Argosy All-Story Weekly, April 7, 1928 — page 77: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

HIS SERVICE TO FOLLY. of surveillance, and there was no sign of Butts or Gefondo about. He stepped from the window and went down the alleyway to a cross-road. Crowds thronged the streets of Cap Francois. Basil followed the laughing, shouting black people and found their course led toward the sea-front. By lights gliding against the stars and dark waters of the harbor, he knew a ship had entered and cast anchor, and he remembered the vessel he had seen at sundown. No one paid him more than passing attention. It seemed as if the populace made a ceremonial of the arrival of this vessel. Basil saw her lights, red and green at the bows, and lanterns strung like shining, yellow garlands on deck. At her mizzen-truck floated the tricolor of France. “ Dear God,” he breathed aloud, “a French ship, and all this vast fuss to greet her. What can be the meaning?” Along the wharf a company of sol- diers in uniform of red and blue slashed with gold braid stood stiffly at attention. In the center of an open square facing the quay, a great fire of logs leaped and showered flame-light and sparks. Palm sabers caught the yellow eleams. The ruddy glow shone on mus- kets; it illumined black faces and threw into sharp relief the magnificent figure of a huge negro clad in shining satin, a cloak of purple velvet lined with scar- let about his shoulders, and on his head a crown of glittering jewels surmount- ed by twisted yellow satin like a turban on which diamonds winked and blazed. His breast was covered with ribbons and medals. A rope of pearls hung to his knees. His dark eyes were pierc- ingly bright in their white settings. His thick red lips were parted, revealing splendid white teeth. Diamonds shone on his black fingers. Basil gazed, spell-bound by the malig- nant gorgeousness of Henri Christo- phe, the negro who had lifted himself from the lot of a common slave to be- come Emperor of Haiti. 67 Banners fluttered from pike-staffs held by the soldiers. At one side of the square were a number of coaches with matched barbs pawing the earth and tossing their red and blue plumes. Sil- ver harness chains chimed; coachmen and postilions clad in red and blue sat with arms folded on their chests. Lines of soldiers held back the crowd with drawn bayonets and formed a bar- rier nearly to the quay, where the crowd shoved close as a boat was lowered from the French ship. Basil ran to the quay edge and gazed across the dark sea. From shore, broke a song of welcome in deep-throated mu- sical voices, a wild barbaric pzean whose rhythm stirred the blood to increasing tempests. He saw a man standing in the boat with his head bared. Light shone on the silver hair and Basil recognized a nobleman of France whose hand he had taken in happier times, the Marquis’ de Tourraine. Sitting near him, was a white-robed girl with golden hair. All this parade was meant to cele- brate her arrival. Basil knew before he glimpsed her features who it was. His young heart leaped, then contract- ed in the grip of fear. Violette had arrived; but to such a welcome that he had rather seen it changed to her funeral. He wondered if there were not some way to intercept her and warn her father of the fate awaiting them, but the crowd hemmed him in and held him fast. Black people pressed close, muttering in growling tones about her fairness, and laughing at_ ribald speeches in their own island tongue. Basil managed to shove forward as the boat landed, but immediately the crowd came between and he lost sight of her. It was some moments before she again came into view sitting in a sedan chair of painted gold carried by four huge blacks in barbaric dress. Lights shone on her golden hair and her white face in which her eyes seemed like shadows. Basil battled the GEomichbooks _. > (E)