Читать «Лучшие романы Томаса Майна Рида / The Best of Thomas Mayne Reid» онлайн - страница 687

Ah! little dreamt they who composed it that the demon was already there before them – if not of death, of a doom equally as dark!

Could Herbert only have known that at that moment the beautiful being he loved with his whole heart, and now more than ever – she who loved him, was struggling in the arms!

No matter. The terrible truth will reach him but too soon. It will meet him on his way. In another hour the sweet dreams in which, throughout that long day, he has been indulging, will meet with a dread dissipation.

At a turning of the road there stood several gigantic trees, offering a grand canopy of foliage. Under these the party halted, by the joint command of Herbert and Cubina, who at the same moment dismounted from their horses.

It was not the shade that had tempted them, for the sun had now gone down; nor yet that the bearers might obtain rest; the men were strong, and the wasted form was far from being a heavy burden. It was not for that reason that the halt had been ordered, but on account of a thought that had suggested itself to Herbert, and which was approved of by Cubina.

It was the apprehension of the dread impression which their arrival might produce at Mount Welcome – of course, on her whose father’s corpse they were carrying.

They had stopped to consider what was best to be done.

A plan soon suggested itself. A messenger could be sent forward upon one of the horses to communicate the sad tidings to Trusty, the overseer, and through him the melancholy news might be more gradually made known to her whom it most concerned.

Herbert would have gone himself, but was hindered by certain delicate considerations, based on the conflicting emotions that were stirring within him.

It mattered little who should bear the melancholy tidings to Trusty; and the negro attendant was finally chosen.

The man received his instructions; and, having mounted his own horse, rode off at such speed as the darkness, now down upon the earth, would permit.

For another hour the party remained in the place where they had halted, to give time for the messenger to execute his commission. Then, once more taking the road, they moved forward at a slow pace, Herbert alongside Cubina – now a-foot, and leading the horse upon which he had hitherto ridden.

Quaco alone guarded the prisoners; a duty to which the Maroon lieutenant was quite equal, and which he had rendered the more easy of accomplishment, by pressing into his service a piece of rope, attached round the neck of the one that was nearest, and which, held halter-fashion in his hand, enabled him to prevent either of them from straying in the darkness. Neither, however, made any attempt to escape, knowing as both did, that the slightest movement in that direction would cost them a “thwack” from a stout cudgel – an additional implement carried in the hands of Quaco.