The Ruby of Kishmoor by Howard Pyle (read a book .txt) 📗

circumstances, would have been at once ludicrous and grotesque.

"By the blood!" cried he, "to be sure it is murder that has happened here."

"Not murder!" cried Jonathan, in a shrill and panting voice. "Not murder! It was all an accident, and I am as innocent as a baby."

The new-comer looked at him and then at the two figures upon the floor, and then back at him again with eyes at once quizzical and cunning. Then his face broke into a grin that might hardly be called of drollery. "Accident!" quoth he. "By the blood! d'ye see 'tis a strange accident, indeed, that lays two men by the heels and lets the third go without a scratch!" Delivering himself thus, he came forward into the room, and, taking the last victim of Jonathan's adventure by the arm, with as little compunction as he would have handled a sack of grain he dragged the limp and helpless figure from where it lay to the floor beside the first victim. Then, lifting the lighted candle, he bent over the two prostrate bodies, holding the illumination close to the lineaments first of one and then of the other. He looked at them very carefully for a long while, with the closest and most intent scrutiny, and in perfect silence. "They are both as dead," says he, "as Davy Jones, and, whoever you be, I protest that you have done your business the most completest that I ever saw in all of my life."

"Indeed," cried Jonathan, in the same shrill and panting voice, "it was themselves who did it. First one of them attacked me and then the other, and I did but try to keep them from murdering me. This one fell on his knife, and that one shot himself in his efforts to destroy me."

"That," says the seaman, "you may very well tell to a dry-lander, and maybe he will believe you; but you cannot so easily pull the wool over the eyes of Captain Benny Willitts. And what, if I may be so bold as for to ask you, was the reason for their attacking so harmless a man as you proclaim yourself to be?"

"That I know not," cried Jonathan; "but I am entirely willing to tell thee all the circumstances. Thou must know that I am a member of the Society of Friends. This day I landed here in Kingston, and met a young woman of very comely appearance, who intrusted me with this little ivory ball, which she requested me to keep for her a few days. The sight of this ball—in which I can detect nothing that could be likely to arouse any feelings of violence—appears to have driven these two men entirely mad, so that they instantly made the most ferocious and murderous assault upon me. See! wouldst thou have believed that so small a thing as this would have caused so much trouble?" And as he spoke he held up to the gaze of the other the cause of the double tragedy that had befallen. But no sooner had Captain Willitts's eyes lighted upon the ball than the most singular change passed over his countenance. The color appeared to grow dull and yellow in his ruddy cheeks, his fat lips dropped apart, and his eyes stared with a fixed and glassy glare. He arose to his feet and, still with the expression of astonishment and wonder upon his face, gazed first at our hero and then at the ivory ball in his hands, as though he were deprived both of reason and of speech. At last, as our hero slipped the trifle back in his pocket again, the mariner slowly recovered himself, though with a prodigious effort, and drew a deep and profound breath as to the very bottom of his lungs. He wiped, with the corner of his black silk cravat, his brow, upon which the sweat appeared to have gathered. "Well, messmate," says he, at last, with a sudden change of voice, "you have, indeed, had a most wonderful adventure." Then with another deep breath: "Well, by the blood! I may tell you plainly that I am no poor hand at the reading of faces. Well, I think you to be honest, and I am inclined to believe every word you tell me. By the blood! I am prodigiously sorry for you, and am inclined to help you out of your scrape.

"The first thing to do," he continued, "is to get rid of these two dead men, and that is an affair I believe we shall have no trouble in handling. One of them we will wrap up in the carpet here, and t'other we can roll into yonder bed-curtain. You shall carry the one and I the other, and, the harbor being at no great distance, we can easily bring them thither and tumble them overboard, and no one will be the wiser of what has happened. For your own safety, as you may easily see, you can hardly go away and leave these objects here to be found by the first-comer, and to arise up in evidence against you."

This reasoning, in our hero's present bewildered state, appeared to him to be so extremely just that he raised not the least objection to it. Accordingly, each of the two silent, voiceless victims of the evening's occurrences were wrapped into a bundle that from without appeared to be neither portentous nor terrible in appearance.

Thereupon, Jonathan shouldering the rug containing the little gentleman in black, and the sea-captain doing the like for the other, they presently made their way down the stairs through the darkness, and so out into the street. Here the sea-captain became the conductor of the expedition, and leading the way down several alleys and along certain by-streets—now and then stopping to rest, for the burdens were both heavy and clumsy to carry—they both came out at last to the harbor front, without any one having questioned them or having appeared to suspect them of anything wrong. At the water-side was an open wharf extending a pretty good distance out into the harbor. Thither the captain led the way and Jonathan followed. So they made their way out along the wharf or pier, stumbling now and then over loose boards, until they came at last to where the water was of a sufficient depth for their purpose. Here the captain, bending his shoulders, shot his burden out into the dark, mysterious waters, and Jonathan, following his example, did the same. Each body sank with a sullen and leaden splash into the element where, the casings which swathed them becoming loosened, the rug and the curtain rose to the surface and drifted slowly away with the tide.

As Jonathan stood gazing dully at the disappearance of these last evidences of his two inadvertent murders, he was suddenly and vehemently aroused by feeling a pair of arms of enormous strength flung about him from behind. In their embrace his elbows were instantly pinned tight to his side, and he stood for a moment helpless and astounded, while the voice of the sea-captain, rumbling in his very ear, exclaimed: "Ye bloody, murthering Quaker, I'll have that ivory ball, or I'll have your life!"

These words produced the same effect upon Jonathan as though a douche of cold water had suddenly been flung over him. He began instantly to struggle to free himself, and that with a frantic and vehement violence begotten at once of terror and despair. So prodigious were his efforts that more than once he had nearly torn himself free, but still the powerful arms of his captor held him as in a vise of iron. Meantime, our hero's assailant made frequent though ineffectual attempts to thrust a hand into the breeches-pocket where the ivory ball was hidden, swearing the while under his breath with a terrifying and monstrous string of oaths. At last, finding himself foiled in every such attempt, and losing all patience at the struggles of his victim, he endeavored to lift Jonathan off of his feet, as though to dash him bodily upon the ground. In this he would doubtless have succeeded had he not caught his heel in the crack of a loose board of the wharf. Instantly they both fell, violently prostrate, the captain beneath and Jonathan above him, though still encircled in his iron embrace. Our hero felt the back of his head strike violently upon the flat face of the other, and he heard the captain's skull sound with a terrific crack like that of a breaking egg upon some post or billet of wood, against which he must have struck. In their frantic struggles they had approached extremely near the edge of the wharf, so that the next instant, with an enormous and thunderous splash, Jonathan found himself plunged into the waters of the harbor, and the arms of his assailant loosened from about his body.

The shock of the water brought him instantly to his senses, and, being a fairly good swimmer, he had not the least difficulty in reaching and clutching the cross-piece of a wooden ladder that, coated with slimy sea-moss, led from the water-level to the wharf above.

After reaching the safety of the dry land once more, Jonathan gazed about him as though to discern whence the next attack might be delivered upon him. But he stood entirely alone upon the dock—not another living soul was in sight. The surface of the water exhibited some commotion, as though disturbed by something struggling beneath; but the sea-captain, who had doubtless been stunned by the tremendous crack upon his head, never arose again out of the element that had engulfed him.

The moonlight shone with a peaceful and resplendent illumination, and, excepting certain remote noises from the distant town not a sound broke the silence and the peacefulness of the balmy, tropical night. The limpid water, illuminated by the resplendent moonlight, lapped against the wharf. All the world was calm, serene, and enveloped in a profound and entire repose.

Jonathan looked up at the round and brilliant globe of light floating in the sky above his head, and wondered whether it were, indeed, possible that all that had befallen him was a reality and not some tremendous hallucination. Then suddenly arousing himself to a renewed realization of that which had occurred, he turned and ran like one possessed, up along the wharf, and so into the moonlit town once more.

VI. The Conclusion of the Adventure with the Lady with the Silver Veil

Nor did he check his precipitous flight until suddenly, being led perhaps by some strange influence of which he was not at all the master, he discovered himself to be standing before the garden-gate where not more than an hour before he had first entered upon the series of monstrous adventures that had led to such tremendous conclusions.

People were still passing and repassing, and one of these groups—a party of young ladies and gentlemen—paused upon the opposite side of the street to observe, with no small curiosity and amusement, his dripping and bedraggled aspect. But only one thought and one intention possessed our hero—to relieve himself as quickly as possible of that trust which he had taken up so thoughtlessly, and with such monstrous results to himself and to his victims. He ran to the gate of the garden and began beating and kicking upon it with a vehemence that he could neither master nor control. He was aware that the entire neighborhood was becoming aroused, for he beheld lights moving and loud voices of inquiry; yet he gave not the least thought to the disturbance he was creating, but continued without intermission his uproarious pounding upon the gate.

At length, in answer to the sound of his vehement blows, the little wicket was opened and a pair of eyes appeared thereat. The next instant the gate was cast ajar very hastily, and the pock-pitted negress appeared. She caught him by the sleeve of his coat and drew him quickly into the garden. "Buckra, Buckra!" she cried. "What you doing? You wake de whole town!" Then, observing his dripping garments: "You been in de water. You catch de fever and shake till you die."

"Thy mistress!" cried Jonathan, almost sobbing in the excess of his emotion; "take me to her upon the instant, or I cannot answer for my not going entirely mad!"

When our hero was again introduced to the lady, he found her clad in a loose and an elegant negligee, infinitely becoming to her graceful figure, and still covered with the veil of silver gauze that had before enveloped her.

"Friend," he