as
thought, with a pistol in each hand, he shouted, "Who's there?"
"It is the little sick boy, _senor_. Do him no harm at your peril!" and
the doctor stood towering before the pirate's leveled weapons.
"_Maldito_ on the brat! Pshaw!" said Captain Brand, quieting down, and
returning the pistols to his pockets. "How nervous I am! Excuse me,
_caballeros_. I was thinking of something else."