Chapter Thirteen.
An Old Man in New Days.
Before the sun had touched the roofs of the town of Cap—while the streets lay cool and grey under the heights, which glowed in the flames of sunrise—most of the inhabitants were up and stirring. Euphrosyne Revel was at her grandfather’s chamber-door; first listening for his call, and then softly looking in, to see whether he could still be sleeping. The door opened and shut by a spring, so that the old man did not hear the little girl as she entered, though his sleep was not sound. As Euphrosyne saw how restless he was, and heard him mutter, she thought she would rouse him: but she stayed her hand, as she remembered that he might have slept ill, and might still settle for another quiet doze, if left undisturbed. With a gentle hand she opened one of the jalousies, to let in more air; and she chose one which was shaded by a tree outside, that no glare of light might enter with the breeze.
What she saw from this window drew her irresistibly into the balcony. It was a tree belonging to the convent which waved before the window; and below lay the convent garden, fresh with the dews of the night. There stretched the green walks, so glittering with diamond-drops and with the gossamer as to show that no step had passed over them since dawn. There lay the parterres—one crowded with geraniums of all hues; another with proud lilies, white, orange, and purple; and another with a flowering pomegranate in the centre, while the gigantic white and blue convolvulus coveted the soil all around, mixing with the bright green leaves and crimson blossoms of the hibiscus. No one seemed to be abroad, to enjoy the garden during this the freshest hour of the day; no one but the old black gardener, Raphael, whose cracked voice might be heard at intervals from the depths of the shrubbery in the opposite corner, singing snatches of the hymns which the sisters sung in the chapel. When his hoarse music ceased, the occasional snap of a bough, and movements among the bushes, told that the old man was still there, busy at his work.
Euphrosyne wished that he would come out, within sight of the beckon of her hand. She dared not call, for fear of wakening her grandfather: but she very much wanted a flowering orange branch. A gay little humming-bird was sitting and hovering near her; and she thought that a bunch of fragrant blossoms would entice it in a moment. The little creature came and went, flew round the balcony and retired: and still old Raphael kept out of sight behind the leafy screen.
“It will be gone, pretty creature!” said Euphrosyne to herself; “and all for want of a single bough from all those thickets!”
A thought struck her. Her morning frock was tied round the waist with a cord, having tassels which hung down nearly to her feet. She took off the cord, made a noose in it, and let it down among the shrubs below, swinging the end this way and that, as she thought best for catching some stray twig. She pursued her aim for a time, sending showers of dew-drops paltering down, and knocking off a good many blossoms, but catching nothing. She was so busy, that she did not see that a grey-suited nun had come out, with a wicker cage in her hand, and was watching her proceedings.
“What are you doing, my child?” asked the nun, approaching, as a new shower of dew-drops and blossoms was shaken abroad. “If you desire to fish, I doubt not our reverend mother will make you welcome to our pond yonder.”
“Oh, sister Christine! I am glad you are come out,” said Euphrosyne, bending over the balcony, and speaking in a low, though eager voice. “Do give me a branch of something sweet,—orange, or citron, or something. This humming-bird, will be gone if we do not make haste—Hush! Do not call. Grandpapa is not awake yet. Please, make haste.”
Sister Christine was not wont to make haste; but she did her best to gratify Euphrosyne. She went straight to the corner of the shrubbery where the abbess’s mocking-bird spent all its summer days, hung up the cage, and brought back what Euphrosyne had asked. The branch was drawn up in the noose of the cord, and the nun could not but stand and watch the event.
The bough was stuck between two of the bars of the jalousie, and the girl withdrew to the end of the balcony. The humming-bird appeared, hovered round, and at last inserted its long beak in a blossom, sustaining itself the while on its quivering wings. Before proceeding to another blossom it flew away. Euphrosyne cast a smile down to the nun, and placed herself against the jalousie, holding the branch upon her head. As she had hoped, two humming-birds returned. After some hesitation, they came for more of their sweet food, and Euphrosyne felt that her hair was blown about on her forehead by the motion of their busy wings. She desired, above everything, to keep still; but this strong desire, and the sight of sister Christine’s grave face turned so eagerly upwards, made her laugh so as to shake the twigs very fearfully. Keeping her hand with the branch steady, she withdrew her head from beneath, and then stole slowly and cautiously backward within the window—the birds following. She now heard her grandfather’s voice, calling feebly and fretfully. She half turned to make a signal for silence, which the old man so far observed as to sink his complaints to a mutter. The girl put the branch into a water-jar near the window, and then stepped lightly to the bed.
“What is all this nonsense?” said Monsieur Revel. “Why did not you come the moment I called?”
“Here I am, grandpapa—and do look—look at my humming-birds!”
“Humming-birds—nonsense! I called you twice.”
Yet the old gentleman rubbed his eyes, which did not seem yet quite awake. He rubbed his eyes and looked through the shaded room, as if to see Euphrosyne’s new plaything. She brought him his spectacles from the toilette, helped to raise him up, threw a shawl over his shoulders, and placed his pillows at his back. Perceiving that he still could not see very distinctly, she opened another blind, so as to let one level ray of sunshine fall upon the water-jar, and the little radiant creatures that were hovering about it.
“There! there!” cried Monsieur Revel, in a pleased tone.
“Now I will go and bring you your coffee,” said Euphrosyne.
“Stop, stop, child! Why are you in such a hurry? I want to know what is the matter. Such a night as I have had!”
“A bad night, grandpapa? I am sorry.”
“Bad enough! How came my light to go out? And what is all this commotion in the streets?”
Euphrosyne went to the night-lamp, and found that a very large flying beetle had disabled itself by breaking the glass, and putting out the light. There it lay dead—a proof at least that there were no ants in the room.
“Silly thing!” said Euphrosyne. “I do wish these beetles would learn to fly properly. He must have startled you, grandpapa. Did not you think it was a thief, when you were left in the dark?”
“It is very odd that nobody about me can find me a lamp that will serve me. And then, what is all this bustle in the town? Tell me at once what is the matter.”
“I know of nothing the matter. The trompettes have been by this morning; and they say that the Commander-in-chief is here: so there will be nothing the matter. There was some talk last night, Pierre said—some fright about to-day. But L’Ouverture is come; and it will be all right now, you know.”
“You know nothing about it, child—teazing one with your buzzing, worrying humming-birds! Go and get my coffee, and send Pierre to me.”
“The birds will come with me, I dare say, if I go by the balcony. I will take them away.”
“No, no. Don’t lose time with them. Let them be. Go and send Pierre.”
When Euphrosyne returned with the coffee, she found, as Pierre had found before her, Monsieur Revel so engrossed in looking through his spectacles at the water-jar, as to have forgotten what he had to ask and to say.
“You will find the bath ready whenever you want it, grandpapa,” said Euphrosyne, as she placed the little tray before him: “and it is a sweet airy morning.”
“Ay; I must make haste up, and see what is to be done. It is not safe to lie and rest in one’s bed, in this part of the world.” And he made haste to stir his coffee with his trembling hands.
“Oh, you have often said that—almost ever since I can remember—and here we are, quite safe still.”
“Tell the truth, child. How dare you say that we have been safe ever since you remember?”
“I said ‘almost,’ grandpapa. I do not forget about our being in the woods—about—but we will not talk of that now. That was all over a long time ago; and we have been very safe since. The great thing of all is, that there was no L’Ouverture then, to take care of us. Now, you know, the Commander-in-chief is always thinking how he can take the best care of us.”
“‘No L’Ouverture then!’ One would think you did not know what and where Toussaint was then. Why, child, your poor father was master over a hundred such as he.”
“Do you think they were like him? Surely, if they had been like him, they would not have treated us as they did. Afra says she does not believe, anybody like him ever lived.”
“Afra is a pestilent little fool.”
“Oh, grandpapa!”
“Well, well! She is a very good girl in her way; but she talks about what she does not understand. She pretends to judge of governors of the colony, when her own father cannot govern this town, and she never knew Blanchelande! Ah! if she had known Blanchelande, she would have seen a man who understood his business, and had spirit to keep up the dignity and honour of the colony. If that sort of rule had gone on till now, we should not have had the best houses in the island full of these black upstarts; nor a mulatto governor in this very town.”
“And then I should not have had Afra for a friend, grandpapa.”
“You would have been better without, child. I do not like to see you for ever with a girl of her complexion, though she is the governor’s daughter. There must be an end of it—there shall be an end of it. It is a good time now. There is a reason for it to-day. It is time you made friends of your own complexion, child; and into the convent you go—this very day.”
“Oh, grandpapa, you don’t mean that those nuns are of my complexion! Poor pale creatures! I would not for the world look like them: and I certainly shall, if you put me there. I had much rather look like Afra than like sister Benoite, or sister Cecile. Grandpapa! you would not like me to look like sister Benoite?”
“How do I know, child? I don’t know one from another of them.”
“No, indeed! and you would not know me by the time I had been there three months. How sorry you would be, grandpapa, when you asked for me next winter, to see all those yellow-faced women pass before you, and when the yellowest of all came, to have to say, ‘Can this be my poor Euphrosyne!’”
Monsieur Revel could not help laughing as he looked up at the girl through his spectacles. He pinched her cheek, and said that there was certainly more colour there than was common in the West Indies; but that it must fade, in or out of the convent, by the time she was twenty; and she had better be in a place where she was safe. The convent was the only safe place.
“You have often said that before,” replied she, “and the time has never come yet. And no more it will now. I shall go with Afra to the cacao-gathering at Le Zéphyr, as I did last year. Oh, that sweet cool place in the Mornes du Chaos! How different from this great ugly square white convent, with nothing that looks cheerful, and nothing to be heard but teaching, teaching, and religion, religion, for ever.”
“I advise you to make friends among the sisters, however, Euphrosyne; for there you will spend the next few years.”
“I will not make friends with anything but the poor mocking-bird. I have promised Afra not to love anybody instead of her; but she will not be jealous of the poor bird. It and I will spend the whole day in the thicket, mocking and pining—pining and mocking. The sisters shall not get a word out of me—not one of them. I may speak to old Raphael now and then, that I may not forget how to use my tongue; but I vow that poor bird shall be my only friend.”
“We shall see that. We shall see how long a giddy child like you can keep her mocking-bird tone in the uproar that is coming upon us! What will you do, child, without me, when the people of this colony are cutting one another’s throats over my grave? What will become of you when I am gone?”
“Dear grandpapa, before that comes the question, What will you do without me? What will become of you when I am gone into that dull place? You know very well, grandpapa, that you cannot spare me.”
The old man’s frame was shaken with sobs. He put his thin hands before his face, and the tears trickled between his fingers. Euphrosyne caressed him, saying, “There! I knew how it would be. I knew I should never leave you. I never will leave you. I will bring up your coffee every morning, and light your lamp every night, as long as you live.”
As she happened to be looking towards the door, she saw it opening a little upon its noiseless hinges, and a hand which she knew to be Pierre’s beckoning to her. Her grandfather did not see it. She withdrew herself from him with a sportive kiss, ordered him to rest for a while, and think of nothing but her humming-birds, and carried the tray out of the room.
Pierre was there, waiting impatiently with a note from Afra.
“I did not bring it in, Mademoiselle,” said he, “because I am sure there is something amiss. A soldier brought the note; and he says he has orders to stay for my master’s commands.”
Afra’s note told what this meant. It was as follows:—
“Dearest Euphrosyne,
“Do not be frightened. There is time, if you come directly. There is no danger, if you come to us. The cultivators are marching hither over the plain. It is with the whites that they are angry; so you had better make yourselves secure with us. The soldier who brings this will escort Monsieur Revel and you this little way through the streets: but you must lose no time. We are sorry to hurry your grandfather; but it cannot be helped. Come, my dearest, to your
“Afra Raymond.”
Pierre saw his young lady’s face turn as pale as any nun’s, as she glanced over this note.
“The carriage, Pierre! Have it to the door instantly.”
“With your leave. Mademoiselle, the soldier says no French carriages will be safe in the streets this morning.”
“Oh, mercy! A chair, then. Send for a chair this moment. The soldier will go for it—ask him as a favour. They will not dare to refuse one to a governor’s guard. Then come, and dress your master, and do not look so grave, Pierre, before him.”
Pierre went, and was met at the door by a servant with another note. It was—
“Do not come by the street, dearest Euphrosyne. The nuns will let you through their garden, into our garden alley, if you can only get your grandfather over the balcony. My two messengers will help you; but they are much wanted:—so make haste.
“A.E.”
“Make the soldiers sling an arm-chair from the balcony, Pierre; and send one of them round into the convent garden, to be ready to receive us there. The abbess will have the gate open to the Government-house alley. Then come, and dress your master; and leave it to me to tell him everything.”
“Likely enough,” muttered Pierre; “for I know nothing of what is in those notes myself.”
“And I do not understand what it is all about,” said Euphrosyne, as she returned to her grandfather.
He had fallen into a light doze, lulled by the motion and sound of the humming-birds. Euphrosyne kissed his forehead, to rouse him, and then told him gaily that it was terribly late—he had no idea how late it was—he must get up directly. The bath! no; there must be no bath to-day. There was not time for it; or, at least, he must go a little ride first. A new sort of carriage was getting ready—
She now looked graver, as Pierre entered. She said, that while Pierre dressed him, she would put up some clothes for a short visit to Government-house.
Monsieur Revel, being now alarmed, Euphrosyne admitted that some confusion in the streets was expected, and that the Governor and Afra thought that their friends would be most quiet at the back of Government-house.
To her consternation, Monsieur Revel suddenly refused to stir a step from his own dwelling. He would not be deceived into putting himself and his child into the hands of any mulattoes upon earth, governors or other. Not one of his old friends, in Blanchelande’s time, would have countenanced such an act; and he would not so betray his colour and his child. He had rather die on his own threshold.
“You must do as you please about that, sir,” said Pierre; “but, for Mademoiselle Euphrosyne, I must say, that I think it is full early for her to die—and when she might be safe too!”
“Oh, grandpapa! I cannot let you talk of our dying,” cried Euphrosyne, her cheeks bathed in tears. “Indeed I will not die—nor shall you either. Besides, if that were all—”
The old man knew what was in her mind—that she was thinking of the woods. He sank down on his knees by the bedside, and prayed that the earth might gape and swallow them up—that the sea might rush in, and overflow the hollow where the city had been, before he and his should fall into the hands of the cursed blacks.
“Grandpapa,” said Euphrosyne, gravely, “if you pray such a prayer as that, do not pray aloud. I cannot hear such a prayer as that.” Struggling with her tears, she continued: “I know you are very much frightened—and I do not wonder that you are: but I do wish you would remember that we have very kind friends who will protect us, if we will only make haste and go to them. And as for their being of a different colour—I do wonder that you can ask God to cause the earth to swallow us up, when you know (at least, you have taught me so) we must meet people of all races before the throne of God. He has made of one blood all the nations of the earth, you know.”
Monsieur Revel shook his head impatiently, as if to show that she did not understand his feelings. She went on, however:—
“If we so hate and distrust them at this moment, here, how can we pray for death, so as to meet them at the next moment there? Oh, grandpapa! let us know them a little better first. Let us go to them now.”
“Don’t waste time so, child; you hinder my dressing.”
He allowed himself to be dressed, and made no further opposition till he found himself at the balcony of the next room.
“Here is your new coach,” said Euphrosyne, “and plenty of servants:” showing him how one of the soldiers and old Raphael stood below to receive the chair, and the abbess herself was in waiting in a distant walk, beside the wicket they were to pass through.
Of course, the old gentleman said he could never get down that way; and he said something about dying on his own threshold—this time, however, in a very low voice. But, in the midst of his opposition, Euphrosyne seated herself in the chair, and was let down. When she could no longer hear his complaints, but was standing beckoning to him from the grass-plat below, he gave up all resistance, was let down with perfect ease, and carried in the chair, followed by all the white members of his household, through the gardens, and up the alley where Afra was awaiting them. There was a grey sister peeping from behind every blind as they crossed the garden, and trembling with the revived fears of that terrible night of ninety-one, when they had fled to the ships. It was some comfort to them to see old Raphael busy with rake and knife, repairing the damage done to the bed under the balcony—all trampled as it was. Each nun said to herself that Raphael seemed to have no fears but that the garden would go on as usual, whatever disturbance was abroad.
“Have you seen him?” asked Euphrosyne eagerly of her friend, the moment they met.
“Oh yes. You shall see him too, from my window, if they will but talk on till we get there. He and the Commissary, and some of the Commissary’s officers, are in the rose-garden under my window. Make haste, or they may be gone.”
“We must see grandpapa settled first.”
“Oh yes; but I am so afraid they may be gone! They have been pacing the alley between the rose-trees this hour nearly—talking and arguing all the time. I am sure they were arguing; for they stopped every now and then, and the Commissary made such gestures! He looked so impatient and so vexed!”
“And did he look vexed, too?”
“Not in the least angry, but severe. So quiet, so majestic he looked, as he listened to all they said! and when he answered them—Oh, I would not, for all the island, have his eyes so set upon me!”
“Oh dear, let us make haste, or they will be gone!” cried Euphrosyne.
While Euphrosyne was endeavouring to make her grandfather feel himself at home and comfortable in the apartment appointed for him by the Governor, Afra ran to her window, to see if the potentates of the island were still at their conference. The rose-garden was empty; and she came back sorrowfully to say so. As she entered the apartment of her guests, she heard Monsieur Revel sending a message of compliments to the Commissary, with a request of an audience of a few minutes. The servants gave as much intimation as they dared of the Commissary being so particularly engaged, that they had rather be excused carrying this message. The girls looked at one another, nodded agreement, and Euphrosyne spoke.
“Suppose, grandpapa, you ask to see the Commander-in-chief. He never refuses anything that is asked of him: and he can do everything he wishes. I dare say he will come at once, if you desire it, and if we do not detain him too long. If he had been in this room once with us, how safe we should feel!”
“Oh, if we could see him once in this room!” cried Afra.
“Do you suppose I will beg a favour of that ambitious black?” cried Monsieur Revel. “Do you think I will crave an audience of a fellow who, for aught I know, may have driven his master’s carriage to my door in the old days?—no, if I cannot see Hédouville, I will take my chance. Go, fellow! and carry my message,” he cried to Pierre.
Pierre returned with the answer which might have been anticipated. The Commissary was so engaged, there was so much bustle and confusion throughout his establishment, that no one of his people would deliver the message.
“That would not have been the answer if—” whispered Euphrosyne to her friend.
“Shall I venture?—yes, I will—shall I? At least, I will keep upon the watch,” said Afra, as she withdrew.
She presently sent in, with the tray of fruit, a basket of flowers, which Euphrosyne occupied herself in dressing, exactly as she did at home, humming the while the airs her grandfather heard her sing every day. Her devices answered very well. He presently occupied himself in pointing out, exactly as he always did, that there was too much green in this bouquet, and not enough in that.