She was singing when she came. He thought he recognized that voice,that it was the same he had often heard from the cell below. Many a time the horrible stillness of that cell had been broken by the sound of a child's voice, which, like a spirit, swept unhindered through the walls,an essence of life, and a power.
It was but a moment that she paused before the flower; she plucked it, and was gone. But his eyes could follow her. She did not really, with her disappearing, vanish. And yet this vision had not to him the significance of the bow seen in the cloud, whose interpreter, and whose interpretation, was the Almighty Love.
All day he stood before that window. The keeper hailed the symptom. The Governor was satisfied with the report. Towards sunset the rain was over, and with the sun came forth abundant indications of the island life. The gardener walked among the garden-beds and measured his morrow's work, calculating time and means within his reach,and vouchsafing some attention to the flower-garden, as was evident when he paused before it and made his thoughtful survey. The prisoner saw him smile when he took hold of the broken stalk which had been flower-crowned. And Sandy saw the prisoner.
The next day Elizabeth came out with the gardener, and they began their day's work together. They seemed to be in the best spirits. The smell of the fresh-turned earth, the sight of the fresh shoots of tender green springing from bulb and root and branch, acted upon them like an inspiration. The warm sun also held them to their task. Sandy was generous in bestowing aid and counsel,and also in the matter of his land,trenching farther on the ground allotted to the vegetables than he had ever done before.
"The land must pay for it," said he. "We'll make a foot give us a yard's worth. Cram a bushel into a peck, though 'The Doctor' said you never could do that! I know how to coax."
"Yes, and you know how to order, if you have not forgotten, Sandy. You frightened me once for taking an inch over my share."
"That was a long while back," answered honest Sandy,"before I knew what the little girl could do. I've seen young folk work at gardening afore, but you do beat 'em all. How could I tell you would, though? You don't look it. Yes,may-be you do, though. But you've changed since I first knew you."
"Why, I was nothing but a baby then, Sandy."
"Yes, yes,I know; but you're changed since then!"
So they all spoke to Elizabeth, praising her, confiding in her with loving willingness,the Daughter of the Regiment.
The gardener was proud of his assistant, and seemed to enjoy the part she took in his labor. They worked till noon, Elizabeth stopping hardly a moment to rest. All this while the prisoner stood watching by his window, and the gardener saw him. The sight occasioned him a new perplexity, and he gravely considered the subject. It was a good while before he said to Elizabeth, speaking on conviction, in his usual low and rather mysterious tone,
"There's some one will enjoy it when all's done."
"Who is that?" asked she, thinking he meant herself, perhaps.
"One up above," was the answer.
But though Sandy spoke thus plainly, he did not look toward the prison,and the prison was the last place of which Elizabeth was thinking. It was so long a time since the cell with the window had an occupant, that she was almost unconscious of that gloomy neighborhood. So, when the gardener explained that it was one up above who would enjoy her work, her eyes instantly sought the celestial heights. She was thinking of sun, or star, or angel, may-be, and smiling at Sandy's speech, for sympathy.
He saw her new mistake, and made haste to correct this also.
"Not so high," said he, cautiously.
Then, but as it seemed of chance, and not of purpose, the eyes of Elizabeth Montier turned toward the prison-wall, and fixed upon that window, the solitary one visible from the garden, and her face flushed in a manner that told her surprisewhen she saw a man behind the iron bars.
"Oh," said she, looking away quickly, as if conscious of a wrong done, "what made you tell me?"
"I guess you will like to think one shut up like him will take a little pleasure looking at what he can't get at," said Sandy, almost sharply,replying to something he did not quite understand, the pain and the reproof of Elizabeth's speech.
"Oh, yes!" she answered, and went on with her work.
But though she might be pleased to think that her labor would answer another and more serious purpose than her own gratification, or that of the pretty flowers, it was something new and strange for the girl to work under this mysterious sense of oversight.
"You have only got to speak the word," said the gardener, who had perceived her perplexity, and was desirous of bringing her speedily to his view of the case, "just speak, and he will be carried back to his old cell below, t'other side."
"Will he?"
"Yes,sure's you live, if he troubles you, Miss Elizabeth. Nobody will think of letting him trouble you."
"Oh, me!" she exclaimed, quickly, "I should die quicker than have him moved where he couldn't see the garden."
"I thought so," said Sandy, satisfied.
"Did you think I would complain of his standing by his window, Sandy?"
"How did I know you would like to be stared at?" asked he, with a laugh.
Elizabeth blushed and looked grave; to her the matter seemed too terrible.
"I might have said something," she mused, sadly.
"And if it had been to the wrong person," suggested Sandy;"for they a'n't very fond of him, I guess."
"Who is he, then? I never heard."
"He has been shut up in that building now a'most five year, Elizabeth," said Sandy, leaning on the handle of the spade he had struck into the ground with emphasis.
"Five years!"
"Summer heat, and winter cold. All the same to him. No wonder he sticks, as if he was glued, to the window, now he's got one worth the glass."
"Oh, let him!"
"If he could walk about the garden, it would be better yet."
"Won't he, Sandy?"
"I can't say. He's here for some terrible piece of work, they say. And nobody knows what his name is, I guess,hereabouts, I mean. I never heard it. He won't be out very quick. But let him look out, any way."
"Oh, Sandy! I might have said something that would have hindered!"
"Didn't I know you wouldn't for the world? That's why I told you."
The gardener now went on with his spading. But Elizabeth's work seemed finished for this day. Above them stood the prisoner. He guessed not what gentle hearts were pitiful with thinking of his sorrow.
The next day the prisoner was not at the window, nor the next day, nor the next. Sandy was bold enough to ask the keeper, Mr. Laval, what was the meaning of it, and learned that the man was ill, and not likely to recover. Sandy told Elizabeth, and they agreed in thinking that for the poor creature death was probably the least of evils.
But the day following that on which they came to this conclusion, the sick man appeared before Sandy's astonished eyes. He was under the keeper's care. The physician had ordered this change of air, and they came to the garden at an hour when there was least danger of meeting other persons in the walks.
Sandy had much to tell Elizabeth when he saw her next. She trembled while he told her how he thought that he had seen a ghost when the keeper came leading the prisoner, whose pale face, tall figure, feeble step, appeared to have so little to do with human nature and affairs.
"Did he seem to care for the flowers? did he take any?" she asked.
"No,he would not touch them. The keeper offered him whatever he would choose. He desired nothing. But he looked at all, he saw everything,even the beds of vegetables," Sandy said.
"Did he seem pleased?" Elizabeth again asked.
"Pleased!" exclaimed Sandy. "That's for you and me,not a man that's been shut up these five years. No,he didn't look pleased. I don't know how he looked; don't ask me; 'tisn't pleasant to think of."
"I would have made him take the flowers, if I had been here," said Elizabeth, in a manner that seemed very positive, in comparison with Sandy's uncertain speech.
"May-be,I dare say," Sandy acquiesced; but he evidently had his doubts even of her power in this business.
She must take no notice of the prisoner, she was given to understand one day, if she was to remain in the garden while he walked there. So she took no notice.
He came and went. Manuel, the keeper called him; and she was busy with her weeding, and neither saw nor heard. Ah, she did not!did not see the figure that came moving like a spectre through the gates!did not hear the slow dragging step of one who is weary almost to helplessness,the listless step that has lost the spring of hope, the exultation of life, the expectation of spirit, the strength of manhood!She did hear, did see the man. We feel the nearness of our friend who is a thousand miles away. Something beside the sunshine is upon us, and receives our answering smile. That sudden shadow is not of the passing cloud. That voice at midnight is not the disturbance of a dream.He walked about the garden; he retired to his cell. It might have been an hour, or a minute, or a day. It does not take time to dream a life's events. How is the drowning man whirled round the circle of experiences which were so slow in their development!
Compassion without limit, courageous purpose impatient of inaction, troubled this young girl.
"You behaved like a lady," said Sandy,"you never looked up. You needn't run now, I'm sure, when he thinks of taking a turn. All we've got to do is to mind our own business, Mr. Laval says. I guess we can. But I did want to let off those chains."
"What chains?" asked Elizabeth, as with a shudder she looked up at Sandy.
"His wrists, you know,locked," he explained.
"Oh!" groaned the gentle soul, and she walked off, forgetful of the flowers, tools, Sandy, everything. But Sandy followed her; she heard him calling to her, and before the garden-gate she waited for him; he was following on a run.
"I can tell you what it's for," said he, for he had no idea of keeping the secret to himself, and he dared not trust it to any other friend.
"What is it?" she asked,and she trembled when she asked, and while she waited for his answer.
"For lighting the Church. Would you think that? He did such damage, it wasn't safe for him to be at liberty. That's how it was. I think he must be a Lutheran;you know they don't believe in the Holy Ghost! Of course,poor fellow!it's right he should be shut up for warring with the Church that came down through the holy Apostles, when you know all the rest only started up with Luther and Calvin. He ought to have knowed better."
"Who told you, Sandy?" asked Elizabeth, as if her next words might undertake to extenuate and justify.
"It came straight enough, I understand. Butrememberyou don't know anything about it. His name is Manuel, though;don't dare to mention it;that's what Mr. Laval calls him. Are you going? I wouldn't have told you a word, but you took his trouble so to heart. You see, now, it's right he should be shut up. But let on that you know anything, all the worse for me,I mean, him!"
"Yes," said Elizabeth, "you're safe, Sandy. Thank you for telling me."
Sandy walked off with a mind relieved, for he believed in Elizabeth, and had found the facts communicated too great a burden to bear alone.
She passed through the garden-gate most remote from the fort; it opened into a lonely road which ran inland from the coast, between the woods and the prison, and to the woods she went. The shadows were gloomy to-day, for she went among them lamenting the fate of the stranger;the mystery surrounding him had increased, not lessened, with Sandy's explanation.
Fighting against the Church was an unimagined crime. Of the great conflict in which he had taken part, to the ruin of his fortunes, she knew nothing. The disputes of Christendom, had they been explained, would have seemed almost incredible to her. For, whatever was known and discussed in the circle of the Governor of the island, Drummer Montier, and such as he, kept the peace with all mankind. The Church took care of itself, and appeared neither the oppressor nor the Saviour of the world. What they had fought about in the first years of the possession of Foray, Montier could hardly have told,and yet he was no fool. He could have given, of course, a partisan version of the struggle; but as to its real cause, or true result, he knew as little as the other five hundred men belonging to the regiment.
While Elizabeth wandered through those gloomy woods, she saw no flowers, gathered no wild fruits,though flowers and berries were perfect and abundant. Now and then she paused in her walk to look towards the prison, glimpses of whose strong walls were to be had through the trees. At length the sound of her father's horn came loud and clear from the cliffs beyond the wood. It fell upon her sombre meditation and slightly changed the current. She hurried forward to join him, and, as she went, a gracious purpose was shining in her face.
When she returned home, it was by the unfrequented prison-way, her father playing the liveliest tunes he knew. For the first time in their lives they sat down by the side of the lonely road where they had emerged from the wood; Elizabeth's memory served her to recall every air that was sweet to her, and she listened while her father played, endeavoring to understand the sound those notes would have to "Manuel."
Montier could think of no worthier employment than the practice of his music. Especially it pleased him that his daughter should ask so much as she was now asking: he could not discern all that was passing in her heart, nor see how many shadows moved before those sweet, serious eyes.
They went home at night-fall together; and the young girl's step was not more light, now that her heart was troubled by what she must not reveal, even to him.
The next morning Sandy was very busy with Elizabeth, tying up some flowers which had been tossed about, and broken, many of them, in the night gale, when the keeper came through the gate, leading this Manuel, who, grim as a spectral shadow, that had been fearful but for its exceeding pitifulness, stood now between her and all that she rejoiced in. "There!" exclaimed Sandy. Looking up, she saw them approaching straight along the path that led past the flowerbeds.
"Your flowers had a pretty rough time of it in the storm," said Jailer Laval, as he drew near. He addressed the drummer's daughter,but his eyes were on Sandy, with the suspicious and stern inquiry common to men who have betrayed a secret. But Sandy was busy with his delving.
"Yes," answered Elizabeth, and she looked from the ground up to the faces of these men.
"Is that a rose-bush? That was roughly handled," said Laval, pointing with his stick to the twisted rose-stalk covered with buds, over whose blighted promise she had been lamenting.
"Yes," said Elizabeth again; but she hardly knew what she said, still less was she aware of the expression her face wore when she looked at the prisoner. Yes,even as Sandy said, big wrists were chained together; he was more like a ghost than a man; his face was pale and hopeless, and woful beyond her understanding was the majesty of his mien.
At such a price he paid for fights against the Church! But in truth he had not the look of an evil, warring man. His gravity, indeed, was such as it seemed impossible to dispel. But only pity stirred the heart of Elizabeth Montier as she looked on him. Surely it was a face that never, in any excess of passion, could have looked malignance. Ah! and at such a price he purchased his sunshine, the fresh air, and a near vision of this flower-garden!in chains!