The Pirate Woman Part 23

Milo watched Stumpy disappear down the grove path, and heard him call to his men to follow. Then he regarded the receding yacht intently for a moment, and the last vestige of n.o.ble devotion went from his face and gave place to a great and absorbing bitterness. In that instant, the foundations, pillars, and capitals of his soul shook and tottered; his universe changed from a thing of golden beauty and heavenly splendor to a shameful mockery of truth and faith.

In that moment his thoughts flew back to little Pascherette, and his great heart yearned toward her. False she had proved, but to what? To whom? He asked himself these things as he slowly walked back along the tunnel, not yet knowing what he would do. He answered his own question.

Pascherette had proven false to falsity; she had schemed against the schemer; and, in the other tray of the balance she had done these things for love of him, out of a deep and all-powerful ambition to place him, Milo the slave, in the high place of the wanton ingrate who had deserted her people. And the thought hurt him now; he had not yet yielded her the kiss she craved. Even now the little gold-tinted one might be cold in death, denied that small consolation because of his obstinate heart.

He ran along the tunnel and burst through the great chamber, cursing the idle slaves into silence when they cried their helpless queries at him.

And straight to Pascherette he sped, to fling himself down by her side and seize her tiny, moist hand in frantic appeal.

"Pascherette!" he whispered with a dry sob. "Little golden one, speak to thy Milo. Speak, and forgive!"

The octoroon gave no sign of life, and the giant dropped her hand and gently raised her pallid face. His lips sought hers in a pa.s.sionate kiss, long and yearning; and slowly her eyelids fluttered and opened.

The dark eyes were misty, yet that longed-for kiss had brought back her fleeting spirit to recognize her man. She closed her tired eyes again, with a little sign, and the small, pale lips formed the words: "I am content, Milo, my G.o.d."

The giant bowed his head over her silent face, and his black eyes searched for a returning flicker of vitality. It was gone forever.

Pascherette was dead; and Milo laid her head down gently, and drew back to stare at her with growing rebellion and horror. What G.o.ds could there be to use him thus? He leaped to his feet with arms flung upward.

"Hah, G.o.ds of earth and sea, witness Milo's penitence!" he said hoa.r.s.ely. "To Dolores I have given the wors.h.i.+p that belonged to ye and ye have taken terrible atonement. Pity me!"

He paced the small alcove nervously, seeking light where no light was.

Then the harsh shouts of Stumpy's men resounded through the chamber, and he stepped outside in alarm. For it was not yet possible for him to discard the usage of years which forbade intrusion in that secret place.

He saw Stumpy's four men standing open-mouthed in the doorway beneath the yellow lantern, gazing ludicrously at the magnificence of the furnis.h.i.+ngs. The slaves at the powder store stood where he had left them, idle and aimless, but with an open chest at their feet. This now attracted the pirates' attention, and with a stamp and a shout they roared through the great chamber, their faces awork with newly aroused avarice.

Just for one second Milo pondered staying them. But his soul had soured; he uttered a grunt of scornful disgust, and waved a hand at them, muttering:

"Revel, ye dogs! Plunge thy hands deep. 'Tis all thine, and the fiend's blessing go with it!"

He returned to his dead Pascherette and knelt beside her, patting her cold hands and speaking to her softly and tenderly. Out in the chamber the pirates had hurled aside the slaves, and, flinging open the chests, were glaring with wolfish eyes and dripping jaws at the bewildering ma.s.s of treasure revealed.

Their noise irritated Milo. He went out again to stop them. And he saw a pirate s.n.a.t.c.h up a glittering tiara and place it on his head with a roaring oath. He saw another s.n.a.t.c.h the bauble off; and in a breath the pirates were at each other's throats; cutlases flashed and a savage fight began at the moment the women stole in to see the mysterious place, and one of their number ran to bring Stumpy.

The giant glowered at the snarling men as at some repulsive beasts, horrified that they should thus desecrate the quiet of his Pascherette's death-bed. He was not the Milo of old now. His memory had flown back through the years to the time when he was a youth of position and great promise in his own land; when, instead of being the cast-off servant of a beautiful ingrate, he numbered his own servants by hundreds. And a great dignity stole into his enn.o.bled face. He softly picked up the dead girl, and advanced toward the rock tunnel.

Stumpy met him at the door, and the crippled pirate's eyes burned with the newborn l.u.s.t of loot. Stumpy made as if to stay the giant with questions; but he saw the snarling fight at the end of the chamber and caught the glitter of jewels. With the stumbling speed of a charging, wounded bull, he rushed in to join battle.

Running women brushed against Milo in the pa.s.sage; all the camp's living people had caught the fever. The giant strode on, until he stood in the rugged rock portals and gazed once more over the sea. The schooner had moved but slightly since he last looked at her; he could see Dolores's head still advancing, and very near to the vessel now. The breeze had lulled, perhaps preceding a s.h.i.+ft of wind; and the visible people on the deck of the Feu Follette appeared to be running back and forth in indecision.

At Milo's right hand the great rock sat on its ledge, ready to fall at a touch, and his brooding eyes flashed to it with terrible meaning.

Inside, the great chamber resounded with the clash of steel, the shouts of furious human beasts, and the shrill cries of women urging them on; for there must be victors, even to such a sordid fight, and to the victors, spoils. Where victors and spoils are, there harpy women await them.

Milo gazed long and pa.s.sionately into the face of his dead; then he laid her softly down outside the rock and arose with a fierce light irradiating his face.

"Dogs, who would thus break the sleep of my beloved, I give ye good for evil!" he muttered. "Treasure ye crave: treasure I give ye, and none may take it from ye!"

He turned, put his hand upon the great rock and started it from its bed.

And as he moved the ma.s.s, the mountain rocked and crashed with the thunder of the bursting powder-magazine.

Down came the great rock, pinning Milo beneath it, threatening in its final fall to crush him and the body of his love. His great arms shot out and up, every muscle on his colossal frame stood out like ropes, his back cracked with the tremendous strain. He stiffened his knees, bit into his lip until the blood gushed; and a groan burst from his breast as he felt his stout knees stagger.

His bulging eyes glared ahead over the sea; into the air flew a thousand fragments of shattered rock; they fell and thrashed the sea into foam a mile from sh.o.r.e. Rocks fell upon his already overwhelming burden; his knees bent, and the blood trickled from his nostrils. And with his fast ebbing breath he breathed his valedictory, fixing his stony eyes upon Pascherette as upon his deity.

"G.o.ds of my fathers, receive my spirit into thy halls. Let thy swift justice overtake the cause of this upheaval; and receive with my spirit the spirit of the one who loved me." He fell to one knee, and a great sob shook him. The rock was falling in a shower about him; it rang and crashed on the gigantic stone that was crus.h.i.+ng him. He bent his gaze in anguish afresh on the dead girl, now almost buried under stone and earth, and murmured: "Pascherette, I come! I see beyond the blue ocean and the golden horizon the throne of my G.o.ds. Come, golden one, let us go. There will our faithfulness meet just reward!"

He pitched forward upon the dead girl, and the great rock crashed down, building them a tomb grand as the eternal hills.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE TOLL OF THE G.o.dS.

Venner's order to heave the treasure-chests overboard was not given without a pang of regret. It was scarcely obeyed without threats; for the sailing master had been bitten by the treasure fever before his owner and guest came on board. Had they not appeared when they did, the schooner had gone without them, and Peters had already seen a golden vista ahead of him. He hesitated now, and Venner left the wheel vacant to urge him.

"Over with it, I say! At once! Here, Pea.r.s.e, lend a hand here, man, before that witch's great eyes mesmerize us again. See, she smiles yet, and comes nearer."

Reluctantly the seamen raised one iron-bound chest to the rail and poised it there. From the water astern rang Dolores's throaty laugh, even and full breathing, as if she had not swam a fraction of the half-mile she had covered.

"Foolish Rupert!" she cried, never relaxing her stroke. "Why waste the fruits of thy pains? Hast looked inside then? Nay, take me on board, and let us look together. Thou wilt not see Dolores drown, I swear. Then look once more into my eyes, my Rupert!"

She laughed again mockingly, alluringly, and Pea.r.s.e turned away with a shudder, not daring to cast a glance in the direction of Venner.

"Throw the stuff over, I say!" cried Venner hoa.r.s.ely, and gave the chest a push that sent it into the rippling sea with a thunderous splash. And again that mocking laugh rang out astern; it was nearer, and Dolores's beautiful face was turned up to them with triumph in every feature. She had seen the struggle going on in her two intended victims; if she could but gain to within whispering distance of either of them, surely she would never let them escape her.

"Come, take me on board, my Rupert. I have a secret to tell thee, but thee alone!" she cried, and spurted swiftly, gaining abreast of the main-chains.

But the eyes of Venner and Pea.r.s.e were fixed in astonishment upon the tall cliff they had left; their eyes stared amazedly, and they stood like statues, hearing none of her seductive words.

"What do ye see?" she demanded, frowning up at them.

A score of sharp splashes in the water around the schooner startled her.

She suspected they were hurling missiles at her, and one struck her arm. She turned swiftly and her face darkened with fury. Then more small objects fell about her, and one struck her arm. She turned swiftly on her side to seek the source, and in her ears boomed the tremendous crash of Stumpy's explosion, rolling far over the sea, reverberating from the sh.o.r.es and making the air quiver like a solid thing.

A great ma.s.s of rock hurtled overhead, missed the schooner by scant feet, and Venner shouted in horror:

"Throw her a line, Pea.r.s.e! Here, quickly, before she is crushed by such a rock as that one!"

The sea was shattered into foam for fathoms around, and every face on the Feu Follette stared over the rail in helpless astonishment. But on the face of Dolores glowed a smile of triumph. She feared nothing of earth or heaven; among the flying rocks she swam on toward the schooner, smiling up at them, waiting for the rope that meant victory to her.

And in the brief s.p.a.ce before the rope hurtled out, down from the heavens plunged a high-flung piece of granite fair upon Dolores. She seemed to sense its shadow, and in the moment it struck her she half sank, breaking its force. But it followed her down. The ma.s.s struck between her gleaming shoulders, and she flung up her arms in despair, turning over and over with the impact, then floating unconscious close by the side of the white schooner that had been her goal.

"G.o.d! Get her aboard!" gasped Pea.r.s.e. "She's done for. Yet we cannot leave her there for the sharks, like a beast!"

Venner and Peters were already trying with boat-hooks to catch Dolores's tunic. Pea.r.s.e threw a line over the girl and drew her nearer and the hooks took hold. They drew her up the side with a care that amounted to reverence, for in her unconsciousness she was more beautiful than ever, her fine features molded in dead white, traced with fine blue veins; the grace of her form was that of a lovely sculpture now, lacking vitality, but possessing every line of perfection. The blow that had overtaken her had failed in its terrible threat to crush her.

"Lay her in the companionway on the lounge," said Venner. He ran to the saloon and brought up wine. He bathed her temples and wrists with the liquor, and forced some between her blue lips. And Pea.r.s.e chafed her hands and patted them, gazing down at her in silent awe.

"Venner," he whispered, when her eyes refused to open, "we must let this settle the score against her. It's a terrible end for such a creature."