The Pirate Woman Part 11

Dolores waved a gleaming arm around the place, indicating with one wide gesture the glories of the walls and roof. But the pirate's senses responded more readily to the tangible riches represented by gold and gems, tall flagons, and jewel-incrusted lamps, littered diamonds and rubies that strewed the big table.

"Hah!" cried Dolores, with a low, throaty laugh. "Ah! my friend, I know thy mind. Milo!"

Milo advanced with a deep obeisance.

"Milo, open the great chests for Sancho. Let him plunge his arms to the elbows in red gold. Then I shall show him that which lies nearest to his deserts."

The pirate watched with lips no longer dry, but dripping with the saliva of greed, while Milo flung open chest after chest, full to overflowing with minted gold of many nations; looted jewels of royal and n.o.ble houses, sacred vessels and glittering orders, weapons whose hilts and scabbards, if ever made for use, could only have been used to bewilder the eye and senses.

Again the thunder pealed; and in the tremendous hush succeeding, the voices outside penetrated the sounding-stone in more than a whisper.

Sancho jerked up his head and fear once more shone in his single eye.

"Come, good Sancho," purred Dolores, running her soft hand down his bare forearm. "Art frightened by petty noises, then? Plunge thy hands deep, man! All thou canst grasp is thine for so long as thy eye can enjoy or thy hands fondle."

Now Sancho's sordid soul surrendered. His greed conquered fear, and he delved deep into a coffer, chattering the while with frenzy. And now when the thunder rolled, his ears heard it not. He drew forth his hands, and a glittering ma.s.s of wealth fell about his feet. He glared up at Dolores, laughing ghoulishly.

"That is well, Sancho," Dolores said, and took his hand. "Now I will show thee the rest; and I know thou'lt never tell of it. I trust thee.

Come. Put thy ear to this tapestry, and tell me what thou canst hear."

Sancho laid his ear to the cloth, and his eye gleamed brightly. Milo stepped silently behind him.

"I hear Hanglip!" he gasped. "Is he, too, here?"

"He is outside the cliff. But whom else canst hear?"

"I hear Caliban--Spotted Dog--Stumpy--I hear a score as if they stood by my side! And Pascherette! By the fiend! She has played Rufe a trick! And me--" He sprang from the wall like a tiger, s.n.a.t.c.hing at his weaponless belt with slavering fury, to be gathered at once into the remorseless hug of Milo. And he glared full into the mocking face of Dolores--soft and generous no more, but the embodiment of awful vengeance.

For many seconds she stood regarding him contemptuously, until he subsided helplessly in Milo's grasp; then, motioning the giant to follow, she pa.s.sed along and stopped before a life-size painting of "The Sleeping Venus" in a ma.s.sive, gilded frame. With one hand raised high at the side, she turned a pulley-catch, and the great picture slowly fell forward from the top until it rested slopingly on the floor, forming an inclined entrance to a gloomy pa.s.sage, dimly touched by a dark-red glow.

This was the secret outlet to the great chamber by which Milo had access to the altar in the grove at such times as his aid was needed to support Dolores in some exhibition of black magic. She stepped swiftly along the pa.s.sage, giving no further heed to the panic-stricken pirate until Milo had carried and dragged him to where she awaited him. This was still another dark excavation, running deeper yet into the bowels of the cliff; and the devilish red glare was here intensified until surrounding objects were vividly revealed.

"Now hear the doom of a traitor!" cried Dolores, with haughty mien.

"What! Not a traitor?" she mocked at the pirate's frantic howl of denial. "Then Dolores has erred, perhaps. There is a test, good Sancho.

Let me see if I am wrong!"

She signed to Milo, and the giant swung Sancho around until he faced the deepest recess of the cave. There, swathed in mummy clothes, preserved by the chemical miracle of the stratum of red earth that formed the core of the rock, the body of Red Jabez stood erect against the wall, bathed in the red glow, diamonds glittering where the dead eyes had been. And on the rock ledge at his feet stood a tall flagon of gold, in which Dolores had brewed an awful potion for this event. Beside this ledge stood a low brazier full of glowing charcoal; on a tabouret near by lay several terrible implements the use of which needed no explanation.

"Look upon the face of the Red Chief, and drink this draft--'tis his blood!" she cried, seizing the flagon and thrusting it into Sancho's hands. "Then, if thy heart held no treachery toward me, thy life and limbs are safe. But have a care! A lie in thy heart will surely undo thee. Drink!"

A splitting thunder-crash filled the place with uproar; a gust of the tempest from the outer entrance sent the wind swirling in. It was as if the breath of the storm s.n.a.t.c.hed Sancho's senses back from the terror-land they had fled to; he ceased his howling, glared defiantly up at the dead chief, and cried in desperation: "Give me the drink! I fear neither G.o.ds nor devils; why should I fear you, dead man?"

"Wait!" Dolores laid a hand on his arm, and stayed the flagon at his lips. "Wait, till I tell thee more. Then, if thou art guiltless, and go from here with the treasure I gave thee, thou'lt know thy friends and thy foes.

"Didst think Yellow Rufe was free? Thou fool! Thy wits are powerless before a woman's. Did my pretty Pascherette tell him he might go free, taking my sloop, escaping my vengeance, as thou didst think to? Didst hear those voices? Then I tell thee, Sancho, that ten-score count, that Rufe doubtless made in fear and trembling, but sufficed to raise his hopes. For ere he had gained the sloop and started her anchor, Pascherette had done her work. The stranger's schooner is full of my men, waiting for Rufe to come for his booty. Let him take alarm, then how far may he win? Thou'lt never know, false Sancho, for I have no doubt of thy treachery. Now drink, if thou darest!"

"Then, by the fiend, I dare!" shouted the pirate. Something in the tang of the gale sweeping in from the unseen entrance rea.s.sured him of the existence of the outer world; persuaded him that by taking a desperate chance he might yet throw dust in the eyes of this terrible woman and go hence with the secret of the great chamber. "I dare, Dolores! Blood, d'

ye say? What fitter drink for a pirate?"

He lifted the flagon, took a deep draft in great gulps, so that his determination might carry him; then his eye sparkled, he took the flagon from his lips, and grinned at Milo. "By the great Red Chief!" he cried.

"This is justice indeed! I drink to ye, Sultana, and to Milo, ye big jester!" and finished the drink with a greedy swallow.

Then the flagon clattered to the ground, Sancho's face went livid, and his mouth opened wide and loosely, as his body and limbs were seized with subtle pains. His brain, too, felt an awful numbness creeping upon it; for the draft had done its work. The rarest of wine from her store, Dolores had mingled with it a devilish powder that first sapped the strength, then attacked the brain, and eventually snapped the cord of intelligence, leaving the victim a driveling imbecile. But that point had not yet been reached. It would come perhaps in one hour, two, three, perhaps six--but inevitably it must come. For the present the pirate was simply in the grip of the unknown, yet having full power to realize, but not resist, the tangible terrors at hand.

"Milo, hasten the rest. I shall await thee at the gate. Put forth this traitor by the Grove outlet, and see to it that he takes with him neither power to see beauty, to utter treason, or to ever feel again the scalding touch of coveted gold. Make speed, I command thee, for I hear my stout trusty ones clamoring for the chase!"

Dolores disappeared through the secret outlet, sprang down behind the altar, and ran through the Grove. Beside the cliff were huddled Hanglip and Stumpy, Caliban, and Spotted Dog, drenched with the teeming rain, restless with impatience, peering ever to seaward in the lightning flashes that continually illumined the scene.

Among them Dolores appeared, suddenly, mysteriously, as coming from the skies, and after a choke of amazement Stumpy flung a hand seaward, and shouted above the turmoil of wind and rain:

"Queen o' Night, thou'lt need thy magic now! See, there flies the villain!"

Dolores looked, and smiled disdainfully. The torrential rain beat upon her bare head and shoulders, causing her to glisten and s.h.i.+ne like a golden G.o.ddess; but she heeded it not at all; her eyes sought out what Stumpy had indicated. And there, in the next lightning-flash, flying seaward, was the sloop. Rufe had taken alarm, and had foregone his plan of looting the schooner.

"Let him go; he'll fly not far," she said calmly. "Come with me to the great rock, my bold fellows; daylight shall show thee Rufe where I would have him--paying the price, as Sancho has paid!"

She glided around the rock, followed by her silent faithfuls, while from the Grove rang a shriek of mortal agony that sent fierce hearts aquiver with terror.

CHAPTER XIII.

DOLORES FLOATS THE FEU FOLLETTE.

"h.e.l.l's breath!" screamed Caliban, as the cry rang out. "Have ye devils in the Grove, mistress?" Hanglip and Spotted Dog, too, cringed back in fright. Stumpy concealed his uneasiness, yet his eyes searched Dolores's face questingly. None truly believed in the queen's magic powers; yet none was bold enough to openly avow his unbelief; and the added grimness of the storm, a.s.sisted by the unearthliness of that howl of anguish, brought the four G.o.dless pirates to the verge of superst.i.tious terror.

"Yes, I keep my devils there," replied Dolores; "and that is the traitor Sancho answering to them for his perfidy. So watch, and obey me, lest thy cries, too, go up from my altar!"

She stood apart at the great stone, listening, and presently Milo rolled up the rock barrier, and appeared in the gloom, calm and cool as if he had no a.s.sociation with devils, imaginary or otherwise. A livid lightning-flash played on his features, and the pirates drew back, muttering at his black eyes which glowed with red points like rubies in the heart of twin coals.

"Milo, there flies Rufe," said Dolores, flinging an arm seaward. Beyond the false point, in the midst of black seas dappled with rus.h.i.+ng white-horses, under a lowering black sky that seemed to lean down to the verge of the ocean itself, Rufe's sloop was pictured in the next flash of electric radiance a thing of desolation and panic. Fully a mile away, the craft vanished in the pervading blackness between every flash. "I need thy condor's vision now as never before. Take the swift, small sailboat, and flares; follow the sloop as long as thy eyes can pick her out; we shall follow thy flares in the schooner until we overtake thee.

Haste now; Rufe has grace enough!"

Milo stayed only to get his flare-powder and tinder-box, then disappeared down the cliff.

Dolores despatched her four attendants to the schooner, prepared to follow, then, with an afterthought, halted two of them.

"Here, Hanglip, Spotted Dog, wait!" She swiftly entered the council hall, went to the three small chambers, and released her captives from the ring-bolts. Driving them before her, bewildered by the sudden emergence from tranquillity to the turmoil of the storm, she gave the two pirates each a chain, held the other herself, and led the way down to the stranded schooner. Her motive was not only uncertainty about the people left at the camp, who might prove susceptible to bribery if not pity; she also felt a sort of whimsical desire to impress these strangers with the utter inevitability of her power.

The Feu Follette lay on the edge of the bar, as she had lain since stranding, except that with tide after tide her keel had worn itself a place in the sand, and she was less closely held than before. Of her rightful crew but five survived the fight; one was the sailing-master, Peters, and all were imprisoned under jailers in the forecastle. On the schooner's sloping decks, when Dolores and her party climbed aboard, were a score of nondescript pirates, besides the crew's custodians, at a loss to account for the escape of the sloop, and worked up to a pitch of nervousness where they were only fit for sudden, strenuous action with a merciless taskmaster. And such they speedily had.

Dolores ordered her three captives to be taken to the great cabin, and their chains were fastened to the ornately paneled mainmast which ran down through both decks and formed the support of a gorgeously furnished sideboard. Then the companionway was locked on them, and the girl sprang to tremendous life.

"Aloft with thee, Stumpy!" she cried, selecting him because after Milo his eyes were keenest of them all. "Keep thy eyes open for Milo's flares, and mark well the direction. Hanglip, thou surly dog! Take ten men and lay me out a good anchor astern, with a stout hawser. Be brisk!

Come aboard in ten minutes, or thy back shall smart."

Sancho's boat had remained at the port quarter, and into this Hanglip drove his crew while Spotted Dog with the rest of the men got ready an anchor to lower to them.