on suspicion, to await their trial for piracy. They were strangers to the language spoken on the island, had no friends there to intercede in their behalf, and indeed matters looked gloomy enough; nor had they much doubt in their own minds that they should be convicted of the charge brought against them. The day on which they were shut up within the cold, damp, and cheerless wails of the prison, was just one year subsequent to that of their leaving Boston harbor, in the good ship Royal Kent. Again and again did they regret that they had not fallen upon the deck of their own ship rather than thus to be murdered by the Spaniards under the charge of piracy upon the sea.
In this harrowing state of suspense, Lovell, with Jack Herbert and Henry Breed, his comrades in captivity, remained for nearly six months before they were summoned for their trial, and then no sufficient evidence appearing against them, they were further remanded to prison. This was in a time of war and contention, and dangers of every kind lurked about the islands and harbors of the West Indies, and in the crowd of other matters the poor prisoners and their case was entirely forgotten. Thus they were likely to remain perhaps for years, in a confinement scarcely more desirable than death itself, save that there still remained a single gleam of hope within their breasts that they might some day be freed. Ah! bright and heaven born Hope, thou art the solace of many an aching heart, and the supporter of many a weary and almost-disconsolate spirit.
While incarcerated in this living tomb, young Lovell’s mind would often revert to the captain of the King’s cutter, whom he knew to be familiar with Fanny, and who had caused him no small degree of unhappiness on his leaving his now far off home. ‘He will have ample time and opportunity to supplant me,’ said Lovell to himself, ‘for Fanny may believe me dead, and thus be induced to give way to his importunities.—Heaven protect her,’ thought Lovell to himself. ‘His motives I fear cannot possibly be of an honorable character.’
While Lovell was thus prompted by his feelings in a prison far away, the drama was still going on at home, and in the family of the Campbells. Captain Burnett was now more frequent in his visits to the High Rock Hamlet, and Fanny still received him on the same kind terms as ever, and they were still good friends. If the officer of the crown did sometimes attempt to talk of love, she would silence him with a look of reproach, or some playful rejoinder, which was ever successful, and thus she kept him as he termed it to one of his confidential messmates in the fleet, constantly in suspense.’
‘Hang it,’ said he on the occasion alluded to, and to his comrade, ‘I would do anything for the girl, even to giving up my commission, for I believe she has really got my heart, if I have any—I never knew I had before, that’s certain.’
‘You would have to turn rebel to get her, Burnet,’ said his friend; ‘if she be so strong a one as you have always told me.’
‘I’ll tell thee between ourselves,’ said Burnet in reply, ‘if I thought I could get the girl’s heart thereby, I would join the continentals to-morrow, and furthermore, I must say that it is the only inducement that could be offered me to do so, though I believe them more than half in the right.’
‘You are serious, Burnet?’
‘Serious, upon my honor.’
‘To what length will the little god carry us in his blind service,’ said his friend. ‘I give you up entirely Burnet. It’s a clear case.’
‘To which I plead guilty.’
The attention of Captain Burnet at the cottage and to Fanny, had become so marked and decided that the gossips of the community—a class of people who know everything, and especially more of other people’s affairs than their own—had fully engaged him to Fanny, and made her give up William Lovell unconditionally.
Nearly two years had passed since the first imprisonment of Lovell and his companions, when by a happy chance Jack Herbert succeeded in making his escape on board of a vessel bound for Boston, and at length reached his home in safety. He was charged with a message to Lovell’s parents, and Fanny, should he ever reach home, and this he took an early opportunity to deliver.
William Lovell’s family and friends had long mourned him as lost, not having heard one word concerning him since his departure, or of the vessel in which he had sailed. But Fanny would not give up all hope, and insisted that they should hear from him at last, and now that they had done so, and knew him to be pining in a Spanish prison, still they were grateful that his life was spared, and were led to hope for his eventual release and return.
‘And how do these Spaniards treat him?’ asked Fanny with a trembling voice, yet flashing eye, of the messenger, Jack Herbert.
‘Rough enough, Miss.’
‘Has he sufficient food?’
‘They used to bring us grub once a day,’ was the answer.
‘But once a day?’
‘That’s all, Miss.’
‘And what did it consist of?’ asked Fanny.
‘The very coarsest, you may be assured, Miss.’
A tear stole into Fanny’s eye, as she thought upon the suffering that William was then experiencing in a foreign prison.
‘At Havana, in the island of Cuba,’ said Fanny, musingly to herself; ‘can you describe the port, my friend?’
‘Why it’s a sunny little basin, not so very small neither, and quite land-locked and guarded by the castle and its entrance, tho’ for the matter of that, the castle is’nt always manned—at any rate ’twas’nt the night we went in with the tag-boat. It’s a pocket of a place, Miss, large enough to hold a thousand sail and yet not more than one can work in or out at a time. It’s in the hands of the Spaniard now, from whom the English took it awhile ago, but have given it back again. Altogether it’s a fine harbor, as far as that goes, why, Miss?’
‘Oh, I was curious about it.’
‘It did’nt bless our eyes very often, I can tell you, Miss. We all saw it once, when we were rode out in a great cart hauled by jackasses to the court of the Governor General, the old tyrant!’ and here honest Jack Herbert made divers passes with his clenched fist in the air as though he was pummelling the identical functionary in question, just about the ribs and eyes.
‘In close confinement all the time,’ said Fanny thoughtfully, and more to herself than to her companion, or for the purpose of eliciting an answer.
‘Close enough, lady, being’s we never went out, saving the time I have just told you of in the jackass team,’ said Herbert, pausing out of breath at the exertion of thrashing the Governor General in imagination.
‘Did you inform yourself concerning the localities of the neighborhood,’ asked Fanny, still half musing to herself.
‘Why, yes, Miss, a little when I got out.’
‘And the prison—is that well guarded?’
‘Only by the jailor, a rough, gray old Spaniard, and three or four soldiers at the different angles of the walls.’
‘Look ye, good Herbert, would you join an expedition for the release of your old comrades?’ asked Fanny, with animation.
‘Would’nt I? perhaps I hav’nt suffered with them, and don’t know what it is to be cooped up in a damp, stone prison, with just enough food to keep you alive, and make you long for more; join? yes, to-morrow, Miss.’
‘Where do you live in the town?’
‘Just at the foot of Copp’s Hill.’
‘Could one find you there if need be?’
‘Ay, Miss, at most any hour’.’
‘Well, good Herbert, you may soon meet with one who will engage with you in an enterprise that may gain you not only a name, but a fortune also. Will you be prepared?’
‘That I will—a fortune?’
‘Aye,