When after this I looked across the parapet I was as a man of highly tempered steel. The compact mass had begun to disintegrate, spreading in both directions until their flanks must have been an eighth of a mile apart. Then they advanced.
On a guess I judged their line to be quite fifteen hundred yards away because each unit looked about the size of a pea; and, as these represented the upper halves of men, the distance was too great to open fire. So I raised my sight to a thousand yards and waited. My nerves were steady with a purpose deep-set in me, for I was about to shoot for the greatest trophy of my life, so when the line had advanced a third of the way I took careful aim, and fired. A second passed; then my target disappeared.
"Is he hit or hiding?" Doloria asked excitedly, adding with a little gasp: "He's hit, for some are going to him—see?"
"I believe he is," I agreed, taking another careful aim at one who had not started to his comrade's assistance. He, too, disappeared, and immediately afterwards all of them ducked from view.
"That's awkward," I growled. "They'll do some crawling up, now!"
"They won't dare come close after that," she cried, "for I know you hit one!" Yet this might have been what Echochee would have called "good-medicine-talk,"and while standing ready I warned her not to be too sure, as both men might have dropped only for safety.
It will not seem strange that we both felt some disappointment over the probability of this, if one stops to consider what lurked in the other side of the scales for us.
Heads soon began to bob up nearer, now accompanied by quickly fired shots, and I ordered Doloria to the ground. But with relief I noticed that these shots went wild, many times hitting too far away to be heard at all, so our position obviously was as yet undiscovered. The morning sun shone directly in the men's eyes, while the protective coloration of our fort blended most elusively into the background of somber forest.
At the bobbing heads I continued to fire with what quickness I could, sometimes sending a second, third and fourth shot purposely low to probe the grass where it seemed that a man might be crouching. I could not reasonably have expected to register a hit by this, but it kept them in check, and that was our chief concern. From the beginning I realized that if they got near enough to rush us the night would close over a very silent little fort.
Suddenly Doloria gave a cry that froze my blood, for I thought it meant an attack from the rear.
"Quick—quick! Your matches! Oh, not to have thought of it before!" But this last was added while I dug into my pockets for the precious box.
"You can't do it," I exclaimed.
"I can! Keep them down, and I'll crawl! They won't see me!"
There was wisdom here, and I yielded. Nimbly she climbed the wall, dropped to her hands and knees, and crawled to the prairie. In another minute a string ofsmoke appeared; then with a bunch of grass alight she flew from place to place, stooping as she ran, and leaving in her wake a trail of fire. Almost as quickly she was back at my side, breathing fast.
"You glorious genius, we'll win out yet," I yelled.
The grass was dry and tall and thick, and the wind was blowing smartly. Fire asks for no better playground, and with incredible swiftness a wall of flame sprang up, crackling and roaring as it spread out fan-wise.
She knew, as did I, that the men would back-fire. But while this would save them from the flames it would at the same time remove their cover, and my rifle could then have a whole man to bite at instead of merely his head and shoulders, or less. They would have no alternative now but to come forward quickly or retreat. I think Doloria realized that anything might be about to happen, for she laid the other rifle in position on the parapet, rather casually asking:
"Will it matter if I stand on the canteens? They raise me just high enough!"
Why should she not be given a chance to fight for her life—at least, until they located our point of concealment and began to concentrate their fire on it. That this would inevitably happen might be a matter of minutes, but until then I thought she had every right to stay. There's no denying, too, that I knew her value.
What was going on behind the wall of racing flame we could not tell. But now it rose majestically, leapt skyward and sank to insignificance. The back-fire had met our own; they had gripped, flared up, and died. Likewise were our forces about to clash, and perhaps burn out with the heat of human passion.
Staring through the smoke we counted seven men running to the rear. They well enough knew the danger of being without cover, and were intending first to get beyond our range and then bring the fight back by some other means. Shooting fast I heard Doloria give several quick gasps of excitement as I knocked up the ash dust close to them, and although, their number was not reduced we gained a feeling of greater security to find the fort more impregnable than I had prophesied.
But our budding hope lasted about as long as it took us to conceive it. One of the fellows suddenly changed his direction, waving as he ran, and the others dashed after him. Then we, too, saw the discovery he had made, and it filled me with a sense of desperation.
This was a long, low line of green, indicating a ditch, or slough, edged with saw-palmettoes and bay bushes, that began at some indefinite northwestward point and diagonally crossed the prairie until it passed around our Oasis scarcely more than a hundred feet away. Heretofore, completely hidden by the tall grass, I had had no idea of its existence, and neither had the men, until Doloria's torch changed the prairie to a charred waste. In reality it was the outlet from our spring, and I knew that it must be fairly wide because the fire had not jumped it.
To Efaw Kotee's band it offered both an immediate cover and a place from which to carry on the fight; moreover, by following it toward us, they could reach the Oasis and eventually creep up behind so near that a well-directed shot in my head would be only a question of persistence and time.
Doloria must have understood this, and for the first time she began to fire, yet at nearly a thousand yards, when one's target not only moves but looks small andblack upon a blackened background, and is made further elusive by a haze of smoke, only luck can hit it. Still we played that luck to the last card, until one by one the men made safe and disappeared. Then she laid her rifle on the parapet, and I think took a long breath. For a moment neither of us spoke, each being afraid of saying too much, perhaps.
Beginning to fill the magazine, she finally announced:
"They're seven, Jack. You hit that first one, a while ago."
"No," I replied, "or we'd see him on the ground now. He merely ducked, like the others."
"But there were eight the night I escaped!"
"Then Smilax got one during the chase—which shows that he and Echochee haven't been killed." But during this our eyes never left the ditch and our rifles were ready to blaze away at the first sign of movement.
"Why?" she asked.
"Because if he had to make a last stand there wouldn't be as many as seven men here now." And I firmly believed it, knowing how savagely our two servants would account for themselves. I think she agreed with me.
An ominous silence lay about us. I felt sure that the scoundrels were crawling up along the ditch, and told her this. She nodded. Minutes passed.
At one point, about two hundred yards out, there was a spot where the saw-palmettoes and bay bushes thinned to almost nothing. Sooner or later the enemy would have to cross this, and I watched it without blinking because it would offer our best—if not, indeed, last—chance to hold them. So when finally a stooping figure showed itself I opened a vigorous fire. He drew back, or fell back, and the silence again enveloped us, to beshattered an instant later by a fusillade of shots that made the air thick with crackling whines. The location of our fort was known.
"Down, down!" I yelled.
"I am," she answered, obeying as the best of soldiers. "I'll load for you!"
We were being showered with lead by now, and between the wasplike things speeding overhead and their "sput-sput" as they hit the logs, I dared expose no more than my eyes and forehead while emptying rifle after rifle. In the fleeting movement of handing one down and taking the other I saw Doloria sitting near my feet, with several opened boxes of cartridges on the ground beside her. We had plenty of ammunition, so I did not wait for human targets but fired rapidly into every probable place of concealment—just hoping.
This must have begun to touch them up, for one now made a dash across the open space and dived into good cover, from which he started an instant reply to me. There had been only time for a quick shot at him, as the opening was scarcely ten feet wide. Another tried and made it, but the third stumbled. Whether he accidentally fell or was wounded, I had no way of knowing, yet he was able, at least, to continue the fight because there seemed to be no let up in their volume of fire. Then, to my chagrin, a fourth got across, and, following him, the last three tried together—successfully.
In the best of conditions these men would have been very hard to hit, yet I offer no excuses. My aim, of course, had greatly suffered. Disregard for the nicest accuracy in marksmanship may be expected when an enemy is pouring a hundred shots a minute at a certain point, and you happen to be that point.
Again their rifles became silent. There seemed, indeed, no reason to keep them speaking, as the road to the Oasis was clear. When the trees back of us should be reached more shots would ring out, closer, always getting closer; eventually would come the hand-to-hand fight, and then—forgetfulness. Yet I swore with a burning rage in my heart that whoever of those fiends were left to gloat over their victory would remember until their dying day the price I had collected for it.
"Where are they?" Doloria asked, in a voice that trembled slightly. The strain of waiting below was greater than that of seeing what went on outside.
Grimly I told her how matters stood with us, and we, also, became silent.
The next move appeared in the direction of our kitchen, when several shadowy forms began to dart from tree to tree. The same plan was being adopted as that which they had used at the ditch: one man, his advance covered by a hot fire from the others, would stoop and run forward to a previously selected place, then a second, third, and so on, each beginning to shoot from the new position, as he got to it. These tactics might successfully be repeated until the last barrier of trees, not more than twenty yards from us, was gained. But now a fellow showed himself a moment too long and I thought I dropped him, because a howl of rage went up from his mates.
I was keeping the two rifles very busy by this time, and Doloria could scarcely load one before the other was being passed to her. Each side had resorted to the expediency of rising, firing and ducking down again. They were too near for me to risk an inch of head for more than the necessary fraction of a second, and sometimes,in my haste, I aimed at nothing at all. A vigorous fire, whether effective or not, would hold off their rush. But when I peeped over the next time a rifle, protruding from around a tree, showed me that one, at least, had reached the nearest point of cover. I banged at it and ducked, as several shots whizzed over me. It was rather discouraging work, this of being forced to keep down! Another brief silence on their part was suggestive of a new move, and I felt sure that they were preparing for a charge.
Calling this to Doloria, I began to bob up at different places along the wall, trying in a frenzy to check them, and for the moment was successful. Then I heard her give a cry, as a bullet split the stock of the rifle she was loading.
"Some one's in a tree shooting down at us! Look out!" she called, rolling over to get beneath the nearer wall.
Upon hearing this I gave up trying to dodge, and stood to the parapet determined to drop as many as possible before being dropped myself; for if their number were materially reduced she might be able, as a last resort, to come off victor with the automatic. And spurred by this intention I faced them so resolutely that they were compelled to hug their cover. But a second shot from the tree, slanting downward, struck the surface of the sand filling we had used between our walls; it hit a few inches directly in front of my face, knocking up a shower of grit that, for the moment, completely blinded me.
I must have wheeled around with my arm across my eyes, because the men believed that I'd been done for, and with a triumphant howl started forward. Doloria, too, thought the end had come, and gave one despairing cry that I shall remember if I live a thousandyears. Through my blurred vision I got a glimpse of her face, a blending of courage and horror and purpose, as she raised the automatic to her temple.
And then by some divine insight I sprang and snatched it away. The howls of triumph had ceased; no leering enemy appeared above our parapet. The smart in my eyes was passing enough for me to see four of them running southward across the prairie with the speed of deer, and suddenly I knew that, without realizing it, I had just been hearing other rifle shots. Whirling about, I saw emerging from a near-by point in the ditch several figures, shouting and waving their hats.
"Tommy," I yelled, "Gates, Echochee, Smilax!" I did not name them all, but turned quickly as Doloria flew into my arms. "We're saved, sweetheart! The dice have rolled for us!"
She was crying a little, clinging to my neck, talking fast, but saying only one thing. And although Tommy afterwards declared that for a time there was such a silence in the fort that he believed we had been killed, I consider this but one of his verbal extravagances; for it seemed only a second after he waved before we were on the parapet waving back to him.
Yet, in the midst of my wildest cheer I stopped. It stuck in my throat, it dried up as the fountain of my gladness seemed suddenly to have gone dry, and I looked at her. There must have been a great pain in my eyes—not physical, for that was transient and had passed—because she touched them, whispering:
"What is it?"
"See what I'm cheering for," I answered huskily. "Our escape only means death to our dreams—it's good-bye to the Oasis!"
"Why?" she asked, her face turning slightly pale.
"Because the minute those people get here you won't be my Doloria of the Golden Dawn any more, but Princess Doloria of Azuria!"
She caught hold of my sleeve and gasped, a little hysterically:
"But, Jack, suppose I don'twantto be Princess Doloria!"
Our friends had covered half the distance, and I hurriedly said:
"You can't help yourself! You don't know the power that man, Dragot, has! Will you run off with me to-night?" For I could not dismiss the obsession that Monsieur would prevail. "He came especially armed with government orders to find you and take you back. And I'm only afraid your heart's too straight to refuse him, even if you could, when he puts it up to your conscience! Oh, Doloria—please don't cry!"
"I won't," she answered tremulously, "if you stop talking that way!"
I was sorry, and quickly told her that everything would come out all right—that my love was stronger than all the powers of all the governments under the sun. Then I helped her down on the prairie side, for the others were nearly up to us, approaching with bared heads. There was a fantastic note in our situation that deeply affected me. What could have been more bizarre than an Azurian princess holding court upon the edge of a Florida prairie? This, emphasized by our escape from death, added color to the fabric of unreality whose warp was romance, and whose woof was the mystifying surge of human impulses. So my vacillating spirits rebounded to the pinnacle of happiness and, raising my hand, I announced in a loud voice:
"Gentlemen, Her Serene Highness, Doloria, Princess of Azuria!"
Except for Echochee, they stopped and in frank amazement gazed at her. Flushed by the excitements that had made this day memorable, she was indeed the most adorable sovereign before whom knights had e'er sworn fealty. But the old Indian woman, with an undisguised croon of delight, went straight to her side, folded her in aged, brown arms of iron, and faced the waiting men with a look of defiance. She did not comprehend all that was passing, but distinctly wanted it understood that no one should touch her child.
After that they were all about her, even Bilkins and the two sailors asking to shake hands and hear from her own lips the story of what had happened. She recognized Gates as "the splendid captain who found the bomb," and he blushed like a little boy. Monsieur, of course, could not bring himself to treat her with anything less than royal deference, so he kneeled and kissed her hand. I saw her look at the back of it when he arose, and then search his face—he had left a tear which she seemed unwilling to brush off. Tommy, not content with one hand, took both; and these he shook until she burst out laughing. As a matter of fact, we were all laughing a few degrees immoderately. Then, without warning, the strain became too much. Her eyes suddenly filled, her lips began to tremble. Turning impulsively, she put an arm across Echochee's shoulders and together they walked toward the spring, leaving us silent.
Old Gates rubbed his chin and looked up at the sky, saying huskily:
"My word, it's going to rain!" And, although there was no cloud in sight, Tommy said he thought so, too.
Thus the spell was broken and, with a more dismal duty to be performed, we sent for Smilax to bring the camp spade—leaving Monsieur to find Doloria and talk with her, for I had excused him from the contract Tommy made aboard theWhim, wanting to remove uncertainties as soon as possible.
Gates entered a careful record in his notebook of identification marks on the three men we found dead. Our joint statement would be sufficient for the law in such a case as this, especially as Monsieur knew there was a price on Efaw Kotee's head, and doubtless on the heads of all who served him.
When Smilax approached the last man he pointed down with grim satisfaction, saying:
"Him bust black boy's head!"
It was Jess, who would have bullied the old chief into giving up my princess! Well, our account was closed. But of Efaw Kotee there was no clue. I felt sure he was not among those who escaped, simply because he could not have run so fast; and Smilax was certain he did not follow with the chase.
Our gruesome task finished, we turned back. For the moment I wanted to be alone, with my thoughts, my happiness, my uncertainty of Monsieur's power of persuasion, my heaviness of spirit caused by the work behind us. But Tommy ran up and slipped his arm through mine, saying with exaggerated carelessness:
"I'm glad that crescendo of horrors is over—if you'll allow a kind of musical term; but I've got music in my soul to-day."
"It's a funny time for music," I grumbled, "—except funeral marches."
"By the way, did you find out about that other funeral march?"
"No, I forgot," I confessed. "Don't bother me, Tommy; I feel like the devil."
"I know it," he gave my arm a squeeze—for Tommy possessed that characteristic making for a community of mind and spirit that did not wait for explanations. "I know it," he repeated, "but youlooka whole lot better—really like your old self! Now, what's the trouble? If you're worrying about the ruins we created back there, cut it out! I'm not bothered over the one or two I might have got! Fact is, nobody knows which of us hit which, anyway. So what is it? I'm not asking, merely insisting!"
So I told him pretty much everything, as one chum can to another.
"You mean she may listen to the little gezabo and go back?" he asked.
"I mean just that. She will if she thinks it has a bigger claim on her. I know how square she is!"
"Besides being square," he said thoughtfully, "there's also something in the make-up of woman that I've never understood: her apparent hankering after sacrifice. When it comes to a show-down between heart and conscience, she'll follow the conscience ten to one—if she's straight. Look at it," he swept his arm toward the prairie, as if innumerable instances were in sight of us. "See the sweet-faced old ladies who never wrote 'Mrs.' before their names—not that they've missed anything, God knows, but just look at 'em! All because some over-finicky parent didn't approve, no doubt! And see the heart starvation stamped on 'daughter's' face, because 'father' was nearly bankrupt and shedidwrite 'Mrs.' to save him! Taking them in retrospect, it's a question if the thing they called sacrifice wasn't plain damn foolishness. Why, hell, Jack,d'you mean to say that the professor and his musty European customs—oh, I can't be profane enough!—the English language is trifling and inadequate! But I'm going to take a hand in this courtship, myself!"
"For a gregarious animal, Tommy, you're something of a wonder," I began to laugh, because it was like myrrh and frankincense blown upon my doubts and fears to hear him talk.
We went quietly on after this. Our boots made no noise in the soft earth, and thus silently we approached the fort; then halted. For on the farther side, hidden by the walls, a man was speaking in tones of earnestness, yet at that very instant a voice interrupted him.
"I wish you wouldn't persist in talking now," it said irritably, "I'm too unhappy over the lives which most have been lost, and——"
"But Your Serenity must realize that lives are nothing. The new destiny that——"
"Oh, I know what you'd say," the voice cried. "But don't give me any more arguments, for Heaven's sake! They're utterly useless and, besides, you might convince me!"
Softly we tiptoed away and, when at a safe distance I stopped to rub my arm where Tommy's fingers had been digging into it, he whispered:
"That didn't sound sacrificy, did it?"
"The old fellow hasn't struck his pace, yet," I answered doubtfully.
"Well," Tommy looked back toward the fort, "the pressure's high enough for one day. She needs another rescuing. You go and speed up the grub."
So, whistling the Charpentier love song, he left me.
At the kitchen fire Echochee was busily preparing food for a company now swelled to ten, and Smilax had dropped in rank to an assistant. I saw from her activity that this was not a fortunate moment to interrupt, yet there are some few things in life more important than a well-turned meal, and I therefore advanced, wishing to speak in the presence of our two sailors who hovered near with lips that all but drewled in anticipation of the feast.
"I want to remind each of you," I said, "not to tell the princess that any one was killed. Let it go that a few were scratched, and the rest got away. You get the idea? I don't want her shocked."
My men understood at once, but Echochee, never taking her eyes from the sizzling skillets, asked:
"What you mean—'shocked'?"
"I mean horrified, terrified—sorry," I answered, rather put to it how else to explain.
"Ugh! She already sorry; cry some, say ve'y bad. Me say ve'y good. She all right now. You through?"
And, since I was through, she gave another grunt, leaving me with the suspicion that she thought I was a very small boy.
When finally the others came in sight Doloria walked at the side of Tommy, while Monsieur followed in some discomfiture of mind. His hair was tousled, and his eyes were thoughtful. From this, and the grin onTommy's face, I judged that all was not going well for him and, in a more happy frame of mind, I went out to meet them.
"Mr. Davis has been telling me a strange story," she smiled at me.
"He's full of strange stories," I warned her. "Don't take him seriously—ever!"
"But I know he was serious this time—weren't you?" The corners of her mouth were tell-tales of merriment as she turned to him.
"Shall we let Jack in on it?" he asked, the grin on his face widening.
"Do you think we'd better?" She was laughing outright now, with an alluring spirit of confidence; so I knew that she approved my estimate of Tommy and had taken him into her heart as for many years he had lived in mine.
But women always loved Tommy—perhaps because he loved them. If some far-reaching providence had not endowed him with a well-developed sense of honor to go hand in hand with his attractiveness, more girls would have looked after him through tears than toward him with gladness. Whatever his loves and secret affairs, he always played above the board and never cheated; so they could trust him if he won, and pet him if he lost. Taken altogether, he was rather a lucky beggar, who learned early in life that the golden key which unlocks a woman's heart is Secrecy—and this they seemed to know by some divine, or devilish, insight.
Before he now had a chance to answer her question, Monsieur caught up with us.
"Ah, my boy Jack," he grasped my hands, forgettinghis ill humor to beam on me. "For lack of opportunity I have not expressed my gratitude! Azuria is your debtor! I, who have the authority, say it!"
"Thank you," I replied, "but that debt was cancelled early this morning when its Princess saved me from assassination."
"Good Lord," Tommy cried, in despair, "he's spilled the beans! Jack, you bone-head, we——"
"Be quiet, sir," she commanded, turning beautifully pink and giving me ten thousand messages in a single look.
"Then come on," Tommy said, beginning to draw her away by the hand, "let's go off and think up another!"
"My boy Tommy," the professor sternly reproved him, "she is of royal blood!"
"You said something that time," he imperturbably replied. "Come on, Princess!" And laughingly she went with him.
"Pardieu," the old fellow pulled at his beard, "that sex is like a cyclone—the nearer I get the faster I am twisted! But just as her mother was at that age—yes, quite!" He sighed.
"Is she going back with you?" I asked, feeling a malicious joy in the question after the last look she gave me.
"Certainement, there is no other way! Thus far I have not tried to persuade her, but merely presented a few minor facts. Yes, she will go."
I confess that my malicious joy sank somewhat.
"You are a gentleman," he continued, "and that presupposes a delicate sense of honor. I know how you feel toward her—yet would you have her remain with you if she one day regretted it? Great things rest on her return, I assure you. Let us start even! You have had two days to persuade her your way; let mehave two days to persuade her mine! After that, we fight in the open—you and I!"
There was something straightforward in his appeal that impressed me. I had had two days, and it would be giving her destiny, those great things he spoke of, a square deal to comply. I had misgivings, of course, but these were overruled by—why deny it?—the masculine conceit that becomes assertive after a few feminine favors. At any rate, it was a fair sporting proposition, and I said:
"All right, for two days—provided I explain to her how we made this bargain."
He smiled and hugged me as of yore, crying:
"Almost you would make me sorry when I win! So we fight to the last ditch, eh?"
"To the last ditch," I smiled, shaking hands with him.
But hardly had the agreement been sealed before I regretted it. Tommy's dissertation on sacrifice worried me. And yet, what man with red blood and two wide-open eyes in his heart would have refused to play the cards Monsieur thus honestly laid out? It would be unfair to Doloria's future if I pugnaciously held to the advantage these few days had brought; for it is one thing to start in an open race with men, and run and burst your heart to be first across the goal which means a woman's arms, but quite another to take her unawares in a wilderness and, upon the spot, claim her before she knows what the surrender may involve. In years to follow a time might come when she would look at me through shadows—shadows that grow dark with perplexity over some irrevocable step—and I did not want to sow a seed to ripen into one of these. It is distracting enough for a man to bury his existing ghosts, butsheer madness deliberately to raise a crop of new ones.
In this case I did not so much fear a race with other men in forms of rivals. I had reached my goal, her arms, and nothing could undo that. But her conscience—who dares claim the conscience of another! For two days, then, Monsieur could fight it out alone with her, and if his arguments prevailed—well, I would set about destroying them.
After luncheon, with a brevity that she must have understood meant torture, I explained the compact, saying that I could ask for no more promises until two days had passed; and when she would have replied that her promise had been given I warned her that Monsieur had not even begun to show his power. She seemed a little frightened at this and, but for the sterling mark indubitably pressed upon her sense of right, I think she might have consented to fly from him.
"For two days, then, I'm not to see you," she said simply.
"No," I cried. "But for two days I can't tell you how I love you; how you're the very breath of my life, the control of my brain and body and soul, how I'll finally win you against everything! I'll see you, and be with you, but for two long, weary, interminable days I can't tell you that!"
"Mightn't you," she smiled, a wee bit naughtily, "remind me each morning of those things you must not tell me during the two long, weary, interminable days? Then you wouldn't be so likely to forget, and break your contract."
"Temptress! I wish we'd walked to the fort!" For, while we stood out of hearing, we were still in sight of the others.
"So do I," she laughed now, her eyes expressive of amost fascinating wickedness, a daredeviltry born of the knowledge that the proximity of outsiders made her safe. Tommy says that girls often take this unfair advantage of a fellow. Then Monsieur, believing the time for explanations should be up, came toward us.
At three o'clock our cavalcade started across the prairie for Efaw Kotee's settlement. Tommy and Monsieur were keen to see it, and especially was the latter keyed up to ransack the place for proofs and information. Smilax led, keeping away from the graves. Doloria had made no reference to casualties, accepting them as an unfortunate necessity, and only once asked about the old chief's fate.
I looked back at the Oasis growing small behind us and a great sorrow came over me. It was not easy to leave the place where I had found such happiness, the place sacred to our vows, our first dwelling together beneath God's tent! It lay green and peaceful, but now upon a blackened sea. And, like that flame-swept land, so was my flame-swept heart; the fire of a resistless passion had passed over it, leaving amid the ashes one spot of beauty. She, also, had stopped to look at it and, as she turned away, our eyes met.
When we approached the islands I went forward with Tommy and Smilax, leaving Gates to command the rear guard composed of his two sailors, Bilkins and Monsieur. Echochee, supremely content to have found Doloria, remained at her side.
Four of the attacking party had escaped and might well have returned to their houses. We favored the theory, too, that Efaw Kotee had remained there, expecting his band to capture us; so, if the fugitives were with him, they could by now have prepared a formidable resistance. We therefore went warily up to acertain point and waited while Smilax crawled forward to reconnoiter.
He returned saying that three punts were on our side, from which he believed the men had not come back but were still putting as much distance between themselves and us as possible. Tommy thought the punts might mean a trap and, although Smilax shook his head in doubt at this, we brought up one of the sailors to cover our crossing in case of an attack. Then, scrambling down the steep bank, in less than a minute we stood upon the island stronghold. No shot had been fired, no sign of life existed anywhere. Running to the nearest cabin we hastily searched it, and ran to the next, and in this way came finally to the old chief's bungalow. Here we halted, as if some horrible magic had turned us to stone.
Efaw Kotee, naked to the waist, a few dried smears of blood around his mouth, was there to meet us. His lips munched the air, as a very old man who interminably chews on nothing, and his chest rose convulsively, then rested several seconds before renewing its struggle for breath. He was repulsive beyond all human description; for, stretched as an animal skin to dry, legs and arms pulled wide apart with buckskin thongs, he had been fastened head down on the wall beside his door. Yet this was not all. Hanging at the end of a string—in fact, now resting inertly against his cheek—was the scarlet, black and yellow ringed body of a coral snake, the deadly elaps. Its head had been severed and lay upon the floor directly underneath.
In a flash I read the story: a duel of teeth between this captive reptile and the semi-crucified man; the one in anger wounding, the other snapping in his frenzy to sever that venomous head—his only means of escapefrom it. From the way the thongs had cut into his wrists and ankles I knew the struggle had been wild, yet much of this may have come from the insanity later kindled by the poison. But that period of torment now had passed. Strength was exhausted, and life dangled by the merest thread.
I heard Tommy draw in his breath. With a shiver Smilax turned away. Better than we he understood what the old man had endured. Together we cut the pitiable victim down, carried him inside and laid him on a kind of divan.
"Who did this?" Tommy kneeled and called in a loud voice close to his ear, hoping to reach a consciousness that had receded far into the shadows.
"I know who did it," I interrupted. "Quick! While there's time let me ask something we're not so sure about!" And, taking Tommy's place, I called: "Is Doloria the princess of Azuria?"
It was so obviously my duty to see that she learned the truth from one who knew, that I may be forgiven this apparent disregard for the sufferer in our hands. But he showed no sign of having heard, although I called again and again in a more commanding voice. His mouth had not munched the air since we put him down, and Tommy, listening for a heart beat, looked up quietly, saying:
"Must have died on the way in."
"If we'd only come an hour ago," I exclaimed.
"No," Smilax shook his head, "him only squeal ve'y bad for last twelve hour. Me reckon some men come back last night; say he plan Lady run-'way; tie him up; tie on snake. No, him no talk hour ago. Coral snake bite make him ve'y crazy bad."
Tommy had arisen and was walking softly back andforth across the room. Finally he stopped, saying over his shoulder:
"I'll give odds there's more in this old desk than he could have told in a week! Here's a safe, too, stuck back in an alcove, that looks like it might hold a ton! You won't have any trouble finding out things!"
I had not yet noticed the room, but now looked with interest at these places that promised to reveal so much. The room itself was large and expressive of luxury, without being luxuriously furnished. The fireplace, mantel, and furniture were of a good, home-made mission type, constructed from gyminda, Florida's nearest approach to ebony; but the floor was covered with really beautiful rugs. Around the walls were built-in book shelves, mantel high, filled with the volumes Doloria had told me of. The piano was there, not an up-right as we had found on theOrchid, but a handsome grand, bearing one of the best names. A violin case lay upon it, while near by was a music stand. Altogether, these living quarters of Efaw Kotee showed a taste I would have expected. Instinctively I crossed to the desk, but Tommy stopped me, saying:
"Not while that's in here, old fellow," he jerked his head toward the divan. "In no other circumstances would he take it from us lying down, and it's kind of rubbing it in, don't you think so?"
"If you feel that way about it," I agreed. "But to rob a girl of seventeen years or so of life isn't a crime that merits much sympathy."
"I reckon he pretty well paid up for it during last night and to-day," he said softly.
"Whether he did or not, I don't owe him anything," I retorted, in no charitable vein, that I hope was caused by our excitement and excessive strain.
"You owe him a dog-gone lot," Tommy emphatically replied. "Look at those books, at that piano, at what is suggested by the violin case, at the refinement of this room—and then picture what might have been here! Take another view, and consider what a fine chance you'd have had to meet her if that old codger hadn't turned scamp off there in Azuria! Anyway, we've got to clean up the signs of this butchery before she comes."
In an adjoining room we laid Efaw Kotee upon his own bed. The sheet that Tommy got out of a press to spread over him was, I noticed, of beautiful linen, and I felt softened toward the uncouth frame which, in this wilderness, had still demanded the refinements of life.
Locking the door, we passed back to the living room and thence to the landing where, at our direction, the sailor signaled Gates to bring up his waiting party. As Doloria once more stepped upon the island I saw her eyes grow moist with tears.
We told her that the chief had been found dying, that now he was dead and the place deserted; but after she and Echochee had been rowed across to their own home and the two sailors posted to guard against a possible return of the outlaws, Monsieur and Gates accompanied us to the place of awful murder where we explained what we had found.
Monsieur passed into the smaller room, but came out shaking his head and murmuring:
"The face is much changed, yet I recognize enough to feel reasonably sure it is he."
More positive proofs came when, with breathless interest, we went through the contents of the desk, taking things out in order and putting them aside after minute examination. The first of these was a seal, and the professor, bending over it, uttered a cry of surprise:
"The royal seal of Azuria! What deviltry could he have been contemplating when he stole this!"
Then came a blank sheet of note paper, stamped with a gold peak, surmounted by a gold crown and three lavender ostrich plumes—the Azurian royal crest. These two things alone were strong pieces of evidence for the professor's sanguine expectation. There was nothing further of importance, so we turned to the safe which seemed impassively challenging us to get at its secrets, for the door stood fastened and the combination was unknown.
Monsieur kneeled, placed his ear against it, and began slowly to turn the knob, listening intently for the little metal hammers, or tumblers, of the lock to fall clicking into place.
"I never supposed he knew enough for that," Tommy whispered. "It's a regular crook's way!"
At last, very much disgusted, he gave up after explaining that he could have succeeded in an hour or so, but preferred to use dynamite because it was quicker.
"Undoubtedly it's quicker," Tommy said, "but unless you've cracked safes that way before, we may as well say good-bye to the bungalow!"
Gates thought that the door, being of ancient pattern, might yield to a sledge, and Smilax went in search of one. Finding none of sufficient size, he returned with an anvil, swinging it by its spike. I remember the muscles of his arm that held it, the poise of his body as he raised it above his head and gathered every ounce of power to hurl it upon the combination knob. It made a superb picture of primordial man pitted against the sciences. After each resounding blow we tried to throw the lever, and at last the battered door swung out.
Here was a find worth coming far to see—packagesupon packages of greenbacks, all counterfeit, but they made a show, nevertheless. There were also plates for printing francs, pounds and rubles, as well as those from which the American bills had been made. While Monsieur was studying one of these more carefully, Tommy reached past him and drew out a large bundle wrapped in heavy brown paper, securely tied and sealed. He cut the strings and opened it, then gave a whistle of surprise, asking:
"Are these counterfeit, too?"
"Mon Dieu, no!" the old fellow gasped, and I, also, caught my breath; for in the bundle were hundreds of unregistered French bonds, of the highest denomination.
Opening one, I looked at the last coupon, announcing that it bore a date of about seventeen years ago, whereupon Monsieur cried:
"Ah, I see it! This accounts for the royal seal we found! Here, at last, is the perpetrator of that grand swindle, lying peacefully behind the door and not caring what we discover! But he has taken his rue with the spoils!—he dared not enjoy these because of the lees he saw in the pleasure cup!"
"Chop that off," Tommy told him. "If you've an inspiration about this stuff, come across with it!"
"Ah-ha, that man—thatcapitaineJess! His name is Karl Schartzmann, a shrewd, rascally German who vanished after thecoup d'état!"
"What swindle, Monsieur?—whatcoup d'état? Whom do these belong to?" I was really losing patience; and Tommy murmured:
"Jack, didn't it strike you that only a German mind could have conceived that revenge on Efaw Kotee?"
"It was certainly true to German form," I admitted, without reluctance.
"The Bank of France!—who else?" Monsieur was saying. "As one of the trusted, I know! Listen: the dead man behind us, and the one called Jess, with our Azurian consul in Paris—all scoundrels—hatched a swindle to sell, through forged state authority and a farcical secret diplomacy, a portion of Azuria to France. This, you may remember, came near upsetting the Balkans in 1903. Their crafty scheme lay ready to be sprung when Efaw Kotee—we will call him that—had to kidnap the princess in self-defense. From that time but fragmentary facts came dribbling in from secret agents, as follows:
"First: Two weeks after the kidnaping a foreigner bought a schooner yacht in New York, fitted it up with great masses of household effects, and sailed, his papers designating Guayra, Venezuela.
"Second: Still two weeks later Karl Schartzmann and our consul in Paris transferred the secret bill of sale and left with their arms full of bonds. When France discovered the fraud they were well away.
"Third: Still two weeks later a schooner yacht, afterward supposed to be the one bought in New York, dropped anchor at Guayra and stayed until two men, arriving by steamer, went aboard; whereupon she sailed.
"This is all we definitely discovered, except that before sailing crafty inquiries were made into extradition treaties between France and South American countries—and found, in every instance, to be unfriendly to swindlers.
"I now see how it was with them. Fearing everywhere the press of France's vengeance, shunning telegraph wires, they were driven to the solitude of these islands where, as solitude has a way of treating the criminal mind, their shyness grew to fear, their fear toterror. They did not dare go out except at rare intervals, nor dared they realize on the bonds. It is clear to me at last!"
It was also clear to me, at last inerrantly clear, that Doloria and the little princess were the same.
"Whew!" Tommy gave a whistle. "I feel as woozy as an old warped mirror! Did France offer a reward for this stuff?"
"Certainement!And you drew it out!—it is yours, my boy!"
"Like hell it is," he laughed. "I move it goes as prize money to Smilax, Echochee, and the crew!"
Late that evening we buried Efaw Kotee under the mangroves, and did not tell Doloria. No one knows, who has never seen it, the desolation of laying a shrouded figure in a mangrove-covered oyster bar at twilight, where water follows each slushy lift of the spade! I feared for her to witness it, and therefore, Tommy reading the service, the old chief was buried without a woman's sympathy. But, in a measure, he had our own. He held a claim on it for having faced a certain responsibility to Doloria; for having, with the skill of a master, developed the talents God had given her; for having kept her from growing up like a weed.
At ten o'clock that night when, by prearrangement, Tommy and I paddled across to bring Monsieur back from the little island, she was standing with him on the landing. The moon was nearing full, bathing her in a silvery light, and I saw from the droop of her body that she was tired.
"Good night," I said, arising in the punt and putting out my hand.
"Good night," she murmured wearily; but her fingers were cold and did not answer the pressure of my own. I had touched Efaw Kotee's hand only a few hours before, and it had been cold with the same inert, mysterious coldness. I shivered.
Early next morning Monsieur was taken to the little island, and I felt that his interview would be long and solemn—perhaps stormy. I hoped so. He came back for luncheon and immediately left again, having given us no intimation of his progress. I did not know what Doloria might be suffering from these visits, but they made me so abominably restive that during the afternoon I took a pine and crossed to the mainland, half-heartedly intending to look for deer. It was nearly sundown when I returned.
"We're packing, sir," said the sailor who tied my punt.
"Packing? Why?"
"Orders, sir."
Without loss of time I hunted up Tommy, finding him and Bilkins busy at carpentry.
"What's in the wind?" I brusquely demanded, forgetting that Tommy was rather particular about the way people addressed him.
"Rain," he imperturbably replied; or did he mean reign, and was employing a vulgar pun to apprize me of Doloria's decision! So I delivered a ten-second philippic on the poverty of some intellects, whereupon he left off working and regarded me with amusement.
"Fact is, Lord Chesterfield, I don't know what's in the wind," he said, "but we're leaving for Little Coveto-morrow at dawn. Bilkins and I are making a portable throne—in other words, a chair suspended from poles so Doloria won't have to walk. Professor came over about five o'clock in a rattling hurry and splendid humor. He's packing Efaw Kotee's effects now. Smilax left two hours ago with orders for theWhimto be there and take us off. Add it up for yourself."
"Orders," I angrily exclaimed, for this impertinence on the part of Monsieur was going too far. "He settles with me, that's all!—and theWhimstays in Big Cove till I send for her!"
He grinned, then whistled softly.
"So there's no use knicking my knuckles any more on this portable throne?"
"Not the slightest," I told him.
"Love's first tiff," he sighed, laying down the hammer and beginning to fill his pipe.
"Love's what?"
"Tootsie-wootsie tiff, I believe I said"—this between puffs as the match flared high and low over the bowl. "You understand, of course, that Doloria gave the order."
"Confound you, why didn't you say so! What's happened? Did a message come?"
"Sure." He stopped smoking and looked at me. "A big limousine drove up with a note and flowers."
"Be serious," I thundered. "This isn't any time to joke!"
"When you talk about a paucity of intellect," he laughed softly, "it's a wonder you don't bite yourself."
"Oh, Tommy, please let up; I'm sorry, honest—I'm wretched, too!"
His manner changed then. Putting his arm through mine, he led me outside, going toward our landing.
"This is just the time to joke, old man," he said, whenwe reached it. "She made up her mind to leave,pronto! Why? Conscience said obey Monsieur, but heart said nixy! What's to do then? Start home quick, of course, before little heart gives old conscience the solar plexus! That's how I size it up!"
"But I don't see anything to joke about," I said gloomily.
"Well, let me shuffle again—now take a look! When Smilax left with her order, I sent a note to the mate, telling him to bring both yachts down. Then we'll have to split the crew, and in the mix-up I'll see that you and she get on theWhim, while Monsieur sails on——But I see you get me! If you can't stifle her conscience before we reach Miami, you're a mud-hen."
"Great guns," I whispered, grabbing him by the arms, "we might sail——"
"All over the Gulf," he chuckled, giving me a push toward the water. "There's your Hellespont, son, as sure as Leander was a gentleman! Cross it now and tell her it's all right about that order!"
"My two days aren't up yet; I'm bound."
"That's nothing. Wait!"
He was off to the old chief's bungalow and reappeared with Monsieur, whose broad smile was anything but reassuring.
"You wish to relieve her uncertainty about that order?" he asked, coming up. "Certainly, my boy Jack, go and say what you please."
"What I please?" I asked pointedly.
"Why not what you please? She goes with me to Azuria—we have arranged it. You could not dissuade her now. Even could you, she knows she can not resist my authority. Yes, go and say what you like."
He was laughing by this time, at his success ratherthan my discomfiture, but Tommy saw that I was making little distinction between the two and wisely led him away.
As I stepped upon the little island Echochee came down to meet me.
"How's your Lady?" I asked.
"You go see," she answered in a low voice, pointing to the open door.
As I entered the commodious living room Doloria looked up, but did not smile. She was reclining on achaise-longue, beneath a shaded lamp whose rays still blended with the light of a dying afterglow. Her hunting costume had been discarded for a flimsy kind of an exquisite thing of blue—hardly a dress, although it had a lot of lace and seemed to fit her perfectly. It was open at the throat like some dresses, and the sleeves fell away from her arms; but I had seen one instinctive movement she made to pull it closer which might have indicated embarrassment.
"I've come with Monsieur's permission," I said, bowing over her hand.
"With Monsieur's permission," she repeated after me. "We seem to do nothing but with Monsieur's permission."
I saw that she was nervous and very much upset, so replied as gently as I could:
"But this visit involved my promise, otherwise I wouldn't have asked him. I want to tell you that it's all right about the yacht—your sending for her, I mean. She'll be on hand to-morrow."
"Thanks, Chancellor." Her tone had changed to one of complete weariness. "Now leave me, please."
"Leave you," I exclaimed. "I'll do nothing of thekind! The two-day ban is off, and Monsieur has told me I can say anything I please!"
"And having his permission to say anything you please, did you rehearse it before him, too?"
This left me helpless, fervently wishing I'd had more of Tommy's experience with girls' moods. He knew a lot about them, and would have understood just what to do. But I felt suddenly enraged—not at her, but at everything, and cried:
"I don't give a damn for him or his permission! He shan't take you away!"
For the first time she smiled, and held out her hands to me, saying:
"That's good-medicine-talk, Jack. I like it even if it won't cure me. Say it again—that you don't give a damn for him!"
I would have said something in an entirely different way had not Echochee been moving about the next room, but I kneeled, leaning over her, keeping her hand and whispering:
"He shan't dominate our lives! You're going back with me—don't you know you are?"
"Don't make me sorry you came, Jack," she said softly. "I must go with him. So let's talk of other things and keep our last evening here from being a horror."
"I've got to talk about it, as I've got to breathe and think and move and love you! It's all one! It's my existence, and if you went away it would be like tearing me to pieces!"
"Oh, but don't you see that I must," she cried despairingly. "I didn't close my eyes all night, thinking, thinking, thinking! It was agony. It's agonynow. But my decision's been through the fire, Jack, and I know I'm right!"
"No decision counts for anything against all you mean to me!"
"Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry!" she moaned, looking at me without dissimulation and letting me see that her face was marked by a solemnity and tragedy that wrung my heart. "God," she whispered, putting her hand to my forehead, "how I suffer while I see your tortured eyes!"
"Then out of sorrow, pity, tell me what the fellow said," I implored, nearly beside myself. "Let me know the strength of your duty, so my own strength can have a chance. It isn't fair to make a beggar of me when I might be fighting for happiness! Let me see his weapons so I can strike back; then, if I lose, I'll lose standing up—and the future," I added, less impetuously, "isn't so gray to the man who loses standing up."
She had turned away with a quick gesture of anguish and seemed to be crying, but when she looked at me again there were no signs of tears.
"He says others have demands and rights, and the many must outweigh the few."
"That depends on the greatness of each side's claims," I began, when she interrupted by continuing:
"My conscience decided that—it had no choice; every claim has been weighed—accurately." Her voice trembled a little, and I thought she was trying to make it harsh. "He said that you and I were thrown out from separate spheres, opposite poles. By chance our orbits happened to cross, and you rendered me this tremendous service. But it was only a part of the foreordination—only to make my path easier to a greater duty ahead, a greater destiny to be fulfilled. Now this commands—he says. The call of my birthright has come, and Imust answer. He says that neither of us will mind it in a little while, as memories pa—pass." She wavered at last, and again turned away her face.
"But you don't believe that stuff?" I cried.
"Oh, his words are so unanswerable—when he speaks them! Then he has the authority to command me!"
"They're not unanswerable," I said hotly. "Youhaven't weighed our happiness against this unknown voice of your people, your birthright—he did it for you! His cold logic read the scales—not your heart or your conscience! He's built a wall around you like a cistern, and you can't see out. If it was ordained for us to face death, then by the same law we've got to face life! Sweetheart, don't you see what I mean?"
"I've seen all that from the beginning, dear," she murmured, putting one hand on my hair and stroking it. "But nothing can prevail against what you call his cold logic. He's certain that he's right, and he has the power to make me go."
"Oh, if I only had the brains to out-argue him!" My voice choked, and I bowed my head in her lap.
For a while we were silent. Her hand continued to stroke my hair, and soon her fingers strayed to my temple and gently pressed it—as if she knew that my head burned and ached, and wanted to make it well.
"You don't have to argue, always my own," I heard her whisper. "There's something stronger than words pleading for you."
I looked up quietly, saying:
"Let's run away to-night! Let's have another rescue, and go back to our Oasis——" But she stopped me by putting her hand over my mouth, although she was breathing fast and the color had flown to her cheeks.
"Don't, don't," she gasped. "I've thought of that so many times!"
"To-night," I begged. "You know I'll always make you happy?"
"Happy?" Her eyes, half closed, held mine with a look that did not try to hide its longing. "There'd be no happiness on earth like that of being entirely yours at our Oasis!"
"Then, sweetheart——"
"No, Jack," she now sat straighter. "I was dreaming. Besides, he'd follow with every officer in Florida. Don't you understand, dear, that he has theright? I'm helpless to refuse! I can't—possibly! It's simply awful, but it's got to be."
Yet I believed that she had been on the point of yielding, and was about to urge still further when Monsieur's voice, speaking to Echochee, brought me to my feet.
"Well, my boy Jack," he exclaimed, entering with a cheeriness I found detestable, "we shall leave her now, eh? She has packing to do, and must get early to rest."
His protectorate seemed to brook no opposition, and an angry retort sprang to my lips which remained unspoken when I saw the pallor of Doloria's face.
"Yes," she said, without animation, "I must pack. See you to-morrow—on the march."
So, ignoring him, I passed out. But a better humor came to me as I thought of Tommy's scheme about theOrchid, and coming upon Echochee at the landing I asked—lightly for her benefit, yet quite seriously for myself:
"Is there any magic in your tribe that can bring a troubled princess sleep and pleasant dreams?"
I knew that she was searching my face with her blacklittle eyes that glistened like a snake's, as she answered slowly:
"Injun maiden find plenty good dream when her head lay on breast of sleeping brave."
"I didn't mean just that," I stammered, feeling my cheeks grow hot. For, albeit, Doloria had slept part of a night with her head against my shoulder when we fared alone in the purity of our wilderness, now, since others of the world were touching elbows with us, Echochee's words knocked me rather into a self-conscious heap. But such is the bitter tithe we must toss into the maw of civilization which, despite its multitude of admitted blessings, breeds also the false! And I stepped into the punt wishing that this daughter of our oldest American family could be divinely appointed arbiter of our customs.
Smilax returned with word that both yachts would be at Little Cove, and one by one the lights in our camp went out. But I sat late at Efaw Kotee's desk writing a ten-page telegram and a fifty-page letter to my father. Both of these I would despatch from Key West—the wire telling him to bring the Mater to Miami where the letter would await them; and I urged them both, as they loved me, to pick up a certain darling of the gods named Nell. Only I made it stronger and more explicit than that, and knew they would comply if such a thing were humanly possible. But this pet scheme I intended to keep from Tommy. It would repay him for his masterly scheme of sailing both yachts homeward.
The next morning after an early breakfast our cavalcade set forth, each man carrying a pack except the two sailors on whose shoulders rested the poles of Doloria's chair. But in this chair sat a very sad littleprincess—this morning particularly, as she was leaving a nominal home for a new and mystifying adventure. Whatever else Efaw Kotee had been to her, at least he stood in her memory of father; and however irrevocably she may have turned against him, the very fact that she found it necessary to do so was a grievous disappointment.
All that had passed. Strangers had come, and in a few days she was being borne to the other half of the world. To her mother!—what did she know of a mother? To a throne!—but with an unknown prince to rule beside her? And these were entirely apart from the longings she might leave on this side of the world. Surely, if she needed sympathy at any time it was now as the march began.
Although Monsieur had taken a position close to her, and evidently meant to keep it, before we had gone very far I fell in alongside with them, asking:
"How do you find the march? Tiring?"
"Oh, no, not in Tommy's flying throne, as he calls it,"—and in an undertone she added: "I wish it were the only throne I had to occupy."
But the professor, overhearing this—for little escaped him now—cleared his throat and stepped nearer.
"She is mistaken, my boy Jack," he said suavely. "The march is quite fatiguing, and I must insist that she conserve her strength. There will be no more conversation."
Taken aback by this, I was on the point of giving him a jolly good blowing up, but her ready acquiescence caused me to desist. Really, I began to wonder if he had her hypnotized; and, furious—indeed, quite a good deal hurt—by the cool way she obeyed him and began to ignore me, I marched grimly ahead.
As, three hours later, we neared the cove I saw Tommy sauntering back. His manner seemed an augury of trouble, and I hurried on to him, asking:
"What's happened?"
"TheOrchidisn't there," he turned and fell into step with me. "While getting her out of Big Cove she fouled on a bar. She's still on it, poor dear. So Monsieur sails with us, after all."
For several minutes I stood still in my tracks and swore, stopping only when Doloria's chair came in sight.
"I'm glad you got that out of your system," Tommy grinned. "Now get busy on a new line of attack. We've only three more days, and you'll have to work fast. Surprise her, upset her, then cinch her before she knows what's what. That's the way!" And he hurried back to pay his respects.
The mate and his fellows, even to Pete the cook, escorted us happily down to the small boats. They were honestly glad, and made no pretense of disguising their admiration for Doloria, to the increasing wrath of Echochee.
If ever the men of my own boat crew were on their mettle it was when they sat with oars straight up while I helped her into the gig and took my place at her side—for this was an honor I could not yield to Monsieur, etiquette demanding that, when going aboard, the owner must be her personal escort. With a nod to them they snapped into stroke and we shot away, leaving the old fellow much disgruntled.
At the top of the gangway she hesitated in pretty wonderment before stepping on deck, for theWhimwas a smart craft and our sailors had not been idle these few days past.
"Everything's so unreal," she murmured. "My house of cards has come tumbling down about my ears, until I think it must be a dreadful dream."
"To be transported to a sure-enough throne is certainly dreamlike," I said, arranging the cushions in a chair. "But I hardly think you'll find anything dreadful about it."
"You don't?" she asked pointedly.
"No," I answered. "The dreadful part's for me."
I knew this was not true, or only partially true, but considered it justifiable after Tommy's warning—and Tommy knew a lot about women. I remembered him saying once that a girl's determination could be changed in two ways: by opposition, and by coöperation. I had tried opposition, so now I would pretend to fall resignedly in with Monsieur's plan, taking it for granted that her future promised nothing but idyllic happiness, that memories would pass, and all that kind of thing. I would become an enigma to her—for this, also, had been one of Tommy's diverse methods of success. Some day, confessing how my triumph had been achieved, we both would laugh over it, and then she would have to admit that Tommy was not the only one who knew a thing or two about women.
So reasoning, I started in at once. For a while she stared at me, her eyes growing wider and wider. Then she arose and went to the rail, remarking coolly:
"Please signal to have Echochee and Monsieur Dragot brought out at once." And that was the only thing she would say.