“There is nothing to be known,” answered the man, speaking with an air of assumed simplicity; “at the least, nothing that’s very particular. We were on our way to Savanna – me and my comrade here – ”
“Stach yer palaver!” cried Quaco, becoming impatient, and pushing the muzzle of his musket within an inch of the Spaniard’s ribs. “Did ye hear the cappen tell ye to drop yer toastin’ forks and surrender? Down with ’em this minnit, I say, an’ do yer jaw-waggin’ atterwards!”
Thus threatened, either with a poke in the ribs, or, perhaps, a bullet between them, Andres sulkily let fall his macheté upon the floor – an action that was instantly imitated by his senior and superior.
“Now, my braves!” proceeded the black lieutenant, still holding his huge gun to the Spaniard’s breast; “lest ye mout be wantin’ to gie us leg-bail, you muss submit to be trussed a trifle. Down upon yer behinds, both o’ ye; and keep that way till I get the cords and skewers ready.”
The caçadores perfectly understood the order; and, perceiving that there was no chance for disobedience, squatted down upon the floor – each on the spot where he had been standing.
Quaco now picked up the two machetés, placing them beyond the reach of their ci-devant owners. Then, handing his great gun over to the care of Cubina – who with Herbert was left to guard the prisoners – he walked off to a short distance among the trees.
Presently he returned, trailing after him a long creeping plant that resembled a piece of cord, and carrying two short sticks, each about three feet in length.
All this was accomplished with as much celerity, and in as brief a space of time, as if he had simply taken the articles from an adjacent store-room.
Meanwhile, Cubina and Herbert had kept their guns still pointed upon the two caçadores: for it was evident that the villains were most eager to get off; and as it was now nearly night, had the least chance been allowed them, they might have succeeded in escaping through the darkness.
Their captors were determined they should have no chance: for although neither Herbert nor Cubina could see into the obscure interior of the cabin, and were as yet ignorant of the fearful spectacle that there awaited them, they had reason to suspect that the Spaniards had either intended some dark deed, or had already committed it. They had learnt something along the road of the progress of the caçadores, and their mode of journeying, which, to more than one whom they met, had appeared mysterious.
The horse standing tied to the tree – caparisoned as he was for travel – that was the most suspicious circumstance of all. Though none of the three pursuers recognised the animal as belonging to Custos Vaughan, as soon as they set eyes upon it they had felt a presentiment that they had arrived too late.
The wild haste with which the Spaniards were rushing from the cabin when intercepted at the door, almost confirmed their unpleasant foreboding; and before any of the three had entered the hut, they were half prepared to find that it contained a corpse – perhaps more than one, for the disappearance of Pluto was not yet explained.
Quaco, habile in handling cordage of all kinds, more especially the many sorts of supple withes with which the trees of a Jamaica forest are laced together, soon tied the two Spaniards wrist to wrist, and ankle to ankle, as tightly as could have been done by the most accomplished gaoler. A long practice in binding runaway blacks had made Quaco an expert in that department, which, indeed, constitutes part of the professional training of a Maroon.
The captors had already entered within the cabin, now dark as death itself. For some moments they stood upon the floor, their eyes endeavouring to read the gloom around them. Silent they stood – so still, that they could hear their own breathing, with that of the two prisoners upon the floor. At length, in the corner, they could dimly make out something like the form of a man lying stretched upon a low bedstead.
Quaco, though not without some trepidation, approached it. Stooping down, he applied his hand to it with cautious touch.
“A man!” muttered he: “eyther asleep or dead.
“Dead!” he ejaculated the instant after, as, in groping about, his fingers chanced to fall upon the chill forehead – “dead and cold!”
Cubina and Herbert stepping forward, and stooping over the corpse, verified the assertion of Quaco.
Whose body was it? It might not be that of Loftus Vaughan! It might be the black attendant, Pluto!
No! it was not a black man. It needed no light to show that. The touch of the hair was sufficient to tell that a white man lay dead upon the couch.
“Catch me one of those cocuyos!” said the Maroon captain, speaking to his lieutenant.
Quaco stepped outside the hut. Low down along the verge of the forest were flitting little sparks, that appeared to be a galaxy of stars in motion. These were the lampyridae, or small fire-flies. It was not with these Quaco had to do. Here and there, at longer intervals, could be seen much larger sparks, of a golden green colour. It was the great winged beetle – the cocuyo (Pyrophorus Nectilucus.) – that emitted this lovely light.
Doffing his old hat-crown, Quaco used it as an insect-net; and, after a few strokes, succeeded in capturing a cocuyo.
With this he returned into the hut, and, crossing over, held it near the head of the corpse.
He did not content himself with the gold green light which the insect emits from the two eyelike tubercles on its thorax. The forest-craft of Quaco enabled him to produce a brighter and better.
Holding open the elytra with his fingers, and bending back the abdomen with his thumb, he exposed that oval disc of orange light – only seen when the insect is on the wing.
A circle of a yard in diameter was illuminated by the phosphoric glow. In that circle was the face of a dead man; and sufficiently bright was the lamp of the cocuyo, to enable the spectators to identify the ghastly lineaments as those of the Custos Vaughan.
Volume Three – Chapter Twenty Two
A Double Murder
None of the three started or felt surprise. That had been gradually passing: for before this their presentiment had become almost a conviction.
Quaco simply uttered one of those exclamations that proclaim a climax; Cubina felt chagrined – disappointed in more ways than one; while Herbert gave way to grief – though less than he might have done, had his relative more deserved his sorrow.
It was natural they should inquire into the circumstances of the Custos’s death. Now, firmly believing he had been murdered, and by the caçadores, they proceeded to make an examination of the body.
Mystery of mysteries! a dozen stabs by some sharp instrument, and no blood! Wounds through the breast, the abdomen, the heart – all clean cut punctures, and yet no gore – no extravasation!
“Who gave the stabs? you did this, you wretches!” cried Herbert, turning fiercely upon the employés of Jessuron.
“Carrambo! why should we do such a thing, master?” innocently inquired Andres. “The alcalde was dead before we came up.”
“Spanish palaver!” cried Quaco. “Look at these blades!” he continued, taking up the two machetés, “they’re wet now! ’Ta’nt blood azzactly; but somethin’ – . See,” he exclaimed, holding his cocuyo over the wounds, and presenting one of the machetés to the light, “they fit to these holes like a cork to a bottle. ’Twere they that made em, nothin’ but they, an’ you did it, ye ugly skinks!”
“By the Virgin, Señor Quaco!” replied Andres, “you wrong us. I’ll swear on the holy evangelists, we didn’t kill the alcalde – Custos, I mean. Carrambo! no. We were as much surprised as any of you, when we came in here and found him lying dead – just as he is now.”
There was an air of sincerity in the declaration of the wretch that rendered it difficult to believe in his guilt – that is, the guilt of him and his companion as the real murderers, though their intention to have been so was clear enough to Cubina.
“Crambo! why did you stab him?” said he to the two prisoners. “You need not deny that you did that.”
“Señor capitan,” answered the crafty Andres, who in all delicate questions appeared to be spokesman, “we won’t deny that. It is true – I confess it with shame – that we did run our blades once or twice through the body.”
“A dozen times, you John Crow!” corrected Quaco.
“Well, Señor Quaco,” continued the Spaniard, “I won’t be particular about the number. There may have been a thrust or two less, or more. It was all a whim of my comrade, Manuel, here – a little bit of a wager between us.”
“A wager for what?” asked Herbert.
“Well, you see, master, we’d been journeying, as I’ve said already, to Savanna. We saw the horse tied outside this little rancho, and thought we would go in and see who was inside. Carrambo! what should we see but the body of a dead man lying stretched out on the bamboos! Santissima! Señores, we were as much startled as you!”
“Terribly surprised, I suppose?” sarcastically spoke Cubina.
“Nearly out of our senses, I assure you, señor.”
“Go on, you wretch!” commanded Herbert. “Let us hear what tale you have to tell.”
“Well!” said the caçadore, resuming his narration, “after a while we got a little over our fright – as one naturally does, you know – and then Manuel says to me, ‘Andres!’ ‘What is it, Manuel?’ said I. ‘Do you think,’ said he, ‘that blood would run out of a dead body?’ ‘Certainly not,’ said I; ‘not a drop.’ ‘I’ll bet you five pesos it will,’ challenged my camarado. ‘Done!’ said I; and then, to settle the thing, we – I acknowledge it – did run our machetés through the body of the Custos – of course, we could do him no harm then.”
“Monsters!” exclaimed Herbert; “it was almost as bad as killing him! What a horrid tale! Ha! you wretches, notwithstanding its ingenuity, it’ll not save your necks from a halter!”
“Oh, señorito,” said Andres, appealingly, “we’ve done nothing to deserve that. I can assure you we are both right sorry for what we’ve done. Ain’t you sorry, Manuel?”
“Carrai! that I am,” earnestly answered Manuel.
“We both regretted it afterwards,” continued Andres, “and to make up for what we had done, we took the cloak and spread it decently over the body – in order that the poor alcalde should rest in peace.”
“Liar!” cried Quaco, throwing the light of his cocuyo on the corpse. “You did no such thing; you stabbed him through the cloak. Look there!”
And as Quaco gave this indignant denial, he pointed to the cuts in the cloth to prove the falsehood of the Spaniard’s statement.
“Carrai-ai-i!” stammered out the confounded Andres. “Sure enough there’s a cut or two. Oh, now I recollect: we first covered him up. It was after we did that, we then made the bet – didn’t we, Manuel?”
Manuel’s reply was not heard: for at that instant the hoof-strokes of horses were heard in front of the hut; and the shadowy forms of two horsemen could be distinguished just outside the doorway.
It was the black groom, who had returned from Content, accompanied by the overseer of the estate.
Shortly after a number of negroes appeared on foot, carrying a stretcher.
Their purpose was to convey the sick man to Content.
Circumstances had occurred to make a change in the character of their duty.
Volume Three – Chapter Twenty Three
Chakra on the Back Track
Of the three magistrates who condemned the Coromantee, one had been slumbering in his grave for six months; the second, about that number of days; and the third – the great Custos himself – was now a corpse!
Of all three had the myal-man been the murderer; though in the case of the first two there had been no suspicion of foul play, or, at least, not enough to challenge inquest or investigation. Both had died of lingering diseases, bearing a certain resemblance to each other; and though partaking very much of the nature of a wasting, intermittent fever, yet exhibiting symptoms that were new and strange – so strange as to baffle the skill of the Jamaican disciples of Aesculapius.
About the death of either one Chakra had not felt the slightest apprehension – nor would he even had an investigation arisen. In neither murder had his hand appeared. Both had been accomplished by the invisible agency of Obi, that at this period held mysterious existence on every plantation in the Island.
With the assassination of the Custos, however, it was different. Circumstances had caused that event to be hurried, and there was danger – as Chakra himself had admitted – that the spell of Obi might be mistaken for a spell of poison. A death so sudden, and by natural causes inexplicable, would, undoubtedly, provoke speculation, and lead to the opening and examining of the body.
Chakra knew that inside would be found something stronger than even the sap of the Savanna flower or the branched calalue; and that in all probability the malady to which the Custos had succumbed would be pronounced murder.
With this upon his mind, he was not without apprehension – his fears pointing to Cynthia.
Not that he suspected the honesty of his confederate; but only that her consistency might be too weak to withstand the cross-questioning of a coroner.
Fearing this, he had scarce got out of sight of the Custos’s corpse before he commenced contriving how Cynthia’s tongue could be tied – in other words, how the mulatta was to be made away with.
Upon this design his thoughts were for the moment bent.
He had less, if any, apprehension about his other accomplice in the crime. He fancied that Jessuron was himself too deeply dyed to point out the spots upon his fellow-conspirator; and this rendered him confident of secrecy on the part of the Jew.
Neither did he dwell long upon the danger to be apprehended from Cynthia, and so trivial a matter as the silencing of her tongue soon became obliterated or blended with another and far more important project, to the execution of which he was now hastening.
On leaving the hut where lay the dead body of his victim, he had taken to by-paths and bushes. Only for a short time did he keep to these. The twilight rapidly darkening into night left the highway free to him; and, availing himself of this privilege, he returned to it – showing by his hurried steps, as he regained the road, that he was glad to escape from a circuitous path.
His face once more set towards the Trelawney hills, he walked in silence, and with a rapidity scarce credible – his long, ape-like legs, split trestle fashion to the centre of his body, enabling him to glide over the ground almost as fast as a mule could mince.
Whenever anyone appeared upon the road before him, he adopted his customary plan of betaking himself to the bushes until they had passed; but when travellers chanced to be going the same way – which more than once did happen – he avoided an encounter by making a circuit through the woods, and coming out far ahead of them.
The trouble thus taken to gain time, as well as the earnest manner with which the myal-man was hastening forward, proved that the crime just committed was not the crisis of Chakra’s villainies; but that some other evil purpose – to him of equal or greater import – was yet before him; and soon to be achieved, or, at least, attempted.
Following back the main route between Savanna-la-Mer and the Bay, he at length arrived at the Carrion Crow Road, and, after traversing this for some distance, came within view of the Jumbé Rock, now glancing with vitreous sheen in the clear moonlight.
Almost as soon as he had caught sight of the well-known land-mark, he forsook the road; and struck off into a by-path that led through the woods.
This path, trending diagonally up the side of the Jumbé mountain, and passing near the base of the rock, was the same which Herbert Vaughan and the two Maroons had traversed on their way from the Happy Valley on that same morning.
Chakra, however, knew nothing of this; nor aught either of the design or expedition of Cubina and his comrades. Equally ignorant was he of the errand on which Jessuron had dispatched his Cuban emissaries – by way of having his bow twice stringed.
The Coromantee, fancying himself the only player in that game of murder, had no idea that there were others interested in it as much as he; and although once or twice during the day he had seen men moving suspiciously behind him along the road, it had never occurred to him who they were – much less that they had been deputed to complete his own job, should the “spell” fail to prove sufficiently potent.
A somewhat long détour– which he had taken after leaving the hut – had brought him out on the main road behind both parties; and thus had he remained ignorant of their proximity, at the same time that he had himself escaped the observation both of the villains who intended to assassinate the Custos, and of the men who were pressing forward to save him.
Still continuing his rapid stride, Chakra climbed the mountain slope, with the agility of one accustomed to the most difficult paths.
On arriving under the Jumbé Rock, he halted – not with any intention of remaining there, but only to consider.
He looked up towards the summit of the cliff, in whose dark shadow he was standing; and then, raising his eyes still higher, he gazed for a short while upon the sky. His glance betrayed that interrogative scrutiny characteristic of one who, not being furnished with a watch, endeavours to ascertain the time. Chakra needed no watch. By day, the sun was sufficient to inform him of the hour; by night the stars, which were old and familiar acquaintances.
The sinking of Orion towards the silvered surface of the sea told him that in two hours, or thereabout, no stars would be seen.
“Kupple ob hour!” muttered he, after making the observation; “woan do – woan do. By de time I get to de Duppy Hole fo’ de lamp, an’ den back to de rock fo’ fix um – It woan do! Adam an’ his men de better part ob an hour ’fore dey ked climb up hya; an’ den it be daylight. Daat woan do nohow. Muss be done in de night, else we git follered, an’ de Duppy Hole no longer safe ’treat fo’ Chakra. Mussent risk dat, whasomebber a do.
“Whugh!” he continued, after reflecting a moment, and with a look of villainous chagrin overspreading his countenance; “’tam a piece of cuss crooked luck fo’ me no’ be hya ’bout two hour soona. Dat ’ud ’a been s’fishint to got ’em all up in time; an’ dar wud den a been gobs o’ time to ’complish de whole bizness.
“Nebba mind!” cried he, after a pause, and rousing himself from the attitude of reflection; “nebba mind, ye old Coromantee fool! ’morra night do jess as well. Den dar be plenty ob time. ’Taint like dey get de dead corpus ob de Cussus back to de Buff afore two, tree day; an’ ef dat ere nigga fotch de news, it do no harm. Maybe do good, in de ’fusion it make ’bout de place. Nebba mind. It be all right fo’ ’morr’ night. ’Fore dis time ob de mornin’ de Lilly Quasheba – de beau’ful dauter ob dat proud quaderoom – she sleep in de ’brace o’ ole Chakra de myal-man. Whugh!
“Two hour ’fore day,” added he, after a longer pause, in which he appeared to gloat over his fiendish expectations; “two hour. I’se jess hab time go down to de Jew penn, an’ den back to de Duppy Hole ’fore daylight. Dat ole sinner, he want know what’s a been done; an’ a want get de balance ob dat fifty poun’. A mout stan’ need ob de money, now a’s a-gwine ta hab a wife, an’ take to de keepin’ ob a ’tablishment. Ha! ha! ha!”
And as he gave utterance to the laugh, the prospective bridegroom once more put his hideous form in motion, and followed the path leading to the Jew’s penn.
Volume Three – Chapter Twenty Four
The Vigil of Love and the Vigil of Jealousy
Yola, true to her tryst, set forth to meet her beloved Maroon. The hour of midnight was the time that had been appointed; but, in order to secure punctuality, she took her departure from Mount Welcome long before that hour – leaving herself ample time to reach the rendezvous.
Of late these after-night expeditions had become known to Miss Vaughan, and their object as well. To her young mistress, the Foolah maiden had confessed her penchant for Cubina – her belief of its being reciprocated; in short, had told the whole story of her love.
Common report spoke well of the young Maroon captain – Yola warmly; and as everything contributed to proclaim his intentions honourable, Miss Vaughan made no objection to his meetings with her maid.
There was something in her own sentiments to incline her to this liberal line of conduct. The young creole could sympathise with hearts that truly loved – all the better that, by experience, her own heart had learnt the bitterness of being thwarted.
At all times, therefore – so far as she was concerned – the brown-skinned sweetheart of Cubina had free leave to meet her lover.
On that particular night permission was granted to the maid more freely than ever, since, for a certain reason, the mistress herself desired the interview to take place.
The reason may be guessed without difficulty. On the previous night Cubina had thrown out a hint, which his sweetheart had communicated to her mistress.
She had spoken of some news he might have that would interest the latter; and although there was nothing definite in that, still the hint had led to an indulgence in speculations – vague as dreams, it is true, but tinged with a certain sweetness.
Kate knew something of the romantic friendship that had been established between Herbert and Cubina. Yola had long ago told her of this – as well as the incident that had given origin to it. Perhaps that knowledge may explain the interest, almost amounting to anxiety, she now felt to ascertain the nature of the communication which the Maroon had hypothetically promised to make.
It was only in the afternoon of the day – after the excursion to the Jumbé Rock – that the maid had imparted this piece of intelligence to her mistress: and the altered demeanour of the latter during the rest of the evening proved how interesting it must have been to her. Her anxiety was scarce of the sorrowful kind, but rather tinged with an air of cheerfulness – as if some secret instinct had infused into her spirit a certain buoyancy – as if on the dark horizon of her future there was still lingering, or had suddenly arisen, a faint ray of hope.
Yola had not told all she knew. She said nothing of certain surmises that had escaped the lips of Cubina. With a woman’s tact, she perceived that these, being only conjectural, might excite false hopes in the breast of her young mistress: for whom the girl felt a true affection. In fear of this, she kept back the allusion to the marriage of Herbert and Judith, and its probable failure, which Cubina had so emphatically illustrated by a proverb.
Yola intended this reserve to be only temporary – only until after her next meeting with her lover – from which she hoped to return with a fuller power of explaining it.
Neither had she made known to her mistress the circumstance of having seen Cynthia in company with the Jew, and the conference that had occurred between them, overheard by herself and Cubina – much less the suspicions to which the latter had given expression.
Under the apprehension that a knowledge of these strange facts and suspicions might trouble her young mistress, she had withheld them.
The young Creole had not retired to rest when Yola took her departure from the house, nor yet for long after. Anxious to know the result of the interview between her maid and the Maroon, she remained awake within her chamber – burning the midnight lamp far into the hours of morning.
Notwithstanding the more than permission that had been accorded to her, the princess-slave stole softly from the house – passing the precincts of the mansion, and traversing the grounds outside with considerable caution. This partly arose from the habit of that half-barbaric life, to which, in her own country and from earliest childhood, she had been accustomed. But there was also, perhaps, some suspicion of present danger, or, at all events, that fear of interruption natural to one on the way to keep an appointment of the kind towards which she was now betaking herself.
