The next afternoon he went to the fonda. Situated on the outskirts of the town which had long outgrown it, it still bore traces of its former importance as a hacienda, or smaller farm, of one of the old Spanish landholders. The patio, or central courtyard, still existed as a stable-yard for carts, and even one or two horses were tethered to the railings of the inner corridor, which now served as an open veranda to the fonda or inn. The opposite wing was utilized as a tienda, or general shop,—a magazine for such goods as were used by the Mexican inhabitants,—and belonged also to Ramierez.
Ramierez himself—round-whiskered and Sancho Panza-like in build—welcomed the editor with fat, perfunctory urbanity. The fonda and all it contained was at his disposicion.
The senora coquettishly bewailed, in rising and falling inflections, his long absence, his infidelity and general perfidiousness. Truly he was growing great in writing of the affairs of his nation—he could no longer see his humble friends! Yet not long ago—truly that very week—there was the head impresor of Don Pancho's imprenta himself who had been there!
A great man, of a certainty, and they must take what they could get! They were only poor innkeepers; when the governor came not they must welcome the alcalde. To which the editor—otherwise Don Pancho—replied with equal effusion. He had indeed recommended the fonda to his impresor, who was but a courier before him. But what was this? The impresor had been ravished at the sight of a beautiful girl—a mere muchacha—yet of a beauty that deprived the senses—this angel—clearly the daughter of his friend! Here was the old miracle of the orange in full fruition and the lovely fragrant blossom all on the same tree—at the fonda. And this had been kept from him!
“Yes, it was but a thing of yesterday,” said the senora, obviously pleased. “The muchacha—for she was but that—had just returned from the convent at San Jose, where she had been for four years. Ah! what would you? The fonda was no place for the child, who should know only the litany of the Virgin—and they had kept her there. And now—that she was home again—she cared only for the horse. From morning to night! Caballeros might come and go! There might be a festival—all the same to her, it made nothing if she had the horse to ride! Even now she was with one in the fields. Would Don Pancho attend and see Cota and her horse?”
The editor smilingly assented, and accompanied his hostess along the corridor to a few steps which brought them to the level of the open meadows of the old farm inclosure. A slight white figure on horseback was careering in the distance. At a signal from Senora Ramierez it wheeled and came down rapidly towards them. But when within a hundred yards the horse was suddenly pulled up vaquero fashion, and the little figure leaped off and advanced toward them on foot, leading the horse.
To his surprise, Mr. Grey saw that she had been riding bareback, and from her discreet halt at that distance he half suspected ASTRIDE! His effusive compliments to the mother on this exhibition of skill were sincere, for he was struck by the girl's fearlessness. But when both horse and rider at last stood before him, he was speechless and embarrassed.
For Richards had not exaggerated the girl's charms. She was indeed dangerously pretty, from her tawny little head to her small feet, and her figure, although comparatively diminutive, was perfectly proportioned. Gray eyed and blonde as she was in color, her racial peculiarities were distinct, and only the good-humored and enthusiastic Richards could have likened her to an American girl.
But he was the more astonished in noticing that her mustang was as distinct and peculiar as herself—a mongrel mare of the extraordinary type known as a “pinto,” or “calico” horse, mottled in lavender and pink, Arabian in proportions, and half broken! Her greenish gray eyes, in which too much of the white was visible, had, he fancied, a singular similarity of expression to Cota's own!
Utterly confounded, and staring at the girl in her white, many flounced frock, bare head, and tawny braids, as she stood beside this incarnation of equine barbarism, Grey could remember nothing like it outside of a circus.
He stammered a few words of admiration of the mare. Miss Cota threw out her two arms with a graceful gesture and a profound curtsey, and said—
“A la disposicion de le Usted, senor.”
Grey was quick to understand the malicious mischief which underlay this formal curtsey and danced in the girl's eyes, and even fancied it shared by the animal itself. But he was a singularly good rider of untrained stock, and rather proud of his prowess. He bowed.
“I accept that I may have the honor of laying the senorita's gift again at her little feet.”
But here the burly Ramierez intervened. “Ah, Mother of God! May the devil fly away with all this nonsense! I will have no more of it,” he said impatiently to the girl. “Have a care, Don Pancho,” he turned to the editor; “it is a trick!”
“One I think I know,” said Grey sapiently. The girl looked at him curiously as he managed to edge between her and the mustang, under the pretense of stroking its glossy neck. “I shall keep MY OWN spurs,” he said to her in a lower voice, pointing to the sharp, small-roweled American spurs he wore, instead of the large, blunt, five-pointed star of the Mexican pattern.
The girl evidently did not understand him then—though she did a moment later! For without attempting to catch hold of the mustang's mane, Grey in a single leap threw himself across its back. The animal, utterly unprepared, was at first stupefied. But by this time her rider had his seat. He felt her sensitive spine arch like a cat's beneath him as she sprang rocket-wise into the air.
But here she was mistaken! Instead of clinging tightly to her flanks with the inner side of his calves, after the old vaquero fashion to which she was accustomed, he dropped his spurred heels into her sides and allowed his body to rise with her spring, and the cruel spur to cut its track upward from her belly almost to her back.
She dropped like a shot, he dexterously withdrawing his spurs, and regaining his seat, jarred but not discomfited. Again she essayed a leap; the spurs again marked its height in a scarifying track along her smooth barrel. She tried a third leap, but this time dropped halfway as she felt the steel scraping her side, and then stood still, trembling. Grey leaped off!
There was a sound of applause from the innkeeper and his wife, assisted by a lounging vaquero in the corridor. Ashamed of his victory, Grey turned apologetically to Cota. To his surprise she glanced indifferently at the trickling sides of her favorite, and only regarded him curiously.
“Ah,” she said, drawing in her breath, “you are strong—and you comprehend!”
“It was only a trick for a trick, senorita,” he replied, reddening; “let me look after those scratches in the stable,” he added, as she was turning away, leading the agitated and excited animal toward a shed in the rear.
He would have taken the riata which she was still holding, but she motioned him to precede her. He did so by a few feet, but he had scarcely reached the stable door before she suddenly caught him roughly by the shoulders, and, shoving him into the entrance, slammed the door upon him.
Amazed and a little indignant, he turned in time to hear a slight sound of scuffling outside, and to see Cota re-enter with a flushed face.
“Pardon, senor,” she said quickly, “but I feared she might have kicked you. Rest tranquil, however, for the servant he has taken her away.”
She pointed to a slouching peon with a malevolent face, who was angrily driving the mustang toward the corral.
“Consider it no more! I was rude! Santa Maria! I almost threw you, too; but,” she added, with a dazzling smile, “you must not punish me as you have her! For you are very strong—and you comprehend.”
But Grey did not comprehend, and with a few hurried apologies he managed to escape his fair but uncanny tormentor. Besides, this unlooked-for incident had driven from his mind the more important object of his visit,—the discovery of the assailants of Richards and Colonel Starbottle.
His inquiries of the Ramierez produced no result. Senor Ramierez was not aware of any suspicious loiterers among the frequenters of the fonda, and except from some drunken American or Irish revelers he had been free of disturbance.
Ah! the peon—an old vaquero—was not an angel, truly, but he was dangerous only to the bull and the wild horses—and he was afraid even of Cota! Mr. Grey was fain to ride home empty of information.
He was still more concerned a week later, on returning unexpectedly one afternoon to his sanctum, to hear a musical, childish voice in the composing-room.
It was Cota! She was there, as Richards explained, on his invitation, to view the marvels and mysteries of printing at a time when they would not be likely to “disturb Mr. Grey at his work.” But the beaming face of Richards and the simple tenderness of his blue eyes plainly revealed the sudden growth of an evidently sincere passion, and the unwonted splendors of his best clothes showed how carefully he had prepared for the occasion.
Grey was worried and perplexed, believing the girl a malicious flirt. Yet nothing could be more captivating than her simple and childish curiosity, as she watched Richards swing the lever of the press, or stood by his side as he marshaled the type into files on his “composing-stick.” He had even printed a card with her name, “Senorita Cota Ramierez,” the type of which had been set up, to the accompaniment of ripples of musical laughter, by her little brown fingers.
The editor might have become quite sentimental and poetical had he not noticed that the gray eyes which often rested tentatively and meaningly on himself, even while apparently listening to Richards, were more than ever like the eyes of the mustang on whose scarred flanks her glance had wandered so coldly.
He withdrew presently so as not to interrupt his foreman's innocent tete-a-tete, but it was not very long after that Cota passed him on the highroad with the pinto horse in a gallop, and blew him an audacious kiss from the tips of her fingers.
For several days afterwards Richards's manner was tinged with a certain reserve on the subject of Cota which the editor attributed to the delicacy of a serious affection, but he was surprised also to find that his foreman's eagerness to discuss his unknown assailant had somewhat abated. Further discussion regarding it naturally dropped, and the editor was beginning to lose his curiosity when it was suddenly awakened by a chance incident.
An intimate friend and old companion of his—one Enriquez Saltillo—had diverged from a mountain trip especially to call upon him. Enriquez was a scion of one of the oldest Spanish-California families, and in addition to his friendship for the editor it pleased him also to affect an intense admiration of American ways and habits, and even to combine the current California slang with his native precision of speech—and a certain ironical levity still more his own.
It seemed, therefore, quite natural to Mr. Grey to find him seated with his feet on the editorial desk, his hat cocked on the back of his head, reading the “Clarion” exchanges. But he was up in a moment, and had embraced Grey with characteristic effusion.
“I find myself, my leetle brother, but an hour ago two leagues from this spot! I say to myself, 'Hola! It is the home of Don Pancho—my friend! I shall find him composing the magnificent editorial leader, collecting the subscription of the big pumpkin and the great gooseberry, or gouging out the eye of the rival editor, at which I shall assist!' I hesitate no longer; I fly on the instant, and I am here.”
Grey was delighted. Saltillo knew the Spanish population thoroughly—his own superior race and their Mexican and Indian allies. If any one could solve the mystery of the Ramierez fonda, and discover Richards's unknown assailant, it was HE! But Grey contented himself, at first, with a few brief inquiries concerning the beautiful Cota and her anonymous association with the Ramierez. Enriquez was as briefly communicative.
“Of your suspicions, my leetle brother, you are right—on the half! That leetle angel of a Cota is, without doubt, the daughter of the adorable Senora Ramierez, but not of the admirable senor—her husband. Ah! what would you? We are a simple, patriarchal race; thees Ramierez, he was the Mexican tenant of the old Spanish landlord—such as my father—and we are ever the fathers of the poor, and sometimes of their children. It is possible, therefore, that the exquisite Cota resemble the Spanish landlord. Ah! stop—remain tranquil! I remember,” he went on, suddenly striking his forehead with a dramatic gesture, “the old owner of thees ranch was my cousin Tiburcio. Of a consequence, my friend, thees angel is my second cousin! Behold! I shall call there on the instant. I shall embrace my long-lost relation. I shall introduce my best friend, Don Pancho, who lofe her. I shall say, 'Bless you, my children,' and it is feenish! I go! I am gone even now!”
He started up and clapped on his hat, but Grey caught him by the arm.
“For Heaven's sake, Enriquez, be serious for once,” he said, forcing him back into the chair. “And don't speak so loud. The foreman in the other room is an enthusiastic admirer of the girl. In fact, it is on his account that I am making these inquiries.”
“Ah, the gentleman of the pantuflos, whose trousers will not remain! I have seen him, friend. Truly he has the ambition excessif to arrive from the bed to go to the work without the dress or the wash. But,” in recognition of Grey's half serious impatience, “remain tranquil. On him I shall not go back! I have said! The friend of my friend is ever the same as my friend! He is truly not seducing to the eye, but without doubt he will arrive a governor or a senator in good time. I shall gif to him my second cousin. It is feenish! I will tell him now!”
He attempted to rise, but was held down and vigorously shaken by Grey.
“I've half a mind to let you do it, and get chucked through the window for your pains,” said the editor, with a half laugh. “Listen to me. This is a more serious matter than you suppose.”
And Grey briefly recounted the incident of the mysterious attacks on Starbottle and Richards. As he proceeded he noticed, however, that the ironical light died out of Enriquez's eyes, and a singular thoughtfulness, yet unlike his usual precise gravity, came over his face. He twirled the ends of his penciled mustache—an unfailing sign of Enriquez's emotion.
“The same accident that arrive to two men that shall be as opposite as the gallant Starbottle and the excellent Richards shall not prove that it come from Ramierez, though they both were at the fonda,” he said gravely. “The cause of it have not come to-day, nor yesterday, nor last week. The cause of it have arrive before there was any gallant Starbottle or excellent Richards; before there was any American in California—before you and I, my leetle brother, have lif! The cause happen first—TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO!”
The editor's start of impatient incredulity was checked by the unmistakable sincerity of Enriquez's face. “It is so,” he went on gravely; “it is an old story—it is a long story. I shall make him short—and new.”
He stopped and lit a cigarette without changing his odd expression.
“It was when the padres first have the mission, and take the heathen and convert him—and save his soul. It was their business, you comprehend, my Pancho? The more heathen they convert, the more soul they save, the better business for their mission shop. But the heathen do not always wish to be 'convert;' the heathen fly, the heathen skidaddle, the heathen will not remain, or will backslide. What will you do? So the holy fathers make a little game. You do not of a possibility comprehend how the holy fathers make a convert, my leetle brother?” he added gravely.
“No,” said the editor.
“I shall tell to you. They take from the presidio five or six dragons—you comprehend—the cavalry soldiers, and they pursue the heathen from his little hut. When they cannot surround him and he fly, they catch him with the lasso, like the wild hoss. The lasso catch him around the neck; he is obliged to remain. Sometime he is strangle. Sometime he is dead, but the soul is save! You believe not, Pancho? I see you wrinkle the brow—you flash the eye; you like it not? Believe me, I like it not, neither, but it is so!”
He shrugged his shoulders, threw away his half smoked cigarette, and went on.
“One time a padre who have the zeal excessif for the saving of soul, when he find the heathen, who is a young girl, have escape the soldiers, he of himself have seize the lasso and flung it! He is lucky; he catch her—but look you! She stop not—she still fly! She not only fly, but of a surety she drag the good padre with her! He cannot loose himself, for his riata is fast to the saddle; the dragons cannot help, for he is drag so fast. On the instant she have gone—and so have the padre. For why? It is not a young girl he have lasso, but the devil! You comprehend—it is a punishment—a retribution—he is feenish! And forever!
“For every year he must come back a spirit—on a spirit hoss—and swing the lasso, and make as if to catch the heathen. He is condemn ever to play his little game; now there is no heathen more to convert, he catch what he can. My grandfather have once seen him—it is night and a storm, and he pass by like a flash! My grandfather like it not—he is much dissatisfied! My uncle have seen him, too, but he make the sign of the cross, and the lasso have fall to the side, and my uncle have much gratification. A vaquero of my father and a peon of my cousin have both been picked up, lassoed, and dragged dead.
“Many peoples have died of him in the strangling. Sometime he is seen, sometime it is the woman only that one sees—sometime it is but the hoss. But ever somebody is dead—strangle! Of a truth, my friend, the gallant Starbottle and the ambitious Richards have just escaped!”
The editor looked curiously at his friend. There was not the slightest suggestion of mischief or irony in his tone or manner; nothing, indeed, but a sincerity and anxiety usually rare with his temperament. It struck him also that his speech had but little of the odd California slang which was always a part of his imitative levity. He was puzzled.
“Do you mean to say that this superstition is well known?” he asked, after a pause.
“Among my people—yes.”
“And do YOU believe in it?”
Enriquez was silent. Then he arose, and shrugged his shoulders. “Quien sabe? It is not more difficult to comprehend than your story.”
He gravely put on his hat. With it he seemed to have put on his old levity. “Come, behold, it is a long time between drinks! Let us to the hotel and the barkeep, who shall give up the smash of brandy and the julep of mints before the lasso of Friar Pedro shall prevent us the swallow! Let us skiddadle!”
Mr. Grey returned to the “Clarion” office in a much more satisfied condition of mind. Whatever faith he held in Enriquez's sincerity, for the first time since the attack on Colonel Starbottle he believed he had found a really legitimate journalistic opportunity in the incident. The legend and its singular coincidence with the outrages would make capital “copy.”
No names would be mentioned, yet even if Colonel Starbottle recognized his own adventure, he could not possibly object to this interpretation of it. The editor had found that few people objected to be the hero of a ghost story, or the favored witness of a spiritual manifestation. Nor could Richards find fault with this view of his own experience, hitherto kept a secret, so long as it did not refer to his relations with the fair Cota. Summoning him at once to his sanctum, he briefly repeated the story he had just heard, and his purpose of using it. To his surprise, Richards's face assumed a seriousness and anxiety equal to Enriquez's own.
“It's a good story, Mr. Grey,” he said awkwardly, “and I ain't sayin' it ain't mighty good newspaper stuff, but it won't do NOW, for the whole mystery's up and the assailant found.”
“Found! When? Why didn't you tell me before?” exclaimed Grey, in astonishment.
“I didn't reckon ye were so keen on it,” said Richards embarrassedly, “and—and—it wasn't my own secret altogether.”
“Go on,” said the editor impatiently.
“Well,” said Richards slowly and doggedly, “ye see there was a fool that was sweet on Cota, and he allowed himself to be bedeviled by her to ride her cursed pink and yaller mustang. Naturally the beast bolted at once, but he managed to hang on by the mane for half a mile or so, when it took to buck-jumpin'. The first 'buck' threw him clean into the road, but didn't stun him, yet when he tried to rise, the first thing he knowed he was grabbed from behind and half choked by somebody. He was held so tight that he couldn't turn, but he managed to get out his revolver and fire two shots under his arm. The grip held on for a minute, and then loosened, and the somethin' slumped down on top o' him, but he managed to work himself around. And then—what do you think he saw?—why, that thar hoss! with two bullet holes in his neck, lyin' beside him, but still grippin' his coat collar and neck-handkercher in his teeth! Yes, sir! the rough that attacked Colonel Starbottle, the villain that took me behind when I was leanin' agin that cursed fence, was that same God-forsaken, hell-invented pinto hoss!”
In a flash of recollection the editor remembered his own experience, and the singular scuffle outside the stable door of the fonda. Undoubtedly Cota had saved him from a similar attack.
“But why not tell this story with the other?” said the editor, returning to his first idea. “It's tremendously interesting.”
“It won't do,” said Richards, with dogged resolution.
“Why?”
“Because, Mr. Grey—that fool was myself!”
“You! Again attacked!”
“Yes,” said Richards, with a darkening face. “Again attacked, and by the same hoss! Cota's hoss! Whether Cota was or was not knowin' its tricks, she was actually furious at me for killin' it—and it's all over 'twixt me and her.”
“Nonsense,” said the editor impulsively; “she will forgive you! You didn't know your assailant was a horse WHEN YOU FIRED. Look at the attack on you in the road!”
Richards shook his head with dogged hopelessness. “It's no use, Mr. Grey. I oughter guessed it was a hoss then—thar was nothin' else in that corral. No! Cota's already gone away back to San Jose, and I reckon the Ramierez has got scared of her and packed her off. So, on account of its bein' HER hoss, and what happened betwixt me and her, you see my mouth is shut.”
“And the columns of the 'Clarion' too,” said the editor, with a sigh.
“I know it's hard, sir, but it's better so. I've reckoned mebbe she was a little crazy, and since you've told me that Spanish yarn, it mout be that she was sort o' playin' she was that priest, and trained that mustang ez she did.”
After a pause, something of his old self came back into his blue eyes as he sadly hitched up his braces and passed them over his broad shoulders. “Yes, sir, I was a fool, for we've lost the only bit of real sensation news that ever came in the way of the 'Clarion.'”
It was four o'clock in the afternoon, and the hottest hour of the day on that Sierran foothill. The western sun, streaming down the mile-long slope of close-set pine crests, had been caught on an outlying ledge of glaring white quartz, covered with mining tools and debris, and seemed to have been thrown into an incandescent rage. The air above it shimmered and became visible. A white canvas tent on it was an object not to be borne; the steel-tipped picks and shovels, intolerable to touch and eyesight, and a tilted tin prospecting pan, falling over, flashed out as another sun of insufferable effulgence. At such moments the five members of the “Eureka Mining Company” prudently withdrew to the nearest pine-tree, which cast a shadow so sharply defined on the glistening sand that the impingement of a hand or finger beyond that line cut like a knife. The men lay, or squatted, in this shadow, feverishly puffing their pipes and waiting for the sun to slip beyond the burning ledge. Yet so irritating was the dry air, fragrant with the aroma of the heated pines, that occasionally one would start up and walk about until he had brought on that profuse perspiration which gave a momentary relief, and, as he believed, saved him from sunstroke. Suddenly a voice exclaimed querulously:—
“Derned if the blasted bucket ain't empty ag'in! Not a drop left, by Jimminy!”
A stare of helpless disgust was exchanged by the momentarily uplifted heads; then every man lay down again, as if trying to erase himself.
“Who brought the last?” demanded the foreman.
“I did,” said a reflective voice coming from a partner lying comfortably on his back, “and if anybody reckons I'm going to face Tophet ag'in down that slope, he's mistaken!” The speaker was thirsty—but he had principles.
“We must throw round for it,” said the foreman, taking the dice from his pocket.
He cast; the lowest number fell to Parkhurst, a florid, full-blooded Texan. “All right, gentlemen,” he said, wiping his forehead, and lifting the tin pail with a resigned air, “only EF anything comes to me on that bare stretch o' stage road,—and I'm kinder seein' things spotty and black now, remember you ain't anywhar NEARER the water than you were! I ain't sayin' it for myself—but it mout be rough on YOU—and”—
“Give ME the pail,” interrupted a tall young fellow, rising. “I'll risk it.”
Cries of “Good old Ned,” and “Hunky boy!” greeted him as he took the pail from the perspiring Parkhurst, who at once lay down again. “You mayn't be a professin' Christian, in good standin', Ned Bray,” continued Parkhurst from the ground, “but you're about as white as they make 'em, and you're goin' to do a Heavenly Act! I repeat it, gents—a Heavenly Act!”
Without a reply Bray walked off with the pail, stopping only in the underbrush to pluck a few soft fronds of fern, part of which he put within the crown of his hat, and stuck the rest in its band around the outer brim, making a parasol-like shade above his shoulders. Thus equipped he passed through the outer fringe of pines to a rocky trail which began to descend towards the stage road. Here he was in the full glare of the sun and its reflection from the heated rocks, which scorched his feet and pricked his bent face into a rash. The descent was steep and necessarily slow from the slipperiness of the desiccated pine needles that had fallen from above. Nor were his troubles over when, a few rods further, he came upon the stage road, which here swept in a sharp curve round the flank of the mountain, its red dust, ground by heavy wagons and pack-trains into a fine powder, was nevertheless so heavy with some metallic substance that it scarcely lifted with the foot, and he was obliged to literally wade through it. Yet there were two hundred yards of this road to be passed before he could reach that point of its bank where a narrow and precipitous trail dropped diagonally from it, to creep along the mountain side to the spring he was seeking.
When he reached the trail, he paused to take breath and wipe the blinding beads of sweat from his eyes before he cautiously swung himself over the bank into it. A single misstep here would have sent him headlong to the tops of pine-trees a thousand feet below. Holding his pail in one hand, with the other he steadied himself by clutching the ferns and brambles at his side, and at last reached the spring—a niche in the mountain side with a ledge scarcely four feet wide. He had merely accomplished the ordinary gymnastic feat performed by the members of the Eureka Company four or five times a day! But the day was exceptionally hot. He held his wrists to cool their throbbing pulses in the clear, cold stream that gurgled into its rocky basin; he threw the water over his head and shoulders; he swung his legs over the ledge and let the overflow fall on his dusty shoes and ankles. Gentle and delicious rigors came over him. He sat with half closed eyes looking across the dark olive depths of the canyon between him and the opposite mountain. A hawk was swinging lazily above it, apparently within a stone's throw of him; he knew it was at least a mile away. Thirty feet above him ran the stage road; he could hear quite distinctly the slow thud of hoofs, the dull jar of harness, and the labored creaking of the Pioneer Coach as it crawled up the long ascent, part of which he had just passed. He thought of it,—a slow drifting cloud of dust and heat, as he had often seen it, abandoned by even its passengers, who sought shelter in the wayside pines as they toiled behind it to the summit,—and hugged himself in the grateful shadows of the spring. It had passed out of hearing and thought, he had turned to fill his pail, when he was startled by a shower of dust and gravel from the road above, and the next moment he was thrown violently down, blinded and pinned against the ledge by the fall of some heavy body on his back and shoulders. His last flash of consciousness was that he had been struck by a sack of flour slipped from the pack of some passing mule.
How long he remained unconscious he never knew. It was probably not long, for his chilled hands and arms, thrust by the blow on his shoulders into the pool of water, assisted in restoring him. He came to with a sense of suffocating pressure on his back, but his head and shoulders were swathed in utter darkness by the folds of some soft fabrics and draperies, which, to his connecting consciousness, seemed as if the contents of a broken bale or trunk had also fallen from the pack. With a tremendous effort he succeeded in getting his arm out of the pool, and attempted to free his head from its blinding enwrappings. In doing so his hand suddenly touched human flesh—a soft, bared arm! With the same astounding discovery came one more terrible: that arm belonged to the weight that was pressing him down; and now, assisted by his struggles, it was slowly slipping toward the brink of the ledge and the abyss below! With a desperate effort he turned on his side, caught the body,—as such it was,—dragged it back on the ledge, at the same moment that, freeing his head from its covering,—a feminine skirt,—he discovered it was a woman!
She had been also unconscious, although the touch of his cold, wet hand on her skin had probably given her a shock that was now showing itself in a convulsive shudder of her shoulders and a half opening of her eyes. Suddenly she began to stare at him, to draw in her knees and feet toward her, sideways, with a feminine movement, as she smoothed out her skirt, and kept it down with a hand on which she leaned. She was a tall, handsome girl, from what he could judge of her half-sitting figure in her torn silk dust-cloak, which, although its cape and one sleeve were split into ribbons, had still protected her delicate, well-fitting gown beneath. She was evidently a lady.
“What—is it?—what has happened?” she said faintly, yet with a slight touch of formality in her manner.
“You must have fallen—from the road above,” said Bray hesitatingly.
“From the road above?” she repeated, with a slight frown, as if to concentrate her thought. She glanced upward, then at the ledge before her, and then, for the first time, at the darkening abyss below. The color, which had begun to return, suddenly left her face here, and she drew instinctively back against the mountain side. “Yes,” she half murmured to herself, rather than to him, “it must be so. I was walking too near the bank—and—I fell!” Then turning to him, she said, “And you found me lying here when you came.”
“I think,” stammered Bray, “that I was here when you fell, and I—I broke the fall.” He was sorry for it a moment afterward.
She lifted her handsome gray eyes to him, saw the dust, dirt, and leaves on his back and shoulders, the collar of his shirt torn open, and a few spots of blood from a bruise on his forehead. Her black eyebrows straightened again as she said coldly, “Dear me! I am very sorry; I couldn't help it, you know. I hope you are not otherwise hurt.”
“No,” he replied quickly. “But you, are you sure you are not injured? It must have been a terrible shock.”
“I'm not hurt,” she said, helping herself to her feet by the aid of the mountain-side bushes, and ignoring his proffered hand. “But,” she added quickly and impressively, glancing upward toward the stage road overhead, “why don't they come? They must have missed me! I must have been here a long time; it's too bad!”
“THEY missed you?” he repeated diffidently.
“Yes,” she said impatiently, “of course! I wasn't alone. Don't you understand? I got out of the coach to walk uphill on the bank under the trees. It was so hot and stuffy. My foot must have slipped up there—and—I—slid—down. Have you heard any one calling me? Have you called out yourself?”
Mr. Bray did not like to say he had only just recovered consciousness. He smiled vaguely and foolishly. But on turning around in her impatience, she caught sight of the chasm again, and lapsed quite white against the mountain side.
“Let me give you some water from the spring,” he said eagerly, as she sank again to a sitting posture; “it will refresh you.”
He looked hesitatingly around him; he had neither cup nor flask, but he filled the pail and held it with great dexterity to her lips. She drank a little, extracted a lace handkerchief from some hidden pocket, dipped its point in the water, and wiped her face delicately, after a certain feline fashion. Then, catching sight of some small object in the fork of a bush above her, she quickly pounced upon it, and with a swift sweep of her hand under her skirt, put on HER FALLEN SLIPPER, and stood on her feet again.
“How does one get out of such a place?” she asked fretfully, and then, glancing at him half indignantly, “why don't you shout?”
“I was going to tell you,” he said gently, “that when you are a little stronger, we can get out by the way I came in,—along the trail.”
He pointed to the narrow pathway along the perilous incline. Somehow, with this tall, beautiful creature beside him, it looked more perilous than before. She may have thought so too, for she drew in her breath sharply and sank down again.
“Is there no other way?”
“None!”
“How did YOU happen to be here?” she asked suddenly, opening her gray eyes upon him. “What did you come here for?” she went on, almost impertinently.
“To fetch a pail of water.” He stopped, and then it suddenly occurred to him that after all there was no reason for his being bullied by this tall, good-looking girl, even if he HAD saved her. He gave a little laugh, and added mischievously, “Just like Jack and Jill, you know.”
“What?” she said sharply, bending her black brows at him.
“Jack and Jill,” he returned carelessly; “I broke my crown, you know, and YOU,”—he did not finish.
She stared at him, trying to keep her face and her composure; but a smile, that on her imperious lips he thought perfectly adorable, here lifted the corners of her mouth, and she turned her face aside. But the smile, and the line of dazzling little teeth it revealed, were unfortunately on the side toward him. Emboldened by this, he went on, “I couldn't think what had happened. At first I had a sort of idea that part of a mule's pack had fallen on top of me,—blankets, flour, and all that sort of thing, you know, until”—
Her smile had vanished. “Well,” she said impatiently, “until?”
“Until I touched you. I'm afraid I gave you a shock; my hand was dripping from the spring.”
She colored so quickly that he knew she must have been conscious at the time, and he noticed now that the sleeve of her cloak, which had been half torn off her bare arm, was pinned together over it. When and how had she managed to do it without his detecting the act?
“At all events,” she said coldly, “I'm glad you have not received greater injury from—your mule pack.”
“I think we've both been very lucky,” he said simply.
She did not reply, but remained looking furtively at the narrow trail. Then she listened. “I thought I heard voices,” she said, half rising.
“Shall I shout?” he asked.
“No! You say there's no use—there's only this way out of it!”
“I might go up first, and perhaps get assistance—a rope or chair,” he suggested.
“And leave me here alone?” she cried, with a horrified glance at the abyss. “No, thank you! I should be over that ledge before you came back! There's a dreadful fascination in it even now. No! I think I'd rather go—at once! I never shall be stronger as long as I stay near it; I may be weaker.”
She gave a petulant little shiver, and then, though paler and evidently agitated, composed her tattered and dusty outer garments in a deft, ladylike way, and leaned back against the mountain side, He saw her also glance at his loosened shirt front and hanging neckerchief, and with a heightened color he quickly re-knotted it around his throat. They moved from the ledge toward the trail. Suddenly she started back.
“But it's only wide enough for ONE, and I never—NEVER—could even stand on it a minute alone!” she exclaimed.
He looked at her critically. “We will go together, side by side,” he said quietly, “but you will have to take the outside.”
“Outside!” she repeated, recoiling. “Impossible! I shall fall.”
“I shall keep hold of you,” he explained; “you need not fear that. Stop! I'll make it safer.” He untied the large bandanna silk handkerchief which he wore around his shoulders, knotted one end of it firmly to his belt, and handed her the other.
“Do you think you can hold on to that?”
“I—don't know,”—she hesitated. “If I should fall?”
“Stay a moment! Is your belt strong?” He pointed to a girdle of yellow leather which caught her tunic around her small waist.
“Yes,” she said eagerly, “it's real leather.”
He gently slipped the edge of the handkerchief under it and knotted it. They were thus linked together by a foot of handkerchief.
“I feel much safer,” she said, with a faint smile.
“But if I should fall,” he remarked, looking into her eyes, “you would go too! Have you thought of that?”
“Yes.” Her previous charming smile returned. “It would be really Jack and Jill this time.”
They passed out on the trail. “Now I must take YOUR arm,” he said laughingly; “not you MINE.” He passed his arm under hers, holding it firmly. It was the one he had touched. For the first few steps her uncertain feet took no hold of the sloping mountain side, which seemed to slip sideways beneath her. He was literally carrying her on his shoulder. But in a few moments she saw how cleverly he balanced himself, always leaning toward the hillside, and presently she was able to help him by a few steps. She expressed her surprise at his skill.
“It's nothing; I carry a pail of water up here without spilling a drop.”
She stiffened slightly under this remark, and indeed so far overdid her attempt to walk without his aid, that her foot slipped on a stone, and she fell outward toward the abyss. But in an instant his arm was transferred from her elbow to her waist, and in the momentum of his quick recovery they both landed panting against the mountain side.
“I'm afraid you'd have spilt the pail that time,” she said, with a slightly heightened color, as she disengaged herself gently from his arm.
“No,” he answered boldly, “for the pail never would have stiffened itself in a tiff, and tried to go alone.”
“Of course not, if it were only a pail,” she responded.
They moved on again in silence. The trail was growing a little steeper toward the upper end and the road bank. Bray was often himself obliged to seek the friendly aid of a manzanita or thornbush to support them. Suddenly she stopped and caught his arm. “There!” she said. “Listen! They're coming!”
Bray listened; he could hear at intervals a far-off shout; then a nearer one—a name—“Eugenia.” So that was HERS!
“Shall I shout back?” he asked.
“Not yet!” she answered. “Are we near the top?” A sudden glow of pleasure came over him—he knew not why, except that she did not look delighted, excited, or even relieved.
“Only a few yards more,” he said, with an unaffected half sigh.
“Then I'd better untie this,” she suggested, beginning to fumble at the knot of the handkerchief which linked them.
Their heads were close together, their fingers often met; he would have liked to say something, but he could only add: “Are you sure you will feel quite safe? It is a little steeper as we near the bank.”
“You can hold me,” she replied simply, with a superbly unconscious lifting of her arm, as she yielded her waist to him again, but without raising her eyes.
He did,—holding her rather tightly, I fear, as they clambered up the remaining slope, for it seemed to him as a last embrace. As he lifted her to the road bank, the shouts came nearer; and glancing up, he saw two men and a woman running down the hill toward them. He turned to Eugenia. In that instant she had slipped the tattered dust-coat from her shoulder, thrown it over her arm, set her hat straight, and was calmly awaiting them with a self-possession and coolness that seemed to shame their excitement. He noticed, too, with the quick perception of unimportant things which comes to some natures at such moments, that she had plucked a sprig of wild myrtle from the mountain side, and was wearing it on her breast.
“Goodness Heavens! Genie! What has happened! Where have you been?”
“Eugenia! this is perfect madness!” began the elder man didactically. “You have alarmed us beyond measure—kept the stage waiting, and now it is gone!”
“Genie! Look here, I say! We've been hunting for you everywhere. What's up?” said the younger man, with brotherly brusqueness.
As these questions were all uttered in the same breath, Eugenia replied to them collectively. “It was so hot that I kept along the bank here, while you were on the other side. I heard the trickle of water somewhere down there, and searching for it my foot slipped. This gentleman”—she indicated Bray—“was on a little sort of a trail there, and assisted me back to the road again.”
The two men and the woman turned and stared at Bray with a look of curiosity that changed quickly into a half contemptuous unconcern. They saw a youngish sort of man, with a long mustache, a two days' growth of beard, a not overclean face, that was further streaked with red on the temple, a torn flannel shirt, that showed a very white shoulder beside a sunburnt throat and neck, and soiled white trousers stuck into muddy high boots—in fact, the picture of a broken-down miner. But their unconcern was as speedily changed again into resentment at the perfect ease and equality with which he regarded them, a regard the more exasperating as it was not without a suspicion of his perception of some satire or humor in the situation.
“Ahem! very much obliged, I am sure. I—er”—
“The lady has thanked me,” interrupted Bray, with a smile.
“Did you fall far?” said the younger man to Eugenia, ignoring Bray.
“Not far,” she answered, with a half appealing look at Bray.
“Only a few feet,” added the latter, with prompt mendacity, “just a little slip down.”
The three new-comers here turned away, and, surrounding Eugenia, conversed in an undertone. Quite conscious that he was the subject of discussion, Bray lingered only in the hope of catching a parting glance from Eugenia. The words “YOU do it,” “No, YOU!” “It would come better from HER,” were distinctly audible to him. To his surprise, however, she suddenly broke through them, and advancing to him, with a dangerous brightness in her beautiful eyes, held out her slim hand. “My father, Mr. Neworth, my brother, Harry Neworth, and my aunt, Mrs. Dobbs,” she said, indicating each one with a graceful inclination of her handsome head, “all think I ought to give you something and send you away. I believe that is the way they put it. I think differently! I come to ask you to let me once more thank you for your good service to me to-day—which I shall never forget.” When he had returned her firm handclasp for a minute, she coolly rejoined the discomfited group.
“She's no sardine,” said Bray to himself emphatically, “but I suspect she'll catch it from her folks for this. I ought to have gone away at once, like a gentleman, hang it!”
He was even angrily debating with himself whether he ought not to follow her to protect her from her gesticulating relations as they all trailed up the hill with her, when he reflected that it would only make matters worse. And with it came the dreadful reflection that as yet he had not carried the water to his expecting and thirsty comrades. He had forgotten them for these lazy, snobbish, purse-proud San Franciscans—for Bray had the miner's supreme contempt for the moneyed trading classes. What would the boys think of him! He flung himself over the bank, and hastened recklessly down the trail to the spring. But here again he lingered—the place had become suddenly hallowed. How deserted it looked without her! He gazed eagerly around on the ledge for any trace that she had left—a bow, a bit of ribbon, or even a hairpin that had fallen from her.
As the young man slowly filled the pail he caught sight of his own reflection in the spring. It certainly was not that of an Adonis! He laughed honestly; his sense of humor had saved him from many an extravagance, and mitigated many a disappointment before this. Well! She was a plucky, handsome girl—even if she was not for him, and he might never set eyes on her again. Yet it was a hard pull up that trail once more, carrying an insensible pail of water in the hand that had once sustained a lovely girl! He remembered her reply to his badinage, “Of course not—if it were only a pail,” and found a dozen pretty interpretations of it. Yet he was not in love! No! He was too poor and too level headed for that! And he was unaffectedly and materially tired, too, when he reached the road again, and rested, leaving the spring and its little idyl behind.
By this time the sun had left the burning ledge of the Eureka Company, and the stage road was also in shadow, so that his return through its heavy dust was less difficult. And when he at last reached the camp, he found to his relief that his prolonged absence had been overlooked by his thirsty companions in a larger excitement and disappointment; for it appeared that a well-known San Francisco capitalist, whom the foreman had persuaded to visit their claim with a view to advance and investment, had actually come over from Red Dog for that purpose, and had got as far as the summit when he was stopped by an accident, and delayed so long that he was obliged to go on to Sacramento without making his examination.
“That was only his excuse—mere flap-doodle!” interrupted the pessimistic Jerrold. “He was foolin' you; he'd heard of suthin better! The idea of calling that affair an 'accident,' or one that would stop any man who meant business!”
Bray had become uneasily conscious. “What was the accident?” he asked.
“A d——d fool woman's accident,” broke in the misogynist Parkhurst, “and it's true! That's what makes it so cussed mean. For there's allus a woman at the bottom of such things—bet your life! Think of 'em comin' here. Thar ought to be a law agin it.”
“But what was it?” persisted Bray, becoming more apprehensive.
“Why, what does that blasted fool of a capitalist do but bring with him his daughter and auntie to 'see the wonderful scenery with popa dear!' as if it was a cheap Sunday-school panorama! And what do these chuckle-headed women do but get off the coach and go to wanderin' about, and playin' 'here we go round the mulberry bush' until one of 'em tumbles down a ravine. And then there's a great to do! and 'dear popa' was up and down the road yellin' 'Me cheyld! me cheyld!' And then there was camphor and sal volatile and eau de cologne to be got, and the coach goes off, and 'popa dear' gets left, and then has to hurry off in a buggy to catch it. So WE get left too, just because that God-forsaken fool, Neworth, brings his women here.”
Under this recital poor Bray sat as completely crushed as when the fair daughter of Neworth had descended upon his shoulders at the spring. He saw it all! HIS was the fault. It was HIS delay and dalliance with her that had checked Neworth's visit; worse than that, it was his subsequent audacity and her defense of him that would probably prevent any renewal of the negotiations. He had shipwrecked his partners' prospects in his absurd vanity and pride! He did not dare to raise his eyes to their dejected faces. He would have confessed everything to them, but the same feeling of delicacy for her which had determined him to keep her adventures to himself now forever sealed his lips. How might they not misconstrue his conduct—and HERS! Perhaps something of this was visible in his face.
“Come, old man,” said the cheerful misogynist, with perfect innocence, “don't take it so hard. Some time in a man's life a woman's sure to get the drop on him, as I said afore, and this yer woman's got the drop on five of us! But—hallo, Ned, old man—what's the matter with your head?” He laid his hand gently on the matted temple of his younger partner.
“I had—a slip—on the trail,” he stammered. “Had to go back again for another pailful. That's what delayed me, you know, boys,” he added. “But it's nothing!”
“Nothing!” ejaculated Parkhurst, clapping him on the back and twisting him around by the shoulders so that he faced his companions. “Nothing! Look at him, gentlemen; and he says it's 'nothing.' That's how a MAN takes it! HE didn't go round yellin' and wringin' his hands and sayin' 'Me pay-l! me pay-l!' when it spilt! He just humped himself and trotted back for another. And yet every drop of water in that overset bucket meant hard work and hard sweat, and was as precious as gold.”
Luckily for Bray, whose mingled emotions under Parkhurst's eloquence were beginning to be hysterical, the foreman interrupted.
“Well, boys! it's time we got to work again, and took another heave at the old ledge! But now that this job of Neworth's is over—I don't mind tellin' ye suthin.” As their leader usually spoke but little, and to the point, the four men gathered around him. “Although I engineered this affair, and got it up, somehow, I never SAW that Neworth standing on this ledge! No, boys! I never saw him HERE.” The look of superstition which Bray and the others had often seen on this old miner's face, and which so often showed itself in his acts, was there. “And though I wanted him to come, and allowed to have him come, I'm kinder relieved that he didn't, and so let whatsoever luck's in the air come to us five alone, boys, just as we stand.”
The next morning Bray was up before his companions, and although it was not his turn, offered to bring water from the spring. He was not in love with Eugenia—he had not forgotten his remorse of the previous day—but he would like to go there once more before he relentlessly wiped out her image from his mind. And he had heard that although Neworth had gone on to Sacramento, his son and the two ladies had stopped on for a day or two at the ditch superintendent's house on the summit, only two miles away. She might pass on the road; he might get a glimpse of her again and a wave of her hand before this thing was over forever, and he should have to take up the daily routine of his work again. It was not love—of THAT he was assured—but it was the way to stop it by convincing himself of its madness. Besides, in view of all the circumstances, it was his duty as a gentleman to show some concern for her condition after the accident and the disagreeable contretemps which followed it.
Thus Bray! Alas, none of these possibilities occurred. He found the spring had simply lapsed into its previous unsuggestive obscurity,—a mere niche in the mountain side that held only—water! The stage road was deserted save for an early, curly-headed schoolboy, whom he found lurking on the bank, but who evaded his company and conversation. He returned to the camp quite cured of his fancy. His late zeal as a water-carrier had earned him a day or two's exemption from that duty. His place was taken the next afternoon by the woman-hating Parkhurst, and he was the less concerned by it as he had heard that the same afternoon the ladies were to leave the summit for Sacramento.
But then occurred a singular coincidence. The new water-bringer was as scandalously late in his delivery of the precious fluid as his predecessor! An hour passed and he did not return. His unfortunate partners, toiling away with pick and crowbar on the burning ledge, were clamorous from thirst, and Bray was becoming absurdly uneasy. It could not be possible that Eugenia's accident had been repeated! Or had she met him with inquiries? But no! she was already gone. The mystery was presently cleared, however, by the abrupt appearance of Parkhurst running towards them, but WITHOUT HIS PAIL! The cry of consternation and despair which greeted that discovery was, however, quickly changed by a single breathless, half intelligible sentence he had shot before him from his panting lips. And he was holding something in his outstretched palm that was more eloquent than words. Gold!
In an instant they had him under the shade of the pine-tree, and were squatting round him like schoolboys. He was profoundly agitated. His story, far from being brief, was incoherent and at times seemed irrelevant, but that was characteristic. They would remember that he had always held the theory that, even in quartz mining, the deposits were always found near water, past or present, with signs of fluvial erosion! He didn't call himself one of your blanked scientific miners, but his head was level! It was all very well for them to say “Yes, yes!” NOW, but they didn't use to! Well! when he got to the spring, he noticed that there had been a kind of landslide above it, of course, from water cleavage, and there was a distinct mark of it on the mountain side, where it had uprooted and thrown over some small bushes!
Excited as Bray was, he recognized with a hysterical sensation the track made by Eugenia in her fall, which he himself had noticed. But he had thought only of HER.
“When I saw that,” continued Parkhurst, more rapidly and coherently, “I saw that there was a crack above the hole where the water came through—as if it had been the old channel of the spring. I widened it a little with my clasp knife, and then—in a little pouch or pocket of decomposed quartz—I found that! Not only that, boys,” he continued, rising, with a shout, “but the whole slope above the spring is a mass of seepage underneath, as if you'd played a hydraulic hose on it, and it's ready to tumble and is just rotten with quartz!”
The men leaped to their feet; in another moment they had snatched picks, pans, and shovels, and, the foreman leading, with a coil of rope thrown over his shoulders, were all flying down the trail to the highway. Their haste was wise. The spring was not on THEIR claim; it was known to others; it was doubtful if Parkhurst's discovery with his knife amounted to actual WORK on the soil. They must “take it up” with a formal notice, and get to work at once!
In an hour they were scattered over the mountain side, like bees clinging to the fragrant slope of laurel and myrtle above the spring. An excavation was made beside it, and the ledge broadened by a dozen feet. Even the spring itself was utilized to wash the hastily filled prospecting pans. And when the Pioneer Coach slowly toiled up the road that afternoon, the passengers stared at the scarcely dry “Notice of Location” pinned to the pine by the road bank, whence Eugenia had fallen two days before!
Eagerly and anxiously as Edward Bray worked with his companions, it was with more conflicting feelings. There was a certain sense of desecration in their act. How her proud lip would have curled had she seen him—he who but a few hours before would have searched the whole slope for the treasure of a ribbon, a handkerchief, or a bow from her dress—now delving and picking the hillside for that fortune her accident had so mysteriously disclosed. Mysteriously he believed, for he had not fully accepted Parkhurst's story. That gentle misogynist had never been an active prospector; an inclination to theorize without practice and to combat his partners' experience were all against his alleged process of discovery, although the gold was actually there; and his conduct that afternoon was certainly peculiar. He did but little of the real work; but wandered from man to man, with suggestions, advice, and exhortations, and the air of a superior patron. This might have been characteristic, but mingled with it was a certain nervous anxiety and watchfulness. He was continually scanning the stage road and the trail, staring eagerly at any wayfarer in the distance, and at times falling into fits of strange abstraction. At other times he would draw near to one of his fellow partners, as if for confidential disclosure, and then check himself and wander aimlessly away. And it was not until evening came that the mystery was solved.
The prospecting pans had been duly washed and examined, the slope above and below had been fully explored and tested, with a result and promise that outran their most sanguine hopes. There was no mistaking the fact that they had made a “big” strike. That singular gravity and reticence, so often observed in miners at these crises, had come over them as they sat that night for the last time around their old camp-fire on the Eureka ledge, when Parkhurst turned impulsively to Bray. “Roll over here,” he said in a whisper. “I want to tell ye suthin!”
Bray “rolled” beyond the squatting circle, and the two men gradually edged themselves out of hearing of the others. In the silent abstraction that prevailed nobody noticed them.
“It's got suthin to do with this discovery,” said Parkhurst, in a low, mysterious tone, “but as far as the gold goes, and our equal rights to it as partners, it don't affect them. If I,” he continued in a slightly patronizing, paternal tone, “choose to make you and the other boys sharers in what seems to be a special Providence to ME, I reckon we won't quarrel on it. It's a mighty curious, singular thing. It's one of those things ye read about in books and don't take any stock in! But we've got the gold—and I've got the black and white to prove it—even if it ain't exactly human.”
His voice sank so low, his manner was so impressive, that despite his known exaggeration, Bray felt a slight thrill of superstition. Meantime Parkhurst wiped his brow, took a folded slip of paper and a sprig of laurel from his pocket, and drew a long breath.
“When I got to the spring this afternoon,” he went on, in a nervous, tremulous, and scarcely audible voice, “I saw this bit o' paper, folded note-wise, lyin' on the ledge before it. On top of it was this sprig of laurel, to catch the eye. I ain't the man to pry into other folks' secrets, or read what ain't mine. But on the back o' this note was written 'To Jack!' It's a common enough name, but it's a singular thing, ef you'll recollect, thar ain't ANOTHER Jack in this company, not on the whole ridge betwixt this and the summit, except MYSELF! So I opened it, and this is what it read!” He held the paper sideways toward the leaping light of the still near camp-fire, and read slowly, with the emphasis of having read it many times before.
“'I want you to believe that I, at least, respect and honor your honest, manly calling, and when you strike it rich, as you surely will, I hope you will sometimes think of Jill.'”
In the thrill of joy, hope, and fear that came over Bray, he could see that Parkhurst had not only failed to detect his secret, but had not even connected the two names with their obvious suggestion. “But do you know anybody named Jill?” he asked breathlessly.
“It's no NAME,” said Parkhurst in a sombre voice, “it's a THING!”
“A thing?” repeated Bray, bewildered.
“Yes, a measure—you know—two fingers of whiskey.”
“Oh, a 'gill,'” said Bray.
“That's what I said, young man,” returned Parkhurst gravely.
Bray choked back a hysterical laugh; spelling was notoriously not one of Parkhurst's strong points. “But what has a 'gill' got to do with it?” he asked quickly.
“It's one of them Sphinx things, don't you see? A sort of riddle or rebus, you know. You've got to study it out, as them old chaps did. But I fetched it. What comes after 'gills,' eh?”
“Pints, I suppose,” said Bray.
“And after pints?”
“Quarts.”
“QUARTZ, and there you are. So I looked about me for quartz, and sure enough struck it the first pop.”
Bray cast a quick look at Parkhurst's grave face. The man was evidently impressed and sincere. “Have you told this to any one?” he asked quickly.
“No.”
“Then DON'T! or you'll spoil the charm, and bring us ill luck! That's the rule, you know. I really don't know that you ought to have told me,” added the artful Bray, dissembling his intense joy at this proof of Eugenia's remembrance.
“But,” said Parkhurst blankly, “you see, old man, you'd been the last man at the spring, and I kinder thought”—
“Don't think,” said Bray promptly, “and above all, don't talk; not a word to the boys of this. Stay! Give me the paper and the sprig. I've got to go to San Francisco next week, and I'll take care of it and think it out!” He knew that Parkhurst might be tempted to talk, but without the paper his story would be treated lightly. Parkhurst handed him the paper, and the two men returned to the camp-fire.
That night Bray slept but little. The superstition of the lover is no less keen than that of the gambler, and Bray, while laughing at Parkhurst's extravagant fancy, I am afraid was equally inclined to believe that their good fortune came through Eugenia's influence. At least he should tell her so, and her precious note became now an invitation as well as an excuse for seeking her. The only fear that possessed him was that she might have expected some acknowledgment of her note before she left that afternoon; the only thing he could not understand was how she had managed to convey the note to the spring, for she could not have taken it herself. But this would doubtless be explained by her in San Francisco, whither he intended to seek her. His affairs, the purchasing of machinery for their new claim, would no doubt give him easy access to her father.
But it was one thing to imagine this while procuring a new and fashionable outfit in San Francisco, and quite another to stand before the “palatial” residence of the Neworths on Rincon Hill, with the consciousness of no other introduction than the memory of the Neworths' discourtesy on the mountain, and, even in his fine feathers, Bray hesitated. At this moment a carriage rolled up to the door, and Eugenia, an adorable vision of laces and silks, alighted.
Forgetting everything else, he advanced toward her with outstretched hand. He saw her start, a faint color come into her face; he knew he was recognized; but she stiffened quickly again, the color vanished, her beautiful gray eyes rested coldly on him for a moment, and then, with the faintest inclination of her proud head, she swept by him and entered the house.