Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer Part 29

"There is another present, senor."

"Where? Another? Who has dared--" roared the buccaneer glaring about him.

"Thy servant--the negro."

"Oh," he laughed, "he is nothing. Black Dog, we call him. He is my slave, my shadow, my protection. He is always by."

An idea had swiftly flashed into the young girl's mind. If she could get rid of the slave she could deal more easily with the master. She was tall, strong, and Morgan, it appeared, was not in full possession of his faculties or his strength from the liquor he had imbibed.

"Still," she urged, "I do not like to be wooed in the presence of another, even though he be a slave. 'Tis not a Spanish maiden's way, sir."

"Your will now, lady," said the buccaneer, with a hideous attempt at gallantry, "is my law. Afterwards--'twill be another matter. Out, Carib, but be within call. Now, madam, we are alone. Speak you the English tongue?"

The conversation had been carried on in Spanish heretofore.

"Indifferently, senor."

"Well, I'll teach it you. The lesson may as well begin now. Say after me, 'Harry'--I permit that though I am a belted knight of England, made so by His Merry Majesty, King Charles, G.o.d rest him. Drink to the repose of the king!" he cried, shoving a cup across the table toward her.

Resisting a powerful temptation to throw it at him, and divining that the stimulant might be of a.s.sistance to her in the trying crisis in which she found herself, the girl lifted the cup to her lips, bowed to him, and swallowed a portion of the contents.

"Give it back to me!" he shouted. "You have tasted it, I drain it. Now the lesson. Say after me, 'Harry Morgan'----"

"Harry Morgan," gasped the girl.

"'I love thee.'"

With a swift inward prayer she uttered the lying words.

"You have learned well, and art an apt pupil indeed," he cried, leering upon her in approbation and l.u.s.tful desire--- his very gaze was pollution to her. "D'ye know there are few women who can resist me when I try to be agreeable? Harry Morgan's way!" he laughed again. "There be some that I have won and many I have forced. None like you. So you love me? Scuttle me, I thought so. Ben Hornigold was right. Woo a woman, let her be clipped willingly in arms--yet there's a pleasure in breaking in the jades, after all. Still, I'm glad that you are in a better mood and have forgot that cursed Spaniard rotting in the dungeons below, in favor of a better man, Harry--no, I'll say, Sir Henry--Morgan--on this occasion, at your service," he cried, rising again and bowing to her as before.

She looked desperately at the clock. The hour was close at hand. So great was the strain under which she was laboring that she felt she could not continue five minutes longer. Would Alvarado never come? Would anybody come? She sat motionless and white as marble, while the chieftain stared at her in the pauses of his monologue.

"Now, madam, since you have spoke the words perhaps you will further wipe out the recollection of this caress--" he pointed to his cheek again. "Curse me!" he cried in sudden heat, "you are the only human being that ever struck Harry Morgan on the face and lived to see the mark. I'd thought to wait until to-morrow and fetch some starveling priest to play his mummery, but why do so? We are alone here--together.

There is none to disturb us. Black Dog watches. You love me, do you not?"

"I--I--" she gasped out, brokenly praying for strength, and fighting for time.

"You said it once, that's enough. Come, lady, let's have happiness while we may. Seal the bargain and kiss away the blows."

He came around the table and approached her. Notwithstanding the quant.i.ty of liquor he had taken he was physically master of himself, she noticed with a sinking heart. As he drew near, she sprang to her feet also and backed away from him, throwing out her left hand to ward him off, at the same time thrusting her right hand into her bosom.

"Not now," she cried, finding voice and word in the imminence of the peril. "Oh, for G.o.d's sake----"

"Tis useless to call on G.o.d in Harry Morgan's presence, mistress, for he is the only G.o.d that hears. Come and kiss me, thou black beauty--and then--"

"To-morrow, for Christ's sake!" cried the girl. "I am a Christian--I must have a priest--not now--to-morrow!"

She was backed against the wall and could go no further.

"To-night," chuckled the buccaneer.

He was right upon her now. She thrust him, unsuspicious and unprepared, violently from her, whipped out the dagger that Hornigold had given her, and faced him boldly.

It was ten o'clock and no one had yet appeared. The struck hour reverberated through the empty room. Would Alvarado never come? Had it not been that she hoped for him she would have driven the tiny weapon into her heart at once, but for his sake she would wait a little longer.

"Nay, come no nearer!" she cried resolutely. "If you do, you will take a dead woman in your arms. Back, I say!" menacing herself with the point.

And the man noted that the hand holding the weapon did not tremble in the least.

"Thinkest thou that I could love such a man as thou?" she retorted, trembling with indignation, all the loathing and contempt she had striven to repress finding vent in her voice. "I'd rather be torn limb from limb than feel even the touch of thy polluting hand!"

"Death and fury!" shouted Morgan, struggling between rage and mortification, "thou hast lied to me then?"

"A thousand times--yes! Had I a whip I'd mark you again. Come within reach and I will drive the weapon home!"

She lifted it high in the air and shook it in defiance as she spoke.

It was a frightful imprudence, for which she paid dearly, however, for the hangings parted and Carib, who had heard what had gone on, entered the room--indeed, the voices of the man and woman filled with pa.s.sion fairly rang through the hall. His quick eye took in the situation at once. He carried at his belt a long, heavy knife. Without saying a word, he pulled it out and threw it with a skill born of long practice, which made him a master at the game, fairly at the woman's uplifted hand.

Before either Morgan or Mercedes were aware of his presence they heard the whistle of the heavy blade through the air. At the same moment the missile struck the blade of the dagger close to the palm of the woman and dashed it from her hand. Both weapons rebounded from the wall from the violence of the blow and fell at Morgan's feet.

Mercedes was helpless.

"Well done, Carib!" cried Morgan exultantly. "Never has that old trick of thine served me better. Now, you she-devil--I have you in my power.

Didst prefer death to Harry Morgan? Thou shalt have it, and thy lover, too. I'll tear him limb from limb and in thy presence, too, but not until after----"

"Oh, G.o.d! oh, G.o.d!" shrieked Mercedes, flattening herself against the wall, shrinking from him with wide outstretched arms as he approached her. "Mercy!"

"I know not that word. Wouldst cozen me? Hast another weapon in thy bodice? I'll look."

Before she could prevent him he seized her dress at the collar with both hands and, in spite of her efforts, by a violent wrench tore it open.

"No weapon there," he cried. "Ha! That brings at last the color to your pale cheek!" he added, as the rich red crimsoned the ivory of her neck and cheek at this outrage.

"Help, help!" she screamed. Her voice rang high through the apartment with indignant and terrified appeal.

"Call again," laughed Morgan.

"Kill me, kill me!" she begged.

"Nay, you must live to love me! Ho! ho!" he answered, taking her in his arms.

"Mercy! Help!" she cried in frenzy, all the woman in her in arms against the outrage, though she knew her appeal was vain, when, wonder of wonders----

"I heard a lady's voice," broke upon her ears from the other end of the room.

"De Lussan!" roared Morgan, releasing her and turning toward the intruder. "Here's no place for you. How came you here? I'd chosen this room for myself, I wish to be private. Out of it, and thank me for your life!"