Carolina Lee Part 37

They straightened up under her words, and, with rapidly clearing faces, they watched her go toward the open door. The rain was coming straight down with a terrific tropical downpour, and, as Carolina stepped suddenly to the open door, she saw the same figure she had seen before, in the act of leaving a little clump of pine-trees to come nearer to the cabin. The figure spied Carolina at the same time, and, lifting a hand, beckoned to the girl. Without a thought of fear, but with rather a wild questioning hope in her heart, Carolina, to the amazement of the cabin inmates, and later on no less to her own, stepped out into the pouring rain and ran toward the shelter of the trees.

They all crowded into the doorway to see her go, and, when they recognized the other figure, they were speechless with awe.

Miss Carolina had deliberately gone to meet the voodoo and lift the curse! Then she was indeed a chosen one of G.o.d!

CHAPTER XXII.

IN THE VOODOO'S CAVE

As Carolina felt the rain drenching her to the skin, the thought came to her, "This is the first time in all my life that I ever was thoroughly wet with rain, yet to how many of the less favoured ones of earth this must be no unusual occurrence. How sheltered my life has been!"

And the thought of G.o.d's protection went with her as she approached the motionless figure under the pines.

At first Carolina took the woman to be a quadroon, but, on a nearer view, she saw that none of the features was African. Rather the high cheekbones and sombre eyes suggested the Indian.

The woman held out her hand, and, as Carolina yielded hers, the woman said, in a voice whose tones vibrated with a resemblance to Flower's:

"You must come with me. You will not be afraid. You are a Lee. I have been waiting a long, long time to get speech with you, but your wet clothes must be dried. Will you follow me?"

"Willingly," said Carolina, gently.

The woman did not smile, but her face lighted.

"You will not be sorry," she said, tersely. Then she turned and led the way.

The rain still came down in torrents, but, as Carolina was already wet through, she thoroughly enjoyed the novel sensation. She remembered how often, as a child, she had begged to be allowed to go out and get sopping wet--just once!--and had been denied.

Suddenly the woman paused.

"Do you know where we are?" she said.

Carolina looked around, but could see no possible place of concealment.

The ground was flat and somewhat rocky. The river made a sudden bend here, and in this clearing lay huge pieces of rock half-embedded in the soil. The timber had been cut, and now a second growth of scrubby trees had grown up, hedging the spot in a thicket of underbrush.

"No," said Carolina. "I never was here before."

"But you will come many times again," said the woman. "Look!"

She knelt in the sand and scratched away with both hands at the base of a great rock, until she came to its edge. Then with one hand she pushed, and the great boulder was balanced so neatly on its fellow that it slid back, revealing a natural cave.

The cool, underground air came in a wave to Carolina's nostrils, laden with mystery. Only one moment she hesitated.

"You are sure we can get out?" she said.

"I am sure. From where I stand I can see through this underground pa.s.sage the sail of a ship on the ocean. But this rock will not slip.

Watch me."

She was already in the cave, and she reached out, and, with apparently little effort, pulled the boulder into place, closing herself in.

Carolina put her hand under the rock and felt its perfect balance give.

She herself opened the cave again.

"I will come," said Carolina. "Have you a light?"

Never could she forget the hour which followed. She sat in this cavern, wrapped in an Indian blanket, watching her thin clothes dry before the fire the woman had kindled and listening to the following story:

"I have watched you," said the Indian, "ever since you came, and when I found that you were the one to cause my daughter to take her rightful place in the La Grange family--you start. Flower is my own daughter. I am a half-breed Indian. My name is Onteora. Both my grandfather and his father were chiefs of the Cherokee tribe. I am a direct descendant of the great chief Attakullakulla, friendly to your people, who, in 1761, made peace between the Cherokees and the great war governor, Bull. My father married a white woman of good family, named Janet Christopher.

I, too, married white blood. I was married by Father Hennessey, the Jesuit priest, to a Frenchman named Pierre Pellisier, who died in Charleston in 1889. I have the doc.u.ments to prove all these things.

Here, I will show them to you.

"I am educated beyond my cla.s.s. I speak French. I can read and write, but no one knows what I can do, because I have lived as an Indian woman in order to avert suspicion from my child. All my children died except Flower. She was my baby,--pure white, as you see, and so pretty! Miss Le Moyne, who educated Flower, knew the truth. We agreed upon terms.

Miss Le Moyne would have gone to the poorhouse if it had not been for the money I gave her every week for the care of Flower. And yet she would have betrayed the secret she swore by her crucifix to keep, if death had not struck her dumb just in time!"

"But why," interrupted Carolina, "did you not come forward after Flower's marriage and tell the La Granges of her honourable birth? It is a proud heritage to have the blood of kings run in her veins."

Onteora shook her head.

"The time was not ripe. _It needed you to open their eyes_. Now they will listen because Fleur-de-lys has found a friend! You have rescued her from their contempt. You have rescued my grandson from blindness--a blindness I knew the moment I looked at him. And for that reason I have a gift for the daughter of the Lees--a gift she will not despise!"

Onteora disappeared and when she came back she held in one hand two silver coasters, beautifully carved and inscribed in French, "From the Marquis de La Fayette to his friend Moultrie Lee, Esquire, of Guildford, 1784." And in the other a large silver tankard engraved, "To Major-General Gadsden Lee, of Guildford, from his obliged friend, George Washington, 1791."

Carolina's shining eyes were lifted from the ma.s.sive silver pieces to Onteora's face. The woman nodded.

"The famous Lee silver! I have it all! It was I who removed it and hid it here. It was in 1866, before I was married. I tracked 'Polyte and her husband to its hiding-place and took it away. No one ever knew--not even my husband! I never knew why I kept it secret. I saw the rewards offered. I could have been rich. I could have dowered Fleur-de-lys so that even the La Granges would have welcomed her. But something told me to wait. Wait! Wait! Now, I know why. It was to give it to you in return for my child's happiness! If I had returned it for the money, that money would have gone to help ruin the La Granges, and I should have come to you empty-handed!"

The woman was barbaric in this speech. She showed her Indian blood, her Indian power, her Indian patience.

Carolina reached out her hand and Onteora took it in both of hers.

"What do you wish me to do?" Carolina asked, gently.

"Take these," said Onteora with sudden pa.s.sion, thrusting the doc.u.ments toward Carolina, "and show them to the La Granges!"

She sprang to her feet and folded her arms in a matchless pride.

She was, in truth, an Indian.

The rain had ceased and Carolina's things were dried. Onteora helped her to dress, her eyes shining with delight at Carolina's beauty, but she expressed nothing in words.

"Come and see your silver," she said.

She led Carolina to a smaller cavern, where, by the light of a candle, Carolina could see the black shapes of all the silver Cousin De Courcey had described to her. But so cunningly was this cavern concealed, that even one who discovered the cave wherein they stood would never have found the cavern.

"It reminds me of Monte Cristo!" she said to herself in the breathless delight every one feels at the touch of the romantic and mysterious in a humdrum daily life.

Then, as she realized the boundless Source of Supply whence this precious silver and thrice precious information had come, Carolina turned and put her arms around Onteora.