Joan, The Curate/Chapter 12
When Tregenna came in, with his wide hat under his arm, and with the easy air of a casual caller, it was Ann who appeared more startled than he did.
She had had one foot on the nearest settle, and had been engaged in priming one of her pistols. But on seeing the intruder she started erect, drew from her belt a second pistol, which was already charged, and leveled it at his head.
It missed fire, however, and Tregenna sauntered up the room towards her, as if such a trifle as the attempted discharge of a pistol at him were the greeting he was most accustomed to.
"Good evening, Mistress Ann," said he, with a low bow, when he had come within half a dozen paces of her.
She replied by a scowl, and by a muttered whisper between her teeth of a very unfeminine kind. Nothing daunted, he still came on; and knowing perfectly the artful character of his opponent, and profiting by her momentary confusion and annoyance at the failure of her weapon, he seized her by both wrists, forced her into a seat and placed himself beside her, still firmly holding both her hands.
"Curse you! What are you going to do to me?"
"Nothing but keep you quiet for a few minutes till I get a chance of getting away."
She laughed scornfully.
"You won't get away. Not even if you kill me. We've got you fast this time."
She glared at him, her face within a foot of his, with eyes full of passionate hate.
"In the mean time I've got you fast, for the moment, and I intend"
She interrupted him, breathing heavily, and almost snorting defiance.
"To humble me, to humiliate me, to treat me as—as"
It was Tregenna's turn to interrupt, which he did with a scorn as steady as her own.
"As a woman! Troth, no! There's nothing less likely, nothing less possible, I assure you. I intend to treat you—I am treating you—as Jem Bax the smuggler, as hardened a ruffian as I've ever met, as ferocious as a savage, and with naught of the other sex about him but the cunning and the meanness!"
"Meanness!"
She quailed under the word. For the first time she flinched, and her eyelids quivered.
"Yes. 'Twould be vastly mean in a man to attempt to harm the enemy who had come to his succor, had promised to pardon him, to let him escape. In a woman 'twould be worse than meanness; but what 'tis accounted by a creature of your sort, that's neither honest man nor true woman, why, in sooth, I know not!"
Again her gray eyes flashed a steely fire as they met his. There was a sudden touch of sex in the lowered eyelids, in the flush which came into her cheek, as she felt the young man's gaze full upon her, saw his handsome features so near her own. She drew a deep, shuddering breath, and then said, in a fierce whisper, turning away her head, and moving nervously under the touch of his strong hands—"I care not to be helped, to be pardoned, by one who stands to me as a foe! 'Twas the first time I'd had a check, the first time I'd been hurt. The others—my comrades—might look at me askance, I thought, might treat me as a mere woman, despise me, when once they found me hurt, wounded, like one of themselves."
"Still, you need not have let your feminine spitefulness carry you so far!"
"Feminine spitefulness!" echoed she; and she made a sudden, vain attempt to wrench her hands away. "Pshaw, you don't understand! And in truth I did you no hurt."
"'Twas the fault of your feminine arm!" retorted Tregenna. "The intention was bad; so, thank Heaven, was your aim!"
She clenched her teeth in rage and agony. Tregenna was interested, excited, in spite of himself, by this sudden revelation of the woman who looked upon herself as a sort of Joan of Arc, invulnerable, triumphant, bringing good fortune to her friends and ill luck to her enemies. He began to understand the movement of impotent rage which had caused her to behave so ungenerously. And he saw, too, that she now felt ashamed of her act of treachery, that she writhed beneath his taunts.
"Let me go," cried she, suddenly. "You—you Damn it, you hurt me!"
Unfeminine as the reproach was, Tregenna was not unaffected by it. Not a very lovely or lovable side of a woman's nature was this that she was revealing to him; but a woman's it was for all that.
"Well," said he, after a moment's pause, "I will let you go."
"You'll trust me?" cried she, quite eagerly.
"No," retorted he, coolly. "I won't trust you. But I can trust to my own limbs to hold my own in a struggle with you."
And he released her. She sprang up, drew back her shirt-sleeves, and looked at the red marks on her wrists.
"I'm sorry if I hurt you," said Tregenna.
"So am not I," retorted Ann. "I'll show these marks to my kinsmen, my comrades; 'twill spur their spirits to see I have been so used."
"Egad, they need but little spurring! And in truth you would do better, if you care for your kinsmen, to warn them to desist from their unlawful practises. The king and the Government are alike resolved to put them down. A handful of men—and women—be they never so bold, can scarce hope to hold out long against such forces as they can bring."
Ann laughed derisively.
"You know us not," said she, disdainfully, "if you think we can be cowed into submission either by red-coats on the land, or blue-jackets on the water. 'Tis in our blood to like the fight as well as the booty. There be spirits among us—and I own myself one of them—would care little for the cargo but for the chance of a pistol-shot about our ears in the landing of it!"
"But one of these nights you may find the bullets whizz by a little too near, and see your lover shot down by your side."
Ann, who, conscious that Tregenna was watching her narrowly, had disdainfully withdrawn to some little distance, and was pacing up and down, throwing from time to time a sidelong glance at him, turned, planted her feet firmly, and put her hands on her hips in a defiant manner.
"My lover!" said she. "And pray who may he be?"
"Well, I know not which is the favored one," said Tregenna. "But I gather from what I have heard—overheard, that there are two who crave your favor: one Gardener Tom, a handsome lad, too good for his vile trade, and he they call Ben the Blast, for whom, truly, I feel no great liking."
"Well, then, sir, know this: little as your liking for him may be, 'tis greater than mine. And as for young Tom, why, in truth I should be sorry to see him fall, but, 'twould be for his mother's sake, and not for my own. As you said but some minutes since, I am ill-fitted to deal in such small wares as kisses and caresses!"
"Nay, I said not so, Mistress Ann."
"You said you looked not upon me as upon a woman."
"But there be other men that do so look upon you."
Ann came a little nearer, and smiled grimly.
"Ay, there's your friend the general. He looked upon me with a most kindly eye. And there's young Master Bertram at Hurst Court, that craves a kiss whene'er he sees me. You cannot understand their taste, sir, doubtless? For you a woman must have soft hands and black eyes, like Mistress Joan Langney?"
There was something surprising in the sort of curious scorn with which she put these questions, as if interested, though somewhat disdainfully, in his answer. Tregenna, who was leaning back on the settle, as easily as if enjoying his rest in an inn, smiled a little.
"Ay, truly I do not know where you would find a fairer specimen of womanhood than the vicar's daughter."
His face softened as he spoke. Ann came a few steps nearer to him, watching him with a slight frown.
"Yet she hath small liking for you. She is on our side, you know. 'Twas she that warned us of your coming with the soldiers."
"She will no longer be on your side when she hears that you have murdered me, Mistress Ann."
"Murdered you?"
"I understood that to be your intention."
"You take it coolly."
"'Tis as well to save my heat till 'tis wanted."
"Maybe you don't think I shall be as good as my word?"
"I have no reason to doubt that you can be as good as your word when you have promised to do something vile and mischievous!"
Ann snorted with anger.
"Yet you can admire a woman of spirit in the parson's daughter!"
"Spirit! Egad, it needs no spirit to call in half a score of your villainous confederates to make an end to one man."
Ann came up and planted herself before him.
"I wanted no confederates to help me with you. I did propose that task for myself," said she, "in return for the humbling you gave me t'other day in sight of all my friends."
"Ay, so you did. But your pistol missed fire, and I was too quick for you afterwards."
Even as he spoke his taunting words, he saw her hand go quickly towards the cutlass she carried at her side. And he smiled as he sprang up and changed his place to the other settle, thus putting the open trap-door to the cellar below between himself and her.
"Come," said she, frowning and tossing back her short hair like a fury, "you shall not say but I play you fair. Out with your sword and fight me again, as you did that day. If you get the best of it this time I'll see you safe out of this, I give you my word."
Tregenna shook his head.
"I can neither take your word, nor fight you," said he, lightly.
"You have fought me before! Did you find me such a contemptible foe?"
"No, indeed. But—I knew you not then for a woman."
"Well, and you own me not for a woman now!"
"Just too much of a woman for me to fight with you I will own you to be."
"Well, then, since you find me too much of a woman to be fought with, you shall find me woman enough to give me a kiss."
"Nay, madam, I would rather be excused from that mark of your favor also. A kiss may be given with the lips and a stab with the hand at the same time."
"You shall make fast my hands with this rope, sir, and then maybe you will be satisfied of my harmlessness."
"Nay, madam, 'twould take more than a rope to satisfy me of that!" retorted Tregenna.
Ann laughed; and he was surprised to note the change which had come over her countenance. This fierce creature, who but a moment ago had looked like a fiend with her glittering eyes and frowning brows, had been transformed, by a fresh gust of the passions which were so strong in her, to a being gentle, mild, humble, and submissive; and all the more dangerous on that account.
"You are hard to please, sir," said she, in a low voice; "harder to please than any man I have ever met before!"
And she gave him a steady glance of her glowing eyes which was a fresh revelation as to her strongly emotional temperament. He began to understand the hold she got on the men she met, high and low, her equals and her superiors, as he noted the transformation from the bold and daring front of the young buccaneer to the modest mien and diffident voice of the more gracious members of her sex.
And he acknowledged to himself that the two sides to her nature gave her a fascination, an odd attractiveness, which made her a creature unique, unapproachable, dangerous.
"I think, Mistress Ann," said he, "'twould be better for us if you pleased us less easily."
She laughed again, showing her beautiful sound white teeth in a most winning mirthfulness which seemed to be wholly without guile. Tregenna, however, was still cautious. The very fact that she now seemed to him to be handsome, whereas hitherto he had thought her features somewhat homely, was enough to put him on his guard.
"Nay, sir, I am not the foul foe you imagine. You shall not fare ill at my hands, if 'twere but for the bold stand you have made against me!" said she. "You shall pledge me in a cup of wine; and you shall find it none the less invigorating that it has never paid duty!"
The archness with which she spoke was charming, irresistible. Tregenna watched her with amusement, interest, admiration, as she went to the table and poured out a full tankard from a flagon that stood at one end of the board. She turned to bring it to him, with a grave, rough grace that was odd and subtly attractive, when there came on a sudden a succession of sharp raps on the door.
Tregenna sprang to his feet, thinking that the smugglers were at hand.
Ann put the tankard hurriedly down on the table, and bounding forward to the place where he stood beside the gaping hole in the floor, she gave him a sudden push which sent him headlong into the cellar below, and shut down the trap-door.