第23章

THE OUTRAGE

When Heideck stepped into the garden he was scarcely able to find his way, but having taken a few steps his eyes had become accustomed to the gloom, and the pale light of the stars showed him his path.

The garden was surrounded by an impenetrable hedge of cactus plants, low enough to allow a tall man to look over.On having closed the wooden gate behind him, Heideck stood and gazed back at the brightly illuminated windows of the house.In the presence of the charming woman he had manfully suppressed his feelings.No rash word, betraying the tempest that this nocturnal conversation had left surging in his bosom, had escaped his lips.He had not for a moment forgotten that she was the wife of another, and it would be an infamy to covet her for his wife so long as she was tied to that other.But he could not disguise from himself the fact that he yearned towards her with a passionate love.He was to-day, for the first time, conscious that he loved this woman with a passion that he had never before felt for another; but there was nothing intoxicating or pleasurable in this self-confession.It was rather a feeling of apprehension of coming difficulties and struggles that would beset him in his passion for this charming creature.Had she not needed his protection, and had he not promised to remain on the spot to assist her, he would have escaped in rapid flight from this struggle within him.Yet, under the existing circumstances, there could be no question of his doing this.He had only himself to blame for having given her the right to count upon his friendship; and it was a behest of chivalry to deserve her confidence.Incapable of tearing himself from the place, where he knew his loved one remained, Heideck must have stayed a quarter of an hour rooted to the spot, and just when he had resolved--on becoming conscious of the folly of his behaviour--on turning homewards, he perceived something unusual enough to cause him to stay his steps.

He saw the house-door, which the Indian maid had a short time before closed behind him, open, and in the flood of light which streamed out into the darkness, perceived that several men dressed in white garments hurried, closely following each other, up the steps.

Remembering Mrs.Irwin's enigmatical references to a danger which possibly threatened her, and seized by a horrible dread of something about to happen, he pushed open the garden gate and rushed towards the house.

He had not yet reached it, when the shrill cry of a woman in distress fell upon his ear.Heideck drew the revolver he always carried from his pocket and sprang up the steps at a bound.The door of the drawing-room, where he had shortly before been in conversation with the Captain's wife, was wide open, and from it rang the cries for help, whose desperate tones brought home to the Captain the certainty that Edith Irwin was in the gravest peril.

Only a few steps, and he saw the young English lady defending herself heroically against three white-dressed natives, who were evidently about to carry her off.Her light silk dress was torn to shreds in this unequal struggle, and so great was Heideck's indignation at the monstrous brutality of the assailants that he did not for a moment hesitate to turn his weapon upon the tall, wild-looking fellow, whose brown hands were roughly clutching the bare arms of the young lady.

He fired, and with a short, dull cry of pain the fellow reeled to the ground.The other two, horror-stricken, let go their victim.