"Until which time you are a slave; and not only a slave, but _my_ slave," replied Maxwell, with perfect coolness, as he drew from his pocket-book the forged bill of sale.
"Great G.o.d, desert me not in this hour of my afflictions!" groaned Emily. This last revelation entirely unnerved her, and exposed in a more terrible light her appalling position. She doubted not the paper she saw in Maxwell"s hands was a bill of sale of her person, and that it would establish his claim; for his present purposes seemed too flagrant to be pursued without good authority. Her features, dress and language, she felt, would be no safeguards. She had seen slave-girls as fair and white as herself. She had heard of those who, with scarcely a drop of negro blood in their veins, were educated to pander to the appet.i.te of depravity. She had seen them in the streets of New Orleans, in no manner differing in appearance from, the best-born ladies. Her situation, then, was an awful one.
"Will you read this paper?" continued Maxwell.
"No; like the will, it is a forgery!" replied Emily, determined to die rather than yield herself to the guidance of the attorney.
"It gives me an undeniable right to your person, and you must obey me.
The carriage waits in the road."
"Mr. Maxwell, if you have a particle of honor left, or if even a shadow of pity rests in your heart, leave me, and finish your despicable persecution!" said Emily, in a pleading tone.
"I have both honor and pity; but I cannot abandon my purpose. You refused to trust to my honor, refused to receive the offered hand, which would lead you back to the home you have left. I would fain have averted the calamity you are madly courting; but you would not. I humbly prayed to be allowed to step between you and your uncle"s avarice; but you would not. I would willingly have prevented the accomplishment of your uncle"s plans; but--"
"Then you own that it is a plot?"
"I acknowledge nothing."
"But you know it is a base trick?"
"It is not for me to say. The law will be satisfied. I have offered to do all I could for you, and you have refused. You appeal to my pity.
Pity! did you pity me when I would have been your willing slave,--when I pleaded for the hope you have ruthlessly crushed?"
"I did pity you; but I could not help you. I could not then, and I cannot now, give my hand where my heart is uninterested. I feared you then, as I despise you now. Report said your character was not entirely free from stain, and you are now striving to demonstrate the truth of the rumors," said Emily, whose contempt would not be concealed.
"Report may have belied me," replied Maxwell, struggling with his violent pa.s.sions. "But we are wasting time. Proceed with me to Vicksburg, and I pledge you my honor you shall not be injured or insulted."
"Your honor!" said Emily, bitterly. "It is but a poor dependence for an unprotected female."
"Gently, Miss Dumont! Do not rouse the demon within me by such taunts."
"I fear the worst demon of your nature is already in the ascendency."
"Enough! Will you go, or will you not?" said Maxwell, impatiently.
"I will not!"
"Then I must claim you as my slave,--do not start!--and _compel_ you."
"Bond or free, I will not stir from beneath this roof with you," replied Emily, with calm resolution. All hope, if she had cherished any, was gone. Silently she breathed a prayer for strength and meekness to endure all; for fort.i.tude to enable her to struggle till death with the oppression of her enemy; and for courage to meet any emergency in which her lot might be cast.
"It must be done! I will hesitate no longer!" said Maxwell, seizing Emily by the arm.
"Look here, you varmint, that won"t do here!" exclaimed the mistress of the house, who, much against her inclination, had remained silent during the past fifteen minutes. "It shan"t be said that Jerry Swinger"s ruff couldn"t protect a stranger."
"But, woman, she is my property," answered Maxwell, not a little intimidated by the ferocious aspect of the matron.
"Do not believe him, good woman, do not believe him!" exclaimed Emily, as she saw the woman was a little staggered by the attorney"s claim.
"No, ma"am, I won"t believe him," responded Mrs. Swinger, as her heart triumphed over the argument of the lawyer.
"It matters little whether you believe me or not. Here is the bill of sale, and, in the name of the law, I take what is mine."
The hostess was not a little perplexed by the doc.u.ment, and Emily observed, with terror, that she wavered in her purpose.
"It is a gross forgery!" exclaimed Emily, with a glance of earnest pleading, which the rough but kind-hearted woman could not resist.
"I don"t care nothin" about your bill of sale! The gal is safe," said Mrs. Swinger, with emphasis.
Maxwell, resolving to execute his design, again seized Emily by the arm, and was on the point of hurrying her out of the cabin.
Mrs. Swinger was a stout, masculine woman, brought up in the woods, and never fainted in her life, even in presence of an alligator or a panther. So she had no scruples in seizing Mr. Maxwell by the nape of the neck, and giving him a kind of double twist, which sent him reeling into the corner of the cabin.
"I"ll teach you to put your hands upon an onprotected female, you varmint, you!" said she, and, going to the door, she screamed "Jerry"
three times, with a voice that would have done honor to a Stentor.
"Now, stranger," said she, elevating her tall form to its full height, and, with a gesture like a queen of the Amazons, pointing to the door, "take yourself off, or my Jerry will tote you down to the river, and drown you like a kitten!"
Mrs. Swinger"s arm fell like a tragic heroine"s, and she stood proudly contemplating the object of her wrath, perhaps hoping the attorney would await the arrival of "her Jerry," in whose prowess she seemed to place unlimited confidence.
Vernon, who was waiting near the vehicle he had procured, heard the loud and angry words of the excited dame, and now approached the house to ascertain the cause of the confusion. This redoubtable worthy had received the reward of his villany, and considered the deed accomplished; but he had no objection to a little excitement. A fight was his element, and he never let slip an opportunity to join in one.
The worthy Jerry Swinger; the good woman"s beau ideal of a man, reached the cabin at the moment Vernon entered.
Maxwell had now the alternative of abandoning his coveted prize, or of fighting for it. The first he would not do; and the second, with the wound he had received in the duel, was not an easy matter. The latter, however, he determined upon. Drawing from his pocket a revolver, he again approached Emily.
"What"s all this about?" said Jerry, as he entered the cabin.
"Save me, sir,--save me from these villains!" exclaimed Emily, whose piteous accents penetrated the heart of the honest woodman.
"That I will, ma"am. Why, you infarnal, sneakin" whelp of an alligator, whar"s your conscience? But you"ve run agin a snag, and you shan"t make another bend, this trip; so sheer off! Suke, jest fotch out my rifle, thar."
Mrs. Swinger, before the a.s.sailants could prevent it, unhung the rifle, and was about to present it to her husband, when Maxwell pointed his pistol at her, and said, "Move another inch, woman, and I will fire!"
"Look here, stranger," said Jerry, approaching the attorney, "if you touch that trigger, I"ll pull your heart out!"
Vernon saw that his time had come, and, grappling with the woodman, they both fell upon the mud floor of the cabin.
Maxwell, his pistol still pointed at the woman, advanced a step, with the intention of taking the rifle from her. Mrs. Swinger, perceiving his purpose, elevated the rifle to her shoulder as gracefully as the most accomplished Kentuckian would have done, and fired. But her aim was bad; the ball pa.s.sed through the attorney"s hat. It came near enough, however, to rouse his pa.s.sion, and, without a moment"s deliberation, which might have saved him the reproach of shooting a woman, he fired.
His aim, better than his feminine opponent"s had been, sent the ball through her side, and she fell. Emily, filled with horror by the sanguinary scene, sprung to Mrs. Swinger"s aid, as she fell.
"Look here, you cussed villain," said Jerry Swinger, who, in the struggle, had got his antagonist under him, and had drawn from his pocket a long clasp-knife, "if you stir an inch, I"ll put this blood-sucker through your shrivelled-up gizzard!"
Vernon attempted to rise, bowie-knife in hand, to the conflict. Jerry Swinger was about to put his threat in execution, when Maxwell, released, by the fall of the woman, from danger in that quarter, struck him a heavy blow upon the head with the pistol in his hand. The woodman sunk back, with a groan, and Vernon, rising from his fallen posture, was about to plunge the knife to his heart, when a new actor appeared upon the stage. The blade of Vernon was arrested in its deadly descent, and a single blow from the fist of the new-comer laid the black-leg prostrate by the side of the woodman. Maxwell was thrown off his guard by the suddenness of the new a.s.sailant"s movements, and, before he could raise his pistol,--his only dependence,--it was wrested from him. The new-comer threw the pistol down, and, seizing the attorney by the neck, and applying a smart blow with the knee upon his back, he brought him to the floor. Taking a cord which hung on the cabin wall, he bound the fallen man hand and foot, and dragged him out of the cabin. Placing his back against a tree, he lashed him firmly to its trunk. Leaving the chop-fallen attorney to mature his plans, the conqueror returned to the hut.
"O, Hatchie, Hatchie! you have again saved me!" exclaimed Emily, as she saw her deliverer reenter. "Thank G.o.d! I am safe, though at what a terrible sacrifice!"
She had, in her terror, obtained but a very imperfect idea of the exciting scene which had transpired before her. When she saw Vernon fall, and then Maxwell, she realized that she was safe. With an effort,--for her excited nerves had taken away her strength,--she rose from her position on the floor, by the side of her lifeless hostess. At this moment Hatchie entered, and, with a heart full of grat.i.tude, she grasped his hand.