Beadle's New York Dime Library, No. 20 — page 27: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

J ~ ee - The Bandit at Bay. ik in ii —— e ~* 27 fixedly at the young American, who was startled at this strange conduct, and could not understand it. The two girls remained thus for a few aeconds, face to face, devouring each other with their eyes, but not exchanging a sylla- hle. No other sound could be heard in the hut, gave the panting respiration of the two fe raales. ‘Why do you shun me ?”’ Ellen at length esked in her harmonious voice, soft as the eooing of a dove. ‘Do I frighten you?” she added, with a smile. The Spaniard listened to her as if she dic oot catch her meaning, and shook her head 40 passionately that she broke the ribbon sontining her hair, which fell in thick ring- ets over her white shoulders, and vailed them. ‘“ Who are you?” she asked, impetuously, with an accent of menace and anger. ‘*Who am I?” Ellen replied, in a firm voice, in which a slight tinge of reproach was perceptible. “‘l am the woman who has just saved your life.”’ daeree who told you I wished it to be sayv- ““In doing so, I only consulted my own heart.”’ ““Oh, yes, I understand,”’ the Gazelle said, ironically. ‘‘You are one of those women called in your country Quakeresses, who spend their life in preaching.” “‘Iam nothing of the sort,” Ellen said. softly. ‘‘I am a woman who suffers like oe and whom your misfortunes af- ect. ‘* Yes, yes,” the Spaniard shrieked, as she writhed her hands despairingly, and burst into tears. ' Ellen regarded her for a moment with compassion, and walked toward her. ** Do not cry, poor girl!”’ she said to her, mistaking the cause that made her shed tears. ‘““You are in safety here. No one will do you any harm.” The Spaniard threw up her head haughtily. “Nay !”? she said, impetuously. ‘* Do you fancy, then, that lam not in a condition to defend myself, were Linsulted? What need have I of your protection ?” And, roughly seizing Ellen’s arm, she shook her passionately as she said: “Who are you? What are you doing here? Answer!” “You, who were with the bandits when they attacked this village, should know me,”’ Ellen replied, dryly. “Yes, I know you,’ the Spaniard said presently, in a hoarse voice. ‘* You are the woman whom the genius of evil brought across my path to rob me of all my happi- ness! I did not expect to find you here, but lam delighted at doing so, for I can at length tell you howl hate you,” she added stamping her foot passionately. ‘* Yes, j hate you!”’ Ellen, in her heart, was alarmed at the etranger’s violence; she tried in vain to ex- plain her incomprehensible words. ““You hate me !’’ she replied, softly, ‘‘ For what reason? Ido not know you. This is the first time that accident has brought us together. Up to this day, wenever had any relations together, near or remote.” ‘* Do you think so ?”’ the Spaniard continu- ed with a cutting smile. ‘‘In truth,” she added, *‘ we never had any relations togeth- er. ou are right, and yet I know you thoroughly. Miss Ellen, daughter of the sqnatter, the Scalp-hunter, the bandit, in a word, Red Cedur, and who dares to love Don Pablo Zarate, as if you did not belong to an accursed race. Have | forgotten aught—are those all your titles? Answer, will you?” she said, thrusti her face, inflamed with Reet close to Ellen’s and shaking her vio- ently by the arm. “T am, indeed, Red Cedar’s daughter,” Ellen answered, coldly; ‘“‘but Ido not un- derstand what you mean by your allusion to Don Pablo Zarate.” ~ “Do you not, innocent lamb ?”’ the Span- iard retorted with irony. “And supposing it were so,”’ the Ameri- can answered with some haughtiness, ‘‘ what does it concern you? By what right do you cross-qnestion me ?’’ ** By what mvs »” the Spaniard said, vio- lently, but suddenly checked herself, and, biting her lips till the blood came, she fold- ed her hands on her breast, and surveying Ellen with a glance full of the utmost con- tempt, she continued: “In truth, you are an angel of purity and gentleness ; your life has passed calmly and softly at the hearth of honest and respectable parents, who incul- cated in you at an early age all the virtues they practice so well—ah, ah! is not that. what you meant to say tome ?—whileI, who” am an associate of brigunds, who have spent: my whole life on the prairie, who under-) stand nothing of the narrow exigencies of our paltry civilization, who have always breathed the sharp and savage air of liberty ———e —by what right should I come to interfere in your family arrangements, and interfere in your chaste loves, whose sentimental and insipid incidents are so well rhs ge ag by feet and inches? You are right, | can not, with my savage manner, and burning heart, cross your love, and destroy fora caprice all your combinations—I am, indeed, mad,” she added, as she rudely repulsed the maiden. She folded her arms on her chest, and leaned against the wall ofthe hut in silence. Ellen looked at her for awhile, and then said, in a soft and conciliating voice: “] try in vain to understand your allu- sions, but if they refer to any fact effaced from my mind, if, under any circumstances I may have unconsciously offended you, i am ready to offer you all the apologies you may require. Our position among these fe- rocious Indians is too critical for me not to try, by all means in my power, to draw more closely together the bonds of friend- ship between ourselves, the only represent- atives of the white race here, which alone can enable us to escape the snares laid for us, and resist the attacks that threaten as.’’ The Spaniard’s face had gradually lost the hateful and wicked expression that disfigur- ed it, and her features had become calmer. Now that she had reflected, she repented the imprudent words she had uttered on the first outburst of passion. She would have liked to recall her secret; still she hoped that it was not too late to do so; and with that craft innate in women, and which renders her so dangerous under certain cir- cumstances, she resolved to deceive her com- panion, and efface from her mind the bad im- pression which her foolish words must have left there. Hence it was with a smile, and in her soft- est voice, that she answered the American. ‘*You are good-hearted; Lam not worthy of the attention you have paid me, or of the entle words you address to me, after what dared to say to you. But I am more un- fortunate than wicked. Abandoned when a child, and adopted by the bandits with whem you saw me, the first sounds that struck my ear were cries of death, the first light I saw was the glare of incendiary fires. My life has been passed in the desert, far from the towns, where people learn to grow better. Iam an impetuous and obstinate girl; but, believe me, my heart is good; I can appreci- ate a kindness, and remember it. Alas! a girl in my position is more to be pitied than blamed.” “Poor child!’ Ellen said, with inyolun- tary emotion, ‘**so young, and already so un- happy.” ‘Oh, yes, most unhappy,’’ the Spaniard went on: ‘‘ I never knew the sweetness of a mother’s caresses, and the only family I have had is composed of the brigands, who ac- companied the Apaches when they attacked ou.”’ The girls remained seated side by side, with their arms intertwined and head on each other’s shoulder, like two timid doves. They talked for a long time, describing their past life. Ellen, with the candor and frankness that formed the basis of her character, allowed her companion to draw from her all her se- crets, harmless as they were, not perceiving that the dangerous woman who held her be- neath the charm of her blandishments, con- tinually excited her to confidence, while her- self maintaining the utmost reserve. The hours passed thus rapidly ; nearly the whole night glided away in their confessions, which did not terminate till sleep, which never surrenders its sway over young and an- imated people, closed the drooping eyelids of the American girl. The Spaniard did not sleep; when the other maiden’s head fell on her chest she raised it cautiously, and laid it delicate- ly on the skins and furs arranged to act as a bed; then, by the flickering and uncertain light of the pine-wood torch fixed in the ground, which lit up the hut, she gazed long and attentively on the squatter’s daughter. Her face had lost its placid mask and as- sumed an expression of hatred of which such lovelyfeatures would have been thought incapable; with frowning brow, clenched teeth, and pallid cheeks, asshe stood before the maiden, she might have been taken for the genius of evil, preparing to seize the victim which it holds fascinated and gasping beneath its deadly glance. * Yes,”’ she said, in a hollow voice, ‘‘ this woman is lovely; she has all needed to be beloved bya man. She told me the truth— he loves her! and I,’ she added, with a movement of rage, “‘ why does he not love me? I am lovely too—more lovely than this one, perhaps. How is it that he has been at least twenty times in my presence, and his heart has never been warmed by the fire that flashed from my eyes! comes it that he has never noticed me, that all my advances to make him love me have remained futile, and that he has never saved, Whence’ thought of any one but the woman lying asleep there, who is in my power, and whom I could kill if I pleased ?” While uttering these words she had drawn from her girdle a small stiletto, with a blade sharp as the tongue of a cascabel. (No |” she added, after a moment’s re- flection, ‘‘ no, itis not thus that she must die! she wov'd not suffer enough. Oh, no! I mean her to endure all the sufferings that are lacerating me. Jealousy shall torture her heart as it has done mine for so long. I willavenge myself as a Spanish woman should do. If he despises me, if he will not love me, neither of us shall have him; we shall both suffer, and her torture will allevi- ate mine. Oh!’’ she said, With a smile, as she walked round the sleeping girl with the muffled tread of a wild oeast; ‘* fair-haired girl, with lily complexion, your cheeks cov- ered with the velvety down of a peach, will ere hong be as pale as mine, and your eyes, red with fever, will no longer find tears to soothe them.” She bent over Ellen, attentively listened toher regular breathing, and certain that she was plunged into a deep sleep, she walk- ed toward the curtain doorof the hut, raised it cautiously, and after looking around her in the obscurity, feeling assured by the calmness that surrounded her, she stepped over the body of Curnmilla, who was lying across the door, and started off hurriedly, but with such light steps that the most prac- ticed ear could not have noticed the sound. The Indian warrior had taken on himself the duty of watching over the two women. When the scalp-dance was ended he return- ed to install himself atthe spot he had se- lected, and, in spite of the remarks of Val- entine and Don Pablo, who assured him that they were in safety, and it was unnecessary for him to remain there, nothing could make him give up his resolution. “Phiegmatically shaking his head at: his friend’s remarks, he took off his buffalo- rcbe without any further response; he atretched Ht on the ground, and lay down on it, wishing them good-night ith a brief but eremptory nod. The others, seeing his mmovable resolve, philosophically went away, shaking their heads. Curumilla was not asleep—not one of the Spanish girl’s movements escaped him; and she had scarce gone ten yards when he was already on her trail, watching her carefully. Why he didso he was himself ignorant; but a secret foreboding warned him to follow the stranger, andtry to learn for what reason, instead of sleeping, she traversed at so late an hour the camp in which she was a pris- oner, and where she consequently exposed herself to come incontact at each step with a ferocious enemy, who would have killed her with delight. The reason that made her brave so immi- nent a danger must be very that reason the Indian chief determined on knowing. ‘ The girl had difficulty im finding her way through this inextricable labyrinth of Euts and tents, against which she stumbled at every step. ‘The night was dark; the moon, vailed under a dense mass of clouds, only displayed its sickly disk at lengthened inter- vals; not astar cleatfmedin the sky. At times the girl halted on her journey, stretching forth her head to listen to any suspicious sound, or else returned hurriedly on her footsteps, turning in the same eir- cle, while careful not to go far from Ellen's hut. It was evident to Curumilla that the pris- oner was seeking, though unable to find, a tent that contained the person she wished to speak with. At length, despairing proba- bly of ever sueceeding in this search of which she did not hold the thread, the gir] stopped and imitated twice the snapping- bark of the white coyote of the Far West. ' This signal, for it was evidently one, suc-' ceeded better than she expected, for two similar barks, uttered at points diametrically opposed, answered her almost immediately. he girl hesitated for asecond; a dark flush passed over ner face, but recovering at once, she repeatea une signal. Two men appeared simultaneously at ber side—one, who seemed to rise out of the Potcmen was Red Cedar, the second, Pedro ndoval. | ** Heaven be praised!’ the Spaniard said, as he promeen the girl’s hand; “‘you are ina, and I fear nothing more now. You may flatter yourself with having caused me a terrible fright.” . ‘**Here I am,”’ said Red Cedar; ‘‘ can I be of any service toyou? We are ambushed a few steps from here, with two hundred Apa- ches; speak, what is to be done?” ¥ ‘‘ Nothing at present,’’ the Gazelle said, as she returned the pressure of her two friends’ hands. ‘* After our ill success of this qvening any attempt would be prema- ture, and fail. At daybreak, from what ] have heard, the Comanches wil) set out te owerful, and