Fiction > Book editions > London, 1885 - Dynamiter

THE FAIR CUBAN, I'^T
house, fetch her to the boat, and set her back upon tho
mainland. But with one voice, they protested that they
durst not obey, coming close about me, pleading and
beseeching me to be more wise ; and when I insisted,
rising higher in passion and speaking of this foul intruder
in the terms she had deserved, they fell back from me as
from one who had blasphemed. A superstitious rever-
ence plainly encircled the stranger ; I could read it in
their changed demeanour, and in the paleness that pre-
vailed upon the natural colour of their faces ; and their
fear perhaps reacted on myself. I looked again at
Madam Mendizabal. She stood perfectly composed,
watching my face through her glasses with a smile of
scorn ; and at the sight of her assured superiority to
all my threats, a cry broke from my lips, a cry of rage,
fear and despair, and I fled from the verandah and the
house.
I ran I knew not where, but it was towards the
beach. As I went, my head whirled ; so strange, so
sudden, were these events and insults. A¥ho was she ?
what, in Heaven's name, the power she wielded over my
obedient negroes ? Why had she addressed me as a
slave ? why spoken of my father's sale ? To all these
tumultuary questions I could find no answer ; and in the
turmoil of my mind, nothing was plain except the hateful,
leering image of the woman.
I was still running, mad with fear and anger, when I
saw my father coming to meet me from the landing-
place ; and with a cry that I thought would have killed
me, leaped into his arms and broke into a passion of sobs
and tears upon his bosom. He made me sit down below
a tall palmetto that grew not far off ; comforted me, but
with some abstraction in his voice ; and as soon as I
regained the least command uj)on my feelings, asked me,
not without harshness, what this grief betokened. I was
surprised by his tone into a still gi^eater measure of com-
posure ; and in firm tones, though still interrupted by
sobs, I told him there was a stranger in the island, at
which I thought he started and turned pale ; that the
servants would not obey me ; that the stranger's name
l2