In Search of Mademoiselle. Gibbs George

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СКАЧАТЬ myself, beside Mademoiselle, to a clumsy rock crumster against the gilded pinnace of the Queen where every line is beauty and strength. I watched her as she walked the deck with Madame. Although the Cristobal lay over to leeward and blundered heavily through the seas, raising her head and stern in abrupt fashion, Mademoiselle walked the slanting deck straightly, conversing quietly the while and cheering Madame, who leaned upon her. Her carriage, though lissome, gained from the set of the head a certain dignity and grace that marked her as a queen among women – perhaps a little haughty but in it the more queenly. But I would not be so interpreted as to show her in any sense cold of temper, for as I stood there watching her, my heart in my eyes, from time to time she turned and flashed a warm glance upon me, which sealed each time more surely my destiny as her willing servitor.

      In a little while the prisoners were brought up from below for their airing and Mademoiselle went with Madame below to the cabin. The Spaniards, taken altogether, were a well enough looking company, and I do not doubt that under proper authority and better conditions of ordnance and seamanship, could have given a good account of themselves. As it was, they seemed well cowed and came up from their quarters sheepishly, blinking their eyes like so many cats at the brightness of the sun. There came also among the last Don Diego de Baçan. Lifting his great bulk over the combing of the hatchway he scanned the horizon as though mechanically and, seeing nothing, turned toward me. I had not given much of my thought to this fellow, for with the many necessary orders and duties in getting the Cristobal to rights and under way my mind had been so occupied as to harbor no place for plans or business of my own. Yet the memory of the haughty taunt of the Spaniard rankled in me, and I promised myself an ungodly pleasure in a further discussion of the subject. As the ranking officer among the prisoners, I had allotted him the half of my cabin, but my business upon the deck having been so urgent, I had not as yet had any talk with him.

      The mist of years passes over our eyes and brains, dimming the memories of youthful impulses and madnesses. Yet even now, as I recall the face of De Baçan, handsome, sneering, powerful, – his look of contempt at all things, – my pulses beat the more quickly and my hand again goes to the place where my sword was wont to hang. It is said that in the matter of love and the taking in marriage, each person may find upon the earth a mate; likewise it seems to me most natural that for each man upon the earth at least one other may be born who shall be his natural adversary and enemy. It was once told me by Martin Cockrem that two churls entered the inn-yard at the Pelican and without exchange of words, or laying eyes on each other ever before, fell instantly to fighting. Setting aside the danger which lay in his presence and the grievance I bore him for his attack upon the Sieur de la Notte, a like feeling of antipathy there was between the Spaniard and me. And as he came forward, my fingers closed so that the nails drove into the flesh and I took a step toward him. Yet he was a prisoner of war, promised to be safely delivered. So, half ashamed of my own impatience, I bit my lip for the better control of my speech and leaned back upon the taffrail smiling.

      “You have not given me the honor of your company in my prison,” said he, with a sneer.

      “Nay, señor,” I returned, “the Cristobal is a sieve, and but for certain precautions might now be floating keelson upward. My company you shall have when other things are righted, for there is a small matter for discussion.”

      “And what, Señor Pirato?” he asked with a lift of the chin. “What matter is common between you and me?”

      “Permit me to be the judge of that, señor. And upon the Cristobal the subject may be settled.”

      “Oho! You crow loud as a fledgling cock with your weighty subjects!”

      “My weighty subjects are less weighty than my fists,” I replied, for I liked him not, striving hard meanwhile to preserve my peace. “You saw fit to put an insult upon me and did me the honor of an offer of a further argument of the question. I accept that offer.”

      He placed his hands upon his hips and looked at me from head to foot as at a person he had never seen before. And then his white teeth gleamed through his black mustache as he smiled.

      “You are a bold stripling. Why, Sir Swashbuckler, the prowess of Don de Baçan is a byword in the navy of King Philip, and no man in all Spain has bested him in any bout of strength. Yet, look you, I like your bulk and manner and it may be that I shall see fit to honor you with a test of endurance.”

      “’Tis no honor that I seek, señor,” said I, giving him smile for smile, “but the satisfaction of a small personal grievance which may be righted quickly. And though your bulk is fit enough for my metal, your manner pleases me not;” for it galled me that he should continue to speak of me as a pirato upon my own command; and my blood boiled at the thought of what he had attempted to work upon the Sieur de la Notte and Mademoiselle.

      “My thews may please you even less, Sir Adventurer. Mark you this,” – and leaning over, he took from one of the guns a chocking quoin of hickory-wood banded with copper. Seizing it in his hands he placed it between his knees for a better purchase and, bending forward quickly, with a mighty wrench, he split it in two parts as one would split an apple; whereat I was greatly surprised, and knew for certain that I had no ordinary giant to deal with. But I held and still hold, that like most of such feats, it was but a trick and come of long practise. I might have shown him, had I wished, the breaking of a pike-staff with a hand-width grasp; for in this there is no great skill but only honest elbow sinew. Yet I had no humor to put him on his guard against me.

      Some of my surprise may have noted itself in my face, for he laughed boastfully as he threw the quoin upon the deck. “So will I split you, – if your humor is unchanged.”

      I laughed back in his face.

      “If your quoins are as rotten as your ship, I fear you not. To-morrow we make the coast. To-night, if it meets your convenience we will meet upon the fore-castle.”

      “As you will,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders, “yet I have warned you. And if blood be spilled by accident – ”

      “It will not be mine! Until then, señor,” and bowing, I made my way below to inquire if Mademoiselle wished for anything.

      CHAPTER IV.

      OF MY BOUT WITH DE BAÇAN

      I met her coming out of the passageway which led to the after-cabin. Holding out her hand to me, she said frankly, “I came to seek you, Master Killigrew.” Her manner was one of friendliness and trust, and so filled my heart with gratitude that at first I did not note the anxiety which showed in her eyes. We moved to an embrasure by one of the casements. There she seated herself upon a gun-carriage and motioned me to a place at her side.

      “God knows, Master Killigrew, that we are deep in your debt,” she began. “You are the only one my father has trusted since we fled from Villeneuve. But there is much that you should know.”

      “Mademoiselle,” I replied, “my devotion to your interests or cause – ”

      There may have been more of ardor in my tones than I meant to show, for I fancied a pink, rosy color came to her neck and cheeks.

      “We have good reason to believe in your honesty of purpose, Master Killigrew,” she said hastily, “and my present talk is further proof of confidence. The matter concerns Don Diego de Baçan and ourselves. This Spaniard has no good will for my father.”

      “But, Mademoiselle, has he – ?”

      “You and your captain thought that the reason for the attack lay in his hope to conceal the money in the cabin. That was not all. When we were first taken aboard the Cristobal he gave me the honor of his admiration. The following day he sought СКАЧАТЬ