The Sun Of Quebec Part 12

"When do you expect to reach New York?" he asked.

"To-morrow some time, if the wind holds fair, but we won't stay there long. A few hours only to comply with the port regulations, and then ho!

for the West Indies! It's a grand voyage down! And splendid islands!

Green mountains that seem to rise straight up out of the sea! While you're working in the cane fields you can enjoy the beautiful scenery, Peter."

Robert was silent. The man's malice filled him with disgust. Undoubtedly the slaver had felt intense chagrin because of his former failure and his defeat in the duel of swords before his own men, but then one should not exult over a foe who was beaten for the time. He felt a bitter and intense hatred of the slaver, and, his breakfast finished, he leaned back, closing his eyes.

"So you do not wish to talk, but would meditate," said the man. "Perhaps you're right, but, at any rate, you'll have plenty of time for it."

When he went out Robert heard the heavy lock of the tiny room shove into place again, and he wasted no further effort in a new attempt upon it.

Instead, he lay down on the bunk, closed his eyes and tried to reconcile himself, body and mind, to his present situation. He knew that it was best to keep quiet, to restrain any mental flutterings or physical quivers. Absolute calm, if he could command it, was good for the soul, placed as he was, and the mere act of lying still helped toward that. It was what Tayoga would do if he were in his place, and, spurred by a n.o.ble emulation, he resolved that he would not be inferior to the Onondaga.

An hour, two hours pa.s.sed and he did not stir. His stillness made his hearing more acute. The trampling of feet over his head came to him with great distinctness. He heard the singing of wind at the porthole, and, now and then, the swish of waters as they swept past the schooner. He wondered what Tayoga was doing and what would Willet think when he came back to Albany and found him gone. It gave him a stab of agony. His pride was hurt, too, that he had been trapped so thoroughly. Then his resolution returned to his aid. Making a supreme effort of his will, he dismissed the thought, concentrating his mind on hope. Would Tayoga's Manitou help him? Would Tododaho on his remote star look down upon him with kindness? The Onondaga in his place would put his faith in them, and the Manitou of the Indian after all was but another name for his own Christian G.o.d. Resolving to hope he did hope. He refused to believe that the slaver could make him vanish from the face of the earth like a mist before the wind.

The air in the little cabin was dense and heavy already, but after a while he felt it grow thicker and warmer. He was conscious, too, of a certain sultriness in it. The tokens were for a storm. He thought with a leap of the heart of the earlier storm that had rescued him, but that was at sea; this, if it came, would be on a river, and so shrewd a captain as the slaver would not let himself be wrecked in the Hudson.

The heat and sultriness increased. Then he stood on the bunk and looked through the porthole. He caught glimpses of lofty sh.o.r.es, trees at the summit, and stretches of a dark and angry sky. Low thunder muttered, rolling up from the west. Then came flashes of lightning, and the thunder grew louder. By and by the wind blew heavily, making the schooner reel before it, and when it died somewhat rain fell in sheets.

Although he felt it rather than saw it, Robert really enjoyed the storm.

It seemed a tonic to him, and the wilder it was the steadier grew his own spirit. The breath of the rain as it entered the porthole was refreshing, and the air in the cabin became clear and cool again. Then followed the dark, and his second night in the schooner.

A sailor brought him his supper, the slaver failing to reappear, and soon afterward he fell asleep. He made no surmise where they were the next morning, as he had no way of gauging their speed during the night, but he was allowed to go about under guard below decks for an hour or two. The slaver came down the ladder and gave him the greetings of the day.

"You will see, Peter," he said, "that I'm a much kinder man than Garay.

He would restrict your food, but I not only give you plenty of it, I also allow you exercise, very necessary and refreshing to youth. I'm sorry I'll have to shut you up again soon, but in the afternoon we'll reach New York, and I must keep you away from the temptations of the great town."

Robert would have given much to be allowed upon the deck and to look at the high sh.o.r.es, but he could not sink his pride enough to ask for the privilege, and, when the time came for him to return to his cell of a cabin he made no protest.

He felt the schooner stop late in the afternoon and he was sure that they had reached New York. He heard the dropping of the anchor, and then the sounds became much dimmer. The light in the cabin was suddenly shut off, and he realized that the porthole had been closed from the outside.

They were taking no chances of a call for help, and he tried to resign himself.

But will could not control feelings now. To know that he was in New York and yet was absolutely helpless was more than he could bear. He had never really believed that the schooner could pa.s.s the port and put out to sea with him a prisoner. It had seemed incredible, one of the things not to be contemplated, but here was the event coming to pa.s.s. Mind lost control of the body. He threw himself upon the door, pulled at it, and beat it. It did not move an inch. Then he shouted again and again for help. There was no response.

Gradually his panic pa.s.sed, and ashamed of it he threw himself once more upon the bunk, where he tried to consider whatever facts were in his favor. It was certain they were not trying to take his life; had they wished they could have done that long ago, and while one lived one was never wholly lost. It was a fact that he would remember through everything and he would pin his faith to it.

He slept, after a while, and he always thought afterwards that the foul, dense air of the cabin added a kind of stupor to sleep. When he came out of it late the next day he was conscious of an immense heaviness in the head and of a dull, apathetic feeling. He sat up slowly and painfully as if he were an old man. Then he noticed that the porthole was open again, but, judging from the quality of the air in the cabin, it had not been open long.

So the slaver had been successful. He had stopped in the port of New York and had then put out to sea. Doubtless he had done so without any trouble. He was having his revenge in measure full and heaped over.

Robert was bound to admit it, but he bore in mind that his own life was still in his body. He would never give up, he would never allow himself to be crushed.

He stood upon the bunk and put his eyes to the porthole, catching a view of blue water below and blue sky above, and the sea as it raced past showed that the vessel was moving swiftly. He heard, too, the hum of the strong wind in the rigging and the groaning timbers. It was enough to tell him that they were fast leaving New York behind, and that now the chances of his rescue upon a lone ocean were, in truth, very small. But once more he refused to despair.

He did not believe the slaver would keep him shut up in the cabin, since they were no longer where he could be seen by friends or those who might suspect, and his opinion was soon justified. In a half hour the door was opened by the man himself, who stood upon the threshold, jaunty, a.s.sured and triumphant.

"You can come on deck now, Peter," he said. "We've kept you below long enough, and, as I want to deliver you to the plantations strong and hearty, fresh air and exercise will do you good."

"I'll come willingly enough," said Robert, resolved to be jaunty too.

"Lead the way."

The captain went up the ladder just outside the door and Robert followed him, standing at first in silence on the swaying deck and content to look at sky and ocean. How beautiful they were! How beautiful the world was to one who had been shut up for days in a close little room! How keen and sweet was the wind! And what a pleasant song the creaking of the ropes and the slatting of the sails made!

It was a brilliant day. The sun shone with dazzling clearness. The sea was the bluest of the blue. The wind blew steady and strong. Far behind them was a low line of land, showing but dimly on the horizon, and before them was the world of waters. Robert balanced himself on the swaying deck, and, for a minute or two, he enjoyed too much the sensation of at least qualified freedom to think of his own plight.

While he stood there, breathing deeply, his lungs expanding and his heart leaping, the slaver who had gone away, reappeared, saluting him with much politeness.

"Look back, Peter," he said, "and you can get your last glimpse of your native soil. The black line that just shows under the sky is Sandy Hook.

We won't see any more land for days, and you'll have a fine, uninterrupted voyage with me and my crew."

Robert in this desperate crisis of his life resolved at once upon a course of action. He would not show despair, he would not sulk, he would so bear himself and with such cheerfulness and easy good nature that the watch upon him might be relaxed somewhat, and the conditions of his captivity might become less hard. It was perhaps easier for him than for another, with his highly optimistic nature and his disposition to be friendly. He kissed his hand to the black line on the horizon and said:

"I'm going now, but I'll come back. I always come back."

"That's the right spirit, Peter," said the slaver. "Be pleasant. Always be pleasant, say I, and you'll get along much better in the world.

Things will just melt away before you."

Robert looked over the schooner. He did not know much about ships, but she seemed to him a trim and strong craft, carrying, as he judged, about thirty men. A long eighteen-pound cannon was mounted in her stern, but that was to be expected in war, and was common in peace also when one sailed into that nest of pirates, the West Indies. The slaver carried pistol and dirk in his belt, and those of the crew whom he could see were st.u.r.dy, hardy men. The slaver read his eyes:

"Yes, she's a fine craft," he said. "Able to fight anything of her size we're likely to meet, and fast enough to run away from them that's too big for her. You can see as much of her as you want to. So long as we've no neighbor on the ocean you've the run of the craft. But if you should want to leave you needn't try to tempt any of my men to help you. They wouldn't dare do it, and they wouldn't want to anyhow. All their interests are with me. I'm something of a deity to them."

The slaver went away and Robert walked about the narrow deck, standing at last by the rail, where he remained a long time. No one seemed to pay any attention to him. He was free to come and go as he pleased within the narrow confines of the schooner. But he watched the black line of land behind them until it was gone, and then it seemed to him that he was cut off absolutely from all the life that he had lived. Tayoga, Willet, Master Jacobus, all the good friends of his youth had disappeared over the horizon with the lost land.

It had been so sudden, so complete that it seemed to him it must have been done with a purpose. To what end had he been wrenched away from the war and sent upon the unknown ocean? His wilderness had been that of the woods and not of the waters. He had imbibed much of Tayoga's philosophy and at times, at least, he believed that everything moved forward to an appointed end. What was it now?

He left the low rail at last, and finding a stool sat down upon the deck. The schooner was going almost due south, and she was making great speed. The slaver's boast that she could run away from anything too strong for her was probably true, and Robert judged also that she carried plenty of arms besides the eighteen-pounder. Most of the crew seemed to him to be foreigners, that is, they were chiefly of the races around the Mediterranean. Dark of complexion, short and broad, some of them wore earrings, and, without exception, they carried dirks and now and then both pistols and dirks in their belts. He sought among them for the face of one who might be a friend, but found none. They were all hardened and sinister, and he believed that at the best they were smugglers, at the worst pirates.

A heavy dark fellow whom Robert took to be a Spaniard was mate and directed the task of working the vessel, the captain himself taking no part in the commands, but casting an occasional keen glance at the sailors as he strolled about. Robert judged that he was an expert sailor and a leader of men. In truth, he had never doubted his ability from the first, only his scruples, or, rather, he felt sure that he had none at all.

The policy of ignoring the prisoner, evidently by order, was carried out by the men. For all save the captain he did not exist, apparently, and the slaver himself took no further notice of him for several hours.

Then, continuing his old vein, he spoke to him lightly, as if he were a guest rather than a captive.

"I see that you're improving in both mind and body, Peter," he said.

"You've a splendid color in your cheeks and you look fine and hearty.

The sea air is good for anybody and it's better for you to be here than in a town like Albany."

"Since I'm here," said Robert, "I'll enjoy myself as much as I can. I always try to make the best of everything."

"That's philosophical, and 'tis a surprisingly good policy for one so young."

Robert looked at him closely. His accent was that of an educated man, and he did not speak ungrammatically.

"I've never heard your name, captain," he said, "and as you know mine, I ought to know yours."

"We needn't mind about that now. Three-fourths of my men don't know my name, just calling me 'Captain.' And, at any rate, if I were to give it to you it wouldn't be the right one."

"I suspected as much. People who change their names usually do so for good reasons."

Color came into the man's sun-browned cheeks.

"You're a bold lad, Peter," he said, "but I'll admit you're telling the truth. I rather fancy you in some ways. If I felt sure of you I might take you with me on a voyage that will not be without profit, instead of selling you to a plantation in the Indies. But to go with me I must have your absolute faith, and you must agree to share in all our perils and achievements."