Alice of Old Vincennes Part 31

Hamilton was not a man of fine scruples, but he may have been, probably was, better than our American historians have made him appear. His besetting weakness, which, as a matter of course, he regarded as the highest flower of efficiency, was an uncontrollable temper, a lack of fine human sympathy and an inability to forgive. In his calmest moments, when prudence appealed to him, he would resolve to use diplomatic means; but no sooner was his opinion questioned or his purpose opposed than anger and the thirst for revenge overpowered every gentler consideration. He returned to his bed that night fully resolved upon a pleasant and successful interview with Alice next morning.

Captain Farnsworth took his fair prisoner straight-way from Hamilton's presence to a small room connected with a considerable structure in a distant angle of the stockade. Neither he nor Alice spoke on the way.

With a huge wooden key he unlocked the door and stepped aside for her to enter. A dim lamp was burning within, its yellowish light flickering over the scant furniture, which consisted of a comfortable bed, a table with some books on it, three chairs, a small looking-gla.s.s on the wall, a guitar and some articles of men's clothing hanging here and there. A heap of dull embers smouldered in the fireplace. Alice did not falter at the threshold, but promptly entered her prison.

"I hope you can be comfortable," said Farnsworth in a low tone. "It's the best I can give you."

"Thank you," was the answer spoken quite as if he had handed her a gla.s.s of water or picked up her handkerchief.

He held the door a moment, while she stopped, with her back toward him, in the middle of the room; then she heard him close and lock it. The air was almost too warm after her exposure to the biting wind and cold dashes of rain. She cast off her outer wraps and stood by the fireplace. At a glance she comprehended that the place was not the one she had formerly occupied as a prisoner, and that it belonged to a man.

A long rifle stood in a corner, a bullet-pouch and powder-horn hanging on a projecting hickory ramrod; a heavy fur top-coat lay across one of the chairs.

Alice felt her situation bitterly enough; but she was not of the stuff that turns to water at the touch of misfortune. Pioneer women took hards.h.i.+ps as a matter of course, and met calamity with admirable fort.i.tude. There was no wringing of hands, no frantic wailing, no hollow, despairing groan. While life lasted hope flourished, even in most tragic surroundings; and not unfrequently succor came, at the last verge of destruction, as the fitting reward of unconquerable courage. A girl like Alice must be accepted in the spirit of her time and surroundings. She was born amid experiences scarcely credible now, and bred in an area and an atmosphere of incomparable dangers. Naturally she accepted conditions of terrible import with a sang froid scarcely possible to a girl of our day. She did not cry, she did not sink down helpless when she found herself once more imprisoned with some uncertain trial before her; but simply knelt and repeated the Lord's prayer, then went to bed and slept; even dreamed the dream of a maid's first love.

Meantime Farnsworth, who had given Alice his own apartment, took what rest he could on the cold ground under a leaky shed hard by. His wound, not yet altogether healed, was not benefited by the exposure.

In due time next morning Hamilton ordered Alice brought to his office, and when she appeared he was smiling with as near an approach to affability as his disposition would permit. He rose and bowed like a courtier.

"I hope you rested well, Mademoiselle," he said in his best French. He imagined that the use of her language would be agreeable to begin with.

The moment that Alice saw him wearing that shallow veneering of pleasantness on his never prepossessing visage, she felt a mood of perversity come over her. She, too, smiled, and he mistook her expression for one of reciprocal amenity. She noticed that her sword was on his table.

"I am sorry, Monsieur, that I cannot say as much to you," she glibly responded. "If you lay upon a bed of needles the whole night through, your rest was better than you deserved. My own sleep was quite refres.h.i.+ng, thank you."

Instantly Hamilton's choler rose. He tried to suppress it at first; but when he saw Alice actually laughing, and Farnsworth (who had brought her in) biting his lip furiously to keep from adding an uproarious guffaw, he lost all hold of himself. He unconsciously picked up the rapier and shook it till its blade swished.

"I might have known better than to expect decency from a wench of your character," he said. "I hoped to do you a favor; but I see that you are not capable of accepting kindness politely."

"I am sure, Monsieur, that I have but spoken the truth plainly to you.

You would not have me do otherwise, I hope."

Her voice, absolutely witching in its softness, freshness and suavity, helped the a.s.sault of her eyes, while her dimples twinkled and her hair shone. Hamilton felt his heart move strangely; but he could not forbear saying in English:

"If you are so devilish truthful, Miss, you will probably tell me where the flag is that you stole and hid."

It was always the missing banner that came to mind when he saw her.

"Indeed I will do nothing of the sort," she promptly replied. "When you see that flag again you will be a prisoner and I will wave it high over your head."

She lifted a hand as she spoke and made the motion of shaking a banner above him. It was exasperation sweetened almost to delight that took hold of the st.u.r.dy Briton. He liked pluck, especially in a woman; all the more if she was beautiful. Yet the very fact that he felt her charm falling upon him set him hard against her, not as Hamilton the man, but as Hamilton the commander at Vincennes.

"You think to fling yourself upon me as you have upon Captain Farnsworth," he said, with an insulting leer and in a tone of prurient innuendo. "I am not susceptible, my dear." This more for Farnsworth's benefit than to insult her, albeit he was not in a mood to care.

"You are a coward and a liar!" she exclaimed, her face flus.h.i.+ng with hot shame. "You stand here," she quickly added, turning fiercely upon Farnsworth, "and quietly listen to such words! You, too, are a coward if you do not make him retract! Oh, you English are low brutes!"

Hamilton laughed; but Farnsworth looked dark and troubled, his glance going back and forth from Alice to his commander, as if another word would cause him to do something terrible.

"I rather think I've heard all that I care to hear from you, Miss,"

Hamilton presently said. "Captain Farnsworth, you will see that the prisoner is confined in the proper place, which, I suggest to you, is not your sleeping quarters, sir."

"Colonel Hamilton," said Farnsworth in a husky voice, "I slept on the ground under a shed last night in order that Miss Roussillon might be somewhat comfortable."

"Humph! Well, see that you do not do it again. This girl is guilty of harboring a spy and resisting a lawful attempt of my guards to capture him. Confine her in the place prepared for prisoners and see that she stays there until I am ready to fix her punishment."

"There is no place fit for a young girl to stay in," Farnsworth ventured. "She can have no comfort or--"

"Take her along, sir; any place is good enough for her so long as she behaves like a--"

"Very well," Farnsworth bluntly interrupted, thus saving Alice the stroke of a vile comparison. "Come with me, please, Miss Roussillon."

He pulled her toward the door, then dropped the arm he had grasped and murmured an apology.

She followed him out, holding her head high. No one looking on would have suspected that a sinking sensation in her heart made it difficult for her to walk, or that her eyes, s.h.i.+ning like stars, were so inwardly clouded with distress that she saw her way but dimly.

It was a relief to Hamilton when Helm a few minutes later entered the room with something breezy to say.

"What's up now, if I may ask?" the jolly American demanded. "What's this I hear about trouble with the French women? Have they begun a revolution?"

"That elephant, Gaspard Roussillon, came back into town last night,"

said Hamilton sulkily.

"Well, he went out again, didn't he?"

"Yes, but--"

"Stepped on somebody's toe first, eh?"

"The guard tried to capture him, and that girl of his wounded Lieutenant Barlow in the neck with a sword. Roussillon fought like a tiger and the men swear that the devil himself appeared on the scene to help the Frenchman out."

"Moral: Be generous in your dealings with Frenchmen and Frenchwomen and so get the devil on your side."

"I've got the girl a prisoner, and I swear to you that I'll have her shot this time if--"

"Why not shoot her yourself? You oughtn't to s.h.i.+rk a dirty job like that and force it upon your men."

Hamilton laughed and elevated his shoulders as if to shake off an annoying load. Just then a young officer with a white bandage around his neck entered and saluted. He was a small, soft-haired, blue-eyed man of reckless bearing, with marks of dissipation sharply cut into his face. He saluted, smiling self-consciously.

"Well, Barlow," said Hamilton, "the kitten scratched you, did she?"

"Yes, slightly, and I don't think I've been treated fairly in the matter, sir."

"How so?"

"I stood the brunt and now Captain Farnsworth gets the prize." He twisted his mouth in mock expression of maudlin disappointment. "I'm always cheated out of the sweets. I never get anything for gallant conduct on the field."

"Poor boy! It is a shame. But I say, Lieutenant, has Roussillon really escaped, or is he hidden somewhere in town? Have you been careful?"

"Oh, it's the Indians. They all swear by these Frenchmen. You can't get any help from them against a fellow like Roussillon. In fact they aid him; he's among them now."