"They will not fire! They dare not!" he was shrieking, as he dashed back and forth along the dock. "It is chance! They do not come for Chase!
Believe in me! The tug! The tug! They must not land!" But others were raging even more wildly than he, and they were calling upon Allah for help, for mercy; they were shrieking maledictions upon themselves and screaming praises to the sinister thing of death that glowered upon them from its s.p.a.celess lair.
The crash of the long-unused six-pounder at the chateau, followed almost immediately by a great roar from one of the cruiser"s guns, brought the panic to a crisis.
The islanders scattered like chaff before the wind, looking wild-eyed over their shoulders in dread of the pursuing cannon-ball, dodging in and out among the houses and off into the foothills.
Rasula, undaunted but crazed with disappointment, stuck to his colours on the deserted dock. He cursed and raved and begged. In time, two or three of the more canny, realising that safety lay in an early peace offering, ventured out beside him. Others followed their example and still others slunk trembling to the fore, their voices ready to protest innocence and friendship and loyalty.
They had heard of the merciless American gunner and they knew, in their souls, that he could shoot the island into atoms before nightfall.
The native lawyer harangued them and cursed them and at last brought them to understand, in a feeble way, that no harm could come to them if they faced the situation boldly. The Americans would not land on British soil; it would precipitate war with England. They would not dare to attempt a bombardment: Chase was a liar, a mountebank, a dog! After shouting himself hoa.r.s.e in his frenzy of despair, he finally succeeded in forcing the men to get up steam in the company"s tug. All this time, the officers of the American warship were dividing their attention between land and sea. Another vessel was coming up out of the misty horizon. The men on board knew it to be a British man-of-war! At last steam was up in the tug. A hundred or more of the islanders had ventured from their hiding places and were again huddled upon the dock.
Suddenly the throng separated as if by magic, opening a narrow path down which three white men approached the startled Rasula. A hundred eager hands were extended, a hundred voices cried out for mercy, a hundred Mohammedans beat their heads in abject submission.
Hollingsworth Chase, Lord Deppingham and a familiar figure in an ill-fitting red jacket and forage cap strode firmly, defiantly between the rows of humble j.a.pat.i.tes. Close behind them came a tall, resolute grenadier of the Rapp-Thorberg army.
"Make way there, make way!" Mr. Bowles was crying, brandishing the antique broadsword that had come down to Wyckholme from the dark ages.
"Stand aside for the British Government! Make way for the American!"
Rasula"s jaw hung limp in the face of this amazing exhibition of courage on the part of the enemy. He could not at first believe his eyes.
Hoa.r.s.e, inarticulate cries came from his froth-covered lips. He was glaring insanely at the calm, triumphant face of the man from Brodney"s, who was now advancing upon him with the a.s.surance of a conqueror.
"You see, Rasula, I have called for the cruiser and it has come at my bidding." Turning to the crowd that surged up from behind, cowed and cringing, Chase said: "It rests with you. If I give the word, that ship will blow you from the face of the earth. I am your friend, people. I would you no harm, but good. You have been misled by Rasula. Rasula, you are not a fool. You can save yourself, even now. I am here as the servant of these people, not as their master. I intend to remain here until I am called back by the man who sent me to you. You have----"
Rasula uttered a shriek of rage. He had been crouching back among his cohorts, panting with fury. Now he sprang forward, murder in his eyes.
His arm was raised and a great pistol was levelled at the breast of the man who faced him so coolly, so confidently. Deppingham shouted and took a step forward to divert the aim of the frenzied lawyer.
A revolver cracked behind the tall American and Rasula stopped in his tracks. There was a great hole in his forehead; his eyes were bursting; he staggered backward, his knees gave way; and, as the blood filled the hole and streamed down his face, he sank to the ground--dead!
The soldier from Rapp-Thorberg, a smoking pistol in his hand, the other raised to his helmet, stepped to the side of Hollingsworth Chase.
"By order of Her Serene Highness, sir," he said quietly.
"Good G.o.d!" gasped Chase, pa.s.sing his hand across his brow. For a full minute there was no sound to be heard on the pier except the lapping of the waves. Deppingham, repressing a shudder, addressed the stunned natives.
"Take the body away. May that be the end of all a.s.sa.s.sins!"
The _King"s Own_ came alongside the American vessel in less than an hour. Accompanied by the British agent, Mr. Bowles, Chase and Deppingham left the dock in the company"s tug and steamed out toward the two monsters. The American had made no move to send men ash.o.r.e, nor had the British agent deemed it wise to ask aid of the Yankees in view of the fact that a vessel of his own nation was approaching.
Standing on the forward deck of the swift little tug, Chase unconcernedly accounted for the timely arrival of the two cruisers.
"Three weeks ago I sent out letters by the mail steamer, to be delivered to the English or American commanders, wherever they might be found.
Undoubtedly they were met with in the same port. That is why I was so positive that help would come, sooner or later. It was very simple. Lord Deppingham, merely a case of foresightedness. I knew that we"d need help and I knew that if I brought the cruisers my power over these people would never be disturbed again."
"My word!" exclaimed the admiring Bowles.
"Chase, you may be theatric, but you are the most dependable chap the world has ever known," said Deppingham, and he meant it.
The warships remained off the harbour all that day. Officers from both ships were landed and escorted to the chateau, where joy reigned supreme, notwithstanding the fact that the grandchildren of the old men of the island were morally certain that their cause was lost. The British captain undertook to straighten out matters on the island. He consented to leave a small detachment of marines in the town to protect Chase and the bank, and he promised the head men of the village, whom he had brought aboard the ship, that no mercy would be shown if he or the American captain was compelled to make a second visit in response to a call for aid. To a man the islanders pledged fealty to the cause of peace and justice: they shouted the names of Chase and Allah in the same breath, and demanded of the latter that He preserve the former"s beard for all eternity.
The _King"s Own_ was to convey the liberated heirs, their goods and chattels, their servants and their penates (if any were left inviolate) to Aden, whither the cruiser was bound. At that port a P. & O. steamer would pick them up. One white man elected to stay on the island with Hollingsworth Chase, who steadfastly refused to desert his post until Sir John Brodney indicated that his mission was completed. That one man was the wearer of the red jacket, the bearer of the King"s commission in j.a.pat, the undaunted Mr. Bowles, won over from his desire to sit once more on the banks of the Serpentine and to dine forever in the Old Cheshire Cheese.
The Princess Genevra, the wistful light deepening hourly in her blue-grey eyes, avoided being alone with the man whom she was leaving behind. She had made up her mind to accept the fate inevitable; he had reconciled himself to the ending of an impossible dream. There was nothing more to say, except farewell. She may have bled in her soul for him and for the happiness that was dying as the minutes crept on to the hour of parting, but she carefully, deliberately concealed the wounds from all those who stood by and questioned with their eyes.
She was a princess of Rapp-Thorberg!
The last day dawned. The sun smiled down upon them. The soft breeze of the sea whispered the curse of destiny into their ears; it crooned the song of heritage; it called her back to the fastnesses where love may not venture in.
The chateau was in a state of upheaval; the exodus was beginning.
Servants and luggage had departed on their way to the dock. Palanquins were waiting to carry the lords and ladies of the castle down to the sea. The Princess waited until the last moment. She went to him. He was standing apart from the rest, coldly indifferent to the pangs he was suffering.
"I shall love you always," she said simply, giving him her hand.
"Always, Hollingsworth." Her eyes were wide and hopeless, her lips were white.
He bowed his head. "May G.o.d give you all the happiness that I wish for you," he said. "The End!"
She looked steadily into his eyes for a long time, searching his soul for the hope that never dies. Then she gently withdrew her hands and stood away from him, humbled in her own soul.
"Yes," she whispered. "Good-bye."
He straightened his shoulders and drew a deep breath through compressed nostrils. "Good-bye! G.o.d bless you," was all that he said.
She left him standing there; the wall between them was too high, too impregnable for even Love to storm.
Lady Deppingham came to him there a moment later. "I am sorry," she said tenderly. "Is there no hope?"
"There is no hope--for _her_!" he said bitterly. "She was condemned too long ago."
On the pier they said good-bye to him. He was laughing as gaily and as blithely as if the world held no sorrows in all its mighty grasp.
"I"ll look you up in London," he said to the Deppinghams. "Remember, the real trial is yet to come. Good-bye, Browne. Good-bye, all! You _may_ come again another day!"
The launch slipped away from the pier. He and Bowles stood there, side by side, pale-faced but smiling, waving their handkerchiefs. He felt that Genevra was still looking into his eyes, even when the launch crept up under the walls of the distant ship.
Slowly the great vessel got under way. The American cruiser was already low on the horizon. There was a single shot from the _King"s Own_: a reverberating farewell!
Hollingsworth Chase turned away at last. There were tears in his eyes and there were tears in those of Mr. Bowles.
"Bowles," said he, "it"s a rotten shame they didn"t think to say good-bye to old man Skaggs. He"s in the same grave with us."
[Ill.u.s.tration]
CHAPTER x.x.xV