Frontier Stories

h of that settlement. That night, however, it was veiled in the smoke that encompassed the great highway leading to Excelsior. It is presumed that the Burnh

st stirring mining worm, and a resounding knock brought him half dressed to the street

ind him, and by a series of pokes in the ribs genially backing his host into his own sitting-room. "I'm

al title of "woman folk," for the integers of which he was not responsible. He hesitated, and then propounded

degrees of grievance and mental distress which indicate too early roused young womanhood. The eventual reply seemed to be affirmat

t door on Brother Burnham. Ha, ha!" and suiting the action to the word, he actually bundled the admiring Brother Burnham out on his own doorstep. There was a light pattering on the staircase, and Nellie Wynn, pink with sleep, very tall, very

you yesterda

shrugged her shoulde

in disguise; you've met him there before. He is your clandestin

!" sh

sto

?" she asked, with an

at the parlor windows. It was only a drunken Mexican muleteer leaning against the house; but if he heard nothing, I did. Nellie, I heard Brace tell Dunn that he had tracked you in your disguis

she re

gain p

id you do?"

surprise you and him together, and I harne

" she said, looking

conveyed in her words, and was obliged to content himself with its logical and worldly significan

alue your reputation, if you wish to si

," she

he cabin in the

N

er go there

t know even

; but as she would have been equally satisfied with an e

did he l

k, here. He wen

for Dunn is on his way t

to affect the young girl with alarm, al

to the woods?" she

," repl

all?" s

w what you are

oing bac

time for tri

said, with a yawn; "it's

whatever face you like on this affair, you are comp

anted to marry Low, if you

ouldn't mar

sure of th

you want to drive me mad? Have you

lp you, do you? Why di

nd bring D

e already in pursuit of your

and talk with me without him. Will

s,

ou will stop at the hotel an

lli

ill be your text for the conversation you will have with him.

In a very few moments she returned with two notes: one contained a

im to my consideration, and that I shall be obliged to discontinue them for the future. At the same time he wishes me to express my gratitude for your valuable instruction and assistance in

rateful

LIE

ith perfectly genuine admiration. "You're a good girl, Nellie," he said, and, in a moment of parental forgetfulness, unc

e said, as a gentle hint to her embarrassed

to be seen on good terms with Low at the hotel; so perhaps you

slipped up-stairs, and her father, without the formality o

avoid recognition at that moment, he whipped up his horse, intending to keep the lead until he could turn into the first cross-road. But the coming travelers had the fleetest horse; and finding it impossible to distance them, he drove close to the ditch, pulling up suddenly as the strange vehicle was abreast of him, and forcing them to pass him at full speed, with the result already chronicled. When they had vanished in the darkness, Mr. Wynn, wit

r eyes," he said, dragging Carter before the bar, "and glasses round for as many of the boys as are up and

m Yolo," said Carter, "and that ar young Injin yarb doctor from the Carquine

-he!" And, nodding to Brother Carter, he strode along the passage, and with no other introduction than a playful and preliminary "Boo!" burst into one of the rooms. Low, who by the light of a single candle was bending over t

ing dews," said Father Wynn archly, illustrating his metaphor

ellie by rising from his chair. "It's a volume I've longed to posses

t a glance at the bare room, which looked like a camp, and the strange, unconventional garb of its occupant, restored

and on Low's shoulder, with an illustration of celestial guardianship that would have been i

mere human interpretation. It was enough, however, to pu

Nellie?" he asked, with

im the purely providential interposition of this suggestion. Seizing it a

s it? You want to trap poor Father Wynn. You want to make him say 'No.'

it, the young man's simple, truthful nature was embarrassed. He longed to express his gratitude

ha! You'd like me to say that I knew nothing of the botanizings, and the herb collectings, and the picnickings there-he-he!-you sly dog! Perhaps you'd like to tempt Father Wynn further and make him swear he knows nothing of his

Low, with his usual directness however, said, "I do n

hand on your heart and say to the world, 'Come on, all of you! Observe me; I have nothing to conceal. I walk with Miss Wynn in the woods as her instructor-her teacher, in fact. We cull a flower here and there; we pluck

Low, starting to his

est roots, for he has trodden in the ways of the Almighty. Gather wisdom from his lips, and knowledge from his simple woodman's craft. Make, in fact, a collection not only of herbs, but of moral axioms and experience,'-I knew I could trust you, and, trusting you, my young friend, I felt I could trust the wor

.. understand you?" i

aidenly instinct-perhaps her duty to another-took the alarm. I remember h

understand," said Low,

mere friend-a teacher, a guide, a philosopher. It is impossible.' Well, sir, she was right. He is jealo

here is your daughter

ust suspicions. She appreciates your anxiety, and, knowing that you could n

us leave of Low in the bar-room, deliver the letter with archness, and escape before a possible explosion. He consequently backed towards the door for an emergency. But he was

pped it into his haversack. Then he picked up his blanket, threw it over his shoulder, took his trus

you-going?" s

oked at him a moment, mumbled something, and then shambled feebly and ineffectively down the staircase before Low, with a

s seized him in his arms, and after an ingenious simulation of depositing him in the horse-trough set him down in affected amazement. "Bleth't if I didn't think from the weight of your hand it wath my old friend, Thacramento Bill," said Curson apologetically, with a wink at the bystanders. "That'th the way Bill alwayth uthed to tackle hith friendth

nding his hand. "You're

from the exthpreth

id.

'm rethponthible for it

ed Low, quickly fixing

etha gave me a commithion to buy it and thend it to you anonymouthly. T

r present," sai

e in plathe of that muthle loader you carry, or thomething thenthible. B

id hurriedly; "but it's nothing. Only I

d Low's hand in hi

u from the time you acted like a white man-no offenthe-to Teretha. She thayth you were left when a child lying round, jutht ath promithcuouthly ath she wath; and if I can do anything towardth putting you on the trail of your people, I'll do it. I know thome of the voyageurth who traded with the Cherokeeth, and

seemed to recall him to himself. He raised hi

ong over there," he sa

inning to doubt Low's sanity; "not

straight up? It isn't blown over from the Div

wait a minute! We'll get hortheth. I say!" he shouted, forgetting his lisp in his ex

to locate the scene of the conflagration. It was evidently not a fire advancing regularly from the outer skirt of the wood, communicated to it from the Divide; it was a local outburst near its centre. It was not in the direction of his cabin in the tree. There was no immediate danger to Teresa, unless fear drove her beyond the confines of the wood into the hands of those who might recognize her. The screaming of jays and ravens above his head quickene

s of a party of men in the road, while the huge bulk of a grizzly was disappearing in the distance. A battue of the escaping animals had

an. To keep his reason and insight so clear as to be able in the midst of this bewildering confusion to shape that course so as to intersect the wild and unknown tract of an inexperienced, frightened wanderer belonged to Low, and to Low alone. He was making his way against the wind towards the fire. He had reasoned that she was either in comparative safety to windward of it, or he should meet her being driven towards him by it, or find her succumbed and fainting at its feet. To do this he must penetrate the burning belt, and then pass under the blazing dome. He was already upon it; he could see the falling fire dropping like rain or blown like gorgeous blossoms of the conflagration across his path. The space was lit up brilliantly. The vast shafts of dull coppe

knees, and lifted her

it was Teresa you called, and no other! You have com

glance around him. It might have been his fancy, but

aid. "Tell me! You did no

he said

lli

age, and mortification of the last hour broke from him in that inarticul

you do not want me to cast you to the beasts like Jezebel of old, never-never take that accursed name again upon your lips. Seek her-her? Yes! Seek her to tie

f savage delight that had passed acros

sing her hands vaguely across his breast,

the scarred tr

. "I was driven from there just now. I thou

ssed his mind at that moment, it was only shown in his redoubled energy. He did not glide through the thick underbrush, as on that day, but seemed to take a savage pleasure in breaking through it with sheer brute force. Once Teresa insisted upon relieving him of the burden of her weight, but after a few steps she staggered blindly against him, and would fain have recourse once more to his strong arms. And so, alternately staggering, bending, crouching, or bounding and crashing on, but always in one direction, they burst through the jealous rampart, and came upon the sylva

u?" she asked

him. He came towards her, and b

d!-look at me! W

light film across them; the lids were bla

ely over his face. "It must have happened when he fainted, and I had to drag him

?" said Lo

, Du

re?" said Lo

rium? Didn't you come to the camp-fire?" she asked

N

there-then you didn

sm that had upheld his own agony bre

s around him, and hid her achi

ed in her listening ear. "Don't m

him in time. But here she stopped, dreading to say a word that would shatter the hope she was building upon his sudden revulsion of feeling for Nellie. She could not bring herself to repeat their interview-that would come later, when they were safe and out of danger; now not even the secret of his bir

ed, unconsciously repeating her thought in a tone that made her

n him. The possibility of Teresa loving him had never occurred to his simple nature. He bent his head and kissed her. She was frightened, and unloosed her clinging arms

this, and read the meaning his voice alone could not entirely convey. For the first time she felt the loss of her s

below. We are safe here, unless some sudden current should draw the fire down upon us. You are not frightened?" She pressed his hand; she was thinking of the pale face of Dunn, lying in the secure retreat she had p

"but I will reconnoitr

upon the slanting trunk and ascended it

t on which she sat, a deafening crash,

its roots, or by the crumbling of the bark from the heat, had slipped, made a half revolution, and, falling,

ery furnace swept through the opening, a thousand luminous points around her burst into fire, and in an instant she was lost in a whirlwind of smoke and flame! From the onset

n black and silver the shrunken and silent columns of those roofless vaults, shorn of base and capital. It flickered on the still, overflowing pool of the hidden spring, and s

*

remains found are those of two wretched tramps, one of whom is said to have been a digger, who supported himself upon roots and herbs, and the other a degraded half-white woman. It is not unreasonable to suppose that the fire originated through their carelessness, although Father Wynn of the First Baptist Church, in his powerful discourse of last Sunday, pointed at the warning and lesson

SSION OF

LOG

er trader, drifting past, saw no change in these rusty undulations, barren of distinguishing peak or headland, and bald of wooded crest or timbered ravine. The withered ranks of wild oats gave a dull procession of uniform color to the hills, unbroken by any relief of shadow in their smooth, round curves. As far as the eye could reach, se

coast faded and was lost. As the fog stole with soft step southward, all distance, space, character, and locality again vanished; the hills upon which the sun still shone bore the same monotonous outlines as those just wiped into space. Last of all, before the red sun

whisper, with grave intervals of silence, but with no continuous murmur as before. In a curving bight of the shore the creaking of oars

e from the sea, and was low, as if unco

nd was followed by the order, "Ste

her?" asked anot

l again, and

y-oi-o

a cry in a dream, and seemed hardly to reach beyond the surf before it

said the first voice, gravely; "and we'll do that if the current

a shore with not a blasted p

only by the occasional dip of oars, kee

ast we'll see of that boat again, or o

painter should slip. Jack Cranch a

the invisible

have been the long-deferred, far-off echo of

t found anything, or he cou

ned ears it seemed to have an intelligent significance, for the fir

ly and simultaneously in the rowlocks, then more faintly,

ilence, and, when they had attracted the weary ear, sank away as in a mocking dream, and showed themselves unreal. Nebulous gatherings in the fog seemed to indicate stationary objects that, even as one gazed, moved away; the recurring lap and ripple on the shingle sometimes took upon itself the s

eir cold bosoms to the sun, the long line of coast struggled back to life again. Everything was un

s that outstripped the old, slow-creeping trader, or was at times streaked and blurred with the trailing smoke of a steamer. There were a few strange footprints o

, lost their weary way in the tangled recesses of the wooded slopes, and breathed their last at the foot of the stone cross before the Mission. It was on the crest of those slopes that the fog halted and walled in the sun-illumined plain below; it was in this plain that limit

not their own. And his smile had an ecclesiastical as well as a human significance, the pleasantest object in his prospect being the fair and curly head of his boy acolyte

Running rapidly to Father Pedro's side, he grasped his

nce. "What new alarm is this? Is it Luzbel hiding among our Catal

ale cheeks, and an apologetic, bashful smile lighting his clear eyes. "Nei

hee, child, those foolish fears are most unmeet for thee, and must be overcome, if necessary, w

o stopped a

eatures. And only last week thou wast disdainful of poor Murieta's pig, forgetti

cleanly, holy father," replied the

the senses. I have noticed of late you gather over-much of roses and syringa, excellent in thei

hild; "and surely the flowers cannot help being sweet, any more than myrrh or incense. And I am not frightened of the heathen Am

e, child?" asked Fat

understand," laughed the boy, "but the ma

esides, have I not told thee it ill becomes a child of Christ to chatter with those sons of

ir throat," replied the boy. "But he said 'Devili

. "They are but heretical words," he replied, in answer to the boy's inquiring look; "it is well you understand not En

rospect. The sun had already disappeared over the mountain wall that lay between him and the sea, rimmed with a faint white line of outlying fog. A cool zephyr fanned his cheek; it was the dying breath of the vientos generales beyond the wall. As Father Pedro's eyes were raise

no "indications" to attract the gold-seekers. Nevertheless, to Father Pedro even the infrequent contact with the Americanos was objectionable: they were at once inquisitive and careless; they asked questions with the sharp perspicacity of controversy; they received his grave replies with the fr

t, bronzed and slightly gray from the vicissitudes of years and exposure, he had an air of practical seriousness that commended itself t

church with his thumb,-"and you haven't got to make an appointment. You have got a clear forty minutes before the Angelus rings," he added, consulting

, however, laid his hand upon the Padre's sleeve with the air

cts. I'm ready to give 'em if you'll take 'em out here, now. If you're willing to drop the Church and confessional, and all that sort o' thing, I, on my side, am willing to give up the absolution, and all that sort o' thing. You might," he ad

ignity, would alone have been enough to touch the Padre, had not the stranger's dominant personality already overridden him. He hesitated. The stranger seized the opportunity to take his arm, and lead him with the h

year-old gal. One o' the crew was fond o' that baby. He used to get the black nurse to put it in the dingy, and he'd tow it astern, rocking it with the painter like a cradle. He did it-hatin' the cap'en all the same. One day the black nurse got out of the dingy for a moment, when the baby was asleep, leavin' him alone with it. An idea took hold on him, jest from cussedness, you'd say, but it was partly from revenge on the cap'en and partly to get away from the ship. The ship was well in shore, and the current settin' towards it. He slipped the painter-that man-and set himself adrift with the baby. It was a crazy act, you'd reckon, for there was n't any oars in the boat; but he had a crazy man's luck, and he contrived, by sculling the boat

trange asperity that boded no good to the penitent; "

hat he-that's me-ran across one of that crew in Frisco. 'Hallo, Cranch,' sez he to me, 'so you got away, didn't you? And how's the cap'en's baby? Grown a young gal by this time, ain't she?' 'What are you talking about,' sez I; 'how should I know?' He draws aw

at the prospect with an uncompromi

ain't it?" the stranger cont

hly, without turning his head, "that

par

spected you? Ah! Holy Trinity," continued Father Pedro, throwing out his han

w?" echoed the

es

w them over his knee, drew it up to his chest car

rose to

persistent, with hanging corner lids that might have concealed even more purpose than they showed. The Padre's

pay me to come here, if I'd killed the baby, unless I wanted you to fix things right with m

then?" demanded the

lowed to confess something short of a murder.

Father Pedro, turning as if to go. But the st

father-the man you wronged-before you

ay if he was living, and

e sure

a

ther relatio

on

irst indication of priestly sympathy in his manner. "You cannot ask forgiveness of the earthly father you have injured, you r

o find th

iving, are you fit to seek her, to even make

it profitable t

iest, scornfully. "So be

arch. You know this country. You were here when

it. It is an affair of the alcalde-t

s

ed, with the snuffbox he had somewhat ostentatiou

ot, Se?or?"

y this time, and might not want the

ady?" asked Father Pedro, with a rapid gesture, indic

thes too; and whoever found her woul

ears! Good! You h

stranger, consulting hi

ss. Good-by; don't

nded hi

xpected further speech or entreaty from him he was mistaken, for the American, without turning his head, walked in the same serious, practical fashion down the aven

ton

stable preceded the entrance of a shor

ancisco, who will take letters from me to the Fa

ak, revere

go by the mountain trai

fonda, but if the ch

nes' or at the rancho o

h stragglers, least

anos.

earer tower. With a gesture Father Pedro waved A

rem Dei

I

o had wisely reflected, from the straying feet of travelers along the dusty highway to San José. As Franci

re not three leagues from the Blessed Fisherman, thou couldst scarce sit thy

and I may not soon again chance this way. And

ld of the Church, though this followi

o does not objec

ver young," replied Antonio, sententiously,

ncisco quickly, opening his blue eyes in fr

s display of the acolyte's direct simplicity, contented hi

ardiente of the Blessed Fisherman thou missest. Never fe

slippers, the flying out of long black braids, and with a cry of joy a young girl thre

conflagration. Am I the fire?" he continued, submitting to the two sounding kisses the youn

s no affair of mine," he added to himself, as he led Pinto away. "Perhaps Father Pedro is right, and

I must talk with thee before thou seest Don Juan; that is why I ran to intercept thee,

cented only by the belt of the light flounced saya, and said, "But why this

e bright sunlight of a walled garden. The girl dropp

ter. "Dost thou remember," said the girl, "it was here," pointing to an embayed pool in the dark current, "that I baptized thee, when Father Pedro first brou

touch of any other, and so himself always was

nio, over a year ago, to the cattle branding. And now, my Pancho, I may

h such abstraction of manner and inadequacy of w

has happened?"

lashed, and she put her brown fist on her

go," she sai

e?" aske

tterly, "I am not a boy, and have not a lovely voice borrowed from the angels. I was, like thee, a foundling, kept, by the charity of the reverend fathers, until Don Juan, a childle

choed Franci

it is discovered w

they

l piety. "There is some one, a thing, a mere Don Fulano

feverish interest, that contrasted so strongly with his pr

a! An extravaganza for

ship of which my fath

ed up among the weeds

rushes. A pretty

ancisco enthusiastically. "Ah,

ly,-"thee! No!-it was a girl

ian come?" persisted the

country or the people, but who helped the other American to claim me. I tell thee, Francisco, like as not it is a

mericano who seeks th

have the four S's, for all I care. Yet," she added with a slight

et so strong that you felt he ordered you to do things without saying it? A

hee, Pancho! Of wh

slipping into the sacristy, he was beside me. He spoke kindly, but I understood him not. He put into my hand gold for an aguinaldo. I pretended I understood not that also

what said he of h

ed. "Perhaps-because I sai

rom the good father when thou carest. But why d

excitement. "Doubtless he knew we were friends and playmates-maybe the good father has told

aimed the girl bitterly, withdrawing the li

y, I know not. But I know this: the good Father Pedro's eyes were troubled when he gave me his blessing, and he held me long in his embrace. Pray Heaven I have committed no fa

th suspicion, she drew in her breath, and closed h

as best pleased the fathers? Was he to know no more than that? With such gifts as God had giv

before him, and envied her courage. "It is the mestizo blood," he mu

hou a

st. Eh, wh

e thicket, Francisco clinging to her with trembling hands and whitened lips. A stone, loosened from

rancisco, hurriedly, sounding the uttermo

petuously; "and who and why, I intend to

ita;" said the young acolyt

da quickly, and leave m

u

fruitless, however, and she was returning impatiently, when her quick eye fell upon a letter lying amid the dried grass where she and Francisco had been seated the moment b

lope, with its red string and its blotch of red seal, was his sentence and her own. The little mestizo, had not been brought up to respect the integrity of either locks or seals, both being unknown in the patriarchal life of the ha

ng, dropping the letter from her hands and rocking to and fro. In the midst of this she quickly stopped again; the clouds broke, a sunshine of laughter started from her eyes, she laughed shyly, she laughed loudly, she laughed hysteric

cally held out her hand for the letter; the Ameri

re you

nita, with a strong dispo

ess directness, "you've read e

either," resp

Father Superior of San José

e power the stranger seemed to be gaining over her. She recalled F

cisco. It contains a

it. Perhaps it would

. "Why?" she asked, h

uietly, "you are old playmates;

hy don't you read it you

people's letters, and if it

if I d

Father Sup

ncisco's secret already

rha

od! Se?or Crancho,

ate two such good frien

oth," said the girl, with a sneer

d be del

sion, Senor, for here c

iend, Senor Br-r-own,

, surmounting a dark face of Quixotic gravity and romantic rectitude, indicated Don Juan B

matter of this kind, it ain't no hoss trade nor sharp practice. The Don is that lofty in principle that he's willin' to sacrifice his affections for the good of the gal; and you, on your hand, kalkilate to see all he's done for her, and go your whole pile

eeds of courtesy and affection. Let it rather stand that Juanita was a sacred trust put into my hands years ago by the goddess of American liberty, and nurtured in the Mexican eagle's

, admiringly, with a slight dropping of his left eye

tinued the old man, carried away by his emot

d the young girl, angrily, exasperated b

aps one of the American nati

ality," said Don Juan, with time-honored courtesy, producing the rustic key of the gate of the patio. "It

el of the tawny fields; the shadows of slowly moving cattle were mingling with their own silhouettes, and becoming more and more grotesque. A keen wind rising in the hills was already creeping from the ca?ada as

ts, running hither and thither. The alleys and gardens were filled with retainers. A confusion of questions, orders, and outcrys rent the air, the plains shook with the gallop

I

ns of the reverend fathers-he deputed the functions of the first mass to a coadjutor, and, breviary in hand, sought the orchard of venerable pear trees. Whether there was any occult sympathy in his reflections with the contemplation of their gnarled, twisted, gouty, and knotty limbs, still bearing gracious and goodly fruit, I know not, but it was his private retreat, and under one of the most rheumatic and misshapen trunks there was a rude seat. Here

Father Ped

eam cut short by the orders of the archbishop, that sent his companion, Brother Diego, north on a mission to strange lands, and condemned him to the isolation of San Carmel. He was thinking of that fierce struggle with envy of a

red how one night, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin herself, as he firmly then believed, this dream was fulfilled. An Indian woman brought him a Waugee child-a baby-girl that she had picked up on the sea-shore. There were no parents to divide the responsibility, the child had no past to confront, except the memory of the ignorant Indian woman, who deemed her duty done, and whose interest ceased in giving it to the Padre. The austere conditions of his monkish

ngers laid upon his yellow cheeks, the pleading of inarticulate words, the eloquence of wonder-seeing and mutely questioning eyes; how he had succumbed again and again, and then struggled no more, seeing only in them the suggestion of childhood made incarnate

he Mission, and as each year passed, the difficulty of restoring her to the position and duties of her sex became greater and more dangerous. And then the acolyte's destiny was sealed by what again appeared to Father Pedro as a direct interposition of Providence. The child developed a voice of such exquisite sweetness and purity that an angel seemed to have strayed i

absolved by the Holy Church? Never! never! Father Pedro dwelt upon the stranger's rejections of the ministrations of the Church with a pitiable satisfaction; had he accepted it, he would have had a sacred claim upon Father Pedro's sympathy and confidence. Yet he rose again, uneasily and with irregular steps returned to the corridor, passing the door of the fa

ms even to San José, and saw the child deliver the missive which gave the secret of her sex and condition to the Father Superior. That the authority at San José might dissent with the Padre of San Carmel, or decline to carry out his designs, did not occur to the one-idea'd priest. Like all solitary people, isolated from passing events, he made no allowance for occurrences outside of his routine. Yet at this

end Fa

his muleteer, José. Father P

y, then; hast tho

er than to fill the six-foot hole and say a prayer over her, I'll give the mule that brought her here for food

xample from hers. Bring her with thee i

November leaf, over his stony forehead, with a sound that seemed almost a rustle. Then he suddenly stiffened his fingers over his

an unstranded riata. A trembling agitated the mass as Father Pedro approached. He bent over the heap and distinguished in its midst the glowing black eyes of Sanchicha,

h thy memory for a moment. Look back fourteen years, mother; it is but yesterday to thee.

turned with a quick look towards the open doo

ot understand; thou dost not attend me. Knowest thou of any

ght have been dead. Father Pedro waited a moment,

mean ther

struggled bac

on

k or put away no sign n

on this c

nd became as empty as the orbit

t passed; only the sound of the mulete

ef. "Pepita shall give thee some refreshment, and

eap in the corner. Sanchicha's eyes lived again; more than that, a singular movement came over her face. The hideous ca

xed upon the mountain between him and that mysterious sea that had brought so much into his life. He was filled with a strange desire to see it, a vague curiosity hitherto unknown to his preoccupied life; he wished to gaze upon that strand, perhaps the very spot where she had been found; he doubted not his questioning eyes would discover some forgotten trace of her; under his persistent will and aided by the Holy Virgin, the sea would give up its secret. He

uming an interrupted conversation, "and I reckon I ain't going to keep you a minit longer than I did t'other day." He m

h a single stride, laying his hand upon

"I reckon that wasn't the name as I caught it,"

pon his bench, "I was thinking of other things. You-you-came upon me

quietly. "That's why I came. And

priest, with rapid ac

this gi

the Santa Clare Valley," replied Cranch, jerking his thumb over his

nd. Cranch drew a plug of tobacco from his pocket, cut off a portion, placed it in his cheek, and then quietly began to strap t

the babe you seek?" said th

ling girl baby baptized by you, you know,"-he partly turned round appealingly to the Padre,-

priest, with his eyes still on the ground,

ch. "The main thing at first was to find the girl; that was my job; the

a slight sneer he could not repress, "if the

e property. Busin

prope

lade on his boot, shut it up with a click,

er left when he died, which naturally belongs to her

ckets, and turned his eyes full upon F

d he, with a gesture of indignation, turning his back qu

operty," returned Cranch, following the Padre with watc

think of your sacred quest, eh?" continued the Padre Pedro, forgetting

won't think the worse for me for helping her to a fortune. Hallo! you've dropped something." He leaped to his feet, picked up the brevi

us hand grasped the volum

he said hastily; "

testify to the b

mistake," said the priest, working himself into a feverish indignation. "That there are not slips of memory, eh?

e to find who is,"

ions of his own conscience. "Who are you, who speak thus?" he said hoarsely, advancing upon Cranch with outstretched and anathematizing fingers. "Who are you, Se?or Heathe

rs lulled the little fold of San Carmel to prayer and rest, came to his throbbing ear. His trembling hands groped for the crucifix, carried it to his left breast; his lips moved in prayer. His ey

the rite, waited patiently. The eyes of Father Pedro returned to the earth

nly a worn old man. I must talk with thee more of this-but

l the dark shadow of the Mission tower met and encompassed him. Cranch follow

he, quite audibly. "He's clean

V

sted, or when he awoke from it, he could not tell. The morbid excitement of the previous da

ing or a week later he did not know. He fancied, too, that Cranch had also confessed some trifling deception to him, but what, or why, he could not remember; so much greater seemed the enormity of his own transgression. He thought Cranch had put in his hands the letter he had written to the Father Superior, saying that his secret was still safe, and that he had been spared the avowal and the scandal that might have ensu

é conversed with bated breath and many pious crossings of themselves, but with eyes always wistfully fixed upon him. He wondered if, as part of his penance, he ought not to proclaim his sin and abase himself before them; but he knew that his devoted followers would insist upon sharing his punishment; and he remembered his promise to Cranch, that for her sake he would say nothing. Before they reached the summit he turned once or twice t

stless expanse, Father Pedro rode forward as if still in a

hat this coast was wild and desol

id, revere

that?" pointin

ed down upon the smoke of a manufactory chimney, upon strange heaps of material and curious engines scattered al

; it is only two years ago, before the rodeo, that I was here for strayed c

r a hut nor fonda to halt at all the way. He returned in seven days, and in the midst of the plain there were three houses and a mill and many people. And why was it? Ah! Moth

id Antonio, eagerly pointing to some men gathered round

e, than when he believed her borne to him over the mysterious sea. It perplexed his dazed, disturbed mind to think that if such an antagonistic element could exist within a dozen miles of the Mission, and he not know it, could n

oper garb: would she look like that? Would she be as tall? He thought he bade José and Antonio go on slowly before with Sanchicha, and dismounted, walking slowly between the high stalks of grain lest he should disturb them. They evidently did not hear his approach, but were talking earnestly. It seemed to Father Pedro

are not pretending t

s the muchacha you had

pity for the deceit you

on poor Fat

e girl drew suddenly away from him with a coquettish fling of

st remembered, and which would have passed for philosophy in a more thoughtful man, "put it squarely,

knew it was Francisco a

an

deceived in giving a fortune to another, and leave it to his own conscience to permit it or frustrate it. I was right. I reckon it was pre

ived me? Thank you, Se?or," sa

u mean. When you know me better, Juanita," he continued, gravely, "you'll know that I would ne

did you have th

first

was-two

ancisco visited you at the ra

ddenly darted at him, caught him by the lap

t Francisco? Speak!" (She shook him aga

ghing and shaking between the

ear you do not love

Juan

we

ather Pedro's intense a

ards her own by the

er, and married a fortune,"

reparation-my duty?" ret

rapid disloyalty of one loving woman to another in an emergency. Th

e trail. Let us return,

you sure he

sed to be here to se

inter and fainter; they we

y had talked of him, of his crime, and the man had pitied him. Why did he not speak? Why did he not call after them? He tried to raise his voice. It sank in his throat with a horrible choking sensation. The neares

*

mo

nt Anthony p

arm, it was the field of wild oats,

ened?" said th

reverence just now, as we

u met n

your re

sed his hand acr

, pointing to two figures wh

io tu

his adopted daughter, the mestiza Juan

id Fathe

rd and greeted th

osé and Antonio, "to come so far to bid me and my adopted daughter farewell. We depart

ed at Cranch and

e will be strange at first. She takes some friend,

ne, Father Pedro, who

s, he assisted the venerable Sanchicha to dismount, and, together with Father Pedro and Juanita, entered a white palisaded enclosure beside the cottage, and halted before what appeared to be a large folding

ears ago by an Indian woman. How this foundling came here, and how I was concerned in it, you all know. I've told everybody here how I scrambled ashore, leaving the baby in the dingy, supposing it would be picked up by the boat pursuin

came up with a party of gold hunters to work these sands. One day, digging near this creek, I struck something embedded

open. They disclosed an irregular trench, in which, fi

ad been taken away alive for some purpose, and the clothes were left so that she should carry no trace with her. I recognized the hand of an Indian. I set to work quietly. I found Sanchicha here, she confessed to finding a bab

y for a tall girl, who had

cha,-Sanchicha, of whom, to render his rebuke more complete, the Deity seemed to have worked a miracle, and restored intellige

er preoccupied mind; her bright eyes were full of eager anticipation of a substantial future. The incarnation of a frivolous world, even as she extended one hand to him in half-coquettish embarrassment she arranged the folds of her dress with the other. At the touch of her fingers he felt himself growin

Francisca the heiress of her father's wealth, the lawyers must say. I reckon it's enough for me that the

f God," said Fathe

to creep in-shore, hastening their departure, he only answered their

o, was it not, daughter, on the night she came?" When the distant clatter of blocks and rattle of cordage came from the unseen vessel, now standing out to sea, he whispered again, "So, this is what thou didst hear, even then." And so during the night he marked, more or less audibly to the half-conscious woman at his side, the low whisper of the waves, the murmu

ted co

GRASS P

" were already the promise of those possibilities. Beautiful she was, but the power of that beauty was limited by being equally shared with her few neighbors. There were small, narrow, arched feet besides her own that trod the uncarpeted floors of outlying log cabins with equal grace and dignity; bright, clearly opened eyes that were equally capable of looking unabashed upon princes and potentates, as a few later did, and the heiress of the county judge read her own beauty without envy in the frank glances and unlowered crest of the blacksmith's daughter. Eventually she had

nd ease to these transitions that were all her own. She softened the abruptness of sudden wealth, mitigated the austerities of newly acquired power, and made the most glaring incongruity picturesque. Only one th

*

ntemplation of the dreary prospect without by the arrival of a visitor. On entering the drawing-room she found him engaged in a half admiring, half resentful examination of its new furniture and hangings. Mrs. Tucker at once recognized Mr. Calhoun Weaver, a former Bl

ncing around the apartment to avoid her clear eyes, as if resolutely setting himself against the old charm of her manner

Cal?" said Mrs. Tuck

an ostentation calculated to resist the assumption of her charms and her furniture. "Senator Dyce of

nd about yourself. You're looking well, and right smart too." She paused to give due emphasis to this

n away from there some time myself," he added, his uneasy vanity taking fresh alarm at the faint suspici

the innuendo. "Ah Cal," she added archly, "I am afraid you are as

s old-fashioned, ambiguous flattery. "Now look yer, Belle," he said, chuckling,

of arch but languid warning. "That will do! I'm dying to know all about it, and you must stay to di

ty than he had ever noticed during their previous acquaintance. He would have felt kinder to her had she shown any "airs and graces," which he could have commented upon and forgiven. He stammered some vague excuse of preoccupation, yet lingered in the hope of saying something which, if not aggressively unpleasant, might at least transfer to her indolent seren

said Mrs. Tucker ga

the opportunity offered for gallant repudiatio

rried him," sa

n, said, "Now that's regular Blue Grass and no mistake!" and retreated under cover of his hilarity. In the hall he made a rallying stand to repeat confide

times a mere blank speck on the gray waste of foam, a closer scrutiny showed it to be one of those lateen-rigged Italian fishing-boats that so often flecked the distant bay. Lost in the sudden darkening of rain, or reappearing beneath the lifted curtain of the squall, she watched it weather the island, and then turn its laboring but persistent course toward the open channel. A rent in the Indian-inky sky, that showed the narrowing portals of the Golden Gate beyond, revealed, as unexpectedly, the destination of the little craft, a tall ship that hitherto lay hidden in the mist of the Saucelito shore. As the distance lessened between

Poindexte

xter was a legal friend of her husband, and had dined there frequently

s,

e ask

s,

'll be down

e part of his intimate friend in their familiar intercourse. Added to this slight jealousy there was a certain moral antagonism between herself and the captain which none but themselves knew. They were both philosophers, but Mrs. Tucker's serene and languid optimism would not tolerate the compassionate and kind-hearted pessimisms of the lawyer. "Knowing what Jack Poindexter does o

fireplace hung a large photograph of Mr. Spencer Tucker. It was retouched, refined, and idealized in the highest style of that polite and diplomatic art. As Captain Poindexter looked upon the fringed hazel eyes, the drooping raven mustache, t

anciful sobriquets of the locality. In his erect figure and the disciplined composure of limb and attitude there were still traces of the refined academic rigors of West Point. The pliant adaptability of Western civilization, which enabled hi

rs. Tucker in languid explanation,

before going further, that she assented mechanically. "Well, then, he's taken some big risks in the way of business, and-well, things have gone bad with him, you know. Very bad! Really, they couldn't be worse! Of course it was dreadfully rash and all that," he went on, as if commenting upon the amusing waywardness of a child; "but the result is the usual smash-up of everything, money, credit, and all!" He laughe

his natural manner; but between the shock and the singular influence of that manner she could at first only say, "You don'

still smil

first shock, and pride lent her a determined calmness

s he?" s

this time where he cann

e or only a vision? She was confused and giddy, but, master

r me from him? He told

xter. "It was as much as he could do, I recko

did not se

n this way." He checked himself and added, with a forgiving sm

uietly, "as soon as he is safe. He must have

d, "Yes, I dare say," in quite another voice, and glanced at the picture. But as she remained standing, he continued more earnestly, "I didn't come here to tell you what you might read in the newspapers to-morrow morni

rs. Tucker, with

e-but as if for yourself. Do you

d

sband hasn't sold, mortgaged, or pledged. Why it w

color. "It was the first land we ever bought, and Spencer alway

that, did he? Well, that's evidence. But you see he never gave you

d Mrs. Tucker, w

n Poindexter, "they happen

" said Mr

to take, suppose we see how you can fill it. It's forty miles to Los Cuervos, and y

wn this then!" eja

out saying how he knew it, he continued, "In the stage-coach you might be recognized. You must go in a private conv

ted pretty lids. "I once drove fi

onal, as we lawyers say. You will have relays and a plan of the road. It's rough wea

can I go?"

th a laugh. "Come now, that's a compliment to you, isn't it?" He smiled a moment i

nner that the servant, who returned to light the gas, never knew that the ruin and bankruptcy

hen," said Poindexter, raising his eyes to

as in my room, Mary," she continued in the same tone of voice as the door closed upon him; "I

not fully appreciate it. To a life like hers it was only an incident, the mere turning of a page of the illimitable book of youth; the breaking up of what she now felt had become a monotony. In fact, she was not quite sure she had ever been satisfied with their present success. Had it brought her all she expected? She wanted to say this to her husband, not only to comfort him, poor fellow, but that they might come to a better understanding of life in the future. She was n

strained her. She would put aside all yearning for him until she had done something to help him, and earned the confiden

hapter of the life just closing. She glanced around the home she was leaving without a lingering regret; there was no sentiment of tradition or custom that might be destroyed; her roots lay too near the surface to suffer dislocation; the happiness of her childless union had depended upon no domestic center, nor was its flame sacred to any local hearthstone. It was without a sigh that, when night had fully fallen, she slipped unnoticed down

I

he had barely crossed the second street when she heard the quick clatter of hoofs behind her; a buggy drove up to the curbstone, and Poindexter leaped out. She en

reins," she

hands that reached from the depths of the

go with you, but, speak frankly, is there any man you know whom you c

ttoning of the leathe

he voice from the interior; "an

manner. "You have a friend and countryman already with

but when they touched the level high road, horse and vehicle slipped forward through the night, a swift and noiseless phantom. Mrs. Tucker could see his graceful back dimly rising and falling before her with tireless rhythm, and could feel the intelligent pressure of his mouth until it seemed the responsive grasp of a powerful but kindly hand. The faint glow of conquest came to her cold cheek; the slight stirrings of pride moved her preoccupied heart. A soft light filled her hazel eyes. A desolate woman, bereft of husband and home, and flying through sto

trend of the beach, and she was exposed to the full power of its dread fascinations. The combined roar of sea and shore was in her ears. As the direct force of the gale had compelled her to furl the protecting hood of the buggy to keep the light vehicle from oversetting or drifting to leeward, she could no longer shut out the heaving chaos on the right, from which the pallid ghosts of dead and dying breakers dimly rose and sank as if in awful salutation. At times through the darkness a white sheet appeared spread before the path and beneath the wheels of the buggy, which, when withdrawn with a reluctant hiss, seemed striving to drag the exhausted beach seaward with it. But the blind terror of her horse, who swerved at every sweep of the surge, shamed her own half superstitious fears, and with the effort to control h

and felt a sudden sense of loneliness at the loss of her new friend, but a recollection of certain cautions of Captain Poindexter's kept her mute. Nevertheless, the hostler's ostentatious adjuration of "Now then, aren't you going to bring out that mustang for the Se?ora?" puzzled her. It was not until the fresh horse was put to, and she had flung a piece of gold into the attendant's hand, that the "Gracias" of his

uneasy consciousness of what her husband must feel if he were subjected to the criticisms of men like Calhoun. She wondered if others knew that he had kept her in ignorance of his flight. Did Poindexter know it, or had he only entrapped her into the admission? Why had she not been clever enough to make him think that she knew it already? For the moment she hated Poindexter for sharing that secret. Yet this was again followed by a new impatience of her husb

her native district. She beguiled her fancy by an ambitious plan of retrieving their fortunes by farming; her comfortable tastes had lately rebelled against the homeless mechanical cultivation of these desolate but teeming Californian acres, and for a moment indulged in a vision of a vine-clad cottage home that in any other woman would have been sentimental. Her cramped limbs aching, she took advantage of the security of the darkness and the familiar contiguity of the fields

ould distinguish the distant, low-lying marshes eaten by encroaching sloughs and insidious channels, and beyond them the faint gray waste of the Lower Bay. A darker peninsula in the marsh she knew to be the extreme boundary of her future home: the Rancho de los Cuervos. In another hour she began to descend to the plain, and once more to approach the main road, which now ran nearly parallel with her track. She scanned it cautiously for any early traveler; it stretched north and south in apparent unending solitude. She struck into it boldly, and urged her horse to the top of his speed, until she reached the cross-road that led to the rancho. But here she paused and allowed the reins to drop idly on the mustang's back. A singu

to rise and fall around her as if with some changing urgency of purpose. Raising her eyes she suddenly recognized the two far-stretching lines of telegraph wire above her head, and knew the aeolian cry of the morning wind along its vibrating chords. But

casionally laid off the ancient embarcadero of the Los Cuervos Rancho. But even while watching it her quick ear caught the sound of galloping hoofs behind her. She turned quickly and saw she was followed by a horseman. But her momentary a

lightly disordered hair as he drew up beside her

ighroad two hours, and have been reconnoiterin

asked Mrs. Tucker, partly

on your own land. You passed the boundary monument of the rancho five minutes ago.

Mrs. Tucker. She shuddered slightly and cast her

ate, and the embarcadero will some day be a town. I suppose you'll call it Blue Grassville. B

ding tear under the pretense of clearing h

t has been deserted for years, but I thought it better you should go into possession there than take up your abode at the shanty where your husband's farm-hands a

repeated Mrs. Tucker, lifting her f

spur, it was a minute or two before he was able to explain. "I mean if

ed up with weeds and grass, and gave no passing glimpse of the interior. Entering a ruinous corral they came to a second entrance, which proved to be the patio or courtyard. The deserted wooden corridor, with beams, rafters, and floors whitened by the sun and wind, contained a few withered leaves, dryly rotting skins, and thongs of leather, as if undisturbed by human care. But among these scattered d

and welcomed them with a feeble crepitation. Following her into the dim interior, Mrs. Tucker was surprised to find some slight attempt at comfort and even ado

ant. There is no danger of his betraying you," he added, with an ironical smile; "Chinamen and Indians are, by an ingenious provision of the statute of California, incapable of giving evidence against a white person. You can trust your handmaiden perfectly-even if she can't trust you. That is your sacred privilege under the

a plucky woman-shall I say like Blue Grass? Good-by!" He mounted his horse, but, as if struck by an after-thought, wheeled and drew up by her side again. "If I were you I wouldn't see many strangers for a day or two, and listen to as little news as a woman p

ty to comprehend her concern, that they were quite unknown at Los Cuervos. Her slight knowledge of Spanish was barely sufficient to make her wants known, so that the relief of conversation with her only companion was debarred her, and she was obliged to content herself with the sapless, crackling smiles a

urface, barely raised above the dead level. On the other side the marsh took up the monotony and carried it, scarcely interrupted by undefined water-courses, to the faintly marked-out horizon line of the remote bay. Scattered and apparently motionless black spots o

harmlessness solitude had made known to her. With misplaced kindness she tempted it with bread-crumbs, with no other effect than to stiffen it into stony astonishment. She wondered if she should become like the prisoners she had read of in books, who poured out their solitary affections on noisome creatures, and she regretted even the mustang, which with the buggy had disappeared under

and seemed to impatiently beckon her to rise and follow it. It brought her feverish dreams of her husband, footsore and weary, staggering forward under its pitiless lash and clamorous outcry; she would have gone to his assistance, but when she reached his side and held out her arms to him it hurri

o would not recognize her. Even if they did, her instinct told her it would be less to be feared than the hopeless uncertainty of another day. As she left the house the wind seemed to seize her as in her dream, and hurry her along with it, until in a few moments the walls of the low ca

open door the word Tienda was rudely painted on a board, and as rudely illustrated by the wares displayed at door and window. Accustomed as she was to the poverty of frontier architecture, even the crumbling walls of the old hacienda she had just left seemed picturesque to the rigid angles of the thin, blank, unpainted shell before her. One of the loungers, who was reading a newspaper aloud as she advanced, put it

a dead silence. Mrs. Tucker

his store is in the hands of the s

r was not

ife," said another with a coarse laugh. The laugh was echoed by the others. Mrs

?" she asked, turning her clear

to sarve here. He sarved an attachment," replied th

isregarding the renewed laughter w

Tucker and said, "It's so, madam! This yer place is attached; but if there's anything you're wanting, why I reckon, boys,"-he turned half appealingly to the crowd, "we could oblige a lady." There was a vague sound of angry opposition and remonstrance from the back door of th

upted Mrs. Tucker, with a slight flus

Look at the wife of the thief, with the stolen money in diamonds in her ears and rings on her fingers. She's got money if we've none. She can pay for what she fancies, if we haven't a cent to redeem the bed that's stole

towards the door. But with a flying leap across the count

earnings, mortgaged these very goods you want to buy, and that he is to-day a convicted thief, a forger, and a runaway coward. Perhaps, if you can't understand me, you can read the newspaper. Look!" She exultingly opened the paper the sheriff had b

now. D-n it! Will you

in her careless perusal of the daily shameful chronicle of domestic infelicity. Then she had coldly wondered if there could be any such men and women. And now! The crowd fell back bef

waited for a word of appeal or explanation from her lips to throw themselves at her feet. Had she simply told her story they would have believed her; had she cried, fainted, or gone into hysterics, they would have pitied her. She did neither. Perhaps she thought of neither, or i

y for her with sullen deference as she passed out on the platform. But her

, perhaps he's safe to pay your

y, "you never spoke a truer word in your life.-One moment, Mrs. Tucker. Let me send you back in the buggy. Don't mind me. I can get a fresh horse of the sheriff. I'm quite at home here." Then, turning to one

es

tary chance of getting a cent of it. If your wife in

el

a Supreme Court of the State of Californi

ad suffused Poindexter's black eyes with mischievous moisture. "If you think it quite

I

keep on, heave ahead. Ef you rather have the chance of getting the rest in cash, you'll let up on her." "You don't suppose," returned Mrs. Patterson contemptuously, "that she's got anything but what that man of hers-Poindexter-lets her have?" "The sheriff says," retorted Patterson surlily, "that she's notified him that she claims the rancho as a gift from her husband three years ago, and she's in po

the whiskey and euchre with which these gentlemen avoided the difficulties of their delicate relations. He brooded over it as he handed the keys of the shop to the sheriff when they parted for the night, and was still thinking of it when the house was closed, everybody gon

lisades of the corral. But, indistinct as it was, it was the voice of a man he was think

oud, and only the faint outlines of the house he had just qui

nd a figure dimly emerged f

son, hurriedly throwing himself upon the appari

to you a moment,

spered. Letting his grasp slip down to the unresisting hand of the stranger, he half dragged, half led him, brushing against the wall, into the open door of the dese

upon the stranger's face, revealed the artistic but slightly

seemed to find expression in a singular unanimity of criticism. Patterson looked at him

ional and theatrical. "I am a man with a price on me!" he said bitterly. "Give me up to the sheriff, and you

atterson gloomily. "But I thought you

on board-everything. The cursed boat capsized in a squall just off the Heads. The ship, d-n her, sailed

who was with you, d

ath to that boat's keel until one of those Chinese fishermen, in a 'dug-out,' haule

certain ostentatious caution that il

htly waved his companion away. "But I reckoned I could trust a white man that I'd been k

stant almost shamed the man who had ruined him. But Tucker's egotism whispered that this affection was only a recog

, with a sad and simple directness that made any further discussion a

oss the Coast Range to

ose coasting schooners

ere the ship

a on the summit. Them greasers that keep it won't know you, And if they did they won't go back on you. And if they did go back on you, nobody would believe them. It's mighty curious," he added, with gloomy philosophy, "but I reckon it's the reason why Providence allows this kind of cattle to live among white men and others made in his image. Take a piece of pie, won't you?" he continued, abandoning this abstract reflection and producing half a flat pumpkin pie

there was anything I could have done for you, you wouldn't have cut away without letting me know." Tucker glanced uneasily at Patterson, who continued, "Ye ain't wanting anythi

moonlight view of himself in the mirror behind the bar, "but that don't matter here." He filled another glass of s

own here this afternoon," s

hat evident simulation failed before Patterson's melancholy. With an assumption of fallin

th her. Put her in the hacienda to ho

rising hastily. "It don't b

ot as long as she's in it; no sir! Whether it's really hers, or she's only keeping house f

ly women folks-wondered how you could leave a woman like your wife, and go off with a scallawag like that gal, I allers said they'd find out there was a reason. And when your wife came flaunting down here with Poindexter before she'd quite got quit of you, I reckon they began to see the whole little game. No, sir! I knew

broken in fortune and reputation-why should she not desert him? He had been unfaithful to her from wildness, from caprice, from the effect of those fascinating qualities; it seemed to him natural that she should be disloyal from more deliberate motives, and he hugged himself with that belief. Yet there was enough doubt, enough of haunting suspicion, that he had lost or alienated a powerful affection, to make him thoroughly mis

killing Poindexter in hi

cticality. "He's mighty quick, like all them army men. It's about eve

d again. "This is not your affair, Patt

tinued Patterson lugubriously. "He seems to object to my pass

's dark enough now for a start," he said hurriedly, "and if I could get acro

mustang was quickly secured and saddled; a heavy poncho afforded Tucker a disguise as well as a protection from the rain. With a few hurried, disconnected words, and an abstr

of the moonlight, he fancied he could distinguish its low walls over the monotonous level. One of those impulses which had so often taken the place of resolution in his character suddenly possessed him to diverge from his course and approach the house. Why, he could not have explained. It was not from any feeling of jealous suspicion or contemplated revenge-that had passed with the presence of Patterson; it was not from any vague lingering sentimen

a detour to the right to avoid it. In doing so, a light suddenly rose above the distant horizon ahead of him, trembled faintly, and then burned with a steady lustre. It was a light at the hacienda. Guiding his horse half abstractedly in this direction, his progress was presently checked by the splashing of the animal's hoofs in the water. But the turf below was firm, and a salt drop that had spattered to his lips told him that it was only the encroaching of the tide in the meadow. With his eyes on the light, he again urged his horse forward. The rain lulled, the clouds began to break, the landscape alternately lightened and grew dark; the outlines of t

V

neck and temples, she muffled her lowered crest in her shawl and bent over the reins. Bit by bit she recalled, in Poindexter's mysterious caution and strange allusions, the corroboration of her husband's shame and her own disgrace. This was why she was brought hither-the deserted wife, the abandoned confederate! The mocking glitter of the concave vault above her, scoured by the incessant wind, the cold stare of the shining pools beyond, the hard outlines of the Coast Range, and the jarring accompaniment of her horse's hoofs and rattling buggy-wheels, alternately goaded and distracted her.

f Los Gatos, is on his way to this house. He once claimed this land, and hated your husband, who bought of the rival claimant, whose grant was confirmed. I tell you this," he added, slightly flushing as Mrs. Tucker turned impatiently away, "only to show you that legally he has no rights, and you need not see him unless you choose. I could

lk, approached him rapidly, an

all, now-

t she had not yet told

posed upon-imposed upon by some wretched woman, who has made him

ut whom?" gas

t M

stones of the patio itself, and then at the inexplicable woman

ty," she went on rapidly, twisting her handkerchief betw

ertain

he darted into her bedroom, and returned with the diamond rings she had torn from her fingers and

oindexter, with demure

to return the money she has stolen!" she went on rapidly;

egan Poindexter, "even

ked her cold fingers before her, and said, hesitating and mechanically, "You meant well, Captain Poindexter, in bringing me here, I know! You must not think that I blame you for it, or for the miserable result of it that you have just witnessed. But if I have gained anything by it, for God's sake let me reap it quickly, that I may give it to these people a

ou are not strong enough to guarantee it to another. There may still be litigation; your husband has other creditors than these people you have talked with. But while nobody could oust you-the wife who would ha

lked to the end of the corridor, ret

se you k

your

n. You hav

to my kn

her eyes to his. "Well," she continued impatiently,

at I have said." said Poindext

if she were asking a business question, but with an eye that showed her rising anger,-"I suppose there is some law by which creat

hat arresting her would hardly hel

with a sudden sublime contempt for the people whose

think of bringing back the strongest

ike a lawyer to a lawyer." He would have taken any other woman by the hand in the honest fullness of his apology, but something restrained him here. He only looked down gently on her lowere

moment." She looked up suddenly, and said, "How long had he known her?" But before he could repl

nt. Mrs. Tucker's swift feminine glance took in these details, as well as the deep salutation, more formal than the exuberant frontier politeness she was accustomed to, with which he greeted her. It was enough to arrest her first impulse to retreat. She hesitated and stopped as Poindexter stepped forward,

deceive you. She will be glad to do the honors of her house," he continued, with a simulation of appealing to

hat have we here fit for a lady?" he continued, raising his eyes in deprecation of the surroundings; "a house of nothing, a place of winds and dry bones, without refreshments, or satisfaction, or delicacy. The Se?ora will not refuse to make us proud this day to send her of that whic

," said Poindexter, with a demure glance at Mrs. Tucker. But the innuendo seemed to lapse equally unheeded by his fair client and the s

of my husband. It is in your power, perhaps, to help me. I am told that you wish to possess Los Cuervos," she went on, equally oblivious of the consciousness that appeared in Don José's face, and a humorous perplexity on the brow of Poindexter. "If you can arrange it with Mr. Poindexter, you will find me a liberal vendor. That much you can do, and I know you will believe I shall be gratefu

ugh which she had vanished, until Poindexter, with a return of his tolerant smile, said

possibly

o unusual significance in his manner, continued, "As you see, she leaves this matter in

hasing?

"If you have any other idea, Don José, I ought to warn you, as Mrs. Tucker's lawyer, that

, s

his, Poindexter continued haughtily, "If I

re." He stopped, appeared to recall himself, and with an apologetic smile and a studied b

an assenting nod he proceeded to remount his horse. "If he wa

l, and side by side emerged on the open plain. Poindexter glanced round; no other being was in sig

all speak as business m

speak, we shall sp

exter, who was begi

d why? Look you, Don Marco;" he reined in his horse, thrust his ha

ile faded from his lips as he read. With blazing eyes he spurred his horse besi

hear!-me, José Santierra, the day before she left! It means that the coyote of a Spencer, the thief, who bought these lands of a thief and gave them to a thief, has tricked you all. Look," he said, rising in his saddle, holding the paper like a baton, and def

," said Poindexter, with a care

should record it?" asked Don José,

gentlemen," he returned. "Do you think you have come

d it tossed in the lap of a harlot. I bo

again for a song?

n-gray brows; "but a moment ago we would sell ever

o I understand that you are the ally of Spencer Tucker and his mistress, that you

ribute largess to these cattle yonder, I do not say no. More she does not ask. But you, Don

regained his composure, suddenly reining up his horse. "As our path

inquire. The question is to me what I"-he emphasized the pronoun by tapping himself on the breast-"I, José Santierra, wil

you give your word, Don José, that you

take this time to defend yourself." He shrugged his shoulder. "No! It is only this. You sh

a moment. "I promis

dios, Do

s, Do

k of humorous toleration with which Mr. Poindexter was in the habit of regarding all human infirmity gave way to something like bitterness. "I might have guessed it," he said, with a slight rise of

n, who still retained the evidences of a picturesque and decorous past, and a repose so different from the life that was perplexing her. Reflecting that if he bought the estate these things would be ready to his hand, and with a woman's instinct recognizing their value in setting off the house to other purchasers' eyes, she took a pleasure in tastefully arranging them, and even found herself speculating how she might have enjoyed them herself had she been able to keep possession of the property. After all, it would not have been so lonely if refined and gentle neighbors, like this old man, would have sympathized with her; she had an i

the oven-shaped windows, and looked out. The dwarfed oak beside the window was still dropping from a past shower, but the level waste of marsh and meadow beyond seemed to advance and recede with the coming and going of the moon. Again she heard her name called, and this time in accents so strangely familiar that with a slight cry she ran into the corridor, crossed the patio, and reached the open gate. The darkness that had, even in this brief interval, again fallen upon the prospect she tried in vain to pier

ght had been fairly forgotten, and she was forced to accept her fate. The sale of her diamonds, which seemed to her to have realized a singularly extravagant s

that scattered their lavish gold to the foot of the hills, where the green billows of wild oats carried it on and upwards to the darker crests of pines. For two months she was dazzled and bewildered with color. She had never before been face to face with this spendthrift Californian Flora, in her virgin wastefulness, her more than goddess-like prodigality. The teeming earth seemed to quicken and throb beneath her feet; the few circuits of a plow around the outlying corral was enough to call out a jungle growth of giant grain that almost hid the low walls of t

giddy muchacha, and who herself glittered as with the phosphorescence of refined decay. Through this circumstance she learned that Don José was not yet fifty, and that his gravity of manner and sedateness was more the result of fastidious isolation and temperament than years. She could not tell why the information gave her a feeling of annoyance, but it caused he

wild act separated them. She had never seen the reflection of another woman's eyes in his; the past contained no haunting recollection of waning or alienated affection; she could meet him again, and, clasping her arms around him, awaken as if from a troubled dream without reproach or explan

r surprise the two men met more or less awkwardly and coldly, and her tact as hostess was tried to the utmost to keep their evident antagonism from being too apparent. The effort to reconcile their mutual discontent, and some other feeling she did not quite understand, produced a nervous excitement which called the blood to

h quiet coolness, as Mrs. Tucker turned her somewhat mystified face t

ms. I thought you were! It's very awkward." Without coquetry and unconsciously she raised her blue eyes under her lids until the

with equal gravity, and began to laugh. The laugh, which was at first frank, spontaneous, and almost ch

what coldly ignoring her hilarity, "but perhaps he is not inclined

rs. Tucker quickly, her

!" said Poindexter

ou are not friends, I see. Is that the reason why

evasively. "I have been lately following up a certain clue rather

id coldly. "Then I am to believe that you prefer to spend your

r husband's paramour! There could be but one answer to it-Don José! Four months ago he would have smiled compass

e inquiry carried on,"

r to me?" she said coo

she said, with a certain hesitating timidity, "Do not

l day, but in his place came Do?a Clara, his younger sister. When Mrs. Tucker had politely asked after the absent Don José, Do?a Clara wou

d the amazed Mrs. Tucker. "He is a gentleman, and has be

ficial de policia, a chief of gendarmes, my sister

hich implied too much that she was obliged to restore him temporarily to his old footing. Meantime she had a brilliant idea. She would write to Calhoun Weaver, whom she had avoided since that memorable day. She would say she wished to consult him. He would come to Los Cuervos; he might suggest somethin

ons" which she might perhaps have heard of-well knew. But Spencer had got the "big head." "As to that woman-a devilish handsome woman too!-well, everybody knew that Spencer always had a weakness that way, and he would say-but if she didn't care to hear any more about her-well, perhaps she was right. That was the best

d get a divorce agin Spencer. Hold on! There ain't a judge or jury in California that wouldn't give it to you right off the nail, without asking questions. Why, you'd get it by default if you wanted to; you'd just have to walk over the course! And then

ice, and other evidence of mental and moral disturbance. His cordiality and oracular predisposition remained sufficiently to enable him to suggest the magical words "Blue Gr

adually the poorer people whom she met in these journeys began to show an almost devotional reverence for her, stopping in the roads with uncovered heads for her to pass, or making way for her in the tienda or plaza of the wretched town with dumb courtesy. She began to feel a strange sense of widowhood, that, while it at times brought tears to her eyes, was not without a certain tender solace. In the sympathy and simpleness of this impulse she went as far as to revive the mourning she had worn for her parents, but with such a fatal accenting of her beauty, and dangerous misinterpreting of her condition to eligible bachelors strange to the country, that she was obliged to put it off again. Her reserved and dignified manner caused others to mistake her nationality for that of the Santierras, and in "Do?a Bella" the simple Mrs. Tucker was for a while forgotten. At times she even forgot it herself. Acc

ersected the highway at right angles a mile farther on. It was with some sense of annoyance and irritation that she watched the trespass, and finally saw the vehicle approach the house. A few moments later the servant informed her that Mr. Patterson would like to see her a

ears ago," said the stranger cheerful

's usual profound melancholy appeared to be intensified by the hilarity of his companion

ed again, and then, with an excellent imitation of Patterson's lugubrious accents, said, "Mr. Spencer Tucker's wife that is, allow me to introduce you to Mr. Spencer Tucker's sweet

frozen truth, and I kin prove it. For I kin swear that when that there young woman was sailin' outer the Golden Gate, Spencer Tucke

w?" said Mrs. Tucker,

slowly and in perfect unison, "That's-what-we-want-to-know." They seemed so satisfied

there was nothing beyond the recollection of that guilt that was really shocking in the woman-between the extravagant extremes of hope and fear sug

ent, but if anything happened to prevent him, he was to join me at Acapulco. Well! he didn't come aboard, and we sailed without him. But it appears now he did attempt to join the ship, but his boat was capsized. There now, don't be alarmed! he wasn't drowned, as Patterson can swear to-no, catch him! not a hair of him was hurt. But I-I was bundled off to the end of the earth in Mexico alone, without a cent to bless me. For true a

l unconsciousness, that even if Mrs. Tucker had been less preoccupied her resentment would have abated. But her eyes were fixed

isfy herself, now she's a married woman and past such foolishness. But that ain't neither here nor there. The gist of the whole matter is that Spencer Tucker was at the tienda the day after she sailed and after his boat capsized." He then gave a detailed account

enly. "Why not at the time? Why," she demanded almost fiercely,

he ought to be, I got to lookin' elsewhere. I knew the track of the hoss I lent him by a loose shoe. I examined,

Mrs. Tucker

m a God-forsaken idiot, but I reckon he did come yer. And mebbe I'm that much of

to her cheeks, although she knew not why. But they were apparently s

only thing wantin' to prove that idea is to know how he got a boat, and what he did with the hoss. And thar's one more id

ker felt a vague chill creep over her that seemed to be the result of his m

s"-his voice was almost lost in a hoarse whisper-"that it was no living man that kem to me that night, but a spirit that kem out of the darkness and went back into it! No eye saw him but mine-no ears heard him but mine. I reckon it weren't intended it should." He paused, and passed the fla

om. "I reckon the only spirit was that which you and Spencer consumed," she said, cheerf

et, alive and kicking! Like as not, then,

have told me," said

without speaking. Patterson repl

said Mrs. Tucker, drawin

o keen to hunt me up at first, shadowing my friends and all that, and why h

ed Mrs. Tucker, hastily, with a

ts himself, and perhaps you're satisfied it is n't to hold the whip hand of him and keep him from coming back openly. Pr'a

it, you mean?" said Mrs. Tucke

t's come! I knew it would. It's the warning! It's suthing betwixt jim-jams and doddering idjiocy. Here I'd hev been wil

Tucker, in a voice

stone. "I command you to tell me what this means!" s

ubmissively: "I thought you knew already that Spencer had given this ranch to me. I

" said Mr

d I did lie; but it's true. And it's true that I never touched a cent of the money, but gave it all to him!" She laid her hand on Patterson's arm, and said, "Come! let us go," and led him a few steps toward the gateway. But here Patterson paused, and again passed

nd whispering without and flecking her white morning dress with gusty shadows from the arbor. Then, with closed eyes, dropping her hands to her breast, still pressing hard, she slowly passed them down the shapely contours of her figure to the waist, and with another cry cast them off as if she were stripping herself of some

its contents and the few curt words with which it was delivered, he gazed silently upon the vacant bower, still fresh and redolent with the delicacy and perfume of its graceful occupant, until his dark eyes filled with unaccus

nately, producing a letter from his bosom. "Look! Do

had only that instant learned of his just claims upon Los Cuervos, tendering him her gratitude for his delicate intentions,

g, I have kept my promise to you. I have as much reason to accuse you of betraying my secret

d put in Los Cuervos to him, to whom she now knew she was indebted for them. She could not thank him for what his habitual generosity impelled him to do for any woman, but she could forgive him for misunderstanding her like any othe

man," said Don José, scanning Poindexter's

r left him, Don José," said Poin

urned carelessly, "And the rancho,

ll abide by my offer,"

ly, and then said, "Ah,

vivid green alone marked the spot where the crumbling adobe walls of the casa had returned to the parent soil that gave it. The channel was deepened, the lagoon was drained, until one evening the magic mirror that had so long reflected the weary waiting of the Blue Grass Penelope lay dull, dead, lusterless, an opaque quagmire of noisome corruption and decay to be put away from the sight of man forever. On this spot the crows, the ti

rst to respond were those into whose boyish hands had been placed the nation's honor. It returned the epaulets to Poindexter's shoulder with the addition of a double star, carried him triumphantly to the front, and left him, at the end o

N LONE STA

ibility, and had borne the disappointment of their creditors with a cheerful resignation which only the consciousness of some deep Compensating Future could give. Giving little else, however, a singular dissatisfaction obtained with the traders, and, being accompanied with a reluctance to make further advances, at last touched the gentle stoicism of the proprietors themselves. The youthf

ossession of the little manzanita-thicketed valley five miles away, the failure of their enterprise had assumed in their eyes only the vague significance of the decline and fall of a general community, and to that extent relieved them of individual responsibility. It was easier for them to admit that the Lone Star claim w

ably covering their faults. The ragged seams in gulch and ca?on lost their harsh outlines, a thin green mantle faintly clothed the torn and abraded hillside. A few weeks more, and a veil of forgetfulness would be drawn over the feeble failures of the Lone Star claim. The charming dere

game of euchre, expressing their relative value in the camp. The mere fact that Union Mills had at one time patched his trousers with an old flour-sack legibly bearing that brand of its fabrication, wa

ical disfavor. It was somewhat remarkable that, although generally giving the appearance of healthy youth and perfect physical condition, they one and all simulated the decrepitude of age and invalidism, and after limping about for a few moments, settled back again upon their bunks and stools in their former positions.

is commotion felt the nec

into private life in that obtrusive way," retorted the Right Bower; "but that exhaustive effort is n't going

want any more in his-thank you!" repeated the Judge with a mechani

Left Bower. "They're just mean enough to join hands against us." It was a fix

h conceit," said Union Mills, trying to dry his leg by alternately beating it or rubbing it agains

e interested in the speaker's peculiar method of drying his leg, to the e

t to?" asked the Right Bower, fi

n," answere

lated the Right Bo

other partners togethe

n all

s like him, but generally that he alone was responsible for the g

ny man to have the Old Man sent to him. They can't, sorter, restrain t

Why, he was out two nights last week, all night, prospecting i

ber when, he proposed to us white men to settle down to plain ground sluicing, making

was the Old Man that took the conceit out of him. He just as good as admitted that a lot of work had got to be done afore any pay ore could be realized. Nev

a retaliating hiss and splutter from the dying embers of the hearth. The Right Bower, with a sudden access of energy, drew the empty barrel before

or anythin'?

ht Bowe

e. Union Mills slowly disengaged himself from the wall and leaned over the "solitaire" player. The Right Bower tu

ce of hushed respect. "What did yo

anch. It's the fifth time to-day," continued the Right Bower in

beaming from every line of his credulous face, "but it's fly

if the Old Man must g

we

d deliberately, placed in their mysterious combination, with the same ominous result. Yet everybody seemed to breathe more freely, a

en recorded, "we must not let any foolishness or sentiment get mixed up with this thing, bu

Man?" queri

an-hush! h

t partner, otherwise known as "the Old Man." Need it be added that he

all the same, boys, it's going to clear up in about an hour, you bet. It's breaking away over Bald Mountain, and there's a sun flash on a bit

lushing exhibition of degrading superstition shown in the last sentence recalled their just severity.

et the Judge have a pair of boots on credit, but he can't send them over here; and considering that the Judge has got to try them anyway, it don't seem to be asking too much

naman, and a four days'

we

umphantly, "for I pitched in at once with a pick he let me have on credit, and did that amo

ir of trousers, Mills, but as he doesn't keep clothing, we'll have to get some canvas and cut you out a pair. I traded off the beans he let me have for some tobacco for the Right Bower at the other shop, and got them to throw

glanced helplessly at each other. Yet his first concern was for them, his first instinct paternal and protecting. He ran his ey

played out, the partnership's played out, and the sooner we skedaddle out of this the better. If," he added, turning to the Old Man, "if you want to stay, if you want to do Chinaman's work at C

do it alone" protested the Old M

nly way we can prove it is to stop the foolishness right here. We calculated to dissolve the partnership and strike out for ourselves elsewhere. You're no longer responsible for us

neasy laugh. "Of course. But"-he stopped suddenly, the blood dropped from his fresh cheek, and he again glanced quickly round the gro

ing you kin drop into, Old Man," he said confidentially; "if I had n't promised the other boys to go with the

n, like goin' into the world on your own capital, that every

p everything, so to speak; but it's for your good, and we ai

t he had cast down, put it on carefully over his brown curls, drew the flap down on the side towards his comp

to the Cross Roads and meet the down stage at about twelve to-night. There's pl

ter, a dumb, gray film covered the ashes of the hushed hearth. For

might as well take a run round the claim to see if we've forgotten nothing. Of course, we'll

t the pork barrel, although that gentleman took refuge from his confusion and secured a decent retreat by a gross exaggeration of his lameness, as he limped after the Right Bower. The Judge whistled feebly. The Left Bower, in a more ambitious e

figure disappeared behind the fringe of buckeye that hid the distant highway. Then he walked slowly to the fireplace, and, leaning against the chi

ange. There were the four "bunks," or sleeping berths, of his companions, each still bearing some traces of the individuality of its late occupant with a dumb loyalty that seemed to make their light-hearted defection monstrous. In the dead ashes of the Judge's pipe, scattered on his shelf, still lived his old fire; in the whittled and carved edges of the Left Bower'

d his own individuality and taken upon his younger shoulders not only a poet's keen appreciation of that life, but its actual responsibilities and half-childish burdens, he never suspected. He had fondly believed that he was a neophyte in their ways, a novice in their charming faith and indolent creed, and they had encouraged it; now their renunciation of that faith could only be an excuse for a renunciation of him. The poetry that had for two years i

tagonist might recognize it, or even worse, anticipate it himself, the idea was quickly rejected. Besides, the opportunity for an apotheosis of self-sacrifice was past. Nothing remained now but to refuse the proffered bribe of claim and cabin by letter, for he must not wait their return. He tore a leaf from a blotted diary, begun and abandoned long since, and essayed to write. Scrawl after scrawl was torn up, until his fury had cooled down to a frigid third personality. "Mr. John Ford regrets to inform his late partners that their tender of house, of furniture," however, seemed too inconsistent with the pork-barrel

ers. To his excited fancy the few disordered blankets and articles of clothing seemed dropping to pieces; in one of the bunks there was a hideous resemblance in the longitudinal heap of clothing to a withered and mummied corpse. So it might look in after-years when some passing stranger-but he stopped. A dread of the place was beginning to creep over him; a dread of the days to come, when the monotonous sunshine should lay bare the loneliness of these walls; the long, long days of endless blue and cloudless, overhanging solitude; summer days when the wearying, incessant trade winds should sing around that empty shell and voice i

m, but whence he had not yet considered. He reached the bank of the creek where he had stood two hours before; it seemed to him two years. He looked curiously at his reflection in one of the broad pools of overflow, and fancied he looked older. He watched the rush and outset of the turbid current hurrying to meet the South Fork, and to eventua

ks, and drowning even the rising moon. The creek caught it here and there, until, in grim irony, it seemed to bear their broken sluice-boxes and useless engines on the very Pactolian stream they had been hopefully created to direct and carry. But by some peculiar trick of the atmosphere the perfect plenitude of that golden sunset glory was lavished on the rugged sides and tangled crest of the Lone Star Mountain. Tha

position in the claim and its superior height had always given it a commanding view of the extent of their valley and its approaches, and it was this practical preeminence that alone attracted him at that moment. He knew that from its crest he would be able to distinguish the fig

where they had poured a wild libation in boyish enthusiasm of success; and here the ledge where their first flag, a red shirt heroically sacrificed, was displayed from a long-handled shovel to the gaze of admirers below. When he at last reached the summit, the mysterious hush was still in the air, as if in breathless sympathy with his expedition. In the west, the plain was faintly illuminated, but disclosed no moving figures. He turned towar

led aloud; the feeble echo of his own voice seemed only a dull impertinence to the significant silence. He turned to reascend; the furrowed flank of the mountain before him lay full in the moonlight. To his excited fancy a dozen luminous star-like points in the rocky crevices started into life as he faced them. Throwing his arm over the ledge above him, he supported himself for a moment by what appeared to b

ly against the curtain of soil that hid the treasure, the elements had achieved with mightier but more patient forces. The slow sapping of the winter rains had loosened the soil from the auriferous rock, even while the swollen stream was carrying their impotent and shattered engines to the sea. What mattered that his single arm could not lift

done. He dwelt somewhat indignantly to himself on this circumstance, and half unconsciously faced defiantly towards the plain below. But it was sleeping peacefully in the full sight of the moon, without life or motion. He looked at the stars, it was still far from midnight. His companions had no doubt long since returned to the cabi

s own future, or the way he should dispose of his newly acquired wealth. This was the more singular as it had been the custom of the five partners to lie awake at night, audibly comparing with each other what they would do in case they made a strike. He remembered how, Alnaschar-like, they nearly separated once over a difference in the disposal of a hundred thousand dollars that they never had, nor expected to have. He remembered how Union Mills always began his career as a millionaire by a "square meal" at Delmonico's; how the Righ

hoarse, laughed down their enemies, and run up the flag triumphantly on the summit of the Lone Star Mountain! How they would have crowned him "the Old Man," "the hero of the camp!" How he would have told them the whole story; how some strange instinct had impelled him to ascend

u are do

he could not believe that it came from his own pale lips until he found himself speakin

it at once. Yet it was hard, very hard and cruel, to be forced to meet them again. What had he done to suffer this mortification? For a moment he actually hated this vul

miles away, yet he could get there in time if he hastened. It was a wise and practical con

them, perhaps they would at first doubt his story. No matter. He bit his l

one to sleep embracing them, until the whole plain seemed to be lifted into infinite quiet. Walking on as in a dream, the black, impenetrable barriers of skirting thickets opened and gave way to vague dist

his sensitive nerves. Was it an accident, or was it an intentional signal to him? He stopped; it was not repeated, the silence reasserted itself, but this time with an ominous deathlike suggestio

I

e lameness of some, and feebleness of moral purpose had predisposed the others to obtrusive musical exhibition. Union Mills limped and whistled with affected abstraction; the Judge whistled and limped with affected earnestness

n argument, "there ain't anything better for a young fellow than ind

rils, "within ten miles of this place; like as not crossing the Ridge. It's always my luck to happen out just at s

y the Right and Left Bower moodily plodding ahead. No respo

long that he was takin' it in, takin' it in kindly but slowly, and I reckoned the best thing for us to do was to gi

enly and facing the others, "didn't he say that that new

y he said it. It was one of the things I was particular about on his account," responded the Judge, with th

lso stopping short, "suthin' about its being c

tense of preparing for a long conference, had luxuriously seated himself on a s

ur mind, are you, if you haven't done the work already? You're just killing yourself with

inaman's three-day job," interpolated the Left Bower, with

Old Man," said Union Mills, feebly,-"ki

hen the Right Bower, wheeling suddenly, set off in the direction of the creek. The Left Bower, after a slight pause, followed without a word. The

s. Here was the beginning of the famous tail-race that skirted the new trader's claim, and then lost its way in a swampy hollow. It was chok

a broken sluice-box; Union Mills forgot his whistle in a happy imitation of a Chinese coolie's song. Nevertheless, after ten minutes of this mild dissipation, the pastime flagged; Union Mills was beginning to rub his leg, when a distant rumble shook the earth. The men looked at each other; the diversion was complete; a languid discussion of the probabilities of its being an earthquake or a blast followed, in the midst of which the Right Bower, who was working a little in advance of the others, uttered a warning cry

p. It's easy to see what's happened. One o' them high-toned shrimps over in the Excelsior claim has put a blast in too near the creek. He

reek below the race and make it do the

an's ideas, I reckon," sai

d on and suthin' will happen.' And," he added, triumphantly, "you see suthin' has happened. I don't w

Excelsior boys ain't blastin' to-day?

on some things; he wants a little more sabe of the world. He's improved a good deal in euchre lately, and in poker-well! he's got that sorter dreamy, lis

uestion," he said virtuously; "we ain't takin' this step to make a card sharp out of him. We're not doin' Chinamen's work in this race to-day for that.

hin' him our canoe was

reply. "That's ab

h his hands in his pockets, stared unconsciously at the rushing water, and then qui

responded

N

Bower quietly. The elder brother h

by saying we reckoned

ntly. Confounded by this practical expression of his own u

after work, just to get him excited and amusin', and he'll kinder miss that sort o' stimulatin'. I reckon we'll miss it too, somewhat. Don't you remember, boys, the night we p

atisfaction to know we did our duty by the young fellow even in those little things." He turned for confirmation of their general disinterestedness to the Right Bower, but he was already striding away, uneasily conscious of

t across the plain like vast roots of its swelling trunk. The shadows were growing blacker as the moon began to assert itself over the rest of the valley, when

ed the direction of his finger. In the distance the black outline of the Lone Star cabin stood out distinctly in the illumined space. There was the b

" said the Judge

being now, so to speak, in the hands of Fate, he was callous to it. This much, at least, the elder brother read in his attitude. But anxiety at that moment was the controlling

liar interior unchanged in aught but one thing. The bunk that the Old Man had occupied was stripped of its blankets; the few cheap ornaments and photographs were gone; the rude poverty of the bare boards and scant pallet looked up at them unrelieved by the bright face and gracious youth that had once made them tolerable. In the grim irony of that exposure, their own penury was doubly conscious. The little knapsack, the tea-cup and coffee-pot that had hung near his bed, were gone also. The most ind

r's his rifle," he broke in, with a feverish return of volubility, and a high excited falsetto. "He wouldn't have left this behind. No! I knowed it from the first. He's just outside a bit, fo

equally reviving mendacity, 'Like as not he's hangin' rou

on purpose," said the Left Bower in a low voice

as that of his brother, but suddenly changed with

id the Left Bower, calmly, "because we've been f

he Right Bower, with a s

e rifle to a half charge with

rit to stick to your ideas or the heart to confess them wrong. We've followed your lead, and-he

r, clinging to that one idea with the blind pe

was a momentary struggle, a flash through the half-lighted cabin, and a shattering repo

pulse to separate them, and consequently even now could scarcely understand what had passed. It was over

ostentatious interest, but with eyes furtively conscious of the rigid figure of the Right Bower by the chimney and the abstracted face of the Left Bower at the door. Ten minutes had passed in this occupation, the Judge and Union Mills conversing in the furtive whispers of children unavoidably but fascinatedly present at a family quarrel, when a light step was heard upon the cracklin

upulousness of the statement that carried everybody with it; "look at him! the game little pup." "Oh, no! he ain't the right breed, is he?" echoed Union Mills with arch irony, while the Right and Left Bower, grasping either hand, pressed a proud but silent greeting that was half new to him, but wholly delicious. It was not without difficulty that he could at last prevail upon them to return with him to the scene of his discovery, or even then restrain them from attempting to carry him thither on their shoulders on the plea of his previous prolonged ex

nt. The subtle tact of Union Mills, however, in expressing an awakened respect for their fortunate partner by addressing him, as if unconsciously, as "Mr. Ford" was at first disc

down before you left the cabin?"

it was. It was about an hour and a

rstitious exultation; "it was the slide that tumbled into t

rance of conquerors. They paused only on the summit to allow the Old Man to lead the way to the slope that held their treasure. He advanced cautiously to the

? Don't-don't look so,

ck side of the mountain, without a crag, bre

s go

*

of the mountain, and burying the treasure and the weak implement that

ned quickly to the Right Bower. "Thank God!" he re

ointing solemnly to the depths below, said, "And thank God for showing

ey had reached the plain, one of them called out to the others to watch a star th

said the Left Bower, smiling; "th

sh of light, beat of hoofs, and jingle of harness, the only real presence in the dreamy landscape, the drive

ning to his companions. "No? Shake hands all round, boys! God

w wh

Chris

IP O

at it was alleged, on good authority, that a hastily embarking traveler had once hopelessly lost his portmanteau, and was fain to dispose of his entire interest in it for the sum of two dollars and fifty cents to a speculative stranger on the wharf.

irements of the goods and passengers who were once disembarked on what was the muddy beach of the infant city. But the building in question exhibited a certain elaboration of form and design utterly inconsistent with this idea. The structure obtruded a bo

ved a free life, pardner," he explained thickly to the Samaritan who succored him, "and every time since I've been on this six weeks' jamboree might have kalkilated it would come t

sted old soaker," said

ted in a block of solid warehouses and dwellings, her rudder, port, and counter boarded in, and now gazing hopelessly through her cabin windows upon the busy street before her. But still a ship despite her transformation. The faintest line of contour yet left visible spoke of the buoyancy of another element; the balustrade of her roof was unmistakably a taffrail. The rain slipp

ancy was a sentimental rather than a commercial speculation, and often generously lent themselves to the illusion by not paying their rent. Others treated their own tenancy as a joke,-a quaint recreation born of the childlike familiarity of frontier intercourse. A few had left; carelessly abandoning their unsalable goods to their landlord, with great cheerfulness and a sense of favor. Occasionally Mr. Abner Nott, in a practical relapse, raged against the derelicts, and talked of dispossessing them, or even dismantling his tenement, but he was easily placated by a compliment to the "dear old ship," or an effort made by some tenant to idealize his apartment. A photographer who had ingeniously utilized the forecastle for a gallery (accessible from the bows in the next street), paid no further tribute than

She had translated its history in her own way, read its quaint nautical hieroglyphics after her own fashion, and possessed herself of its secrets. She had in fancy made voyages in it to foreign lands, had heard the accents of a softer tongue on its decks, and on summer nights, from the roof of the quarter-deck, had seen mellower constellations take the place of the hard metallic glitter of the Californian skies. Sometimes, in her isolation, the long, cylindrical vault she inhabited seemed, like some vast sea-shell, to become musical with the murmurings of the distant sea. So completely had it take

riefly known to commercial San Francisco,-and Mr. Nott was subject at such times to severely practical relapses. A swinging light seemed to bring into greater relief that peculiar encased casket-like security of the low-timbered, tightly-fitting apartment, with its toy-like utilities of space, and made the pretty oval face of Rosey Nott

window caused Rosey to li

the wind don't whistle through the cracks and blow out the candle when you're reading, nor the rain spoil your things hung up against th

with his surroundings. "Yes," he said awkwardly, with a slight relaxation of his aggressive attitude; "yes, in course it's more bang-up style, but it don't pay-Rosey-i

st of every month for the last two years, and cheerfully ignored it the next d

advance on 'em, sez he believes he'll have to sacrifice 'em to me after all, and only begs I'd give him a chance of buying back the half of 'em ten years from now, at double what I advanced him. The chap that left them five hundred cases of hair dye 'tween decks and then skipped out to Sacramento, met me the other day in the street and advised me to use a bottle ez an advertisement, or t

amiliar with the text of her father's monologue. But recognizing an additional querulo

Sleight wants to buy the Pontiac out and out just ez

her? Sleight?" echoe

big financier, the sma

her for?" asked Rosey, k

feebly at his daughter's face, and frowned in vacant irritation. "T

continued the young

d sharp. Some fellers, Rosey," said Nott, with a cunning smile, "would hev blurted out a big figger and been cotched. That ain't my style.

ecause he knows it's valuable property, and not because he likes it as we do. He can't take that value away e

as conclusive. He, however, deemed it wise to still preserve his practical attitude. "But that don't

of the Pontiac from the street, father! No! He's going to give us

; sorter make the old folks open their eyes-oh? Well, seem' he's been to some expense fittin' up an entrance from the other street, we'll let him slide. But as to that d--d

se bales of curled horsehair were left behind by the late tenant to pay his rent. When Mr. De Ferrières rented th

a big price per pound paid for the darn

e knew it, father?

at first, and then put on airs

nd-not like the others. I don't think he knew what you meant then, any more than he belie

on, and even the prettiness it enhanced, gave him a dull premonition of pain. His small roun

id, with a faint attempt at archness; "if he warn't ez old ez a cr

egularly every steamer night," she said, quietly, as if dismissing an exhausted subject, "and he'll be here in a m

that he had always accepted the admiration of others for her as a matter of course, but for the first time he became conscious that she not only had an interest in others, but apparently a superior knowledge of them. How did she know these things about this man, and why had she only now accidentally spoken of them? He would have done so. All this passed

y wore at home as a single concession to his nautical surroundings, he drew himself up with something of the assumption of a shipmaster, d

ed, dyed, and painted to the verge of caricature, but without a single suggestion of ludicrousness or humor. A face so artificial that it seemed almost a mask, but, like a mask, more pathetic than amusing. He was dressed in the extreme of fashion of a doz

precision of motion that might have hid the infirmiti

-r ac-

ng uneasily at his daughter and seeing her calm eyes fixed on the speaker without embarrassm

The gentlem

a step quickly forward, bent stiffly but profoundly over the little hand that held the account, raised it to his lips, and with "a

cantile city was at its height. With a vague idea of entering into immediate negotiations with Mr. Sleight for the sale of the ship-as a direct way out of his present perplexity, he bent his steps towards the financier's office, but paused and turned back before reaching the door. He made his way to the wharf and gazed abstractedly at the lights reflected in the dark, tremulous, jelly-like water. But wherever he went he was accompanied by the absurd figure of

os

s voice from the little state-roo

languid calmness; "I only wanted to know if you w

, fa

s o' gold goin' to t

, fa

comforta

, fa

round a spell, and

, fa

three o'clock every afternoon, dressed as he has been described, stride deliberately through the passage to the upper deck and thence into the street, where his strange figure was a feature of the principal promenade for two or three hours, returning as regularly at eight o'clock to the ship and the seclusion of his loft. Mr. Nott paused before the door, under the pretense of throwing the light before him into the shadows of the forecastle: all was silent within. He was turning back when he was impressed by the regular recurrence of a peculiar rustling sound which he had at first referred to the rubbing of the wires of the swinging lantern against his clothing. He set down the lig

ling deck of the proudly-riding Pontiac, she was so impressed as to rise and cross on tiptoe to the little slanting port-hole. Morning was already dawning over t

I

night's gas, and strewn with the dead ashes of last night's fires. There was a brief pause before the busy life which ran its course from "steamer day" to steamer day was once more taken up. In that interval a few anxious speculators and investors breathed freely, some critical situation was relie

hat for?' ''Spose you sell the ship?' sez he, 'afore the two months is up. I've heard that old Sleight wants to buy her.' 'Then you gets back your money,' sez I. 'And lose my room,' sez he; 'not much, old man. You sign a paper that whoever buys the ship inside o' two months hez to buy me ez a tenant with it; that's on the square.' So I sign the paper. It was mighty cute in the young feller, wasn't it?" he said, scanning his daughter's pretty puzzled face a little anxiously; "and don't you see, ez I ain'

aid Rosey; "there may be some private things in it. There were some letters

sness, "photographs and love letters you can't sell for cash, and I

ve we the right

g business sharps yer about call 'em. You can't get round that." He paused a moment, and then, as a new idea seemed to be painfully borne in his round eyes, continued cautiously: "Was that the reason why you would

tly to his side, and, placing her arms around his neck, turned his broad, foolish face towards her own. "Father," s

hanging up in the wagin, 'cept the petticoat ez she had wrapped around yer. It was about ez much ez we could do to skirmish round with Injins, alkali, and cold, and we sort

e change did not escape either the sensitive observation or the fatuous misconception of the sagacious parent. "Ye'll be mountin' a few furbelows and fixins, Rosey, I reckon, ez only natural. Mebbee ye'll have to prink up a little now that we've got a gentleman contractor in the ship. I'll see what I kin pick up in Montgomery Street

o seldom, fathe

to appear ez if she did go out, or would go out if she wanted to. So you kin be wearin' that ar he

The space between the galley and the bulwarks had been her favorite resort in summer when not actually engaged in household work. It was now lightly roofed over with boards and tarpaulin against the winte

o violent radical changes. But after trying it on before the tiny mirror in the galley once or twice, her though

er father's description, and partly from the impossibility of its being anybody else, she at once conceived it to be the new lodger. She had time to note that he was young and good-looking, graver perhaps than became his sudden pantomimic appearance, but before she could observe him closely, he had turned, closed the hatch with a certain familiar dexterity, and

eck that he was at first disconcerted and confused. But after a second glance at her h

ed you, popping up th

t?" aske

eated impatiently, indic

h?" she said abstractedly

ned the hatch to come up the quickest way and take a look

d Rosey simply; "yo

oh, yes! You seem

r's to

nly, Miss Nott, good morning," he half added and walked towards the companion-way. Something in the direction of his

and ran quickly to

she c

ere was a faint color in her cheeks, and her pretty brown hair

ut strangers being on this de

m sorry I

d Rosey, frightened by her bold

nk y

h, she gazed at the lower deck. As she already knew the ladder had long since been removed to make room for one of the partitions, the only way the stranger could have reached it was by leaping to one of the rings. To make sure of this she let herself down holding on to the rings, and dropped a couple of feet to the deck below. She was in the narrow passage her father had penetrated the previous night. Before her was the door leading to De Ferrifères' loft, always locked. It was silent within; it was the hour when the old Frenchman made his habitual promenade in the city.

l recreation. But it pleased Mr. Nott also to give it more than his usual misconception. "Looking round the ship, was he-eh, Rosey?" he said with infinite archness. "In course, kinder sweepin' round the galley, and offerin' to fetch you wood and water,

osey, lifting her abst

ceit or duplicity in Rosey's clear gaze. But Mr. Nott's intelligence was superhuman. "

ith an effort to follow him out

awkwardly waylaid the new lodger before the cabin-do

ntruded upon your daughter to-day. I was a little curious to s

't as much right to go ez any other man; thar ain't any man, furriner or Amerykan, young or old, dyed or undyed, ez hev got any better rights. You hear me, young fellow. Mr. Renshaw-my darter. My darter-Mr. Renshaw. Rosey, give the gentleman a chair. Sh

s abstracted face, brusquely excused himself. "I've got a let

ts to light the lamp and adjust his writing materials. For his excuse to Mr. Nott was more truthful than most polite pretexts. He had, inde

or lofts that that Pike County idiot has put into her, she looks but little changed, and her fore-hold, as far as I can judge, is intact. It seems that Nott bought her just as she stands, with her cargo half out, but he wasn't here when she broke cargo. If anybody else had bought her but this cursed Missourian, who hasn't got the hayseed out of his hair, I might have found out something f

ere and corral my things at once, for this old frontie

s, D

I

r. Nott appeared impelled to make, whenever they met in the passage, but did so without seemingly avoiding her, and marked his half contemptuous indifference to the elder Nott by an increase of respect to the young girl. She would have liked to ask him something about ships, and was sure his conversation would have been more interest

ower deck and the forward bulkhead where she had discovered the open hatch. It had not been again disturbed, nor was there any trace of further exploration. A little ashamed, she knew not why, of revisiting the scene of Mr. Renshaw's researches, she was turning back when she noticed that the door which communicated with De Ferrières' loft wa

hair-cushion covers, and a few cushions unfinished and unstuffed, lay in the light of the ports, and gave the apartment the appearance of a cheap workshop. A rude instrument for combining the horse-hair, awls, buttons, and thread, heaped on a small bench, showed t

stammeringly refused to receive her father's offer to buy back the goods he had given him; she knew now how hardly gained was the pittance that paid his rent and supported his childish vanity and grotesque pride. From a peg in the corner hung the familiar masquerade that hid his poverty-the pearl-gray trousers, the black frock-coat, the tall shining hat-in hideous contrast to the penury of his surroundi

, but examined him closely. He was unconscious, but not pulseless; he had evidently been strong enough to open the door for air or succor, but had afterwards fallen into a fit on the couch. She flew to her father's locker and the galley fire, returned, and shut the door behind her, and by the skillful

is face back from hers with an effo

l," she said quie

his chattering teeth. When he had drained it he thr

ickly. "I happened to see the door open as I passe

hich, to her infinite uneasiness, again feebly lightened into one of

-what you call-the experiment of your father's fabric. I make myself-ha! ha!-like a workman. Ah, bah! the heat, the darkness, the plebeian mot

et there was so much genuine feeling mixed with his grotesque affectation, so much piteous consciousness of the in

aid gently. "I will return again. Perhaps,"

lently. Then in his o

selle-n

sitated; "have

t doubt." He shrugge

le will co

now anything if you don't wish it. Try to sleep. You need no

and averted his eye

elle, is

id Rosey, glancing ro

oiselle is

rst purely unaffected action. She slipped thr

rance of his weakness than reverence of his judgment, she saw no disloyalty to him in withholding a confidence that might be disloyal to another. "It won't do father any good to know it," she said to herself, "and if it did it oughtn't to," she added with triumphant feminine logic. But the impression made upon her by the spectacle she had just witnessed was stronger than any other consideration. The revelation of De Ferrièfres' secret poverty seemed a chapter from a romance of her own weaving; for a moment it lift

pse of his invalid figure. When she had satisfied herself that his sleep was natural, she busied herself softly in arranging the miserable apartment. With a few feminine touches she removed the slovenliness of misery, and placed the loose material and ostentatious evidences of his work on one side. Finding that he still slept, and knowing the importance of this natural medication, she placed the refreshment she had brought by his side and noiselessly quitted

al intruder this time, Miss Nott. But I found no one here, and I was tempted to look

few hours had brought a wonderful charm into her pretty face, had aroused the slumbering life of her half-wakened beauty, she would have been more confused. As it was, she was only glad that the young man should turn out to be "nice." Perhaps he might tell her something about ships; perhaps if she

ion to California to the transfer of her childish life to the old ship, and even of much of the romantic fancies she had woven into her existence there. Whatever ulterior purpose he had in view, he listened as attentive

already better than I do,

ly. "Ah," he said, with a touch o

went round and touched things in a famili

entler expression. "Then, because I found you trying on a very queer bonnet the first day I

wed the evident perfect understanding of the pair was destined to suffer some abatement. Rosey, suddenly conscious that she was in some way participating in the ridicule of her father through his unhappy gift, became embarrassed. Mr. Renshaw's restraint returned with the presence of the

tleman were talkin' of contracts, mebbee; but don't mind me. I'm on

acres, he was struck with an idea. "It's them boots," he whispered to himself, softly; "they somehow don't seem 'xactly to trump or follow suit in this yer cabin; they don't hitch into anythin' but jist slosh round loose, and so to speak play it alone. And them young critters nat'rally feels it and gets out o' the way." Acting upon this instinct with his usual precipitate caution, he at on

in the room, and had himself cleared away the pallet from which he had risen to make two low seats against the wall. Two bits of candle placed on the floor illuminated the beams above, the dressing-gown was artistically draped over the solitary chair, and a pile of cushions formed another seat. With elaborate courtesy he

elplessly before her, she said hesitatingly that she was

have taken it all-every precious drop. What else

rom want of food. The thought restored her self-possession even while it brought the tears to he

say, that they will misunderstand. No, Mademoiselle is good, is wise. She will say to herself, 'I understand, my friend Monsieur de Ferrières for the moment has a secret. He would seem poor, he would take the r?le of artisan, he would shut hi

you live here. This is not fit work for you. You seem to be a-a gentleman. You ought to be a lawyer, or a doct

what I do! But the lawyer, the banker, the doctor, what are they?" He shrugged his shoulders, and pacing the apartment with a furtive glance at the half anxious, half frightened girl, suddenly stopped, dragged a small portmanteau from behind the heap of bales and opened it. "Look, Mademoiselle," he said, tremulously lifting a ha

ded her of some play she had seen; they might be the clue to some story, or the mere worthless hoardings of some diseased fancy. Whatever they were, De Ferrières did not apparently care to explain furthe

sked Rosey, partly to draw her host's

and regarded the youn

selle t

" said Rosey.

ould deign"-He stopped again and placed his hand

rising with an awkward sense of const

I will accompany y

been here!" She stopped. The honest blush flew to her

exaggerated and indescribable gesture, "Go, my child, go. Tell your father that you have been alone and

e her hand. At once impressed and embarrassed at this crowning incongruity, her pretty lips tr

en he slowly began to close the door. But a strong arm arrested it from without, and a large carpeted foo

V

t seemed almost as moral as it was physical. He did not appear to take any notice of the room or its miserable surroundings; indeed, scarcely of the occupant. Still pushing him, with abstracted eyes and immobile face, to the chair that Rosey had just quit

ye-fetched Flynn comin' outer meetin' one Sunday, and it was only on account of his wife, and she a second-hand one, so to speak. There was Walker, of Contra Costa, plugged that young Sacramento chap, whose name I disremember, full o' holes je

rising, with an excess of extravagance. "A saint! Look

s, and slowly pinning him down again upon his chair, "ye're about right, though she ain't mam'selle yet. E

errières, again springing to his feet, and throwing open

mebbee ye wouldn't hev keered-or you might hev wiped me out, and I mout hev said. 'Thank'ee,' but I reckon this ain't a

hat this abstracted look, which had fascinated his lodger, was merely a resolute avoidance of De Ferrières' glance

of God's mercy on yearth to be seen for miles and miles. It's a little gal as uster hunger and thirst ez quiet and mannerly ez she now eats and drinks in plenty; whose voice was ez steady with Injins yellin' round yer nest in the leaves on Sweetwater ez in her purty cabin up yonder. That's the gal ez I knows! That's the Rosey ez my ole woman puts into my arms one night arter we left Laramie when the fever was high, and sez, 'Abner,' sez she, 'the chariot is swingin' low for me to-night, but thar

pers, and, as he reached down to put it on again, he added

announcement was unobserved by Nott's averted eyes, nor did he perceive that his

on of looking at his companion but really gazing on vacancy, "this fixed-up, antique style of yours goes better with them ivy-kivered ruins in Rome and Palmyry that Rosey's mixed you up with, than it would yere. I ain't sayin'," he added as De Ferrières was about to speak, "I ain't sayin' ez that child ain't smitten with ye. It ain't no use to lie and say she don't prefer you to her old father, or young chaps of her own age and kind. I've seed it afor now. I suspicioned it afor I se

ntleman's system delicately to look another way at that moment so as not to embarrass his adversary's calculation. "Pardon,"

usiness. I'm asking you," he continued, taking from his breast-pocket a large wallet, "how muc

's restraining hand. "To leave Mademoiselle and

Nott, for the first time looking round the miserable apartment. "It's a business job. I'll ta

s said," repeated De Ferr

, and ez thar ain't any other ma

! it is a dream!" He walked stiffly to the corner where his portmanteau lay, lifted it, and going to the outer door, a cut through the ship's si

"I shall take what you cannot give, Monsieur, but what I would not keep if I

ible ocean below. Stupefied and disconcerted a this complete success of his overtures, Abner Nott remained speechless,

yer-Say! Wot's yo

. Suddenly an idea seized him. Rosey! Where was she? Perhaps it had been a preconcerted plan, and she had fled with him. Putting out the lights he stumbled hurriedly through the passage to the gangway above. The cabin-door was open; there was the sound of voices-Renshaw's and Rosey's. Mr. Nott felt reli

ith a slight peevishness that was new to her. "And

ther wanted to talk with her. To his surprise and annoyance, however, Mr. Nott insisted on accompanying

ember that when you first kem here you asked me if you c

he added, after a pause, with the air of a man obliged to re

'ere Frenchman is movin' out," responded Nott. "I th

e young man's attention. "What's the reason you didn't sell this old ship long ago, take a decent house in the town, and bring up your daughter like a lady?" he asked, w

lown ideas of livin' in a castle w

y," returned Renshaw

ter had retired, he sought his own couch. But not to sleep. The figure of De Ferrières, standing in the ship side and melting into the outer darkness, haunted him, and compelled him in dreams to rise

ed by the restraint of a father's roof, he would now give full license to his power. "Said he'd take his Honor with him

ortified her, it did not seem to her inconsistent with what she already knew of him. "Said his doctor had ordered him to quit town under an hour, owing to a comin' attack of hay fever, an

he look badly, father?" in

r looked as if he mout be worse

r existed, she felt that her own obligations to secrecy had been removed. But Mr. Nott's answer disposed of this vain hope. It was a response after his usual fashion to the question he imagined she artfully wished to ask, i.e

ng outer that curled horse-hair, for I see he's got in an invoice o' cushions. I've stowed

ned, and once or twice in distant and furtive contemplation of Rosey at work in the galley. This last observation was not unnoticed by the astute Nott, who at once conceiving that he was nourishing a secret and ho

walked rapidly until he reached the counting-house of Mr. Sleight, when he was at once shown

, closing the door c

leight," he added, turning to him suddenly.

found nothing?" asked

and that I don't intend to without the full

it. Mr. Sleight dropped the letter back into the drawer, which he quietly locked. The apparently simple act dyed Mr. Renshaw's cheek with color, but it vanished quickly, and with it any

to examine a mine that was to be valued according to his report of the indications, but that it was entirely another thing to g

hink of selling; something he himself never paid

rom our knowledge of all this, and it

new all th

overreach. I never was sure of it until this morning, when he actually turned out one of his lodgers that I might have the very room I

th the percentage-unless you've also felt it your

of treasure, concealed in an unknown ship that entered this harbor. You are enabled, through me, to corroborate some facts and identify the ship. You proposed to me, as a speculation, to identify the treasure if possible before you purchased the ship. I accepted the offer without consideration; on consideration I now decline it,

rl-what

"The old man's daughter-a poor girl-whom

dmitting you've got the old man and the young girl on the same string, and that you've played it pretty low down in the short time you'

r. Sleight was i

gnation as to enable him even to admire the perfect moral insensibility of his companion. As he rose and walk

ider that I've passed out. Let some other man take my hand. Rake down

ed behind him Mr. Slei

for grading Pont

to sign first," Mr. Sleight paused and then affixed his signature to the pa

tt doesn't

sessed all the same." Mr.

he other day has been wanting to s

t down his hat

apparently in utter oblivion of the man who entered. He was lithe and Indian-looking;

Sleight witho

to know ef you had a

ight as if absentl

the Pontiac we talked a

servility in the white

a regular fraud. It's an old forecastle yarn,

r's face

he whole thing up. I tell you it's played out

med to struggle hard with savage earnestness. "You can swear me, boss; I wouldn't lie

to know that your friends haven't been there

oss, and I ain't drunk. Say-don't give it up, boss. That man of yours likely d

e moments. Then glancing at the Lascar, he took his pen, wrote a hurried note, fol

He's going to Sacramento to-night, but you could go down there and find him before he starts. He's got

g to catch the eye of his employer. But Mr. Sleigh

goes at nine," said

ened with subtle intelligence. The next moment he was g

seemed to him enough that he had withdrawn from a compact he thought dishonorable; he was not called upon to betray his partner in that compact merely to benefit others. He had been willing to incur suspicion and loss to reinstate himself in his self-respect, more he could not do without justifying that suspicion. The view taken by Sleight was, after all, that which most business men would take-which even the unbusinesslike Nott would take-which the girl herself might be tempted to listen to. Clearly he could do no

f a trailing skirt in the passage attracted his attention. The sound was so unlike that made by any garment worn by Rosey that he remained motionless, with his hand on the door. The sound approached nearer, and the next moment a white veiled figure with a trailing skirt slowly swept past the room. Renshaw's pulses halted for an instant in half superstitious awe. As

tammered Renshaw; "I d

heatrical wardrobe-"some things father gave me long ago. I wanted to see if there was anything I could use. I thought I was

eal and accent a certain repose of gentlewomanliness, that he was now wishing to believe he had always noticed. Conscious of a superiority in her that now seemed to change their relations completely, he alone remained silent, awkward, and embarrassed be

as you passed. I began to think the Pontiac was haunted. I thought you were a ghost. I don't know why such a ghost should frighten an

me," said Rosey simply; "she died of yellow

e more of the nun than the provincial, that he hesitated

on the poor thing's clothe

thought otherwise, that she drew a little a

hings before any one c

hen, Miss Nott? I am going away to-night, and I mayn't see you again." He had not intended to

e going

to-night. I have som

amen

k of disappointment that he saw in them gave his heart

to tell me all about the ship, and he went away the second week. The photographer left before he fi

ith a bitterness he would have recalled the next moment. But Rosey, with a faint si

more? What was he waiting for now? To endeavor to prove to her that he really bore no resemblance to Captain Bower, the photographer, the crazy Frenchman De Ferrières? Or would he be forced to tell her that he was running away f

e recognized the change as due to a new corset, which strict veracity compels me to record Rosey had adopted for the first time that morning. Howbeit, her slight coquetry

e a favor," she said a

and it shall be done,"

. He was very poorly when he left here, and I should like to know if he was better. He didn't

Miss Nott," returned Renshaw with a faint smile. "I don't suppose either that i

aid Rosey, with an ab

nly a little coquette playing her provincial airs on him? "You say he and your father

knew anything about

Perhaps," he said grimly, "you would also like news of the photogr

moment, and lifting her lashes said, "Father alway

why yo

crease of coldness and color. "I only meant to say it w

f sitting down again. Confused and pleased, wishing he had said

morning to make a visit to some friends at the old R

"Sooner or later you will be forced to go where you will be properly appreciated, where you will be admired an

, with a slight glistening of the eyes. "But," she added hastily, "you don't kn

anch?" sai

r. "But this is so cosy and snug, and yet so strange and foreign. Do you know I think I began to understand why I like it so since you taught

t covered his cheeks and apparently dazzled his

ley door, looking forward. You remember the first day I sa

" said Renshaw, with more earnestne

in a print shop in Montgomery Street that haunted me. I think it was called 'The Pirate.' There were a number of wicked-looking

ou," sai

day I thought how dreadful it would have been if some one like him and not like you had come up then. That made me nervous s

le that Sleight had always suspected him, and set spi

s of setting bear-traps. I hope you're not mad, Mr. Renshaw," she added, suddenly catching sight of

t now." He had taken her hand. It seemed so like a mere illustration of his earnestness, that she did not withdraw it. "Your father tells you everything. If he has any offer to dispose of the ship, will you write to me

er speak to father, a

ot be here. I shal

d you didn't

said Rosey, listlessly

d upon his next act, he made a step towards her, with eager outstretched hands. But she slightly lifted her own with a warning

I

d upon Rosey as her father entered the cabin. Providence, which always fostered Mr. Nott's characteristic misconceptions, left that

, hastily regaining his composure with an effort. "I a

thingly; "that's wot you say now, and that's

absconding propensities of Nott's previous tenants,-"I mean that you shall kee

we'll just square up and settle in there. Come along, Mr. Renshaw." Pushing him with paternal gentleness from the cabin, with his hand still upon his shoulder, he followed him into the passage. Half annoyed at his familiarity, yet not altogether displeased by this illustration of Rosey's belief of his preference, Ren

rupted Renshaw, impatie

I'd hev done to her mother if anythin' like this hed ever cropped up, which it didn't. Not but what Almiry Jane had young fellers enou

ggling between a dawning sense of some impending absurdity and his growing pa

in'. 'Speak out,' sez I, 'Abner! Speak out if you've got anything to say. You kin trust this yer Mr. Renshaw. He ain't the kind of man to creep into th

ace and darkening eyes. "What trea

. Ferrers," retur

n of relief which here passed swiftly over his face

and blood ez if I was talkin' hoss-trade, but you and me is bus'ness men, Mr. Renshaw, and we discusses ez such. We ain't goin' to slosh round and slop over in po'try and sentiment," continued Nott, with a tremulous voice, and a hand that slightly shook on Renshaw's shoulder. "We ain't goin' to git up and sing, 'Thou 'st lamed to love another thou 'st broken every vow we've parted from each other and my bozom's lonely n

with M. de Ferrières?" asked

, dumb, round, astonished

ainly

n anythin' about him?

-He stopped, with the reflection th

t's faculties. "Then she didn't tell yer that she and Ferrers was sparkin' and keepin' kimpany together; that she and him

nd I shouldn't believe it

ustfulness of love and youth. There was clearly no deceit here!

her she's bewitched or not; whether it's them damn fool stories she reads-and it's like ez not he's just the kind o' snipe to write 'em hisself, and sorter advertise hisself, don't yer see-she's allus stuck up for Lim.

es not even know where he is!" said Renshaw, with a

's put upon that poor child. That man, Mr. Renshaw, hez been hangin' round the Pontiac ever since. I've seed him twice with my own eyes pass the cabin windys. More than that, I've heard strange noise

sked Renshaw quickly, with a r

ing complacently at his pea-jacket. "H

lightly, "But what have these strange faces and this strange man

d man, Mr. Renshaw. I've told Rosey she must make a visit to the old Ranch. Once I've got her th

ly know that I've changed my mind. I'm not going to Sacramento. I shall stay here, old man, until I see you safe through the business, or my name's not Dick Renshaw. There's my hand on it! Don't say a word. Maybe

Rosey with them," said Nott, with a cunning twinkle. Renshaw nodd

art of Sleight's informants, was in either case a reason and an excuse for his own interference. But the connection of the absurd Frenchman with the case, which at first seemed a characteristic imbecility of his landlord, bewildered him the more he thought of it. Rejecting any hypothesis of the girl's affection for the antiquated figure whose sanity was a question of public criticism, he was forced to the equally alarming theory that Ferrières was cognizant of the treasure, and that his attentions to R

dy run away from the ship?' sez she, rather peart-like and sassy for her. 'Mr. Renshaw hez contractin' business,' sez I; 'got a big thing up in Sacramento that'll make his fortun','sez I-for I wasn't goin' to give yer away, don't ye see?' He had some business to talk to

"-interrupted the y

she flounced into her state-room!-she, Rosey, ez allus moves ez softly ez a spirit-you'd h

. "Perhaps I'd better speak to her agai

er not," replied th

man was right. What, indeed, could he say to her with his present imper

ery opened the door and beckoned Renshaw to follow him. Leading the way cautiously, he brought the young man into an open unpartitioned recess beside her state-room. It seemed to be used as a store-room, and Renshaw's eye was caught by a trunk the size and shape of the one that had provided Rosey with the materials of her masquerade. Pointing to it, Mr. Nott said in a grave whisper: "This yer trunk is the companion trunk to Rosey's. She's got the things them opery women wears; this yer contains the he things, the duds and fixins o' the men o

g the wharf as a last gorgeous appeal to the affections of Rosey, rose before his fancy, he gave way to a fit of genuine laughter. The nervous tension of the past few hours

red Renshaw hastily. "I did

to her father. "I am ready," she sai

haw's apparently causeless hilarity. Turning to him he winked solemnly. "That keerless kind o' ho

ion. "A minit ago," he said, mysteriously closing the door behind Renshaw, "I heard a voice in the passage, and goin' out, who should I see agin but that darned furrin nigger ez I told yer 'bout, kinder hidin' in the dark, his eyes shinin' like a catamount. I was jist reachin' for my we

only a line in Sleight's hand. "If you change

t. "You say it was the sa

wa

ointed air. Mr. Nott would have asked another question, but with an abrupt "Good-night" the young

by the caprices of a pretty coquette and the absurd theories of her half imbecile father? Had he broken faith with Sleight and remained in the ship for nothing, and would n

I

rames and tenements on either side. The galley and covered gangway presented a mass of undefined shadow, against which the white deck shone brightly, stretching to the forecastle and bows, where the tiny glass roof of

lwarks toward the companion-way. At the cabin-door it halted and crouched motionless. Then rising, it glided forward with the same staccato movement until opposite the slight elevation of the forehatch. Suddenly it dar

ugh the dark passage between the partitions, evidently l

eemed to outline the shadowy beams and transoms. Disregarding those curious spectators of his movements, he turned his attention eagerly to the inner casings of the hold, that seemed in one spot to have been strengthened by fresh timbers. Attacking this stealthily with the aid of some tools hidden in his oil-skin clothing, in the light of the lantern he bore a fanciful resemblance to the predatory animals around him. The low continuous sound of rasping and gnawing of

s mind. He had discovered it-why should he give it up to anybody? He had run all the risks; if he were detected at that moment, who would believe that his purpose there at midnight was only to satisfy some one else that the treasure was st

he door that morning. He would convey the treasure there and drop it into the alley. The boxes were heavy. Each one would require a separate journey

n he had died for! The mate's blood was on those boxes, if the salt water had not washed it out. It was a hel

at he had forgotten. He rose to his feet, and running quickly to the hatchway, leaped to the deck above. All was quiet. The door leading to the empty loft yielded to his touch. He entered, a

ied to reach the deck above through the forehatch, but was stopped by the sound of a heavy tread overhead. The immediate fear of detection now overcame his superstition; he would have even faced the apparition again to escape through the loft; but, before he could return there, other footsteps approached rapidly from the end of the passage he would have to traverse. There was but one chance of escape left now-the forehold he had just quitted. He might hide there until the alarm was over. He glided back to the hatch, lifted it, and

enshaw. "There's little doubt wh

uliar look of Machiavellian sagacity

res you saw pass by your window

with an expression of

ip. Then it could not have been he wh

bbee yes," returne

you say you barred from the inside, would indicate, what the devil did he w

head with momentous significance. Nevertheless, hi

id Renshaw, following the direction of his

ammer and some o' them big nails from the locker, would yer, while

to accept Nott's theory that De Ferrières was the aggressor and Rosey the object, nor could he justify his own suspicion that the Lascar had obtained a surreptitious entrance under Sleight's directions. With a feeling that if Rosey had been present he would have confessed all, and demanded from her an equal confidence, he began to hate his feeble, purposeless, and inefficient alliance with her father, who believed

expense; mebbee ye'll allow it's askin' too much in the matter o' time. But I kalkilate to pay all the expense, and if you'd let me know what yer val

ealization of his wish of a moment before. "

at gravity. "But that's not so much ma

o if I can be of any service t

en-o'clock boat this m

fael a

y went to Petaluma," int

h an expression of pa

out to the public gin'r

. We said Petalumey, b

fael, you'll fi

nderstanding with Rosey at once it would have been this last evidence of her father's utte

s inter her own hands, and wait

an Rafael boat. Brief as was the journey it gave him time to reflect upon his coming interview with Rosey. He had resolved to begin by confessing all; the attempt of last night had r

I

road-little more than a trail-wound along the crest of the hill looking across the ca?ada to the long, dark, heavily-wooded flank of Mount Tamalpais that rose from the valley a dozen miles away. A cessation of the warm rain, a rift in the sky, and the rare spectacle of cloud scenery, combined with a certain sense of freedom, restored that lig

th cheeks that retained enough of their color to suggest why she had hesit

de an entry last night. Who he was, and what he came for, nobody knows. Perhaps your father gives you his suspicions." He could not help looking at her narrowly as he han

ll father

ll

ou haven't dro

ve given you a

ited the missive, a perfectly blan

, there must be some mistake. He himself has probably forgotten the inclosure," he continued, y

think any more of it, Mr. Renshaw. Father is fo

very of the unknown trespasser's flight by the open door to the loft. When he had finished, he hesitated, and then taking Rosey's hand, said impulsively, "You will

might have called the blood to her face. But only innocence could have bro

what you were

s about to reply. "I have no right to hear you; I have no right to even stand in your presence until I have confessed everything. I came to the Pontiac; I made your acquaintanc

it?" said Rosey, quite white, but more from sympathy

u shall know all. It's a long story. Will you walk on, and-take my arm? You

pathy. "Do you remember," he continued, "one evening when I told you some sea tales, you said you always thought there must be some story about the Pontiac? There was a story of the Pontiac, Miss Nott-a wicked story-a terrible sto

lightly on Rosey's, as if to assu

here was something so queer in their story that our skipper took the law in his own hands, and put me on board of her with a salvage crew. But that night the French crew mutinied, cut the cables, and would have got to sea if we had not been armed and prepared, and managed to drive them below. When we had got them under hatches for a few hours they parleyed, and offered to go quietly ashore. As we were short of hands and unable to take them with us, and as we had no evidence against them, we let them go, took the ship to Callao, turned her over to the authorities, lodged a claim for salvage, and continued our voyage.

-I wish you hadn't told me," she said. I shall never c

reasure which they were supposed to have buried, but in vain. About two months ago Mr. Sleight told me one of his shipmasters had sent him a Lascar sailor who had to dispose of a valuable secret regarding the Pontiac for a percentage. That secret was that the treasure was never taken by the mutineers out of the Pontiac! They were about to land and bury it when we boarded them. They took advantage of their impr

is own. Her eyes sought his. "And y

y like Sleight's, that Rensh

dn't

sked Ros

iousness of having exaggerated his sentiment, "it

ou might have lo

"do you think that wo

igh

wouldn't belong to any of us. It would belong to

y some impostor who pretended to be his brother, and libelled

r than to Sleight, who did nothing." She was silent for a moment, and then re

ght so too,"

she continued, impulsively. "

your father the trouble I have brought upon you. Do not," he added in a lower tone, "depri

rm, "I am sure I have nothing to forgive. You did not believe the tre

the young man, attemp

" She withdrew her arm gently, and became interested in the selection of certain wayside bay leaves as they passed along. "All the same,

ly ascertained no

dn't find it out while

ave saved so much

Renshaw, with a slight bitterness. "But it seems I could

ouldn't be a fool, except in heeding what a silly girl says. I only me

n?" returned Renshaw. "What if I were to confess to you that I lately su

man's great discomfiture, Rosey only knit her pretty brows, an

tell another person's se

d Renshaw

because I believe from what you have just said that

gination, she lightly passed over his antique gallantry and grotesque weakness, exalting only his lonely sufferings and mysterious wrongs. Renshaw listened, lost between shame for his late suspicions and admiration for her

ng eccentric. I hardly think public curiosity has ever even sought to know his name, much less his histo

ill find it much easier to discover him than his treasure.

," said Renshaw, w

" said Rosey, turning her consci

er

f Madro?o Cottage was even now visible. At the expected sight they unconscio

e, but it's a roundabout

ke it," sa

at goes at four, and w

y find yourself an heiress, Miss Nott. To-morrow," he added, with a slight tremor in his voice, "I may have earned your forgiveness, only to say farew

indly before a fallen tree in the hollow, where they had quite lost it, and had to sit down to recall it; a rough way, often requiring the mutual help of each other's hands and eyes to tread together in security; an uncertain way, not to be found Without whispered consultation and concession, and yet a way eventually bringing them hand in hand, happy and hopeful, to the gate of Madro?o Cottage. And if there was only just t

X

ully examined the hammer and cap, and then cautiously let himself down through the forehatch to the deck below. After a deliberate survey of the still intact fastenings of the hatch over the forehold, he proceeded quietly to unloose th

out o' that,"

d him with his rifle. A slight shade of disappointment and surprise had crossed the old man's face, and clouded his small round eyes at the apparition of the Lascar

t's my style to drop Injins at two hundred yards, and this deck ain't anywhere more 'n fifty. It's an uncomfortable sty

derment at the question was evident. "Ferrers?"

thought that would fetch ye!" he continued, as the man started at the evidence that his vision of last night was a living man. "P'r'aps you and him didn't break into this ship last ni

to steal was utterly ignorant of his real offense, and yet uncertain of the penalty of the other

e vallyble than that of a dead Injin, I don't care ef I let up on yer-seein' the cussednes

, boss, and I swear t

r eag

kin say to Ferrers like this-sez you, 'Ferrers,' sez you, 'the old man sez that afore you went away yo

, bo

z, sez he-tell Ferrers, sez he, that his honor havin' run away agin, he sends it back to hi

red the bewil

en

w of the ship with an unhesitating directness that showed that every avenue of escape had been already contemplated by him.

with trunks and boxes, and the bulk of their household goods apparently in the process of removal. Mr. Nott, who was superintending the work of two Chi

your fixins, Rosey; I've left 'em till the last. P'r'aps yer and Mr. Renshaw

d man by the lappels of his pea-jacket, and slightly emphasizi

ith the end of the rope in his hand as if it were a clue, "don't ye mind that day we started outer Livermore Pass, and seed the hull o' the Kaliforny coast stretchin' yonder-eh? But don't ye be skeered, Rosey

er," continued Rosey, impetuously. "Yo

ld hev got the name right the first pop, ain't it, Rosey? but it's Sleight, sure enough, all the time. This yer check," he adde

g to his feet furiously, "you

ought this yer ship five years ago jist ez she stood for 8,000 dollars. Kalkilatin' wot she cost me in repairs and taxes, and

shaw's despairing face than at the news itself. "Tell hi

ed frequently by Rosey's tenacious memory and assisted by her deft and tactful explanations. But to their surprise the imperturbable countenance

eyes, thar might be suthin' in that story. I don't let on to be a sailor like you, but ez I know the ship ez a boy knows his first boss

to-day if he were not positive! And that positive knowledge was gained l

t. That Lascar I fastened down in the hold last night unbeknownst to y

Sleight-without a word!" said Renshaw, wit

m," said Nott, winking both his eyes at Renshaw signi

atience than from any faith in her suggestion, interfered. "Why not examine

the Pontiac over to Sleight jist as it stands, I don't

t you deliver to him," interrupted R

en hatch of the forehold. The two men leaped down first with the lantern, and

arefully but that the quick eye of Renshaw had discovered it. The next moment he had stripped away the planking again, and the hurriedly restored box which the Lasc

have been duped?" sai

ravely to Renshaw. "Would ye mind heftin' that 'ere coin in your hand-feelin' it, bi

u mean?" sa

r box, that all the coins in them other boxes-and thar's

aw's hand, and striking another that lay o

well ez them buttons ye puts in missionary boxes, I reckon, and, 'cepting ez freight, don't cost nothin'. I found 'em tucked in the ribs o' the old Pontiac when I bought her, and

h such child-like simplicity that it checked the hys

ne know of thi

oolin' round the hold yer, must hev noticed the bulge in the casin', but w

on way he observed Renshaw's arm around the waist of his daughter. He said nothing until they had reache

this young man ez how I forgive him for hav

*

ailin' and don't seem to be so eager to diskiver what's become of Mr. Ferrers, I don't mind tellin' ye that over a year ago I heard he died suddenly in Sacramento. Thar was suthin' in the paper a