The Water-Witch; Or, the Skimmer of the Seas: A Tale. James Fenimore Cooper
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unnatural to believe that another might view it with the same eyes? But since you disavow the letter—nay, your disavowal is unnecessary—I see my vanity has even deceived me in the writing—but since the delusion is over, I confess that I rejoice it is not so."
La belle Barbérie smiled, and her countenance grew brighter. She enjoyed the triumph of knowing that she merited the respect of her suitor, and it was a triumph heightened by recent mortification. Then succeeded a pause of more than a minute. The embarrassment of the silence was happily interrupted by the return of François.
"Mam'selle Alide, voici de l'eau de la fontaine," said the valet; "mais Monsieur votre oncle s'esi couché, et il a mis la cléf de la cave an vin dessous son oreiller. Ma foi, ce n'est pas facile d'avoir du bon vin du tout, en Amerique, mais après que Monsieur le maire s'est couché, c'est toujours impossible; voila!"
"N'importe, mon cher; le capitaine va partir, et il n'a plus soif."
"Dere is assez de jin," continued the valet, who felt for the captain's disappointment, "mais, Monsieur Loodle, have du gout, an' he n'aime pas so strong liqueur."
"He has swallowed already more than was necessary for one occasion," said Alida, smiling on her admirer, in a manner that left him doubtful whether he ought most to repine, or to rejoice. "Thank you, good François; your duty for the night shall end with lighting the captain to the door."
Then saluting the young commander, in a manner that would not admit of denial, la belle Barbérie dismissed her lover and the valet, together.
"You have a pleasant office, Monsieur François," said the former, as he was lighted to the outer door of the pavilion; "it is one that many a gallant gentleman would envy."
"Oui, Sair. It be grand plaisir to serve Mam'selle Alide. Je porte de fan, de book, mais quant an vin, Monsieur le Capitaine, parole d'honneur, c'est toujours impossible après que l'Aldermain s'est couché."
"Ay—the book—I think you had the agreeable duty, to-day, of carrying the book of la Belle?"
"Vraiment, oui! 'Twas ouvrage de Monsieur Pierre Corneille. On prétend, que Monsieur Shak-a-spear en a emprunté d'assez beaux sentiments!"
"And the paper between the leaves?—you were charged also with that note, good François?"
The valet paused, shrugged his shoulders, and aid one of his long yellow fingers on the plane of an enormous aquiline nose, while he seemed to muse. Then shaking his head perpendicularly, he preceded the captain, as before, muttering, as usual, half in French and half in English—
"For le papier, I know, rien du tout; c'est bien possible, parceque, voyez vous, Monsieur le Capitaine, Mam'selle Alide did say, prenez-y garde; but I no see him, depuis. Je suppose 'twas beaux compliments écrits on de vers of M. Pierre Corneille. Quel génie que celui de cet homme là!--n'est ce pas, Monsieur?"
"It is of no consequence, good François," said Ludlow, slipping a guinea into the hands of the valet. "If you should ever discover what became of that paper, however, you will oblige me by letting me know. Good night; mes devoirs à la Belle!"
"Bon soir, Monsieur le Capitaine; c'est un brave Monsieur que celui-la, et de très bonne famille! Il n'a pas de si grandes terres, que Monsieur le Patteroon, pourtant, on dit, qu'il doit avoir de jolies maisons et assez de rentes publiques! J'aime à servir un si généreux et loyal maître, mais, malheureusement, il est marin! M. de Barbérie n'avait pas trop d'amitié pour les gens de cette profession là."
Chapter VIII.
"—Well, Jessica, go in;
Perhaps, I will return immediately;
Do as I bid you,
Shut doors after you: Fast bind, fast find;
A proverb never stale, in thrifty mind."
Merchant of Venice.
The decision, with which la demoiselle Barbérie had dismissed her suitor, was owing to some consciousness that she had need of opportunity to reflect on the singular nature of the events which had just happened, no less than to a sense of the impropriety of his visiting her at that hour, and in a manner so equivocal. But, like others who act from feverish impulses, when alone the maiden repented of her precipitation; and she remembered fifty questions which might aid in clearing the affair of its mystery, that she would now gladly put. It was too late, however, for she had heard Ludlow take his leave, and had listened, in breathless silence, to his footstep, as he passed the shrubbery of her little lawn. François reappeared at the door, to repeat his wishes for her rest and happiness, and then she believed she was finally alone for the night, since the ladies of that age and country, were little apt to require the assistance of their attendants, in assuming, or in divesting themselves of, their ordinary attire.
It was still early, and the recent interview had deprived Alida of all inclination for sleep. She placed the lights in a distant corner of the apartment, and approached a window. The moon had so far changed its position, as to cast a different light upon the water. The hollow washing of the surf, the dull but heavy breathing of the air from the sea, and the soft shadows of the trees and mountain, were much the same. The Coquette lay, as before, at her anchor near the cape, and the Shrewsbury glittered towards the south, until its surface was concealed by the projection of a high and nearly perpendicular bluff.
The stillness was profound, for, with the exception of the dwelling of the family who occupied the estate nearest the villa, there was no other habitation within some miles of the place. Still the solitude of the situation was undisturbed by any apprehension of danger, or any tradition of violence from rude and lawless men. The peaceable character of the colonists, who dwelt in the interior country, was proverbial, and their habits simple; while the ocean was never entered by those barbarians, who then rendered some of the seas of the other hemisphere as fearful as they were pleasant.
Notwithstanding this known and customary character of tranquillity, and the lateness of the hour, Alida had not been many moments in her balcony, before she heard the sound of oars. The stroke was measured, and the noise low and distant, but it was too familiar to be mistaken. She wondered at the expedition of Ludlow, who was not accustomed to show such haste in quitting her presence, and leaned over the railing to catch a glimpse of his departing boat. Each moment she expected to see the little bark issue from out of the shadows of the land, into the sheet of brightness which stretched nearly to the cruiser. She gazed long, and in vain, for no barge appeared, and yet the sound had become inaudible. A light still hung at the peak of the Coquette, a sign that the commander was out of his vessel.
The view of a fine ship, seen by the aid of the moon, with its symmetry of spars, and its delicate tracery of cordage, and the heavy and grand movements of the hull as it rolls on the sluggish billows of a calm sea, is ever a pleasing and indeed an imposing spectacle. Alida knew that more, than a hundred human beings slept within the black and silent mass, and her thoughts insensibly wandered to the business of their daring lives, their limited abode, and yet wandering existence, their frank and manly qualities, their devotion to the cause of those who occupied the land, their broken and interrupted connexion with the rest of the human family, and finally to those weakened domestic ties, and to that reputation for inconstancy, which are apparently a natural consequence of all. She sighed, and her eye wandered from the ship to that ocean on which it was constructed to dwell. From the distant, low, and nearly imperceptible shore of the island of Nassau, to the coast of New-Jersey, there was one broad and untenanted waste. Even the sea-fowl rested his tired wing, and slept tranquilly on the water. The broad space appeared like some great and unfrequented desert, or rather like a denser and more material copy of the firmament by which it was canopied.
It has been mentioned that a stunted growth of oaks and pines covered much of the sandy ridge that formed the cape. The same covering furnished a dark setting to the waters of the Cove. Above this outline of wood, which fringed the margin of the sea. Alida now fancied she saw an object in motion. At first, she