The Knight of Malta Part 61

Besides, in the frightful position in which she was placed, she felt that in him, at least, she had a defender.

A feeble ray of the sun lighted the little apartment where these three persons were a.s.sociated.

Stephanette, exhausted by fatigue, was sleeping, half-rec.u.mbent on a mat.

Reine, seated, hid her face in her two hands.

Erebus stood with his arms crossed and head bowed, while great tears rolled down his pale cheeks.

"Nothing--nothing, I see no help," said he, in a low voice; then, lifting a supplicating glance to Reine, he said: "What can be done, my G.o.d, to s.n.a.t.c.h you from the hands of these wretches?"

"My father, my father!" said Reine, in a hollow voice. Then turning to Erebus, she exclaimed: "Ah, be accursed, you have caused all my sorrows! But for you I should be with my father. Perhaps he is suffering--perhaps he is wounded! And then at least he would have my care. Ah, be accursed!"

"Yes, always accursed!" repeated Erebus, with bitterness. "My mother doubtless cursed me at my birth! Cursed by the man who reared me!

Cursed by you!" added he, in a heartrending voice.

"Have you not taken a daughter from her father? Have you not often been the accomplice of the brigands who ravaged that unfortunate city!" cried Reine, with indignation.

"Oh, for pity's sake do not crush me! Yes, I have been their accomplice. But, my G.o.d! have compa.s.sion on me. I was brought up to evil, as you have been brought up to good. You had a mother. You have a father. You have had always before your eyes n.o.ble examples to imitate.

I,--thrown by chance among these wretches at the age of four or five years, I believe, without parents, without relations, a victim of Pog-Reis, who for his pastime--he told me yesterday--trained me to evil as one would train a young wolf to slaughter, accustomed to hear nothing but the language of bad pa.s.sions, to know no restraint,--yet, at least, I repent of the evils I have caused. I weep--I weep with despair, because I cannot save you. These tears, which the most cruel suffering would not have wrung from me,--these tears are the expression of the remorse I feel for having wronged you. This wrong I have tried to repair by wis.h.i.+ng to conduct you back to your father. Unfortunately, I could not succeed. Ah, if I only had not met you that day in the rocks of Provence, if only I had not seen your beauty--"

"Not a word more," said Reine, with dignity. "It was that day my sorrows began. Oh, it was indeed a fatal day!"

"Yes, fatal, for if I had not seen you I should never have felt an aspiration toward good. My life would always have been a life of crime.

I should never have been tormented by the remorse which now consumes me," said Erebus, with a gloomy air.

"Unhappy man!" cried Reine, carried away in spite of herself by her secret preference. "Do not speak thus. Notwithstanding all the evil you have done me and mine, I shall despise our fatal meeting less, if you owe to it the only feelings which some day may result in the saving of your soul."

Reine des Anbiez uttered these words with such earnestness, and with such an accent of interest, that Erebus clasped his hands, looking at her with grat.i.tude and astonishment.

"Save my soul! I do not understand your words. Pog-Reis has always taught me there was no soul, but at last I see that you have a little pity for me. Those are the only kind words I have ever heard during my existence. Severity and cruelty repel me. Goodness would surely conquer me, would render me better, but, alas! who cares whether I am better or not? No one! I see only hatred, contempt, or indifference around me."

He put his hand over his eyes, and remained silent.

Reine could not repress an emotion of pity for the unfortunate youth, nor a feeling of horror at the thought of his cruel education.

Moved with compa.s.sion, she could but hope that his natural instincts toward good had prevented his utter corruption. Since she had been in the power of the pirates, the conduct of Erebus had never transgressed the limits of the most profound respect. If he had abducted her from her father's castle, with a most criminal audacity, he had, at least, shown in his bearing toward her a delicacy and forbearance which seemed almost like timidity.

This decided contrast proved to her the struggle of a n.o.ble, generous nature against a perverse education, and her imagination fondly pictured what he might have been, but for the cruel fate which imposed such a life upon him.

But these sentiments soon gave way to the anxious fears which agitated her mind concerning her father, and she cried with tears, "Oh, my father, my father! when shall I see him again? Oh, how dreadful!"

Erebus, thinking that she addressed him, replied, sadly, "Do you think I would not attempt everything in the world to take you from this vessel? But what can be done? Ah, without you, without the vague hope that I have been useful to you--" Erebus could not finish, but his countenance was so sad that Reine, frightened, cried, "What do you mean?"

"I mean that when one cannot endure life the best thing is to get rid of it; when you are rescued and in safety, Erebus will give a last thought to you, and then kill himself."

"Another crime! he will end a life already so guilty by another misdeed!" cried Reine. "But you do not know that your life belongs to G.o.d only!"

Erebus smiled bitterly, and replied: "My life belongs to me, since I can free myself from it when it becomes a burden. When I shall have left you, I can live no longer. I do not kill myself at your feet, because I still hope to be useful to you. What good is my life henceforth?

You have made me understand how criminal has been the life I have been leading. But the future! The future for me is you, and I am unworthy of you, and you do not love me--and you will never love me. Ah, cursed be the Bohemian who has deceived me, who told me that you had not forgotten him who saved your father's life!"

"I have never forgotten that you were my father's saviour," said Reine, with dignity, "nor can I forget the outrage practised upon me, yet I ought to take kindly what you have done to repair that wrong.

Repentance for the greatest crimes finds pardon before the Lord! If I am permitted to see my father and my home again, I will forgive you.

But before I leave, I will say to you: 'Never despair of the infinite goodness of G.o.d! Instead of yielding to an insane despair, abandon for ever those who made you their accomplice, seek instruction in our holy religion, learn to know and love and bless the Lord, become a good man; prove by an exemplary life that you have forsaken the criminal career which wicked men forced upon you; then can we pity your past misfortunes, then we can forget your outrages, then we can believe, indeed, that you wish to expiate the guilty actions of the past, by good.'"

"And if I follow your counsel," cried Erebus, transported by the pious and lofty language of Reine, "if I become a good man, may I some day present myself at Maison-Forte?"

Reine looked downwards.

The door of the cabin suddenly opened, and the Bohemian entered, and perhaps saved the young girl from an embarra.s.sing reply.

Stephanette started out of sleep, and said, artlessly:

"Ah, my G.o.d, mademoiselle, I dreamed that I was married to my poor Luquin, who had rescued us, and that he was having that wicked vagabond hanged."

"All I wish, my pretty girl," said the Bohemian, with an insolent smile, "is that the very opposite of your dream may happen, which is usually the case. You can believe that such are my intentions concerning Captain Luquin."

"What do you want?" asked Erebus, impatiently, interrupting Hadji.

"I have come for you. Pog-Reis wants you. He is waiting for you on board the _Red Galleon_."

"Tell Pog-Reis that I will not leave this chebec except to conduct Mlle, des Anbiez ash.o.r.e. She has no other protector, and I will not abandon her."

The Bohemian, knowing the determined spirit of Erebus, preferred to have recourse to a lie to employing force to take him away from the young girls, and said to him:

"Pog-Reis asks for you because he wishes to get rid of you. He knows that you tried to make his crew act contrary to his orders. As to these two women, he prefers a ransom. You are to go and demand this ransom from Raimond V. As soon as the money is here, you can conduct the two doves to Maison-Forte."

"That is a decoy to separate me from them," cried Erebus. "You are lying."

"And if I only wished to take you away, my young captain, what would hinder my calling our men to my aid, and making them carry you off?"

"I have a kangiar in my belt," said Erebus.

"And when you have stabbed one, or two, or three of these honest pirates, will you not be obliged to yield to numbers sooner or later?

So believe me; go on board the _Red Galleon_. Pog-Reis will give you his orders and a little boat. You will go to Raimond V., and to-morrow you can be here with a large sum of gold that the old baron will be only too glad to give for his daughter. To-morrow, I tell you, you can take away these two girls."

"My G.o.d, what is to be done?" cried Reine. "That man perhaps is speaking the truth. And my father would not hesitate to give any sum, whatever it might be. Yet, if the man is lying, we will only lose our only protector," added she, turning to Erebus.

Erebus was equally perplexed. He realised that he must succ.u.mb to numbers at last, and that, in refusing Pog-Reis, he would only aggravate the situation of Mlle, des Anbiez.

After some moments of reflection Reine said to Erebus, in a voice full of courage:

"Go to my father, and give me that weapon," and she pointed to the dagger which Erebus wore at his side.

"I am left without a defender, but at least death will be able to save from dishonour."

Impressed with these simple and dignified words, Erebus knelt respectfully before Reine, and gave her his kangiar without uttering a word, as if he feared to profane the solemnity of the scene.

He left the cabin, followed by the Bohemian, embarked in a small boat, and presented himself to Pog, on board the _Red Galleon_.