CHAPTER XIII--OOLANGA'S HALLUCINATIONS
During the last few days Lady Arabella had been getting exceedingly
impatient. Her debts, always pressing, were growing to an
embarrassing amount. The only hope she had of comfort in life was a
good marriage; but the good marriage on which she had fixed her eye
did not seem to move quickly enough--indeed, it did not seem to move
at all--in the right direction. Edgar Caswall was not an ardent
wooer. From the very first he seemed DIFFICILE, but he had been
keeping to his own room ever since his struggle with Mimi Watford.
On that occasion Lady Arabella had shown him in an unmistakable way
what her feelings were; indeed, she had made it known to him, in a
more overt way than pride should allow, that she wished to help and
support him. The moment when she had gone across the room to stand
beside him in his mesmeric struggle, had been the very limit of her
voluntary action. It was quite bitter enough, she felt, that he did
not come to her, but now that she had made that advance, she felt
that any withdrawal on his part would, to a woman of her class, be
nothing less than a flaming insult. Had she not classed herself
with his nigger servant, an unreformed savage? Had she not shown
her preference for him at the festival of his home-coming? Had she
not. . . Lady Arabella was cold-blooded, and she was prepared to go
through all that might be necessary of indifference, and even
insult, to become chatelaine of Castra Regis. In the meantime, she
would show no hurry--she must wait. She might, in an unostentatious
way, come to him again. She knew him now, and could make a keen
guess at his desires with regard to Lilla Watford. With that secret
in her possession, she could bring pressure to bear on Caswall which
would make it no easy matter for him to evade her. The great
difficulty was how to get near him. He was shut up within his
Castle, and guarded by a defence of convention which she could not
pass without danger of ill repute to herself. Over this question
she thought and thought for days and nights. At last she decided
that the only way would be to go to him openly at Castra Regis. Her
rank and position would make such a thing possible, if carefully
done. She could explain matters afterwards if necessary. Then when
they were alone, she would use her arts and her experience to make
him commit himself. After all, he was only a man, with a man's
dislike of difficult or awkward situations. She felt quite
sufficient confidence in her own womanhood to carry her through any
difficulty which might arise.
From Diana's Grove she heard each day the luncheon-gong from Castra
Regis sound, and knew the hour when the servants would be in the
back of the house. She would enter the house at that hour, and,
pretending that she could not make anyone hear her, would seek him
in his own rooms. The tower was, she knew, away from all the usual
sounds of the house, and moreover she knew that the servants had
strict orders not to interrupt him when he was in the turret
chamber. She had found out, partly by the aid of an opera-glass and
partly by judicious questioning, that several times lately a heavy
chest had been carried to and from his room, and that it rested in
the room each night. She was, therefore, confident that he had some
important work on hand which would keep him busy for long spells.
Meanwhile, another member of the household at Castra Regis had
schemes which he thought were working to fruition. A man in the
position of a servant has plenty of opportunity of watching his
betters and forming opinions regarding them. Oolanga was in his way
a clever, unscrupulous rogue, and he felt that with things moving
round him in this great household there should be opportunities of
self-advancement. Being unscrupulous and stealthy--and a savage--he
looked to dishonest means. He saw plainly enough that Lady Arabella
was making a dead set at his master, and he was watchful of the
slightest sign of anything which might enhance this knowledge. Like
the other men in the house, he knew of the carrying to and fro of
the great chest, and had got it into his head that the care
exercised in its porterage indicated that it was full of treasure.
He was for ever lurking around the turret-rooms on the chance of
making some useful discovery. But he was as cautious as he was
stealthy, and took care that no one else watched him.
It was thus that the negro became aware of Lady Arabella's venture
into the house, as she thought, unseen. He took more care than
ever, since he was watching another, that the positions were not
reversed. More than ever he kept his eyes and ears open and his
mouth shut. Seeing Lady Arabella gliding up the stairs towards his
master's room, he took it for granted that she was there for no
good, and doubled his watching intentness and caution.
Oolanga was disappointed, but he dared not exhibit any feeling lest
it should betray that he was hiding. Therefore he slunk downstairs
again noiselessly, and waited for a more favourable opportunity of
furthering his plans. It must be borne in mind that he thought that
the heavy trunk was full of valuables, and that he believed that
Lady Arabella had come to try to steal it. His purpose of using for
his own advantage the combination of these two ideas was seen later
in the day. Oolanga secretly followed her home. He was an expert
at this game, and succeeded admirably on this occasion. He watched
her enter the private gate of Diana's Grove, and then, taking a
roundabout course and keeping out of her sight, he at last overtook
her in a thick part of the Grove where no one could see the meeting.
Lady Arabella was much surprised. She had not seen the negro for
several days, and had almost forgotten his existence. Oolanga would
have been startled had he known and been capable of understanding
the real value placed on him, his beauty, his worthiness, by other
persons, and compared it with the value in these matters in which he
held himself. Doubtless Oolanga had his dreams like other men. In
such cases he saw himself as a young sun-god, as beautiful as the
eye of dusky or even white womanhood had ever dwelt upon. He would
have been filled with all noble and captivating qualities--or those
regarded as such in West Africa. Women would have loved him, and
would have told him so in the overt and fervid manner usual in
affairs of the heart in the shadowy depths of the forest of the Gold
Coast.
Oolanga came close behind Lady Arabella, and in a hushed voice,
suitable to the importance of his task, and in deference to the
respect he had for her and the place, began to unfold the story of
his love. Lady Arabella was not usually a humorous person, but no
man or woman of the white race could have checked the laughter which
rose spontaneously to her lips. The circumstances were too
grotesque, the contrast too violent, for subdued mirth. The man a
debased specimen of one of the most primitive races of the earth,
and of an ugliness which was simply devilish; the woman of high
degree, beautiful, accomplished. She thought that her first
moment's consideration of the outrage--it was nothing less in her
eyes--had given her the full material for thought. But every
instant after threw new and varied lights on the affront. Her
indignation was too great for passion; only irony or satire would
meet the situation. Her cold, cruel nature helped, and she did not
shrink to subject this ignorant savage to the merciless fire-lash of
her scorn.
Oolanga was dimly conscious that he was being flouted; but his anger
was no less keen because of the measure of his ignorance. So he
gave way to it, as does a tortured beast. He ground his great teeth
together, raved, stamped, and swore in barbarous tongues and with
barbarous imagery. Even Lady Arabella felt that it was well she was
within reach of help, or he might have offered her brutal violence--
even have killed her.
"Am I to understand," she said with cold disdain, so much more
effective to wound than hot passion, "that you are offering me your
love? Your--love?"
For reply he nodded his head. The scorn of her voice, in a sort of
baleful hiss, sounded--and felt--like the lash of a whip.
"And you dared! you--a savage--a slave--the basest thing in the
world of vermin! Take care! I don't value your worthless life more
than I do that of a rat or a spider. Don't let me ever see your
hideous face here again, or I shall rid the earth of you."
As she was speaking, she had taken out her revolver and was pointing
it at him. In the immediate presence of death his impudence forsook
him, and he made a weak effort to justify himself. His speech was
short, consisting of single words. To Lady Arabella it sounded mere
gibberish, but it was in his own dialect, and meant love, marriage,
wife. From the intonation of the words, she guessed, with her
woman's quick intuition, at their meaning; but she quite failed to
follow, when, becoming more pressing, he continued to urge his suit
in a mixture of the grossest animal passion and ridiculous threats.
He warned her that he knew she had tried to steal his master's
treasure, and that he had caught her in the act. But if she would
be his, he would share the treasure with her, and they could live in
luxury in the African forests. But if she refused, he would tell
his master, who would flog and torture her and then give her to the
police, who would kill her.
