Part 3 (1/2)
CHAPTER V
ARABELLA BISHOP
One sunnyin January, about a etown, Miss Arabella Bishop rode out frohts to the northwest of the city She was attended by two negroes who trotted after her at a respectful distance, and her destination was Government House, whither she went to visit the Governor's lady, who had lately been ailing Reaching the surassy slope, she entle in the opposite direction He was a stranger to her, and strangers were rare enough in the island And yet in soer
Miss Arabella drew rein, affecting to pause that she h to warrant it Yet out of the corner of those hazel eyes she scanned this fellow very attentively as he came nearer She corrected her first ientlemanly Coat and breeches were of plain homespun; and if the former sat so well upon hirace than by that of tailoring His stockings were of cotton, harsh and plain, and the broad castor, which he respectfully doffed as he came up with her, was an old one unadorned by band or feather What had see at a little distance was now revealed for theblack hair
Out of a brown, shaven, saturnine face two eyes that were startlingly blue considered her gravely The man would have passed on but that she detained him
”I think I know you, sir,” said she
Her voice was crisp and boyish, and there was so of boyishness in her manner - if one can apply the term to so dainty a lady It arose perhaps from an ease, a directness, which disdained the artifices of her sex, and set her on good terms with all the world To this it e of five and twenty not merely unmarried but unwooed She used with all men a sisterly frankness which in itself contains a quality of aloofness, rendering it difficult for any roes had halted at some distance in the rear, and they squatted now upon the short grass until it should be her pleasure to proceed upon her way
The stranger ca addressed
”A lady should know her own property,” said he
”My property?”
”Your uncle's, leastways Let me present myself I am called Peter Blood, and I am worth precisely ten pounds I know it because that is the sum your uncle paid for me It is not everyhis real value”
She recognized him then She had not seen hio, and that she should not instantly have known hiain despite the interest he had then aroused in her is not surprising, considering the change he had wrought in his appearance, which noas hardly that of a slave
”My God!” said she ”And you can laugh!”
”It's an achievement,” he adht”
”I have heard of that,” said she
What she had heard was that this rebel-convict had been discovered to be a physician The thing had come to the ears of Governor Steed, who suffered daout, and Governor Steed had borrowed the fellow froood fortune, Peter Blood had afforded the Governor that relief which his excellency had failed to obtain fro in Bridgetown Then the Governor's lady had desired hiri worse than peevishness - the result of a natural petulance aggravated by the dulness of life in Barbados to a lady of her social aspirations But he had prescribed for her none the less, and she had conceived herself the better for his prescription After that the faetown, and Colonel Bishop had found that there washi him to work on the plantations, for which purpose he had been originally acquired
”It is yourself, madam, I have to thank for my comparatively easy and clean condition,” said Mr Blood, ”and I aratitude was in his words rather than in his tone Was hefrankness that another lance for a question, and answered it
”If soht me,” he explained, ”it is odds that the facts of ht, and I should be hewing and hoeing at this moment like the poor wretches ere landed with me”
”And why do you thank ht you”
”But he would not have done so had you not urged him I perceived your interest At the time I resented it”
”You resented it?” There was a challenge in her boyish voice
”I have had no lack of experiences of this ht and sold was a new one, and I was hardly in the ed you upon my uncle, sir, it was that I coht severity in her tone, as if to reprove the mixture of
She proceeded to explain herself ”My uncle may appear to you a hard man No doubt he is They are all hard men, these planters It is the life, I suppose But there are others here who are worse There is Mr Crabston, for instance, up at Speightstown He was there on the s, and if you had fallen into his handsA dreadful man That is why”
He was a little bewildered
”This interest in a stranger ” he began Then changed the direction of his probe ”But there were others as deserving of commiseration”
”You did not seem quite like the others”
”I a a little ”You have a good opinion of yourself”
”On the contrary The others are all worthy rebels I am not That is the difference I was one who had not the wit to see that England requires purifying I was content to pursue a doctor's trade in Bridgewater whilsttheir blood to drive out an unclean tyrant and his rascally crew”
”Sir!” she checked hi treason”
”I hope I am not obscure,” said he
”There are those here ould have you flogged if they heard you”
”The Governor would never allow it He has the gout, and his lady has the rims”
”Do you depend upon that?” She was frankly scornful
”You have certainly never had the gout; probably not even the rims,” said he
She made a little impatient movement with her hand, and looked away from hiain; and now her broere knit
”But if you are not a rebel, how co she apprehended, and he laughed ”Faith, now, it's a long story,” said he
”And one perhaps that you would prefer not to tell?”
Briefly on that he told it her
”My God! What an infamy!” she cried, when he had done
”Oh, it's a sweet country England under King Jas considered I prefer Barbados Here at least one can believe in God”
He looked first to right, then to left as he spoke, from the distant shadowy bulk of Mount Hillbay to the limitless ocean ruffled by the winds of heaven Then, as if the fair prospect rendered hinificance of his woes, he fell thoughtful