Читать книгу The Gold Brick - Ann S. Stephens - Страница 3

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A low coast, burdened in every foot of its soil with the luxuriant growth of a tropical climate; a large town, straggling and flat, swarming like a hive of bees with turbulent life. Lights flickering wildly from the windows and dancing with a fantastic and red glare up and down the streets. A dull, hollow sound rolling constantly out upon the stillness of the waters, broken now and then with sharp shrieks as lightning cleaves the thunder gust.

This was the scene commanded from the deck of a New England brig, lying in the harbor of Port au Prince, on one of those terrible nights in the end of the last century, when the horrible passions that had rioted through France, like wild beasts ravening for blood, fled across seas and fired themselves anew in the hot life of the tropics.

The contrast between the stillness of the harbor, where the starlight fell smilingly, and the waters rippled like kisses around the vessels, and that demon riot on the shore, was awful. To lie so near, with death shrieks cutting the air every instant, with murderous yells chasing them, like fiends, was enough to drive men mad. The iron-hearted New England sailors on that deck, grew restive as caged lions, while the tumult swelled louder and louder around them. The young captain turned white as he took short marches up and down the deck. The men drew close together, eyeing each other with fierce glances. A word from the captain would have sent them headlong into the massacre, in a wild effort to save the women and children, whose shrieks, even from the distance, drove them frantic.

But what could they do?—a handful of men against thousands on thousands of brutalized blacks, swarming in that doomed city. It was terrible to remain, but madness to go. The captain ground his teeth and clenched his hands in the agony of this restraint. Every cry that reached the ship pierced him like a sword; every fresh gleam of light quivering across the waters seemed to lure him to the rescue.

"Oh, my God! my God! I cannot bear this!" he cried, as a group of wooden buildings near the shore burst into a volume of fire, and one appalling shriek told that scores on scores of human beings were engulphed in the flames that danced and leaped and shed floods of fiery gold far out on the harbor. "Neither my owners nor my Maker could wish me to stand still now."

Going up to the group of sailors, he called out, "All hands to work, my boys! lower the boats. Such of you as want to help the poor wretches they are murdering yonder, come with me."

"Aye, aye," broke in a smothered shout from the sailors, and each man sprang to his duty—from cabin boy to mate, not a soul lagged behind. Yes, one man, the first mate, he neither repeated his superior's orders, or moved toward the boats, but stood near the captain, looking quietly unconcerned, with a half smile on his lip.

"You will not go, Thrasher," said the captain. "I am glad of it; some one must take charge of the ship. Stay on board, and be ready to lend a hand—we may bring back some of those poor creatures."

"And if your men are killed, who will work the ship, Captain Mason? Remember the craft belongs neither to you nor me."

"They shall not be killed, Thrasher, these brutes have plenty to do without minding us; besides, I'll keep off shore, and only lie to, ready to haul any poor creature in that takes to the water. They are sure to try, if they think of the ship."

"Well, well, captain, you command here, and know your own business best," answered Thrasher, with that same smile creeping across his lips; "for my part, I stand by the ship."

"That's right; I won't risk the men—never fear! As for the brig, what can harm her?"

"Nothing, while I'm aboard," answered the mate, turning suddenly townward, where another broad sheet of smoky flame blazed forth. "There," he cried, almost with a shout, "there goes another bonfire. The whole town will be roaring hot at this rate. Ha, look at that flock of women rushing out of the smoke like rats—hot work that—how plainly you can see 'em with their hair in the wind, turning and rushing hither and yon, between fire and water! Ho, ho, the black rascals are after 'em—Lord, how they run!—how they fling up their arms toward the ship—scatter on the beach—take to the water—they're on 'em—the nigger hounds are on 'em tooth and nail. What an infernal yell!"

Even that hard man turned away and covered his face with both hands; when he looked again it was with wild, heavy eyes.

"Heavens and earth," he muttered, "how still it is in spite of the roaring pit behind. The brutes have done their work, and gone into the smoke again. How softly the waves lick up the dead bodies from the sand and sweep 'em under. But they'll come to daylight again; perhaps here under our bows, a hundred women—who knows how many—with long hair, weltering up and down like sea-weed after a storm. Faugh! the dread of it makes one childish. I wonder if they are all gone. What, ho!"

Two persons, the cook and cabin-boy, had been left behind by the boats, much against their will. They, also, had witnessed the fearful scene on the beach, and shuddering with terror, crouched together behind some barrels that stood upon the deck. One of them tried to answer Thrasher's shout, but his voice broke in a hoarse whisper, and he really had neither the strength nor courage to move.

By this time the captain's boat was nearing the shore rapidly. If the scene of revolt had been terrible from the distance, it was crowded with horrors now. The fierce, hot breath of the fire came surging toward the coast like a sirocco. The roar of that infernal massacre, the pleadings and shrieks, the moans and shouts, horribly mingling and rising above each other, oppressed the very air. Out of the reeking melee of the town human beings darted like scared birds, and hid among the chaparral or rushed madly toward the beach.

The captain was brave and humane, but he was honest too, and in the midst of all this gave a thought to the obligations he owed to his command. He would go close to the shore, ready to save those who fled to the water for death or refuge. If it proved possible for the nature within him to resist the temptation to offer more, he would resist; if not, he was but human, and life was a precious thing to every breathing being; God would forgive him for saving it, though his owners might not.

As he neared the shore, that portion of the town which lay close to the water was in a bright blaze; the boat, the wharves, and the foam-fringed waves reddened and glowed under the hot smiles of the fire. Deep into the lurid caves made by the whirl of glowing smoke men and women struggled madly, and tore at each other like wild beasts, smothering their yells beneath the tumultuous elements.

From this lurid torrent the people scattered, both pursuers and pursued, out upon the open country. The poor wretches who were to die sought the darkest spots, hiding behind clumps of aloes and cactus hedges, or creeping under torn masses of wild vines, panting with terror and dread, and striving to hold the very breath that threatened to betray them.

Secure of their victims in the end, the triumphant hordes of negroes came huddling forth like demons, hooting, dancing, and rioting in the brazen light their own fiends' work had kindled. A group of palm trees stood close to the shore a little distance from the town, and to that point the insurgents swarmed in hundreds, dragging the pale beings whose death was to be their sport, brutally after them. When they reached the palm trees there was a rush from the crowd, and a score of dark objects leaped upon the slender stems, struggling upward, hustling over each other, the lowermost seizing his neighbor by the bare, glistening shoulders and hurling him down to the crowd amid wild shouts and stormy oaths.

At last the palms swayed and bent almost double under the burden of fiends, who dropped off by dozens into the yelling crowd. The beautiful trees, relieved of their weight, swayed back and penciled themselves against the flaming sky, not green and free as they had appeared a moment before; but with the bark torn from their delicate trunks, and the symmetrical foliage broken and ragged. From the point of each leaf flaunted a gorgeous scarf or tawdry ribbon—red, orange, purple, and flame colored—which fluttered wildly in the hot draughts of wind that swept over them from the burning town.

Out from the crowd, like sharks leaping in the black waves of a tempest, the negro women sprang upward, seizing the ribbons, tearing them away from the leaves, or bending down the stately trees until they took uncouth forms, and seemed tortured like the group of women and children whose death cries rang out from the midst of the fiendish dance. The mingled mirth and horror grew more and more maddening, till the sand all around refused to soak in the blood they had shed, and the naked feet of the dancers plashed to their own barbarous war cry, or stumbled over the dead bodies of the slain; for with every turn of the dance, an axe had fallen, and a soul gone shrieking up to its Maker.

Captain Mason saw all this from his boat, while it was far out in the harbor; with a cry of horror he seized the oars and worked them till they bent like saplings under his iron handling. But human strength was not equal to human cruelty. While he was yet some fathoms from the shore, the demons under the palm trees, scattered back to the town in search of fresh victims, leaving the dead and the dying to their agonies, with those mocking ribbons waving fantastically in the wind, as if a May dance had just passed beneath them.

Panting and breathless, their hearts burning with indignation, the captain and his men rested on their oars; their work of mercy cut short, for alas! rage is quicker than charity. They could see the pale, dead faces of the white women and children that had been murdered under the palm trees, with terrible distinctness. Their rich garments and delicate features, bespoke them of the higher classes, but there they lay, like soldiers heaped on a battle-field, with nothing but the stars of heaven to pity them—the pure stars that seemed affrighted by the tumult, and grew pallid in the smoke.