In the Roar of the Sea/Chapter 51
CHAPTER LI.
SURRENDER
Scantlebray was mistaken. Coppinger had not crossed the estuary of the Camel. He was at Pentyre Glaze awaiting the time when the tide suited for landing the cargo of the Black Prince. In the kitchen were a number of men having their supper and drinking, waiting also for the proper moment when to issue forth.
At the turn of the tide the Black Prince would approach in the gathering darkness and would come as near in as she dare venture. The wind had fallen, but the sea was running, and with the tide setting in she would approach the cove.
Judith hastened toward the Glaze. Darkness had set in, but in the north were auroral lights, first a great, white halo, then rays that shot up to the zenith, and then a mackerel sky of rosy light. The growl and mutter of the sea filled the air with threat like an angry multitude surging on with blood and destruction in their hearts.
The flicker overhead gave Judith light for her cause; the snow had melted except in ditches and under hedges, and there it glared red or white in response to the changing, luminous tinges of the heavens. When she reached the house she at once entered the hall; there Coppinger was awaiting her. He knew she would come to him when her mind was made up on the alternatives he had offered her, and he believed he knew pretty surely which she would choose. It was because he expected her that he had not suffered the men collected for the work of the night to invade the hall.
"You are here," he said. He was seated by the fire; he looked up, but did not rise. "Almost too late."
"Almost, maybe, but not altogether," answered Judith. "And yet it seems unnecessary, as you have already acted without awaiting my decision."
"What makes you say that?"
"I have been shown your letter."
"Oh! Obadiah Scantlebray is premature."
"He is not at Othello Cottage yet. His brother came beforehand to prepare me."
"How considerate of your feelings," sneered Captain Cruel. "I would not have expected that of Scantlebray."
"You have not awaited my decision," said Judith.
"That is true," answered Coppinger, carelessly. "I knew you would shrink from the exposure, the disgrace of publication of what has occurred here. I knew you so well that I could reckon beforehand on what you would elect."
"But, why to Scantlebray? Are there not other asylums?"
"Yes: so long as that boy is placed where he can do no mischief, I care not."
"Then, if that be so, I have another proposal to make."
"What is that?" Coppinger stood up.
"If you have any regard for my feelings, any care for my happiness, you will grant my request."
"Let me hear it."
"Mr. Menaida is going to Portugal."
"What!"—in a tone of concentrated rage—"Oliver?"
"Oliver and his father. But the proposal concerns the father."
"Go on." Coppinger strode once across the room, then back again. "Go on," he said, savagely.
"Old Mr. Menaida offers to take Jamie with him. He intends to settle at Oporto, near his son, who has been appointed to a good situation there. He will gladly undertake the charge of Jamie. Let Jamie go with them. There he can do no harm."
"What, go—without you? Did they not want you to go, also?"
Judith hesitated and flushed. There was a single tallow candle on the table. Coppinger took it up, snuffed it, and held the flame to her face to study its expression. "I thought so," he said, and put down the light again.
"Jamie is useful to Mr. Menaida," pleaded Judith, in some confusion, and with a voice of tremulous apology. "He stuffs birds so beautifully, and Uncle Zachie—I mean Mr. Menaida—has set his heart on making a collection of the Spanish and Portuguese birds."
"Oh, yes; he understands the properties of arsenic," said Coppinger, with a scoff.
Judith's eyes fell. Captain Gruel's tone was not reassuring.
"You say that you care not where Jamie be, so long as he is where he cannot hurt you," said Judith.
"I did not say that," answered Coppinger. "I said that he must be placed where he can injure no one."
"He can injure no one if he is with Mr. Menaida, who will well watch him, and keep him employed."
Coppinger laughed bitterly. "And you? Will you be satisfied to have the idolized brother with the deep seas rolling between you?"
"I must endure it. It is the least of evils."
"But you would be pining to have wings and fly over the sea to him."
"If I have not wings I cannot go."
"Now hearken," said Coppinger. He clinched his fist and laid it on the table. "I know very well what this means. Oliver Menaida is at the bottom of this. It is not the fool Jamie who is wanted in Portugal, but the clever Judith. They have offered to take the boy, that through him they may attract you, unless," his voice thrilled, "they have already dared to propose that you should go with them."
Judith was silent.
Coppinger clinched his second hand and laid that also on the table. "I swear to heaven," said he, "that if I and that Oliver Menaida meet again, it is for the last time for one or other of us. We have met twice already. It is an understood thing: between us, when we meet again, one wets his boots in the other's blood. Do you hear? The world will not hold us two any longer. Portugal may be far off, but it is too near Cornwall for me."
Judith made no answer. She looked fixedly into the gloomy eyes of Coppinger, and said——
"You have strange thoughts. Suppose—if you will—that the invitation included me, I could not have accepted it."
"Why not? You refuse to regard yourself as married, and if unmarried, you are free—and if free, ready to elope with——" he would not utter the name in his quivering fury.
"I pray you," said Judith, offended, "do not insult me."
"I—insult you? It is a daily insult to me to be treated as I have been. It is driving me mad."
"But, do you not see," urged Judith, "you have offered me two alternatives and I ask for a third, yours are jail or an asylum, mine is exile. Both yours are to me intolerable. Conceive of my state were Jamie either in jail or with Mr. Scantlebray. In jail—and I should be thinking of him all day and all night in his prison garb, tramping the tread-mill, beaten, driven on, associated with the vilest of men, an indelible stain put, not on him only, but on the name of our dear, dear father. Do you think I could bear that? or take the other alternative? I know the Scantlebrays. I should have the thoughts of Jamie distressed, frightened, solitary, ill-treated, ever before me. I had it for a few hours once and it drove me frantic. It would make me mad in a week. I know that I could not endure it. Either alternative would madden or kill me. And I offer another—if he were in exile, I could at least think of him as happy among the orange groves, in the vineyards, among kind friends, happy, innocent at worst, forgetting me. That I could bear. But the other no, not for a week—they would be torture insufferable." She spoke full of feverish vehemence, with her hands outspread before her.
"And this smiling vision of Jamie happy in Portugal would draw your heart from me."
"You never had my heart," said Judith.
Coppinger clinched his teeth. "I will hear no more of this," said he.
Then Judith threw herself on her knees, and caught him and held him, lifting her entreating face toward his.
"I have undergone it—for some hours. I know it will madden or kill me. I cannot—I cannot—I cannot," she could scarce breathe, she spoke in gasps.
"You cannot what?" he asked, sullenly.
"I cannot live on the terms you offer. You take from me even the very wish to live. Take away the arsenic from me—lest in madness I give it to myself. Take me far inland from these cliffs—lest in my madness I throw myself over—I could not bear it. Will nothing move you?"
"Nothing." He stood before her, his feet apart, his arms folded, his chin on his breast, looking into her uplifted, imploring face. "Yes—one thing. One thing only." He paused, raking her face with his eyes. "Yes—one thing. Be mine wholly—unconditionally. Then I will consent. Be mine; add your name where it is wanting. Resume your ring—and Jamie shall go with the Menaidas. Now, choose."
He drew back. Judith remained kneeling, upright, on the floor with arms extended—she had heard and at first hardly comprehended him. Then she staggered to her feet.
"Well," said Coppinger, "what answer do you make? Still she could not speak. She went to the table with uncertain steps. There was a wooden form by it. She seated herself on this, placed her arms on the board, joining her hands, and laid her head, face downward, between them on the table.
Coppinger remained where he was, watching and waiting. He knew what her action implied—that she was to be left alone with her thoughts, to form her resolve undisturbed. He remained, accordingly, motionless, but with his eyes fixed on the golden hair that flickered in the dim light of the one candle. The wick had a great fungus in it—so large and glaring that in another moment it must fall, and fall on Judith's hand. Coppinger saw this and he thrust forth his arm to snuff the candle with his fingers, but his hand shook, and the light was extinguished. It mattered not. There were glowing coals on the hearth, and through the window flared and throbbed the auroral lights.
A step sounded outside. Then a hand was on the door. Coppinger at once strode across the hall, and arrested the intruder from entering.
"Who is that?"
"Hender Pendarvis"—the clerk of St. Enodoc. "I have some'ut partickler I must say."
Coppinger looked at Judith; she lay motionless, her head between her arms on the board. He partly opened the door and stepped forth into the porch.
When he had heard what the clerk of St. Enodoc had to say, he answered with an order, "Round to the kitchen—bid the men arm, and go by the beach."
He returned into the hall, went to the fireplace and took down a pair of pistols, tried them that they were charged, and thrust them into his belt.
Next he went up to Judith, and laid his hand on her shoulder.
"Time presses," he said; "I have to be off. Your answer." She looked up. The board was studded with drops of water. She had not wept, these stains were not her tears, they were the sweat of anguish off her brow that had run over the board.
"Well, Judith, your answer."
"I accept."
"Unreservedly?"
"Unreservedly."
"Stay," said he. He spoke low, indistinctly articulated sentences. "Let there be no holding back between us. You shall know all. You have wondered concerning the death of Wyvill—I know you have asked questions about it. I killed him."
He paused.
"You heard of the wreckers on that vessel cast on Doom Bar. I was their leader."
Again he paused.
"You thought I had sent Jamie out with a light to mislead the vessel. You thought right. I did have her drawn to her destruction, and by your brother."
He paused again. He saw Judith's hand twitch: that was the only sign of emotion in her.
"And Lady Kinghton's jewels. I took them off her it was I who tore her ear."
Again a stillness. The sky outside shone in at the window, a lurid red. From the kitchen could be heard the voice of a man singing.
"Now you know all," said Coppinger. "I would not have you take me finally, fully, unreservedly without knowing the truth. Give me your resolve."
She slightly lifted her hands; she looked steadily into his face with a stony expression in hers.
"What is it?"
"I cannot help myself—unreservedly yours."
Then he caught her to him, pressed her to his heart and kissed her wet face—wet as though she had plunged it into the sea.
"To-morrow," said he, "to-morrow shall be our true wedding."
And he dashed out of the house.