Kitabı oku: «The Fortunes Of Glencore», sayfa 28

CHAPTER XLVI. THE FLOOD IN THE MAGRA

When it rains in Italy it does so with a passionate ardor that bespeaks an unusual pleasure. It is no “soft dissolving in tears,” but a perfect outburst of woe, – wailing in accents the very wildest, and deluging the land in torrents. Mountain streams that were rivulets in the morning, before noon arrives are great rivers, swollen and turbid, carrying away massive rocks from their foundations, and tearing up large trees by the roots. The dried-up stony bed you have crossed a couple of hours back with unwetted feet is now the course of a stream that would defy the boldest.

These sudden changes are remarkably frequent along that beautiful tract between Nice and Massa, and which is known as the “Riviera di Levante.” The rivers, fed from innumerable streams that pour down from the Apennines, are almost instantaneously swollen; and as their bed continually slopes towards the sea, the course of the waters is one of headlong velocity. Of these, the most dangerous by far is the Magra. The river, which even in dry seasons is a considerable stream, becomes, when fed by its tributaries, a very formidable body of water, stretching full a mile in width, and occasionally spreading a vast sheet of foam close to the very outskirts of Sarzana. The passage of the river is all the more dangerous at these periods as it approaches the sea, and more than one instance is recorded where the stout raft, devoted to the use of travellers, has been carried away to the ocean.

Where the great post-road from Genoa to the South passes, a miserable shealing stands, half hidden in tall osiers, and surrounded with a sedgy, swampy soil the foot sinks in at every step. This is the shelter of the boatmen who navigate the raft, and who, in relays by day and night, are in waiting for the service of travellers. In the dreary days of winter, or in the drearier nights, it is scarcely possible to imagine a more hopeless spot; deep in the midst of a low marshy tract, the especial home of tertian fever, with the wild stream roaring at the very door-sill, and the thunder of the angry ocean near, it is indeed all that one can picture of desolation and wretchedness. Nor do the living features of the scene relieve its gloomy influence. Though strong men, and many of them in the prime of life, premature age and decay seem to have settled down upon them. Their lustreless eyes and leaden lips tell of ague, and their sad, thoughtful faces bespeak those who are often called upon to meet peril, and who are destined to lives of emergency and hazard.

It was in the low and miserable hut we speak of, just as night set in of a raw November, that four of these raftsmen sat at their smoky fire, in company with two travellers on foot, whose humble means compelled them to await the arrival of some one rich enough to hire the raft. Meanly clad and wayworn were the strangers who now sat endeavoring to dry their dripping clothes at the blaze, and conversing in a low tone together. If the elder, dressed in a russet-colored blouse and a broad-leafed hat, his face almost hid in beard and moustaches, seemed by his short and almost grotesque figure a travelling showman, the appearance of the younger, despite all the poverty of his dress, implied a very different class.

He was tall and well knit, with a loose activity in all his gestures which almost invariably characterizes the Englishman; and though his dark hair and his bronzed cheek gave him something of a foreign look, there was a calm, cold self-possession in his air that denoted the Anglo-Saxon. He sat smoking his cigar, his head resting on one hand, and evidently listening with attention to the words of his companion. The conversation that passed will save us the trouble of introducing them to our reader, if he have not already guessed them.

“If we don’t wait,” said the elder, “till somebody richer and better off than ourselves comes, we ‘ll have to pay seven francs for passin’ in such a night as this.”

“It is a downright robbery to ask so much,” cried the other, angrily. “What so great danger is there, or what so great hardship, after all?”

“There is both one and the other, I believe,” replied he, in a tone evidently meant to moderate his passion; “and just look at the poor craytures that has to do it. They’re as weak as a bit of wet paper; they haven’t strength to make themselves heard when they talk out there beside the river.”

“The fellow yonder,” said the youth, “has got good brawny arms and sinewy legs of his own.”

“Ay, and he is starved after all. A cut of rye bread and an onion won’t keep the heart up, nor a jug of red vinegar, though ye call it grape-juice. On my conscience, I ‘m thinkin’ that the only people that preserves their strength upon nothin’ is the Irish. I used to carry the bags over Slieb-na-boregan mountain and the Turk’s Causeway on wet potatoes and buttermilk, and never a day late for eleven years.”

“What a life!” cried the youth, in an accent of utter pity.

“Faix, it was an elegant life, – that is, when the weather was anyways good. With a bright sun shinin’ and a fine fresh breeze blowin’ the white clouds away over the Atlantic, my road was a right cheery one, and I went along inventin’ stories, sometimes fairy tales, sometimes makin’ rhymes to myself, but always happy and contented. There wasn’t a bit of the way I had n’t a name for in my own mind, either some place I read about, or some scene in a story of my own; but better than all, there was a dog, – a poor starved lurcher he was, – with a bit of the tail cut off; he used to meet me, as regular as the clock, on the side of Currah-na-geelah, and come beside me down to the ford every day in the year. No temptation nor flattery would bring him a step farther. I spent three-quarters of an hour once trying it, but to no good; he took leave of me on the bank of the river, and went away back with his head down, as if he was grievin’ over something. Was n’t that mighty curious?”

“Perhaps, like ourselves, Billy, he wasn’t quite sure of his passport,” said the other, dryly.

“Faix, may be so,” replied he, with perfect seriousness. “My notion was that he was a kind of an outlaw, a chap that maybe bit a child of the family, or ate a lamb of a flock given him to guard. But indeed his general appearance and behavior was n’t like that; he had good manners, and, starved as he was, he never snapped the bread out of my fingers, but took it gently, though his eyes was dartin’ out of his head with eagerness all the while.”

“A great test of good breeding, truly,” said the youth, sadly. “It must be more than a mere varnish when it stands the hard rubs of life in this wise.”

“‘Tis the very notion occurred to myself. It was the dhrop of good blood in him made him what he was.”

Stealthy and fleeting as was the look that accompanied these words, the youth saw it, and blushed to the very top of his forehead. “The night grows milder,” said he, to relieve the awkwardness of the moment by any remark.

“It’s a mighty grand sight out there now,” replied the other; “there’s three miles if there’s an inch of white foam dashing down to the sea, that breaks over the bar with a crash like thunder; big trees are sweepin’ past, and pieces of vine trellises, and a bit of a mill-wheel, all carried off just like twigs on a stream.”

“Would money tempt those fellows, I wonder, to venture out on such a night as this?”

“To be sure; and why not? The daily fight poverty maintains with existence dulls the sense of every danger but what comes of want. Don’t I know it myself? The poor man has no inimy but hunger; for, ye see, the other vexations and troubles of life, there’s always a way of gettin’ round them. You can chate even grief, and you can slip away from danger; but there’s no circumventin’ an empty stomach.”

“What a tyrant is then your rich man!” sighed the youth, heavily.

“That he is. ‘Dives honoratus. Pulcher rex denique regum.’ You may do as you please if ye’r rich as a Begum.”

“A free translation, rather, Billy,” said the other, laughing.

“Or ye might render it this way,” said Billy, —

 
“If ye ‘ve money enough and to spare in the bank,
The world will give ye both beauty and rank.
 

And I ‘ve nothing to say agin it,” continued he. “The raal stimulus to industhry in life, is to make wealth powerful. Gettin’ and heapin’ up money for money’s sake is a debasin’ kind of thing; but makin’ a fortune, in order that you may extind your influence, and mowld the distinies of others, – that’s grand.”

“And see what comes of it!” cried the youth, bitterly. “Mark the base and unworthy subserviency it leads to; see the race of sycophants it begets.”

“I have you there, too,” cried Billy, with all the exultation of a ready debater. “Them dirty varmint ye speak of is the very test of the truth I ‘m tellin’ ye. ‘T is because they won’t labor – because they won’t work – that they are driven to acts of sycophancy and meanness. The spirit of industhry saves a man even the excuse of doin’ anything low!”

“And how often, from your own lips, have I listened to praises at your poor humble condition; rejoicings that your lot in life secured you against the cares of wealth and grandeur!”

“And you will again, plaze God! if I live, and you pre-sarve your hearin’. What would I be if I was rich, but an ould – an ould voluptuary?” said Billy, with great emphasis on a word he had some trouble in discovering. “Atin’ myself sick with delicacies, and drinkin’ cordials all day long. How would I know the uses of wealth? Like all other vulgar creatures, I ‘d be buyin’ with my money the respect that I ought to be buyin’ with my qualities. It’s the very same thing you see in a fair or a market, – the country girls goin’ about, hobbled and crippled with shoes on, that, if they had bare feet, could walk as straight as a rush. Poverty is not ungraceful itself. It’s tryin’ to be what isn’t natural, spoils people entirely.”

“I think I hear voices without. Listen!” cried the youth.

“It ‘s only the river; it’s risin’ every minute.”

“No, that was a shout. I heard it distinctly. Ay, the boatmen hear it now!”

“It is a travelling-carriage. I see the lamps,” cried one of the men, as he stood at the door and looked landward. “They may as well keep the road; there’s no crossing the Magra to-night!”

By this time the postilions’ whips commenced that chorus of cracking by which they are accustomed to announce all arrivals of importance.

“Tell them to go back, Beppo,” said the chief of the raftsmen to one of his party. “If we might try to cross with the mail-bags in a boat, there’s not one of us would attempt the passage on the raft.”

To judge from the increased noise and uproar, the travellers’ impatience had now reached its highest point; but to this a slight lull succeeded, probably occasioned by the parley with the boatman.

“They’ll give us five Napoleons for the job,” said Beppo, entering, and addressing his Chief.

“Per Dio, that won’t support our families if we leave them fatherless,” muttered the other. “Who and what are they that can’t wait till morning?”

“Who knows?” said Beppo, with a genuine shrug of native indifference. “Princes, belike!”

“Princes or beggars, we all have lives to save!” mumbled out an old man, as he reseated himself by the fire. Meanwhile the courier had entered the hut, and was in earnest negotiation with the chief, who, however, showed no disposition to run the hazard of the attempt.

“Are you all cowards alike?” said the courier, in all the insolence of his privileged order; “or is it a young fellow of your stamp that shrinks from the risk of a wet jacket?”

This speech was addressed to the youth, whom he had mistaken for one of the raftsmen.

“Keep your coarse speeches for those who will bear them, my good fellow,” said the other, boldly, “or mayhap the first wet jacket here will be one with gold lace on the collar.”

“He’s not one of us; he’s a traveller,” quickly interposed the chief, who saw that an angry scene was brewing. “He’s only waiting to cross the river,” muttered he in a whisper, “when some one comes rich enough to hire the raft.”

“Sacre bleu! Then he shan’t come with us; that I’ll promise him,” said the courier, whose offended dignity roused all his ire. “Now, once for all, my men, will you earn a dozen Napoleons, or not? Here they are for you if you land us safely at the other side; and never were you so well paid in your lives for an hour’s labor.”

The sight of the gold, as it glistened temptingly in his outstretched hand, appealed to their hearts far more eloquently than all his words, and they gathered in a group together to hold counsel.

“And you, are you also a distinguished stranger?” said the courier, addressing Billy, who sat warming his hands by the embers of the fire.

“Look you, my man,” cried the youth, “all the gold in your master’s leathern bag there can give you no claim to insult those who have offered you no offence. It is enough that you know that we do not belong to the raft to suffer us to escape your notice.”

“Sacristi!” exclaimed the courier, in a tone of insolent mockery, “I have travelled the road long enough to learn that one does not need an introduction before addressing a vagabond.”

“Vagabond!” cried the youth, furiously; and he sprang at the other with the bound of a tiger. The courier quickly parried the blow aimed at him, and, closely grappled, they both now reeled out of the hut in terrible conflict. With that terror of the knife that figures in all Italian quarrels, the boatmen did not dare to interfere, but looked on as, wrestling with all their might, the combatants struggled, each endeavoring to push the other towards the stream. Billy, too, restrained by force, could not come to the rescue, and could only by words, screamed out in all the wildness of his agony, encourage his companion. “Drop on your knee – catch him by the legs – throw him back – back into the stream. That’s it – that’s it! Good luck to ye!” shouted he, madly, as he fought like a lion with those about him. Slipping in the slimy soil, they had both now come to their knees; and after a struggle of some minutes’ duration, rolled, clasped in each other’s fierce embrace, down the slope into the river. A plash, and a cry half smothered, were heard, and all was over.

While some threw themselves on the frantic creature, whose agony now overtopped his reason, and who fought to get free, with the furious rage of despair, others, seizing lanterns and torches, hurried along the bank of the torrent to try and rescue the combatants. A sudden winding of the river at the place gave little hope to the search, and it was all but certain that the current must already have swept them down far beyond any chance of succor. Assisted by the servants of the traveller, who speedily were apprised of the disaster, the search was continued for hours, and morning at length began to break over the dreary scene, without one ray of hope. By the gray cold dawn, the yellow flood could be seen for a considerable distance, and the banks too, over which a gauzy mist was hanging; but not a living thing was there! The wild torrent swept along his murky course with a deep monotonous roar. Trunks of trees and leafy branches rose and sank in the wavy flood, but nothing suggested the vaguest hope that either had escaped. The traveller’s carriage returned to Spezia, and Billy, now bereft of reason, was conveyed to the same place, fast tied with cords, to restrain him from a violence that threatened his own life and that of any near him.

In the evening of that day a peasant’s car arrived at Spezia, conveying the almost lifeless courier, who had been found on the river’s bank, near the mouth of the Magra. How he had reached the spot, or what had become of his antagonist, he knew not. Indeed, the fever which soon set in placed him beyond the limit of all questioning, and his incoherent cries and ravings only betrayed the terrible agonies his mind must have passed through.

If this tragic incident, heightened by the actual presence of two of the actors – one all but dead, the other dying – engaged the entire interest and sympathy of the little town, the authorities were actively employed in investigating the event, and ascertaining, so far as they could, to which side the chief blame inclined.

The raftsmen had all been arrested, and were examined carefully, one by one; and now it only remained to obtain from the traveller himself whatever information he could contribute to throw light on the affair.

His passport, showing that he was an English peer, obtained for him all the deference and respect foreign officials are accustomed to render to that title, and the Prefect announced that if it suited his convenience, he would wait on his Lordship at his hotel to receive his deposition.

“I have nothing to depose, no information to give,” was the dry and not over-courteous response; but as the visit, it was intimated, was indispensable, he named his hour to admit him.

The bland and polite tone of the Prefect was met by a manner of cold but well-bred ease which seemed to imply that the traveller only regarded the incident in the light of an unpleasant interruption to his journey, but in which he took no other interest. Even the hints thrown out that he ought to consider himself aggrieved and his dignity insulted, produced no effect upon him.

“It was my intention to have halted a few days at Massa, and I could have obtained another courier in the interval,” was the cool commentary he bestowed on the incident.

“But your Lordship would surely desire investigation. A man is missing; a great crime may have been committed – ”

“Excuse my interrupting; but as I am not, nor can be supposed to be, the criminal, – nor do I feel myself the victim, – while I have not a claim to the character of witness, you would only harass me with interrogatories I could not answer, and excite me to take interest, or at least bestow attention, on what cannot concern me.”

“Yet there are circumstances in this case which give it the character of a preconcerted plan,” said the Prefect, thoughtfully.

“Perhaps so,” said the other, in a tone of utter indifference.

“Certainly, the companion of the man who is missing, and of whom no clew can be discovered, is reported to have uttered your name repeatedly in his ravings.”

“My name, – how so?” cried the stranger, hurriedly.

“Yes, my Lord, the name of your passport, – Lord Glen-core. Two of those I have placed to watch beside his bed have repeated the same story, and told how he has never ceased to mutter the name to himself in his wanderings.”

“Is this a mere fancy?” said the stranger, over whose sickly features a flush now mantled. “Can I see him?”

“Of course. He is in the hospital, and too ill to be removed; but if you will visit him there, I will accompany you.”

It was only when a call was made upon Lord Glencore for some bodily exertion that his extreme debility became apparent. Seated at ease in a chair, his manner seemed merely that of natural coolness and apathy; he spoke as one who would not suffer his nature to be ruffled by any avoidable annoyance; but now, as he arose from his seat, and endeavored to walk, one side betrayed unmistakable signs of palsy, and his general frame exhibited the last stage of weakness.

“You see, sir, that the exertion costs its price,” said he, with a sad, sickly smile. “I am the wreck of what once was a man noted for his strength.”

The other muttered some words of comfort and compassion, and they descended the stairs together.

“I do not know this man,” said Lord Glencore, as he gazed on the flushed and fevered face of the sick man, whose ill-trimmed and shaggy beard gave additional wild-ness to his look; “I have never, to my knowledge, seen him before.”

The accents of the speaker appeared to have suddenly struck some chord in the sufferer’s intelligence, for he struggled for an instant, and then, raising himself on his elbow, stared fixedly at him. “Not know me?” cried he, in English; “‘t is because sorrow and sickness has changed me, then.”

“Who are you? Tell me your name?” said Glencore, eagerly.

“I’m Billy Traynor, my Lord, the one you remember, the doctor – ”

“And my boy!” screamed Glencore, wildly.

The sick man threw up both his arms in the air, and fell backward with a cry of despair; while Glencore, tottering for an instant, sank with a low groan, and fell senseless on the ground.