The Missourian

Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

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• Publié par: vawyer
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 29
• Langue: English

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The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Missourian, by Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle, Illustrated by Ernest Haskell

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Title: The Missourian Author: Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle Release Date: December 7, 2009 [eBook #30623] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 ***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG MISSOURIAN***

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E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)

THE MISSOURIAN

“JACQUELINE” “She was the spirit of the enigma, the very personification of the Napoleonic sphinx”

The Missourian

By EUGENE P. LYLE, Jr.

“In my predestin’d Plot of Dust and Soul.” –Omar

Illustrated by Ernest Haskell

New York Doubleday, Page & Company 1905

Copyright, 1905, by Doubleday, Page & Company Published, August, 1905

All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian

To MY TWO BEST FRIENDS My Father and my Mother

IX. X. XI. XII. XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV. XXV. XXVI. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. XXXIII.

A Wilful Maid Arrives A Fra Diavolo in the Land of Roses The Violent End of a Terrible Bandit La Luz, Blockade Runner The Storm Centre A Bruising of Arms for Jacqueline Swordsmanship in the Dark The Thoughts of Youth May Be Prodigiously Long Thoughts Toll-Taking in the Huasteca The Brigand Chief The Cossacks and Their Tiger Colonel Pastime Passing Excellent Unregistered in Any Studbook The Herald of the Fair God The Ritual He of the Debonair Sceptre Rather a Small Man Little Monarchs, Big Mistakes A Tartar,anda Tartar In the Wake of Princely Cavalcades The Red Mongrel “Equidad en la Justicia” A Curious Pagan Rite The Man Who Did Not Want to be Shot The Person on the Other Horse The Strangest Avowal of Love Berthe “Mike” The Whisper of the Sphinx The Ambassador Carlota The Woman Who Did Not Hesitate A Sponsor to the Fat Padre

PART II. The Rose That Was a Thorn in the Land of Roses

I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII.

PART I. The Thorn in the Land of Roses

273 284

I. II.

Meagre Shanks The Black Decree

3 11 18 27 34 45 55

CONTENTS

64 69 80 89 98 108 114 122 131 140 149 156 164 173 182 188 193 200 209 219 228 238 242 253 258 266

III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. IX. X. XI. XII. XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV.

As Between Women The Lacking Coincidence The Missourians If a Kiss Were All A Crop of Colonels Royal Resolution Interpreter to the Almighty Alone Among His Loving Subjects Fatality and the Missourian The Rendezvous of the Republic A Buccaneer and a Battle Blood and Noise–What Else? Of All News the Most Spiteful Vendetta’s Half Sister, Better Born Under a Spanish Cloak El Chaparrito In Articulo Mortis Knighthood’s Belated Flower The Title of Nobility The Abbey of Mount Regret The Contrariness of Jacqueline The Journalistic Sagacity of a Daniel

293 298 306 315 324 335 344 351 359 369 380 391 406 422 434 443 459 465 475 484 496 506

THE PEOPLE OF THE STORY

T HE M ISSO URIAN , known in every fight as the Storm Centre. His real name is John D. Driscoll, familiarly shortened to Din Driscoll. At the close of the Civil War he finds himself a lieutenant-colonel in General Joe Shelby’s brigade of Confederate daredevils, sent by his comrades as emissary to the Emperor Maximilian of Mexico. J ACQ UELINE , who is the Marquise Jeanne d’Aumerle, on a missio n of high politics from Napoleon III. to the Court of Mexico. B ERTHE , her maid. M AXIMILÍAN , archduke of Austria, occupant of the New World throne created for him. C HARLO TTEO F O RLEANS , the Empress. A NASTASIO  M URG UÍA ng, a Mexican hacendado, who acquires riches by runni Federal blockades into Southern ports. He is both a coward and a miser. M ARÍADE L A L UZ , his daughter. R O DRIG O G ALÁN , brigand and guerrilla. T IBURCIO , blackmailer of the highway, scout, and “loyal Imperialist.” A UG USTIN F ISCHER , “the Fat Padre,” a renegade priest of subtle parts. M ICHEL N EY , grandson of the “Bravest of the Brave.” T HE M ARSHAL B AZAINE , commander-in-chief of the French Army of Occupation in Mexico. M ADAMELA M ARECHALE , his bride. C O LO NEL D UPIN , the “Tiger of the Tropics,” chief of the Contra Guerrillas. M IG UEL L O PEZ , colonel of Dragoons, a favorite of the Emperor. M O NSIEUR É LO IN , the Emperor’s secretary. M ARQ UEZ , M IRAMO N , M EJÍA , M ENDEZ , Imperialist officers. R ÉG ULES , E SCO BEDO , Republican officers. D ANIEL  B O O NE , first scout among the Missourians, one-time editor and editor yet to be. “O LD B RO THERSAND S ISTERS ,” “T ALL M O SE ” B LEDSO E , O F T HE C O UNTYO F P IKE , and yet more of the Missouri colonels. B ENITO J UAREZ , president of the Mexican Republic.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

“J ACQ UELINE ” “She was the spirit of the enigma, the very personification of the Napoleonic sphinx”

“M URG UÍA ” “He had evidently passed through salty spray, had braved the deep, this shrinking old man in frayed black”

“R O DRIG O G ALÁN ” “The fierce stranger, however, seemed undecided. His brow furrowed, and for the moment he only stared”

“J O HN D INWIDDIE D RISCO LL , THE M ISSO URIAN ” “His cheeks were smooth, but they were tight and hard and brown from the weathering of sun and blizzard”

“C O LO NEL D UPIN ” “The Tiger of the Tropics ... the chief of Contra Guerrillas”

T HE E MPERO R M AXIMILIAN

“M ARÍADELA L UZ ” “The tapestry behind them parted and fell”

“B ERTHE ” “... brought down the ponderous knocker so terrifically that it abashed her, for all her present agitation”

Frontispiece

F ACINGPAG E 16

18

38

94

134

146

220

PART FIRST THE THORN IN THE LAND OF ROSES

“Array you, lordyngs, one and all, For here begins no peace.” –The Ballad of the Battle of Otterburn

CHAPTER I A W ILFUL M AID A RRIVESFROM F RANCE

“I’ll tell thee, it is the stubbornest young fellow of France, full of ambition.” –As You Like It.

Jacqueline was a gentlewoman of France. But there w as usually mischief in her handsome head, for all its queenly poise. Just now, she was running away from the ship. Captain and officers of theImpératrice Eugénie, Imperial red pantaloons, gilt Imperial eagles, such tokens of awe were yet not awful enough to hold Jacqueline. So, with the humility of limp things in that sticky air, the sailors shoved closer in the small boat an d made place for the adjustment of crisp skirts. With the lady went her gentle little Breton maid, who trembled with the trembling of every plank in those norther-rocked waters. The high sun, just showing himself after the late gale, was sucking a gummy moisture out upon all surfaces, and the perspiring men felt mean and base before the starchy freshness of the two girls. No one was pleased that Jacqueline was going, except Jacqueline herself. But she was keen for it. She had been impervious to their flustered anxiety, also to the tributes to her importance betrayed therein. In vain they argued no fewer than two emperors to dissuade her. She meant to have a walk on the shore and–a demure Parisian shrug settled it. Jacqueline rested a high-heeled boot on a coil of r ope and blithely hummed an old song–“Mironton, mironton, mirontaine!” Oh, how she had wearied of bumping, heaving, bumping! At first she had enjoyed the storm. It was a new kind of play, and the mise-en-scène was q uite adequate. But ennui had surged in again long before danger had surged out. And now she considered that some later sensation was due her, j ust as supper after an evening of fasting. In such a way, her life long, Jacqueline had sustained existence. Her nourishment was ever the latest “fri sson,” to use her own word. She craved thrills of emotion, ecstatic thril ls. Naturally, then, three weeks of ocean had fretted the restless lass as intolerable, tyrannical. During the norther’s blinding fury, the liner of th e Compagnie Trans- Atlantique had groped widely out of her course, to find herself off Tampico when the storm abated. But the skipper saw in his ill-luck a chance for fresh meat, and he decided to communicate with the port before going on to Vera Cruz. And when Jacqueline found that out, she decided to communicate with the port too. Little enough harm in that, truly; if only it were any one else but Jacqueline. In her case, though, all concerned would have felt easier to keep her on board. Then, when the ship sailed, they were sure to have her there. Otherwise, they assuredly were not. For they knew well her startling capacity for whims. But never, never, could they know the startling next way a whim of hers might jump. Yet did she give herself the small pains of wheedling? Not she. The mystery of her august guardianship, of no less than two emperors, and the responsibility falling on captain, crew, red trousers, and gilt eagles –Hé bien, what then? Neither were they cunning with their dark warnings of outlawry and violence. Dreadfulest horrors might lurk in the motley Gulf town held by force against bloodthirsty Mexicans. But croaking like that only gave

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