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data/Books/marip10.txt ADDED
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+ The Project Gutenberg EBook of Their Mariposa Legend, by Charlotte Herr
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+
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+ Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
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+ copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
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+ this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
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+
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+ This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project
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+ Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the
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+ header without written permission.
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+
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+ Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the
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+ eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is
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+ important information about your specific rights and restrictions in
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+ how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a
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+ donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
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+
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+
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+ **Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
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+
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+ **eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
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+
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+ *****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
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+
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+
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+ Title: Their Mariposa Legend
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+
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+ Author: Charlotte Herr
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+
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+ Release Date: February, 2004 [EBook #5196]
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+ [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
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+ [This file was first posted on June 3, 2002]
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+
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+ Edition: 10
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+
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+ Language: English
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+
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+ Character set encoding: ASCII
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+
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+ *** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THEIR MARIPOSA LEGEND ***
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+
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+
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+
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+
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+ This eBook was produced by David Schwan <davidsch@earthlink.net>.
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+
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+
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+
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+ Their Mariposa Legend
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+
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+ A Romance of Santa Catalina
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+
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+
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+
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+ By Charlotte Herr
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+
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+
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+
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+
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+ To Little Bruce Parker
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+ Who Loved Stories
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+
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+
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+
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+ Part I
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+
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+
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+
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+ Sir Francis Starts It
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+
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+
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+
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+ It began to happen a long time ago, centuries ago, when, in a fragrant
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+ rush of rain, spring came one day to Punagwandah, fairest of the Channel
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+ Islands. Beneath the golden mists of sunrise danced a radiant sea. On
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+ steeply sloping hillsides where thickets of wild lilac bloomed, the lark
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+ shook from his tiny throat a tumult of glad music. In shadowed niches of
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+ the canyons lilies waited to fill with light their gleaming ivory cups.
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+ Spring in very truth was there.
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+
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+ And looking down upon it from her cavern bower high above the beach,
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+ watched the Princess Wildenai. Kneeling there, the light of dawn shining
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+ on her long black hair, she was, herself, the sweetest blossom of the
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+ spring. Loveliest was she among all the maidens of the Mariposa and of
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+ royal blood besides; although of this the great chief Torquam, who even
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+ at that moment lay sleeping in his lodge of deerskin on the crescent
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+ beach below, knew more than he had ever told.
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+
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+ With eyes rapt, her breath scarcely stirring the folds of softest
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+ fawnskin drawn across her breast, the princess bent her gaze to where
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+ the waves ran silver on the ocean's distant rim. There she knew the sun
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+ must rise and, as the first dazzling ray sparkled across the water, she
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+ rose slowly until she stood erect, a slender, graceful figure against
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+ the dim, gray rocks, and stretching her arms toward the East, spoke in
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+ the musical words of her people.
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+
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+ "Oh, Waken-ate, great spirit-father," she pleaded, "have mercy on me.
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+ Grant to me, thy humble daughter, one only boon. Grant, I pray thee,
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+ that it need not be I wed with Torquam's friend, the pale-face stranger.
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+ Well knowest thou I would not disobey my father, him the bravest and
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+ most powerful of all thy warriors, him whom his people delight to honor,
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+ and whom I strive to please. All the more I feel my duty since, many
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+ moons ago, they laid my mother underneath the flowers. Yet, even so, I
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+ cannot find it in my heart to wed with Don Cabrillo, dearly as does my
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+ father wish it. Can'st thou not then, in thy great power, turn his
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+ heart, oh lord of spirits, that he no longer may desire it? Help me in
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+ this, my only trial, I pray thee, and in all else will I be indeed his
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+ loyal daughter, - in all else save alone in this one thing!"
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+
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+ Her arms fell. Slowly she sank again to her knees, bending her head
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+ until her forehead touched the ground. For many minutes she lay thus
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+ prostrate while the glory of the rising sun bathed the sea in splendor.
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+ Yet, when at last she rose, her eyes were dim with tears.
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+
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+ But now from the beach below there drifted up to her the sounds of a
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+ village astir. Shrill voices of women mingled with the crackling of
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+ freshly kindled fires. A canoe, pushed hastily into the water, grated
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+ harshly on the pebbles. Still the maiden did not stir. Leaning against
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+ the rocky ledge, her chin in her hands, she gazed listlessly out over
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+ the shining sea. If any interests lived for her among the dark-skinned
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+ people beneath the cliffs, for the moment at least she gave no sign.
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+
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+ Then, suddenly, above the ordinary din of the Indian village, rose the
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+ hoarse shouting of men. Wildenai lifted her eyes, - eyes that widened
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+ first with wonder, then with fear. For there, far down the shoreline to
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+ the south, her sails gleaming white against the walls of rock behind her
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+ as she rounded a distant point, a ship came slowly into view. With
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+ wildly beating heart the young girl watched the vessel tack to clear the
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+ long curve of the coast. But once before in all her life had she seen
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+ such another monster winged canoe, and that had been when Senor Don
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+ Cabrillo first cast anchor in the Bay of Moons below, now almost a year
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+ ago. For many a week had the young man lingered, renewing the friendship
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+ with the Mariposa cemented more than eighteen years before when his
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+ father, hindered by storms in his adventurous journey up the coast, cast
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+ anchor off the shore, - the first white man to see their island. Nor was
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+ the lingering without result. Torquam he taught to speak the Spanish
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+ tongue, learning in his turn safer and easier routes to the gold fields
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+ of the north, while not the least among the treasures carried with him
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+ when at last he sailed away did he hold the promise that the beautiful
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+ daughter of the chief should become his bride when next he touched upon
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+ that shore. Could this, then, be the Spaniard's fleet returning? Was the
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+ Great Spirit powerless, after all, to save her? In sore bewilderment and
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+ terror Wildenai watched the distant ship.
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+
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+ Nearer and nearer it came. But, as its outline grew each moment more
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+ distinct, gradually her fears departed. For this was not the clumsy
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+ Spanish galleon she remembered. The prow was not nearly so high, nor was
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+ the incoming vessel as large in any respect as had been that other. Yet,
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+ though fear died, wonder grew. What new variety of strangers, then, was
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+ about to visit them? For that the ship intended to anchor she was by
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+ this time sure. Steadily it bore on until within a scant half mile of
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+ the crescent shaped beach where lay the royal village of the tribe. At
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+ length, as if in fear to trust themselves closer to the rocky shore, the
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+ crew were seen to bring the vessel sharply about. An anchor was cast
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+ over, the creaking of the hawsers distinctly audible in the clear
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+ morning air, and a few moments later a small boat was lowered. Into this
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+ boat immediately several sailors swung themselves and after a short
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+ delay, amidst the shouting of the Indians, now running in wild
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+ excitement up and down the beach, the men picked up their oars and
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+ started for the land.
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+
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+ "Alla-hoa, Wildenai!"
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+
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+ Up the stony trail leading to her cavern scrambled an Indian runner, a
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+ lithe youth who flung himself breathless at her feet.
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+
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+ "Thy father, oh princess, sends me to summon thee to his lodge.
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+ Strangers, - paleface strangers, - enemies, who can tell, are coming.
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+ See, - the ship!" With dark forefinger he pointed toward the sea.
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+ "Torquam would have thee hide with the rest of the women in the cave at
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+ the Great Rock. There Kathah-galwa wilt keep thee safe, he says. Make
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+ haste, oh Wildenai!"
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+
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+ "And am I not as safe up here?" returned the princess, calmly. "Be not
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+ so lost in thy terror, oh Norqua. I, too, have seen the ship and I fear
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+ not. Yet will I obey if so my father bids," she added quickly. "Go thou
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+ ahead. I follow." And hastily gathering together some reeds and colored
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+ grasses lying on the ledge, parts of an unfinished basket upon which,
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+ evidently, she had during some previous visit been at work, she flung
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+ them into a corner of the cavern and ran lightly down the narrow path
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+ leading to the village.
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+
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+ Here all by this time was tense excitement, the dramatic, ungoverned
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+ excitement of children. While with shrill cries two or three of the
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+ women gathered the little ones together, the rest pulled frantically at
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+ the poles holding each tepee in place. Still apparently quite unmoved,
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+ Wildenai sought first her father standing surprised but unafraid in the
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+ doorway of his lodge. Tall and spare and stern he looked, straight as
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+ some lonely pine on the slopes of distant San Jacinto. Yet even in the
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+ stress of such a moment a tender light stole into his eyes as they
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+ rested upon his motherless daughter.
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+
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+ Wildenai made obeisance and for a brief moment the two surveyed each
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+ other in silence. Then,
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+
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+ "It is well thou art come, my beloved one," spoke the chief. "Stranger
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+ pale-faces will soon be amongst us."
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+
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+ "Wildenai feels no fear, my father," quietly answered the girl.
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+
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+ "If they come in friendship," quickly Torquam replied, "then indeed may
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+ all be well. But the ship is not of the Senor's fleet, and if so be that
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+ we must fight, thou wert better hidden in the cave. We shall see."
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+
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+ Bending her head in mute acquiescence the girl moved away to join the
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+ group of women now almost ready to depart.
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+
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+
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+
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+ Meantime the vessel's long boat, driven onward by the stout arms of
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+ three strong sailors, steadily approached the bay.
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+
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+ "What think'st thou then, Rufus Broadmead, of this fool's errand to the
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+ savages?" inquired one of these, resting upon his oars for a moment that
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+ he might the better listen to the tumult on the shore. "Wot ye not that
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+ if water had been the only boon he craves the captain had fared much
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+ better on the mainland? Besides, did not I myself overhear the Apache
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+ only yesterday tell him of a certainty that the tribes over there were
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+ away on the warpath? But no, by the mass, here must we risk our precious
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+ scalps to row into the very teeth of the heathen, and that to humor the
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+ whim of as obstinate an Englishman as ever sailed aboard Her Majesty's
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+ fleets!" and without awaiting any reply he lowered his oars in disgust.
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+
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+ The others laughed.
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+
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+ "Hast been, then, so stupid, brother Giles, for all thy listening with
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+ thy big ears, as not to know 'tis Spanish treasure ever and naught else
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+ our captain seeks? Water, - pouf!" the speaker made a rough grimace,
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+ "water may well serve as an excuse, and what to bold Sir Francis were
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+ the lives of half a dozen seamen when booty for the queen lies in the
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+ balance? The Apache told him, too, - thou see'st thou hast not played
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+ the listening game alone, for, hiding behind the fo'castle door myself,
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+ I heard him say it, - that here lay that famous island, San - how is't
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+ they call it? San Catlina - I know not how 'tis spoken, - some Spanish
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+ lingo not fit for English tongues! At any rate 'twas here your Spanish
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+ robber, Don Cabrillo, and, for the matter of that, his precious son as
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+ well, stopped to seek direction ere they found the land of gold. The
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+ savage sware besides they were a gentle tribe, not given to war and
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+ murder like the rest. I hearkened well, forsooth, knowing past doubt I
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+ would be een one o' those chosen to try 'em out. The devil take the
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+ Apache an he lied," he added fiercely, "I'll break his head across till
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+ even he shrieks out for help when I get back!"
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+
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+ He paused to gaze fearfully at the stern cliffs now looming close at
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+ hand, beneath which the excited natives still ran back and forth,
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+ pointing with frantic gestures at the boat.
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+
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+ The third man spoke. He was smaller than the other two and darker, with
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+ a sly look about his eyes and mouth in strong contrast to the bluff
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+ frankness of his comrades. So far he had appeared content to listen in
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+ amused silence, but now with a short laugh he interrupted.
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+
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+ "The Apache did not lie. This is the island Santa Catalina, though that,
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+ mark you, is not the Indian name. And right well can the chief who rules
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+ here direct our captain also to the goldfields of the north. But
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+ hearkee, comrades. 'Tis not Drake will reap the profits this time!" He
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+ lowered his voice mysteriously as though fearful of being overheard,
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+ albeit nothing was nearer than his two companions and the clear, green
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+ stretch of water. "Have ye not observed the boy who travels with the
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+ captain? - the boy I serve, - the one they call Sir Harry? To my mind,
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+ cub though he be, 'tis he who rules the ship. Hast never noticed how the
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+ great Drake himself bends to his slightest wish?"
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+
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+ "Aye, marry, that have I! And who, then, is he, think'st thou?" inquired
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+ the man who had spoken first.
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+
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+ "Some close kin to the queen, - that much I know," the other answered
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+ quickly, "the heir to some great dukedom, mayhap, in disguise to see the
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+ world and make a fortune. 'Tis his desire we land, so much he told me,
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+ and 'tis to learn more than directions, my hearties, and that I'll
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+ warrant ye! But, look ye, the water grows too shallow! We can use the
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+ oars no longer."
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+
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+ And even as he spoke the boat grated upon the pebbles. An incoming
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+ breaker would have carried it ashore, but before the sailors could take
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+ advantage of this help or even so much as ship their oars, half a dozen
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+ swarthy youths had waded out and, with shouts and gestures, whether of
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+ welcome or hostility the Englishmen had no means of knowing, pushed it
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+ high upon the beach. At once, then, for well they realized the danger of
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+ delay, and with a stolid courage born of many a like adventure, the
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+ seamen leaped fearlessly out upon the sand. In their hands they held
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+ aloft bolts of brightly colored cloth snatched on the instant from the
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+ bottom of the boat. These they offered for the wondering inspection of
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+ the women who, observing the small number of invaders, were cautiously
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+ returning. To the warriors grouped about the chief they proffered knives
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+ of which the steel blades, set in strong handles of bone, glistened in
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+ the sun. Eagerly, yet with a certain unexpected formality, the men
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+ accepted these, passing them for examination from one to another with
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+ many a grunt of satisfaction. To be sure, no brave among them but might
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+ the next moment decide to try out the merits of his gift upon the
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+ bestower, but this danger the adventurers had to risk. More timidly the
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+ women, their eyes fixed wistfully upon the gaudy red and yellow cloth,
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+ approached the strangers, offering in their turn bits of abalone shell
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+ polished to iridescent beauty.
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+
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+ They seemed in truth a gentle, friendly people, so much so that at
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+ length the sailors, deeming it safe to undertake the second part of
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+ their errand, began to plead for water and to request, besides, an
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+ interview between their captain and the chief. All this by means of
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+ signs in which they displayed no little wit and skill, the Englishmen
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+ accomplished until, well on toward the middle of the morning, they made
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+ ready to return to the ship, the casks they had brought brimming with
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+ sweet mountain water, while with them they bore as well the promise of
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+ an interview of state between the great chief Torquam and Sir Francis
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+ Drake, to take place upon the beach at sunset.
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+
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+ And then at once the little village of Toyobet seethed again with
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+ excitement. For these good paleface friends and their god-like commander
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+ a fitting welcome must be prepared. Fleet-footed messengers, bearing
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+ flaming torches, sped in hot haste along the mountain trails that all
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+ who saw might know without words spoken of the assembling of the tribe.
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+ To the distant village at the isthmus they hurried, and to the cove on
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+ the western coast, some twenty miles away, to which a band of warriors
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+ had gone several days before to hunt the otter. That no one among his
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+ people might remain in ignorance of his command, Torquam even caused
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+ signal fires to be kindled on each of the twin peaks, extinct volcanoes,
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+ near the center of the island. Smoke rising there was visible from every
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+ corner of his land, and woe to any subject who dared to disregard that
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+ warning!
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+
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+ Throughout the long bright day the women toiled, preparing a ceremonial
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+ feast. Three antelope, a deer, and half a dozen of the wild sheep which
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+ roamed the hills were killed and placed for roasting over deep pits dug
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+ in the sand. Nor did any member of the tribe forget in his own crude
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+ fashion to deck himself for the occasion. The warriors adorned their
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+ heads with feathers and daubed their cheeks and lips with ochre. The
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+ women clothed themselves in loose-hanging tunics of doeskin girt with
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+ strings of wampum, and hung about their tawny shoulders the lovely
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+ greens and blues of uncut turquoise. Meanwhile, also, the great chief
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+ Torquam donned his ceremonial dress, a string of eagle feathers held by
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+ the crimsoned quills of the porcupine and extending down his back until
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+ almost it touched the ground. About his neck, as token of his
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+ priesthood, he threw the bear-claw necklace, known far and wide among
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+ the tribes for its famous powers of healing. Wildenai alone made no
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+ change except to bind the satin black of her hair still more smoothly
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+ within a fillet of silver. In the center of the band, so that it rested
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+ just above her brow, a strange device appeared, a circle enclosing many
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+ rays, - the royal insignia of the tribe which only the daughter of the
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+ chief might wear.
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+
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+
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+
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+ Then at last when, in the sunset, level rays of light rested golden on
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+ the bay and turned to amethyst the distant mountains on the mainland,
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+ all was ready. Once again, this time to the weird music of tom-toms and
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+ the beating of drums, a boat was lowered from the ship while on the
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+ shore the Indians watched.
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+
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+ It was in truth a picture not soon to be forgotten. Behind the mirrored
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+ Bay of Moons, its crescent of sand gleaming white against the rocks, the
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+ bands of dusky men and women stood motionless as statues in the quiet
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+ light of the setting sun, while in the doorway of his lodge, his
352
+ daughter close beside him, Torquam waited with simple dignity to receive
353
+ his guests, the fair-skinned strangers.
354
+
355
+ At length along the beach advanced the little group of English, friends
356
+ and fellow adventurers with the most renowned of all their great queen's
357
+ buccaneers. Beside Sir Francis himself marched young Harold of Wessex,
358
+ little more than a boy in years, yet dreaded and feared in his own land
359
+ even then - a possible heir to Elizabeth's throne. Some short distance
360
+ in front of these two, standard bearers carried the flags of Merry
361
+ England, each glorious with fringes and tassels of gold. Well might such
362
+ banners dazzle the eyes and wits of simple savages.
363
+
364
+ Yet, possibly, for all that, had it not been for the lengthy ceremonial
365
+ of the peace-pipe, Wildenai could not have taken time to observe so
366
+ closely, in stolen glances from beneath her long black lashes, the
367
+ splendor of the young noble standing proudly erect beside his captain;
368
+ nor could he have stared so often, with no attempt to hide his
369
+ admiration, at the dark beauty of the princess.
370
+
371
+ Perhaps, too, if fate had not contrived to place them side by side at
372
+ the feast which followed, young Harold might never have discovered that
373
+ an Indian girl, however beautiful, possessed the wit to learn a foreign
374
+ language. Yet it was certainly Spanish and that well spoken in which, at
375
+ length, she softly asked of her father a question intended obviously for
376
+ himself.
377
+
378
+ Under cover of one of the Indian dances with which, from time to time,
379
+ the feast was enlivened, he leaned impulsively toward her.
380
+
381
+ "Can'st speak the Spanish tongue?" he hastily inquired.
382
+
383
+ The princess dropped her eyes. For a moment she remained silent as if
384
+ debating to what extent such boldness might involve her. Then, with a
385
+ glance as shy as if some deer gazed at him startled from the thicket,
386
+
387
+ "Yes, mon senor," she answered simply. "I learned it when Don Cabrillo
388
+ came to Punagwandah many moons ago."
389
+
390
+ After that it was only that one thing led to another, as was sometimes
391
+ true of men and maidens even in the days so long gone by. For, as if by
392
+ common consent, then, they drew a little apart from the rest, where,
393
+ throwing himself on the sand beside her while the firelight threw
394
+ flickering shadows among the rocks, the young man related fragments of
395
+ his story, - of the long journey across the sea, something of his home
396
+ in England, and of the brilliant court of the great queen wherein he had
397
+ served as gentleman-in-waiting. So had he served, yet soon, but here her
398
+ guest had suddenly flushed and paused as though he spoke too hastily or
399
+ of what he should not. To all of it the princess listened with
400
+ fast-beating heart and a desire, ever growing, to make herself a place
401
+ in this splendid stranger's world. Was not she then, also, the daughter
402
+ of a king? Yet how different and how unimportant beside that wonderful
403
+ woman of whom he spoke! For father she boasted the great chief Torquam,
404
+ feared by every tribe in the north and rich because of the gold hidden
405
+ in many a canyon among the distant mountains; yet her woman's instinct
406
+ told her that to this proud Englishman her people were at best little
407
+ more than a curiosity, almost, indeed, a cause for laughter.
408
+
409
+ When at last the feast was finished, Torquam rose, and removing with
410
+ slow solemnity his crest of eagle feathers, he placed it upon the head
411
+ of Sir Francis, a seal of everlasting friendship. With difficulty young
412
+ Harold suppressed a smile. But the older man, as well aware of what the
413
+ situation demanded as he was keenly alive to its danger, received the
414
+ attention with a gravity fully equal to that of his host. Indeed, he
415
+ went still further.
416
+
417
+ "Most gracious hast thou been, oh Torquam, all wise chief of the
418
+ Mariposa," he began in carefully chosen Spanish, "nor shall thy kingly
419
+ gift remain unrequited. Listen, oh Torquam! On yonder vessel I carry
420
+ steeds like those of which I told you. For a journey over the mountains
421
+ of the north we have brought them. One there is, swifter of foot than
422
+ all the rest. Him will I cause my men to lower into the boat and bring
423
+ to you after our return tonight."
424
+
425
+ In silence Torquam inclined his head. Nothing could have pleased him
426
+ more. He would be the first then, of all his tribe to own one of those
427
+ strange yet wondrous creatures never before seen in his world until the
428
+ Spanish landed! Yet only the eager gleam in his eyes betrayed his
429
+ pleasure. But Harold of Wessex stared at his captain in blank
430
+ astonishment, for the gift he had just bestowed with such apparent
431
+ carelessness was the most valuable bit of cargo in the ship, a costly
432
+ Arabian horse intended for the young noble's own special comfort and
433
+ convenience during the search for gold on which they were bound. Was
434
+ Drake gone suddenly mad, then, thus to throw away, and that without
435
+ permission, his choicest property on a mere savage? Hot with resentment
436
+ he was about to interfere; but before he could obey the rash impulse his
437
+ better judgment prevailed, and just in time he remembered how, on
438
+ several other such occasions, his very life had been saved by some swift
439
+ expedient of Drake's and his tact in handling the natives.
440
+
441
+ Slowly Sir Francis continued, and now one watching intently might have
442
+ sensed from the gleam in his eyes that he had reached the real point in
443
+ the interview.
444
+
445
+ "One question, nevertheless, would I ask of all-wise Torquam before we
446
+ part." He hesitated, searching the impassive face of the Indian. "Can'st
447
+ tell me of a Spaniard, one Cabrillo, son to that arch pirate of Spain,
448
+ who, since his father's death, still sails upon these waters? To him I
449
+ bear a message," - again he paused while the heart of Wildenai beat in
450
+ sudden panic beneath her fawnskin tunic; but Torquam's face remained
451
+ blank as a page unwritten, - "a message from our queen," added Drake.
452
+ The last words were uttered with significance.
453
+
454
+ The Indian slowly shook his head.
455
+
456
+ "The noble white chief asks what is unknown to any man," he answered.
457
+ "The young Cabrillo once landed, 'tis true, on Punagwandah. Many moons
458
+ ago it was. Where he is now, how should Torquam know?"
459
+
460
+ In his bitter disappointment the hand of the Englishman sought the hilt
461
+ of his sword. Instantly a ring of warriors closed darkly about the
462
+ chief.
463
+
464
+ Drake laughed.
465
+
466
+ "Nay then, 'tis but by chance I asked thee, thinking thou mightst tell
467
+ me. It matters not. The gift I promised thee will come, as I said,
468
+ tonight."
469
+
470
+ He turned to go and young Harold rose to follow. Then, perceiving the
471
+ dark eyes of the princess fixed wistfully upon him, he hesitated and,
472
+ obeying a sudden impulse, he stepped hastily to her side.
473
+
474
+ "When they return with the gift for thy father," he whispered, "I will
475
+ come with them," he smiled into her soft eyes shining with pleased
476
+ surprise, "and I will bring a gift to thee as well, oh Wildenai, fairest
477
+ of maidens!"
478
+
479
+ Drake gave a sharp command. His followers sprang to their feet, and
480
+ without further ceremony the party passed quickly down the beach to
481
+ their boat.
482
+
483
+ But the princess Wildenai did not leave the feasting ground. Hidden by
484
+ deepening shadows she watched the ship's lights glimmer across the
485
+ water. Glad indeed was she of the darkness, for a warm flush glowed in
486
+ her cheeks and her heart throbbed with a strange new pleasure, a
487
+ pleasure bordering close on fear, yet wholly sweet.
488
+
489
+ But when, at length, the quiet of sleep had descended upon the village,
490
+ once again she sought her father. He, too, within the open doorway of
491
+ his lodge, watched intently the distant ship. Without surprise he saw
492
+ his daughter enter and, as she knelt upon the blanket beside him, he
493
+ stretched a hand and drew her close.
494
+
495
+ "It grows cold. The wind is rising. 'Twere best to wait inside." He
496
+ spoke in the musical Indian tongue. For a moment he stroked her hair in
497
+ silence, then -
498
+
499
+ "What think'st thou by now of the English, Wildenai, my little wild
500
+ rose?" he asked.
501
+
502
+ But the princess seemed not to have heard his question.
503
+
504
+ "My father," she began after another short silence, "I have a favor to
505
+ ask of thee."
506
+
507
+ "And what may that be, my daughter?" he returned gravely.
508
+
509
+ But again the young girl made no answer and for many minutes they
510
+ watched the tremulous paths of light in the wake of the vessel.
511
+
512
+ After a time he felt her hand tighten upon his arm.
513
+
514
+ "It is but the old boon over again, my father." Her voice was low as the
515
+ sighing of the wind among the oak trees. "I would be freed from my
516
+ promise to wed with Don Cabrillo."
517
+
518
+ An Indian is not given to caresses. Much more used was Torquam's hand to
519
+ wield the war-club or the hatchet. Yet it was with fingers gentle as any
520
+ woman's that he stroked the smooth black head at his knee.
521
+
522
+ "Doubtest thou then, my motherless one, the judgment of him who loves
523
+ thee?" he asked.
524
+
525
+ "I doubt it not, my father," answered his daughter. "Yet would I not wed
526
+ with the Spaniard," she added stubbornly.
527
+
528
+ "The blue-eyed senor from England" - there was a hint of humor in his
529
+ tone, - "he it is who steals thy fancy! Is it not so, my Wildenai?"
530
+
531
+ Then, after a moment: "Right well knowest thou my only wish is to make
532
+ thee happy." Again his voice, though gentle, grew serious almost to
533
+ sadness. "No mere whim it is that counsels me to wed thee to Cabrillo.
534
+ "There is something - " He paused, continuing with effort, - "a reason I
535
+ have never told thee why it seems most fitting. Now I will tell thee.
536
+ That reason is because, because, my Wildenai, thou art Spanish born
537
+ thyself."
538
+
539
+ The princess drew a hasty breath. In the darkness he felt rather than
540
+ saw her startled eyes upon him.
541
+
542
+ "My father!" The exclamation, filled with pain as well as astonishment,
543
+ touched him to the quick. Tenderly he drew her to him. Then briefly, as
544
+ was the Indian way, yet with the pictured phrasing which caused each
545
+ scene to spring into vivid life before the young girl's eyes, he told
546
+ her of the day, already more than eighteen years gone by, when, in the
547
+ wake of a long midwinter storm, the first sailing vessel ever beheld by
548
+ his people had fled for refuge to their bay; and of the little girl
549
+ carefully brought to shore by her old nurse in the first boat to touch
550
+ the beach. A mere baby she was, too young to know aught of her
551
+ misfortune, yet a princess royal, rudely dispossessed of her right to
552
+ the throne of Spain, and smuggled aboard the adventurer Cabrillo's ship
553
+ to be dropped in some out-of-the-way corner of the western world. Even
554
+ then, he made it clear, she might have perished, - since little recked
555
+ the Spanish explorer what should happen, well knowing that upon his
556
+ return no questions would be asked, - had it not been for his Indian
557
+ wife. She, lacking children of her own, had taken an instant fancy to
558
+ the dark-eyed little girl, a fancy so strong that nothing would do but
559
+ they must adopt her as their own daughter into the tribe to belong
560
+ forever, according to their law, she and her children, to the Mariposa.
561
+
562
+ "Nor, because thy mother - for ever was she a true mother to thee -
563
+ thought that it might grieve thee, have any of my people ever given thee
564
+ cause to doubt that thou wert native born," he finished proudly. "Loyal
565
+ have they been, doing all they could to make thee happy. But now that
566
+ thy Indian mother is dead, and I myself grow old, I thought to wed thee,
567
+ knowing his desire, to the son of that same Cabrillo who brought thee to
568
+ us, for I long to be sure, when at length I go, that thou art safe, - at
569
+ home."
570
+
571
+ He waited then and in the silence only the low weeping of the girl was
572
+ heard. At length the old chief spoke again, and now in his voice love
573
+ conquered disappointment.
574
+
575
+ "Much do I desire it, but that matters not. I would not have thee
576
+ unhappy. I myself will tell the senor that what he hopes for cannot be."
577
+
578
+ Slowly Wildenai bent her head until it touched his feet. Then she
579
+ nestled close against him.
580
+
581
+ "I thank thee, oh my father!" she cried, and all her voice was music
582
+ because of her joy. "And thou art still my father," she added,
583
+ earnestly. "What care I to go to Spain? I will stay always with thee."
584
+
585
+ "For a time, it may be. Yet have a care, little wild rose," he
586
+ cautioned, smiling, "Let not the Englishman lure thee away! He, too, may
587
+ not be all that thou thinkest."
588
+
589
+ And even as he spoke, in mocking confirmation of his words, there came
590
+ to them suddenly from across the water, the distant creaking of ropes,
591
+ the snapping of sails flung hastily to the wind. Before their
592
+ unbelieving eyes the vessel swung about and put slowly out to sea. Dumb
593
+ with amazement they watched until the last faint light flickered into
594
+ darkness. Not until the remotest chance of a mistake was past did the
595
+ old chief rise, trembling with rage, to his feet.
596
+
597
+ "See'st thou now what I meant, my daughter? The English pale-faces know
598
+ not the meaning of honor, - no, nor of gratitude either!"
599
+
600
+ He lifted his long spear from the ground and shook it fiercely.
601
+
602
+ "The words of the Mariposa are few," he cried, "but their revenge is
603
+ sure. Let but an Englishman set foot again on Punagwandah and, swifter
604
+ than the arrow leaves the bowstring, he dies!"
605
+
606
+ And at once, without answer, in the silence of suffering which only the
607
+ wild things of the earth understand, Wildenai crept from the lodge, her
608
+ heart heavy with its own bitter disappointment. Noiselessly she passed
609
+ among the tepees where her father's people slept. Not one of them should
610
+ ever know how far dwelt slumber from her own eyes that night. Up the
611
+ steep trail beyond the Bay of Moons she climbed and flung herself
612
+ weeping on the bed of skins within the cavern.
613
+
614
+ "Oh, thou false one," she moaned, "why did'st thou promise then, when
615
+ never did'st thou mean to keep it?"
616
+
617
+
618
+
619
+ Yet nothing had been farther from the young Englishman's thoughts when
620
+ he left her than faithlessness to his word. On reaching the ship again
621
+ he had gone directly to his cabin. Here he took from its small but
622
+ richly embroidered case a slender chain of gold, threaded so closely
623
+ with garnets that even in the dim light of the one flaring lantern, the
624
+ only illumination the room could boast, it glowed, a glancing stream of
625
+ crimson, in his hand. This he carried to the light and as he examined it
626
+ under the lantern he smiled.
627
+
628
+ "Never saw the little maid such jewels before, I'll warrant me! Yet,
629
+ beshrew my heart, but she deserves them. Indian though she be, still is
630
+ she, nevertheless, the loveliest woman that ever mine eyes have looked
631
+ upon!"
632
+
633
+ Then, stowing the necklace carefully away in his belt, he went at once
634
+ in search of the commander.
635
+
636
+ But at this point an unexpected difficulty had presented itself. He
637
+ found Sir Francis in close conversation with his pilot.
638
+
639
+ "Marry, Sir, an it fit n'er so ill with thy wish," the keen-eyed old
640
+ mariner was saying. "I still maintain it were a shame to lose this wind.
641
+ Gift or no gift, I've sailed these latitudes before, my lord, and by
642
+ heaven I swear we're not like to have such another breeze, no, not till
643
+ the change of the moon, and that you know yourself, sir, is a good
644
+ fortnight hence."
645
+
646
+ Sir Francis, striding back and forth within the narrow confines of the
647
+ quarter deck, appeared to be weighing the old man's words with unusual
648
+ care. At length, however, he turned as one who has made his decision.
649
+
650
+ "By the mass and it shall be even as you say, Jarvis," he declared. "I
651
+ think myself 'twere well to push on at once. At the most they be but
652
+ Indians!" The last words were spoken in a lower tone as if to himself.
653
+ "'Twill matter little either way!"
654
+
655
+ It was at this point that young Harold stepped hastily forward. For,
656
+ strangely enough, although on the morning of that same day such a
657
+ proceeding would scarcely have appealed to him as being at all unfitting
658
+ or out of the ordinary, yet now it seemed unthinkable.
659
+
660
+ "But, good sir," he interrupted, "you would not so belie your promise!
661
+ To do as Jarvis here advises, - by heaven, 'twould be neither truthful
662
+ nor honorable! 'Tis not like you, Sir Francis!"
663
+
664
+ Drake shot at him a surprised glance from under his bushy eyebrows, then
665
+ shrugged his shoulders.
666
+
667
+ "Prate not to me, my lord, of truth or honor amongst these savages," he
668
+ replied. "Did not their chief himself but even now lie to me? Well knew
669
+ the rascally heathen where the Spaniard hides! The truth indeed! They
670
+ know not the meaning of such words."
671
+
672
+ In vain the younger man petitioned to be allowed to deliver the promised
673
+ gift with the aid of his own retinue.
674
+
675
+ "Thou can'st not get under way for two hours at best, sir," he pleaded,
676
+ "and well within that time I will be back. 'Tis but a stone's throw to
677
+ the shore!"
678
+
679
+ But Drake first scoffed at his rashness, then, finally losing patience,
680
+ as commander of the expedition he sternly forbade him or any of his men
681
+ to leave the ship.
682
+
683
+ "We dare not lose the wind," he finished emphatically, "and are like to
684
+ start at any minute." Then, turning on his heel, he strode away to his
685
+ cabin and shut the door behind him.
686
+
687
+ Left in this unceremonious fashion, young Harold considered a moment,
688
+ glancing with anxious eyes at the dim line of the coast just visible in
689
+ the darkness. For some minutes he leaned upon the rail, lost in thought.
690
+
691
+ "The old man will e'en have to bear his disappointment," he muttered at
692
+ length, "but, an' heaven help me, the maid shall not!"
693
+
694
+ Then he, too, left the deck to seek out his favorite retainer, the dark,
695
+ swarthy man who had sat that morning in the prow of the long boat. To
696
+ him he explained his difficulty, adding grimly:
697
+
698
+ "And so thou see'st, Mortimer, that I have work cut out for thee!"
699
+
700
+ He threw an arm about the other's shoulders and in this familiar fashion
701
+ the two men paced the deck together, conversing in low tones.
702
+
703
+ "And besides," observed the nobleman as they paused a moment before
704
+ parting, "would'st know the truth about the matter? For all old Jarvis'
705
+ prating, the Golden Hind is not like to sail before the dawn, no, nor
706
+ even then! Jarvis is ever the man to make a show of much hurry, but - "
707
+ he snapped his fingers scornfully, "only aid me now, unseen by anyone,
708
+ to launch the Zephir, and by our virgin queen herself I swear, when once
709
+ again we see the shores of Merry England, thou shalt find 'twas well
710
+ worth thy trouble."
711
+
712
+ His companion smiled even while, with the trained servility of the
713
+ retainer, he doffed his cap.
714
+
715
+ "Aye, truly, my lord," he answered, "but, since it were an impossible
716
+ feat to get so much as a colt into the Zephir, methinks thou hast a gift
717
+ of thine own to bestow on yonder pretty Indian maid!"
718
+
719
+ The blood leaped to Sir Harry's cheek. With a quick gesture he placed
720
+ his hand upon his sword.
721
+
722
+ "Presume not upon my favor, Mortimer, or by heaven! - " he began
723
+ angrily, but stopped suddenly as, with a fearless laugh, the man beside
724
+ him pushed the half-drawn weapon back into its place.
725
+
726
+ "Nay then, not so fast, my lord," he chuckled gaily. "Hearkee, my
727
+ master. I did but use my eyes during their everlasting pow-wow. Surely
728
+ ye would not grudge me that! And the maid is comely, well worth a
729
+ trinket from thy store. Besides," he laughed slyly, "I saw e'en more to
730
+ thine interest, for methinks the princess is as much in love with thy
731
+ looks as art thou with hers."
732
+
733
+ "Silence, fool! Thou hast said more than enough already. Think'st thou
734
+ the son of a duke royal would look at a brown-skinned savage, an
735
+ unbelieving pagan, no matter how comely, as thou call'st it, she might
736
+ be!"
737
+
738
+ But the flush remained, nevertheless, on the dark cheek of the young
739
+ nobleman as he strode angrily from the deck.
740
+
741
+
742
+
743
+ The moonlight had laid a quivering path of light across the water before
744
+ Wildenai raised her bowed head from the ground. But, at length, drawing
745
+ her blanket more closely about her, for into the night air the chill of
746
+ the ocean had crept, she was about to leave the cave when a sudden sound
747
+ from the beach below arrested her. For a moment she listened in silence
748
+ while the shout was repeated, then stood dumb with amazement. A third
749
+ time it came to her, borne on the rising wind, the terrified cry of a
750
+ man in dire distress. Nor was it one of her own people who thus called
751
+ out of the darkness for help. Swiftly she ran to an overhanging ledge of
752
+ rock from which, by lying flat and peeping over, she could, without
753
+ exposing herself, command a wide view of the sea.
754
+
755
+ At the first glance there appeared to be nothing amiss. Far beneath her
756
+ the noisy breakers spilled in liquid silver on the beach. Above their
757
+ musical booming no other sound could be heard. Then suddenly she saw
758
+ him. A tiny boat it was, tossing dangerously close to the great rounded
759
+ boulder which, together with a still larger one from which it had at
760
+ some distant time been broken off, formed the outermost boundary of the
761
+ curving Beach of Moons. The dark figure standing erect in the boat
762
+ strove with the aid of an oar to keep it from being dashed to pieces
763
+ against the giant rock. Again there floated up to her the desperate call
764
+ for help. The voice was that of the English noble!
765
+
766
+ Instantly the girl sprang to her feet, and without the slightest
767
+ hesitation ran lightly down the perilous incline, leaping fearlessly
768
+ from rock to rock, until, within a few seconds, she stood poised above
769
+ the seething surf on the top of the larger boulder. Here, balancing
770
+ herself as easily and securely as a wild antelope, she raised her arms
771
+ to dive. But now from the shadows below the white man called once more.
772
+
773
+ "Attempt it not, oh Wildenai! 'Tis death to leap from there!"
774
+
775
+ But without waiting even to reply, the Indian girl sprang into the
776
+ waves. An instant later and he saw her arms gleam in the moonlight as,
777
+ with the strong slow strokes of an experienced swimmer, she struck out
778
+ for the boat. In spite of the perilous rocking of the little craft he
779
+ rested on his oar to watch her for a moment in sheer admiration of her
780
+ skill. But the maid knew well the danger of every instant's delay. In
781
+ the very nick of time she seemed almost to throw herself between him and
782
+ the rocks while, with a strength he would have believed impossible in
783
+ one so small, she pulled the boat around. Then, still swimming and
784
+ without a word to him, she began to push it ahead of her toward the
785
+ shore. It was but a few minutes before they stood together on the beach.
786
+
787
+ And now the young noble, overcome with gratitude, fell on his knees
788
+ before her and caught her hand between his own. He would have kissed it
789
+ in sheer joy at his escape, but the Indian girl drew sharply back.
790
+
791
+ "Quick!" she whispered, yet remembering to speak in Spanish, "You must
792
+ hide yourself at once. My father will kill you if he should find you
793
+ here!"
794
+
795
+ Swiftly she concealed the boat in a tiny cove behind the boulder, a
796
+ hiding place he would never have seen though it was apparently perfectly
797
+ familiar to her.
798
+
799
+ "Sometimes my own canoe I keep there too," she whispered. "Now come!"
800
+ and she hurried him along the beach and up an easier trail beyond the
801
+ rocks to her cavern bower above.
802
+
803
+ Nor did she pause for an instant's rest until they had passed safely
804
+ behind the manzanita branches which concealed the entrance. Here,
805
+ motioning him to do the same, she dropped upon a pile of skins. But
806
+ instead, in real concern, the young Englishman knelt again beside her.
807
+
808
+ "Thou art so wet and cold," he began anxiously, "Will it not make thee
809
+ ill? Yet 'twas a wondrous feat," he added admiringly, "well conceived
810
+ and carried out with skill such as any man might envy!"
811
+
812
+ The princess laughed.
813
+
814
+ 'Twas nothing," she answered briefly. "I do it almost every day."
815
+
816
+ "I came to bring to thee the gift I promised," explained Lord Harold
817
+ then, and from his belt he drew the little case. Eagerly he flung the
818
+ gleaming string of garnets about her slim brown throat.
819
+
820
+ "Jewels brought by my father to my mother on the morning of their
821
+ marriage," he told her. "When she lay dying she gave them me and told me
822
+ never to part with them except I gave them to my - " He paused suddenly,
823
+ "But thou hast saved my life!" he added as quickly, "Who else could ever
824
+ deserve them more? Well know I my mother would wish thee to have them."
825
+
826
+ Silently, though her eyes were bright with, pleasure, the princess
827
+ lifted the beautiful necklace.
828
+
829
+ "Wildenai will wear them always, senor lord," she answered softly, "for
830
+ now she knows that truly you did mean to keep your word!"
831
+
832
+ And so, his mission accomplished, her guest rose hastily to his feet. He
833
+ must return immediately to the ship.
834
+
835
+ "Know you not, then, that it is gone?" exclaimed the girl, amazed.
836
+
837
+ "Gone?" echoed young Harold, and stared at her astounded. He seemed not
838
+ to have grasped her meaning. "Gone, said'st thou?"
839
+
840
+ "The ship was out of sight a full hour or more ere ever I heard you
841
+ call," she explained.
842
+
843
+ Still he continued to gaze at her fixedly as if totally unable to
844
+ comprehend what she would have him know. Then it was plain to be seen
845
+ that, for the moment at least, blank despair took hold upon him. Up and
846
+ down the length of the cave he strode like some imprisoned wild thing.
847
+ At length, standing quite still with folded arms, he seemed to lose
848
+ himself in thought.
849
+
850
+ "Battling with the surf I did not see nor hear," he muttered at last.
851
+ "But he could not sail without me!" he added. Fiercely he raised his
852
+ head and his eyes flashed. "He dare not so betray me!"
853
+
854
+ Wildenai, too, had been considering.
855
+
856
+ "The great white captain knew, then, that you were not on board?" she
857
+ asked suddenly.
858
+
859
+ "No," replied the young man reluctantly, "that did he not. I came
860
+ without his knowledge. He would have prevented me," he continued
861
+ stubbornly, "and I had promised thee a gift. Never did I break my word,
862
+ nor would not then. But I did not dream it possible they could get away
863
+ so soon! By our virgin lady in Heaven I swear I know not what to do."
864
+ And once more he seemed lost in despair.
865
+
866
+ But only for a moment. Then he turned hastily to the entrance.
867
+
868
+ "I must follow them at once," he declared impatiently, "I can overtake
869
+ them even yet."
870
+
871
+ Swift as lightning the girl threw herself between him and the opening in
872
+ the cave.
873
+
874
+ "No, no, senor Englishman," she cried. "It is impossible! Listen, only
875
+ listen to me! What have you, then, to steer by save the stars? And you
876
+ see that, drowned in moonlight, they do not shine tonight. And, more
877
+ than that, you do not even know what course the vessel takes. Remember,
878
+ too, that there is neither food nor drink within your boat. You would
879
+ surely die ere you could ever find the ship."
880
+
881
+ Gradually she compelled him to listen to reason until, seating himself
882
+ again upon the skins, he challenged her still further.
883
+
884
+ "But what, then, shall I do?" he demanded. "Can'st also tell me that?"
885
+
886
+ And with equal readiness the princess replied:
887
+
888
+ "If you will but let me I can hide you here. The cavern is my own. Here
889
+ for many a moon have I worked and waited. No one would dare to enter.
890
+ You will be safe. Besides, my father's anger will grow cold in time, and
891
+ then I know that, if I ask him, he will help you."
892
+
893
+ His chin propped upon his hands, the young nobleman moodily considered.
894
+
895
+ "Well, do then as thou deemest best," he told her finally.
896
+
897
+ And from that moment there began for the little princess a time so
898
+ wonderful that for all the rest of her life she remembered each separate
899
+ hour as though it had been some beautiful word in a poem learned by
900
+ heart.
901
+
902
+ With deft fingers she piled her softest doeskins for his bed.
903
+
904
+ "But what wilt thou do, tell me, if I rob thee of thy nest?" he asked,
905
+ watching her with amused eyes as she worked.
906
+
907
+ "I go always to the village to sleep," she answered simply, and so left
908
+ him.
909
+
910
+ But in the morning while yet the red of sunrise burned above the great
911
+ peak Orazaba, she returned, bearing upon her head an olla of carved
912
+ stone filled with water from a mountain spring. This in smiling silence
913
+ she set before him and disappeared. Within the hour, however, she was
914
+ back again and this time, kneeling on the ground, she laid at his feet
915
+ the ripe fruit of the manzanita tree, lying like small red apples, dewy
916
+ fresh, upon a wild-grape leaf.
917
+
918
+ "Ala - ate, see! Are they not good?" she asked triumphantly.
919
+
920
+ And so from day to day she ministered to him. Many a time as he sat,
921
+ listless and moody, within his hiding-place, a handful of wild
922
+ strawberries, steeped in the warm sweetness of the hills, would be
923
+ pushed beneath the leafy branches that concealed the door. Sometimes she
924
+ brought him bread baked from a curious kind of meal made of pounded
925
+ seeds.
926
+
927
+ Once, too, when a sudden storm had chilled the air, she kindled a fire
928
+ for him within a smaller cave, receding like a fire-place into the rocky
929
+ wall opposite the opening. It was a long and tedious process which the
930
+ man watched curiously. First, kneeling on the ground, she rubbed
931
+ together two dry willow sticks until a little pile of dust had gathered.
932
+ Then, still stooping, she struck two flints together until at last a
933
+ spark fell into the dust. Some dry leaves were dropped upon the tiny
934
+ blaze, then twigs, and lo, a fire!
935
+
936
+ In spite of himself the Englishman smiled, though a softer feeling shown
937
+ in his eyes. How beautiful and yet how childish she looked kneeling
938
+ there with the anxious pucker between her brows. Poor little princess,
939
+ how very hard she worked to serve him!
940
+
941
+ "It takes a long time, Wildenai," he observed, "dost thou try it often?"
942
+
943
+ "Never for myself," she answered gravely. "I have no need. But I do it
944
+ gladly for you." She smiled brightly back at him, then rose and moved
945
+ swiftly to the doorway. "Another thing I do for you today. Wait!"
946
+
947
+ And when she returned a few minutes later she brought with her,
948
+ carefully wrapped in cool green leaves, a fish freshly caught that
949
+ morning.
950
+
951
+ "A brook trout, on my word, such as I have often taken in the streams at
952
+ home!" exclaimed Lord Harold, amazed.
953
+
954
+ "I got it far up the canyon before the sun was risen," she answered,
955
+ delighted at his surprise.
956
+
957
+ This, having quickly dressed it, she wrapped again in leaves and placed
958
+ under the hot ashes to bake, and it being, evidently, a feast out of the
959
+ ordinary, a merry-making to which a third guest might be bidden,
960
+ suddenly Wildenai left the cavern again to return this time with a tiny
961
+ gray fox perched familiarly upon her shoulder.
962
+
963
+ "'Tis Onatoa, senor Englishman," she announced, gently stroking the
964
+ bushy tail of the little creature as it lay about her neck.
965
+
966
+ But from his vantage point above his rival, Onatoa merely sniffed
967
+ disdainfully with his sharp black nose. He looked far from friendly.
968
+
969
+ The princess laughed softly.
970
+
971
+ He does not know you yet," she defended her pet. "He will soon learn to
972
+ love you, too."
973
+
974
+ "I will catch fish with thee next time thou goest," declared young
975
+ Harold later as they ate together. "There's no reason I can see why I
976
+ should stay mewed up forever in this cave. I fear not Indians! No, not
977
+ even Torquam, thy father, himself."
978
+
979
+ For an instant Wildenai seemed alarmed. Then she laughed.
980
+
981
+ "You are afraid of nothing. I knew it!" she exclaimed with pride. "Nor
982
+ would there be much danger. We will go to the other side of the island
983
+ where the waves run high and the cliffs are tall and black. There will I
984
+ show you the nests of the great eagles, and the antelope leaping among
985
+ the rocks. And, - who can tell?" she laughed again with child-like
986
+ pleasure, "perhaps we shall find a white otter!"
987
+
988
+ And, true to her word, he heard at dawn next day outside the cavern the
989
+ whistle of a blackbird, a signal early contrived between them. She
990
+ deemed it best, she explained, to start thus early that the darkness
991
+ might conceal them until they had passed well beyond the outskirts of
992
+ the village. But this danger overcome, they spent the whole day rambling
993
+ fearlessly among the hills, - a long, idle, happy day. Up many a dim
994
+ trail winding back into the canyons the princess led him. Through golden
995
+ thickets of wild mustard they passed, coming, when he least expected it,
996
+ upon glimpses of the summer sea framed between the branches of knarled
997
+ old oak trees.
998
+
999
+ "They are low and crooked, and they spread themselves over the ground as
1000
+ do our English oaks," the young nobleman informed her.
1001
+
1002
+ As Wildenai had promised they discovered, poised high among the crags of
1003
+ the wild southern shore, the great eagles of which she had told him,
1004
+ measuring easily, from wing-tip to wing-tip, fully a dozen feet. The
1005
+ white otter, rarest and most valuable of all the game hunted by her
1006
+ people, eluded them, but many a small gray fox slipped away among the
1007
+ bushes, leaving the Englishman tingling for the chase.
1008
+
1009
+ At twilight, as they made their way back to the cavern, they came upon a
1010
+ tiny lake lying asleep within the crater of a dead volcano. From the
1011
+ sides little clouds of ashes rose, floating softly away on the breezes
1012
+ of evening. The princess gathered a handful and murmuring some musical
1013
+ words in her own tongue she threw them into the air.
1014
+
1015
+ "And would it be amiss for me to ask what 'tis you do?" questioned her
1016
+ companion, observing her closely.
1017
+
1018
+ "I was sending a prayer to Wakan-ate, the Great Spirit," she replied
1019
+ quietly.
1020
+
1021
+ "A prayer, - and borne to heaven on the wings of ashes!" He seemed
1022
+ amused. "But what hast thou to pray for, oh fair princess?"
1023
+
1024
+ Her cheeks glowing with quick color, she replied: "It were not fitting
1025
+ that any maiden tell for what she prays!"
1026
+
1027
+ The words were spoken with such gravity that the young man flushed under
1028
+ the rebuke.
1029
+
1030
+ When she left him at the doorway of the cavern that evening she said as
1031
+ she made a gay little gesture of farewell: "Today the land, but tomorrow
1032
+ we shall find still more beautiful things that lie hidden under the deep
1033
+ waters. You shall see!"
1034
+
1035
+ And once again with dawn she came. This time it was the splash of a
1036
+ paddle that brought him to the opening in the rock.
1037
+
1038
+ "Aloho-ate, lazy one!" she called gaily from below. "Make haste! The
1039
+ world is always loveliest while it lies waiting for the sun!"
1040
+
1041
+ That day, perhaps, from among them all, lived longest within the memory
1042
+ of young Harold, - the porpoises playing fearlessly around her canoe as
1043
+ the princess, with graceful, effortless strokes, paddled around one
1044
+ after another of the pointed tongues of rock; the flying fish, skimming
1045
+ the surface of the ocean until, by virtue of their speed alone, they
1046
+ rose like gleaming bows of silver from the foam. Intent to show him all
1047
+ her treasures, Wildenai guided him to a quiet stretch of water lying
1048
+ close to shore within the shadow of tall cliffs which rose at that point
1049
+ with precipitous abruptness from the sea itself.
1050
+
1051
+ "Here are my gardens that grow under the water," she explained, as they
1052
+ glided above the spot. "Look well at them. They are most beautiful."
1053
+
1054
+ And gazing down at her command through the clear green into the luminous
1055
+ depths below, he caught glimpses of these gardens of the sea where
1056
+ goldfish darted like tropical birds among the branches of tall tree-like
1057
+ stalks of swaying seaweed, and strange shapes of jade and blue floated
1058
+ in the shadows.
1059
+
1060
+ "Is it not wonderful?" she asked.
1061
+
1062
+ "It is indeed, my Wildenai," he answered earnestly. "Never in all my
1063
+ travels, methinks, have I seen aught before like this your island here!
1064
+ It seems to me indeed a charmed land, a kind of magic isle!"
1065
+
1066
+ One day it rained, the last belated rain of winter. But even the storm
1067
+ brought pleasures of its own, for, seated on the pile of skins beside
1068
+ him, the little gray fox curled contentedly at her feet, Wildenai worked
1069
+ at her loom. Within its dull-colored warp a blanket, woven in a strange
1070
+ design of mingled red, and black, and white, grew slowly beneath her
1071
+ busy fingers.
1072
+
1073
+ For hours the maiden drew the short woolen threads in and out while the
1074
+ young man, stretched lazily upon the ground, told her many a tale of the
1075
+ England he had left. Then, quite without warning, she ceased her work
1076
+ and sat pensively watching through the opening in the rocks the long
1077
+ gray swell of the sea.
1078
+
1079
+ "And what is it now, my princess?" laughed young Harold. "The pattern is
1080
+ not yet finished, nor is the rain abated."
1081
+
1082
+ "Ah, senor Harold lord," wistfully replied the girl, "I was but wishing
1083
+ I had been born one of those same fair English maids with the eyes of
1084
+ blue and golden hair you tell about. Then would you love me even as you
1085
+ do them!" she added artlessly, and leaned her chin upon her hand,
1086
+ considering. A secret trembled on her lips.
1087
+
1088
+ "And how if I were Spanish born?" she questioned, and lifted hesitating,
1089
+ frightened eyes to his, "dark to look at, that I know well, but even so,
1090
+ the white man's kind of princess, who also has a throne?"
1091
+
1092
+ And all unwitting Lord Harold answered scornfully, "Spanish! Say no such
1093
+ word to me! The English hate the Spanish!" Fiercely he caught up a
1094
+ pebble and sent it whirling out across the water. "Even now their robber
1095
+ king plans his huge armada to take our queen and rule our land, but
1096
+ that, by the holy virgin herself, shall never be! Sooner will every drop
1097
+ of blood in bonny England be spilt. Never could I make thee understand
1098
+ how much I hope to be at home before he comes! Spanish indeed! Nay,
1099
+ never let me hear the hateful word again!"
1100
+
1101
+ Then, noting her puzzled, downcast face, with the impulsive
1102
+ changeableness which had so endeared him to her, he caught one little
1103
+ brown hand and raised it to his lips.
1104
+
1105
+ "But I do love thee even as thou art, my Wildenai," he told her with the
1106
+ careless assurance of one much older speaking to a child. "Is not a wild
1107
+ rose sweet as any garden bloom? Nay, methinks 'tis often sweeter!"
1108
+
1109
+ Again he laughed and the little princess laughed with him now, for into
1110
+ her heart at his words had come a happiness so unlooked for and so
1111
+ wildly sweet as wholly to bewilder her. Quickly she rose, struck by a
1112
+ sudden thought, and running to the farthermost corner of the cavern she
1113
+ brushed aside a pile of leaves and lifted some stones, disclosing at
1114
+ length a box fashioned from the choicest cedar. Out of it, while the
1115
+ Englishman watched with wondering eyes, she drew a garment made of
1116
+ creamy doeskin, deeply fringed and trimmed besides with strings of
1117
+ wampum, the polished fragments of abalone shells and many-colored beads.
1118
+ Silently she brought it to him and when he touched it admiringly, for
1119
+ the dress was beautiful. "It is my marriage robe," she told him gravely.
1120
+
1121
+ That night, while the rain tapped softly at her tepee, the princess
1122
+ dreamed of a wondrous land beyond the sea where proudly she walked by
1123
+ her white chief's side and fair women with braided, golden hair spoke
1124
+ kind words of welcome, smiling at her out of sweet blue eyes.
1125
+
1126
+
1127
+
1128
+ Then, without warning, came the end of all her dreams. Hurrying along
1129
+ the beach at sunset only a few days later, Wildenai caught the first
1130
+ glimpse of the returning vessel as it stole around a distant point. For
1131
+ the space of a second her heart stood still, then throbbed wildly, but
1132
+ whether with joy or pain she could not herself have told. One question
1133
+ only demanded all her thought. Should she let Lord Harold know? Perhaps
1134
+ the great white captain would not remember their bay. Perhaps, - her
1135
+ breath came fast, - perhaps the ship, unseen by anyone, would pass and
1136
+ Lord Harold remain behind content. With hands tight-clenched she watched
1137
+ the distant sail, fear growing in her eyes. Yet she knew that she would
1138
+ tell him. Nothing else was honorable. This, surely, he must decide for
1139
+ himself.
1140
+
1141
+ But tidings of such moment outran even her swift feet. She found him
1142
+ buckling on his swordbelt, in his eyes the glad light of some trapped
1143
+ bird which sees the door of its cage suddenly open.
1144
+
1145
+ "The ship - " she began with sinking heart.
1146
+
1147
+ "Yes, yes, I know! I saw it!" he answered, a fever of impatience in his
1148
+ voice. "'Tis Drake. I knew he dared not leave me! 'Twill soon be too
1149
+ close in. Needs not he risk his safety. I must go before he gains the
1150
+ shore."
1151
+
1152
+ The princess hesitated. What meant that strange heaviness at her heart?
1153
+ Was he not still her brave, true warrior, - her great white chief? Had
1154
+ he not told her that he loved her? Crossing to where he stood she bowed
1155
+ herself before him until her silver fillet touched his feet.
1156
+
1157
+ "I, too!" she whispered, "I shall go to England with thee!"
1158
+
1159
+ And at her words, within the little cavern there came a silence to be
1160
+ felt. In undisguised dismay the Englishman gazed at her where she knelt.
1161
+ Then:
1162
+
1163
+ "By the holyrood!" he muttered aghast, "She must have thought, - God
1164
+ only knows what she must have thought!"
1165
+
1166
+ He glanced hurriedly toward the doorway and back again, ashamed. Then
1167
+ even such impatience as was his gave way, for the moment at least, to
1168
+ something more chivalric. He stooped and patted awkwardly the smooth
1169
+ black head.
1170
+
1171
+ "Come, Wildenai, little wild rose, look up and speak to me. I must be
1172
+ going!"
1173
+
1174
+ But still the maid lay prostrate, clasping close his rough buskins in
1175
+ her little brown hands. Never in all his life had Lord Harold been so
1176
+ sorely uncomfortable. How was it possible she had ever imagined that he
1177
+ could take her with him, - that he had meant so much? Resentment grew
1178
+ within him at the thought, yet strangely mingled always with something
1179
+ far more tender. Hastily he considered, his heart torn between the
1180
+ desire not to wound her and dread of what he knew she wanted. To be sure
1181
+ the maid was beautiful, with the softened beauty of a moonlit night in
1182
+ summer, her eyes beneath her dusky hair like stars between the branches
1183
+ of dark trees, her voice that of the forest stream when it sings itself
1184
+ to sleep. Yet past all doubt he knew that not one among the gorgeous
1185
+ throng that crowded about Elizabeth would ever see that beauty, no
1186
+ English ear take heed to hear the music of her voice. Nay, he could
1187
+ even, as he thought of it, picture the amazement of the great queen,
1188
+ could hear her scornful laughter, should he present, to help adorn her
1189
+ court, a savage Indian girl! No, a thousand times no! Such disgrace he
1190
+ could not suffer. Nor was the maid herself, so he defended himself,
1191
+ fitted for such a life. Soon would she be as unhappy in England as he
1192
+ would be to have her there. Besides, she was but a child. Else had she
1193
+ never so far forgot all womanly dignity as to force herself upon him,
1194
+ and being but a child she would soon forget. Gently he made to raise her
1195
+ to her feet.
1196
+
1197
+ "Wildenai, little wild rose," he began again, "what thou hast asked of
1198
+ me thou dost well know thyself is an unheard of thing. Much as I owe to
1199
+ thee, and well know I that 'tis so much I never can repay it; still for
1200
+ thine own sweet sake 'tis not in this way thy reward must come. The long
1201
+ journey and the strange new life would kill thee, Wildenai." Having once
1202
+ begun he stumbled on, but half aware of how each word he uttered hurt
1203
+ her, eager only to have done with the whole sorry scene. "Thou art but a
1204
+ little wild flower. Thou couldst not live away from this, thy sunny
1205
+ island. Can'st thou not understand, my Wildenai?"
1206
+
1207
+ He paused, waiting for a reply; but the maiden answered nothing. Silent
1208
+ she lay as though in very truth she were a wild flower tossed to earth
1209
+ and trampled upon by some uncaring foot.
1210
+
1211
+ At last the man could bear it no longer. Forcibly he loosed her hands
1212
+ and stepped back. For a moment longer he lingered, looking down upon her
1213
+ in mingled impatience and regret; then, turning abruptly, he passed
1214
+ hastily out of the cavern and down the trail to the beach.
1215
+
1216
+ Still the girl lay motionless. It was as if every sense were stunned,
1217
+ all power of thought suspended except to grasp the one fact that made
1218
+ her whole world empty, - he was gone! As in a dream she heard the
1219
+ grating of the pebbles when he pushed his boat into the water, heard the
1220
+ clank of the oars as they dropped into the oar-locks. Even yet she did
1221
+ not move. Then, after many minutes, she crept to the opening and
1222
+ searched the sea with eyes almost, too dim with tears to find that for
1223
+ which she sought. But yes, there it was, - a black speck against the
1224
+ golden sunset. She watched until she had seen the distant vessel put
1225
+ about, making for the open sea. Ah, now she knew that he was safe
1226
+ aboard, - no need had they to come farther into shore. Yet still she
1227
+ waited, straining her eyes to see the ship sink slowly beneath the
1228
+ horizon. One last glint of sunlight against a white sail, and it was
1229
+ gone.
1230
+
1231
+ Then at once she rose, and moving quietly about the little cavern, she
1232
+ put all in perfect order with touch as tender as that of a mother
1233
+ preparing for its last sleep some little child. Here was the basket he
1234
+ had helped to weave, here the mat on which he had lain. Her fingers
1235
+ lingered caressingly on each thing that he had touched. There in the
1236
+ corner still stood the olla in which she had brought him water. How
1237
+ amused he had been that she could carry it on her head all the way up
1238
+ the hill from the spring without so much as spilling one drop! But that
1239
+ was all past now.
1240
+
1241
+ When at last everything was finished she gave the little rock-walled
1242
+ room one long, lingering look, the look of one who would carry in his
1243
+ heart the image of what he beholds all the rest of his life. Then she,
1244
+ too, made her way through the doorway into the deepening dusk.
1245
+
1246
+
1247
+
1248
+ On the beach below, squatted within the opened flap of his tepee,
1249
+ Torquam, mighty chief of the Mariposa, smoked his evening pipe. A
1250
+ wonderful pipe it was, long and delicately fashioned, inlaid with
1251
+ iridescent fragments of shell. Yet instantly he laid it aside as the
1252
+ slender form of his daughter darkened the doorway.
1253
+
1254
+ "Ah, Wildenai, little wild rose, welcome art thou as sunshine after
1255
+ rain!" His eyes lighted with the tenderness never seen there by any
1256
+ other than this motherless girl. He stretched his hand to her and the
1257
+ princess came silently and knelt before him.
1258
+
1259
+ "My father," she said firmly, though in so low a tone that Torquam bent
1260
+ to hear. "Oh, father, thou art always wise! Thou only knowest best. I
1261
+ come to thee to tell that I will wed Cabrillo. I will wed with him
1262
+ whenever thou dost choose!"
1263
+
1264
+ Taking her face between his hands, Torquam gazed long and searchingly
1265
+ into the sorrowful eyes of his daughter.
1266
+
1267
+ "And thou art wise to do so, my beloved one," he said at last. "He will
1268
+ make to thee a good husband." In his voice was the keen understanding of
1269
+ a father. "He will be kind to thee and heal thy wounded heart, my
1270
+ daughter. Don Cabrillo is a good man," he repeated solemnly."
1271
+
1272
+
1273
+
1274
+ Miss Hastings Brings It to an End
1275
+
1276
+
1277
+
1278
+ Part II
1279
+
1280
+
1281
+
1282
+ Miss Hastings Brings It to an End
1283
+
1284
+
1285
+
1286
+ Centuries passed, and again, with the same sweet suddenness as in the
1287
+ days gone by, spring came to Catalina. Guests of the St. Catherine,
1288
+ lounging on its wide verandahs, gazed across a sunlit sea to where the
1289
+ faint cloud that was San Jacinto hovered, the merest ghost of a
1290
+ mountain, above the misty mainland. Along the broad board-walk leading
1291
+ down to Avalon benches, shaded by brightstriped awnings, flaunted an
1292
+ invitation to every passing tourist. Strings of Japanese lanterns bobbed
1293
+ merrily above the narrow village streets. Everywhere were laughter and
1294
+ movement and color from the bathing beaches, dotted with gay umbrellas -
1295
+ even to the last yacht anchored round the point.
1296
+
1297
+ To the man making slow progress down the crowded wharf from the
1298
+ afternoon boat this holiday world into which he thus suddenly stepped,
1299
+ presented an appearance so different from that he had pictured as almost
1300
+ to bewilder him. At sight of the jaunty little motorbus waiting to haul
1301
+ him up the winding grade to the hotel, he actually hesitated. Yet seldom
1302
+ before, to his knowledge, had he found it difficult to adapt himself to
1303
+ an unexpected situation.
1304
+
1305
+ "Hotel St. Catherine! Bus to the hotel, sir?"
1306
+
1307
+ Other guests, more certain of their intentions, pushed impatiently
1308
+ against him, and presently he found himself, wedged well toward the
1309
+ middle of the long seat, chugging comfortably up the hill. Still
1310
+ half-daunted, he gazed about him. It was all of it charming to be sure,
1311
+ fascinating even; yet, could this festive summering place be the Avalon
1312
+ of his dreams? Was this the quaint village of Spanish times, reaching
1313
+ back still further through dimly remembered Indian lore to a world lost
1314
+ now except to legend? Yet it was for the sake of a mere legend, a
1315
+ fanciful tale handed down in his family through many a generation, that
1316
+ he had made the long journey from New York to California, nor - and here
1317
+ he set his lips with dogged determination, did he intend to return until
1318
+ he had found that for which he searched.
1319
+
1320
+ It was now something over two years since Harrison Blair, then fresh
1321
+ from Yale, had astonished both those who wished him well and those who,
1322
+ for various envious reasons, did not, with the wholly unreasonable
1323
+ success of his first book. For, to those who did not understand, his
1324
+ sudden fame had seemed all the more surprising in that it rested upon
1325
+ nothing more substantial than a slender volume of Indian verse. So
1326
+ unusual, however, had been his treatment of this well-worn subject as to
1327
+ call forth more than a little comment from even the most conservative of
1328
+ critics. The Brush and Pen had hastened to confer upon him an honorary
1329
+ membership. Cadmon, magic weaver of Indian music, had written a warm
1330
+ letter of appreciation. And, most precious tribute of all, the Atlantic
1331
+ Monthly had become interested in his career.
1332
+
1333
+ To be sure, it was nothing more than might have been expected of a man
1334
+ whose undergraduate work in English had aroused the reluctant wonder of
1335
+ more than one instructor. Nevertheless, the fact that he pulled stroke
1336
+ on the 'varsity crew had somewhat blinded other contemporaries to his
1337
+ more scholarly attainments. Nor had anyone thought it probable, because
1338
+ of his father's wealth, that Blair, in any event, would feel called upon
1339
+ to do much more than make a frolic of life. No one, indeed, had been
1340
+ more taken aback than had his father to find him, a year after
1341
+ graduation, drudging over the assistant editor's desk of a struggling
1342
+ magazine the payroll of which, to put it mildly, offered no financial
1343
+ inducements.
1344
+
1345
+ "It's good practice for me, though, - quickest way to learn," was all he
1346
+ vouchsafed when the older man remonstrated.
1347
+
1348
+ Yet, had that same father, shrewd capitalist that he was, but taken the
1349
+ trouble to reason back from premises evident enough, he might have been
1350
+ the first to realize that this tall son of his, with the keen gray eyes
1351
+ and a face the strength of which was but increased by the high cheek
1352
+ bones and squarely molded chin, was scarcely the type of man to sit idly
1353
+ by enjoying the fruits of another's labor.
1354
+
1355
+ And now, after two years more of grinding apprenticeship, he had in mind
1356
+ something much bigger than the slender volume of verse, - an adventure
1357
+ into authorship more suited to his metal, - a story for which an intense
1358
+ personal sympathy would furnish fitting atmosphere, with the final spur
1359
+ to his ambition a letter from the Atlantic even at the moment stowed
1360
+ safely away in his pocket.
1361
+
1362
+ Some two hours later, after an unexpectedly excellent dinner in the
1363
+ luxurious dining room, he sauntered over to the hotel desk. There was no
1364
+ more than the faintest probability that a clerk of the St. Catherine
1365
+ would be able to tell him how to reach a secret cavern bower above the
1366
+ Bay of Moons; still, he had to enter an opening wedge somewhere. The one
1367
+ man on duty was for the moment occupied with another guest, and Blair,
1368
+ lighting his after-dinner cigar, prepared with leisurely patience to
1369
+ await his turn.
1370
+
1371
+ The guest happened to be a young woman, rather pretty, he casually
1372
+ decided, although her greatest claim to beauty lay more, perhaps, in the
1373
+ swift changes in expression of which her face was capable, than in any
1374
+ actual regularity of line. For lack of anything better to do, Blair
1375
+ watched idly her encounter with the clerk. There appeared to be some
1376
+ kind of misunderstanding.
1377
+
1378
+ "Awfully sorry it's happened that way, Miss Hastings," the man behind
1379
+ the desk was saying. He lifted with genuine reluctance the key she had
1380
+ just laid down. "We'd be mighty sorry to interfere with your work, but
1381
+ those small rooms always do go first. You know that yourself."
1382
+
1383
+ "I hadn't heard about it, though. I didn't know they were all gone." Her
1384
+ voice quivered with disappointment.
1385
+
1386
+ Blair, whose vocation taught him a certain technical sympathy, shot a
1387
+ swift glance at her. She couldn't be more than twenty-two or
1388
+ thereabouts, he decided less casually, and went on to observe her still
1389
+ further. She wore a shabby, broad-brimmed hat much faded as if from
1390
+ constant exposure to the sun, but the shadows in the coil of hair
1391
+ beneath were warmly golden.
1392
+
1393
+ "Couldn't you find a room down in the village somewhere, - at Mrs.
1394
+ Merrill's perhaps?" suggested the clerk.
1395
+
1396
+ "But Mrs. Merrill isn't here this spring." In spite of its quiver the
1397
+ voice was very sweet.
1398
+
1399
+ "No," she started to turn away, "I'll have to put it off again, I
1400
+ suppose. I've looked everywhere."
1401
+
1402
+ She took a step or two, hesitated, then returned to the desk.
1403
+
1404
+ "You're positive there isn't a single one of the small rooms left?" she
1405
+ pleaded. "I wouldn't care how far back it was, - anything would do. You
1406
+ can't think how I hate to give up. I had so hoped to finish it this
1407
+ time!"
1408
+
1409
+ The man shook his head.
1410
+
1411
+ "No, we're absolutely full just now. Later on there might be something,
1412
+ - after the season is over."
1413
+
1414
+ "But that will be after school begins," answered the girl bitterly. "I
1415
+ can't work at all then!" and catching up a bag fully as shabby as the
1416
+ hat, she hurried away.
1417
+
1418
+ "Who is she?" asked Blair abruptly, overlooking for the moment his
1419
+ original purpose in seeking the man.
1420
+
1421
+ "School-teacher from Pasadena," replied the clerk briefly. "Teaches art
1422
+ in some private school over there, I believe." He eyed Blair amusedly.
1423
+ "Think you've met her before somewhere?"
1424
+
1425
+ Blair allowed his annoyance to show. "No, never laid eyes on her till
1426
+ just now. But I couldn't help feeling a bit sorry for her," he
1427
+ persisted. "She seemed so sort of cut up. What's the trouble?"
1428
+
1429
+ "I'm sorry for her myself," declared the man on the other side as he
1430
+ hung the returned key on its board. "This is the third time that poor
1431
+ little woman's had to leave before she could finish what she came for on
1432
+ account of the expense. But what can we do?" He shrugged his shoulders.
1433
+ "The St. Catherine isn't exactly a Y. W. C. A."
1434
+
1435
+ "What is it she's trying to do?"
1436
+
1437
+ Amusement deepened in the man's eyes.
1438
+
1439
+ "She's supposed to be painting Indians."
1440
+
1441
+ "Indians!" To the amazement of the other man Blair suddenly leaned
1442
+ forward, his eyes agleam with interest.
1443
+
1444
+ "But I didn't know there were any around here."
1445
+
1446
+ "There aren't."
1447
+
1448
+ "Then how - ?"
1449
+
1450
+ "Makes 'em up out of her head, I guess. I never heard that she had even
1451
+ a model."
1452
+
1453
+ "But - but what I want to know is why she comes here at all?" The
1454
+ situation seemed to Blair to offer possibilities, yet he was thoroughly
1455
+ puzzled. "I met a fellow on the train who does that sort of thing, but
1456
+ he always goes to the desert to paint, - at least he said he did."
1457
+
1458
+ "Yes, they do mostly. Probably he meant Taos, - whole nest of artists at
1459
+ Taos."
1460
+
1461
+ "Well, but why in thunder then - ?"
1462
+
1463
+ The clerk smiled skeptically.
1464
+
1465
+ "Why, you see, it's something like this. Miss Hastings' bent on being an
1466
+ illustrator, pays better than teaching, I suppose, or - well, at any
1467
+ rate, that's what she's aiming for, - and she has an idea that if she
1468
+ can only get a series of pictures, - several of them on the same
1469
+ subject, you understand, - accepted by one of those Eastern magazines,
1470
+ she can soon work in with some big publisher and get an order. She told
1471
+ us all about it one night last winter when she was over."
1472
+
1473
+ "But in heaven's name, why Indians?" persisted Blair.
1474
+
1475
+ "Because she thinks she's found some good material here. She told me
1476
+ about that, too. Seems there's an old legend connected with Catalina,
1477
+ about an Indian princess and a cavern. The princess died of a broken
1478
+ heart or something of the sort, I believe she said. I never heard the
1479
+ particulars myself. Nobody else, either, seems to know anything about
1480
+ it. But Miss Hastings says there's quite a story, and she's got it all
1481
+ down pat from A to Z. She's using it for her series."
1482
+
1483
+ A porter brought up some newcomers and Blair stepped aside. But the
1484
+ moment his man was at leisure again he cornered him at once. An idea had
1485
+ come to him, an idea almost dazzling in its possibilities.
1486
+
1487
+ "You say she hasn't finished her series yet?"
1488
+
1489
+ "Beg pardon? Oh, the teacher?" The man shook his head. "Evidently not
1490
+ from what she said just now. She never stays long enough really to put
1491
+ it over. Every few months she bobs up over a week-end, but that doesn't
1492
+ give her time even to visit some of the places she's after. She never
1493
+ seems to get much more than started before she has to go home again."
1494
+
1495
+ For a moment Blair smoked in silence. Then:
1496
+
1497
+ "Look here," he cut in abruptly, "You split my suite and give her one of
1498
+ my rooms."
1499
+
1500
+ The man's eyebrows rose in surprise.
1501
+
1502
+ "Her? What do you mean?"
1503
+
1504
+ Blair made an impatient gesture.
1505
+
1506
+ "Why, this Miss - the teacher, you know. Didn't you just say you hadn't
1507
+ any room for her? Well, I've got three, you know."
1508
+
1509
+ "Yes, but that's altogether a different proposition. You made your
1510
+ reservation weeks ago."
1511
+
1512
+ "But you could still give her one of them, couldn't you?"
1513
+
1514
+ Clerks in large hotels listen with patience to a vast number of strange
1515
+ proposals, but at this from Blair, the man opposite eyed him in
1516
+ unflattering amazement.
1517
+
1518
+ "But you said, when you wired, you wanted the extra room to work in," he
1519
+ objected, "and you'll remember, Mr. Blair, that you were pretty emphatic
1520
+ about it, too, at the time. We went to all kinds of trouble to fix that
1521
+ up for you."
1522
+
1523
+ "I can get along all right without it, though," coolly observed his
1524
+ changeable guest, "and I'd rather she'd have it. It's possible to split
1525
+ suites here, isn't it?" he persisted. "They do at most hotels."
1526
+
1527
+ "It's possible, of course." Across the desk the eyes of the two men met
1528
+ squarely. "That part of it's easy enough. But why? and who's going to
1529
+ pay for it?"
1530
+
1531
+ "I'm going to pay for it! What did you suppose?" exploded Blair. "It's
1532
+ worth that and a lot more to me just now to keep her from getting away.
1533
+ Oh, I'm in earnest all right. I mean it! Look here! Can't you see how
1534
+ that woman can be a perfect gold mine to me? You know enough about my
1535
+ work to understand that I'm really out here after Indians myself, and
1536
+ she - well, I'll wager a cool thousand there isn't a spot on this whole
1537
+ island that ever dreamed of seeing an Indian that she doesn't know all
1538
+ about!"
1539
+
1540
+ The clerk nodded. "But - "
1541
+
1542
+ "But nothing!" Impatiently Blair brushed aside all objections. "Why, I
1543
+ hadn't the remotest idea how I was going to get started. It's a rattling
1544
+ piece of good luck, and we'll fix it up right now!"
1545
+
1546
+ "Yes, but - " Still the other man hesitated. "It sounds all right
1547
+ enough, - from your end of it especially, but you'd better see her
1548
+ first. She's a proud little piece, - doesn't like obligations of any
1549
+ kind, - and a stranger, - a man - I'm sorry to discourage you, but I
1550
+ don't believe she'll have a thing to do with it."
1551
+
1552
+ In Blair's eyes impatience threatened to become something more emphatic.
1553
+
1554
+ "It's a business proposition pure and simple," he argued. "She gives me
1555
+ all the information she's been able to get together, and I pay her
1556
+ expenses while she does it. That gives her a chance to finish her own
1557
+ work, don't you see? A mighty good proposition for her, too, I should
1558
+ say, and if she doesn't see it that way herself, - why, - well, she
1559
+ isn't as intelligent as she looks, that's all!"
1560
+
1561
+ "Providing you can persuade her it is just business. I'd advise you to
1562
+ talk with her first, just the same. And you'll have to be quick about
1563
+ it, too. She's planning to wait in the village tonight for the morning
1564
+ boat, and she'll be starting down about now."
1565
+
1566
+
1567
+
1568
+ Outside was one of those radiant nights intended for dreams and the
1569
+ makers of dreams. Over an ocean white with light long breakers rolled
1570
+ crests gleaming with silver that fell in soft thunder on the beach. Miss
1571
+ Hastings, hurrying along the board-walk to the village, glanced at them
1572
+ and looked quickly away.
1573
+
1574
+ "Oh, I say!" came a voice out of the darkness behind her, "if you don't
1575
+ mind, hold on there a minute, will you? Wait for me, please!" The voice
1576
+ was that of a man, pleasant, but exceedingly determined. Without so much
1577
+ as turning her head Miss Hastings quickened her steps.
1578
+
1579
+ But it was of no use. Whoever her pursuer might be, he was even then at
1580
+ her side.
1581
+
1582
+ "I beg your pardon," breathlessly he began again, "but I've been chasing
1583
+ you all the way down from the hotel. I want you to come right back there
1584
+ with me. I have a proposal to make to you."
1585
+
1586
+ Even in the darkness he could see how the girl's eyes blazed.
1587
+
1588
+ "I never listen - " she began hotly, "to proposals from people I don't
1589
+ know," she had meant to add, but he gave her no time.
1590
+
1591
+ "It will mean the biggest chance for your pictures you've ever had," he
1592
+ broke in. "Now, listen!"
1593
+
1594
+ And, to her complete surprise, Miss Hastings suddenly found herself
1595
+ doing that very thing.
1596
+
1597
+ "There are a lot of things I've got to find out right away," continued
1598
+ the astonishing stranger, "and the clerk up there tells me you're
1599
+ painting a series of Indian portraits."
1600
+
1601
+ The little art teacher gazed at him fascinated. What manner of man could
1602
+ this be, she wondered.
1603
+
1604
+ "I don't see the connection - " Coldness struggled with curiosity in her
1605
+ voice.
1606
+
1607
+ "Listen!" With uplifted, peremptory hand again he stopped her. Nor is it
1608
+ safe to say that any book agent, watching the door slowly closing upon
1609
+ him, ever talked faster, or more rigidly to the point, than did Blair
1610
+ within the next few minutes.
1611
+
1612
+ "Perhaps you won't understand it all right off. I wouldn't expect that.
1613
+ But it's this way. I'm representing Harper's, and Houghton and Mifflin,
1614
+ and Dodd and Mead, and - several other firms" (to satisfy his conscience
1615
+ Blair contended with himself that he might as well as not have been
1616
+ their representative - a mere oversight on their part ought not to be
1617
+ allowed to stand in his way), "and I'm out here to find the best
1618
+ illustrator I can lay hands on to do the pictures for some Indian stuff
1619
+ I'm getting into shape for one of 'em. I want to see your work. And, if
1620
+ I like it, I'll pay you well. And anyway, I'll pay every bit of the
1621
+ expense while you finish your series here if you'll tell me what you
1622
+ know about Wildenai!"
1623
+
1624
+ But, at the name, the girl beside him had given a low cry of utter
1625
+ amazement. She stopped short.
1626
+
1627
+ "Do you know it too, then?" she gasped. "How did you hear about it?"
1628
+
1629
+ "Oh, I've known it for years," replied Blair carelessly. "Some of it
1630
+ I've known all my life. But look here now. Is it a bargain? - about your
1631
+ helping me, I mean?"
1632
+
1633
+ Before he left her, an hour or so later, every detail had been arranged.
1634
+ Miss Hastings had meekly agreed to return to the hotel in the morning.
1635
+ Blair would pay her expenses and something he called a retaining fee
1636
+ besides. That would make an extra fifty dollars, - she smiled to herself
1637
+ in the dark, - a new winter suit at least, and perhaps one or two
1638
+ matinees if she managed! All this for the information she could give him
1639
+ about the island and its history. The various points in their contract
1640
+ spun dizzily in her dazed brain. No spot known to legend to which it was
1641
+ possible to conduct him should remain unvisited. Four hours out of every
1642
+ day were pledged without fail to his interests. The rest of the time she
1643
+ might have for her own work. It had all come about so unexpectedly, and
1644
+ was altogether so extraordinary that, after he had gone, his new
1645
+ employe, stretched uncomfortably upon a narrow cot in the tent of a
1646
+ fellow teacher, spent the remainder of the night in imaginary interviews
1647
+ with Eastern publishers regarding impossible royalties. She was far too
1648
+ excited to sleep.
1649
+
1650
+ And, for a week, the arrangement worked very well, - almost too well.
1651
+ Every day brought with it some new adventure, and every adventure became
1652
+ a pleasure.
1653
+
1654
+ Mounted at Blair's expense on more or less energetic ponies, for from
1655
+ the first he had insisted that horses were a necessary part of their
1656
+ business equipment, they cantered gaily along the shady canyon trails,
1657
+ or over the sunlit slopes sheeted in pale lavender wherever the wild
1658
+ lilacs were in bloom. Often, emerging from some thicket of dwarf oak
1659
+ they caught glimpses of a sapphire sea held between red, twisted
1660
+ branches of manzanita as in a frame. About them rang the music of the
1661
+ meadow larks. Merry shouts of bathers floated up from the beaches far
1662
+ below, mingled with the distant click of golf balls on the greens.
1663
+
1664
+ For the whole of a golden day they chartered a sailboat from one, Capt.
1665
+ Warren, and rounding the yellow headlands under his lazy guidance, they
1666
+ went to examine the Ning Po, the ancient Chinese barge stranded, no one
1667
+ knew how many hundreds of years before, among the rocks off the isthmus.
1668
+
1669
+ "Fascinating old place," observed Blair gazing, his eyes aglow with
1670
+ interest, around the mediaeval cabin. "Don't doubt a dozen murders at
1671
+ least were pulled off in this one room!"
1672
+
1673
+ "Oh yes, of course," eagerly echoed his assistant. "It's absolutely
1674
+ unique!"
1675
+
1676
+ Her gaze, as bright with interest as his own, rested upon Blair himself.
1677
+ She was considering, absent-mindedly, how becoming white trousers can be
1678
+ to most men, especially when they are reasonably dark themselves. But, -
1679
+ her glance travelled upward, - how unusually dark he was, and his hair,
1680
+ - yes, without question, the straightest and blackest she had ever seen.
1681
+ Yet it seemed in some indefinable way to become him, - to belong, as it
1682
+ were, to his type. Leaning her elbows meditatively upon the rusty
1683
+ anchor, her chin in her hands, she silently appraised him. He really was
1684
+ a handsome man, she decided, and clever, too, of the sort who does
1685
+ things in the world! A dreamy light grew within her eyes.
1686
+
1687
+ It was only two or three evenings later when, on their way back from the
1688
+ site of an historic Indian village on the other side of the island, they
1689
+ walked their horses slowly around the Wishbone Loop, the ostensible
1690
+ reason being that, as Blair had already discovered, it commanded the
1691
+ widest view of the ocean at sunset.
1692
+
1693
+ He was the first to speak when they struck again into the main trail.
1694
+
1695
+ "I wished for something about a rose, a wild rose, - want to guess?" He
1696
+ eyed her mischievously.
1697
+
1698
+ "Hush, - mustn't tell!" she laughed. "Your wish won't come true if you
1699
+ tell." Then, for no reason at all, she blushed.
1700
+
1701
+ Never, in truth, during her twenty-three years of working, and
1702
+ scrimping, and going without, had life shown to the little art teacher
1703
+ so fair and generous a side, seemed so extravagantly joyous an affair as
1704
+ during that magic week. The spending of money, it was easy to see, meant
1705
+ little or nothing to Blair. But that was the least of his attractions,
1706
+ for, to the girl herself, mere wealth for its own sake had never
1707
+ appealed. The charm lay rather in the genial broadness of his view of
1708
+ things, the strength of reasoning behind the few opinions he put
1709
+ forward, his reticence, and quiet modesty. In these dwelt the spell that
1710
+ swept her into an almost delirious enjoyment of his society. For, all
1711
+ unknown to herself, like many another woman in like condition, she had
1712
+ needed a change of people. In the cramped life of a private school men
1713
+ played but little part, and the men who were most worth while, almost no
1714
+ part at all. Instinctively, in time, she had wearied of little girls and
1715
+ their lessons. Sorely had she craved the stimulus which only the
1716
+ companionship of congenial men can give. Of this fact, however, she had
1717
+ been even less aware.
1718
+
1719
+ One crisp morning, seated in a diminutive wicker cart behind a
1720
+ discontented pony, they searched out Chicken John's cabin on the mesa
1721
+ behind the golf links.
1722
+
1723
+ "Not that it has anything to do with Indians," she apologized, "only I
1724
+ want you to see him. He's such a character, so nice and untidy and
1725
+ queer!"
1726
+
1727
+ As a result of this expedition they brought away with them what old John
1728
+ designated a "plump little fry" to be served at the cosy table for two
1729
+ in the sunniest window of the dining room, a luxury which Blair had
1730
+ likewise confiscated in the interests of business.
1731
+
1732
+ And so for seven glorious days they tramped the fragrant hills, or
1733
+ sailed a sea as softly blue as though fallen fresh that morning from the
1734
+ cloudless heaven above. In the warmth and glow of his friendship the
1735
+ starved heart of the little art teacher opened like some hot-house
1736
+ flower carried suddenly into the wide outdoors. And when at last the
1737
+ week drew to an end, their work, both his and hers, was still
1738
+ unfinished, so that there was nothing else to do but to live on through
1739
+ another fully as wonderful.
1740
+
1741
+ Blair himself took things much more for granted, and even when their
1742
+ talk strayed farthest afield it was plain to the girl that his mind
1743
+ never fully lost sight of the purpose for which he had come. His work
1744
+ stood always first, while, - she blushed to own it even to herself, -
1745
+ she had sometimes entirely forgotten her own.
1746
+
1747
+ At the end of the third week they had seen almost everything he
1748
+ considered essential and at times she sensed in his manner, even when he
1749
+ was least aware of it, a kind of repressed impatience. She knew what it
1750
+ meant and shivered. Presently he would leave her, and life would become
1751
+ again the same dull round of work. Only one spot of real importance
1752
+ remained unvisited, - the cavern bower above the Bay of Moons. Of this
1753
+ he had spoken frequently, and well she knew he held it the climax of his
1754
+ search.
1755
+
1756
+ But for reasons best known to herself Miss Hastings put off from day to
1757
+ day this final expedition until Blair began to chaff at the delay.
1758
+
1759
+ "That's really the one place I came to see!" he told her more than once.
1760
+ "After I've been there I think I can go."
1761
+
1762
+ "But we've planned Middle Ranch for today," she would answer evasively,
1763
+ or, "This is the best time to see Orazaba; it's so clear this morning.
1764
+ That's the mountain, you know, where the Indians carved out their ollas.
1765
+ Some of them are still there, only half cut away. It would be too bad
1766
+ for you to miss that."
1767
+
1768
+ At length, however, there came a day when excuses would do no longer.
1769
+
1770
+ "We've waited long enough," he declared that morning over their coffee,
1771
+ "Besides, I may have to go now in a few days."
1772
+
1773
+ And although at his words the sunshine of her new world faded suddenly
1774
+ away, yet the little teacher kept a brave front. She even laughed
1775
+ carelessly.
1776
+
1777
+ "Men are so impatient," she teased, "But we'll go today."
1778
+
1779
+ Nevertheless, it was not until the rose of sunset rested among the hills
1780
+ that at last they found themselves on the crest of the tall cliff which
1781
+ commanded so wide a stretch of the ocean and the shimmering valleys
1782
+ below.
1783
+
1784
+ "It reminds one of the Bay of Naples," observed Blair, pausing to scan
1785
+ the rocky coastline against which, far beneath them, the foaming
1786
+ breakers threw themselves. He shaded his eyes with his hand and looked
1787
+ far out to sea. "What a wonderful place for a watch tower it would have
1788
+ made!"
1789
+
1790
+ "It had one once," softly replied the girl, "Wildenai's watch tower!"
1791
+
1792
+ Blair turned, their eyes met, and he smiled.
1793
+
1794
+ "It's been splendid to have you with me all these days," he said, "I've
1795
+ been wanting to tell you. You've been more of a help than you'll ever
1796
+ know." And then, after a pause, "It's because you care so much about the
1797
+ story yourself, I suppose, that you've been such an inspiration to me."
1798
+
1799
+ Something in the girl's heart seemed suddenly to snap.
1800
+
1801
+ "It's because I care more about your work, and - and you. You are so
1802
+ wonderful!" she broke forth impulsively, and stood before him crimson
1803
+ with confusion. For a second, which seemed to her an age, there was
1804
+ silence. Then he spoke and, in her bitter humiliation, his voice sounded
1805
+ strained and cold.
1806
+
1807
+ "Shall we go in?" he asked.
1808
+
1809
+ Silently he parted the tangle of manzanita that for centuries had veiled
1810
+ the secrets of the princess, and stood aside for her to enter. Wildly
1811
+ the little art teacher glanced about her. This moment to which she had
1812
+ so looked forward, and yet had dreaded as much because it meant the end,
1813
+ - this moment which might, nevertheless, have meant much to them both
1814
+ even though it were the end, she herself had spoiled! All its delicate
1815
+ beauty changed to a sordid suspicion, it lay in ruins now because of her
1816
+ thoughtless words. She dared not guess at what he must be thinking! For
1817
+ a desperate second she considered flight. Then proudly she raised her
1818
+ head. One more thing, at least, about her now he should learn!
1819
+
1820
+ "Did you know - ?" she began, then broke off irresolute.
1821
+
1822
+ Blair glanced at her and again their eyes met. This time he did not
1823
+ smile.
1824
+
1825
+ "Know what?" he asked.
1826
+
1827
+ She laughed with embarrassment.
1828
+
1829
+ "It really isn't of any interest to you, but - " and again she paused.
1830
+
1831
+ "Suppose you let me be the judge of that," he suggested stiffly. "You're
1832
+ making me horribly curious, you know. You can't very well drop the
1833
+ subject now." He was evidently making an effort at pleasantry.
1834
+
1835
+ She flushed brightly.
1836
+
1837
+ "Of course it couldn't be of the slightest importance to anyone except
1838
+ myself," she explained. Then, as if doubting her courage to continue
1839
+ long, she hurried on, "but one reason I take such an interest in - your
1840
+ work is because I'm a direct descendant of Lord Harold myself. He became
1841
+ the Duke of Norfolk afterward, you know, but Hastings was always the
1842
+ family name." She flashed him a haughty glance, a pride that changed to
1843
+ wideeyed surprise as she noted his amazement.
1844
+
1845
+ "Not really?" He had turned abruptly and in his eyes there was a curious
1846
+ expression, almost of alarm. "How extraordinary, - how perfectly
1847
+ extraordinary!"
1848
+
1849
+ "Why extraordinary?" That her cup of humiliation might brim to the full,
1850
+ resentment was added to confusion. "You consider me unworthy, then, of
1851
+ having had nobility among my ancestry? But, just the same, there was
1852
+ nothing strange about it. The colonies were chiefly English, you
1853
+ remember!" He smiled at her sarcasm. "The duke married one of
1854
+ Elizabeth's ladies-in-waiting after he went home and there was a younger
1855
+ son, and he had a younger son, and after a long time one of them came
1856
+ over to Virginia just like anybody else. They have always been good,
1857
+ loyal, highly respected American citizens," she told him fiercely, "and
1858
+ I'm proud of them! Besides - " with reckless emphasis, "I've always felt
1859
+ so sorry for Wildenai."
1860
+
1861
+ But at this point, quite incomprehensibly, Blair broke into peals of
1862
+ laughter.
1863
+
1864
+ "And by and by, after a long, long time, one of these good, loyal,
1865
+ American citizens that we're both so proud of had a hot-tempered, most
1866
+ disloyal little daughter who intends to show her employer his proper
1867
+ place before she dismisses him! But why are you sorry for Wildenai?"
1868
+
1869
+ With mischievous eyes he searched her face.
1870
+
1871
+ She flushed, then, looking squarely at him, "Because she was impulsive
1872
+ like me, and just for that reason Lord Harold ran away and left her,"
1873
+ she said. "He's the only one of them I never had any use for."
1874
+
1875
+ Blair wandered the length of the cavern and back before he replied.
1876
+
1877
+ "You think him a coward, I suppose." He still looked as though he wanted
1878
+ to laugh, yet something in his tone seared her outraged pride. He might
1879
+ as well have touched an iron to quivering flesh. "You ought to remember,
1880
+ however, - I mean every woman ought to remember, - that when a girl lets
1881
+ a man know that she cares for him she generally forfeits, then and
1882
+ there, whatever interest she may have had for him. Wildenai risked too
1883
+ much. Of course, in her case there was some excuse. She was only an
1884
+ untrained barbarian. But, under ordinary circumstances, I tell you
1885
+ there's nothing a man despises so much!"
1886
+
1887
+ What was done or said after that Miss Hastings never could have told.
1888
+ She was possessed of but one desire, - to get away, to go back to the
1889
+ hotel, - home, anywhere beyond the reach of his voice and his eyes. For
1890
+ the moment she hated him, and although Blair, conscience smitten at he
1891
+ knew not what, waited in the lobby a full hour before going in to
1892
+ dinner, she did not come down.
1893
+
1894
+ Up in her room, mechanically brushing her hair for the night, Miss
1895
+ Hastings stormily addressed the girl in the glass who stared so
1896
+ scornfully back at her.
1897
+
1898
+ "I tell you I don't care a thing about it! He probably thought he was
1899
+ justified in every word he said. He's probably smiling this very minute
1900
+ because he thinks he managed it so well! But he's a coward just the
1901
+ same, and I despise him, - I do despise him!" Her eyes brimming with
1902
+ tears, she fiercely repeated the word. "Well, he'll soon find out how
1903
+ much I really meant!"
1904
+
1905
+ Over and over she re-lived the short scene, - all of its humiliation,
1906
+ all of its hurt, seeking at every turn solace for her woman's pride.
1907
+
1908
+ "Naturally I wanted to help him all I could, to appear, at least, to be
1909
+ interested, especially when he was paying so much for it! It was only a
1910
+ business arrangement anyway," she continued bitterly, "nothing but
1911
+ business from start to finish, and if he doesn't know that yet, he'll
1912
+ find it out the very first thing tomorrow morning!"
1913
+
1914
+ And having tumbled into bed she lay staring into the dark, planning the
1915
+ details of a campaign warranted either to cure or kill the enemy.
1916
+ Outside, a mocking bird, perched provokingly near her window, kept the
1917
+ night ringing with music. Resolutely she closed her ears to his song.
1918
+ But presently, through the faint fragrance of oleanders, other sounds
1919
+ began to penetrate, - the strains of the waltz to which they had danced
1920
+ only the night before. The little art teacher turned wearily over and
1921
+ cried herself to sleep.
1922
+
1923
+ On the morning which followed she rose very early, however, much too
1924
+ early to breakfast with Blair at the little table in the sunny corner.
1925
+ Instead, she ordered some coffee and toast at Jim's Waffle Shop in the
1926
+ village and was hard at work sketching on the wharf before eight
1927
+ o'clock. She had suddenly remembered a promise to sketch Capt. Warren's
1928
+ dog holding the gaff, a feat of which both Pal and his master were
1929
+ justifiably proud. Indeed, so long had the arrangement been made and so
1930
+ entirely had it been neglected, that no one was more surprised than the
1931
+ Captain himself at her unexpected appearance.
1932
+
1933
+ "But Pal and me ought to be at the Tuna Club in fifteen minutes, to take
1934
+ a party o' members out fishin'," he demurred. "You can't paint Pal in no
1935
+ quarter of an hour!"
1936
+
1937
+ "I'm sorry to have had to put it off so long," replied Miss Hastings
1938
+ crisply, "but I'm planning to go home in a few days now, - this
1939
+ afternoon probably. It's the only chance I shall have." And she prepared
1940
+ to make good the belated promise with such determination that, after a
1941
+ wistful glance or two across the slapping white caps, the old skipper
1942
+ meekly succumbed.
1943
+
1944
+ It was here Blair found her an hour or so later. Unceremoniously he
1945
+ placed himself in front of her, his hands in his pockets, and gave vent
1946
+ to a low whistle.
1947
+
1948
+ "Well, of all the - !"
1949
+
1950
+ "Oh, is it you, Mr. Blair?" she inquired in cool, sweet tones. "I
1951
+ thought most probably you'd gone! Didn't you say yesterday you intended
1952
+ to as soon as you'd seen the cavern?" Then, after a pause during which
1953
+ Blair said nothing, "I've been getting dreadfully behind with my own
1954
+ work, so I thought, if you didn't mind, I'd try to catch up a little
1955
+ this morning."
1956
+
1957
+ "Certainly not. Take all the time you want! We've about finished anyway,
1958
+ I guess." His coolness matched her own.
1959
+
1960
+ Another silence during which she painted furiously.
1961
+
1962
+ "I'm making a sketch of Pal holding the gaff," she ventured at length
1963
+ when the strain had become too uncomfortable.
1964
+
1965
+ "So I see."
1966
+
1967
+ This second tentative effort at conversation having flickered and gone
1968
+ out she bent again to her work, while Blair remained, looking down at
1969
+ her, in his eyes mingled amusement and resentment. What had he done, he
1970
+ wondered, to account for such a change? Or, perhaps, it was something he
1971
+ had not done. He tried again.
1972
+
1973
+ "Aren't we going for our ride this morning? It's a glorious day, and I
1974
+ have the refusal of the two best horses."
1975
+
1976
+ "No, I think not, - not this morning, thank you," she answered. In her
1977
+ voice was the same crisp sweetness. "I haven't time!"
1978
+
1979
+ With a shrug of pure bewilderment he backed away, then lingered a moment
1980
+ longer to watch the sketch take shape beneath her hurrying brush. That
1981
+ was the particular moment Miss Hastings chose for the final reckless
1982
+ stab.
1983
+
1984
+ "You're standing in my light," she said. "If you'd just as soon, please
1985
+ do go away, Mr. Blair. It makes me nervous to have people looking over
1986
+ my shoulder when I'm trying to paint."
1987
+
1988
+ This was just a trifle more than Blair at the moment was prepared to
1989
+ stand. His eyes grew dark.
1990
+
1991
+ "Certainly," he replied icily. "So sorry to have bothered you at all. I
1992
+ only came down to tell you that I've decided to leave today. There's
1993
+ nothing more to keep me now, I think, and I'm rather anxious to get
1994
+ home. You'll find your check at the desk." And he sauntered away.
1995
+
1996
+ She did not go back to the hotel for luncheon. She had finished her
1997
+ sketch, yet, somehow, when the time came, she discovered that it would
1998
+ be quite impossible to enter the dining room. She found it equally
1999
+ impossible to take the afternoon boat herself. Instead, having clambered
2000
+ half way up the steep slope to the cavern, she watched from behind a
2001
+ flaming riot of wild nasturtians while, preceded by a hotel porter
2002
+ bearing bags and suit-cases, Blair boarded the Avalon for Los Angeles.
2003
+ He was going away, then, without even a word of farewell.
2004
+
2005
+ The heart of the little art teacher turned cold within her, so cold that
2006
+ she sank numbly into the red and gold tangle; nor did she look up again
2007
+ until the steamer, dipping below the horizon, had left only a trail of
2008
+ smoke to show where it disappeared. She had not believed that he would
2009
+ do quite that!
2010
+
2011
+ When evening came she went stoically in to dinner. There was no reason
2012
+ any longer for staying away. Sternly she kept her eyes from the vacant
2013
+ place opposite. Yet somehow she could not persuade herself that he was
2014
+ really gone. More than once she caught herself watching the door, half
2015
+ expecting to see him stroll in with apologies for tardiness and take his
2016
+ empty chair. When again the orchestra drifted suddenly into the waltz to
2017
+ which they had danced, she rose abruptly and left the room.
2018
+
2019
+ Well, she would go herself in the morning. She would settle everything
2020
+ and pack her things at once. She went to the desk to ask for the check.
2021
+ But there was nothing for her. No, the clerk assured her after much
2022
+ fumbling, Mr. Blair hadn't left anything, either in her box or his own.
2023
+ But, - the man stole a covert glance at her downcast face, - he was
2024
+ still holding his rooms. Probably he meant to attend to it when he
2025
+ returned.
2026
+
2027
+ That he might not see the wild joy that leaped to her eyes, Miss
2028
+ Hastings turned with startling suddenness and fled upstairs. Safe in her
2029
+ own room she flung herself with tears and laughter on the bed. So that
2030
+ was the hand he was playing, was it? - the dear, wicked, unmanageable - !
2031
+ Of course he would have to be punished, - well punished! but - she
2032
+ laughed aloud for pure joy - the world was a radiant place once more,
2033
+ and nothing of any sort really mattered, because he was coming back.
2034
+
2035
+ But the next day went by, and the next, and he had not come. Day after
2036
+ day passed in an empty procession, yet no one of them brought that for
2037
+ which she waited. And there was nothing else to do. Work was out of the
2038
+ question. She could not sit still long enough. It became, instead, her
2039
+ sole occupation to linger each morning and afternoon on the verandah
2040
+ until the steamer from Los Angeles had rounded the point and crossed the
2041
+ bay in front of the hotel. Then, hidden behind the palms she would watch
2042
+ until the last straggling tourist had left the pier. But still he did
2043
+ not come.
2044
+
2045
+ Doubt in every tormenting guise assailed her. Perhaps he had changed his
2046
+ mind and decided later not to return. Yet the clerk had said he meant to
2047
+ come back! Perhaps her check, sent by mail, was even now in her box. But
2048
+ she had not the courage to go again to the desk. Driven by alternate
2049
+ hope and fear she lost color, and she could not sleep. During seven
2050
+ miserable nights she planned to go back to Pasadena by the morning boat,
2051
+ and as many times she put it off. Yet, if he did return to find her
2052
+ waiting, what, then, would she have given him the right to think? But,
2053
+ on the other hand, if she went she might never see him again!
2054
+
2055
+ On the eighth day she took herself grimly in hand. No longer would she
2056
+ humiliate herself by any further delay. Wildenai had not waited, and
2057
+ even a school teacher can be as proud as an Indian princess! That very
2058
+ afternoon she would finish her sketch of the cavern. Then tomorrow she
2059
+ would go back to Pasadena and the long gray round of work. Desolately
2060
+ she wandered up the secret trail to Wildenai's bower. Never had her
2061
+ sympathy for the deserted princess been so keen. Perhaps, she mournfully
2062
+ considered, if the spirit of the Indian maiden still lingered there it
2063
+ might feel sympathy for her as well. Perhaps she, too, would find
2064
+ comfort in the spot where that other woman had paid an equal price for
2065
+ her impulsiveness.
2066
+
2067
+ The shadows in the little cavern were dark and cool and, laying aside
2068
+ her box of colors, for a long time she sat quite motionless, staring out
2069
+ to where the gulls drifted and glinted against the blue. She heard after
2070
+ a while the whistle of the approaching steamer but gave no heed. Lying
2071
+ back against the moss she had almost dropped asleep when something in
2072
+ the corner opposite attracted her attention. She sat up nervously and
2073
+ stared into the shadows. Was it only that the darkness was deeper over
2074
+ there, or was that really something propped against the wall? And had it
2075
+ moved?
2076
+
2077
+ In the years that followed she never knew how long she sat there after
2078
+ the stones had been lifted away, holding in her lap those shreds of torn
2079
+ white doeskin. Still caught together, though in tatters, by long strings
2080
+ of shells and beads, they shone, a ghostly film of white from out the
2081
+ dimness. A breath, and the whole would have crumbled into dust. Yet the
2082
+ beads, she noticed, were still perfect as when strung by slim brown
2083
+ fingers centuries before. Only half believing it was not all of it a
2084
+ dream, she lifted them strand after strand. Then, suddenly, she gave a
2085
+ little cry. Somewhere from out the torn folds a slender chain had
2086
+ slipped. Trembling with a curiosity that bordered close on terror, she
2087
+ carried it to the light, and there it glowed, a glancing stream of
2088
+ crimson, in her hand.
2089
+
2090
+ "Wildenai's necklace!" she breathed, and hid her face.
2091
+
2092
+ There came the sound of a step outside. The manzanita branches were
2093
+ pushed impatiently aside and he stood before her.
2094
+
2095
+ The journey across the channel from Los Angeles had seemed twice as long
2096
+ as when he made it a few weeks before, and he had hurried all the way
2097
+ from the hotel straight to the little cavern. But now that he had found
2098
+ her again, there seemed to be plenty of time for everything, and he
2099
+ stood quite silent looking down at her. He was glad he had found her
2100
+ there, glad, in a curious, unreasoning way, for the quiet of the late
2101
+ afternoon, for the faint fragrance of the Mariposa lilies blooming just
2102
+ beyond the ledge. Yet he let her know nothing of this in what he said.
2103
+
2104
+ "So here you are, after all! I thought I should find you here."
2105
+
2106
+ She had not heard him come and was startled into a cry.
2107
+
2108
+ "You!" she gasped, and lifted eyes in which the telltale signs of tears
2109
+ were still quite evident, so evident that, with a woman's instinct to
2110
+ hide them, she caught up the necklace and held it toward him.
2111
+
2112
+ "See what I've found!" she exclaimed.
2113
+
2114
+ But he paid no heed. Instead, manlike, he proceeded, quite
2115
+ unconsciously, to say the one thing that could hurt her most.
2116
+
2117
+ "I looked for you at the hotel first, then I came on up here. I knew you
2118
+ wouldn't go till I came!"
2119
+
2120
+ The color that had flooded her face at the sound of his voice faded
2121
+ again. She was quite white as she asked quietly:
2122
+
2123
+ "How could you know I would stay?"
2124
+
2125
+ He laughed easily, settling himself confidently on the moss at her side.
2126
+
2127
+ "Because I hadn't paid you yet," he answered gaily. "Don't you think
2128
+ that was clever of me, Wildenai?"
2129
+
2130
+ "I would rather you did not call me that," she told him coldly, "It
2131
+ sounds irreverent." And she dropped her eyes, which had filled again
2132
+ miserably, to the film of white in her lap. Then, with a pitiful attempt
2133
+ to hurt him in return: "Of course you realize that I really don't know
2134
+ much about you. I don't want you to think that I distrusted you exactly
2135
+ - " she marvelled at herself that she could say such things to him, but
2136
+ went recklessly on. "The check wasn't there, - and so, well, it seemed
2137
+ wisest to wait. They said you were coming back, and I couldn't afford to
2138
+ lose it; so I stayed. Just a matter of business, you see!" She finished
2139
+ in a tone which, except for a suspicious tremble, was satisfactorily
2140
+ disagreeable.
2141
+
2142
+ But Blair's armor, since his return, seemed proof against such thrusts
2143
+ as she could give.
2144
+
2145
+ "Won't play Indian at all, then?" he retorted teasingly. "But of course
2146
+ not! How could you when you happen to come from the other side of the
2147
+ house? However," he continued whimsically, "there are such things as
2148
+ English roses, you know. I've always loved them, too, even when they
2149
+ were thorny!"
2150
+
2151
+ He pulled absently at a fern growing near, while, suddenly, for no
2152
+ particular reason, the color glowed again in the cheeks of the little
2153
+ art teacher. She smiled, half unwillingly.
2154
+
2155
+ "But don't pull up the wild flowers here," she warned him, "You'll have
2156
+ the forester after you! When did you get back?" she added. "Where have
2157
+ you been so long?" burned on her lips, but she scorned to ask it.
2158
+
2159
+ "About an hour ago," he replied amiably. "The boat was late."
2160
+
2161
+ "I was beginning to think you'd given up coming at all." She could not
2162
+ keep it back. "The duke never bothered to, you know."
2163
+
2164
+ But this blow, like the first, failed to reach any vulnerable spot.
2165
+ Blair did not flinch.
2166
+
2167
+ "No, naturally he didn't! He was English, and you can't depend upon the
2168
+ English, I've discovered. But there's not the slightest reason for
2169
+ linking me up with him. The princess never ran away now, did she? And I
2170
+ - " He paused, then without looking at her he began again.
2171
+
2172
+ "Seriously, I'm sorry if I seemed to be deserting. I - well, honestly, I
2173
+ didn't know what else to do. You suggested it yourself, you remember!
2174
+ And I'd promised my father to look after some business for him in Los
2175
+ Angeles while I was out here. You see, he - our family, have lived in
2176
+ the East for a long time now, but we used to own pretty much all of Los
2177
+ Angeles county some three centuries ago, when the Spanish were here, and
2178
+ - " Again he broke off abruptly. "Do you want to know about me?" he
2179
+ demanded.
2180
+
2181
+ Miss Hastings leaned breathlessly toward him. Her heart was beating
2182
+ wildly.
2183
+
2184
+ "Oh, please!" she begged.
2185
+
2186
+ "Perhaps I should have told you at the first," he began, "or at least
2187
+ after you told me who you were, but - anyway, I didn't. I'd never told
2188
+ anyone before and I didn't much suppose I ever would. There's a reason,
2189
+ though, why I'm particularly interested in this legend, too, a reason
2190
+ just as good as you've got. I'm - well, I'm one of Wildenai's great,
2191
+ great grandsons!"
2192
+
2193
+ And then, because she sat quite silent there in the shadows, and
2194
+ motionless except for fingering something white that lay in her lap, he
2195
+ waited uneasily. Was she angry again, he wondered, or perhaps she was
2196
+ only laughing!
2197
+
2198
+ She was the first to break the silence.
2199
+
2200
+ "Are you trying to be funny?" Her voice was very cold.
2201
+
2202
+ "Not at all," he answered hotly. "It must be all of ten generations back
2203
+ or even more, and of course it wasn't all Spanish afterward, but, just
2204
+ the same, I'm as much a descendant of the princess as you are of the
2205
+ duke, - always have been! I'm just as proud of it, too. Possibly you
2206
+ will remember that the Spanish beat the English to it, at least in
2207
+ California. Anyway," he finished bitterly, "what difference does it
2208
+ make? So far as I can see, it only gives us one more good subject to
2209
+ quarrel about!"
2210
+
2211
+ Then out of the dimness came a queer little sound, whether of tears or
2212
+ of laughter it was impossible to know. For the least part of a second a
2213
+ hand brushed his own.
2214
+
2215
+ "Oh, no!" she whispered, "Let's not do that. It wouldn't be right! And
2216
+ see," she laughed tremulously, "Isn't it strange I should have found it
2217
+ today, but," she lifted the white thing in her lap, "here is Wildenai's
2218
+ wedding dress - and the chain of garnets!"
2219
+
2220
+ The cavern was quite dark before they had finished talking about it, but
2221
+ at length they laid the poor little ghost of a garment reverently back
2222
+ among the stones and rose to go.
2223
+
2224
+ "But the necklace?" Blair asked, hesitating, "do you think we ought to
2225
+ leave that here?"
2226
+
2227
+ The girl considered a moment.
2228
+
2229
+ "It's really yours," she decided. "Nobody else could have the least
2230
+ claim to it."
2231
+
2232
+ "Except - " Suddenly his eyes shone with a strange expression before
2233
+ which the little art teacher instinctively shrank. He took a step toward
2234
+ her.
2235
+
2236
+ "I believe I'll give the garnets back," he announced. "I fancy that's
2237
+ what the princess would have liked to do if she'd had the chance.
2238
+ Besides," his eyes grew still darker, "they were meant in the first
2239
+ place for a wedding gift, and so if you - "
2240
+
2241
+ He would have clasped them about her neck, but Miss Hastings backed
2242
+ frantically away.
2243
+
2244
+ "No! - not for worlds," she cried. "You know you're only saying it
2245
+ because you think you can't get out of it!" And before he could realize
2246
+ just what was happening, she was gone.
2247
+
2248
+
2249
+
2250
+ The boat for Los Angeles was unusually crowded that night. For either
2251
+ this reason, or some other she would not acknowledge, Miss Hastings
2252
+ found herself pushed aside by more impatient passengers every time she
2253
+ attempted to enter the gangway.
2254
+
2255
+ "All aboard!" called a peremptory voice from somewhere on deck. She took
2256
+ a step forward, hesitated, drew back. The plank was hauled irrevocably
2257
+ away, and she turned to face Blair standing just behind her on the
2258
+ wharf.
2259
+
2260
+ "I was sure you wouldn't run away," he declared, "but if you had - !"
2261
+
2262
+ She let him lead her back along the broad boardwalk toward the hotel
2263
+ until they stood within the shadow of the huge boulder which for
2264
+ centuries has marked the outer boundary of the Bay of Moons. Beyond them
2265
+ the lights of the St. Catherine glimmered down the hill and on over the
2266
+ water, rimming with golden bubbles the outlines of the pier.
2267
+
2268
+ "Wildenai!" Out of the darkness his voice came to her, mocking, tender,
2269
+ wholly insistent. "Foolish, obstinate little lady! Can't you see how
2270
+ it's up to you, - up to the English to make amends? Honestly now, when
2271
+ he began it I don't imagine even that rascal Drake himself would have
2272
+ believed a family scrap could last the better part of four centuries.
2273
+ Don't you really think it's about time for you to call it off?"
2274
+
2275
+ And flinging her scruples to the winds, Miss Hastings suddenly decided
2276
+ that it was.
2277
+
2278
+
2279
+
2280
+
2281
+
2282
+ *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THEIR MARIPOSA LEGEND ***
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2284
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