Read Ebook: The Maroon by Reid Mayne

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Ebook has 3736 lines and 164742 words, and 75 pages

"Rabbi Jessuron, you weary my patience. For the Foolah prince--as you say he is--you are answerable only to Captain Jowler. Captain Jowler comes not ashore."

"True--it ish true," assented the Jew, with a gesture that signified his comprehension of these preliminary premises.

"Who, then, is to hinder you from doing as you please in the matter of these Mandingoes?"

"Wonderful Shoodith!" exclaimed the father, throwing up his arms, and turning upon his daughter a look of enthusiastic admiration. "Wonderful Shoodith! Joosh the very thing!--blesh my soul!--and I never thought of it!"

"Not a word, Shoodith! not a word!"

"Then no one need be a word the wiser. As to Captain Jowler--"

"Showler daren't show hish face in the Bay: that'sh why he landed hish cargo on the coast. Besides, there wash an understanding between him and me. He doeshn't care what ish done with the prinshe--not he. Anyhow, he'll be gone away in twenty-four hours."

"Then in twenty-four hours the Mandingoes may be yours--prince, attendants, and all. But time is precious, papa. We had better hasten home at once, and strip his royal highness of those fine feathers before some of our curious neighbours come in and see them. People will talk scandal, you know. As for our worthy overseer--"

"Ah, Ravener! he knowsh all about it. I wash obliged to tell him ash we landed."

"Wonderful Shoodith!" again exclaimed the admiring parent. "My precious daughter, you are worth your weight in golden guinish! Twenty-four shlaves for nothing, and one of them a born prinshe! Two thousand currenshy! Blesh my soul! It ish a shplendid profit--worth a whole year's buyin' and shellin'." And with this honest reflection, the slave-merchant hammered his mule into a trot, and followed his "precious Shoodith"--who had already given the whip to her horse, and was riding rapidly homeward.

THE SEA NYMPH.

Among these nondescripts was one of peculiarities sufficiently distinctive to attract attention. A single glance at this personage satisfied you that you looked upon a London Cockney, at the same time a West-End exquisite of the very purest water. He was a young man who had just passed the twenty-first anniversary of his birth; although the indulgence of youthful dissipation had already brushed the freshness from his features, giving them the stamp of greater age. In complexion he was fair--pre-eminently so--with hair of a light yellowish hue, that presented the appearance of having been artificially curled, and slightly darkened by the application of some perfumed oil. The whiskers and moustache were nearly of the same colour; both evidently cultivated with an elaborate assiduity, that proclaimed excessive conceit in them on the part of their owner.

The eyebrows were also of the lightest shade; but the hue of the eyes was not so easily told: since one of them was kept habitually closed; while a glancing lens, in a frame of tortoise-shell, hindered a fair view of the other. Through the glass, however, it appeared of a greenish grey, and decidedly "piggish."

The features of this individual were regular enough, though without any striking character; and of a cast rather effeminate than vulgar. Their prevailing expression was that of a certain superciliousness, at times extending to an affectation of sardonism.

The affected drawl in which the gentleman spoke, whenever he condescended to hold communion with his fellow-passengers, confirmed this character.

Mr Smythje had not come over the water with any intention of settling upon his Jamaica estate. "Such an ideaw," to use his own phraseology, "nevwaw entawed ma bwain. To exchange London and its pwesyaws for a wesidence among those haw-ed niggaws--deaw, no--I could nevwaw think of such a voluntawy banishment; that would be a baw--a decided baw!" "A meaw twip to see something of the twopics, of which I've heard such extwaor'nary stowies--have a look at my sugaw plantation and the dem'd niggaws--besides, I have a stwong desire to take a squint at these Queeole queetyaws, who are said to be so dooced pwetty. Haw! haw!"

After such fashion did Mr Montagu Smythje explain the purpose of his voyage to such of his fellow-passengers as chanced to take an interest in it.

His features were nobly defined; and his whole countenance sufficiently striking to attract the attention of even an indifferent observer. Dark-brown eyes, and hair of like colour, curling jauntily over his cheeks, were characteristic points of gracefulness; and, take him all in all, he was what might justly be pronounced a handsome young fellow.

The occupation in which the young man was engaged betrayed a certain degree of refinement. Standing near the windlass, in the blank leaf of a book, which appeared to be his journal, he was sketching the harbour into which the ship was about to enter; and the drawing exhibited no inconsiderable degree of artistic skill.

Whatever hopes of success the young colonist may have entertained, they were evidently neither sanguine nor continuous. Though naturally of a cheerful spirit, as his countenance indicated, a close observer might have detected a shadow stealing over it at intervals.

As the ship drew near to the shore, he closed the book, and stood scanning the gorgeous picture of tropical scenery, now, for the first time, disclosed to his eyes.

Despite the pleasant emotions which so fair a scene was calculated to call forth, his countenance betrayed anxiety--perhaps a doubt as to whether a welcome awaited him in that lovely land upon which he was looking.

Only a few moments had he been thus occupied, when a strange voice falling upon his ear caused him to turn towards the speaker--in whom he recognised the distinguished cabin-passenger, Mr Montagu Smythje.

As this gentleman had voyaged all the way from Liverpool to Jamaica without once venturing to set his foot across the line which separates the sacred precincts of the quarter from the more plebeian for'ard deck, his presence by the windlass might have been matter of surprise.

Not for long, however, did Mr Smythje remain silent. He was not one of a saturnine habit. The fair scene was inspiring him with a poetical fervour, which soon found expression in characteristic speech.

"Dooced pwetty, 'pon honaw!" he exclaimed; "would make a spwendid dwop-scene faw a theataw! Dawnt yaw think so, ma good fwend?"

On perceiving that the speech was meant for himself, he was at first a little nettled at its patronising tone; but the feeling of irritation soon passed away, and he fixed his eyes upon the speaker, with a good-humoured, though somewhat contemptuous expression.

"Aw--haw--it is yaw, my young fellaw," continued the exquisite, now for the first time perceiving to whom he had made his appeal. "Aw, indeed! I've often observed yaw from the quawter-deck. Ba Jawve! yes--a veway stwange individwal!--incompwehensibly stwange! May I ask--pawdon the liberty--what is bwinging yaw out heaw--to Jamaica, I mean?"

"Aw, haw! indeed! Good--veway good! But, my deaw sir, that is not what I meant."

"No?"

"No, I ashaw yaw. I meant what bisness bwings yaw heaw. P'waps you have some pwofession?"

"No, not any," replied the young man, checking his inclination to retaliate the impertinent style of his interrogator.

"A twade, then?"

"I am sorry to say I have not even a trade."

"No pwofession! no twade! what the dooce daw yaw intend dawing in Jamaica? P'waps yaw expect the situation of book-keepaw on a pwantation, or niggaw-dwivaw. Neithaw, I believe, requiaws much expewience, as I am told the book-keepaw has pwositively no books to keep--haw! haw! and shawly any fellaw, howevaw ignowant, may dwive a niggaw. Is that yaw expectation, my worthy fwend?"

"I have no expectation, one way or another," replied the young man, in a tone of careless indifference. "As to the business I may follow out here in Jamaica, that, I suppose, will depend on the will of another."

"Anothaw! aw!--who, pway?"

"My uncle."

"Aw, indeed! yaw have an uncle in Jamaica, then?"

"I have--if he be still alive."

"Aw--haw! yaw are not shaw of that intewesting fact? P'waps yaw've not heard from him wately?"

"Not for years," replied the young steerage passenger, his poor prospects now having caused him to relinquish the satirical tone which he had assumed. "Not for years," repeated he, "though I've written to him to say that I should come by this ship."

"Veway stwange! And pway, may I ask what bisness yaw uncle follows?"

"He is a planter, I believe."

"A sugaw plantaw?"

"Yes--he was so when we last heard from him."

"Aw, then, p'waps he is wich--a pwopwietor? In that case he may find something faw yaw to daw, bettaw than niggaw-dwiving. Make yaw his ovawseeaw. May I know yaw name?"

"Quite welcome to it. Vaughan is my name."

"Vawrn!" repeated the exquisite, in a tone that betrayed some newly-awakened interest; "Vawn, did I understand yaw to say?"

"Herbert Vaughan," replied the young man, with firmer emphasis.

"And yaw uncle's name?"

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