CHAPTER XXXVII
HOW I SOUGHT DEATH BUT FOUND IT NOT
Beyond Deliverance Sands I saw the glow of their fire, and drawingthither knew them camped in the shadow of that great pimento tree andwithin that rocky gorge the which had afforded my dear lady and me ourfirst night's shelter. Being come thither, I sat me down and tookcounsel how best to attack them that I might slay as many as possibleere they gave me the death I hungered for; and the end of it was Ibegan to scale the cliff, my goatskin buskins soundless and very sureamid the rocks.
As I mounted I heard the hoarse murmur of their voices and knew bytheir very intonation (since I could hear no words as yet) that theywere speaking English. Reaching the summit, and mighty cautious, Icame where I might look down into the cleft.
They lay sprawled about their fire, four grim-looking fellows, raggedand unkempt, three of them talking together and one who lay groaningever and anon.
"Be damned, t'ye, Joel for a lily-livered dog!" growled a great, bonyfellow, "Here's good an island as man can want--"
"And full of bloody Indians--eh, Humphrey?" says a black-jowled fellow,turning on the wounded man. "Us do know the Indians, don't usHumphrey? Inca, Aztec, Mosquito and Cimaroon, we know 'em and theirdevil's ways, don't us, Humphrey?"
"Aye--aye!" groaned the wounded man. "They tortured me once andthey've done for me at last, by God! My shoulder's afire--"
"And the shaft as took ye, Humphrey, were a Indian shaft--a Indianshaft, weren't it, lad? And all trimmed wi' gold, aren't it? Here, yemay see for yourselves! 'Sequently I do know it for the shaft of achief or cacique and where a cacique is there's Indians wi' him--Othick as thieves--I know and Humphrey knows! I say this curst islandbe full of Indians, thick as fleas, curse 'em! And they'll have ussoon or late and torment us. So what I says is, let's away at theflood and stand away for the Main--the sea may be bad now and then, butIndians be worse--always and ever!"
"Why, as to that, Ned, the Indians ha' left us alone--"
"Aye!" cried the bony man, "And what o' the wench--her was no Indian, Ilay! A fine, dainty piece she was, by hooky! And handsome,ah--handsome! But for Humphrey's bungling--"
Here the man Humphrey groaned and cursed the speaker bitterly.
"Howbeit--'twas an Indian arrer!" says Ned. "And that means Indians,and Indians means death to all on us--ask Humphrey! Death--eh,Humphrey?"
"Aye--death!" groaned Humphrey, "Death's got his grapples aboard menow. I'm a-dying, mates--dying! Get me aboard, death will come easierin open water."
"Why, if ye must die, Humphrey," growled the bony man, "die, lad, dieand get done wi' it, the sooner the better. As to Indians I wait tillI see 'em, and as for Death--"
"Death?" gasped Humphrey, "Here's for you first!" and whipping out aknife he made a fierce thrust at the speaker; but the others closedwith him. Then as they strove together panting and cursing I rose tocome at them; but the wounded man, chancing to lift his head, saw mewhere I stood, the moonlight on my bloody face, and uttered a hoarsescream.
"Death!" cries he, "'Tis on us mates--look, look yonder! Death andwounds--yonder he comes for all of us--O mates look! Yon's death--forall on us!"
But in this moment I leaped down upon them from above, sending one mansprawling and scattering their fire, and 'mid whirling sparks andsmoke, within this dim rock-cleft we fought with a merciless fury anddesperation beyond words. A pistol flashed and roared and then anotheras I leapt with whirling axe and darting knife. I remember a wildhurly-burly of random blows, voices that shouted hoarse blasphemies,screams and groans, a whirl of vicious arms, of hands that clutched;once I reeled to hard-driven sword-thrust, a knife flashed and stabbedbeneath my arm, but twice I got home with my knife and once a mansobbed and went down beneath my hatchet--and then they were running andI after them. But I had taken a scathe in my leg and twice I fell;thus they reached their boat with some hundred yards to spare, and Isaw their frantic struggles to launch it as I staggered after them; butere I could reach them they had it afloat and tumbled aboard pell-mell.Then came I, panting curses, and plunged into the sea, wading afterthem up to my middle and so near that, aiming a blow at one of them, Icut a great chip from the gunwale, but, reeling from the blow of anoar, sank to my knees, and a wave breaking over me bore me backward,choking. Thus when I found my feet again they were well away and plyingtheir oars lustily, whiles I, roaring and shouting, stood to watch themuntil the boat was lost in the distance. Now as I stood thus, ragingbitterly at my impotence, I bethought me that I had seen but three menrun and, turning about, hasted back to deal with the fourth. Reachingthe scene of the struggle, I came on the man Humphrey outstretched uponhis back in the moonlight and his face well-nigh shorn asunder. Seeinghim thus so horribly dead, I went aside and fell to scrubbing myhatchet, blade and haft, with the cleanly sand.
Then came I, and grasping this thing had been named Humphrey, I draggedit a-down the sands and hove it forthwith into the sea, standingthereafter to watch it borne out on the receding tide. Now as I watchedthus, came a wave that lifted the thing so that this dead man seemed torise up and wave an arm to me ere he vanished.
This done (and I yet alive!) I took to wandering aimlessly hither andthither, and chancing into the rocky cleft found lying three musketsand four pistols with bandoliers full-charged, together with a knifeand a couple of swords; these I set orderly together and so wanderedaway again.
All this night I rambled about thus, and dawn found me seated 'neathBartlemy's tree staring at the ocean yet seeing it not.
So God had refused my appeal! It seemed I could not die. Andpresently, chancing to look down at myself in the growing light Iunderstood the reason, for here was I armed in my shirt of mail(forgotten till now) and scowling down at this, I saw its fine, steellinks scratched and scored by many blows and bedaubed here and therewith blood. So then (thinks I) 'twas she had saved me alive, and inthis thought found me some small solace. Hereupon I arose and wentdown to the sea, limping by reason of my hurt (an ugly gash above myknee) being minded to wash from me the grime and smears that fouled me.But or ever I reached the water I stopped, for there, more hateful insun than moonlight, lay that ghastly thing that had been Humphrey.There he lay, cast up by the tide, and now, with every wave that broke,he stirred gently and moved arms and legs in wanton, silly fashion, andnodding with his shattered head as in mockery of me. So I went and,seizing hold upon the thing, swung it upon my back and, thus burdened,climbed out upon the reef (and with mighty trouble, for my strengthseemed oozing out of me). Reaching a place at last where the water randeep I paused, and with sudden, painful effort whirled the thing abovemy head and hove it far out, where, splashing, it fell with sullenplunge and vanished from my sight. But even so I was possessed ofsudden, uneasy feeling that the thing had turned on me and was swimmingback to shore, so that, drawing my knife, I must needs sit there awhileto watch if this were so indeed. At last I arose, but being come toDeliverance Sands, whirled suddenly about, expectant to behold thatdead thing uprising from the surge to flap derisive arms at me. Andthis did I many times, being haunted thus all that day, and for manyweary hours thereafter, by this dead man Humphrey. Presently, as I wentheedless of all direction and the sun very hot, I began to stagger inmy gait and to mutter her name to myself and presently to shouting it,until the cliffs gave back my cries and the hollow caves murmured,"Damaris! O Damaris!"
And now was a mist all about me wherein dim forms moved mocking me, andever and anon methought to behold my lady, but dim and very far removedfrom me, so that sometimes I ran and oft-times I fell to moaning andshedding weak and impotent tears. Truly a black and evil day for methis, whereof I have but a vague memory save only of pain, a hopelessweariness and intolerable thirst. Thus it was sunset when I foundmyself once more upon that grassy plateau, creeping on hands and knees,though how I came thither I knew not. I remember drinking from thelittle rill and staggering within the cave, there to fall and liefilling the place with my lamentations and oft-rep
eated cry of"Damaris! O Damaris!" I remember a patch of silver light, a radiancethat crept across the gloom, and of dreaming my lady beside me as ofold, and of babbling of love and forgiveness, of pain and heartbreak,whiles I watched the beam of light creeping nigh me upon the floor;until, sobbing and moaning, yet gazing ever upon this light, I saw growupon it a sudden dark shape that moved, heard a rustle behind me, afootstep--a cry! And knowing this for the man Humphrey come upon me atlast in my weakness, I strove to rise, to turn and face him, butfinding this vain, cried out upon him for murderer. "'Twas you killedher--my love--the very soul of me--'twas you, Humphrey, that aredead--come, that I may slay you again!" Then feeling his hands upon meI strove to draw my knife, but could not and groaned, and so knowledgepassed from me.