A Bitter Heritage: A Modern Story of Love and Adventure

by John Bloundelle-Burton

The Indians who were bearing him to the old ramshackle sailing-boat he possessed (a thing half yawl and half lugger--a thing, too, which she supposed those men had been instructed to pierce and bore so that it would begin to fill from the first, and should, thereby, sink by the time it was in deep water) must necessarily go slowly, owing to the burden they had to carry, while she--well! she could progress almost as swiftly as the deer could themselves thread the thickets that bordered the coast.

Surely, surely, lithe, young, and active as she was she would overtake those men with their burden ere they could reach the yawl; she would be able to bid them stop, and could at once point out to them the fatal mistake that had been made. She could give them proof, by bidding them take one glance at the features of the senseless man they were transporting, of the nature of that mistake.

So she set out to overtake the Indians with their burden; set out, staying for nothing, and allowing nothing to hinder her. For, swiftly as she might go, every minute was still precious.

And now--now--as the night wind arose still more and the rusty red of the lightning turned to a more purple-violet hue--sure warning of the nearness of the coming storm--she was almost close to the beach where she knew Sebastian's crazy old craft was kept in common with one or two others; namely, a punt with a deep tank for fish, a scow, and a boat with oars. She was close to the beach, but with, at this time, her heart like lead in her bosom because of the fear she had that she was too late.

"No sound," she muttered to herself. "No voices to be heard. They are gone. They are gone. I am too late!"

Then, redoubling her exertions, she ran swiftly the remainder of the distance to where she knew the boathouse--an erection of poles with planks laid across them--stood.

And in a moment she knew that she was, indeed, too late. Where the yawl usually floated there was now an empty space; there was nothing in the boathouse but the punt and the rowboat.

"Oh! what to do," she cried, "what to do!" and she beat her breast as she so cried. "They have carried him out to sea, even now the yawl is sinking--has sunk--they will be on their way back. He is dead! he is dead! he must be dead by now!"

While, overcome by the horror and misery of her thoughts, she sank down to the ground. But not for long, however, since at such a crisis as this her strong--if often ungovernable--heart became filled with greater courage and resource. To sink to the ground, she told herself, to lie there wailing and moaning over the impending fate of him she loved, was not the way to avert that fate. Instead, she must be prompt and resolute.

She sprang, therefore, once more to her feet and--dark as was all around her, except for the light of a young crescent moon peeping up over the sea's rim and forcing a glimmer now and again through the banks of deep, leaden clouds which the wind was bringing up from that sea--made her way into the boathouse, where, swiftly unloosing the painter of the rowboat, she pushed the latter out into the tumbling waves and began to scull it.