Page:Cerise, a tale of the last century (IA cerisetaleoflast00whytrich).pdf/323

 to noble blood. She muttered many a prayer indeed, that arose straight from her heart, but her eyes were fixed on her mother the while, and she had disposed the ammunition on a chair beside her in such a manner as to reload for the Marquise with rapidity and precision. "We are like a front and rear rank of the Grey Musketeers," said the latter, with a wild attempt at hilarity, in which a strong hysterical tendency, born of over-wrought feelings, was with difficulty kept down. "The affair will soon commence now, and, my child, if worst comes to worst, remember there is no surrender. I hear them advancing to the assault. Courage! my darling. Steady! and Vive la France!"

The words were still upon her lips, when a swarm of negroes, crowding and shouldering up the narrow passage, halted at her door. Hippolyte commenced his summons to the besieged by a smashing blow with the crowbar, that splintered one of the panels and set the whole wood-work quivering to its hinges. Then he applied his thick lips to the keyhole, and shouted in brutal glee—

"Time to wake up now, missee! You play 'possum no longer, else cut down gum-tree at one stroke. Wot you say to dis nigger for buckra bridegroom? Time to come out now and dance jigs at um wedding."

There was not a quiver in her voice while the Marquise answered in cold imperious tones—

"You are running up a heavy reckoning for this night's work. I know your ringleaders, and refuse to treat with them. Nevertheless, I am not a severe mistress. If the rest of the negroes will go quietly home, and resume their duties with to-morrow's sunrise, I will not be hard upon them. You know me, and can trust my word."

Cheers of derision answered this haughty appeal, and loud suggestions for every kind of cruelty and insult, to be inflicted on the two ladies, were heard bandied about amongst the slaves. Hippolyte replied fiercely—

"Give in at once! Open this minute, or neither of you shall leave the house alive! For the Marquise—Achille! I give her to you! For lilly ma'amselle—I marry her this very night. See! before the moon goes down!"

Cerise raised her head in scornful defiance. Her face was livid, but it was stamped with the same expression as