One bright morning about the middle of January, four sturdy "yamstalks," or inhabitants of composite origin, laboriously mounted the hillside above the town, carrying the invalid on a chaise à porteurs extemporized out of an arm-chair and a couple of poles. Nurse MacDonald walked by his side, chattering vivaciously.
"Never before or since have I heard such vivid narratives as those of Nurse MacDonald," said Joseph Lees in after years when relating his adventures. "She was certainly a very remarkable woman. But with all her cleverness, there was something about her that made me distrust her from the very beginning. She was given to falling into periods of morose silence, and on more than one occasion, during my first fortnight's residence at the Briars, she struck me as being a woman whom it would be better to have as a friend than as an enemy. In short, the longer I was acquainted with her, the more uncomfortable did I feel. At first I attributed my feelings to prejudice, to the morbid effects of my illness; but as I got to know her better, and as my bodily health rapidly returned, I had finally to confess that I could not be altogether mistaken, and that the sooner I brought my sojourn in the hills of St. Helena to an end the better it would be for my peace of mind. After events proved that I was right, and that our first impressions of a person are sometimes to be trusted."
THE BRIARS, NAPOLEON'S HOUSE AT ST. HELENA, WHERE MR. JOSEPH LEES STAYED.
From an Old Print.
The dread—and there is no other word to express the feeling—that Joseph Lees finally came to have for the Briars was first awakened by an incident that occurred there after his first month's residence. As near as possible, I will describe it in his own words.
"I shall remember the night of that incident," he would begin, "as long as I live. The impression that it made at the time appeared to be slight, but in the light of after events it became indelible. It was midnight, and I was perusing a letter which I had just written to my son in the dim light of a candle placed on a little table near my bed on which I was stretched. The captain of one of the vessels which I myself had chartered had brought me that day fresh information from Ichaboe, and, as he was to sail on the following morning, I was anxious that he should take my epistle with him. After giving certain instructions in regard to the sale of the cargo, I proceeded to speak of my health and of the renewal of the troubles on the island. 'I have now some hopes of returning home, as I am much better,' I wrote. 'We have suffered greatly by robberies of guano, even to the tune of thousands. Disturbances and battles are frequent between the soldiers and the crews, who want and will have cargo. There are yet three hundred and fifty ships in the roadstead of Ichaboe, though there are not twenty cargoes on the island, and these are all expecting to beat the authorities and take it from the owners. Three hundred men made an attack the other day, and got from the chairman's pit as many tons before the soldiers proved masters. In consequence of all these things we shall not be able to fill all the ships named in the list, and there are six more to come that will not get more than half a ——'
"I had reached this part of my letter when I broke off, my attention being attracted by the sound of voices. At first I imagined that it was Mme. MacDonald talking to herself, as she was in the habit of doing, but on listening I could distinguish another voice. A feeling of alarm suddenly came over me and impelled me to blow out the candle.
"'Who could my nurse's visitor be?' I asked myself, as I jumped off the bed and approached the long French windows that opened on to a little veranda. To find anyone calling upon her at such an hour was, to say the least, strange. Stranger still, I seemed to know the voice of the person who was talking with her, but where I had heard it before I could not for the life of me tell. There was no doubt, however, that it was that of a man, and that the language in which he was conversing was French, of which I knew sufficient to seize a phrase now and then. From the words 'arrivé aujourd'hui,' 'voyage,' 'fatigue,' I came to the conclusion that the speaker must be a sailor who had arrived at the port of James Town after a long and fatiguing voyage; and on hearing him addressed as 'mon fils,' my mind immediately began to weave a story around the mother and the son. Their relationship thus established, I felt much less alarmed than I had been at first; so I refrained from further eavesdropping and retired to rest. But, though I tried my hardest, I could not get to sleep for hours. Again and again I found myself dwelling on the question: 'Where have I heard that voice before?'