The Cuban liberated; or

Chapter I

“ Her eye’s dark charm ’twere vain to tell, — But gaze on that of the gazelle,

It will assist thy fancy well!

As large, as languishingly dark.

But soul beamed forth in every spark That darted from beneath the lid.”

— Byron.

RIGHT clever thrust, you Cuban dog I But look well to your sword, for I will kill you ! ”

The speaker, Roderick Brawn, who with lowering brow watched each movement of his younger and more agile opponent, was a duelist of the Virginian school ; a man cruel by nature, though handsome of face and form ; skilled in using the deadly weapons of his profession, and with a seeming disregard for the sacredness of life.

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His appearance in Boston, shortly after the decadence of southern institutions following the Rebellion, was marked by no outward show of surprise. The close of the Sixties saw troublous times. Society had been shaken by the shock of arms, and had become corrupted by the bitterness of internecine strife, till a spirit of indifference was rife in all the larger cities of the country.

Thus the advent of the duelist Roderick Brawn, as a gentlemanly exponent of the art of fencing, was a matter of small surprise in this bustling city of the East.

Those who frequented the duelist’s apartments, and bartered their ducats for a nominal proficiency in handling the foils, were captivated by the suavity of the swordsman ; and as a natural sequence, he became the tutelary god of many a youth of gilded fortune, who was fortunate indeed if gambling and its allied vices did not entail their heritage of degradation .

To the police he was known as a dangerous man — one whom, so long as he committed no flagrant breach of the law, it were politic to refrain from meddling with.

There had, however, been rumors of a fatal meeting at Brighton, growing out of some dispute over the cards in a fashionable club house where Roderick Brawn was a visitor. But the matter was so effectually hushed, that the true history of his victim’s death is locked within a few faithful breasts.

Ah ! well, perhaps it is better so. In days of sudden deaths, when the heart-strings snap from

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excessive tension, it is easy to say with the poet, —

“ Only a heart whose pulsations are o’er,

Only a form that will journey no more,

Only a shade for the Stygian shore —

Dropped dead ! ”

So much for the early history of Roderick Brawn, which at the time of our story we find identified with the unwritten annals of a great city.

In the lapse of years, his haughty nature has felt the influence of that genial atmosphere which permeates the surroundings of a man of the world. There remain the same dexterity of hand, the same quickness of vision, that guided his flashing foil to a vulnerable point, without that repellent manner once so noticeable. Yet to-night, as the sword of Juan Fernandez, disdaining the blade opposed to its progress, inflicts a vexing wound in his shoulder, Roderick Brawn in anger drops the smiling mask which has rendered him an enigma to all who would know the workings of his brain.

“A right clever thrust, you Cuban dog !” does not imply commendation for a pupil’s skill. The words have a tinge of bitterness in their tone that augurs ill for Juan Fernandez.

The young Cuban is quick to perceive their significance, for a fierce, strangely vindictive light comes into his eyes, and an ominous frown darkens his handsome features, as he stands, sword in hand, before the wounded duelist.

“ I know you now, Senor Roderico ! ” he says in excellent English. “You have forced me to fight that you may kill me ! ”

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“ I always kill my man,” returned the swordsman doggedly. “ And think you, now that a lucky stroke of yours has aroused the demon in me, I will make a show of mercy? No, there shall be no boys’ play here ! ”

“As a friend, I would bid you be wary, Roderick Brawn,” the surgeon had said to him. “ You have no common adversary in this Cuban. I hear he had for his instructor the deadly Mazzantini of Havana. They tell of his wonderful work with the foils at Harvard, and he has a cool head in spite of his Castilian temperament.”

“Bah! You Yankee doctors know nothing of dueling ! ” was Brawn’s uncivil reply. “After this night you, at least, will have had some valuable experience.”

The conversation of the group was carried on in a low tone of voice, since the quietude of the midnight hour, unbroken save by the rumbling of some belated vehicle, rendered detection not wholly improbable.

The carriages containing Brawn and the Cuban, together with their seconds and the surgeon, had stopped at the least noticeable point, and the drivers — two Jehus known to most men about town after the conventional early hours — were yawning on their boxes by the roadside, apparently indifferent to what was taking place so long as the night’s adventure would bring its own reward.

“We have no time for idle words, gentlemen,” said Colonel Graham at length.

At this brusque warning from the military gentle-

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man who had arranged the details of the meeting with soldierly exactness and promptitude, the two combatants resumed the duel in ominous silence.

Roderick Brawn, with white, firmly set lips, looked the incarnation of evil as his eyes met the unflinching gaze of the Cuban.

As for Juan Fernandez, the look of boyish triumph that followed his slight victory over the duelist had vanished, and in its place rested an expression of seriousness, suggestive rather of sadness than fear of the danger that menaced him.

That events which precede the meeting of Brawn and Fernandez may be understood, since the unity of the story demands their recapitulation, the reader is asked to attend in imagination the masked ball given at a palatial residence on Beacon Hill, where the fashionable world, in that maddening round of gayety that follows the solemn season of Lent, have gathered to do homage to the god of pleasure.

A home magnificent in all that luxury can supply ; yet barren of real happiness. Redolent to-night of bloom and beauty, filled with music and the laughter of its guests ; but on the morrow the cloister of two hearts that dwell apart within its stately loneliness.

Think of this, ye toilers in life’s humble ways, when your eyes with longing turn to towering piles. For, like the mansion of Clifford Reinhardt, they may be only the semblance of that bliss you so fondly picture for those upon whom fortune has showered her favors.

The scene within the brilliantly lighted ball room

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suggests a German fete in the Rhineland, which the strains of a Strauss waltz, coming from an unseen orchestra in the conservatory, render intensely realistic.

Beautiful women and handsome men — the flower of the aristocracy — are among the figures threading the mazy windings of the dance. The gay costumes of the ladies have been chosen with a discrimination nicely adjusted to the beauty of the wearers, since their slight masks cannot hide the charm of heaving bosoms and glancing eyes. Ah ! what conquests are made within the life of a single waltz.

The music has ceased, and the dancers are standing in little groups, or strolling in couples toward the refreshment room, where cooling sherbets and ices are served amid a Babel of chatter and gayety.

But look — oh ! strange infatuation — at yonder Fra Diavolo and the queenly Cleopatra, who have drawn upon themselves an inordinate curiosity by prolonging the waltz till the very echoes of the music have died away.

They seem unconscious of the fact that the dance has ended, for away they are whirling under the spell of that melody born of the soul, oblivious of all save their own existence. It is not possible, since they still retain their masks, to watch the play of countenance seen in two people whose conversation is intended solely for each other ; but the veriest dolt cannot help thinking that this “ glorious sorceress of the Nile” is captivated by the dashing bandit chief, and that both have identified themselves with the romantic characters assumed. Whispers of

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mysterious import circulate freely among the throng of watchers.

“Who is Fra Diavolo?” * * * “Who is

Cleopatra ? ”

Yet among them there is one who recognizes the woman, while the identity of her companion baffles even the jealous scrutiny of a husband’s eye.

Clifford Reinhardt, with illy concealed interest, had watched the couple from the beginning of the waltz, and in the character of a courtier had shadowed them with baleful glances. The bribery of her maid had enabled him to spy upon his wife’s movements, since she knew the character in which her mistress would appear.

“So, my false beauty, ” he muttered in low, inaudible tones, “this is my return for the pleasure I would give you. Fool that I am to longer believe you innocent ! ”

Jealousy, excitement, the thought that she is playing him false beneath his own roof, render the shrewd, impassive broker reckless in a trying moment. The sight of his wife listening to the sweet flattery of a masquerading lover maddens him. And in the midst of it all, the memory of the babe asleep with its nurse up stairs — upon whose life his young wife had lavished the affection denied to him — is like the sudden plunging of a dagger into his doubting heart.

“Oh, this cursed doubt,” he moans in spirit. “ How it weighs me down.”

Reinhardt had known that feeling before when domestic storms obscured the matrimonial skies, but

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never so intensely as to-night. And yet, as the dancers draw near him, there is a loving pathos in his low, quickly uttered words :

“Madeline! Madeline! Stop this madness, I command you !”

The woman raises her head from Fra Diavolo’s shoulder and looks about in a bewildered way. She seems to realize the situation with intuitive grasp, and summons all her feminine courage to baffle that searching gaze of the masked throng seeking to penetrate their disguises.

Fra Diavolo, too, is quick to perceive that he and his fair companion have unhappily blundered into notoriety. One cannot help thinking, at this moment, how well they assume their respective characters. He with all that self-assurance, bravado and effective gallantry associated with the name of the handsome brigand. She an ideal Cleopatra, proud in her disdain — with large, dark, flashing eyes — just such a woman as we imagine could sway the heart of a Ptolemy or an Antony.

“Quick!” she whispers. “My husband must not find you here. Lead me to the conservatory ; from there you can reach the balcony, and escape through the garden ! Oh, the miserable ending of this night ! — when I had hoped to be so happy, free from the espionage of jealous eyes.”

By this time they had passed from the ball room, and paused in the friendly shadow of a flowering cactus, near the low window opening to the balcony.

“The fault is mine,” he is saying. "I should not have come. But not upon you, — Madelina ! — must

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his vengeance fall. I will stay and meet Senor Reinhardt ! ”

“No! No! You forget my position. A wife

does not desire conviction in her husband’s sight.

My safety — your own as well — depends upon your

instant flight. In mercy to an erring woman, spare

me the humiliation of a scene! Go — see, there

is some one coming: ! ”

Clifford Reinhardt had seen his mistake in thus betraying himself ; and, after the first flash of anger, he too made his way in the direction of the conservatory. He had a horror of public scandal. True, he had not changed his bachelorhood for that conjugal felicity which, in marriages where love is the uniting power, arises like incense from the hymeneal altar. It was the old story of wealth, social position, crafty lovemaking, upon the one side ; and upon the other a cold, imperious beauty, who had married well, as the world goes, but who, in yielding to the parental wish, had gone as a lamb to the sacrifice. Yet, we know, it is not uncommon for people who wed unhappily to live a life of partial estrangement beneath the same roof, and still so conduct themselves in the eyes of society as to appear wholly satisfied with their lot.

The horror of such an existence — with no reciprocal affection to soften the austerity of life’s duties, and with a knowledge possessed by each that they are daily drifting apart — is a merited but perhaps severe punishment of the folly of forming an alliance in its very nature antagonistic to the Creator’s plan.

Two years of such marital experience had told

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heavily upon Clifford Reinhardt, and had added to the tell-tale “crows’ feet” very preceptibly. He was not so young as his beautiful wife by twenty years on their marriage day. But at forty a man need not be considered old, though grey hair and thoughtful, refined mannerisms, give warning of approaching age.

If it were not for his extreme jealousy, which made him the enemy of every man his wife chose to be even gracious toward, he might have plunged into the gayety of the time, and by relaxing somewhat his system of espionage among the servants, could perhaps have materially lessened the breach between himself and Madeline, since no woman can be won by outspoken distrust of her marriage vows.

It was this jealous feeling that now impelled him to the rash resolve of tearing the mask from the face of Fra Diavolo, regardless of the courtesy due from him to one of his guests ; if, indeed, it should prove, which Reinhardt would fain not believe, that he came by invitation of the master rather than the mistress of the house. Intent on doing this, he had approached the couple in the conservatory unperceived, until only the tall cactus plant separated him from them. With sudden, fierce pain at his heart, he heard their whispered good-night, and saw the stranger bend over her jeweled hand.

Then, hoarse with passion, Reinhardt sprang toward him as he moved in the direction of the balcony.

“ Villain ! ” he cried, 4 4 unmask before me, that I may look upon the man who thus betrays my confidence ! ”

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The mute appealing look in the eyes of Cleopatra, meant for him alone, decides the course to be taken by Fra Diavolo, for he reads therein the dread of having her husband gain the knowledge he so much desires. So, fearing to speak, lest his voice betray him, he remains silent.

“ By heaven ! then, I will do what you dare not,” said Reinhardt, grasping at the mask that concealed the other’s features, save a dark, curling moustache, and handsome, firmly-set mouth.

A short, quick blow from Fra Diavolo, staggers the broker for a moment and causes him to relax his hold on the stranger, who, passing hurriedly into the garden, is lost in the darkness of night. ******

On her husband becoming involved in a quarrel with the masked stranger, Mrs. Reinhardt had fled to her own room, the windows of which overlooked the garden below. I will do her the justice to say she deeply regretted her share in the night’s episode ; but the fact that she had been spied upon in all her actions, through the connivance of her husband with those who knew the part she intended to take in the masquerade, left a sting that rankled in her proud bosom like a poisoned barb.

“If it were not for baby,” she moaned, “I would leave this prison for ever ! ”

The thought of her child led her irresistibly to nurse’s room, to find the baby sleeping soundly and sweetly in his crib. Thrilled with love for her child, she bent to kiss the pretty face nestled between two chubby fists ; but fearing to wake him, she instead

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lightly pressed his tangled curls and returned with trembling heart to her own apartments.

A sudden fear was inspired by the ominous crack of a pistol borne on the night wind, followed by the deep, savage barking of the watch-dog, and a confused murmur of voices. These told her, plainer than words, that Fra Diavolo had been discovered and was being hunted down.

The guests in alarm had voluntarily unmasked, and her absence from the ball room might be noticed, she thought. But to appear among them as Cleopatra, after the scene just enacted, would be fatal in its consequences. So, summoning her maid, she exchanged the rich, voluptuous garments of the Egyptian, for a robe of cardinal hue that displayed her brunette beauty to a rare degree.

“There is terrible times below, ma’am,” said the garrulous Mary. “Thomas saw a robber stealing off through the garden, and he untied his dog, and the police has come, and they is all searching the premises.”

“ Yes, yes,” she said in answer, “ I know. But hurry, so I may see the silver isn’t stolen.”

So far she breathed free, since all thought the man in the garden some thief who had gained an entrance during the confusion of the masquerade.

"Oh, that he may elude them ! ” was her inmost prayer.

She thankfully noted that her husband was not in sight when she descended to bid the ladies good-night. His presence might provoke a scene, and lead to consequences she was straining every nerve

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to avert. If she could avoid him until morning, when his anger would have lost much of its virulence, she felt that, guilty as she was of justly arousing his indignation, she could then meet him without compromising her honor as a woman, however culpable she might appear in her duty as a wife and the mother of his child.

" You poor dear!” was the sympathetic outburst that greeted Mrs. Reinhardt from all sides as she appeared among her friends, — "weren’t you dreadfully frightened?”

Scarcely divining their meaning, she answers in such language as seems to serve the occasion best, and with a vague idea that the supposititious burglar is in some way connected with herself in the minds of her guests.

"It’s so horrible to find a robber in the house, and especially searching for one’s jewels in one’s very room ! ”

" The wonder is he did not kill you ! ”

"I know I should have fainted, had I been in your place ! ”

These and similar remarks, quite unintelligible to her, prompt the reply :

"I — I — am not so sure that I understand you.”

"Why, didn’t you see the robber opening your jewel box?” they chorus in return. "Mr. Reinhardt and the officers have tracked him to the garden, you know.”

"Yes,” she answers, "I know some thief has been discovered, but I did not see him. And I have just left my room.”

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"Oh, then it must have been your maid. She has been telling us of the robbery and her struggle with the burglar upstairs.”

The truth is Mary had been giving the frightened ladies a graphic description of her heroism ; and as the whole affair was one of pure fiction, invented by the maid to gratify a morbid desire for notoriety, her mistress evinced no wish to rob her of the laurels she had gained, since the romance tended to distract attention from other things.

"Mary is a brave girl,” she answers quietly.

A servant appeared with the startling intelligence that an officer had captured the burglar, after a spirited resistance, and was bringing him into the vestibule for identification ; but beyond a slight show of excitement, no more nor less than is common to womankind in the presence of impending danger, Mrs. Reinhardt gave no outward signs of her emotion.

She seems impelled toward the spot where the officer is standing with his prisoner, surrounded by a curious crowd, drawn together by a desire to catch a glimpse of his face. Eager, yet fearing to meet his gaze, she presses nearer to the throng, until a pair of large, wildly-rolling eyes, fix themselves upon her own and plead for protection with silent eloquence.

At first she doubts the revelation, for instead of Fra Diavolo, struggling in the rough grasp of a minion of the law, is beheld a small, misshapen body, its deformity consisting of an unsightly hump between the shoulders, which imparts to the whole

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figure a suggestiveness of impish character, and makes the arms, now entwining themselves in frantic endeavors to unloose the hold of their captor, appear of almost superhuman length and activity.

Yet there is nothing in the appearance of this strange youth, thief though he may be, to repel generous sympathy ; rather is it true, despite his incongruous style of dress, that a kindly eye can sec in him qualities which appeal to the philanthropic heart. He has a face that in others would be called intellectual, and more than comely. Great wideopen blue eyes, and curling locks, are not without their charm in all conditions of life ; but that very charm becomes the more noticeable when its possessor, like some rare flower struggling to reach the sunlight, thrives within the vitiated atmosphere of a city’s slums.

"What is your name, child?” asks Mrs. Reinhardt, moved to pity by that appealing look.

"Dandy,” is the reply.

A smile that overspread the features of those crowding around him, since the appellation seemed so much at variance with his make-up, operated to impress the ladies in his favor.

"And your other name?” she asks.

"Only Dandy. That’s wot they all calls me.”

"Well, then, Dandy,” said the policeman gruffly, but not unkindly, "we’ll have to be going ; so you may bid the ladies good-night. The Island ’s the place tor you. Little thieves won’t get much sympathy wasted on ’em there.”

"Oh, missus! don’t let ’em send me to jail!” he

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pleaded, with those expressive eyes on Mrs. Reinhardt’s face. " I haint stealed nothin’ here. I only climbed over the fence so ? s ter hear the moosic, an’ pipe o:f the big folks dancing inside. Yer might give a poor cove a show ! ”

A natural feeling of pity prompted her to ask the patrolman to let his young prisoner go free.

"It’s no use, ma’am,” the officer respectfully replied, "to pity the kid. He’ll only show his gratitude by breaking into the house some dark night. If he’ll tell who the other in the garden was, I wouldn’t mind so much if he manages to slip away from me. T’ other one was a man, and this is only a boy.”

"Don’t I tell yer I’se alone!” broke in Dandy, seeing that the policeman’s story about an accomplice would make his case all the more difficult. "I only wanted to see the people and listen to the moosic.”

"You have a fine ear for music, you have,” was the sarcastic reply, "and six months down the bay will give you lots of time to cultivate it. Oh, you’re a deep one, you are ! ”

" Officer, why don’t you take your prisoner away ? ” This question was asked by Clifford Reinhardt, who hot and excited by his chase in the garden, smarting under the insult of the blow from Fra Diavolo, and tortured by his wife’s unfaithfulness, was not moved by any considerations of mercy for the little hunchback caught peering in at his windows.

"The child says he did not come here to steal,’ said Mrs. Reinhardt, championing Dandy’s cause.

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Her proud, beautiful bearing, as she unflinchingly met her husband’s gaze, abashed him for the moment.

"He is only some street Arab whose fondness for music has lured him into your grounds.”

" And you believe this unlikely story ? ”

" I do, sir. If my wishes are consulted you will not have him sent to prison.”

"And ours as well, Mr. Reinhardt,” said several of the ladies, inspired by the leadership of their hostess.

Seeing that the weight of sympathy inclined so strongly toward the prisoner, he questioned the boy, and found him straightforward in his answers. What more common, he asked himself, than to find such as he about the city at night? And he might have added, what more natural than that such a one, roving aimlessly through the dark streets, should be attracted by the sounds of music and gayety within some mansion like his own.

"Since the ladies desire it,” he said, "you may let the boy go. I may be acting under a false impulse, but as he has not really committed any theft, I will not trouble you further.”

“Very well, sir; if that’s your orders, why all right,” said the patrolman.

When released by the officer, Dandy’s joy prompted him to do a double-shuffle before that chagrined individual, indicative, presumably, of his triumph over arbitrary justice, if one may use such a paradoxical expression. His comical actions, and the grotesque appearance imparted by a Prince Albert coat, shiny by reason

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of long wear and several sizes too large, made even Reinhardt smile ; and Dandy, after bowing his thanks to those who had interceded for him, was conducted to the door by a servant and told to make himself scarce. The alacrity with which the little hunch-back acted upon this advice attested his eagerness to avoid again falling into the meshes of the law.

It was over at last — the farewells, the hollowhearted nothings, the simulation of happiness — and in the quietude of her luxurious chamber, dimly lighted by a single gas-jet burning low in the chandelier, Mrs. Reinhardt sat dreamily reviewing the events of the past few hours.

Those who knew this unhappy woman as Madeline Maitland, when she was a reigning belle, will tell of the charm of manner — more potent than beauty — that was the crowning glory of a joyous girlhood.

If it were with a feeling of apprehension some few of her friends watched the unfolding of her charms, it was because they guessed Gregory Maitland’s great need of money, and feared that, to save himself from the financial wreck that threatened so many at the close of the war, the old West India merchant would not hesitate to sacrifice his child to some rich suitor ; and this, too, in wilful blindness as to her heart’s dictates. More than this, it was no secret that her education tended to exalt the great desirability of wealth, social position, and that prestige enjoyed by reason of in uential connection, in any love affair involving an offer of marriage. And so, in her wanton freedom, the girl thought only of the present.

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The crisis came at a time when Clifford Reinhardt, absenting himself from gay companions at the Bachelors’ Club, was intent upon winning the beautiful Madeline for his wife, and he finally made an offer of his heart and fortune, only to meet with an unequivocal refusal, couched in such kindly language as the girl thought was due her father’s friend.

But it was none the less a spirited rejection of a proud man’s love. Still, like the moth that woos destruction in the flame, the rich broker hovered within the circle of her charms, till each smile not bestowed upon himself was a torture ; while Madeline, with girlish thoughtlessness, basked in the favor of younger men, and rather preferred the society of those who could "lute and flute fantastic tenderness” without falling on their knees and calling her an angel.

The girl was now in her twentieth year, a favorite with all, and ranked among the fairest women of her set. That she was cons cious of her beauty, and not averse to adulation because of the gift, it is useless to deny. The fault, if such it deserves to be called, is one not uncommon to her sex. And of all uninteresting women, commend to me those who have no adequate conception of their charms, which, be they ever so commonplace in the eyes of the casual beholder, are deserving of assiduous cultivation.

"But Madeline had a lover?” you ask. Ah ! impatient reader, it is hard to penetrate the mysteries of a woman’s heart ; and infinitely more difficult does the task become, when we seek to learn the heart' secrets of some gay butterfly of society.

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Suddenly she arose, drew her magnificent figure to its full height, and paced excitedly about the room. Becoming calmer, there was yet something almost tragic in her mein, as with e} 7 es that looked beyond the present, and perchance into the dimness of a happy past, she stood at her window gazing up into the faces of the stars.

How peaceful it seemed after the excitement of the ball room ! The effect was tranquilizing to her high-strung nerves, and, lowering her eyes, she dwelt upon that vista of peace seemingly spread out in illimitable expanse below; — a city sleeping beneath its watchful spires, while beyond lay the ocean gleaming like silver in the light of a rising moon.