Coppinger

“ You are an eagle—a bird of prey."
"A bird of prey," repeated Coppinger.
"And you soar and fight, and dive, and rend in your own element; whereas I am a little silver trout——"
"No"—he drew up his arm wound round with her hair—"No—a goldfish."
"Well, so be it; a goldfish swimming in my own crystal element, and happy in it. You would not take me out of it to gasp and die. Trust me, Captain Coppinger, I could not—even if I would—live in your world."
She put up her hands to his arm and drew some of the hair through his fingers, and unwound it from his sleeve. He made no resistance. ”

“ They had lost their heads—every one."
"Captain Coppinger," said Judith, "I have lost all trust in you. I return you the ring which I will never wear. I have been to see the rector and told him that I refuse you, and I will never sign the register."
"I will force the ring on to your finger," said Coppinger.
"You are a man, stronger than I—but I can defend myself, as you know to your cost. Half married we are—and so must remain, and never, never shall we be more than that." ”

“ You held me to my bond.”
“I hold you to your bond,” exclaimed Coppinger, in loud rage. “I hold you, indeed. Even though you can neither love nor honor me, you shall be mine. You likened me to a bird of prey that must have its prey or die, to a fire—and that must have its fuel—to a wrecker, and he must have his wreck, I care not. I will have you as mine, whether you love me or not.”
“So be it, then,” said Judith, sadly. “You had your opportunity and have put it from you. We understand each other. The slave is master—and a tyrant.” ”

“ I cannot endure it,” he repeated.
“I beg your pardon,” said Aunt Dionysia, “you must excuse me saying it, Captain Coppinger, but you place me in a difficult position. I am the guardian of my niece, though, goodness knows, I never desired it, and I don’t know what to think. It is very flattering and kind, and I esteem it great goodness in you to speak of Judith with such warmth, but——”
“Goodness! kindness!” exclaimed Coppinger. “I am good and kind to her! She forced me to it. I can be nothing else, and she throws me at her feet and tramples on me.” ”

“ Coppinger visited Polzeath and saw Judith whenever he came to Mr. Menaida’s house, but his wooing met with no response. She endured his attentions, shrinking from the slightest approach to familiarity, and though studiously courteous was never affectionate. It would take a heavy charge of self-conceit to have made the Captain blind to the fact that she did not love him, that in truth she viewed her approaching marriage with repugnance. Coppinger was a proud, but not a conceited man, and her coldness and aversion aroused his anger, for it galled his pride. ”

“ Is it not so much as saying to me, ‘You are false, cruel, not to be trusted; you are not worthy that I should be under the same roof with you, and breathe the same air?’”
“Oh, Captain Coppinger, I do not mean that!”
“Then let go the latch and come in. Stand, if you will not sit, opposite me. How can I see you there, in the doorway?”
“There is not much to see when I am visible,” said Judith, laughing.
“Oh, no! not much! Only a little creature who has more daring than any man in Cornwall—who will stand up to, and cast at her feet, Cruel Coppinger, at whose name men tremble.” ”

“ He had no idea that at that time Captain Coppinger was dead.
It was not till some days later that Judith understood why, at the last moment, with death before his eyes, Coppinger had urged on her this ratification of her marriage. It was not till his will was found, that she understood his meaning. He had left to her, as his wife, everything that he possessed. No one knew of any relatives that he had, for no one knew whence he came. No one ever appeared to put in a claim against the widow. ”

“ The footprints satisfied Coppinger that Judith had crept along this terrace, and so had missed the right course. It was impossible that she could reach the summit by this way—she must have fallen or be clinging at some point farther ahead, a point from which she could not advance, and feared to retreat.
He held the lantern above his head, and peered before him, but could see nothing. The glare of the artificial light made the darkness beyond its radius the deeper and more impervious to the eye. ”

“ Then Coppinger laughed, laughed long and boisterously. His hand that held Judith’s foot and the stirrup leather shook with his laughter.
“By Heaven!—You are wonderful, very wonderful. Any one who opposes you is ill-treated, knocked down and broken, or locked into a black hole in the dead of night.”
Judith, in spite of her exhaustion, was obliged to smile.
[Pg 202] “You see, I must do what I can for Jamie.”
“Always Jamie.”
“Yes, Captain Coppinger, always Jamie. He is helpless and must be thought for. I am mother, nurse, sister to him.” ”

“ Not Green Dragon or The Norreys King-at-Arms, or any other pontiff of pedigrees, could attach a higher importance to gentle blood than did little elderly Mary Twomey, elderly, but still as indomitably nimble and resolute as when in Frederica's childhood she would catch the donkey for her, and run after it, belabouring it in its rider's interest, for half an afternoon.
In spite of the fact that Miss Coppinger's youth had been spent, chiefly, in a town, the love of the country, ingrained during her first years, was merely dormant, and it revived with her return to Coppinger's Court. ”

“ Judith hesitated. He again looked up at her searchingly.
“If you really must know the truth, Captain Coppinger, papa thought your house was hardly one to which to send two children—it was said to harbor such wild folk.”
“And he did not know how fiercely and successfully you could defend yourself against wild folk,” said Coppinger, with a harsh laugh. “It is we wild men that must fear you, for you dash us about and bruise and break us when displeased with our ways. We are not so bad at the Glaze as we are painted, not by a half—here is my hand on it.” ”

“ The passage of extreme danger was over. From the point now reached the ledge widened, and Coppinger was able to creep onward with less stress laid on the fractured bones. The anguish of expectation of death was lightened; and as it lightened nature began to assert herself. His teeth chattered as in an ague fit, and his breath came in sobs.
In ten minutes he had attained the summit—he was on the down above the cliffs.
“Judith,” said he, and he kissed her cheeks and brow and hair. “For life—for death—mine, only mine.” ”

“ In the West of England every one is given his Christian name. An old man is Uncle, and an old woman Aunt, and any one in command is a Captain. So Coppinger was known as Captain Cruel, or as Cruel Coppinger.
Strange vessels were often seen appearing at regular intervals on the coast, and signals were flashed from the one window of Pentyre Glaze that looked out to sea.
Among these vessels, one, a full-rigged schooner, soon became ominously conspicuous. She was for long the terror of the Cornish coast. Her name was The Black Prince. ”

“ Moreover, Coppinger was well aware that his left arm had not recovered its strength. He could not trust her weight on that. He dare not trust it on his right arm, for to return by the way he came the right hand would be that which was toward the void. The principal weight must be thrown inward. ”

“ Coppinger looked at it, with a curl of his lips; then handed it back to Mr. Menaida.
"Why is it here?"
"I brought it here to show it her. I am very proud of my son," said Uncle Zachie.
Coppinger was in an irritable mood, captious about trifles. Why did he ask questions about this little picture? Why look suspiciously at Judith as he did so—suspiciously and threateningly?
"Do you play on the piano? " asked Coppinger. "When the evil spirit was on Saul, David struck the harp and sent the spirit away. ”

“ Coppinger reached the summit of the cliffs. His feet were on the down. He ran at once in the direction of Othello Cottage. His only chance of safety lay there. There he could hide in the attic, and Judith would never betray him. In his desperate condition, wounded, his blood flowing from him in streams, hunted by his foes, that one thought was in him—Judith—he must go to Judith. She would never betray him, she would be hacked to death rather than give him up. To Judith as his last refuge! ”

“ Coppinger was a man who had, all his life long, done what he willed, till his will had become in him the mainspring of his existence, and drove him to execute his purposes in disregard of reason, safety, justice, and opposition. ”

“ He came again to the fireplace and again leaned against the mantel-shelf. He was trembling with passion.
“And what if I say that, if you go, I will turn old Dunes—I mean your aunt—out of the house?”
“You will not say it, Mr. Coppinger; you are too noble, too generous, to take a mean revenge.” ”

“ Coppinger is plucky enough, and he has a good head on a height, but there is no getting over the fact that he is portly and nearer fifty than forty-five. So you can see he must have been pretty keen. Of course I went first each time, and got into the cave mouth, and did what I could to help him in; but when you have to walk down a vertical cliff face fly-fashion, with only a thin bootlace of a rope for support, it is not much real help the man below can give, except offer you his best wishes. ”

“ I cannot endure it, it curdles my heart—choose a girl who is indifferent.”
“You shall not be subjected to it,” said Coppinger, “and as to the girl you have sketched—I care not for her—such as you describe are to be found thick as whortle-berries on a moor. Do you not know that man seeks in marriage not his counterpart but his contrast? It is because you are in all things different from me that I love you.”
“Then will naught that I have said make you desist?”
“Naught.”
“I have told you that I take you only so as to be able to make a home for Jamie.” ”

“ But indeed, Captain Coppinger, you have made a great mistake in thinking of me. I am not suited to you to make you happy and content; any more than you are suited to me. Look out for some girl more fit to be your mate. ”

“ Coppinger knew this, and thought that now he was married an opportunity had come in this charity ball for the introduction of Judith to society, and that to the best society, and he trusted to her merits and beauty, and to his own influence with the gentlemen, to obtain for her admission to the houses of the neighborhood. ”

“ Judith loosened her arms, and with her right hand swept a space before her with the bunch of lavender. He should not approach her within arm's length; the lavender marked the limit beyond which he might not draw near.
"Now, hear me!" said Coppinger. "I have been too indulgent. I have humored you as a spoilt child. Because you willed this or that, I have submitted. But the time for humoring is over. I can endure this suspense no longer. Either you are my wife or you are not. ”

“ Larry Coppinger's up for this election, and I've told him to use this house, like his own, as much as he wants to," the Doctor stood up and took a pocket-book from the breast-pocket of his coat. "You're to make it agreeable for him to come here. Mind that! And more than agreeable! I'll think very little of you if you don't have him at your feet before you're done with him!" he went on, selecting something from among the papers in the pocket-book as he spoke. "There's not a girl in Ireland that wouldn't half hang herself for the chance you'll have! ”

“ Aunt Dunes could not understand the conduct of Coppinger toward Judith and her brother. Nor could she understand how a child like her niece could have faced and defied a man of whom she herself stood in abject fear. Judith had behaved to the smuggler in a way that no man in the whole countryside would have ventured to behave. She had thrown him at her feet, half killed him, and yet Cruel Coppinger did not resent what had been done; on the contrary, he went out of his way to interfere in the interest of the orphans. He was not the man to concern himself in other people’s affairs ”

“ Aunt Dionysia knew well enough that things went on in Pentyre Glaze that were not to be justified, that Coppinger's mode of life was not one calculated to make a girl of Judith's temperament happy, but—"Hoity-toity!" said Miss Trevisa to herself, "if girls marry, they must take men as they find them. Beggars must not be choosers. You must not look a gift horse in the mouth. No trout can be eaten apart from its bones, nor a rose plucked that is free from thorns." She herself had accommodated herself to the ways of the house, to the moods and manners of Coppinger ”

“ He is not very clever; he is easily led astray. There is no one to think for him, to care for him, but myself. I could never let him run the risk of such a thing happening again."
"Confound the boy!" burst forth Coppinger. "Are you going to bring him up as a milk-sop? You are wrong altogether in the way you manage him."
"I can but follow my conscience."
"And is it because of him that you go?"
"Not because of him only."
"But I have spoken to your aunt; she consents."
"But I do not," said Judith. ”

“ No man ever crossed me yet but was brought to bite the dust."
"He has not harmed you, Captain Coppinger."
"He! Can I endure that you should call him by his Christian name, while I am but Captain Coppinger? That you should seek him out, laugh, and talk, and flirt with him——"
"Captain Coppinger!"
"Yes," raged he, "always Captain Coppinger, or Captain Cruel, and he is dear Oliver! sweet Oliver!" He well-nigh suffocated in his fury.
Judith drew herself up and folded her arms. She had in one hand a sprig of lavender from which she had been shaking the over-ripe grains. She turned deadly white. ”