Cudjo's Cave Part 62

By her side was Virginia, with the uplifted axe, expressing no less determination by her posture and looks, though she did not speak, though there was no smile on her pale lips, and though her features were as white as death.

"It's no use, gals!" said Sprowl. "Don't make fools of yourselves! You won't be hurt; but I'm bound to come in!"'

"Do not attempt it! You have broken your oath to me. But I have made an oath I shall not break!"

What that oath was Salina did not say; but Lysander's changing color betrayed that he guessed it pretty well.

"I don't care a d--n for you! Virginia, drop that axe, and come out here with your father, and I pledge my sacred honor that neither of you shall receive the least harm."

"Your sacred honor!" sneered Salina.

But Virginia said nothing. She stood like a clothed statue; only the eyes through which the fire of the excited spirit shone were not those of a statue; and the advanced white arm, beautiful and bare, from which the loose sleeve fell as it reared the axe, was of G.o.d's sculpture, not man's.

She seemed not to hear Lysander; for the promise of safety for herself was as nothing to her: she felt that she was there to defend, with her life, if needs were, the friends whom he had betrayed. Only a holy and great purpose like this could have nerved that gentle nature for such work, and made those tender sinews firm as steel.

There was something slightly devilish in the aspect of Salina; but Virginia was all the angel; yet it was the angel roused to strife.

"Call off your gals, Mr. Villars!" said Sprowl.

"Lysander!" said the solemn voice of the old minister from within, "hear me! We are but three here, as you see: a blind and helpless old man and two girls. Why do you follow to persecute us? Go your way, and learn to be a man. The business you are engaged in is unworthy of a man. My daughters do right to defend this place, which you, false and ungrateful, have betrayed. Attempt nothing farther; for we are not afraid to die!"

"Go in, boys!" shouted Lysander, himself shrinking aside to let the soldiers pa.s.s.

Salina fired the pistol--not at the soldiers.

"She has shot me!" said Lysander, staggering back. "Kill the fiend! kill her!"

Instantly two bayonets darted at her breast. One of them was struck down by Virginia's axe, which half severed the soldier's wrist. But before the axe could rise and descend again, the other bayonet had done its work; and the soldiers rushed in.

It was all over in a minute. The axe was seized and wrenched violently away. Toby lay senseless on the rocks without. Lysander was leaning dizzily, clutching at the ledge, a ghastly whiteness settling about the gay mustache, and a strange gla.s.siness dimming his eyes. The soldiers had possession. Virginia was a prisoner, and her father; but not Salina.

There was the body which had been hers, transfixed by the bayonet, and fallen upon the ground: that was palpable: but who shall capture the escaping soul?

When Penn and his companions arrived, not a living person was there; but alone, stretched upon the cold stone floor, where the gray light from the entrance fell,--pulseless, pallid, with pale hands crossed peacefully on her breast, hiding the wound, and features faintly smiling in their stony calm,--lay the corpse of her that was Salina. The fair cup that had brimmed with the bitterness of life was shattered. The soul that drank thereat had fled away in haughtiness and scorn.

Toby, groaning on the stones outside, felt somebody shaking him, and heard the voice of Carl asking how he was.

"Dunno'; sort o' common," said the old negro, trying to rise.

He knew nothing of what had happened, except that he had been fallen upon and beaten down: for the rest, it was useless to question him: not even Penn's agonies of doubt and fear could rouse his recollection.

Lieutenant-colonel Bythewood had committed the error of an officer green in his profession. The cave surprised, and the prisoners taken, the men retired in all haste, simply because they had received no orders to the contrary. Thus no advantage whatever was taken of the very important position which had been gained.

Leaving the dead behind, and carrying off the wounded and the prisoners, the sergeant, upon whom the command devolved after his captain was disabled, lost no time in reporting to the lieutenant-colonel.

Augustus stood up to receive the report and the prisoners,--extremely pale, but appearing preternaturally courteous and composed. He bowed very low to the old clergyman (who, he forgot, could not witness and appreciate that graceful act of homage), and expressed infinite regret that "his duty had rendered it necessary," and so forth. Then turning to Virginia, whose look was scarcely less stony than that of her dead sister in the cave, he bowed low to her also, but without speaking, and without raising his eyes to her face.

"Have this old gentleman carried to his own house, and see that every attention is paid to him."

"And my daughter?" said the blind old man, meekly.

"She shall follow you. I will myself accompany her."

"And my dead child up yonder?"

"She shall be brought to you at the earliest possible moment."

"And my faithful servant?"

"He shall be cared for."

"Thank you." And Mr. Villars bowed his white head upon his breast.

"Take the captain immediately to the hospital! And you fellow with the hacked wrist, go with him."

The number of men required to execute these orders (since both the old clergyman and the wounded captain had to be carried) left Augustus almost alone with Virginia. Having previously sent off all his available force to Ropes at the sink, in answer to a pressing call for reenforcements, he had now only the sergeant and two men at his beck.

But perhaps this was as he wished it to be. He approached Virginia, and, bowing formally, still without speaking, offered her his arm.

"Thank you. I can walk without a.s.sistance." Like marble still, but with the same wild fire in her eyes. "The only favor I ask of you is to be permitted to leave you."

Bythewood made a motion to the sergeant, who removed his men farther off.

"I wish to have a few words of conversation with you, Miss Villars. I beg you to be seated here in the shade."

Virginia remained standing, regarding him with features pale and firm as when she held the axe. It was evident to her that here was another struggle before her, scarcely less to be dreaded than the first.

Augustus looked at her, and smiled pallidly.

"If eyes could kill, Miss Villars, I think yours would kill me!"

"If polite cruelty can kill, YOU HAVE killed my sister!"

"O, I beg your pardon, dear Miss Villars, but it was not I!"

"I beg no pardon, but I say it WAS you! And now you will murder my father--perhaps me."

"O, my excellent young lady, how you have misunderstood me! By Heaven, I swear!"--his voice shook with sincere emotion,--"if I have committed a fault, it has been for the love of you! Such faults surely may be pardoned. Virginia! will you accept my life as an atonement for all I have done amiss? You shall bear my name, possess my wealth, and, if you do not like the cause I am engaged in, I will throw up my commission to-morrow. I will take you to France--Italy--Switzerland--wherever you wish to go. Nor do I forget your father. Whatever you ask for him shall be granted. I have money--influence--position--every thing that can make you happy."

There was a minute's pause, the intense glances of the girl piercing through and through that pale, polite mask to his soul. A selfish, chivalrous man; not a great villain, by any means; moved by a genuine, eager, unscrupulous pa.s.sion for her--sincere at least in that; one who might be influenced to good, and made a most convenient and devoted husband: this she saw.

"Well, what more?"

"What more? Ah, you are thinking of your friends--I should say, of your friend! It is natural. I have no ill will against him. Whatever you ask for him shall be granted. At a word from me, the fighting up there ceases; and he and the rest shall be permitted to go wherever they choose, unharmed."

"Well, and if I reject your generous offer?"

Augustus smiled as he answered, with a hard, inexorable purpose in his tones,--